He did not look at all like a hero, nor even like the picture of a scout on the cover of a boys' magazine....



CHAPTER XXIII

ROY BLAKELEY KEEPS STILL—FOR A WONDER

"Yes, that was the one trouble with Tom Slade—he couldn't obey orders."

"I think you're rather severe," said Mrs. Ellsworth.

"He had his work all cut out for him here," persisted her husband relentlessly. "He knew the part the scouts were supposed to play in the war, but he thought he knew more than I did about it. He gave me his promise, and then he broke his word. He flunked on his first duty."

Mr. Ellsworth pushed his coffee cup from him and pushed his chair back from the dining table in a very conclusive manner.

For a moment no one spoke. The young man in the soldier's uniform gazed into his empty cup and said nothing. Then he looked up at Mrs. Ellsworth as if he hoped she would answer her husband. Of the four who sat there in the Ellsworths' pleasant little dining room, Roy Blakeley was the first to speak.

"He'll make a good soldier, anyway," he said.

"A good soldier is one who obeys orders," said Mr. Ellsworth, tightening his lips uncompromisingly. "Tom Slade's war duties were very clearly mapped out for him. And, besides, he gave me his promise; you heard him, didn't you?"

"Yes, I did," said Roy reluctantly.

"All I asked of him," continued the scoutmaster, "was to do his bit as a scout with the Colors, till he was of military age. He gave me his promise—you heard him—and then he desert——"

"Oh, don't say that," said Mrs. Ellsworth; "that's a dreadful word!"

The young man in uniform bit his lip and started to move his chair back; then, as if uncertain what to do, remained where he was.

"A promise is a promise," said the scoutmaster. "You can't build up anything good on the foundation of a broken promise."

"Don't you think a person might be justified in breaking a promise?" said the soldier diffidently.

"No, sir; not if it is humanly possible to keep it.—Besides, Tom must have had to lie to get into the army."

There was a moment's pause.

"It was dreadful to think of his pawning his Gold Cross," said Mrs. Ellsworth; "if he had only kept his word and waited a little while——"

"He would never have had that Cross to pawn if he hadn't been brave," said Roy, flushing slightly.

"Good for you, Roy!" said the young soldier.

Mr. Ellsworth laughed pleasantly at Roy's unshakable faith in his absent friend.

"That's right, Roy," said Mrs. Ellsworth, with a very sweet smile. "You stand up for him."

"If I can't stand up for him, I'll keep still," said Roy.

"Well, then, I guess you'll have to keep still," laughed Mr. Ellsworth, "for there isn't much defense. I did all I could for Tom," he added, more soberly. "If his three years of scouting didn't teach him to keep his word with me as I always kept mine with him, it must have been to no purpose. He might have waited a little, kept his solemn promise, and gone into the army under the same honorable conditions as you did," he said, turning to the soldier; "and we should all have——"

"What's the matter?" exclaimed Roy.



Roscoe Bent had thrown his chair back and without so much as excusing himself had stridden over to the bay window, where he stood holding the curtain aside and looking out.

"What is it—reveille?" the scoutmaster laughed.

"May I smoke a cigarette?" Roscoe asked nervously.

"Uncle Sam hasn't cured you of that, has he?" Mr. Ellsworth laughed. "Sure; go ahead."

The soldier's abrupt movement seemed to terminate the little after-dinner chat, and Mrs. Ellsworth, bent on other duties perhaps, or possibly foreseeing that her husband wished to "talk business," arose also and left the three to themselves.

"I—er—don't smoke as much as I did," said Roscoe; "but sometimes—er—a cigarette sort of pulls you together. What—what were you going to say?"

He returned and sat down again at the table.

"Why, nothing in particular," said Mr. Ellsworth, "except this: I want you to drive home to these boys of mine this lesson of obedience, this necessity for respecting a promise above all things, and of obeying an order from one whom they've promised to obey. You get me?"

"I—I think I do."

"This meeting which we're holding in conjunction with the Y. M. C. A. to-morrow night is the last one before I go away myself. When I heard you were going to be home from camp over the week-end, it just popped into my head that I'd ask you to come around and give the boys a spiel. They've all got a great admiration for you, Roscoe. I suppose it's because your uniform becomes you so well. You make a pretty fine-looking soldier. Anybody tell you that?"

"Miss—Margaret Ellison, in the Temple Camp office, was kind enough to hint as much," admitted Roscoe humorously.

He did look pretty handsome in his new khaki. He had a figure as straight as an arrow and a way of holding his head and carrying himself with the true soldier air. Besides, his blond, wavy hair, always attractive, seemed to harmonize with his brown uniform, and his blue eyes had a kind of dancing recklessness in them.

"All the boys have promised to be there—the Methodist Troop, the East Bridgeboro Troop, and mine——"

"Which is the best of all," put in Roy.

Roscoe laughed merrily.

"We'll have the Y. M. C. A. boys and three full troops as well."

"Except for Tom," said Roy.

"We won't talk of Tom any more," said Mr. Ellsworth. "That's a tale that is told. It's a closed book."

"It isn't with me," said Roy bravely.

"I want you to tell the boys—there'll be some girls there, too, if they want to come——"

"Oh, joy!" Roy commented.

"I'm glad to see you bucking up," said the scoutmaster. "I want you to tell the boys," he went on to Roscoe, "a little about life down in Camp Dix. Tell them how you enlisted."

"I didn't enlist—I was drafted."

"Well, it's much the same—you were glad to be drafted. There were a whole lot of you fellows who didn't get around to enlisting who were glad enough when the call came. You didn't need any urging, I'll bet."

