'They'll attack at once,' he thought, 'and then I can get Chippy free.'

But to his surprise there was no attack. The two keepers glided into shelter of a holly patch and vanished. There was neither sign nor sound from them. Dick, of course, could not know that the keepers were biding their time, for they wished to take the poachers in confusion, and it was very likely the biters would be bit.

The truth was that an inkling of the raid had been gained from words let fall by a drunken poacher in the village inn, and the pool had been prepared. Across the middle of it a long weighted log had been sunk, and in this log a number of old scythe blades, their edges whetted as keen as razors, had been fixed in an upright position. The edges were turned down-stream, and the keepers were waiting until the drag-net should be brought upon this cunning engine of destruction.

Presently there was a hitch in the dragging.

'Wait a bit,' said one of the poachers; 'she's caught a bit somewheer or other. Pull a bit harder, Young Bill.'

The navvy pulled hard, but to no purpose.

'It's out towards the middle o' the pool,' he growled, 'an' I dursn't go a step fudder in. I'm nigh out o' my depth already.'

'We'll get on the bank,' said the other man who was in the water. 'We'll have a better purchase for a tug at her then.'

He climbed out on the farther side, and Young Bill climbed out on the nearer. Then the four men bent to it, and hauled on the net with all their might. No use: it was stuck as fast as ever.

'Ye want to pull harder, boys,' called out Smiley.

Young Bill exploded into a volley of imprecations addressed to the watchman.

'Hark at 'im,' growled the navvy—'pull harder; we're to pull harder while 'e slinks about on the bank. Come an' lend a hand yerself, an' be quick about it, or I'll sling ye into the river.'

Smiley ran at once, for he stood in great dread of his violent accomplice, and knew that the threat was a perfectly serious one. For a few moments there was a busy interchange of remarks and opinions as the baffled poachers discussed the possibilities of the case, and decided that a water-logged branch was at the bottom of the trouble.

While they were talking Dick was acting. No sooner did he see the watchman called off guard than he began to wriggle like an eel across the turf towards the beech, keeping the trunk of the tree between himself and the poachers. His keen knife made short work of Chippy's bonds, gag included, and the Raven was free. The latter slipped round the trunk, and the two scouts glided quickly back into cover of the hazels.

'Good old Wolf,' whispered Chippy, drawing a few deep breaths. 'I felt sure ye'd be somewheer handy. I owe ye a vote o' thanks. It's carried unanermously.'

'Oh, dry up, Chippy,' whispered his comrade. 'As if you wouldn't have done the same for me. What luck the rascals got into a fix! That gave me a chance. But, Chippy, there are keepers over there, watching them.'

'Keepers!' breathed Chippy in amazement. 'Why don't they collar 'em?'—and even as he spoke, the scouts learned why the keepers had delayed their attack.

'Now, altogether,' cried young Bill at the waterside, and the five poachers bent for a last tremendous tug which would free their net. The net was freed, but not exactly in the style they hoped for. There was a sudden, keen Cr-r-r-rish! of snapping, parting meshes, and the net, cut clean into two by the scythe blades, came to shore in two halves, one on either bank.

It gave, at the last, so suddenly that the hauling rogues were taken completely by surprise. At one moment they were pulling against a tremendous resistance; at the next there was none, and they went head over heels, all five of them, the three on the nearer side piled in a heap.

Upon this heap the two keepers darted, and at the same moment a keeper and a policeman appeared on the other bank. The yell of surprise which burst from the lips of the rogues as they went to earth was still ringing in the air when they felt the grip of justice fastened on their collars, and knew that the game had gone against them on every score.

The gigantic navvy broke away from his captors and ran. A keeper pursued him, caught him up, and closed with him. There was a short, fierce struggle, and both men went down headlong, locked together in a savage grapple. The keeper was undermost, and the weight of his huge opponent knocked the breath out of him for the moment. The poacher leapt up, and aimed a terrific kick at his fallen opponent. The man would have received a severe injury had not the scouts swept into action at the very nick of time.

'Here's the wust of 'em. Cop 'im, my lads,' roared Chippy, in a voice which he made as deep as a well. And Dick lashed out and fetched the big fellow a staggerer with his patrol staff, and shouted also. Feeling the blow, and hearing the voices at his back, the poacher thought that a crowd of foes was upon him, and took to his heels and fled through a coppice, crashing through bushes and saplings with furious lumbering speed.

The scouts slipped away to see how the second keeper was getting on, and found that he had got Smiley safe and sound, while the third man had vanished. Upon the other bank one was captive and the other had fled.

'How are you gettin' on there, Jem?' called the keeper who had secured Smiley.

'Oh, I've as good as got my man,' replied Jem, returning to the river-bank. 'It was Bill Horden, that big navvy. I'll nail him to-morrow all right. But there was the rummest thing happened over yonder, 'mongst the trees.' And he burst into the story of his rescue.

'I'd have had my head kicked in if they boys hadn't run up and started Bill off,' he concluded; 'but who they are, and where they sprung from, I can't make out.'

The scouts, tucked away in the cover, chuckled as they heard their mysterious appearance discussed, and wondered if Smiley would throw any light on the matter. But the old poacher remained sullen and silent, and now the keepers were hailed by the policeman across the river.

'Bring your man down to the bridge,' he cried, 'and we'll march the two we've got off to the lock-up.'

'All right,' said the keeper who had collared Smiley. 'I'll come now. Jem, you get the nets an' follow us.'

'The play's over,' whispered Dick in his comrade's ear, 'and we'll get back to camp.'

The scouts glided away up the little brook, and soon regained their camp, where the fire was burning briskly, for the whole affair had not taken any great amount of time. They sat down and discussed the matter from the moment Dick had smelt the tobacco-smoke till the final rally on the bank of the trout-pool, then turned in once more, and were asleep in two moments.

Dick had rearranged his side of the bed before he lay down again, and now he slept in great comfort, and slept long, for when he woke the sun was high up and the day was warm.

He rubbed his eyes and looked round for Chippy. To his surprise, the Raven sat beside the fire skinning a couple of young rabbits.

'Hallo, Chippy!' cried Dick, 'been hunting already? Why, where did you pick those rabbits up?'

'Just along the bank 'ere,' replied the Raven. 'I was up best part of an hour ago, an' took a stroll, an' seed 'em a-runnin' about by the hundred. These two were dodgin' in an' out of a hole under a tree, so I went theer, an' in they popped. But I soon dug 'em out.'

'Dug them out!' cried Dick. 'Why, I've heard that digging rabbits out is a job that takes hours with a spade.'

'So 'tis if they've got into their burrows,' returned his comrade. 'But theer's the big deep holes they live in, an' theer's little short holes they mek' for fun. They're called "play-holes," an' 'twas a play-hole these two cut into. It worn't more'n eighteen inches deep, an' soft sand. I 'ad 'em out in no time.'

Chippy finished skinning the rabbits, and washed them, and then they were set aside while the comrades stripped, and splashed round, and swam a little at a spot where the brook opened out into a small pool. When they were dressed again, they were very ready for breakfast. Chippy fried the rabbits in the billy with another lump of Dick's mutton fat, and they proved deliciously tender. The boys left nothing but the bones, and with the rabbits they finished their loaf. After breakfast they lay on the grass in the sun for half an hour working out their day's journey on the map, and pitched on a place called Wildcombe Chase for their last camp. It was within fourteen miles of Bardon, and would give a quiet, steady tramp in for their last day.

At the thought that the morrow was the last day of their delightful expedition the scouts felt more than a trifle sad; but they cheered themselves up with promises of other like journeys in the future, and took the road for a seventeen-mile march.

'Do we pull our knots out for lending a hand to the keeper last night, Chippy?' asked Dick, laughing.

'You can pull your'n out two or three times over,' replied the Raven. 'Fust ye saved me; then ye let that big rogue ha' one for luck, an' that saved the keeper. Me, I did naught, 'cept get collared when I wor' fast asleep.'

'Didn't you?' returned Dick. 'I know that shout of yours was the thing that frightened him, not the crack I hit him. He thought a six-foot policeman was at his heels. Well, never mind the knots. We'll throw that in. After all, boy scouts are bound to lend a hand in the cause of law and order.'

'O' course,' agreed Chippy. 'Wheer's discipline if so be as everybody can do as he's a mind?'



CHAPTER XLIII

THE BROKEN BICYCLE

That morning the brother scouts enjoyed an experience which gave them keener pleasure than perhaps anything else which happened during their journey. It began about eleven o'clock, when they were following a country road upon which hamlets, and even houses, were very far apart.

They were approaching the foot of a very steep hill, when the Raven's eyes, always on the watch, as a scout's eyes should be, caught a gleam of something glittering in a great bed of weeds beside the road. He stopped, parted the weeds with his staff, and disclosed a broken bicycle, diamond-framed, lying on its side. It was the bright nickelled handle-bar which had caught his eye.

'Somebody's had a smash, and left the broken machine here,' said Dick; and Chippy nodded.

Now, Dick's statement of the case would have satisfied most people, and they would have gone on their way. There was the broken bicycle, and the rider had left it. Perhaps he meant to fetch his disabled machine later. In any case an untrained person would have seen nothing that he could possibly do, and would have dismissed the matter from his mind. But that would not do for the Wolf and the Raven. It was their duty as scouts to got to the bottom of the affair, if possible, on the chance that help was needed somehow or somewhere, and they began a careful examination of the machine and its surroundings.

