'I know it all right,' replied Chippy. 'There ain't no 'ouse nor anythin' for miles of it.'

'Not nowadays?' cried Albert.

'Yus!' returned Chippy. 'It's just as quiet as it used to be.'

'Could a boat from a ship in the river go up it?' asked Albert.

'Oh, easy!' replied Chippy; and, in response to the other's request, he gave clear directions for finding the spot.

'I'll 'ave a look at it,' said the lodger. 'I like a good long walk. The doctor told me as that was the best thing for me. So I got a good strong pair o' trotter-cases, an' I tramp out wet an' dry.'

He raised one of his heavy boots for a moment, and let it fall.

'Got it,' said the pleased scout to himself, but gave no sign of his discovery. The heavy iron tips on Albert's heels were screwed on instead of nailed on, and the groove in the head of each screw had left a small but distinct ridge in the earth at each point where the screws came in the heel.

It was only practice, but Chippy was as keen in practice as he was when chasing the thievish tramp for the lost basket. He had mastered the idea that it will not do to be keen by fits and starts: you must be on the spot all the time. So he took away from Locking that afternoon one fact which he had discovered about his grandmother's lodger—the boots from a London hotel—that the tips on his heels were screwed on, whereas the common method is nailing.



CHAPTER XII

DICK AND CHIPPY MEET A SERGEANT—THE QUEER TRAIL—A STRANGE DISCOVERY

The Monday week after Chippy's visit to Locking was Easter Monday and a general holiday. The Wolves and the Ravens made it a grand field-day, and they were on the heath by nine o'clock, each with a day's food in pocket or haversack, and a grand scouting-run ahead—a run which had been planned from point to point by Mr. Elliott, who accompanied them. The patrols had by now worked together several times, and had become brothers in arms.

The old foolish feuds between them were completely forgotten, and when Dick and his friends crossed Quay Flat the wharf-rats would now swarm out, not with sticks for a 'slug,' but with salutes and eager inquiries as to progress in this or that game dear to the hearts of Boy Scouts.

But it is not with this Easter-Monday scouting-run of the combined patrols that we are about to deal. We shall go straight away to the hour of three o'clock on that afternoon, when a very memorable and exciting experience for the two patrol-leaders began to unfold itself.

Mr. Elliott had set his band of scouts the hardest task of the day. He himself had put on the irons, and was laying the track. He had warned them that it would be a tough test—something to really try them—and so it proved. If they failed to run him down, they were all to meet at a little railway-station about two miles away, from which they would go back to Bardon by rail. They were already a good eight miles from home, for they had marched right across to an unknown part of the heath to carry out their manoeuvres.

At one point, where Mr. Elliott's track seemed to have vanished into the very earth, Dick took a long cast away to the right by himself. As he moved slowly forward he heard a rustle of bushes, and looked up and saw Chippy trotting to join him.

'He's done us one this time!' said Chippy, grinning; 'I'm blest if I can 'it the trail anywheer!'

'It's jolly hard to find any sign,' answered Dick; 'but he told us it was to be a stiff thing, and if we can't get hold of it we shall have to head for the station, that's all. But we'll have a good go at it. What about a cast round by that rabbit warren over there? The ground's half covered with soft soil the rabbits have thrown out of their holes. If he's gone that way the irons will leave a dead certain track.'

'Righto!' murmured the Raven leader, and they trotted across to the rabbit warren and began to search the heaps of sandy soil.

They were working along the foot of a bank with faces bent to the earth, when suddenly they were startled by a voice hailing them a few yards away.

'Hallo, there!' called someone.

The boys glanced up, and at once straightened themselves and came to the salute. A tall man in khaki and putties stood on the top of the bank looking at them, a revolver in the holster strapped at his side.

'And who may you be, and what do you want here?' he asked pleasantly, and returned the salute.

'We're Boy Scouts,' replied Dick, 'and our patrols are out for a big scouting-run over the heath.'

'Ah, yes! Boy Scouts—I've heard of you,' said the big man, still smiling at them. 'Well, I'm in the same line myself. But you can't come any further this way, mateys. You'll have to scout back, if you don't mind.'

'Why must we do that, sergeant?' asked Dick, who had noted the chevrons on the big man's sleeve, and understood them.

'Well,' said the good-natured soldier, 'it's like this: We've got a lot of big, bad convicts at work over there,' and he jerked his head behind him, 'and we keep 'em strictly to themselves, you see. They're bad company for anybody but the men as looks after 'em, so we keep this corner of the country clear of other people.'

'At that rate,' laughed Dick, 'the track we want isn't likely to be laid your way?'

'Not it,' said the sergeant, 'else I should ha' spotted it on my round. No, mateys, you can cut right back. Ta-ta!'

The boys gave him a farewell salute, and ran back towards the spot where they had left the rest of the patrol.

'That's a rum game, ain't it?' remarked Chippy—'a soldier a-walkin' round in a quiet place like that theer. Who's he a-tryin' to cop?'

'Perhaps watching to see that no convicts escape,' suggested Dick. 'You know, Chippy, they often try to cut and run if they see a chance.'

'Yus,' said the Raven. 'I've seed that in the papers. But wot do they want convicts for on the h'eth?'

'I know,' cried Dick—'I know. I heard my father talking about it at dinner the other day. It's the Horseshoe Fort at the mouth of the river. They're making it ever so much bigger and putting new guns there so as to be ready if ever some enemy should come to our country and try to sail up the river. The convicts are at work there, digging and building and doing all sorts of things.'

'I see,' nodded Chippy; 'that's 'ow they mek' 'em useful, I s'pose.'

'That's it,' said Dick, 'and that sergeant we saw was one of the men in charge of them.'

'He soon started us back,' murmured Chippy.

'Yes,' said Dick; 'I heard my father say that they are very strict about letting any stranger go near the place.'

'That was on'y gammon of his about them convicts,' remarked Chippy.

'Of course it was,' agreed Dick; 'he wouldn't let anyone go nearer the fort on any account.'

'How far are we off?' asked Chippy.

'I'll soon tell you!' replied Dick, and pulled his haversack round. From this he took out a small leathern case with a map tucked away in it. The map was a shilling section of the Ordnance Survey on the scale of one inch to a mile. Dick had bought it and carried it as patrol-leader. The space it covered—eighteen miles by twelve—was ample for their work.

Dick knelt down and spread the map on the ground; Chippy knelt beside him. Chippy had never seen such a map before, and his keen intelligence was soon deeply interested. His finger began to run along roads he knew, and to point out spots he had often visited.

'Why, wi' this,' he declared, 'ye could go anywhere if ye'd never seed the place afore. Look here, this is the road to Lockin', an', I'm blest! why, 'ere's my gra'mother's house, this little black dot, just off o' the road. An' 'ere's the Beacon, an' there's the san'pit!'

'Yes, it's a jolly good map,' said Dick, 'and very clear in the heath part, for there are few roads and few houses, and every one is put in. Now, where are we? Let's find the rail and the station. That will give us our bearings.'

The boys considered the map very carefully for a few moments; then Dick put his finger on a certain spot.

'That's just about where we are now,' he said, 'and I can prove it, I think.'

'I should just like to know 'ow ye do prove it,' said Chippy, to whom this map was a new and wonderful thing.

'Well,' said Dick, 'we know in a general way we're no very great distance from the Horseshoe, and here that is.' He placed his finger on the spot where the big redoubt was shown on the map. 'Then here's rising ground with trees on it, marked Woody Knap. Now, where's that?'

'Why, theer it is,' replied Chippy, pointing to a hill which rose above the heath at some distance. 'It must be that. There ain't no other hill wi' trees on it in all this part o' the h'eth.'

'And how far is it away from us?'

''Bout a mile.'

'Which way does it lie?'

Chippy considered the sun, and thought over the directions Mr. Elliott had given the scouts time and again.

'Right away north,' he answered.

'Very well, then,' said Dick. 'We're a mile to the south. And a mile on the heath is an inch on the map. Now, my thumb-nail is just half an inch—I've measured it; so twice my thumb-nail to the south of Woody Knap brings us to the spot where we are.'

'So it does,' cried Chippy, with enthusiasm. 'It's as plain as plain now ye put it that way. An' that's a proper dodge, to measure it off wi' yer thumb-nail.'

'Oh, uncle gave me that tip,' laughed Dick. 'It's very useful for measuring short distances on the map. When you want a rule, you generally find you've left it at home, but your thumb-nail is always on the spot.'

'Yus,' smiled Chippy; 'ye mostly bring it wi' yer. Now,' he went on, 'wot's the distance to the Fort?'

'To the Horseshoe?' said Dick, and began to measure. 'Barely a couple of miles,' he said. 'We're quite close. Isn't it lonely country all round it? There isn't another building for miles on this side of the river.'

The broad tidal river curved down the western side of the map, widening rapidly as it neared the sea. Its western bank was dotted with hamlets and villages and scattered farms, with roads and lanes winding in every direction; from the eastern bank the heath stretched away with scarce a road or house to be seen for a great distance.

'We must get on, Chippy,' said Dick, starting to fold up the map, 'or we shall get clean out of touch with the other fellows. We've been studying this thing quite a while.'

'Oh, we'll soon drop across 'em,' replied Chippy; 'they ain't found anythin', or they'd be a-hootin' like mad.'