"N-no," said Roscoe.

"And so I want you to tell these scouts, just in your own way, what it means to be a soldier. Dwell on the sense of honor which this fine military discipline gives. Tell them what is meant by a parole, and what it means to break a parole—which is just breaking your promise. I don't care so much about the guns and swords just now—I mean as far as to-morrow night is concerned. But I'd like these scouts to know that there's something besides fighting to being a soldier—a real one. I'd like them to know that a soldier's word can be trusted, his promise depended on. If anything that has happened in my troop," he added significantly, "has given them a wrong impression—you correct that impression. See?"

"I'll try to."

"That's it. You know, Roscoe, most boys, and some scouts even, think that a soldier is just a fellow who shoots and makes raids and storms fortifications and all that. There's many a boy thinks he can be a soldier by just running off to the war. But that's where he's got a couple of more thinks coming, as Roy here would say. Uncle Sam wants soldiers, but he doesn't want to be lied to and cheated——"

Roy winced.

"I want you to give them just a little off-hand, heart-to-heart talk about the other end of it—how a 'soldier's wealth is honor,' as old What's-his-name, the poet, says."

"I'll try to," said Roscoe.

"Then there's another thing. I'm off with the engineering corps myself pretty soon. And my three patrols are going to feel pretty bad to see me go, too. That so, Roy?"

"You bet it is," said Roy.

"Tell them they ought to be proud to see me go. They'll listen to you, because you're a regular A-One, all-around soldier, you're nearer to their own age, and you're an outsider. Tell them how tickled you were to get your name down on that little old roll of honor——"

Roscoe rose suddenly.

"Don't—please don't," said he.

"What's the matter?" Mr. Ellsworth asked.

"Nothing—only—I have to go home now. I—I understand, and I'll do it—I'll—I'm not much on speechmaking, but I know what you mean, and——"

"That's right, you get the idea," Mr. Ellsworth exclaimed, rising and slapping him on the shoulder. "I won't keep you any later, for I know they're waiting for you around in Rockwood Place."

"I'll only have this one night at home," said Roscoe.

"And I'll bet they're proud of you round there, too," Mr. Ellsworth added, as he followed them into the front hall. "I've got three full patrols—that is, two, I mean; and Connie Bennett expects to dig up another boy for us. Roy refused the job. Never had a kid of my own, but I'd like to have a soldier boy like you."

He helped Roscoe on with his big army ulster, and stood with a hand on either of Roscoe's shoulders.

"You tell your father when you get home that I congratulate him. Providence did him a good turn, as we scouts say."

"I dare say somebody or other did him a good turn," said Roscoe, almost in a tone of disgust.

"Tell him I said he ought to be proud to furnish Uncle Sam with such a soldier."

"Humph," said Roscoe, in the same mood; "it's a question who furnished Uncle Sam with the soldier."

"What do you mean?" asked Mr. Ellsworth, slightly puzzled.

"Oh, nothing in particular—I guess. I'm kind of tired—I'll be—glad when I get in bed...."



CHAPTER XXIV

A SOLDIER'S HONOR

As the two walked along the dark street together, Roscoe, in his long military coat, seemed taller than he really was and the boy at his side seemed small and young to him.

He knew Roy only as everybody in a small city knows everybody else, but Roy knew Roscoe as every boy in Bridgeboro knew the soldiers whom the town had given to the Colors. He was proud to have been at that little supper party, and he was proud now to be walking along at Roscoe's side.

"Gee, I'd like to come down to Camp Dix!" he said.

"Pretty hard for outsiders to get in the place now," said Roscoe, "unless you're a wife, a mother, or a sweetheart."

"I'm only a boy sprout," said Roy, his wonted buoyancy persisting. "I wouldn't go where I'm not welcome.... They might think I was a German spy, hey?"

Roscoe looked down at him and laughed. Roy amused him, and he felt a little twinge of sympathy for him, too.

"Ellsworth's pretty strict, isn't he?" he said. "I mean sort of—he's got pretty strict ideas," he added, anxious not to say too much in criticism.

Roy was silent for a moment. Then he said: "Gee, I hate to see that vacant place in the Elk Patrol filled up! I know a lot of fellows who'd be glad to come in, but I just can't ask them. That's what he meant when he said I wouldn't take the job. Maybe you don't understand what I mean, but as long as that place isn't filled, it seems like a—kind of as if it was in memory of Tom—as you might say. It's a crazy idea, I suppose."

Roscoe looked at him marching along with his scout hat set jauntily on the back of his curly head in a way that was characteristic of him.

"I don't see anything crazy about it," he said.

"A lot of fellows always said Tom was kind of crazy, anyway," Roy concluded; "but you can be crazy in a good way—can't you?"

"Yes, you bet!"

"If I only knew where he was," said Roy, with a little catch in his voice, "it wouldn't seem so bad."

"If I knew where he is, I'd tell you," said Roscoe simply.

"How could you know? You never even knew him. Even Mr. Ellsworth didn't know him the way I did."

"Oh, yes, I knew him," said Roscoe; "not as well as you did, of course; but I'll tell you this much, kiddo: I don't believe he lied to any one, and I don't believe he broke his promise."

"Honest, don't you?"

"No, I don't."

"I wish—I wish you had told Mr. Ellsworth that."

"I couldn't have proved—I mean—well, it isn't so easy to talk to Mr. Ellsworth as it is to you, kiddo."

"I'll tell you something if you'll promise not to tell it—not even to Mr. Ellsworth," said Roy.

"A soldier's word of honor," said Roscoe, with a little bitter sneer.