The cause of the accident suggested itself at once—a broken brake and a runaway down the hill, with a smash at the foot. There were two brakes on the machine. One was jammed; one had a broken wire. Whether the jammed brake had been so or not before the accident they could not tell. As far as they could judge, the broken wire had left the rider helpless on the steep slope. They looked up the hill. The track came down fairly straight, until it was within a few yards of the bed of weeds. Then it swerved sharply aside. A yard from the angle of the swerve lay a large stone. Deduction: The front wheel had struck the stone, driven it a yard to the left, and itself had swerved violently to the right, and dashed on to a heap of stones hidden under the growth of weeds. The shock had been tremendous. How discovered? The frame was badly twisted and broken, and the machine was an excellent one; the transfer bore the name of a first-rate maker.

Now, what had happened to the rider? He had been pitched flying from his machine, and Dick found where he had fallen. Three yards from the spot where the broken bicycle lay, the weeds were flattened, as if a heavy body had dropped there. Then Dick gave a long, low whistle.

'By Jove, Chippy! look here!' he cried, and pointed with his staff. The Raven hastened up, and whistled too, when he saw a patch of blood lying around a sharp-edged stone. The blood was quite fresh, and that proved the accident was recent.

'Poor chap dropped with his head on the stone, and cut himself pretty badly,' said Dick; and Chippy nodded.

'It ain't a big machine,' he remarked.

'It's just about the size of mine,' returned Dick. 'It may be a fellow about our age, Chippy, by the look of the bike.'

Now arose the vital question: Had the unlucky rider received help or not? How had he left the place—on his own feet, or with assistance? The scouts settled that in a minute's close search. They had taken care not to potter about and confuse the spoor with their own markings. They soon came to the conclusion that such marks as they could find were made by the rider when he had dragged himself to his feet.

'Has anyone passed here since the accident?' said Dick.

'Soon find that out,' cried Chippy; and the two scouts turned their trained eyes on the dusty road, which gave up instantly the knowledge its surface held.

Two tracks only were recent. One was made by a pair of wheels and the feet of a horse; the other by a pair of large, hobnailed shoes. The wheel-tracks were narrow, and the horse had trotted till it was some distance up the hill, then fallen into a walk. The boys decided that a gig and a labourer had passed along, both going the same way.

Ten yards up the hill the bicycle track crossed a track of the gig. Thirty yards up the hill the ribbed Dunlops had wiped out the side of a hobnailed impression. Very good. The bike had come down the hill after these had passed; it had been the last thing on the road. This greatly strengthened the idea which the scouts had already formed, that no help had been available. Now they began to search for the rider's line of movement from the place.

Dick found it: a footprint on a dusty patch in the grassy wayside track. He called to his companion. When Chippy had seen it, Dick set his own foot on the track; his shoe exactly covered it.

Now the scouts gathered their impressions together, and reconstructed in theory the whole affair. A boy of about their own age had ridden over the brow of the slope, with only one brake available on his machine. Near the top of the hill the brake had broken; they regarded this as proved by the tremendous way which the machine had got on it. The rider was skilful, for his track was true, and he would have escaped had it not been for the large stone in the track, and this, it was very likely, his great speed had prevented him from seeing until too late; another point, by the way, to prove the early giving-out of the brake. He had swerved violently aside, and struck the heap of stones by the bank before he could regain control of his machine, and the smash followed. After the smash the rider had pulled himself together, and gone alone from the place; his trail ran up the hill, and it looked as if he were making for home; it was certain that he was pretty badly hurt.

'Now, Chippy,' said Dick, 'the point for us is this: Has he got safely home or not?'

'Foller 'im up,' said the Raven briefly; 'scout's job to mek' sure.'

Dick nodded, and without another word they struck the trail, and worked their way up the steep slope.

'Blood,' said Chippy, and pointed out two stains on the grass.

'Blood it is,' replied his companion, and they pressed forward.

Near the top of the slope, where, just at the crown, the hill was at its steepest, the boys stopped in amazement. Here was a trail with a vengeance! The roadside grass gave way to a sandy patch twenty yards long, and the patch was scored with long, dragging marks. Then Dick-pointed with his staff. There in the soft soil was the impression of a hand, and dark spots lay along the trail.

'By Jove, Chippy! the poor chap!' cried the Wolf. 'The hill proved too steep for his weakness. Look, he's finished it on his hands and knees.'

Dick bent, and laid his own hand over the clear impression on the sand.

'Same size again,' he cried; 'he's just about our age, Chippy.'

'It's the blood he's lost as fetched 'im down,' said the Raven, his face very grave; 'but he's a good plucked un. He's fightin' his way somewheer.'

At the top of the hill came a level stretch, and here the wounded rider had gathered himself together again and stumbled forward. Within a very short distance the road forked, and at the fork the trail was lost. The two roads were hard and stony, and showed no trace of footmarks, and the blood had ceased to fall.

'A road apiece,' said Chippy.

'Yes,' said Dick. 'You take right; I'll take left. First one to find anything whistles.'



CHAPTER XLIV

THE BROTHER SCOUT

They parted instantly, and each took his track, his eyes glued to the ground. They could work a great distance apart and yet keep in touch, for their patrol whistles were very powerful, and the day was still.

Chippy went a good three-quarters of a mile, and yet had found nothing. He feared he was not on the right track, for at last he came to a soft patch where spoor ought to have been. There was one new track: the man with the hobnailed boots had turned this way, but there was no other sign of recent passage. Chippy was standing in hesitation, when faint and far away the shrill call of a patrol whistle came to his ears. At once he raised his own whistle to his lips and blew an answering call, then turned and darted like a hare back along the road. He gained the fork and raced along the path which Dick had followed. It was clear that the Wolf had found the track or the injured boy, but the Raven did not trouble about searching for signs of the rider. He knew that his comrade would leave him full directions which way to travel, and his only aim now was to join Dick. So he tore along the road, his eyes fixed on the centre of the track.

Suddenly he pulled up dead. There was a broad arrow marked heavily in the road with the point of Dick's staff. The head pointed to a side-track, and Chippy wheeled and flew off in the new direction. Again he was pulled up. A second broad arrow, square across the way. This time the head pointed to a wicket-gate painted white. Even as the Raven dodged through the wicket he knew that his comrade had hit the right trail. The wicket was painted white, and a stain of red was smeared across the top bar: the injured boy had passed this way.

Faster and faster sped the Raven along a winding field-path which led through meadow after meadow. Then he saw his friend in the distance, and knew that Dick was still on the trail, for he was bending low and moving slowly. The Wolf turned his head as his companion came up panting.

'I'm on the spoor, Chippy,' he said. 'Here's blood again, spot after spot. He must have begun to bleed afresh.'

'I seed some on the gate,' said the Raven; 'did yer hit the trail pretty soon?'

'No,' returned Dick. 'I was in more than half a mind to turn back when I came on the boot track and knew it again. And within twenty yards I found sure signs and whistled.'

He moved forward, and the Raven dropped into file behind, for the track was narrow. Thus it was that he, being free to glance ahead, was the first to catch sight of the object of their search.

'Look, Dick!' he cried. 'Look, look! Right ahead!'

Dick straightened himself, saw what his comrade meant, and the two boys darted forward. They had just turned a corner where the path wound by a tall bank, and thirty yards before them a figure lay in a heap at the foot of the bank. As they ran up to it, they uttered a cry of surprise and wonder. It was a brother scout! There he lay, his slouch hat beside him, his badge on his arm, his legs doubled under him. He had made a grand fight, a scout's fight, to gain his home after his severe accident. But now he had collapsed from utter weakness and loss of blood, and lay against the bank, his face as white as wood-ashes.

His comrades pounced on him at once, placed him in an easier position, and searched for the wound. It was on the inner side of the right arm, a frightful ragged cut made by the deep point of the jagged stone, and was bleeding still. Out came Dick's handkerchief and Chippy's knife. Dick tied the handkerchief above the wound, Chippy cut a short, stiff stick. Then the stick was slipped inside the bandage and twisted until the handkerchief was very tight, and had checked the flow of blood. Dick held the boy's arm up above his body as a further aid to check the bleeding.

'Now, Chippy,' he said, 'cut round and get some water in the billy.'

'Right,' said the Raven; 'we passed a ditch wi' some water in it a bit back.' He flew off, and soon returned with the billy full of cold water.

'Now give me your handkerchief,' said Dick, 'and while I dab the cut with water you push ahead and find help.'

Chippy nodded. 'I reckon this path runs somewheer,' he said. 'I'll foller it up.'

He raced forward and disappeared round a further bend, leaving Dick to do his best for their unconscious comrade. Within three hundred yards Chippy saw a white house before him in lee of a fir coppice.

'His place, I know!' burst from Chippy's lips. The poor lad had fallen almost within call of home. How narrowly had a tragedy been averted!

The Raven ran on, passed through another white wicket, and entered a farmyard. A tall man was just dismounting from a cob.

'What, Fred, back already?' he cried, then stopped, for he saw it was not Fred, but a stranger in scout's uniform. Chippy darted up to him.

'Fred's your boy as like as not,' he said. 'A scout same as me. Went off on his bike a bit back, eh?'

'Yes,' said the farmer wonderingly; 'how do you come to know about him? I've never set eyes on you before.'

'He's met with a bit o' an accident,' said Chippy, 'an' a comrade o' mine found him an' sent me to get help. Seems I've come to the right place, fust send on.'

'Where is he?' cried the farmer.

'Just along the medder-path,' replied Chippy, pointing; 'fell off his bike, an' had a nasty tumble. Better bring summat to carry him.'

'Is he badly hurt?' cried the farmer in alarm.

'Well,' said Chippy, 'theer's a nasty cut on his arm, but we've stopped the bleedin'.'

The farmer called to two men at work in a barn, and a door was hastily lifted from its hinges. Then all three hurried along in the wake of the Raven, who led the way back.