He rose to his feet and strolled slowly forward, while Dick put the map-case back into the haversack. The latter was adjusted, and Dick was just rising in turn, when something moving caught his eye. Seventy yards away a rabbit flashed at full speed across an open strip of turf, and dived full into its burrow, and vanished with a flick of white scut.

'Down, Chippy!' hissed Dick; and the Raven fell flat on his face behind a gorse-bush, and Dick crouched lower and watched.

'Someone has disturbed that rabbit,' thought Dick, and he waited to discover who that someone was. Dick knew the ways of wild rabbits perfectly well. If a rabbit feels certain that no one is near, he ambles about in the most unconcerned fashion; but scent, sight, or sound of man, dog, or other enemy sends him to his hole at treble-quick speed.

Three minutes passed, and no one appeared. Four, five, and Dick began to think it was a stoat or weasel from which the rabbit had fled. Then he knew it was not; it was a man, for there was a movement in the clump of bushes from which the rabbit had darted, and Dick saw a tall figure moving very slowly. He waited for it to come into the open, but it did not. It bent down and disappeared.

'Why,' thought Dick, 'he's going to work just like a scout. Is he slipping off under cover of those low blackthorns?'

The boy watched the line of dwarf bushes, and was soon certain that the stranger was doing this. He caught a glimpse of the man's form through a thin patch, then lost it as the hidden figure crept on.

Dick dropped flat on the ground, and slid along to the spot where Chippy lay behind the gorse-bush, and told his companion what he had seen.

'Rum go, that!' murmured Chippy, who from his post had been unable to catch any glimpse of the stranger. 'Yer sure that it warn't Mr. Elliott!'

'Oh no; it wasn't my uncle!' whispered Dick. 'I didn't see the man clearly, but I should have known at once if it had been my uncle.'

'How about the sergeant?' said Chippy. 'P'raps he's come a-creepin' arter us, to be sure we've cleared off.'

'No; I'm sure it wasn't the sergeant,' replied Dick. 'The man had a cloth cap on, and the sergeant had a flat-topped soldier's cap.'

Suddenly Chippy's eyes became round and bright, and he turned a look full of meaning upon his companion.

'Wot about a convict?' he whispered.

'By Jingo!' murmured Dick. 'There may be something in that, Chippy! Has a convict escaped? Is he trying to steal across the heath to find somewhere to hide himself? Is that it?'

Chippy said nothing, but he gave a nod of deep meaning, and the two boys stared at each other.

'We must follow 'im up,' said Chippy at last. 'Track 'im down an' see wot it means.'

'Yes, we must,' agreed Dick. 'You see, Chippy, if he is an escaped convict, he may be a very dangerous character to be at large. I've heard of them attacking lonely places to get food and clothes to help them to escape.'

'I've heerd o' that, too,' said the leader of the Ravens; 'an' some o' the h'eth folk, they live in cottages all by theirselves.'

'Yes; and suppose such a man went to a place where there was no one at home but a woman, or a woman and children?' said Dick.

'Who knows wot 'e might do?' And Chippy shook his head. 'We're bound to lend a hand, then—Law 3, ye know.'

'Right you are, Chippy,' said Dick. 'Law 3. Come on!' And the two boy scouts, game as a pair of terriers, crept swiftly up to the clump of bushes from which the mysterious stranger had emerged.

From the bushes the track was easy to follow for some distance. There were no footmarks, but the ferns were brushed aside and some were broken, and these signs showed which way the man had gone. When the ferns were left behind, there was still a fair trail, for the heavy boots of the stranger had broken the grass, or scraped a little earth loose here and there along the slope of the ridge which led up to Woody Knap.

Suddenly the boys lost the trail. It disappeared on a strip of turf, and they slipped back at once to the last spot of which they could be sure—a soft patch of earth where hobnail marks were fresh and clear.

'Now we've got to separate and try to pick up the line,' said Dick softly. 'I'll work right, and you left; and we'll meet at that big thorn-bush right in front, if we've found nothing. If one of us hits on the track, he must call to the other.'

'Wait a bit,' said Chippy. 'Wot call? Our own calls 'ud sound odd, an' might give 'im the tip as somebody was arter 'im.'

'You're right,' said Dick; 'the wolf howl, at any rate, is no good here.'

'Let's 'ave a call for ourselves this time,' suggested Chippy. 'One as you might 'ear at any minute, an' never notice. How about the pewey?'

'First-rate!' said Dick. 'The pewey. There are plenty of them on the heath!'

Bardon boys always called the 'peewit' the 'pewey,' and every one of them could imitate its well-known call. Nothing more simple and natural could have been adopted as a signal.

Dick was working most carefully round his half of the circle, when the cry of the peewit rang out from the other side. Away shot Dick, quickly and quietly, and, as he ran, the call was repeated, and this guided him straight to the spot where Chippy was kneeling beside the mouth of a rabbit burrow. The rabbits had been at work making the burrow larger, and a trail of newly thrown out earth stretched three or four feet from the hole.

'Have you got the track?' breathed Dick eagerly.

'I've got summat,' replied Chippy; 'it looks pretty rum, too!'

Dick dropped beside his companion, and saw that a foot had been set fair and square in the trail of earth. But there was no sign of a nail to be seen; the track of the foot was smooth and flat, and outlined all the way from heel to toe.

'That's not a boot-mark,' said Dick.

'No, it ain't,' murmured Chippy. 'If you ask me, I should say it wor' stockin' feet.'

'But what should he pull his boots off for?' said Dick, knitting his brows. 'This is an awfully strange affair, Chippy.'

'Ain't it?' said the latter, his eyes glittering with all the excitement of the chase, and the pleasure of having found this queer mark. 'As far as I can mek' out, he wanted to step as soft as he could tread.'

'But why—why, in the middle of the heath, here?' went on Dick.

'I dunno yet,' said Chippy; 'let's get on a bit, an' see if we pick up summat else.'

Dick blew out a long breath. 'It's going to be jolly hard,' he murmured, 'to track a fellow in his stockings. We've got to keep our eyes open.'

Chippy nodded, and they went on slowly and warily. As it happened, Dick scored the next move in the game. Thirty yards from the rabbit burrow a heath track crossed the trail they were following. The weather had been very dry lately, until about twelve o'clock of the present day, when a heavy shower had fallen—a shower from which the scouts had sheltered in a hovel where the heath-folk store their turves.

This shower had wetted the dust of the track, and Dick at once saw clear, heavy footmarks, as if a man had quite lately walked along the path and gone on.

'Here's a perfectly fresh track,' said Dick; 'and this chap in his stockings has crossed it at this patch of grass where he has left no sign on the path.'

'Seems to me,' remarked Chippy, 'as 'im wot we're arter heerd this one a-comin',' and Chippy pointed to the firm new tracks; 'an' then he off wi' his boots to dodge along on the quiet.'

'I don't see anything else for it,' said Dick; 'and that would make it plainer than ever that he's up to no good.'

'Look theer!' snapped Chippy swiftly, and pointed.

Dick whirled round in time to see a man's head and shoulders appear over the bushes at a far bend of the way, and then vanish as the walker turned the corner. But both boys had recognised him. It was the sergeant with whom they had spoken.

Dick gave a long, low whistle. 'He was dodging the sergeant, Chippy!'

'It's a convict!' said Chippy. 'Can't be nuthin' else!'

For a moment the boys discussed the plan of running after the sergeant and laying the matter before him, but they gave it up, for several reasons. He was a good way ahead, and out of sight. He might turn right or left across the open heath, and in that case they would have to hunt his track while their quarry was going farther and farther away. They decided to stick to their man, and turned to his spoor.

'Here's his road,' said Dick, pointing along a grassy glade. 'He's gone on, and he must have gone this way. It's all bramble and gorse everywhere else, and a man isn't going through that in his stockings.'

Chippy nodded in agreement, and the two scouts ran at full apeed along the narrow ribbon of grass between the prickly, spiny bushes.

'He'll soon put his boots on again,' said Dick,' and then we'll get this line a lot easier.'

But the fugitive had not stayed to do so for a long way, as was plain from the flat, smooth marks which the boys found twice in soft places. Then the trail went again, and they pulled up and began to beat round in search of it. It was Dick this time who uttered the cry of the peewit, and Chippy ran up to find his brother scout holding a fragment of something in his fingers.

'Picked it up just here,' said Dick. 'What do you reckon it is. Chippy?'

'Bit of an old cork sock,' replied the Raven.

'Just so,' said Dick, 'and it's quite dry, so it was dropped here since the rain.'

'One to you,' said Chippy; 'that come out of 'is boot—jerked out as 'e was runnin'. We're on the line.'

He made a few steps forward, then gave a low cry. 'Here's the place where he put 'is boots on,' called Chippy eagerly. 'Here's all sorts o' marks.' And then Chippy gave another low cry, this time full of such astonishment and wonder that Dick looked at him quickly.

To Dick's surprise, Chippy seemed fixed to the spot, his finger pointing, his eyes staring, his mouth gaping open, as if he could not believe what he saw. 'I know the tracks,' gasped Chippy. 'I know 'im! I can tell yer who it is!'



CHAPTER XIII

ALBERT, WHO WASN'T ALBERT

'You know who it is?' cried Dick. 'Well, who?'

'It's Albert,' said Chippy. 'It ain't no convict at all. It's Albert.'

'Who's Albert?' asked Dick.