"All the fellows in the Elk Patrol—that's Tom's own patrol, he started it—they made an agreement they wouldn't ask any fellows to join, or even vote for one—not for six months. In that time we might hear something—you can't tell. Mr. Ellsworth may possibly be wrong. Something may have happened to Tom. My patrol and the Ravens, they mostly agree with Mr. Ellsworth, and even some of the Elks do, I guess; but I asked them as a special favor."

"So they're doing it for your sake, eh?"

"Yop. And oh, gee, I'm glad you're with me! I didn't know you ever knew Tom Slade.—I'm glad you think the way I do.—I used to see you with Rolf Brownell in his automobile. I didn't know who you were then.... I—I believe in sticking to a fellow through thick and thin—don't you?"

"Some fellows."

"I got Tom in the troop, you know."

"You did a good job, I guess, that time," said Roscoe absently.

"You can bet I did.—Cracky, I'm awful anxious to hear you to-morrow night. You'll get a lot of applause—from me; that's dead sure!"

Roscoe laughed. He had an engaging laugh.

"It seems as if you're sort of an ally now," said Roy. "There aren't any of the troop that really agree with me," he added dubiously. "Well, here's where I have to leave you. Don't forget to tell your father what Mr. Ellsworth said."

Roscoe laughed shortly.

"About supplying Uncle Sam with a good soldier, you know."

They paused at the corner.

"You can't always tell who really does the supplying, kiddo.—It might possibly be a fellow's mother, say—or a girl—or——"

"I bet girls like you, all right. And I bet you're brave too. Gee, you must have felt proud on Registration Day when you stood in line to register. I bet you were one of the first ones, weren't you? We helped that day, too. Maybe you saw me—I gave out badges. But I guess you wouldn't remember because you were probably all—all thrilled; you know what I mean. That was the day—Tom—didn't show up——"

Roscoe Bent walked on alone. In a drug store window on the opposite corner was a placard, the handiwork of the scouts, which showed how much store Mr. Ellsworth set on the meeting of the next night:

SPECIAL! SPECIAL!

and a little farther down:

SCOUT GAMES EXHIBITIONS OF SCOUT SKILL AND RESOURCE

and so forth, and so forth:

ONE OF OUR OWN BOYS FROM CAMP DIX, PRIVATE ROSCOE BENT, WILL TELL OF SOLDIER LIFE. COME AND GIVE HIM A WELCOME

There was more, but that was all Roscoe saw. It sickened him to read it. He went on, heavy hearted, trying to comfort himself with the reflection that he really did not know where Tom was or what he was doing. But it did not afford him much comfort.

As he walked along, his head down, certain phrases ran continually through his mind. They came out of the past, like things dead, out of another life which Roscoe Bent knew no more: Do you think I'd let them get you? Do you think because you made fun of me ... I wouldn't be a friend to you? I got the strength to strangle you! I know the trail—I'm a scout—and I got here first. They'd have to kill me to make me tell....

Roscoe Bent looked behind him, as if he expected to see some one there. But there was nothing but the straight, long street, in narrowing perspective.

Under a lamp post on the next corner he took out of his alligator-skin wallet a folded paper, very much worn on the creases, and holding it so that the light caught it he skimmed hurriedly the few half-legible sentences:

"... glad you didn't tell. If you had told it would have spoiled it all—so I'm going to help the government in a way I can do without lying to anybody.... can see I'm not the kind that tells lies. The thing ... most glad about ... that you got registered. ... like you and I always did, even when you made fun of me."

"I made fun——" he mumbled, crumpling the letter and sticking it into the capacious pocket of Uncle Sam's big coat. "I—Christopher! If I only had your nerve now—Tommy. It doesn't—it doesn't count for so much to be able to strangle a fellow—though I ought to be strangled.—It's just like Margaret said—the other kind of strength. If I could only make up my mind to do a thing, like he could, and then do it!"

He leaned against the lamp post, this fine young soldier who was going to help "can the Kaiser," and he did not stand erect at all, and all his fine air was gone from him.

You had better not slink and slouch like that on the platform to-morrow night, Private Roscoe Bent.

"I can see myself giving my father that message! Proud of me—of me! Brave soldier! That's what this poor kid said. And me trying to flim-flam myself into thinking that I've got to keep still because I promised Tom. How is it any of his business? It's between me and my—— And I made fun of him—him! I wonder what this bully scout kid would say to that! I'm—I'm a low-down, contemptible sneak—that's what——"

On a sudden impulse, the same fine impulse which would some day carry him ahead of his comrades, straight across the German trenches, he ran to the corner where he had parted with Roy and looked eagerly up one street and down another. He ran to the next corner and looked anxiously down the street which crossed there. He ran a block up this street and looked as far as he could see along Terrace Place which was the way up to the fine old Blakeley homestead on the hill.

But no sign of Roy was there to be seen, for the good and sufficient reason that when Roy Blakeley, "Silver Fox," took it into his head to go scout pace, he was presently invisible to pursuers.

So Roscoe's impulse passed, as Roscoe's impulses were very apt to do, and he wandered homeward, telling himself that fate had been against him and balked his noble resolution.

As he went down through Rockwood Place he saw the lights in the library, which told him that his mother and father were still up. But he did not deliver Mr. Ellsworth's message; he was strong enough for that, anyway. Instead, he went straight up to his own room, which he had not occupied lately, and when he got up there he found that he was not alone. For a certain face haunted him all night and would not go away—a face with a heavy shock of hair, with a big, rugged mouth, and a bloody cut on its forehead.



