The Boy Scouts' Mountain Camp

CHAPTER XIX

THE FOREST MONARCH

“Say, what’s that up yonder – there, away toward the head of the lake?”

Tubby, standing on a rock by the rim of the lake where he had just been performing his morning’s ablutions, pointed excitedly.

“I can’t see a thing but the wraiths of mist,” rejoined Merritt, who was beside him. The lads were stripped to the waist. Their skin looked pink and healthy in the early morning light.

“Well, you ought to consult an oculist,” scornfully rejoined Tubby, “you’ve got fine eyes for a Boy Scout – not.”

“Do you mean to tell me you saw something, actually?”

“Of course. You ought to know me better than to think I was fooling.”

“What were they then – mud hens?”

“Say, you’re a mud rooster. No, what I saw looked to me uncommonly like our missing canoes.”

“You don’t say so,” half mockingly.

“But I do say so, – and most emphatically, too, as Professor Jorum says,” rejoined the stout youth, “there they’ve gone now. That morning mist’s swallowed ’em up just like I mean to swallow breakfast directly.”

“But what would the canoes be doing drifting about?” objected Merritt. “From Rob’s story yesterday, Hunt and his gang had them in that cove. Do you suppose they’d have let them get away?”

“Maybe not, willingly,” rejoined Tubby sagely, who, as our readers may have observed, was a shrewd thinker, “but it blew pretty hard last night. The canoes may have broken loose from their moorings.”

“Jimminy! That’s so,” exclaimed Merritt, “I’ll go and tell – ”

“No, you won’t do anything of the kind,” said Tubby, half in and half out of his Boy Scout shirt.

“Why not?”

“Because if they did turn out to be mud hens we’d never hear the last of it.”

“H’um that’s so. What do you advise, then?”

“We’ll wait till after breakfast. Then we’ll say we’re going to take a tramp and sneak off toward the head of the lake. If they are the canoes they’ll still be there.”

“And if not – ”

“We’ll have had a tramp.”

“Say,” exclaimed Merritt as a sudden idea struck him, “how do you propose to get them, even if they do turn out to be the canoes. Stand on the bank and call ‘come, ducky! ducky!’”

Tubby looked at his corporal with unmixed scorn.

“We can swim, can’t we?”

“I see you have every objection covered, like a good Scout, Tubby. Well, we’ll try after breakfast. If they’re not the canoes there’s no harm done, anyhow.”

“Except to our shoe leather,” responded Tubby finishing dressing.

The morning meal over, and Jumbo washing the tin plates in silence – he was still regretting that five hundred dollars – the two lads, in accordance with their plan, got ready for their tramp.

They buckled on their belts, saw that their shoe-laces were stout and well laced, and equipped themselves with two scout staves. It was against the rules to carry firearms unless the major or one of the leaders was along. No objection was interposed to their going. In fact, the major, worried as he was over the vanished canoes, was rather glad to have an opportunity for a quiet talk with the professor. Rob was still rather fagged by his experiences of the preceding night and day, and Hiram and Andy Bowles had decided to indulge in signal practice.

“Well, good-bye,” called the major as the young Scouts strode off.

“Bring back the canoes with you,” mockingly hailed Rob.

“Sure. We’ll look in all the tree tops. I’m told they roost there with the gondolas,” cried the irrepressible Tubby, with a wave of his hand.

The next instant the two adventurers had vanished over the ridge.

“Say, what a laugh we’ll have on them if we really do bring the canoes back,” chuckled Tubby merrily, as they plodded along.

Distances in the mountains are deceptive. From the camp it had not looked so very far to the head of the lake. But the two lads found that, what with the innumerable ridges they had to cross, and the rough nature of the ground before them, it was considerably more of a tramp than they had bargained for.

Of the canoes too, there was no sign. The mists had now vanished and the sun beat down on the smooth surface of the lake as if it had been a polished mirror.