Chippy told the story of his grandmother's lodger, and pointed to the heel-mark before them. It was the first time since they hit the trail that the heel-mark had been clearly shown. 'Screws in the heel-tip,' said Chippy. 'That settles it. It's Albert.'

'But wait a bit, Chippy, wait a bit,' said Dick. 'You're making jolly sure all at once over this one point. Fifty fellows might have screws in their heels.'

'Not they,' returned Chippy. 'I know more about them sorts o' boots than wot you do. It's a scout's job to twig everythin', an' I twigged the screws in his boots. I knowed they worn't common, an' a day or two arter I asked a snob' (a local term for a cobbler) 'about it. I done one or two odd jobs for 'im to get 'im to talk, and then I sez to 'im, "D'yer ever screw tips on heels?" "No," he sez, "never. We screw tips on the toes sometimes, for there ain't much depth o' leather theer. But on heels there's plenty of leather to drive nails into, an' that's a lot quicker."'

'By Jingo, Chippy!' murmured Dick; 'we shall have to get you the Wolf badge.'

'Not me,' grunted Chippy; 'yer must do a lot more than that to get the "Wolf" name, I should fancy. But wot about this work? Wot about Albert?'

He turned to business again, knitting his brows and staring hard at the track their man had left.

'The thing gets queerer still, if it is the man Albert,' said Dick. 'Why should he be here, all this distance from Locking?'

'Six mile good,' put in the Raven.

'Yes,' went on Dick, 'full six miles, and then taking off his boots and stealing about like a thief or an escaped convict, as we thought.'

'Foller 'im up,' said Chippy shortly.

'Right,' said Dick, 'we'll see this out;' and the scouts began once more to work along the trail.

For more than half a mile they followed quite easily. There were many bare patches among the grass, and the heavy shower which had fallen at midday proved a good friend to them, the damp soil giving many excellent impressions of the heavy steps of the man whom they pursued.

The boys had now gained a very lonely part of the heath, for the fugitive appeared to be making for the most secluded corner of the vast expanse. They had been steadily working away from the part where the patrols had been searching, and the distance between them and the rendezvous at the railway-station increased with every stride.

Chippy was leading, and Dick was guarding the rear. The former looked out the track, the latter watched before and behind and on either side: by sharing the duties thus they covered the whole field of a scout's work—the finding of the trail and the guarding against surprise.

Looking out in this fashion, Dick saw a crow come sailing on outspread wings, down, down from a great height. The crow was skimming straight towards a small solitary pine sixty or seventy yards before them, as if aiming to settle among the topmost branches; but just as it was about to alight, it gave a startled, gobbling quaw-quaw-quaw, flapped its wings swiftly, and shot away at a sharp angle, and continued its flight across the heath.

Dick reached out his patrol flag and touched Chippy. The latter paused, and the two scouts put their heads together while Dick whispered what he had seen. 'There's someone about,' concluded Dick. 'The bird was going to settle, but it was scared and flew away.'

'S'pose I 'ave a look?' suggested Chippy.

'All right,' said Dick. 'I'll stay here. One can work more quietly than two.'

Chippy went, and within ten minutes was back, his face shining with excitement and triumph.

'Albert,' he whispered—'it's Albert aw' right. Come on!' He crept away on hands and knees, and Dick followed. Piloted by Chippy, the latter crawled along until he found himself behind a small bank about a yard high.

'Yer can see 'im over this bank,' breathed Chippy into his ear.

Laying his hat aside, Dick raised his head inch by inch until his eyes were above the bank. Now he could see between stems of dried fern without being seen himself. He was looking into a deep green hollow, bounded upon one side by an almost perpendicular wall of earth—a place from which most likely sand had been dug a long time ago. At the foot of the steep wall sat a man—the man whom they had been following. He had a pencil in his hand, and a pocket-book on his knee, and he was busily writing on a sheet of the pocket-book.

All this seemed innocent enough, but at the next moment the boys looking on were filled with wonder. Albert suddenly laid down pencil and pocket-book, bent forward, unlaced his left boot, and took it off. Then he drew something from his pocket, and went to work on the heel of his boot. The boys were not near enough to see what tool he was using, but his movements were those of one who draws out screws, and they clearly saw the heel of the boot come loose and fall into his hand.

Chippy gave his companion a nudge, and they looked at each other in astonishment. Then they watched Albert closely, and saw him fold into small compass the piece of paper upon which he had been writing, place it inside the heel, and screw the latter up again.

An idea shot into Dick's mind. If he had never been a boy scout, that idea would not have occurred to him; but in his enthusiasm he had bought Baden-Powell's 'Aids to Scouting,' and read it over and over again. One chapter in that little book now sprang to his memory, and he touched Chippy, and beckoned to the latter to draw back completely out of sight.

They slipped eight or ten yards away, and put their heads close together and held a whispered conversation.

Dick's eyes shone brightly, and he took Chippy by the arm. 'Chippy,' he said, 'I believe that's a spy!'

Chippy's sharp face wore a puzzled look. 'A spy!' he repeated. 'Wot's he a-spyin' on in the he'th?'

'The fort, Chippy—the fort!' breathed Dick eagerly—'the Horseshoe, the new fort!'

'Ah!' said the Raven, and began to see what his companion meant.

'I've read all about it in a book of B.-P.'s,' went on Dick. 'Foreigners will do anything to learn about a new fort. They send spies to find out all they can. He's taking notes of all he discovers, and hiding the papers in the heel of his boot.'

Chippy gave an eager nod. His keen face lighted up at this new and wonderful turn of events. A spy! a foreign spy! He felt at once that here was greater game than any escaped convict.

'That's why he dodged the sergeant,' breathed Chippy.

'Yes; it's plainer and plainer every instant,' said Dick.

Chippy nodded. 'Wot do we do?' he asked.

'We must stop him, somehow,' replied Dick. 'He might do the greatest harm to our country. It's a scout's work to collar such people. B.-P. himself has caught four foreign spies at different times in England.'

Chippy jerked his head towards the bank, and began to crawl back. Dick understood that he was going to see what the man was at now, and followed.

Albert still sat under the steep bank, pencil in hand, and a fresh sheet of paper on his knee. Chippy nudged Dick, and made signs to him to duck down, as Bardon boys say.

'I'm off to get a bit closer and see wot he's a-doin',' breathed Chippy. 'Stop 'ere an' "pewey" if he shifts.'

Dick nodded, and Chippy slid away as quietly as a snake.

Six or seven minutes passed before Dick saw his companion again. Then he caught sight of the Raven's head as Chippy appeared round the trunk of the pine which grew on the steep bank of the pit.

Little by little Chippy crept on, until his head was thrust over the brink, and he was looking straight down on the concealed man, the latter now drawing lines on his sheet of paper. His head was bent low over his work, and Chippy craned out farther and farther to glance over his shoulder. The man sat up and began to fold this paper as before, then reached out his hand for the boot which lay beside him, and deftly unscrewed the heel once more. As soon as the paper was stowed away and the heel refastened, he took the boot in hand to put it on his foot.

Suddenly he looked up. Either he had caught Chippy's shadow, or he had felt that he was watched. He looked up, and saw the boy hanging over the brink.

Chippy's main purchase was on a root of gorse which cropped up at the edge of the pit. He aimed to swing himself back with all his might, depending on his grasp of the root. The root snapped short off close to the ground, and Chippy went tumbling and sprawling head-long into the pit, landing at the man's feet.



CHAPTER XIV

CHIPPY AND THE SPY

The latter sprang up with a savage cry that was not English. 'Ach Himmel!' cried he, and again, 'Ach Himmel!'

At that moment of immense surprise, his native tongue sprang to his lips before any other, and he leapt upon Chippy, and seized him with hands that trembled.

The leader of the Ravens was not hurt, and his coolness was splendid.

'Hello, Albert!' he said; 'it's all right. There's no need to 'elp me up.'

'Help you up!' hissed the stranger. 'What are you doing here? What do you mean by watching me?'

His Cockney accent, too, was wiped out as if by magic. Probably he had forgotten for the instant that he had used it in Locking. At any rate, he did not use it now. But his English was perfect, in word and tone—the English of a well-educated man.

'Why,' said Chippy calmly, as if to tumble on a man's head was the most natural thing in the world, 'me an' a lot more are out to-day for a run over the he'th. One cuts ahead, an' the rest of us foller 'im. We've lost the one we foller, an' he's got to be found, so I'm looking everywheer. Wot made yer pull yer boot off? Got a stone in it?'

Chippy did this superbly. He boldly mentioned the fact that the boot was off, and he suggested a probable explanation, and he did it all with just the right amount of careless curiosity. But he was dealing with no common man. The tall, powerful foreigner was still holding him by one hand with a grip of steel, and the fierce blue eyes blazed again with suspicion and distrust. The man spoke, and his tone was low and cool, for he had mastered himself, but there was a hard note in it.

'How long had you been there?' he asked quietly.

'Just seein' who it was, then tumbled,' said Chippy.

The Raven knew—how he could not say—but he knew that he was in great danger. There was a dreadful change in this man. The chattering Cockney who had called himself Albert had gone, and a grim, stern, savage man stood in his place, a man whose fierce glittering eyes seemed to be striving to pierce Chippy's very soul and read his thoughts.