CHAPTER XXV

THE FACE

All the next day that face haunted Roscoe. "If I could only know where he is," he said to himself; "if I could bring him back, I'd tell the whole business."

It occurred to him that perhaps Tom was dead and that that was why he was continually seeing that stolid face with the bloody scar. "Maybe the cut got worse and he got blood poisoning and died," he thought.

This train of thought possessed him so that he grew to believe that Tom Slade must really be dead. And that being the case, there would be no use in telling anybody anything....

At breakfast he seemed so preoccupied that after he left the room his mother said to his father,

"You don't think he's nervous or timid, do you?"

"I think he's a little nervous about making a speech in public," said Mr. Bent. "He isn't afraid of anything else," he added proudly.

During the morning Mrs. Bent wanted to take his picture. "You look so splendid and handsome in your uniform, dear!" she told him. So he stood in the big bay window where the sunlight streamed in and let her snap the camera at him. He did look splendid and handsome, there was no denying that.

Then she would have him develop the film with his own hands so that she could make some prints right away. "You may not have another leave," she said. "It's dreadful that you have to go back to camp late to-night."

"Don't you care," he laughed, in that companionable way in which he always talked with his mother.

"You can take one of the prints over to East Bridgeboro to-night," she added, as an inducement to his developing the film at once.

"Think she'd like to have one?"

"The idea! Of course she would."

So, to please his mother, Roscoe took off Uncle Sam's service coat, put on a kitchen apron, and went into his little familiar dark closet to wrestle with chemicals.

And there again, in the dim light of the red lantern, and the deathlike quiet, he saw that face—with the cut and the thick, disordered hair, and the big, tight-set mouth. "You can see yourself it wouldn't do for anybody to know," he fancied the lips saying. "If you told, it would spoil it all——"

"I won't spoil it," Roscoe mumbled, as if he were doing the shadowy presence a great favor.

Private Bent, who was going to "can the Kaiser," was glad to get out of that dark, stuffy place.

In the afternoon he went down into the cellar to grease and cover up his motorcycle in anticipation of his long absence "over there." This would be his last chance to do it, unless he got up very early in the morning. But then he would be an hour over his leave in getting back to camp late to-night on a milk train. A soldier's honor must not be sullied by a stolen hour....

And there again Roscoe Bent saw that face. It was a little more than a face this time. He could almost have sworn that he saw the figure of Tom Slade standing over in the dark corner near the coal bins; and as Roscoe, kneeling by his motorcycle, fixed his eyes upon this thing another sentence ran through his thoughts: "Those secret service fellows—do yer think I'd let them get yer? Do you think because you made fun of me...."

He tried to stare the apparition down, but it would not disappear—not until he went over to it and saw that it was just a burlap bag full of kindling wood, with James, the furnace man's, old felt hat thrown upon it.

"I—I know what it means, all right," he muttered; "it means he's dead."

After supper he parted his wavy blond hair, and his mother brushed his uniform while he stood straight as an arrow, his handsome head thrown back. Then his father proudly helped him into his big military coat and he started for East Bridgeboro, which was across the river. The new Y. M. C. A. hall was not over there, but he was going there first, just the same.

"Have you got the print?" his mother called after him.

"Sure."

"The one holding the gun? You look so soldierly and brave in that!"

He laughed as he went down the steps.

But presently he became moody and preoccupied again. "If Mr. Ellsworth hadn't dragged me into this thing," he said to himself, "it wouldn't be so bad. It gets my goat to stand up there and shoot off about honor and all that sort of thing. But I can't do anything else now. I'm not going to spoil it all. It can't make any difference to Tom now—he's out of the game. He's through with the scouts, and he's through with Bridgeboro—dead, I'm afraid. And if I just keep my mouth shut, it'll be doing just what he wanted me to do; it was his idea."

So that was settled; and in place of those troubling thoughts, Roy Blakeley bobbed up in his mind—Roy Blakeley, who believed in "standing by a fellow through thick and thin"; who was staunch and loyal to his friend.

"He's a bully kid," mused Roscoe, as he crossed the bridge whence the town derived its name, and the more he thought about Roy the more mean and contemptible he felt himself to be.

At the scouts' float hard by the bridge, the troop's cabin launch, the Good Turn, participant in many adventures, past and to come, lay moored.

Even the sophisticated Roscoe, who had never "bothered much with the kids," knew of this famous boat. There had been a photograph of it hanging in the Temple Camp office, with the face of Tom Slade peering out through the little hatchway. The sudden knocking of the hull against the float in the still night startled him, and as he looked down upon the moon-lit river with its black background of trees he fancied again that he saw the face of Tom Slade looking out from the hatchway of the boat.

"Hello, there!" he called, though of course he knew no one was there.

Once over the bridge, he took a short cut through Morrell's Grove for the River Road.

"It's best to let well enough alone," he told himself; "what's past is past. I'm not going to worry about it now. If Ellsworth hadn't hauled me into this thing, and given me that spiel, I wouldn't be bothering my head about things that happened months ago. I'm not going to worry."

He was singularly moody and dissatisfied for a person who was not going to worry.

"Wish I could get that Blakeley kid out of my head," he reflected.

But he couldn't exactly get that Blakeley kid out of his head, and he couldn't get that face out of his mind, nor Mr. Ellsworth's stinging words out of his memory. So he stumbled along through the dark grove, thinking what he should say to the boys and how he should talk to Margaret Ellison so as not to let her suspect his troubled conscience and general feeling of—not exactly meanness and dishonor, but....

"Girls are such blamed fiends for reading your thoughts," he grumbled.