“Maybe they’ve drifted ashore,” said Tubby, hopefully.

“If they have I’ll bet they chose the other one,” said Merritt, “it’s what they used to call at school ‘the perversity of inanimate things.’”

“Phew!” exclaimed Tubby, “don’t spring any more like that. I didn’t bring a dictionary.”

It was about noon when they came to a halt in a ravine near the lake shore and sat down on a log to rest.

“Gee, I wish we had something to eat,” groaned Merritt.

“Ever hear of a fairy godmother?” inquired Tubby, gazing abstractedly up through the tree tops.

“Well, if you aren’t the limit, Tubby. What on earth have fairy godmothers to do – ”

“They were always on the job with what was most wanted, I believe,” pursued Tubby.

“Oh, don’t talk rot. Let’s – Gee whiz! I’ll take it all back, Tubby. You are a real, genuine, blown-in-the-glass fairy godmother.”

Merritt’s exclamation was called forth by the fact that Tubby had produced, with the air of a necromancer, two packets of sandwiches and ditto of cake.

“There’s water in that spring, I guess,” he said laconically ignoring Merritt’s open compliments.

The two lads munched away contentedly. They were seated at the head of the little ravine which ran back from the shore of the lake. Above them towered a rocky cliff from which flowed the spring. Ferns of a brilliant green and almost tropical luxuriance festooned its edges. The water made a musical tinkling sound. It was a pleasant spot, and both boys enjoyed it to the full. They would have appreciated it more though, if they could have stumbled across the canoes which Tubby was beginning to believe were a figment of his imagination.

“Wonder if there were ever Indians through here?” said Merritt, after a period of thought.

“Guess so. They used to navigate most of these lakes,” said Tubby, stuffing some remaining crumbs of cake into his mouth.

“Why?” he added, staring at Merritt, with puffed out cheeks.

“I was just thinking that if we were early settlers and an Indian suddenly appeared in the opening of this canyon or ravine or whatever you like to call it, that we’d be in a bad way.”

“Yes, we couldn’t get out. That’s certain,” said Tubby, looking around, “I guess the red men would bury the hatchet – in our heads.”

“I’m glad those days are gone,” said Merritt, “I should think that the early settlers must have – Hark! What’s that?”

A sudden crunching sound, as if someone was leisurely approaching had struck on his ear.

“Sounds like somebody coming,” rejoined Tubby.

His heart began to beat a little faster than was comfortable. What if some of the Hunt gang were prowling about.

“What do you think it is?” he asked, the next moment, in rather a quavering tone.

“Jiggered if I know,” said Merritt; “let’s go toward the beach and investigate.”

“Better do that than stay here,” agreed Tubby.

Picking up their scout staves both boys cautiously tip-toed toward the mouth of the ravine. But before they could reach it a sudden shadow fell across the white strip of sand at the outlet.

The next moment a huge body came into view. Its great bulk loomed up enormously to the eyes of the excited boys.

“It’s a big deer!” exclaimed Tubby; “what a beauty! Look at those horns!”

The deer, a fine antlered beast that was moving leisurely along the beach, looked up at the same instant. It gazed straight at the boys for a moment. Then it began pawing the ground angrily, and tossing its head.

“What can be the matter with it?” said Merritt in a whisper.

“Bothered if I know,” rejoined Tubby, “it looks kind of mad, doesn’t it? Maybe we’d better try to climb up that cliff.”

“I think so, too,” said Merritt, as the stag buck lowered its head and its big eyes became filled with an angry fire.

“Quick, Tubby!” he cried the next instant, “it’s going to charge!”

Hardly had he voiced the warning before, with a furious half-bellow, half-snort, the buck rushed at them at top speed, its antlers lowered menacingly.