CHAPTER XLV

AT THE HARDYS' FARM

But scarcely had the party left the farmyard than they saw in the distance the figure of a heavily laden scout. It was Dick marching along with his injured comrade on his shoulders. A few moments after Chippy departed in search of help, the wounded boy came to himself under the influence of the cold water with which Dick bathed the hurt and the boy's face.

'Hallo!' he murmured feebly. 'What's wrong? Have I got home?'

'Not just yet, old chap,' said Dick cheerily, 'but you'll soon be there. A friend has gone ahead for help.'

'It's only a little way now,' muttered the injured boy.

'How far?' cried Dick, but he received no answer. The other was fast falling into a stupor again.

Dick felt very uneasy. He did not know a great deal about wounds, but he knew that his brother scout had lost a large amount of blood, and that it was very urgent that he should be swiftly conveyed to a place where he could receive proper attention.

'I'll carry him in,' thought Dick. He looked at the bandage, and carefully tightened it a little again. Then he turned the boy, now insensible once more, on his face, and knelt down. Raising the body, Dick worked his way beneath it until his right shoulder was under the other's stomach. Slipping his right arm between the legs of his burden, Dick gripped the wrist of the sound arm, and slowly raised himself. This was the hardest part of the task, but the Wolf's strong, limber knees made sure work of it, and in a moment he stood nearly upright with the injured scout across his shoulders. Then Dick stepped out at a gentle, even pace, following the path Chippy had taken. He was in sight of the farmhouse when the Raven and his followers came streaming through the gate, and the farmer, running at full speed, was the first up to the marching scout.

'Give him to me, give my boy to me,' cried the pale-faced man.

'Better not,' said Dick quietly; 'we mustn't move him about too much, or the bandage may work loose. Is that your house?'

'Yes,' cried the other.

'I'll run him right in,' said Dick. 'Shift the wicket.'

One of the men hurried forward and swung the wicket-gate from its hinges, and, piloted by the farmer, Dick crossed the farmyard, marched through a door into a passage, and thence into an ample kitchen, where, with the aid of the farmer, he set down his burden on a broad settle. As he did so, the boy's mother came hurrying in from the dairy. She gave a little gasping cry when she saw the ghastly face of her son, but at once took command in a quiet, sensible fashion.

'Have you sent for the doctor?' she said to her husband.

'Yes; Joe's gone,' he answered. Joe was one of the men. He had raced off at once to the village.

The wounded boy was again lifted very carefully, and carried away to a bedroom. In a few moments the farmer came back, eager to hear how the scouts had found his son. He was astonished to find that their only clue, as he understood clues, was the seeing of the broken bicycle. It took him some time to grasp the methods by which the scouts had pieced together the evidence and followed up the wounded rider, and his thankfulness and gratitude were beyond expression.

'To think he was barely a field away from home, and couldn't move another step!' cried Mr. Hardy—for that was the farmer's name. 'And then you tracked him down in that clever fashion. Well, if you two are not a credit to Baden-Powell's Scouts, my name isn't George Hardy.'

'Your son is a scout too, I think,' said Dick. 'I saw he was wearing our uniform and badge.'

'Of course he is,' cried Mr. Hardy. 'He's fairly crazy about it—thinks of nothing else, he's so keen on it. There's a patrol over in the village yonder, and he's joined it. He's what they call a second-class scout at present, and he wants to become first-class. So off he set on his bike for a fifteen-mile ride, as it seems that's one of the things he's got to do.'

'Test 7,' grunted Chippy.

'Ah, very likely,' agreed Mr. Hardy. 'I don't know the numbers. Hallo! that's good. Here's the doctor.'

He sprang up, and took the medical man to the bedroom, while Joe came into the kitchen, wiping his face.

'Met the doctor on the road, so that's lucky,' said Joe, and then began to ask the scouts about the accident; for Fred was a great favourite, and all were anxious to know how ill had befallen him.

Dick and Chippy would now have resumed their interrupted march had they not been desirous of hearing the doctor's report on their brother scout's condition.

Twenty minutes passed before Mr. Hardy returned to the kitchen, and his face shone with joy.

'He'll pull through,' cried the farmer. 'Doctor says there's a chance for him yet. But if he'd lain there half an hour longer there'd have been no mortal hope of saving him, and I can never tell you how thankful his mother and me do feel towards you.'

'Oh, very likely someone would have found him in time if we hadn't tracked him,' said Dick.

'Never in this world,' said Mr. Hardy solemnly—'never in this world! That path is but little used. The village lies t'other way. He might have lain there for hours and hours.'

'Well, we're very glad we were so lucky as to be of service,' said Dick; 'and now we must push on our way. We're making a scouting journey, and have to finish it by to-morrow night.'

'Nay, nay,' cried the farmer; 'you'll have dinner, at least, before you go. 'Twill be ready soon, and I'd take it very onkindly if you left us without bite or sup.'

At this moment Mrs. Hardy came in, and thanked the clever scouts warmly for the great service they had rendered. She seconded her husband's invitation, and as one o'clock struck in thin chimes from a tall eight-day clock, they sat down to a plentiful dinner. Over the meal the talk turned on the journey the scouts were making, and the farmer and his wife were deeply interested in their adventures.

'But look here, now,' said Mr. Hardy; 'this fine piece of work you've done for us—and we shall never forget it—has fetched you out of your way, and cost you a lot of time.'

'We'll make it up before dark,' said Dick.

'Ay, by overtiring yourselves,' said the farmer. 'Now, suppose I run you along a piece of your way in my trap. I've got a Welsh cob that'll slip us along as if he'd but a feather behind him. I'll set you ten or twelve miles on your road, and be thankful if you'd give me the chance.'

The scouts looked at each other. It was a temptation. It was an undeniable temptation. It would make the march into Bardon a very simple affair on the morrow.

Then Chippy spoke up, his keen eye reading Dick's puckered brow and considering face.

'Yer want to march all the way,' he said quietly.

'I didn't at first, Chippy,' replied Dick. 'The offer of the lift seemed splendid, and it is immensely good of you,' he went on, turning to Mr. Hardy. 'But I'll tell you just where I stand. I'm under a sort of agreement with my father that it's to be a genuine march all the way. If I had a lift from you, it would hardly be fair as I see it. But that doesn't apply at all to my chum; he's quite at liberty to come with you.'

'I'll take one or both, and be proud to do it,' cried the farmer.

'Much obliged,' said Chippy in his hoarsest notes; 'but me and my comrade march together.' Nor could either of the scouts be shaken from his determination.



CHAPTER XLVI

DICK'S ACCIDENT

Dick and Chippy took the road again an hour after dinner amid a volley of cheers raised by the labourers on the farm. The men had gathered in the stockyard to see them start, and gave them three times three and a tiger; for the Hardys were very popular with their dependents, and, beyond that, the men felt respect for coolness, pluck, and skill for the sake of the qualities themselves.

The two scouts felt a glow of delight in this achievement such as no words can describe. They marched on their way with a swinging stride, as if they stood on air. First they had the keen professional delight of having built up by their own observation a theory which proved true in every particular save one—that the blood found on the scene of the accident had flowed from a cut in the arm, and not in the head. But that was a mere detail; in every item that mattered their deductions had proved sound.

'I should just like to have asked him when the brake went,' said Dick. 'Pretty well at the top of the hill, I know.'

'Must ha' done,' said Chippy, 'by the spin he'd got on the machine.'

They had not seen or spoken to their comrade before leaving the farm. Fred Hardy was in too weak a state even to know what his brother scouts had done for him, let alone seeing them or thanking them; his life still hung on a thread, but that thread would for a surety have been snapped had not the patrol-leaders discovered him and checked the bleeding.

'An' to think, arter follerin' him up, he turned out one of us,' murmured Chippy.

'Wasn't it splendid!' cried Dick.

Yes, that was the very crowning touch of the adventure. They would have done it all with the most cheerful willingness for anyone, old or young, sick or poor; but to rescue a brother scout—ah! that gave a flavour to the affair which filled them with purest delight.

Now the scouts swung forward with steady stride; they had lost a good deal of time, and the miles stretched before them—a formidable array to be ticked off before the spires of Bardon would be seen. This sweep back from Newminster was longer than the road they had followed to the city, and the extra distance was beginning to tell. They made a good strong march for three hours, and then halted for a short rest; and upon this halt a rather awkward accident took place, in which Dick was the sufferer.

The scouts had been tempted to pause at a point where a shallow brook ran for some hundreds of yards beside the road, forming one boundary. They had just made a long stretch of hot, dusty road, and their feet were aching. The water tempted them to halt, and strip off shoes and stockings, to bathe their heated and weary feet.

They sat down on the roots of a tree beside the stream, and dangled their feet in the cool running water, and found it very pleasant and refreshing.

'There's a fish acrost th' other side, just gone into a hole in the bank,' said Chippy; 'wonder if I could get 'im out?'

'Are you any good at catching fish with your hands, Chippy?' asked his companion. 'I never had any luck that way. I've tried in that brook on the heath, but they mostly seem to slip through my fingers.'

'There's a knack about it,' replied the Raven. 'Now, I dessay, Dick, ye tried to shut your hand round 'em.'

'Yes, I did,' said the Wolf.

'Ah, now, that's wheer ye went wrong,' returned his friend. 'Ye want to mark 'em down under a stone or in a hole, then press 'em hard agin the side, an' hold 'em theer a while. Then ye can jerk 'em out when they've lost their wind a bit.'

Chippy proceeded to show how it was done. He slipped his shirt-sleeve back to the shoulder, and introduced his hand cautiously into the hole. He made a sudden movement, and snapped 'Got 'im!' and held on. A minute later he drew out a small trout, his finger and thumb thrust into the gills, and showed it to Dick.

'Quarter-pounder for ye,' he said, and dexterously broke its neck.