Chippy was indeed in danger. For Dick was right: this man was a spy sent by his Government to gather for them all particulars of the new fort which was being built at the mouth of the river. So far the spy had been very successful, and to carry off his notes and to secure his own safety he was quite ready to kill this boy if need should arise, and hide his body in this solitary place.

Consider for a moment the position in which the spy stood. What is the punishment threatened to the spy who is caught at such a task? Death! What will the Government he serves do to help him? Nothing at all, nothing. It may be a Government quite friendly to the land where the spy is seized. It will disavow him, and leave him to his fate. Yet that Government was quite willing to profit by his labours; nay, sent him there to gain that information. Yes, because Governments act upon the idea that the friend of to-day may be the foe of to-morrow, so they use such instruments freely. But if an instrument should break in the hand, it is cast aside, and not a second thought is given to it.

The spy knew all this; he was no raw hand in this dangerous profession, and he was now weighing in his mind whether it would be safe to let this boy go. Had he seen too much? He tried to find out how much Chippy had seen.

'What was I doing when you saw me first?' he asked lightly, and smiled. But the smile was of the lips only, a mere mockery of a smile. The eyes, the very heart of a smile, remained fiercely bright, and cold, and questioning.

'Fiddlin' wi' yer boot,' said Chippy calmly; 'gettin' the stone out, I s'pose.'

'Look here,' said the spy in quiet tones, 'have you seen me for the last five minutes? Yes or no.'

He paused for a reply, but none came. Chippy was shaken. Yes or no. That position admitted of no manoeuvring.

'What's this?' said the spy softly, and fingered with his left hand Chippy's badge; his right hand was clutched with a grip of iron on Chippy's shoulder.

'Scout's badge,' muttered Chippy.

'Ah, is it really?' murmured the spy. 'Yes, I've looked into that movement. Well, on your word as a scout, yes or no.'

Chippy looked up. He forced a laugh.

'Why—look 'ere, Albert,' he began, and then twisted like an eel, and tried to dive under the spy's arm. He had smiled and spoken, hoping to throw the man off his guard, but this man was not easily deceived, and his grip remained unshaken.

He gave a low, savage laugh. 'Thank you; that is all the answer I want,' he said, and slipped his left hand into a hidden pocket under his coat.

There is an instinct which teaches every living creature that the moment has come when it must fight for its life. Chippy felt it strongly, and he hurled himself upon the spy, kicking, biting, tearing at him like a little tiger, but all in vain; in that powerful grip he was utterly helpless. Yet no, that gallant struggle was not all in vain, for it held the spy's whole attention as he mastered his victim, and it prevented him from seeing a second boyish figure racing into the hollow down the slope by which the spy had entered.

Chippy, clever Chippy, saw his staunch brother scout dashing into the combat, and began to yell at the highest pitch of his voice, not calling to Dick, but just making a noise, any noise, to cover the sound of those swift feet, and give Dick the advantage of a surprise as he darted up behind the spy.

Dick made full use of the opportunity. He had watched every movement of the two in the hollow, and had leapt from his cover as soon as he saw Chippy begin to struggle. His patrol flag was fastened on a stout ashen staff, hard as iron, an old alpenstock cut down. He swung it up as he ran, and he was within a yard of striking distance, when he saw the spy's hand reappear with something in it glittering like the blade of a dagger.

With a last bound Dick was within reach, and he brought the heavy staff down with all his strength, fetching the spy a ringing crack on the head. Half-stunned, the man staggered round to face the new assailant, and Chippy saw his chance. He tore himself free, made a swift dive to the ground, and was off. Dick joined him, and the two boys scoured away at full speed, leaving the spy all abroad for the moment from the effects of that shrewd stroke.



CHAPTER XV

FLIGHT

The scouts made straight for the bank over which they had been peeping, leapt it, and dashed on, Chippy picking up his patrol flag as he ran. He had left it with Dick to have his hands free. Dick was last over the bank, and he glanced back as he cleared it. 'Run, Chippy, run,' he called. 'He's coming! He's coming!'

The spy had pulled himself together, and was in hot pursuit. He was bounding up the slope, and Dick saw that he came terribly fast. 'He's a confounded long-legged beggar,' thought Dick. 'We shall have to fight for it yet. It's lucky we've got a good stick apiece.'

Beyond the bank was a long grassy ride sloping easily downwards, and here the boys ran their fastest, and behind them the spy raced at great speed, gaining, gaining steadily. They went half a mile, and then Dick gasped: 'He's close on us, Chippy. Let's turn on him!'

'Not a bit of it,' grunted Chippy. 'Peg it! peg it! See wot's in front?'

'Only some burnt furze,' said Dick.

'Only!' snorted Chippy. 'See wot's under my arm?'

Dick looked, and, precious as wind was, he let out a yell of delight. In the excitement of the flight he had not observed it; tucked under Chippy's arm was the spy's boot. The Raven had whipped it up, and carried it on at the moment of escape.

Dick at once saw what Chippy meant. Hitherto they had been running over clear open grass, and the spy, even with one boot off and one boot on, had made tremendous headway, but the burnt furze was close at hand, and here they would show him another dance altogether.

They were approaching a broad belt of land which had been swept by a heath-fire. The furze-bushes had been very thick on the ground, and had been burned away to the very foot of the stems. Now those close-standing stems pushed short spikes above the soil like the teeth of a huge harrow pointing upwards, each tooth blackened, hardened, and pointed by fire.

The spy was not ten yards behind the boys when the latter burst into the flame-swept belt of heath. Their boots kicked up clouds of black ashes as they bounded forward, and their pursuer followed at once. Twice he put his unprotected foot down in safety, missing by sheer luck the thickly planted spikes, but the third time he set the very middle of his sole on a short stout fang standing bolt upright, and pointed by fire as if with a knife.

He let out a yell of agony as the spike, by the force of his weight and speed, was driven home into his foot.

'Got 'im,' said Chippy, and the two scouts turned to see their enemy, doubled up on the ground, utterly crippled for the time by that shrewd thrust from below.

'I knowed that 'ud settle 'im, if we could on'y get on to it,' chuckled Chippy, while the boys eased their speed, but still ran steadily on. 'I've 'ad my foot cut on a burnt root afore now.'

'Oh, Chippy,' said Dick, 'what a touch to bring his boot! That was splendid.'

''Tworn't a bad notion,' agreed Chippy. 'We'll leg it a bit again, an' then 'ave a look at it.'

The boys ran for a mile or more, and then fell into a walk. The blackened strip of country was now out of sight, and they looked round for a place to halt for a few minutes to get their breath and examine the boot.

'We want a place,' said Dick, 'where there's good cover for ourselves, and a clear space all round so that no one can surprise us. I learned that from "Aids to Scouting."'

'I see,' said Chippy. 'Wot about that patch o' thick stuff right ahead?'

'That'll do,' said Dick; 'there's plenty of room all round it;' and the boys ran to the covert and crept into it.

'Now for the boot,' murmured Dick eagerly, as Chippy laid it down between them. 'Here you are, Chippy. Here's my pocket-knife, and there's a screw-driver in it.'

'Righto,' said the Raven. 'I was just a-thinkin' 'ow to open it.'

Chippy went to work with the screw-driver in Dick's knife, and in two minutes the heel-plate was off. The screws held the iron tip and a single thickness of leather in place as a cover on the rest of the heel. In the thickness of the heel was a small cavity out of which fell three closely folded scraps of paper. The boys opened the papers and looked at them. They could make nothing of the marks and signs with which the tiny sheets were covered.

'There don't seem no sense at all here,' remarked Chippy.

'Those are secret signs,' replied Dick, 'so that no one can understand the information except the people for whom it is meant. I expect they'd know fast enough, if once they got hold of it.'

'Well, they won't 'ave it this time,' said Chippy. 'Wot are we goin' to do wi' this?'

'I wonder where that sergeant is,' said Dick. 'I'll be bound that was his business on the heath, Chippy—not trying to keep convicts in, but trying to keep spies out.'

'I never took it in when he was tellin' us to tek' care o' the convic's,' said Chippy. 'Not but wot I thought at fust as one of 'em had got away.'

'So did I,' agreed Dick. 'I felt certain it was an escaped convict.'

'An' it wor' Albert,' murmured Chippy in wonder. 'Albert, wot 'ad been bad, an' come down from Lunnon for his health,' and Chippy chuckled dryly.

Before the papers were restored and the heel fastened up, Dick measured the hidden cavity with his thumb-nail. It was one inch and a quarter in length, one inch in breadth, and half an inch deep. 'Plenty of room for a lot of dangerous information there,' remarked Dick.

'What makes 'em so sharp on this game?' asked Chippy.

'Oh,' cried Dick, 'I've heard about that. A spy gets a great sum of money if he can carry back full information about the forts and soldiers of another country. You see, it is a great help if you are going to war with that country. You know just what you've got to meet, and you can be ready to meet it.'

'I see,' said Chippy. 'Well, I've done the boot up again. Now we'll have a look round for that sergeant. We've come straight back to the part where we seed 'im afore.'

'So we have,' said Dick; 'there's Woody Knap right in front of us again.'

'Hello! wot's that?' cried Chippy, whose eyes were always on the move. He was pointing through the covert towards the direction from which they had come. Something was moving in the distant gorse, and then they saw the spy. He was hobbling along at a good speed, his eyes bent on the ground.