About halfway through the grove he stopped suddenly in the narrow path. For there was that face again peering out of the darkness. There was a slouch hat on it this time, but the old familiar shock of hair protruded from under it and there was an ugly scar on the forehead.

"It's blamed dark in here," said Roscoe, as he pulled himself together. A lonely owl answered with a dismal shriek from a distant tree, making the night seem still more spooky.

Roscoe tried to whistle to keep up his spirits, but as he walked on along the path the face, instead of fading away, seemed to become clearer, and he could have sworn that there was the dark outline of a form below it leaning against a tree. It was only his fancy enlivened by his conscience, he knew, but it took him back to a night months before, when he had stood in a remote mountain trail and watched a figure clinging to a tree, and he remembered how he had stood speechless and listened, as a man may watch a thunderstorm. No one in all the wide world but those two had known of that meeting.

"Or ever will," thought Private Bent.

Suddenly he paused again, and he, Private Roscoe Bent, who would take delight in canning the Kaiser, who would give his young life if need be, to make the world free for democracy, trembled like a leaf.

The figure had moved—he was sure of it. For a couple of seconds he could not speak, he was breathing so heavily.

"Hello!" he finally managed to call.

"Hello!" came a dull voice. "There ain't any need to be afraid," it added. "I couldn't hurt you. I can't see very good—is—it—you—Roscoe?"

Roscoe spoke not a word but went forward and cautiously felt of the figure, laid his hand on the heavy thick shoulder and peered into the face.

"Tom Slade," he muttered.

"I didn't know you in your soldier's coat," said Tom; "it makes you look so tall and straight and—brave——"

Still the soldier did not speak, only kept his hand upon Tom's shoulder and looked into his square ugly face. And again the ghostly hoot of the owl made the little patch of woods seem more spooky and lonesome.

Then Private Roscoe Bent, Second Infantry, U. S. A., who intended to help roll the Teuton lines back and smash militarism once and for all, who would go over the top with all the fine frenzy of his impulsive nature and send the blond beast reeling, slipped his arm farther over Tom's shoulder until Tom Slade could feel the warmth from the thick sleeve of Uncle Sam's big military coat upon his own bare neck and threadbare flannel shirt. And the handsome head with its wavy blond hair which Private Roscoe Bent knew how to hold with such a fine air, hung down against that threadbare shirt in anything but martial fashion.

"Oh, Tom—Tom Slade——" he said, a feeling of great relief taking possession of him. "I know what to do now—now I can see straight—as you used to say.—You've come—to show me the right way, just as you did before."



CHAPTER XXVI

ROSCOE BENT BREAKS HIS PROMISE

"There ain't so much more to tell," said Tom, in his old lifeless way. "After that we got torpedoed. The officer said only sixteen could get on a raft, and there was a man who was anxious to get on and he made seventeen, so I got off. I guess I was the last one on the ship. She made an awful noise when she went down."

"Yes—and——"

"There's nothing else." Tom's reports of thrilling happenings were always provokingly tame and brief. "I swam around for about two hours, I guess. I had a piece of a door to hold on to. That scar's where a big wave banged me against it.—A schooner picked me up. I'd 'a' got picked up sooner, maybe, only I was the last one and I drifted away from the ship lane—sort of. It was going to South America after bananas, so they took me there."

"How'd you get back?"

"Came home on another ship. I worked cabin boy. They caught a German spy on the first ship."

It was quite like him not to tell how they happened to catch the spy.

"And then you came right here?"

"They gave me dinner in the Sailors' Mission in New York, and then I started out here."

"You don't mean you walked?"

"I'm going to Mrs. O'Connor's in the Alley where I used to live—till I can get a job. I made two good friends, but I don't know whether they were drowned.—You look good in your soldier suit."

Roscoe had to get control of himself before he could answer.

"That's a screech-owl," said Tom; "hear him? When you get—when I was a scout we had to learn the calls of all the different birds."

"Never mind that. Why did you go on that ship?"

"I told you—I wanted to help with the Colors."

Roscoe struggled again with his voice.

"Don't you think you did enough for the Colors," he said thickly, "when you gave me this uniform? Don't you think that was enough?"

"I didn't give it to you."

"Sit down here a minute. Don't you think you did enough for the Colors when you started me—over the top? Don't you?"

"It wasn't me. Anyhow, you can't do too much for the Colors."

Roscoe paused with his hand on Tom's knee. "No, I guess you can't," he said.

"You never told anybody, did you?" Tom asked.

"No," said Roscoe, with that little sneer of self-disgust. "I never told."

"It would of spoiled it all if you had. You got to be careful never to tell. You got to be specially careful, now you're a soldier—and look so fine and straight."

"Don't, Tom."

"You got to promise you'll never tell," said Tom, scenting danger in Roscoe's manner. "Will you?"

"Have you got any money at all, Tom?"

"You got to promise you'll never let 'em know about it now. Do you?"

"Never mind that, Tom——"

"You've got to. Do you?" Tom persisted.

"Can't you trust to a soldier's honor, Tom, without pinning him down?"

"Do you promise?"

"Won't you trust a friend? Won't you trust a soldier's honor, Tom?"

"Yes," said Tom. "I will."

For a few moments Roscoe sat breathing audibly and staring at Tom as if hardly knowing what to do or say next.

"Do you know where I'm going now?" he asked, feeling the necessity of speaking.

"Maybe I could guess," said Tom: "you're going up River Road. I bet she said you looked fine in your uniform."

"Yes, I'm going there. I'm going to take her to a racket in Bridgeboro."

"It's funny how I met you here," said Tom.

