One for courage One for s.p.u.n.k One to take aim And then--_KERPLUNK!_

Those magic words were intended, especially, for use in despatching tomatoes and they never failed to make good. There, upon the bulletin board was a vivid area which looked like the midday sun. From it trickled an oozy ma.s.s, down over the list of uncalled for letters, straight through the prize awards of yesterday, obliterating the _Council Call_, and bathing the list of new arrivals in soft and pulpy red. The "hike for to-morrow," as shown, was through a crimson sea.

Hervey approached for a closer glimpse of his triumph. No other incentive would have taken him so close to that prosy bulletin board. He had vaulted over it but never read it. But now in the moment of supreme victory he limped forward, like an elated artist, to inspect his work.

There, in front of him, with a little red river flowing down across the middle of it, was the ominous sentence.

Hervey Willetts will report _immediately_ to his scoutmaster at troop's cabin upon his return to camp.

WM. C. DENNY.

CHAPTER XIX

HERVEY SHOWS HIS COLORS

"_If_ I hadn't fired the tomato I wouldn't have known about that," said Hervey. Which fact, to him, fully justified the juicy bombardment. "That shows how you never can tell what's going to happen next." And this was certainly true of Hervey.

But to do him justice, what was going to happen next never worried him.

He took things as they came. He was not the one to sidestep an issue.

The ominous notice signed by his scoutmaster had the effect of directing his ambling course to that officer's presence, on which detour, he might encounter new adventures. To reach his troop's cabin he would have to pa.s.s the cooking shack where a doughnut might be speared with a stick.

All was for the best. He would as lief go to troop cabin as anywhere else....

In this blithe and carefree spirit, he approached the rustic domicile which he seldom honored by his presence, singing one of those s.n.a.t.c.hes of a song which were the delight of camp, and which rounded out his role of wandering minstrel:

Oh, there is no place like the old camp-fire, As all the boy scouts know; And the best little place is home, sweet home-- When there isn't any other place to go, go, go.

When there isn't any other place to go.

Mr. Denny, standing in the doorway of the cabin, contemplated him with a repressed smile. "Hervey," he could not help saying, "since you think so well of the camp-fire, I wonder you don't choose to see more of it."

"I can see it from all the way across the lake," said Hervey. "I can see it no matter where I go."

"I see. It must arouse fond thoughts. I'm afraid, Hervey, to quote your own song, there isn't any other place for you to go but home, sweet home. You seem to have exhausted all the places. Sit down, Hervey, you and I have got to have a little talk."

Hervey leaned against the cabin, Mr. Denny sat upon the door sill. None of the troop was about; it was very quiet. For half a minute or so Mr.

Denny did not speak, only whittled a stick.

"I sometimes wonder why you joined the scouts, Hervey," he said. "Your disposition----"

"A fellow that sat next to me in school dared me to," said Hervey.

"Oh, it was a sort of a wager?"

"I wouldn't take a dare from anybody."

"And so you joined as a stunt?"

"I heard that scouts jumped off cliffs and all like that."

"I see. Well, now, Hervey, I've written to your father that I'm sending you home."

Hervey began making rings in the soil with his stick but said nothing.

Mr. Denny's last words were perhaps a little more than he expected, but he gave no other hint of his feelings.

And so for another minute or so there was silence, except for the distant voices of some scouts out upon the lake.

"It is not exactly as a punishment, Hervey; it is just that I can't take the responsibility, that's all. You see?"

"Y---- yes, sir."

"I thought you would. Your father thought the influence of camp would be good, but you see you are seldom at camp. We can't help you because we can't find you."

"You can't cook a fish till you catch it," said Hervey.

"That's just it, Hervey."

"If you don't want to leave any tracks the best thing is to swing into trees every now and then," Hervey informed him.

"Ah, I see. Now, Hervey, my boy, I'm anxious that you and I should understand each other. You have done nothing disgraceful and I don't think you ever will----"

"I landed plunk on my head once."

"Well, that was more of a misfortune than a disgrace."

"It hurt like the d.i.c.kens."

"I suppose it did."

Mr. Denny paused; he was up against the hardest job he had ever tackled.

It was harder than he had thought it would be.

"You see, Hervey, how it is. Last week you stayed away over night at some farm. I had told you you must not leave camp without my knowledge.

For that I had you stay here all day, making a birchbark basket. I thought that was a good punishment."

"I'll tell the world it was," said Hervey.

Mr. Denny paused before proceeding.

"Did it do any good? Not a bit."

"The basket was a punk one," said Hervey.

"Again you rode down as far as Barretstown, hitching onto a freight train."

"I'd have got all the way down to Jonesville, if it hadn't been for the conductor. He was some old grouch, believe _me_."

"Then we had a little talk--you remember. You promised to be here at meal times. Look at Mr. Ellsworth's troop, Harris, Blakeley and those boys. Always on hand for meals----"