'Here he comes again!' cried Dick, 'and, by Jingo, he's following our trail. I say, Chippy, he can do a bit of scouting, too.'

'That's a fact,' said Chippy, and began to steal out of the covert on the farther side. Before leaving it the two boys paused for a last look at the spy. His wounded foot was bound up in his cap with a handkerchief round it, and he was covering the ground at considerable speed. He was a first-rate tracker, and he was coming along their trail as easily as if he had been trotting on a plain road. For a few seconds the boys were held fascinated by the sight of this savage sleuth-hound at their heels. They were held as the rabbit is held, when he pauses in his flight, yet knows that all the time the weasel is following swiftly in quest of his life.

Suddenly the boys started, looked at each other, threw off the feeling, and ran away at their best speed, for the halt had given them their wind again.

'Good job we 'ad a place where we could see 'im a-comin',' remarked Chippy. 'I ain't a-goin' to forget that tip.'

'He sees us now,' cried Dick. 'He's coming faster.'

The boys were no longer hidden by the covert in which they had halted. They had come into the spy's field of view, and now he pursued by sight, and leapt out at the best speed he could make.

Chippy looked round. 'Droppin' 'is foot down a bit tender,' commented the Raven; 'we can choke 'im off any time we want on a rough patch.'

Dick now pulled out his patrol whistle, and began to blow it.

'I'll join yer,' said Chippy, and pulled out his. The two whistles sent their shrill blasts far over the heath, as the boys ran on and on, and the spy still pursued. The latter had faltered for a moment when the whistles rang out but he had recovered his speed and hastened forward. He thought that it was a trick, that the boys wished him to fear that they had support near at hand. If only he could seize the boy who carried his boot! That was his great hope.



CHAPTER XVI

THE SPY IS SEIZED

It was a happy thought of Dick to use his patrol whistle upon reaching the strip of country where they had seen the sergeant. The latter heard the very first shrill note. He was haunting that stretch of the heath for a purpose, eyes and ears wide open. He ran towards the sound, and came plump on the boys as they raced round a bend in the way, for the two scouts were now following the heath-track where they had last seen the prints of the soldier's ammunition boots.

'Hooray!' yelled Chippy, who was a little in front. ''Ere he is. Hooray!' and Dick joined in the cheer.

'You two again!' cried the astonished sergeant. 'What on earth are you nippers up to?'

'We've discovered a spy, sergeant,' panted Dick. 'He's running after us. He'll be up in a minute.'

At the word 'spy' the sergeant's face underwent an extraordinary change. It filled with wonder, and then a grim alertness sprang to life all over him. He dropped his hand to his holster, and whipped out a big regulation 455 revolver, blue and sombre. The boys formed behind as under cover of a tower of strength, and the spy dashed round the bend.

'Hands up!' bellowed the sergeant, and the spy knew better than to disobey with that grim dark muzzle laid full on his body.

'Heavenly powers!' murmured the sergeant, 'I was right. As sure as my name's John Lake I was right. Didn't I see you on the heath just about here last Thursday?' he demanded of the spy. The latter made no reply. He stood, drawn up to his full height, his hands above his head, and in one of them was a long-bladed hunting-knife of the sort which folds into small compass. Now it was fully opened, and looked a very dreadful weapon. The man was white as death, and gasping fiercely from his run and this frightful surprise.

'Drop that knife,' commanded the sergeant, 'or I'll put a bullet through your wrist.'

The spy's wild eyes were fixed on the English soldier's grim face. He knew when a man meant what he said, and he dropped the knife.

'Step two yards back,' went on the sergeant. The spy did so.

'One o' you boys pick up that knife,' murmured the sergeant; and Dick ran and fetched it.

'Now, I'm in the dark yet,' went on the sergeant quietly; 'all this looks very suspicious, but how do you boys come to reckon you've nabbed a spy?'

Dick began with the boot and the papers hidden in it.

'That's enough, my lad,' said the sergeant. 'We'll lose no time. There's plenty o' reason, I can see, to take him in on suspicion, and after hearing that I'd shoot him at once if he tried to escape. Now you,' he went on to the spy, 'turn right round and march ahead as I tell you. And remember I'm a yard behind you with a cocked revolver. March!'

The spy turned, and went as he was bidden.

'Come on, boys; you must come with me,' said the sergeant and the little party went across the heath, the prisoner turning as the sergeant bade him, and taking as direct a line as possible to the Horseshoe Fort.

An hour later Dick and Chippy found themselves in the presence of the officer in charge of the works at the fort. The prisoner had been handed over into safe keeping, and the sergeant and the two boys had been ordered to report to the colonel himself.

They were shown into a large bare room where a tall man was seated at a great table covered with papers. He stood up, as they went in and saluted, and posted himself in front of the fire.

'Well, Sergeant Lake,' he said. 'What's all this about?'

'I believe, sir, I've got a spy; at least, these boys had him. I only helped to bring him in.' So spoke the modest sergeant.

'Ah, yes, a spy;' and the colonel nodded, as if he had been expecting a spy for weeks, and perhaps he had. 'But this is rather an odd thing to get hold of a spy in this fashion. Let me hear all about it.'

'I can tell you little or nothing, sir,' replied Sergeant Lake. 'I didn't wait to hear all their story. The boys told me enough, though, for me to bring him in.'

'Well,' said the colonel, 'suppose I have the story from one of you boys?'

Dick and Chippy looked at each other, and the latter mumbled: 'You tell 'em. Yer can manage it a lot better 'n me. I shan't, anyhow. Goo on.'

Thus adjured by his brother scout, Dick told the whole story from the moment he saw the startled rabbit until they had run upon the sergeant in their headlong flight. Then Chippy handed over the boot, which underwent the most careful examination at the hands of the colonel. The latter spread out on the table the tiny sheets of paper from the cavity, and studied them long and earnestly. To his trained eyes those marks meant things which the boys had, as was only natural, failed to grasp. He had sat down at the table to examine the papers, and Dick, Chippy, and the sergeant were standing on the opposite side.

At last the colonel leaned back in his chair, and looked at the boys and tapped the papers with his forefinger.

'Oh yes,' he said, 'you've nabbed a spy, and no mistake about it, my brave lads. I feel, personally, that you've done me an immense service, for I should have been simply wild to think that my plans were as good as pigeon-holed in some foreign intelligence office. But, after all, that's only my personal feeling. You've done your country an immense service, and that's a much bigger thing still. Unfortunately, it can never be publicly recognised: this affair must remain a profound secret; and men, you know, have received medals and open honour for smaller things than you have done to-day.'

'We don't trouble at all about that, sir,' said Dick quietly. 'We're not out for what we can get for ourselves: we're boy scouts.'

'I beg your pardon,' said the colonel. 'I beg your pardon. Of course, you're boy scouts, and that puts you on a different footing at once. You look at the thing from a real soldier's point of view—all for his side, and nothing for himself. That's it, isn't it?'

'Theer's Scout Law 2,' growled Chippy; 'it's all theer.'

Ah! Law 2,' said the colonel, who was not, like Chippy, a walking encyclopaedia on 'Scouting for Boys.' 'I should like very much to hear how that law runs.'

Chippy recited it, and the colonel listened attentively as the scout said, 'A Scout is loyal to the King, and to his officers, and to his country, and to his employers. He must stick to them through thick and thin against anyone who is their enemy, or who even talks badly of them.'

'A splendid law,' he said, 'and you boys have obeyed it nobly to-day. And now I'm going to ask you to be very quiet about the seizure of this man. You may, if you wish, tell your parents, but bind them over to strict secrecy. You see, this man belongs to a nation with whom at the moment our own is on the most friendly terms, and it will never do for his capture to get abroad. Now, how are you going to get back to Bardon?'

Dick mentioned the station at which they were all to meet. The colonel looked at his watch, and shook his head. 'You can't do that now,' he said; 'but we'll manage it all right. My chauffeur shall run you over to Bardon direct, and drop you at the station. There you'll meet your friends when they arrive. My Napier will do that comfortably. But we must find you something to eat first. Come with me to my quarters.'

Half an hour later the colonel put the two scouts in his big splendid six-cylinder Napier, and the great car was ready to start. As he shook hands with them at parting, he wished to tip them a sovereign apiece, but the boys would not hear of it. Chippy, to whom the money was a little fortune, was most emphatic.

'Not a bit of it, sir,' he growled—'not a bit of it. If we tek' money for the job, 'ow 'ave we 'elped our country?'

'I quite understand,' said the colonel, smiling, 'quite. You're a pair of trumps, and I honour the feeling. If B.-P.'s movement turns out many more like you it will prove the finest thing we've had in the country for many a day.'

He gave his man a nod, and away shot the huge powerful car along the road which led to Bardon.

True to the colonel's promise, the car drew up outside Bardon Station a few minutes before the train which would bring their friends was due. Dick and Chippy sprang from the tonneau, where they had ridden in immense comfort, thanked the chauffeur, bade him good-night, and sought the arrival platform.

''Ow about Mr. Elliott?' said Chippy; 'we ought to tell 'im.'

'Ah, of course!' said Dick. 'He's our instructor, and the colonel said we might tell our parents. At that rate we might tell Uncle Jim.'

'I shan't tell my folks,' said Chippy; 'they wouldn't bother about knowin'. I'll tell Mr. Elliott instead.'

'All right, Chippy,' said Dick. 'Hullo, here's the train!'