'Let's see if we can get enough for supper, Chippy,' cried Dick; 'they'd go down first-rate with the sandwiches;' for Mrs. Hardy had insisted on storing their haversacks with a plentiful supply of ham and beef sandwiches. They spent half an hour or more paddling about in the cool, clear water, but only three small ones came to hand.

Then Chippy thrust his arm up a hole among the roots of an alder, and gave a chuckle of delight. 'A big un at last,' he cried; 'I've got 'im.' But suddenly his note changed.

'Ow!' he yelled, in comic anguish, and whipped his hand out of the hole. Blood was streaming from his forefinger.

'I say,' cried Dick, 'what a savage trout!'

''Tworn't a trout at all,' wailed the Raven; ''twor a big rat, an' he bit me.'

The scouts roared with laughter as Chippy flipped the blood into the water.

'He'd got you that time,' chuckled Dick.

'Sure enough,' nodded the Raven. 'I thought it wor' a pounder at the least. He's nigh on bit my finger through.'

Dick had his patrol staff in hand: he thrust it up the hole and tried to poke the rat out. But the hole twisted among the roots, and was a safe fortress for its wily defender.

'Well, I've done all the gropin' I want, this time,' remarked Chippy, washing his finger in the stream.

'Yes, we must be off again,' said Dick, and began slowly to wade towards the bank where their shoes and stockings lay.

Suddenly he started and picked up one foot.

'Ah!' cried Dick, 'that was sharp, and no mistake.'

'Wot's the matter?' called out Chippy, approaching him.

'Trod on something sharp,' said Dick.

'I should think yer did,' cried the Raven; 'look at yer foot. We must see to this.'

Dick looked, and saw the clear water stained with blood as it swept past his foot. He bent down and looked at the bed of the stream.

'Confound it all,' he said, 'it's the end of a broken bottle I've trodden on. No wonder it warmed me up a bit. Somebody's chucked it into the brook as they passed.'

The boys scrambled to the bank, and there Dick's wound was examined. It was on the outer side of the right heel, not long, but deep, for the broken bottle had thrust a sharp splintered point upwards, and the cut bled very freely. They washed it well in the cold water until the blood ceased to flow, then rubbed plenty of the mutton-fat in, for that was the only kind of ointment they had.

'Quite sure theer's no salt in this?' asked Chippy. ''Cos salt 'ud be dangerous.'

'Quite sure,' replied Dick. 'I boiled it down myself. It's pure fat.'

Chippy looked anxious. 'It's frightful awk'ard a cut in yer foot,' he said. 'How are ye goin' to march, Dick?'

'Oh, I'll march all right,' said Dick. 'I wish, though, it had been my finger, like yours, Chippy.'

The Raven nodded. 'True for you,' he said, 'ye don't ha' to tramp on yer hands.'

They bound up the cut in a strip torn from a handkerchief, got into their stockings and shoes, and went forward. Dick declared that his cut gave him little or no pain, but Chippy still looked uneasy. He knew that the time for trouble was ahead, when the cut would stiffen.



CHAPTER XLVII

THE LAST CAMP

'We'll never see Wildcombe Chase to-night, Chippy,' said Dick, as they stepped along.

'Not likely,' was the reply; 'we've a-lost too much time for that. An' now theer's that cut. What I say is this: let's mek' an early camp an' give yer foot a good rest. P'raps it'll feel better in the mornin'.'

'It isn't very bad now,' said Dick, 'only a little sore.'

'H'm,' grunted Chippy, 'so ye say. I know wot a deep cut like that means. We'll rest it as soon as we can.'

They paused on a triangle of grass at some cross roads and got out their map. Wildcombe Chase was altogether too far now, and they looked for a nearer camping-ground. They saw that they were within a mile of a village, and beyond that a by-way led across a large common. On this common they resolved to make their last bivouac.

They passed through the village without purchasing anything. They had plenty of food for supper in their haversacks, and though their tea and sugar and so on were finished, they did not intend to buy more. Even to purchase in small quantities would leave them with some on their hands, and they were not willing to spend the money. It was no mean, miserly spirit which moved them. Their scout's pride was concerned in carrying out the journey at as low a cost as possible, working their own way, as it were, through the country. For the money, as money, neither cared a rap. It must also be confessed that Dick was rather keen on handing back to his father a big part of the ten shillings. Dick remembered the twinkle in his father's eye, when Mr. Elliott handed over the half-sovereign for way money. The smile meant that he felt perfectly certain that the two boys would soon run through the ten shillings and have to turn back. Dick had perfectly understood, and the more he could return of that half-sovereign the prouder be would feel.

They pressed on across the common with a distant fir coppice for their landmark and goal. Such a place meant a comfortable bed for the night, and as soon as they gained its shelter Chippy cried halt, and forbade Dick to stir another step.

'It's been gettin' wuss and wuss lately,' said Chippy. 'Ye don't say a word, an' ye try to step out just as usual, but it's gettin' wuss an' wuss.'

'Oh, I don't mind admitting it's a trifle sore,' said Dick, 'but it will be all right in the morning.'

'Hope so,' said Chippy. 'Now you just drop straight down on that bank, an' I'll do th' odd jobs.'

Dick protested, but the Raven was not to be moved. He forced his chum to stretch himself on a warm, grassy bank while he made the preparations for camping that night. A short distance away a rushy patch betokened the presence of water. Dick pointed it out. 'I'll go over there and wash my foot,' he said.

'Right,' said Chippy, 'an' dab some more o' that fat on the cut.'

Dick found a little pool in the marshy place, and the cool water was very pleasant to his wounded foot, which had now become sore and aching. When he returned, Chippy was emerging from the coppice with armfuls of bedding; he had found a framework in the rails of a broken fence which had once bounded the firwood.

'Here, Chippy, I can lend a hand at that,' said Dick. 'There's no particular moving about in that job.'

'Aw' right,' said the Raven; 'then I'll set plenty o' stuff to yer hand an' see about the fire.'

Chippy soon had a fire going, and a heap of dry sticks gathered to feed it. A short distance away a big patch of gorse had been swaled in the spring. It had been a very partial affair, and the strong stems stood blackened and gaunt, but unburned. Thither went Chippy with the little axe, and worked like a nigger, hacking down stem after stem, and dragging them across until he had a pile of them also.

'They'll mek' a good steady fire for the night,' he remarked. Then he seized the billy.

'What d'ye say to a drop o' milk?' he said. 'We could manage that, I shouldn't wonder. When I wor' up in the wood I seen a man milkin' some cows t'other side o' the coppice, an' now as I wor' luggin' these sticks back I seen him a-comin' down the bank. Theer he goes.'

Chippy pointed, and Dick saw a man crossing the common with two shining milk-pails hanging from a yoke. At this warm season of the year the cows were out day and night, and the man had clearly come to milk them on the spot, and thus make a single journey instead of the double one involved in fetching them home and driving them back to the feeding-ground.

Dick turned out twopence, and Chippy pursued the retreating milkman. He returned, carrying the billy carefully.

'He wor' a good sort,' cried Chippy. 'He gied me brimmin' good measure for the money.'

The scouts now made a cheerful supper. Chippy broiled the trout in the ashes; Mrs. Hardy's sandwiches were very good, and the milk was heated in the billy and drunk hot from their tin cups.

Supper was nearly over when a small, reddish-coated creature came slipping through the grass towards them.

'There's a weasel,' said Dick, and the scouts watched it.

The little creature came quite near the fire, loping along, its nose down as if following a track. Then it paused, raised its head on the long snake-like neck, and looked boldly at the two boys, its small bright eyes glittering with a fierce light.

'Pretty cheeky,' said Dick, and threw a scrap of wood at it. The weasel gave a cry, more of anger than alarm, and glided away.

Within twenty minutes they saw a second weasel running along under the brake, nosing in every hole, and pausing now and again to raise its head and look round sharply on every hand.

'Weasels seem pretty busy about this 'ere coppice,' observed Chippy.

'No mistake about it,' agreed Dick. 'Do you know, Chippy, I've heard that they are always active and running about before bad weather.'

'Hope they've got another reason this time,' growled the Raven. 'Sky looks all right.'

'It does,' replied Dick.

The two scouts looked to every point of the compass, and raked their memories for weather signs, and compared what they remembered, but they could see nothing wrong. The sun was going down in a perfectly clear sky, and flooding the common with glorious light. There was no wind, no threat of storm from any quarter: the evening was cool, calm, and splendid.

'We'll turn in as soon as the sun's gone,' said Dick, 'and be up early in the morning, and make a long day of it.'

Chippy nodded, and the boys watched the great orb sinking steadily towards a long bank of purple woodland, which closed in the horizon.

'Wot's the home stretch run out at?' asked the Haven.

'The march in from here?' said Dick. 'Where's the map? We'll soon foot it up.'

The map was spread out, and careful measurements taken. 'Rather more than twenty-one miles,' said Dick.

Chippy whistled softly. 'We'd do it aw' right if nuthin' had happened to yer foot,' he murmured.

'We'll do it all right as it is,' cried the Wolf. 'Do you think I'm going to let that spoil our grand march? Not likely. I'll step it out to-morrow, and heel-and-toe it into Bardon every inch, Chippy, my boy.'

'It's a tidy stump on a cut foot,' said the Raven soberly.

'Hallo! what's that?' said Dick, and they looked round.

A furious squealing broke out among the trees behind them, and then a rabbit tumbled out of a bush, made a short scuttling run, and rolled over in a heap.

Close at its heels came the bloodthirsty little weasel in full pursuit, sprang on its prey once more, and fixed its teeth in the back of the rabbit's head, when the squealing broke forth anew.