"You walked all the way out on the turnpike road, I suppose. Tom," he broke off suddenly, "there isn't any time to sit here and talk now; listen. It seems as if all these weeks had been wiped out and we were back up on that mountain again."

"I knew you'd like it up there; I——"

"Never mind that; listen. We're back just where we were that night. We can make everything all right."

"Everything is all right."

"No, it isn't; everything isn't all right—old man. Tom, there's a meeting to-night, a sort of jumble—Y. M. C. A., scouts, and I don't know what all. Ellsworth nailed me for it. I've got to give the bunch a little spiel.—Tom, I want you to come to it——"

"I——"

"Now, don't start that; listen. It's in the new Y. M. C. A. Hall. I know you haven't got any clothes, if that's what you want to say, and I don't care a hang about your clothes. I don't ask you to blow in with the rest of them and sit in the audience," he went on hurriedly. "But just stroll around after everything's started and the lights are down. They couldn't see you—they won't notice you. Just stand in back."

"They got no use for me; they——"

"This is between you and me, old man; nobody else has got anything to do with it. Go down to Mrs. What's-her-name's——"

"O'Connor's," said Tom.

"Go down there and wash up, if you want to—I don't care. Only promise me you'll come around. I want you to see me make a show of myself. You'll have a good laugh—you old grouch," he added, with sudden good humor, "and after it's over we'll go up to my house and have a good long talk."

"I've often passed your house," said Tom.

"I'm going down to camp on a milk train about two A. M. This may be the last chance for us to see each other," Roscoe still spoke hurriedly; "they're sending troops across every week, Tom."

"I know they are."

"When I left you up on that mountain, Tom, I promised to come right back and register; and I did it, didn't I?"

"I told you nobody'd ever find out about that——"

"Never mind that. Will you do something for me now? Will you say you'll come?"

Tom hesitated. "I always said you'd be good at making speeches, and that kind of thing, but——"

Roscoe thrust his hand straight out. "Give me your hand, Tom, and say you'll come."

"Maybe I will."

"Say you'll come."

"I'd only stand in back after they put the lights down."

"Say you'll come," Roscoe persisted.

"All right."

"Sure, now?"

"I ain't the kind that breaks my word," said Tom dully. "But besides that, I want to hear you."

Roscoe held his hand tight for a full minute. Then they parted and he hurried along the River Road.

He was already late, but he would probably have hurried anyway, for when the heart is dancing it is hard for the feet to move slowly. And Roscoe's heart was dancing. He could "see straight" now, all right. To be a soldier you must see straight as well as shoot straight.

He swung along the River Road with a fine air, as if he owned it, and passing a small boy (bound across the river, perhaps) he lifted the youngster's hat off and handed it to him with a laugh. When he reached the Ellison cottage he deliberately kept pushing the bell button again and again, just out of sheer exuberance, until Margaret herself threw the door open and exclaimed,

"What in the world is the matter?"

"Nothing; can't you take a joke?"

"You're late," she said.

"Sure; I'm a punk soldier. That's a swell hat you've got on. Can you hustle? If you don't mind, we'll take the short cut through the grove."

It was a swell hat, there is no denying that, and she looked very pretty in it.

"I'm taking my knitting," she said, handing him one of those sumptuous bags with two vicious-looking knitting needles sticking out of it.

"I hate to go through the grove, it's so spooky," she said, as they hurried along. "I'm always seeing things there. Do you, ever?"

"Oh, yes."

"Really? What?"

"Oh, lions and tigers and things."

"Now you make me afraid," she shuddered.

"I met a lion in there to-night," he said; "that's what delayed me. If I see another one, I'll jab him with one of these knitting needles. Hear that screech-owl? He sounds like the Kaiser'll feel next year.—Do you know that Blakeley kid?"

"Roy? Surely I do. Everybody knows him."

"He's all wool and a yard wide, isn't he?"

"Yes, he's fine."

"Look out you don't trip on that rock.—He walked down the street with me last night and talked about—about that Slade fellow."

"Tom, you mean?"

"Yes; he's a staunch believer in Tom, even yet."

She made no answer.

"I think you kind of liked that fellow," said Roscoe teasingly.

"I always said if he ever made up his mind to do a thing he'd do it."

"Well, I guess he went and done it, as my old school grammar used to say."

"I don't like to hear you speak flippantly about him."

"How about me? Suppose I should make up my mind to do a thing——"

"Here we are at the bridge already," she said.

* * * * *

The new Y. M. C. A. Assembly Hall presented a gay scene, and they pushed through the crowd, Roscoe opening a way for the girl to pass, greeted on both hands by his friends and former companions. It seemed as if all the young people of the town were on hand; scouts were conspicuously in evidence, and among them all Mr. Ellsworth hustled genially about attending to a hundred and one duties.

"There you are," said Roscoe; "take that seat. Reminds you of that meeting on June fifth last when I wasn't with you—and Slade didn't show up either. Now, don't forget to clap when I stand up, will you?"

He swung up onto the platform, where Roy and Pee-wee and Doc Carson and Connie Bennett and the whole tribe of Silver Foxes clustered about him, helping him out of his big military coat and hovering about the chair he sat in. Even Dr. Wade, of the Y. M. C. A., and the gentlemen of the Local Scout Council received less attention.

As he sat there waiting, one or two of the scouts noticed (for scouts are nothing if not observant) that he craned his neck and looked far back into the lobby. If they thought twice about it, however, they probably attributed it to nervousness.

At last, after much impatient handclapping, all except the stage lights were dimmed, and Roy noticed again how the soldier peered searchingly into the back of the hall.

"Your mother and father coming?" he asked.