Mr. Elliott was very much relieved when the first faces he saw on the platform were those of the missing patrol-leaders. Wolves and Ravens, too, swarmed out and sprang on their lost comrades, and plied them with eager questions. But to each inquirer Dick and Chippy merely said they had been on duty, and come home another way, and the patrols were left mystified and wondering.

'I've got to report to yer, Mr. Elliott,' said Chippy, and took him aside. Now, the patrols thought that this disappearance and reappearance of the leaders was something in connection with the day's movements, and their questions were checked, for discipline forbids prying into the arrangements made by officers.

The instructor was full of delight when he heard how the missing leaders had spent their time. He congratulated both warmly, and said: 'One to the Boys' Scout movement this time. If you hadn't been out on that scouting-run, the plans of the new Horseshoe Fort would have gone abroad as easily as possible. That's playing the game as it ought to be played.'



CHAPTER XVII

HOPPITY JACK'S STALL

When Chippy left the station and gained Skinner's Hole, he put away his patrol flag carefully behind the tall clock, which was the only ornament of the poor squalid place he called home, and then turned to and helped his mother with a number of odd jobs.

'There ain't much supper for yer,' she said—'on'y some bread an' a heel o' cheese.'

'That's aw' right,' said Chippy. 'Gie it to the little uns. I don't want none.'

He left the house and strolled towards a corner of Quay Flat, where on Saturday nights and holidays a sort of small fair was always held. One or two shooting-galleries, a cocoa-nut 'shy,' and a score or more of stalls laden with fruit, sweetmeats, and the like, were brilliantly lighted up by naphtha flares. Towards this patch of brightness all loungers and idlers were drawn like moths to a candle, and Chippy, too, moved that way. It was now about half-past nine, and the little fair was at its busiest.

As he went he was joined by an acquaintance, who held out a penny packet of cigarettes.

'Have a fag, Chippy?' he said.

'Not me, thenks,' replied Chippy. 'I've chucked 'em.'

'Chucked 'em!' replied his friend in amazement. 'What for?'

'They ain't no good,' said Chippy. 'There ain't one in our patrol as touches a fag now. If he did, I'd soon boot 'im. 'Ow are yer goin' to smell an enemy or a fire or sommat like that half a mile off if yer spoil yer smell wi' smokin'?'

'I dunno,' replied the other. 'Who wants to smell things all that way? Why don't yer go and look?'

'Yer can't always,' returned Chippy, 'and when you dussn't go close, it comes in jolly handy to be able to smell 'em, and them wot smoke can't do it. So there ain't no fags for boy scouts!'

'I like a cig now and then,' said the other boy.

'Who's stoppin' yer?' asked Chippy loftily. 'You ain't a boy scout: you don't count.'

This view of the case rather nettled Chippy's acquaintance, and he began to argue the matter. But he was no match for Chippy there. Away went the latter in full burst upon his beloved topic, and the other heard of such pleasures and such fascinating sport that his cigarette went out, and was finally tossed aside, as he listened.

'Yer don't want another in the Ravens, do yer, Chippy?' he asked eagerly.

'Not now,' returned Chippy, 'but we could mek' another patrol, I dessay. I'll talk to Mr. Elliott about it.'

'Righto, Chippy,' returned the other. 'I know plenty as 'ud like to join. I've heard 'em talkin' about it, but I hadn't got 'old of it as you've been givin' it me. Hello, wot's up here? Here's a lark—they're havin' a game wi' old Hoppity Jack, and there's ne'er a copper about.'

While talking, the boys had drawn near the noisy crowd of Skinner's Hole residents gathered around the stalls and shooting-galleries. One of the stalls stood a little away from the rest, and instead of a huge naphtha flare, was only lighted by a couple of candles set in battered old stable-lanterns. The owner of the stall was a queer little bent old man wearing an immensely tall top-hat and a very threadbare suit of black. The collar of his coat was turned up and tied round his neck with a red handkerchief, and the ends of the handkerchief mingled with a flowing grey beard. He was a well-known character of Skinner's Hole, and the boys called him Hoppity Jack, because one of his legs was shorter than the other, so that his head bobbed up and down as he walked.

He kept a small herbalist's shop, and stored it with simples which he rambled far and wide over heath and upland to gather, and dry, and tie up in bunches. On Sundays he betook himself to the public park of Bardon, carrying a small stand. From this stand he delivered long lectures, whenever he could gather an audience, on the subject of the ten lost tribes of Israel. Altogether, he was one of those curious characters whom one finds at times in the byways of life. His many oddities marked him out very distinctly from other people, and often made him a butt for the rude jokes and horseplay of idle loungers on Quay Flat.

His stall was always to be found near the rest, and it was never stocked but with one thing—a kind of toffee with horehound in it. He made it himself, and vended it as a certain cure for coughs and colds.

As Chippy and his companion came up, Hoppity Jack was screaming with rage, and the crowd of idle boys tormenting him was convulsed with laughter. A long-armed wharf-rat had flung a piece of dried mud and sent the old man's queer tall hat spinning from his head.

The thrower was laughing loudly with the rest, when a sound fell on his ear. 'Kar-kaw! Kar-kaw!' He whipped round, for he was a member of the Raven Patrol, and saw his leader a dozen yards away, and ran up at once.

'Wot d'yer want, Chippy?' he cried.

'Come out o' that,' commanded Chippy—'come out an' stop out. Wot sort o' game is that un for a scout?'

'On'y a bit of a lark wi' old Hoppity Jack,' said the surprised Raven. 'Why, yer've bin in it yerself many a time, Chippy.'

The patrol-leader went rather red. No one likes to be reminded of the days when he was unregenerate. But he spoke firmly.

'We got to chuck them games now, Ted. Theer's Law 5, yer know. He's old, an' more 'n a bit of a cripple.'

'Well, I'm blest!' murmured the astonished Ted. 'I never thought o' the scoutin' comin' into this.'

'It does, though,' replied Chippy, 'an' we got to stand by an' lend 'im a hand, as far as I can mek' it out.'

'He'll want a hand, too,' said Chippy's acquaintance. 'They're goin' to upset the stall an' collar the toffee.'

It was true; a number of boys were gathering for a rush, while Hoppity Jack danced in frenzy up and down in front of his stall and shouted for the police. But though no police were near, a staunch band of helpers sprang up as if by magic to aid the poor badgered old fellow beset by enemies.

The Raven patrol call rang out, and was answered swiftly. Most of the Ravens had come out on to Quay Flat after their return home, and in a trice Chippy was at the head of six of his scouts. His orders were brief.

'We got to stand that lot off old Hoppity,' he said, and every Raven wondered, but obeyed, for they adored their clever leader, and were held in strict discipline.

At that moment the marauders made their rush, but, to their great surprise, they were taken in flank by a charge which hurled them into utter confusion, and sent them rolling to the ground, one on the other. The seven scouts had timed their assault to the moment, and sent their opponents over like ninepins. There was a sharp, short scuffle when the assailants got to their feet, but it soon ended in favour of the patrol. Chippy had known what he was about when he enrolled his men, and the pick of Skinner's Hole now fought under his command.

'No punchin',' roared Chippy. 'Just start 'em. Like this! ' He bounded up to the leader of the rush on the stall—a youth a good head taller than himself—and gave him an open-handed slap on the jaw, which rang like a pistol-shot. The Ravens leapt to support him, and the marauders were driven off in short order, the Raven who had knocked the old man's hat off now exerting himself with tremendous zeal to show the sincerity of his repentance.

'That's aw' right,' said Chippy to his followers when the enemy were in full flight; 'yer off duty now.'

'But look 'ere, Chippy,' said the corporal, Sam Fitt by name, 'have we got to be ready any time to stand up for Hoppity Jack sort o' people? O' course, now we had orders from you, an' that's plain enough. But is it a reg'lar game?'

'Of course it is, Sam,' said Chippy; 'you can't be a scout when yer like an' then drop it for a lark. Yer must play the game all the time.'

Thus did Chippy turn from serving his country to saving Hoppity Jack's stall, and it was all in the day's work.



CHAPTER XVIII

CHIPPY'S BAD TIME

When Chippy told his followers that they must play the game all the time, he meant every word that he said. He had devoted himself heart and soul to becoming a true scout, who is also a true gentleman, and he not only could reel off the laws by heart, but, as we have seen, he honestly strove to put them into practice at every moment. But now and again he ran up against a hard streak of weather in doing this, and he hit an uncommonly hard streak the very next morning.

At seven o'clock he turned up bright and early at the fishmonger's shop where he was employed. His employer, Mr. Blades, was in a fairly prosperous way of business in one of the secondary streets of the town. Mr. Blades looked after the shop; his son, a young man of twenty-three, drove a trap round with the customers' orders; and two boys, of whom Chippy was one, cleaned up, fetched and carried, ran short distances with pressing orders, and made themselves generally useful.

All went as usual until about eleven o'clock in the morning, when Chippy was despatched to deliver four or five small bags of fish at the houses of customers who lived within easy reach. He handed in the last bag of fish at the kitchen door of a semi-detached house, and the mistress took it in herself. Chippy was going out at the gate, when he heard himself called back. He returned to the door. The customer had already opened the bag, and was surveying critically the salmon cutlets inside.

'I don't think these look quite fresh,' she said. 'Has Mr. Blades had salmon in fresh this morning?'