Up leapt the Raven and took a hand in the affair at once. He caught up a stick of firewood, but the weasel ran away and left the rabbit kicking on the ground. Chippy picked up the bunny and came back to the fire.

'A good fat un, he cried, 'about three-parts grown. Good old weasel!'

'Very kind of him to go foraging for us,' laughed Dick.

'Ain't it?'—and the Raven showed the rabbit. It was not yet dead, and Chippy at once put it out of its pain by a sharp tap on the back of its neck with the edge of his hand. This killed it instantly.

'That's a good breakfast for us,' said Dick. 'We've got one or two sandwiches left as well.'

'Righto,' said Chippy, and turned to and skinned the rabbit, and cleaned it, ready for broiling in the morning.

Then they turned in, and were soon off to sleep.

Three hours later the Raven was wakened by something moving and sniffing about his bed. He sat up, and a creature, looking in the faint light something like a dog, ran away into the coppice.

Next Dick awoke, aroused by his chum's movements, and heard the Raven grunting and growling softly to himself.

'Anything wrong, Chippy?' he asked.

'Sommat's been here an' bagged the brekfus',' replied the Raven.

'Was it a dog prowling about?' cried Dick.

At this moment a hollow bark rang from the depths of the coppice:

'Wow-wow! Wow-wow!'

'There it is,' said Dick; 'a dog.'

'No,' replied Chippy. 'I know wot it is now. That's a fox. I'll bet theer's a vixen wi' cubs in this coppice, an' she's smelt the rabbit an' collared it.'

'Then I hope that weasel will start hunting again, laughed Dick, 'and chevy up another breakfast for us.'

'Well, it's gone, an' theer's no use tryin' to look for it,' said Chippy, and tucked himself up in his blanket again.



CHAPTER XLVIII

IN THE RAIN

The scouts were falling off to sleep once more when they were aroused again, this time by the divinest music. A nightingale began to sing in the little wood, and made it echo and re-echo with the richest song.

Suddenly a faint murmuring began to mingle with the lovely notes. The murmuring grew, and the bird's song ceased. The air was filled with the patter of falling rain.

'Rain!' cried Dick; 'that's rain, Chippy.'

'On'y a shower, p'raps,' said his comrade.

'I hope so,' returned the Wolf.

They felt nothing of the rain at present, for they were camped beneath a fir which stood as an outpost to the coppice, and its thick canopy was stretched above their heads. Chippy sprang up and threw fresh fuel on the fire, and looked out on the night.

'Theer's a big black cloud creepin' up from the sou'-west,' he said. 'That looks pretty bad for a soaker.'

In a short time the scouts knew they were in for a real drenching. The patter of the rain came heavier and thicker, until it was drumming on the fir-branches in steady streams. Soon great spots began to fall from the lower branches of the fir beneath which they lay.

'I've just had a big drop slap in my eye,' said Dick, sitting up. 'What are we going to do, Chippy?'

'Got to do summat,' said the Raven, 'an' quick, too, afore we're drownded out.'

'Let's rig up a shelter tent with the blankets,' suggested Dick; and they set to work at once. They pulled the four fence-rails which formed the framework of their bed from their places, and laid them side by side in search of the shorter ones. They proved much of the same size, so Chippy went to work with the hatchet to shorten a pair, while Dick began to dig the holes in which to step them. The ground was soft, and with the aid of his knife Dick soon had a couple of holes eighteen inches deep. While he did this Chippy had cut two rails down, and fastened a third across the ends of the shorter ones, with the scouts' neckties for cords. They had ample light to work by, for the fire had flared up bravely.

Now they swung up their framework of two posts and a cross-bar, and stepped the feet of the posts in the holes, throwing back the soft earth, and ramming it in with the short, thick pieces cut off the rails. This made a far stronger hold for the uprights than anything they could have done in the shape of sharpening their ends and trying to drive them down.

Next they took their blankets, and hung them side by side over the cross-bar, one overlapping the other by a couple of feet. With their knives they cut a number of pegs from the hard gorse stems, and sharpened them, and drove them through the blankets into the bar, pinning the blankets tightly in place. The tough gorse-wood went into the soft rail like nails, and the back of the tomahawk made a splendid hammer. They had a fourth rail, and they pegged the other ends of the blankets down to that, drew it backwards, and there was a lean-to beneath which they leapt with shouts of triumph.

'Done th' old rain this time,' yelled the Raven. 'Now we'll keep a rousin' fire goin', and sit here and listen to it.'

There was, luckily, no wind, or the scouts might not have been so jubilant; it was a heavy summer rain, pouring down strong and straight. The boys were pretty wet before they had got their shelter rigged up, but the fire was strong and warm, though it hissed vigorously as the heavy drops fell from the branches of the fir.

'Any chance of putting the fire out, do you think?' said Dick.

'Not if we keep plenty o' stuff on it,' replied his chum. 'Hark 'ow it's patterin' on the blankets!'

'They'll be jolly wet, and take some drying,' said Dick. 'Still, better for them to get wet than for us.'

'We ain't cut a trench,' said Chippy.

'To carry off the water,' cried Dick. 'No, we haven't. But we can dig that from cover, just round the patch we want to sit on.'

They went to work with their knives, and cut a trench six inches deep round the pile of bedding on which they were seated, and then had no fear of being flooded out with rain-water.

Down came the rain faster and heavier. The whole air was filled with the hissing, rushing noise of the great drops falling on the trees, the bushes, the open ground, but the scouts sat tight under their blanket lean-to, and fed the fire steadily from the heap of sticks and stems which the Raven had piled up.

'Weasels for weather-prophets for me arter this,' grunted Chippy; and Dick nodded his head.

'It was my Uncle Jim who told me that about the weasels,' said Dick. 'He said they're always very active before stormy weather.'

'Just about fits it this time, anyway,' remarked the Raven. The mention of Mr. Elliott brought to mind their chums in Bardon.

'I wonder how our patrols are getting on without us, Chippy?' said Dick.

'Oh, it'll gie the corporals a chance to try their 'ands at leadin',' returned the Raven. 'I wish they could just see us now. They'd gie their skins to jine us.'

'Rather,' laughed Dick; 'this is just about all right.'

It is possible that some persons might not have agreed with him, and at one o'clock in the morning might have preferred their beds to squatting on a heap of brushwood under the shelter of a blanket, the hissing fire making the only cheery spot in the blackness of the cloud- and rain-wrapped moorland. But the scouts would not have changed their situation for quarters in Buckingham Palace. There was the real touch about this. It seemed almost as romantic as a bivouac on a battlefield.

'Well, s'pose we try for a bit more sleep,' said the prudent Raven; 'long march to-morrer, yer know.'

'We've got to keep the fire up,' said Dick; 'it would never do to let that out.'

'O' course not,' replied Chippy; 'we must take turns to watch. Now, who gets fust sleep—long or short?'

He held up two twigs which he had plucked from the bedding; the ends were concealed in his hand.

'Short gets first sleep,' said Dick.

'Aw' right,' replied the Raven; 'you draw.'

Dick drew, and found he had the long draw.

'Wot's the time?' asked Chippy.

'Just turned one.'

'Right; then I'll sleep till three. Then you wake me, and I'll tek' a turn till five. Then we must be movin', for to-morrer's a long day.'

'To-day's a long day, you mean,' laughed Dick.

'So it is,' replied the Raven. 'It's to-day a'ready—o' course it is.'

He was about to coil himself round like a dog upon the hearth, when he cast a quick glance on the heap of firewood.

'Not enough theer,' he said; 'an' I ain't a-goin' to have ye hoppin' round on yer game foot.'

He sprang up again, and, in spite of Dick's protestations, caught up the axe and a flaming brand from the fire, and went down to the burnt gorse-patch, and hacked away till he had as many of the long stems as he could drag.

'They're a bit wet outside,' he said, as he returned; 'but they'll ketch all right if ye keep a good fire up, and theer's a plenty to last till I've finished my nap. Then I can fill in my time wi' cuttin' any amount.'

He curled himself up again, and was asleep in a moment.

Dick's watch was only two hours, but it seemed a long, long time. He kept a rousing fire going, such a fire as the rain could make no impression upon, and lost itself in the glowing depths in an angry spluttering. Once the heat made him so drowsy that he dreaded the terrible disgrace of falling asleep on his post. So he stuck his head from under the shelter, and washed the sleep out of his eyes in the slashing downpour. But even after that he was half asleep again, when a sluice of cold water came in at the point where the blankets overlapped, and very obligingly ran down his neck, and fetched him up with a jump. Now he had a job to do in arranging their cover, and he moved the ground rail a little back, and drew the blankets tauter. The simple shelter did its work nobly. It is true that towards the bottom the weight of water caused the blankets to sag, and there was a steady drip at that point; but it was beyond the spot where the scouts were crouching, and the sharp slant of the upper part ran the water safely over their heads.

Chippy woke upon the stroke of three in a manner which seemed to Dick perfectly miraculous.

'How did you do it?' asked the latter. 'I should never have awakened of myself in that style.'

'Yer must fix it on yer mind,' replied the Raven, 'and then somehow or other yer eyes open at the right time.'

'Well,' laughed Dick, 'I'm afraid it's no use my trying to fix five o'clock in my mind. You'll have to wake me, Chippy.'

'I'll wake ye fast enough,' returned the Raven. 'Now roll yerself up, an' go to bye-bye. It'll be broad daylight soon. Most likely the rain will stop at sun-up.'

Day was breaking, but grey and chill, and the rain still poured down in lines which scarcely slanted. The scouts, however, were quite warm, for there was no wind, and the leaping fire sent ample heat into the nook where they lay.