CHAPTER XX

THE CANOES FOUND

Merritt made a spring up the side of the steep-walled little ravine. He succeeded in grabbing an outgrowing bush and drawing himself up to a ledge about ten feet above the ground. Tubby followed him. But the fat boy’s weight proved too much for the slender roots of the plant. It ripped out of the cleft in which it grew, and Tubby, with a frightened cry, went rolling over and over down the steep acclivity. He fell right in the path of the advancing stag. The creature saw him and prepared to gore him with its horns. But just as Tubby was giving himself up for lost, an inspiration seized Merritt.

A big stone lay close at hand. He grabbed it up and hurled it with all his might at the buck. The lad’s experience on the baseball diamond stood him in good stead at this trying moment.

The rock, with all the power of Merritt’s healthy young muscles behind it, struck the buck between the eyes. The animal staggered and snorted. For one critical instant it hesitated, its sharp forefeet almost on the recumbent fat boy. Then, with a shrill sort of whinny of terror, it swung, as swiftly and gracefully as a cat, and clattered off, running at top speed.

Merritt lost no time in clambering down to Tubby, who was sitting up and looking about him in a comical dazed way.

“H-h-h-has it gog-g-g-gone?” he stammered.

“I should say so,” laughed Merritt, “it stood not on the order of its going, but – got! as they say in the classics.”

“I’m glad of that,” remarked Tubby, getting up slowly, “I could almost feel those antlers investigating my anatomy. Let’s see how far he’s run.”

The two boys made for the entrance of the ravine. Gaining it they had a good view up and down the beach in either direction. On a distant projection of rock stood the buck. He was looking back. As he saw the boys he wheeled abruptly and dashed into the forest.

“Too bad,” said Tubby shaking his head with a serious air.

“What’s too bad?” asked Merritt, struck by the other’s pensive air.

“Why, if he’d stood still a little longer and we’d had a gun we might have shot him,” rejoined Tubby with a perfectly serious face.

They turned, and as they did so a shout burst from the lips of both.

Bobbing about serenely on the placid water, not half a mile in the other direction, was the red canoe.

“I’ll bet the others are ashore right there, too,” cried Tubby.

As he spoke the stout boy dashed off at surprising speed for one of his build. It was all Merritt could do to keep up with him.

It was as Tubby had suspected. The blue and the green canoes lay on the beach, their bows just resting on the sand. The paddles were in them and it was an easy task to embark and capture the red craft. This was made fast to the one Tubby paddled and the boys, congratulating each other warmly, set out for the camp. As they glided along Tubby uplifted his voice.

“But it isn’t rowing, it’s paddling,” objected Merritt.

“Whoever heard of a rhyme to paddling?” demanded Tubby, “you might as well expect one to motor boating,” and he resumed his song.

As they drew near to the spot where the camp had been pitched they saw the black figure of Jumbo on the beach. Tubby hailed him in a loud voice. Instantly the negro looked up, and as his eyes fell on the canoes he tossed the frying pan he was scouring high into the air. It descended on his head again with a resounding whack.

But that African head seemed hardly to feel it. Bounding and snapping his fingers in joy, Jumbo raced up to the camp, electrifying everybody with the glad news that the canoes had been found.

“How on earth did you discover them, boys?” demanded the major, as the prows grated on the beach and a glad rush of excited feet followed.

“Simple,” said Tubby, with a grand air and a sweep of his hands, “simple. They were up in a tree, just as I suspected.”

Before long Merritt had to tell the real story. But when they looked about for Tubby to congratulate him that modest youth had slipped away. He was found later, devouring a raisin pie of Jumbo’s baking.

“You deserve pie and anything else you fancy,” said the major warmly.

“There’s only one thing I’d fancy right now,” rejoined Tubby.

“What is that?”

“I’d like to have hold of Freeman Hunt for about ten minutes.”