'Yus, mum,' answered Chippy.

'Were these cutlets taken from the fresh salmon?'

They were not, and Chippy knew it, and was silent for a moment. She looked at him keenly, but smiling at the same time—a pleasant-faced, shrewd-eyed woman.

'Look here, my boy,' she said, 'these cutlets are for my daughter, who is only just recovering from a long illness, and I want her to have the best. You've got an honest sort of face, and I'll take your word. Were they cut from the fresh salmon?'

'No, mum,' mumbled Chippy.

'I felt certain of it,' she said. 'Now you ask Mr. Blades to send up fresh cutlets or none at all.'

Chippy went back with a sinking heart: he knew Mr. Blades. There was ample reason for his foreboding when he reported that the customer wanted cutlets from the fresh salmon.

'Fresh salmon!' roared Mr. Blades, a red-haired, choleric man. 'How under the sun did she find out these were not fresh? They look all right, and they smell all right.'

Chippy said nothing. Suddenly the fishmonger turned on him. 'Tell me just what she said!' he bellowed. 'You've been at some fool's trick or other, I know. You boys are enough to drive a man mad. Did she ask you anything?'

'Yus,' grunted Chippy, who now saw breakers ahead.

'Well, what did she ask you?'

'Wanted to know if they wor' off o' the salmon as come in this mornin'.'

'And what did you tell her?'

'Told 'er no,' mumbled Chippy.

The fishmonger jumped from the ground in his rage. 'There!' he cried, and smote the counter in his anger. 'What did I say? These boys are enough to ruin anybody! "Told her no! Told her no!"' He paused, speechless, and glared at Chippy.

At this moment a trap drove up to the kerb and stopped. Young Blades jumped out and came into the shop.

'Hallo!' he said cheerfully. 'Giving him a wiggin', guv'nor? That's rum. Slynn's a good little man, as a rule.'

Mr. Blades recovered his breath with a gasp and poured out the story of Chippy's enormity. 'Told her no, Larry!' he said. The astounded fishmonger could not get away from this. 'Told her no!' he repeated once more.

Larry Blades threw back his head and burst into a roar of jolly laughter which rang through the shop. 'Well, that's a good un!' he cried—'a real good un. And I never thought Slynn was such a softy. Why, Slynn,' he went on, and clapped Chippy on the shoulder, 'you'll never make a fishmonger if you carry on like that. Everything's fresh to a customer. You must always tell 'em it's just done its last gasp, unless the smell's a trifle too high, and then you must be guided by circumstances.'

He turned round to his father and laughed again jovially.

'It's all right, guv'nor,' he said. 'Cool off and calm down. You do get so excited over these little trifles. The kid's made a mistake. Well, he won't do it again. Anyhow, he's worth twenty o' that other kid. I caught him on th' Oakford road with his bags hangin' on some railings and playin' football with about a dozen more.'

'I dunno about him not doin' it again,' grumbled Mr. Blades; 'that's the way to lose customers; and people pass things like that from one to another.'

'Look here, Slynn,' said Larry Blades, wheeling sharply round, 'you've got to put yourself square with the guv'nor, or he'll have a fit every time you start on a round. Now, drop on your bended knees, raise your right hand, roll your eyes up, and say, "Mr. Blades, I'll never, never be such a flat again"'; and Larry laughed loudly, and pressed Chippy's shoulder to force him down and carry out the joke.

But Chippy did not go down: he only looked with anxious eyes from father to son.

'Come on, speak up!' cried Larry. 'What made you do such a soft trick, Slynn?'

'She said her daughter 'ad been ill,' mumbled Chippy.

'What of that?' laughed Larry. 'That salmon wouldn't hurt her then.'

'Yer see, I'm a boy scout,' burst out Chippy suddenly, his husky voice hoarser than ever from excitement and uneasiness.

'Boy scout?' said Larry wonderingly. 'What's that? And what's it got to do with Mrs. Marten's cutlets?'

Chippy began eagerly to explain, and the two men listened for a few moments in puzzled wonder.

'Oh, well,' burst in Larry, 'that may be all very well in its way, but it's clean outside business.'

'It ain't outside anything,' murmured Chippy.

'What!' said young Blades. 'You don't mean to say you'd do the same if it happened again, do you? Do you want to lose your job?' Chippy stood aghast. Lose his precious four-and-six a week!

'No, no,' cried Chippy; 'I'll do anything. I'll work as long as yer like—I'll come at six if yer like, an' stop till any time at night. Don't tek' me job off o' me.'

'Well, if you want to keep it, you must do as you're told,' began Larry, but his father out in.

'There's a lot of talk,' he cried, 'but I want you to notice, Larry, that that boy is dodging the question all the time. He's given no promise to do his best by us, and he ain't going to give any promise, either.'

'All right,' said Larry. 'I'll come bang straight to the point. If we send you out, Slynn, with a bit o' salmon that looks sweet and smells sweet, will you swear to a customer as it's dead fresh, and can't be bettered?'

Chippy was cornered. On one side his job—his precious job—how precious none could know unless they knew his starved and narrow home; on the other his oath as a boy scout to run straight and play fair to all men.

'Now, speak out,' cried Larry impatiently. But Chippy—poor Chippy!—had seen an ideal in his rough, hard life, and he clung to it.

'Yer see,' he began once more, 'I'm a boy scout——'

The fishmonger was bubbling mad all the time; now he completely boiled over.

'There he goes again!' yelled Mr. Blades. 'If he's a boy scout, let him clear out o' this, and scout round for another job. Now, then, shift, and look sharp about it.'

But Chippy was unwilling to go. He was searching his mind for words with which to plead, and to promise to do his utmost for them, save for the breaking of his scout's oath, when the furious fishmonger sprang upon him, tore the bag he still held from his grasp, and literally threw him out of the shop. Taken by surprise, Chippy was pitched headlong, and went sprawling along the pavement. He picked himself up without a word, and went away down the street. His job had gone, and he knew it, and he stayed not another moment for vain pleading.

'Just hark at him!' cried the fuming Mr. Blades; 'the impident young dog! Got the sack, and goes off whistling!'

'Well, I'm blest!' said Larry, and nodded his head thoughtfully. 'I thought he was dead keen on his job. But he don't care a rap about it. He was only a-kiddin' us. Whistling like a lark!'

Poor Chippy! how sorely was he misjudged! The fishmonger and his son knew nothing of Scout Law 8: 'A scout smiles and whistles under all circumstances,' and 'under any annoying circumstances you should force yourself to smile at once, and then whistle a tune, and you will be all right.'

Chippy turned a corner, and his whistling died away. Soon it stopped. His mouth worked a little, and his lips would not quite come into shape for the merry notes. Scout Law 8 was splendid advice, but this was a very stiff thing, even for No. 8. Chippy could not whistle, but he hoped very much that he still wore the smile. Well, his face was twisted, true, and the twists had the general shape of a smile, but it was a smile to wring the heart.

When he got home, he found his mother bending over the wash-tub. She looked up in surprise and then alarm: his face betrayed him.

'What's the matter?' she cried. 'What brings you back at this time?'

'I've got the sack,' said Chippy briefly.

The poor pinched-face woman cried out in dismay.

'An' your father's only done four days this last fortni't!' she wailed. Chippy's father was a dock-side labourer, and work had been very slack of late.

'It's aw' right,' said Chippy. 'Don't worry, mother. I'm off up the town now, to look for another job. I seen two cards out th' other day in Main Street, "Boy Wanted." I only come in now to mend me britches.'

When Mr. Blades flung Chippy out, the Raven had fallen on one knee, and his trouser had split clean across. He now purposed to cobble up the rent before he started on his quest for the precious work which means the right to live.

He found a needle and some thread, took off his trousers, and stitched busily away, for he was very handy with his fingers: his mother, too, had no time for such work; she had got a washing job, and was hard at it to help the family funds.

As Chippy stitched, his cheerfulness returned. Soon he was whistling in real earnest. 'I'm goin' in for a rise,' he announced. 'I've picked up a lot at old Blades' place. I'm goin' to ask five bob.'

'What made him sack yer?' asked his mother.

'Oh, I didn't suit,' said Chippy hastily. 'An' I done my best, too.'

He made haste to be off on his quest, for he was not anxious to disclose why he had been sacked: in Skinner's Hole the reason would sound too fantastic to be easily accepted.



CHAPTER XIX

A BROTHER SCOUT TO THE RESCUE

Nearly a fortnight passed, and one dull afternoon a very discouraged Raven was perched on a capstan at the edge of Quay Flat. Chippy had tramped the town end to end and street by street in search of those cards marked 'Boy Wanted,' and had found none, or had failed to get the place. There was so small a number of them, too. He was reflecting that when he had been in a job he had seen two or three in a day as he traversed the town; he was quite sure of it. Now they seemed to have vanished, or, when he lighted on one, it meant nothing. The people had just got a boy, and had forgotten to take the card down.

Suddenly he was hailed from behind. He glanced round, leapt down, and came promptly to the full salute, which was promptly met by his brother patrol-leader.

'Hallo, Chippy!' said Dick. 'Got a holiday?'

'Got nuthin' else,' said Chippy.

'How's that?' asked Dick. 'I thought you went to work.'

'So I did—once,' murmured Chippy; it seemed a hundred years since he was pleasantly engaged in the task of earning the substantial sum of four-and-sixpence a week.