Dick placed his haversack for a pillow, and laid his head on it. The sleep he had been fighting off descended on him in power, and he knew no more until Chippy shook his arm and aroused him at five o'clock.

His eyes opened on a very different scene from that he had last gazed upon. The rain was over; the morning was bright with glowing sunshine; the new-bathed country looked deliciously fresh and green; a most balmy and fragrant breeze was blowing; and in copse and bush a hundred birds were singing, while the lark led them all from the depths of the blue sky.

'What a jolly morning!' cried Dick.

'Aw' right, ain't it?' grinned the Raven. 'The rain stopped a little arter four, an' the sun come out, an' it's been a-gettin' better an' better.'

Suddenly Dick looked up. The blankets had gone. Chippy laughed.

'Look behind,' he said.

Dick looked, and saw that the Raven had been very busy. He had built a fresh fire with a heap of glowing embers from the old one; the billy had served him as an improvised shovel. Over this fire he had erected a cage of bent sticks, and the blankets were stretched on the framework and drying in style; the steam was rising from them in clouds.

'That's great,' said his chum; 'I wondered more than once in the night what we should do with sopping wet blankets.'

'They'll be all right in a while again.' And the Raven gave them a turn. 'Now we've got to wire in and hunt up a brekfus.'

Dick turned out the haversack which held the food they had left, but it made a very poor apology for a meal.

'I could put that lot in a holler tooth, an' never know I'd had aught,' said Chippy. 'This scoutin' life mek's yer uncommon peckish.'

'Rather,' cried the Wolf, who was as hungry as the animal after which his patrol was named; and the two boys began to scout for their last wild, free breakfast-table.



CHAPTER XLIX

DIGGING A WELL

The two scouts crept along the edge of the coppice, eye and ear on the alert. They were hoping to surprise a rabbit in a play-hole, but though they saw plenty of rabbits scuttling to shelter, every hole proved the mouth of a burrow, and that was too much for them to attempt. They worked clean round the coppice, saw dozens of rabbits, but were never within a mile of catching one; at last they came back to their camp.

'It strikes me, Chippy, we shall have to divide the scraps we've got left, tighten our belts, and strike out for the next baker's shop.'

'Looks like it,' murmured the Raven. 'I'm jolly thirsty too.'

'So am I,' said Dick; 'let's see if we can find a pool of clear water in the swampy patch yonder.'

They went down to the little marsh, but though there was plenty of water, it all appeared thick and uninviting. Being scouts, the boys were very careful of what water they drank, and they looked suspiciously on the marsh pools.

'No drink nayther,' said the Raven; 'we'd better get a start on us for a country wheer there's things to be got.'

'Wait a bit, Chippy,' replied his comrade. 'I think I know a dodge to get round this, if we only had a spade to dig with. It's a trick my Uncle Jim put me up to. He often used it when he was travelling in Africa.'

Dick explained what was to be done, and the Raven nodded.

'If that's all there is to it,' remarked the latter, 'I'll soon find the spades.'

He returned to the camp, seized the tomahawk, and began to cut at one of the pieces chopped off the rails. In five minutes of deft hewing Chippy turned the broad, flat piece of timber into a rude wooden shovel. Dick seized it with a cry of admiration.

'Why, this will do first-rate, old chap,' he asid. 'The ground is pretty sure to be soft.'

'Go ahead, then,' said the Raven. 'I'll jine ye wi' another just now.'

Dick went down to the swamp, and chose a grassy spot about twenty feat from the largest pool. Here with his knife he cut away a patch of turf about a couple of feet across; then he went to work with his wooden spade on the soft earth below. In a short time Chippy joined him, and the two scouts had soon scraped a hole some thirty inches deep. From the sides of the hole water began to trickle in freely, and a muddy pool formed in the hollow. Dick now took the billy, and carefully baled the dirty water out. A fresh pool gathered, not so dirty as the first, but still far from clean. This, too, was baled out, and a third gathering also. Then the water came in clear and cool and sweet, and the scouts were able to drink freely.

Chippy was warm in his praise of this excellent dodge, when suddenly he stopped, caught up the wooden spade, and, with a single grunt of 'Brekfus ahoy!' was gone.

His eye, ever on the alert, had marked a small figure scuttling along in the undergrowth of the coppice, and he was in hot pursuit. In two minutes he was back with a fat hedgehog.

'Ye've tasted this afore,' he said. 'How about another try?'

'Good for you, Chippy!' cried Dick; 'it was first-rate. Will you cook it the same way?'

'There ain't none better,' replied the Raven, and set to work at once to prepare and cook the prey of his spade. In the end the scouts made an excellent breakfast. They enjoyed hedgehog done to a turn—or, rather, to a moment, as there was no turning in the matter—the remains of Mrs. Hardy's sandwiches, and a billy of water drawn from their own well. The well and the breakfast took some time, and their start was much later than they had intended that it should be. But, on the other hand, there were the blankets to dry, and between the sun and the fire the latter were quite dry enough to pack away in the haversacks when the scouts were ready to move.

Dick's foot had become quite easy during the night's rest, but after a couple of miles the cut began to let him know that it was there. By the time they had covered four miles it was very painful, and he was limping a little. Then they struck a canal on the side opposite to the towpath, and they sat down beside it on a grassy bank and cooled off a little before they stripped for a good swim in the clear water.

When Dick took off his shoe and stocking, the Raven whistled and looked uneasy. The flesh all round the cut looked red and angry, and the heel was sore to the touch.

'Isn't it a nuisance,' groaned Dick, 'for a jolly awkward cut like that to come in and make the going bad for me? But I'll stick it out, Chippy. It's the last day, and I'll hobble through somehow and finish the tramp.'

'We'll pass a little town 'bout a mile again, accordin' to the map,' said the Raven, 'an' there we'll get some vaseline.'

'Good plan,' said Dick; 'that's splendid stuff for a cut.'

They had their dip, dressed, and pushed forward. At the little town they called at a chemist's and bought a penny box of vaseline. As soon as they reached quiet parts again, Dick took off his shoe and stocking, and rubbed the wound well with the healing ointment, then covered the bandage with a good layer, and tied it over the cut, and rested for half an hour. This greatly eased the pain and discomfort, and they trudged on strongly for a couple of hours.

Suddenly the scouts raised a cheer. Above a grove of limes a short distance ahead, a church steeple sprang into sight.

'Half-way!' cried Dick. 'We've done half the journey, Chippy. Here's Little Eston steeple.'

The Raven nodded. 'We'll halt t'other side,' he said.

In the village they bought a small loaf and a quarter of a pound of cheese, and those were put into Chippy's haversack. At a cottage beyond the hamlet they lent a hand to a woman who was drawing water from her well, and filled their billy with drinking-water at the same time. They made another three hundred yards, then settled on a shady bank under a tall hawthorn-hedge for their midday halt.

'How's yer foot, Dick?' queried the Raven anxiously.

'A bit stiff,' replied Dick; 'but that vaseline has done it a lot of good. I'll peg it out all right yet, Chippy, my son. Now for bread and cheese. It will taste jolly good after our tramp, I know.'

It did taste very good, and the scouts made a hearty meal, and then lay for a couple of hours at ease under the pleasant hawthorns, now filled with may-blossom.



CHAPTER L

THE OLD HIGGLER

Before they started again Dick gave his foot another rubbing with vaseline, but found it hard going after the rest.

'Look here, Chippy,' he said, 'I mustn't halt again for any length of time. If I do, my foot may stiffen up till I can't move. We must make one long swing in this afternoon.'

The road that ran from Little Eston in the direction of Bardon had a broad strip of turf beside the way, and Dick found this a great ease to his aching foot. But after a time the road narrowed, and was dusty from hedge to hedge. They passed a sign-post which said, 'Two miles to Little Eston.'

'That's a couple scored off,' said Dick; 'the miles are less than double figures now, Chippy.'

'Yus,' said the latter; 'an' we'll get to Shotford Common soon. That'll be easier walkin' than the road.'

A short distance beyond the sign-post an old man leading a small donkey in a little cart met them, and they passed the time of day.

'Mortal hot, ain't it?' said the old man; and the scouts agreed with him. The heat was, indeed, sweltering. It was one of those days of early summer which seem borrowed from the dog-days, and the scouts, tough as they were, were dripping with sweat as they marched along with shirt-sleeves rolled nearly to their shoulders, their shoes and stockings thickly powdered with the white dust which lay deep under foot.

Suddenly Chippy pulled up. 'I'll 'ave that haversack o' yourn,' he remarked.

'You won't, old boy,' replied Dick. 'Every man shoulders his own pack on a day like this.'

'I'll have that haversack,' went on Chippy calmly. 'Bit too bad for a scout wi' a damaged foot to pull a load while another strolls along as easy as can be. So pass it over.'

'I won't,' said Dick. 'It's no load in particular.'

'Then why mek' a row about handin' it over?' queried the Raven.

Dick was about to reply when he paused, looked ahead, and said: 'By Jingo, Chippy, here comes a choker. The haversacks will come handy to put our heads into.'

The Raven turned and saw a huge pillar of dust whirling towards them. It rose high above the hedges beyond a bend near at hand, and came on at great speed. The scouts knew that a motor-car was at the fore-foot of the pillar, and they stepped back into the shallow ditch which bordered the way.

In another moment a big, heavy car, flying at terrific speed, came shooting round the bend, and as it flew it gathered the deep white dust, and hurled it thirty feet into the air; leaving the road in the wake of the car one utterly blinding, choking mass of eddying dust. The scouts threw themselves into the bank and covered their faces with their hats: it was the only way of drawing some sort of breath, and even then their throats were choked with dust till they coughed.

'Nice thing, a motor-car running forty miles an hour over two inches of dust,' remarked Dick in ironical tones.