"They might stroll around."

"You look dandy," Roy whispered.

Roscoe grabbed him by the neck pleasantly and winked as he reached slyly over and pulled Pee-wee's belt axe from its martial sheath, to the amusement of some boys in the audience. But it was no matter for laughing, for if the Germans should break through the French lines at Verdun, say, and push through to Bordeaux, capture all the French transports, run the British blockade and make a sudden flank move against Bridgeboro, Pee-wee would be very thankful that he had his belt-axe along.

It was a great affair—that meeting. Dr. Wade told of the aims of the new Y. M. C. A.; the Methodist Scouts' gave an exhibition of pole jumping; the Elks (one member short) gave a demonstration of First-Aid bandaging, and a Red Cross woman gave a demonstration of surgery, for (as Roy said) she extracted one bone from everybody in the audience. Oh, it was a great affair! They had a movie play, Scouts in Service; the Bridgeboro Quartette sang Over There; a real, live Belgian refugee told how the gentle, kind Germans burned his little home and sent his sisters and brothers into slavery.

Perhaps it was this tragic story fresh in their minds which caused the crowd to clap vigorously when Private Bent, Second Infantry, U. S. A., jumped to his feet as Mr. Ellsworth finished introducing him and stood, feet close together, straight as an arrow, a little flush of embarrassment upon his handsome face, and threw his head back suddenly to get his little forelock of wavy hair out of the way.

It is no discredit to Dr. Wade or to Mr. Perry, of the Local Council, that Roscoe caught the audience with his first words. He was so young and fresh, so boyishly off-hand—so different from the others who had spoken. And then his straight young figure and his uniform!

"I don't know exactly why I'm here," he said; "I got this thing wished on me and you've got me wished on you. I'm sorry for you. So far as I'm concerned I guess I don't deserve any sympathy. I ran right into Scoutmaster Ellsworth with my eyes wide open [laughter] and he nabbed me. I should have kept my fingers crossed when I came back to Bridgeboro. He took me to his house and fed me on sugar——"

"You're lucky," some one called.

"And what could I do after that?"

"If I ever get clear of the Boy Scouts, believe me, I'll never get tangled up with them again. [Laughter.] But they tell me I'll see more of them in England and still more of them in France—so I guess there's no hope of getting away from them. [Laughter and applause.]

"If this thing keeps up we'll have to start a campaign to swat the scout, and see if we can't exterminate them in that way. [Uproarious shouts from Pee-wee.]

"But, ladies and gentlemen and scouts—not that scouts aren't gentlemen [laughter]—I don't think soldiers ought to be expected to make speeches. Actions speak louder than words, as the Kaiser will find out—— [Pee-wee was restrained with difficulty.] So I'm just going to do something instead of standing here talking. Scoutmaster Ellsworth said for me to put plenty of pep into my little performance. And I'm going to put some tabasco sauce in it [Pee-wee again] and I hope it will hold him for a while.

"He introduced me as an enlisted soldier. Two thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven times in the last two days, he's called me that. It's a base libel! I didn't enlist; I was drafted. [Laughter.]

"And now I'm going to let you into a secret. Before Registration Day I felt pretty much as I felt about coming here to-night—I had cold feet. I have only the one thought now," he added, speaking more earnestly, "and that is to get over there and get one good whack at that crew of bandits and murderers! [Loud cheering.]

"But before Registration Day I was scared—just plain scared. You soon get rid of that when you get into the uniform. [Applause.] Well, I'm ashamed to say it, but I ran away. I had a crazy notion I could get away with it. I went up to a lonely place on a mountain near that big scout camp."

You could have heard a pin drop in the hall now.

"And one of these fellows—these scouts—suspected where I had gone and came up there after me and brought me to my senses." Roscoe's voice had grown gradually lower, and he spoke hesitatingly now, but the silence was so intense that every word was audible. "He pawned a gold medal he had to pay his way up there and he made me come back here. He missed his part in the big rally. He couldn't come back himself because he'd hurt his ankle.—He made me come back here where I belonged—to register!

"And then when he found—— No, wait a minute, I'll read you the letter!"

He was in a fine frenzy of enthusiasm again now that he had finished the recital of his own shameful part in the affair. He took out Tom's letter and read it—read every word of it—and finished it with his cheeks flushed and his voice ringing:

"... so I'm going away to help in a way I can do without breaking my word to anybody. The thing I care most about is that you got registered. And next to that I'm glad because I like you"—Roscoe shook his head hastily and stopped for a second to control his voice—"because I like you and I always did—even when you made fun of me——"

"What he liked me for, I'm hanged if I know—but that's the kind of a fellow Tom Slade is——"

"Whatever became of him?" some one on the platform whispered to some one else.

There was a slight sound back in the lobby of the hall.

"Somebody down there head him off; don't let him get away!" called Roscoe, stepping right to the front of the platform. "Start him down here! He didn't get away, did he?"

Roy Blakeley, vaulting over two rows of chairs, was in the aisle in three seconds. Everybody turned and looked toward the back of the hall. Some stood, peering cautiously into the dim lobby, where a little scuffle seemed to be going on. Then Roscoe himself leaped straight over the orchestra's space and started up the aisle.

But he was not needed. For Mr. Ellsworth himself had caught Tom by the collar, thrusting him out into the aisle, where Roy clutched aim by the arm.

And then the crowd saw him; saw him standing shamefacedly there as if still inclined to break away and run for it; his head hanging down, his big hand moving nervously on the old book-strap which he wore for a belt. The necktie, which presumably Mrs. O'Connor had furnished him, was all awry, and in the half light they could see, too, that his old clothes were faded and torn. He seemed quite indifferent to everybody and everything—even to Mr. Ellsworth—though he smiled nervously at Roscoe.