Dick looked at his comrade, whom he had not seen since that eventful afternoon on the heath. Chippy was thinner and whiter: Dick saw it, and asked him if he had been ill. They got into talk, and before long Dick learned about Mr. Blades, and the manner in which the Raven leader lost his job.

'What a jolly shame, Chippy!' burst out Dick. 'That's altogether too bad. Sacked you because you wouldn't be a sneak and break your scout's oath! And you haven't found anything else?'

'Nuthin' straight,' replied Chippy. 'I could soon get a job on the crook.'

'On the crook?' repeated Dick; 'that means dishonest, doesn't it, Chippy?'

Chippy nodded, and went on: 'There's a chap as lives in Peel's Yard down in Skinner's 'Ole, he's been arter me two or three times. He's a bad un, I can tell yer. He wants me to goo wi' him a-nickin'.'

'What's that, Chippy?' asked Dick.

'Stealin' money out o' shop-tills,' replied Chippy. 'He keeps on a-tellin' me as we could make pounds a day at it, if I'd on'y let him train me a bit.'

'Oh, but you'd never, never do that!' cried Dick.

'No fear,' returned the Raven. 'I told 'im straight he was on the wrong lay. "Yer wastin' yer breath," I told 'im. "A boy scout don't goo a-nickin'."'

'Not likely,' said Dick. 'Oh, you'll soon find a job, Chippy, I'm sure.'

'It 'ud suit me uncommon to come acrost one,' murmured Chippy. 'Four-an'-six a wick wor' very useful, I can tell yer, at our 'ouse. Theer's some kids, an' they eat such a lot, kids do.'

Chippy fell silent, and Dick kicked thoughtfully at the capstan for a few seconds. Then he whirled round on his heel, saluted, and said, 'Well, I'm off.'

'Why, you're goin' straight back!' cried Chippy, returning the salute.

'Yes, Chippy, old boy,' said Dick. 'I'm going straight back.'

He had been coming from the town, and he now returned to it at a swift step. On he went, head back, shoulders square, walking as a scout should walk, until he reached Broad Row, the street where the great shipping firms had their offices, and here he paused before a fine building, whose huge polished brass plate bore the inscription of Elliott Brothers and Co. The Elliott Brothers were Dick's father and his Uncle Jim, and before going in Dick paused for a moment and bit his lip.

'It's a business job I'm after,' said Dick to himself, 'and I'll carry it out in a business style. I don't want father to make a joke of it; it's no joke to poor old Chippy—anybody can see that with half an eye.'

So Dick dived into his pocket and fetched out a dozen things before he lighted on what he wanted—a small leathern case with a dozen cards in it. In the centre of the card appeared 'Dick Elliott,' neatly printed; while in the corner, in quaint Old English lettering, was his address, 'The Croft, Birchfields,' being the names of the house and suburb in which he lived. The card was his own achievement, produced on his own model printing-press, and he was rather proud of it.

He entered the inquiry office on the ground-floor, and the clerk in charge came forward with a smile.

'I say, Bailey,' said Dick, 'you might take this up to my father, will you?'

The clerk took the card, looked at it, and then at Dick, and went without a word; but his smile was now a grin. In a short time he came back, and murmured, 'This way, please,' and Dick followed, very serious and thoughtful, and in no wise responding to Bailey's unending grin.

Dick was shown into the room of the senior partner, who was looking at his visitor's card, and now glanced up with a humorous twirl of his eye.

'Ah, Mr. Elliott,' he said—'Mr. Dick Elliott, I think'—glancing at the card again. 'Pleased to meet you, Mr. Elliott. Won't you sit down? And now what can I do for you?'

'I have called upon you, sir,' said Dick, 'in the hopes of enlisting your sympathy on behalf of a worthy object and a noble cause.'

Dick had collared this opening from the heading of a subscription-list, and he thought it sounded stunning. He felt sure it would impress the senior partner. It did: that gentleman's emotion was deep; he only kept it within bounds by biting his lips hard.

'Ah, Mr. Elliott,' he said, 'you are, I suppose, in quest of a donation?'

'Well, not exactly,' replied Mr. Elliott; 'I should like to tell you a little story.'

'Charmed,' murmured the senior partner; 'but I hope it will be a little story, Mr. Elliott, as I and my partner are due very shortly at an important meeting of dock directors.'

Dick plunged at once into his narration, and the senior partner listened attentively, without putting in a single word.

'I see, Mr. Elliott—I see,' he remarked, when Dick had made an end of the story of Chippy's troubles; 'you are in search of a post for your friend?'

'I should be uncommonly glad to find him something,' murmured Dick.

'I'm afraid you've come to the wrong person, Mr. Elliott,' said the shipowner. 'I believe there are some small fry of that kind about the place who fetch parcels from the docks, and that kind of thing, but I really don't concern myself with their appointment—if I may use so important a word—or their dismissals. All those minutiae are in the care of Mr. Malins, the manager.'

'Oh, father, don't put me off with Mr. Malins!' burst out Dick, forgetting his character for a moment in his anxiety. 'I want you to lend me a hand, so as to make it dead sure.'

'Well, Mr. Elliott, you're very pressing,' remarked the senior partner. 'I'll make a note of it, and see what can be done.'

'I'm very much obliged indeed,' murmured Mr. Elliott.

'May I ask your friend's name?'

'Slynn,' replied Dick.

'Christian name?'

'I never heard it,' said Dick, rubbing his forehead. 'They call him Chippy.'

'Thank you,' said the senior partner, pencilling a note on his engagement-pad; 'then I am to use my best efforts to find a post for Mr. Chippy Slynn, errand-boy. Well, it's the first time I've made such a venture; it will have, at any rate, the agreeable element of novelty. And now I must beg you to excuse me: I fear my junior partner is waiting for me.'

'That's all right, sir,' said Dick cheerfully. 'Uncle Jim won't mind. He knows Chippy.' And forthwith Dick departed, quite content with the interview.



CHAPTER XX

THE OPINIONS OF AN INSTRUCTOR

As Dick's father and uncle walked towards the docks, the former related with much relish how Dick had gone to work to do his friend a good turn, and the two gentlemen laughed over Dick's serious way of tackling the question. Then Mr. Elliott began to speak soberly.

'He seems very friendly with this boy Slynn,' said Dick's lather.

'Naturally, after the splendid piece of work they did together the other Monday,' replied the younger man.

'Oh yes, yes, of course; that, I admit, would be bound to draw them together,' said the other. 'But do you think it is quite safe, Jim, this mingling of boys from decent homes with gutter-sparrows?'

'Dick will come to no harm with Chippy Slynn,' replied James Elliott quietly; 'the boy is quite brave, quite honest.'

'I don't know,' said Mr. Elliott uneasily. 'His mother was very uncomfortable when Dick and his sister had been out one day. Ethel brought word home that Dick and a wharf-rat had been chumming up together. His mother spoke to Dick about it.'

'Oh yes,' said his brother, 'and Dick referred her to me, and I explained, and put matters straight.'

'I hardly know what to think about it,' said Mr. Elliott, and his tone was still uneasy.

'Look here, Richard,' said his brother, 'the feelings which I know are in your mind are the feelings which make such an immense gulf between class and class. Now, confess that you are not quite comfortable because Dick has a deep regard for a wharf-rat out of Skinner's Hole.'

'I confess it,' said Mr. Elliott frankly.

'Exactly,' returned his brother; 'there is no saying more frequent on our lips than that we must look, not at the coat, but at the man inside it; but it remains a saying—it has little or no effect on our thoughts and actions. The rich look with suspicion on the poor; the poor repay that suspicion with hatred. This brings about jealousy and distrust between class and class, and gives rise to any amount of bad citizenship. I declare and I believe that if those who have would only try to understand the difficulties and the trials of those who have not, and would help them in a reasonable fashion—not with money; that's the poorest sort of help—we should see an immense advance in good citizenship.'

'And what is your ideal of good citizenship, old fellow?' asked Mr. Elliott.

'All for each, and each for all,' replied his brother.

'Why, Jim,' laughed the elder man, 'I never heard you break out in this style before. I never knew you set up for a social reformer.'

'Oh,' said James Elliott, smiling, 'I don't know that I claim any big title such as that. But, you know, I was in the Colonies some eight or nine years, and I learned a good deal then that you stay-at-homes never pick up. Out there a man has to stand on his own feet, while here he is often propped up with his father's money.'

'And that's true enough,' agreed the elder. 'Well, then, Jim, you think this scouting movement is of real service?'

'I am convinced of it,' said the other. 'Even in our little circle it has thrown together a group of boys belonging to the middle classes and another group whose parents are the poorest sort of dock labourers. I have watched them closely, and the results are good, and nothing but good. I am delighted that I have been given the chance to have a hand in bringing about such results. What were their former relations? They used to shout insulting names at each other, and fight. That boyish enmity would have deepened and embittered itself into class hatred had it continued. But in their friendly patrol contests the boys have learned to know and like each other, and to respect each other's skill. Take Dick and Chippy Slynn. Without this movement, Dick would only have known the other as a wharf-rat who was formidable beyond ordinary in their feuds. Now he knows him as a boy whose pluck and honesty command respect, and Dick gives that respect, and liking with it. Will they be class enemies when they are men? I think not. But I'll dry up. I am letting myself go into a regular sermon.'