'It 'ud serve 'em right to bust their tyres on a broken bottle end,' murmured Chippy. 'It ain't safe to scoot along like that on these 'ere narrow roads.'

'It's to be hoped they eased up before passing the old man and his donkey-cart,' said Dick. 'The wind of their passing would be enough almost to upset him.'

'That's wot they've done,' cried Chippy suddenly. 'Look! look! his cart's in the ditch.'

Dick looked, and saw through the thinning cloud that the poor old man was in distress. His cart was turned over, and the donkey was struggling on its side. The scouts ran back at full speed to help him.

'What's wrong?' cried Dick. 'Did the car hit you?'

''Twor comin' a main sight too fast,' cried the old man, 'an' just as it passed, the noise o' it med Jimmy start round an' swerve a bit, an' suthin' stickin' out caught him on the shoulder an' knocked him into the ditch as if he'd been hit wi' a cannon-ball.'

'And they never stopped or asked what was the matter?' cried Dick.

'Not they,' said the old man; 'on they went as fast as iver.'

'What cads!' cried Dick. 'Did you see the number, Chippy?'

'No,' replied the Raven. 'Too much dust.'

'There were four men in it,' went on the old man, 'an' they looked back at me, but they niver pulled up.'

The scouts were loud in their anger against the inconsiderate motorists, and they were perfectly right. The truth was that the men had fled in fear. A chauffeur had taken his master's car without permission to give some of his fellow servants a run, and they dreaded detection, which would get them into trouble at home. However, the car had gone, and its number was not known, and within half a mile there was a meeting of cross roads where the motorists could turn aside without passing through the village. The comrades gave their attention to the matter immediately in hand, and helped the old man to unharness the struggling donkey and draw the little cart back.

The poor beast did not attempt to rise when it was freed. There was a cut on the shoulder where it had been struck, but the wound was not bleeding much, and the old man did not think the hurt was so bad as it proved to be.

'S'pose we tried to get Jimmy on his legs,' he proposed, and the two scouts sprang to help him. They were trying to raise the poor brute when a gamekeeper with his gun under his arm came through a gate near at hand.

'Hallo, Thatcher, what's wrong?' he called out.

'Why, 'tis one o' these here danged motor-cars,' replied the old man. 'Gooin' faster than an express train along this narrow way, an' knocked Jimmy into the ditch.'

The gamekeeper came up, and at the first glance called upon them to lay the donkey down again.

'Let me have a look at him,' he said. 'That cut's nothing. There's worse than that cut, I fancy.'

'I hope no bones have a-gone,' said the donkey's master.

'That's just where it is, Thatcher,' said the gamekeeper, after a short examination. 'The poor beast's shoulder is a-broke right across. He'll ne'er stand on his four legs again.'

Thatcher uttered a cry of distress.

'Broke across, ye say, keeper! Then what's to be done with him?'

'Nothing,' said the keeper; 'there's nothing ye can do to cure him. The poor brute's in agony now. Look at his eyes!'

'Nothin' ye can do,' repeated the owner in a dull voice, his eyes almost as full of distress as those of his injured helpmate. 'An' Jimmy were the best donkey as iver pulled a cart.'

'Nothin' at all,' said the keeper, ''cept a charge o' No. 6,' and he tapped the breech of his gun significantly.

'Shoot him?' cried old Thatcher.

'It's that or let him die slowly in misery,' replied the keeper. 'If ye like I'll put him out of his pain before I go on, but I can't stay long, for I've got to meet someone in Hayton Spinney, and I ought to be there now.'

'You're quite sure nothing can be done?' said Dick to the keeper.

'Perfectly sure, sir,' replied the man; 'the shoulder bone's clean gone. If it wor' a hunter worth three hundred guineas nothing could be done to save the creature's life.'

Jimmy was not worth three guineas, let alone three hundred, but when the keeper had mercifully ended the poor brute's sufferings with a cartridge, and hurried on to his appointment, he left old Thatcher heart-broken beside the body of his faithful servant.

'I dunno what I'm goin' to do now!' cried the poor old fellow to the scouts, who remained at his side to see what help they could render. 'Ye see, wi' Jimmy to help me I've med a few shillin's a week, doin' a bit o' higgling an' odd jobs in carryin' light things. That's kept me out o' the Work'us. But I'm a lost man now. There's nowt but the Union for me, I doubt. An' I've fowt hard to keep out o' that.'

The scouts tried to console him, but the loss of his donkey was a heavy blow to the old higgler.

'Where am I goin' to get another?' he said. 'I'm a bit short-handed now wi' my rent, for I've been ill a good bit on an' off last winter. Eight-an'-twenty shillin' I gave for Jimmy; an' I ain't got eight-an'-twenty fardens to spare.'

He heaved a bitter sigh, and began to strip the harness off the companion of his daily journeys. The scouts helped, and the harness was tossed into the little cart. That had escaped very well in the overset: one shaft was cracked, and that was all.

'Joseph Thatcher, Little Eston,' read Dick, from the side of the cart.

'Ay, that's me,' said the higgler. 'Joe Thatcher: lived in Little Eston all my life.'

'And you were on your road home?' went on Dick.

'Just comin' back from town,' replied the old man. 'I'd been wi' a load of butter an' fowls an' what-not for two or three neighbours, an' left the things at different shops. An' now I must get my cart home somehow an' tell my neighbours what's happened.'

'I see,' said Chippy. 'That's aw' right. I'll run yer cart home for ye.'

'Yes,' said Dick; 'we'll soon run it home for you.'

'No, yer don't,' said the Raven to his friend. 'Ye'll stop here an' tek' care o' the traps till I get back;' and with these words he whipped off haversack and jacket, and tossed them on to the bank.

'Oh, that won't do, Chippy,' cried Dick; 'that's just a trick to prevent me lending a hand.'

'Trick or no trick, it's just wot 'ull happen,' said the Raven firmly. 'It's rather more'n two miles back to Eston—that's four goin' an' comin', an' you wi' a game foot. No, not an inch back do ye stir. Besides, it gies me the chance to strip to the work nice an' comfortable.'

'But you can't shift that cart by yourself,' cried Dick.

Chippy uttered a grunt of scorn.

'There's nothing in it 'cept the harness,' he said. 'Can't shift that, eh?'

He took the shafts and ran the cart into the way as if it had been a big wheelbarrow: there was surprising strength in his slight but sinewy figure.

'Come on, gaffer!' cried Chippy, and he trundled the cart rapidly away down the road, leaving Dick on guard perforce beside his comrade's equipment.

Within three-quarters of an hour Chippy was back, travelling at scout's pace.

'You've been jolly quick, Chippy,' shouted Dick.

'Had a bit o' luck,' returned the Raven, wiping his sweat-soaked face; 'met a farmer's cart goin' into Eston, and tied th' old man's cart at the back, so I didn't 'ave to go all the way.'

'What about the motor-car?' asked Dick. 'Had it run through the village?'

'Not it,' replied the other; 'turned sharp to the left at the cross-roads.'

Dick got out the map, and the scouts saw that the driver knew the country; he had taken the most solitary road of the neighbourhood.

'A set of sneaks,' said Dick.

'Bad uns,' agreed his chum.

'I say, Chippy, it was no end good of you to cut off like that with the cart, but I would rather have lent a hand,' cried Dick.

'Let's 'ave a look at that 'ere foot,' was the Raven's only reply.

The foot was looked at, anointed with vaseline, bound up afresh, and then the march was resumed.

Dick now had a very bad quarter of an hour, for his foot had stiffened rather while Chippy was away. But he set himself to tramp it out, and when they passed a station beside the road, and heard an engine whistle, and saw from a bridge the rails running away towards Bardon, he only limped on faster, and put aside the temptation of a lift in by train.

After a while his foot became more easy, and he was able to set it down without giving any decided indication that there was something amiss. For this he was very glad before long, when the two scouts met friends who would soon have spotted a lame walker, and have cut his march short.



CHAPTER LI

THE WELCOME HOME

It was about half-past four when they gained a point where the country began to wear a familiar look.

'Shotford Corner!' cried Chippy. 'We'll see Bardon from the cob.'

The cob, as Chippy called it, was a small knoll on which stood a finger post, with many arms to guide wayfarers along the roads which met at Shotford Corner. The boys gained the knoll by the smallest of the side-roads which ran in at that point.

They paused beneath the finger-post, and looked ahead. There was their old familiar heath spreading away to the distant spires of Bardon, and from this point on they knew every step of the way. 'Six miles to Bardon' was on the arm above their heads.

'We'll be home in less than a couple of hours now,' said Dick. 'We'll put this journey to our credit easily enough, Chippy.'

Suddenly behind them a wild honk-honk—h-o-n-k of a motor-horn broke out. The boys looked along the road, and saw a car coming towards them at full speed with two figures in it. The driver was performing a fantasia on his horn; the passenger was waving his cap.

'Why,' cried Dick, 'it's my father out in his car with Uncle Jim.'

'Well, here you are,' shouted Mr. Elliott, as the car sped up to them. 'We've been scouring these roads all the afternoon in search of you. How have you got on?'

'Oh, splendid, father—splendid,' cried Dick. 'We should like to start again on Monday, shouldn't we, Chippy?'

'It 'ud suit me fust rate,' said the Raven, respectfully saluting his employers.

'Well,' laughed Mr. Elliott, 'I don't know about that. I'm afraid there'd be trouble with your headmaster and with Mr. Malins, who has rather missed Slynn.'

The Raven saluted again, blushing with pleasure to find that the manager had missed his services.

'You look uncommonly fit, the pair of you,' said Mr. Jim Elliott, marking the brown faces, the lean, lithe look of the hardy, toughened scouts.