But Roy Blakeley, clinging to his arm, could feel what no one else could feel or see—Tom's hand pressing his wrist like a wireless signal, and Roy, like the bully scout he was, understood the code, took the message, and was silent.



CHAPTER XXVII

THE END OF THE TRAIL

Yes, that was a great meeting—it was a peach of a meeting!

"You broke your word," accused Tom, as Roscoe elbowed his way in.

"I did nothing of the kind. I asked you to trust a soldier's honor. You know more about a soldier's honor now than you did before, don't you?"

"Good-night!" laughed Roy. "No more soldier's honor for you! Hey, Tomasso? You've had enough of it."

Indeed he had had altogether too much of it. But his embarrassment passed as the bulk of the crowd, not involved in this surprising turn of affairs, took its way homeward, leaving the scouts and a few others in the hall. And soon things worked around so that Roscoe saw Tom alone. Not altogether alone, either, for Margaret Ellison was with him. How Roy and Pee-wee chanced to miss this I do not know.

The girl said very little, but stared at him until at last he said, "Are you looking at that scar? It don't look good, but it'll go away, I guess."

"How did you get it?" she asked.

"He gave his place to another man," said Roscoe, "and was dumped into the ocean alone."

"A chunk of wood banged me in the forehead," said Tom simply.

"Tom, I want you to do me a favor," said Roscoe, while Margaret continued to gaze at him. "It's a terribly impolite thing to suggest, but if you'd be willing to walk over to East Bridgeboro with Margaret, I could go home and get my things together. I'm afraid I'll miss the only train. You come to my house afterward and go to the train with me. You don't mind, do you, Marge? He'll protect you from the lions and tigers."

If she minded she didn't show it.

"I—ain't dressed up," said Tom awkwardly.

"I'm so glad of that!" she said.

* * * * *

Never in his life had he walked with a girl anywhere near his own age, and he felt just as he had felt that gala day when he had chatted with her in Temple Camp office. And because he was flustered and knew of nothing in particular to say, he repeated just what he had said then—that he could see she liked Roscoe, and he added that he didn't blame her, for Roscoe was "so good-looking in his uniform—kind of."

To this she made no answer; but after a few minutes she said, "Will you take me through Barrel Alley where you used to live?"

So Tom took her through Barrel Alley, answering her questions about his experiences and telling of spies and torpedoings and his rescue and cruise to South America simply, almost dully, as if they were things which were not worth talking about.

When they came behind John Temple's big bank building, they stood on the barrel staves whence the alley derived its name and counted the floors and picked out the windows of Temple Camp office.

"You'll come in and see Mr. Burton in the morning, won't you?" she said.

"Maybe," said Tom.

The good scout trail, which had wound over half the earth, took them on down that poor, sordid alley, and he showed her the tenement where he had once lived.

"The day we got put out," he said simply, "the sheriff stood a beer can on my mother's picture."

"Oh!" she said; "and then?"

"Nothing then," said Tom, "only I knocked him into the gutter. I got arrested."

They came out into the brighter light and clearer air of Main Street, and now the good scout trail, which indeed had not disappointed him, led them toward the quiet river and the willows and the hilly banks and across the bridge, from which he showed her the troop's cabin boat (soon to be plastered with Liberty Loan posters), and into the rural quiet of East Bridgeboro.

"I said it was a trail," said Tom.

"Yes?"

"I mean everything you do—kind of. It's just a trail. You don't know where it'll take you."

"It's just brought you back to the same place, hasn't it?" she said.

"But it won't stop," said Tom. "It don't make any difference, anyway, as long as you hit the right one. Once I thought it was kind of a crazy notion about everything you do being a trail. But now I know different. And if you do the wrong thing, you get on the wrong trail, that's all. Maybe you don't understand exactly what I mean."

"I do understand."

"It's brought me right back to where I'm talking to you again the same as on Registration Day. So you see it's a good trail. I got a kind of an idea that there can be a trail in your brain—like.—Often I think of things like that that I can't make other people understand—not even Roy sometimes.—I guess maybe girls understand better."

"Maybe," she said. "Do you see I'm wearing the little badge you gave me yet?"

They strolled on, following the trail, and neither spoke for a few minutes.

"In the end you don't get misjudged," said Tom simply, "because if you get on the right trail it'll bring you to the right place. If you've got the right on your side, you got to win."

"And that's why we'll win the war," she said.

"A feller that maybe got drowned told me about a little girl in London that got blown up while she was studying her lessons. And when I heard that I knew we'd win."

"Uncle Sam's like you, Tom," she laughed. "When he makes up his mind to do a thing.... Do you remember how you told me you had a good muscle? Uncle Sam's got a good muscle, don't you think?"

"I was thinking something like that when I looked at Roscoe to-night," he said. "We got to trust to Uncle Sam."

"The whole world is trusting to Uncle Sam now."

"He's got the muscle," said Tom.

"Yes."

The trail led through a fragrant avenue of evergreens now, through a solitude where Tom had often hiked, and presently they turned into the path which formed the short cut to the girl's home. Across the river, on the top of the bank building, they could see the Stars and Stripes waving in the small field of brightness thrown by the searchlight. And all else was darkness.

So, chatting idly, but all the while, coming to know each other better, they passed the log on which Tom and Roscoe had sat and talked, and strolled on through the dark, silent grove, where the lions and tigers were, and where the lonely screech-owl still hooted his dismal song.

THE END