An examination of the canoes showed that, as Tubby had guessed, their mooring ropes had chafed through during the wind storm of the night before. This set them wondering how Hunt and his companions could have escaped from the cove. The next day on resuming their journey they examined the place – the entrance to which was not found without difficulty – but of Hunt and his gang no trace was found but the embers of the camp fire. Rob and Jumbo viewed with interest the rope ladder which lay in a heap at the foot of the cliff, just as it had fallen on the night that they made their escape. Further investigation showed that, by walking along the lake shore, the rascals who had harried the Boy Scouts must have managed to find a place to climb up to the forests above.

“I’m sorry they got away,” said Merritt.

“So are we all, I expect,” said the professor. “I don’t suppose we shall ever see them again now.”

“I hardly think so,” agreed the major.

“Dere’s only one man ah’d lak ter see ag’in,” put in Jumbo.

“Who is that?” inquired Rob.

“Dat five hundred dollah baby wid de black whiskers,” was the prompt rejoinder; “de nex’ time ah gits mah han’s on him ah’m gwine ter fin’ de bigges’ chain ah can, den ah’m gwine ter fasten dat to de bigges’ rock ah kin fin’ an’ den ah’s gwine ter k’lect!”

“I hope for your sake and for that of law and order that you succeed,” said the major, “liquor is vile stuff, anyhow. It’s bad enough that it is made legally in this country. It is ten thousand times worse when laws are broken to distil it. I’m afraid, however, that all the rascals have slipped through our fingers. We shall hardly set eyes on them again.”

How wrong the major was in this supposition we shall see before long. Such men as Stonington Hunt and his chosen companions are not so easily thrown off the trail for a rich prize. The thought of the treasure was in Hunt’s avaricious mind day and night, and already he was plotting fresh means of wresting the secret from its rightful possessors.

Possibly, if the major had seen an encounter which took place in the woods not so many hours before our party landed in the hidden cove, he might have felt less easy in his mind. Black Bart, in his flight, had encountered Hunt’s party. Creeping through the woods he had seen the light of their camp fire. He had approached it cautiously. But as he neared it, keeping in careful concealment, he recognized his erstwhile comrades, Dale and Pete Bumpus. Hesitating no longer to declare himself in his half-famished condition, he had come forward and been greeted warmly. What he had to tell of his meeting with Rob and Jumbo, held, as may be imagined, the deepest interest for Hunt and the others. The consultation and plan of campaign that resulted therefrom, were fraught with important results for our party.

What these were we must save for the telling in future chapters. But stirring events were about to overtake the Boy Scouts and their friends.

CHAPTER XXI

“THE RUBY GLOW.”

Camp, that night, was made at the portage of which the major had spoken. Although strict watch was kept all night nothing unusual occurred. Bright and early the work of the portage was commenced. The Major, Jumbo and Professor Jorum, each burdened themselves with a canoe, which they carried across their shoulders, turned bottom up and resting on a wooden “yoke.”

The lads carried the “duffle” and provisions. The portage, connecting the lake they had traversed with the one beyond, was over rough ground. In fact, at one place, they had to clamber up quite a ridge. It was rocky and grown with coarse undergrowth interspersed with scanty trees. Further on the trail ran beside quite a deep ravine.

Tubby, with his load of duffle, was slightly in advance of the other lads, and humming a song as he trudged along. With the curiosity natural to the stout youth, he could not refrain from wandering from the path to peer over into the depths of the gulch.

“My goodness!” he exclaimed to himself, as he gazed interestedly, “it would be no joke to fall in there.”

As he spoke he drew closer to the edge of the rift and craned his short neck to obtain a still better view of the abyss below him. At this juncture the others, laboring along the trail, caught up with him, and Rob gave the stout Scout a hail.

“Better come away from there, Tubby,” he warned, “you know what happened out west, when you went rubbering about the haunted caves.”

“It’s all right,” retorted the fat boy, “it looks nice and cool down in there. I’d like to – ”

The rest of his speech was lost in an alarmed exclamation from the onlookers.