'Yes, uncle, we feel up to the work all round, and we've had a grand time.'

'Have you had plenty to eat?' asked Dick's father.

'Plenty, father,' cried Dick;' and we've had the jolliest times sleeping. Three nights we camped, one we slept in a hayloft, and one in the cabin of a barge.'

'Lodgings have been cheap, then?' chuckled Mr. Elliott; 'but how much of the second half-sovereign have you spent for food?'

Dick laughed in triumph, and fetched out the bit of gold.

'Not a stiver,' he said; 'and there's the best part of the other half-sovereign too.' And he laid a heap of silver and copper in his father's hand.

Mr. Elliott counted it in surprise. 'Why, there's seventeen and fourpence farthing here,' he said. 'Do you mean to say you two have been out for a week, and only spent two and sevenpence three-farthings all told?'

'We do,' cried Dick. 'We've won and earned fairly all the rest of our food. I'll tell you everything, and you shall judge for yourself, father. But it's too long a tale to go into now.'

Mr. Elliott stared through his goggles in wonder at the money. 'Well, Jim,' he said at last to his brother, 'these scouts of yours can look after themselves, it seems.'

'That's the chief thing that Baden-Powell's scouts are expected to learn,' said the instructor, smiling; 'it is quite clear that Dick and Slynn have picked up the art in great form.'

'Done the whole thing on two and sevenpence three-farthings!' repeated Mr. Elliott, his wonder growing as he thought it over. 'Dick, you'd better come into the business straight away. You'd be able, I should say, to give your uncle and myself most valuable advice on the subject of cutting down expenses.'

Dick laughed, for his father's surprise filled him with the utmost delight. Chippy, too, was on the broad grin.

'Here,' said Mr. Elliott suddenly, 'take it; it's yours. Share it up between you.' He poured gold, silver, and copper into the hat which Dick promptly held out for the money.

'I'm not going to say "no" to that offer, father,' said Dick; 'for I've a use for my half of the money.'

'Same here,' murmured Chippy; 'the party's name is Joseph Thatcher, Little Eston.'

'Now, Chippy,' cried Dick, 'how in the world did you know what was in my mind?'

The Raven chuckled. 'I knowed,' he murmured, and would say no more.

Dick explained who Joseph Thatcher was, and what misfortune had befallen him.

'He gave twenty-eight shillings for the donkey,' concluded Dick, 'and this will go a long step towards setting him up again. The poor old chap's horribly frightened of the workhouse at present.'

'Ah,' said his father, 'the road-hog is the curse of decent motor-drivers. One black sheep can cover the whole flock with discredit. Well, now, boys, jump in, and I'll run you into Bardon in triumph.'

'Oh no, no, father,' cried Dick; 'thank you very much, but that would spoil the whole thing. We must finish it out to the last step on foot.'

'What Spartans!' said Mr. Elliott; 'still ready to face six miles of hot, dusty road after a week's tramping.'

'Yes, father, we must do it,' replied Dick. 'To finish up in a motor-car would take the shine off the whole affair.'

'Well, well, as you please,' laughed Mr. Elliott; 'then, you can hand that money back. Your uncle and I are out for a spin, and we'll slip over as far as Eston, and see Mr. Joseph Thatcher, and console him for his loss with your offering. If one motorist upset him, it's only right for another to do the friendly.'

Dick hailed this proposal with delight, and handed back the seventeen shillings and four-pence farthing. 'I'll be bound the poor old chap will get enough to buy a new donkey before all's done,' chuckled Dick.

'Can't say,' said Mr. Elliott, preparing to back and fill till he had his car round; 'depends on whether your uncle's got any loose silver to throw away. Well, we shall catch you up again long before you reach Bardon.'

The car sped away, and the boy scouts watched it for a moment, then marched on down the Bardon road.

'Bit of a temptation, worn't it, to tumble into the car?' said Chippy.

'Oh, Chippy, that would have spoilt it all!' cried Dick. 'My foot's giving me beans rather, but I'm not going to chuck it for a six-mile tramp.'

'I know just how ye feel,' replied the Raven; ''twould ha' seemed to tek' the polish off, but I was thinkin' o' yer foot.'

'That will be all right after a day or two's rest,' said Dick; 'but with the end of the journey in sight I mean to stump it out.'

A couple of miles on he was stumping it out steadily, when all thoughts of lameness and soreness were put to flight by a joyous vision; for just as they gained the heath two files of marching figures came into sight in the distance. The familiar uniforms at once caught the eye of the two patrol-leaders.

'Scouts!' cried Chippy.

'Our own patrols!' yelled Dick. 'Look, Chippy; our patrols have come out to meet us!'

At this instant the two marching figures were seen by the advancing patrols, and on dashed Wolves and Ravens, eager to greet their leaders. Dick and Chippy hurried to meet them, and at the next moment the two leaders and their comrades met, and there was such an outburst of cheering, questioning, shaking hands, and chanting of the scouts' war-song and chorus—a general merry babel of welcome and greeting!

The first to recover were the corporals, who had been in charge while the leaders were absent.

They gave orders for the patrols to line up, and the Scouts obeyed instantly. Wolves on the right of the way, Ravens on the left, they formed up shoulder to shoulder to be inspected by their leaders. Dick and Chippy each went along his own line, and saw that the men were turned out in proper style, and the inspection was careful and thorough. Everything was found correct, and the corporals were congratulated on the manner in which they had handled the patrols during the absence of the leaders. Then review order was broken up, and the patrols gathered in cheerful, laughing, chattering groups to discuss the week's march with the heroes of the day. The Wolf Patrol was a member short. No. 6 had left the town during the week, and his place was vacant among Dick's followers.

'I say, Dick,' said Billy Seton, corporal of the Wolves, 'there's a fellow been following us from the town. He's kept at a distance, dodging behind bushes and gorse on the heath, but I'm sure he was after us. I've looked back a dozen times, and seen him making ground when he thought he wouldn't be observed.'

'That's odd,' said Dick. 'Why should anyone want to follow you?'

'To see where we were going, I suppose,' replied Billy; 'and though I've never had a fair look at him, there seemed to me something familiar about the chap. I can't make it out.'

'Where is he now?' asked Dick.

'Haven't seen him for quite a bit,' replied Billy; 'but I've an idea he's watching us from somewhere.'

The words had scarcely fallen from Billy's lips when a boy in civilian dress stepped from the shelter of a clump of hollies and walked swiftly towards the patrol.

'Why, it's Arthur Graydon!' cried Dick in surprise.

'So it is,' said Billy; 'no wonder I thought I knew him.'

Yes, it was the lost leader of the Wolves who now came striding up to his old friends, as the latter stared at him in wonder.

Arthur's face was pale, and his teeth were clenching his under-lip; but he had made up his mind, and he said what he had to say like a man.

He walked up amid a perfect silence, and saluted the two leaders, who now stood side by side.

'Look here, Dick,' he began—and his voice shook a little—'I heard, by accident, of this march to meet you, and I took the chance of coming when the patrols were together. I'm awfully sorry I made such an ass of myself in the beginning. I've been miserable every day since I left the patrol, and I should like, above everything, to get back to it. I know I behaved badly to Slynn, and insulted him, when he had given me no cause at all. I'm sorry, Slynn. Will you shake hands?'

'Won't I?' roared Chippy, his honest face ablaze with pleasure and friendship. 'An' proud to—prouder 'n I can tell yer.' And the two lads clasped each other's hands in a hearty grip, while both patrols gave vent to their excitement in a tremendous outburst of the scouts' chorus, stamping their feet and clashing their staves together in joyous uproar.

Every boy had been touched deeply by Arthur's speech. His pale face and shining eyes had told of the effort it had cost him to make it, and now everybody set up as much noise as he could to celebrate the reconciliation, and to work off the constraint of the moment.

When Chippy dropped Arthur's hand, Dick seized it.

'I'm jolly glad to see you back, Arthur, old chap,' he cried. 'We shall be delighted to have you in the patrol once more.'

'Thanks awfully, Dick,' said Arthur. 'I heard No. 8 had gone. If I can only get his place, that's what I should like.'

'It's yours, old fellow,' said Dick, 'and long may you wave!'

'H-o-n-k!' A long blast of the motor-horn warned the patrol that Mr. Elliott's car was close upon them. The scouts recognised their instructor seated beside the driver, and formed up to receive him with the full salute.

'I see you've got a guard of honour back to town,' laughed Dick's father, as he brought the car up between the two lines of scouts.

'Yes, father,' cried Dick; 'we think it was immensely good of them to come out to meet us.'

The instructor leaned over the side of the car towards the line of the Wolves.

'Arthur!' he cried, 'this is splendid to see you among the Wolves again.'

'Yes, Mr. Elliott,' said Arthur Graydon, saluting. 'Dick has given me a place there was to spare, and I'm glad to get it.'

The driver blew a long toot on his horn to call attention to something he had to say.

'Wolves and Ravens,' he called out, 'I beg to invite you all to conclude your march this afternoon at my house. With your permission, your instructor and I will now go ahead to announce your arrival, and to see that preparations are made to welcome you in a fitting manner.' And at the next moment the car sped away amid the ringing cheers of the scouts, who now felt certain that the day was to close with a noble feed.

The march was at once resumed, and the scouts tramped over the heath to Bardon chanting the Ingonyama chorus in honour of their leaders. The corporals sang the opening phrase, and then the patrols swept in with a joyous roar of 'Invooboo!' and struck the ground with their staves in time to the long-drawn notes. And at their head marched the brother scouts, their journey nearly ended—the journey which they had made in true scouting style—helpful and courteous to all, hardy, resolute, and enduring, staunch to their oath and their badge, bearing themselves at all points as true knights in the chivalry of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts.

THE END