As Tubby uttered his confident remark he seemed to vanish suddenly, like an actor in a stage spectacle who has dived through a trap door. Only a cloud of dust and a roar of stones sliding into the ravine told of what had happened to the over-confident youth. Standing too close to the edge he had stepped on an overhanging bit of ground and had been precipitated downward.

“Good gracious!” cried Rob, in real alarm, “he’s gone over!”

With a swift fear that Tubby’s accident might have resulted fatally, Rob was at the edge of the ravine in two jumps. The rest were not far behind him.

Rob experienced a feeling of intense relief, however, as he gazed into the depths. Some time before, a tree had become dislodged and slid into the rift. It lay upon the bottom of the place. Tubby, luckily for himself, had fallen into its branches and was, except for a few scratches, apparently unhurt.

“Are you injured?” demanded Rob, anxiously, nevertheless. He wanted to hear from Tubby’s own lips that he was all right.

“Nothing hurt but my feelings,” the stout youth assured him. “Say, it is cool down here.”

“Well, if nothing’s hurt but your feelings you’re all right,” cried Merritt; “you couldn’t hurt those with an axe.”

“Just you wait till I get out of here,” yelled Tubby from his leafy seat.

“Well, how are we going to get you up?” demanded Merritt. “Guess you’ll have to stay there till we get a ladder.”

“Tell you what we’ll do,” said Rob, “we’ll take the ropes off the packs and join them together. Then we can knot one end to one of the staves and haul Tubby up.”

“That’s a good idea,” called the stout youth, who had overheard, “and hurry up, too.”

“Gracious, it needs an elephant to haul your fat carcass out of there,” scoffed Merritt. “I guess we’ll take our time over it.”

“Take as long as you like, so long as you get me out,” parried Tubby, “you always were slow, anyhow, as the fellow said when he threw his dollar watch into the creek.”

It did not take long to rig up an extemporized life-line with the pack ropes. This done, one end was made fast to the staves, and the other lowered to Tubby. At Rob’s orders the rope was passed round a tree trunk, and when Tubby had adjusted the rope under his arm pits the young Scouts began to haul. As Merritt had said, Tubby was no lightweight. Once they had to stop, and the rope ran back quite a way. A yell from Tubby ensued.

“Hey! Keep on hauling there!” he roared, “what do you think I am, a sack of potatoes?”

“You feel like a sack of sash weights!” shouted Rob, “keep still now, and we’ll have you out in a jiffy.”

A few minutes later Tubby’s fat face, very red, appeared above the edge of the rift over which he had taken his abrupt plunge. Rob seized him by the shoulders and dragged him into safety.

“There now, for goodness sake don’t fall in again,” he said.

“As if you aren’t always telling me to fall in,” scoffed Tubby.

“When, pray?”

“Every time we drill,” said the stout youth solemnly, flicking some dust off his uniform with elaborate care.

Owing to the length of time occupied by extricating Tubby from his difficulties, the canoe bearers had become apprehensive of harm to the following body and had halted. Of course questions ensued when the rear guard came up.

“What happened?” demanded the major, noting the suppressed amusement on the lads’ faces.

“Oh, Tubby fell in again,” answered Merritt.

“Fell in?” asked the professor in an astonished tone.

“I went hunting for botanical specimens at the bottom of a ravine, professor,” said Tubby gravely.

“For botanical specimens? Most interesting. Pray did you find any?”

“Nothing but a Bumpibus Immenseibus,” replied Tubby with perfect gravity. The other boys had to turn aside and stuff their fists in their mouths to keep from laughing outright.

Even the major’s lip quivered. But the professor displayed immense interest. As for Jumbo, he was lost in admiration.

“Dat suttinly am de mos’ persuasive word I’ve done hearn in a long time,” he exclaimed. “Blumpibusibus Commenceibus. What am dat, fish, flesh or des corned beef?”

“It’s a pain,” rejoined Tubby, “and usually follows a fall. But not a fall in temperature, or – ”