Roy Blakeley, Pathfinder | Page 3

and if you want to know why he came, it's in another story. But, anyway, I'll tell you this much. Our three patrols went up to camp in his father's house-boat. His father told us we could use the house-boat for the summer. Those patrols are the Ravens and the Elks and the Solid Silver Foxes. I'm head of the Silver Foxes.
The reason he came to camp was to get something belonging to him that was in one of the lockers of the house-boat. I wrote to him and told him about it being there and so he came up. He liked me and he called me Skeezeks. Most everybody that's grown up calls me by a nickname. As long as he was there he decided to stay a few days, because he was stuck on Temple Camp. All the fellows were crazy about him. At camp-fire he told us about his adventures in France. He said you can't get gum drops in France.
Gee, I wouldn't want to live there.
CHAPTER II
AN AWFUL WILDERNESS
After he'd been at camp three or four days, Harry Donnelle said to me, "Skeezeks, are you game for a real hike-you and your patrol?"
I said, "Real hikes are our specialties-we eat'em alive."
"I don't mean just a little stroll down to the village or even over as far as the Hudson," he said; "but a hike that is a hike. Do you think you could roll up a hundred miles?"
"As easy as rolling up my sleeves," I told him. "We're so game that a ball game isn't anything compared with us. Speak out and tell us the worst."
He said, "Well, I was thinking of a little jaunt back home."
"Good night," I told him, "I thought maybe you meant as far as Kingston or Poughkeepsie. But Bridgeboro! Oh boy!"
"Of course, we wouldn't get very far from the Hudson," he said, "and we could jump on a West Shore train most anywhere, if you kids got tired."
"The only thing we'll jump on will be you-if you talk like that," I said; "Silver Foxes don't jump on trains. But how about the other fellows-the Elks and the raving Ravens? United we stand, divided we sprawl."
He said, "Let them rave; I'm not going to head a whole kindergarten. Eight of you are enough. Who do you think I am, General Pershing?" And then he ruffled up my beautiful curly hair and he gave me a shove-same way as he always did. "This is not a grand drive," he said, "it's a hike. Just a few shock troops will do."
"We'll shock you all right," I said, "but first you'd better speak to Mr. Ellsworth (he's our scoutmaster), and get the first shock out of the way."
"I think I have Mr. Ellsworth eating out of my hand," he said; "you leave that to me. I just wanted to sound you and find out if you were game or whether you're just tin horn scouts-parlor scouts."
"Well, do I sound all right?" I said. "Believe me, there are only two things that keep us from hiking around the world, and those are the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean."
"Think you could climb over the Equator?" he said, laughing all the while. And he gave me another one of those shoves--you know.
Then he said, "Well then, Skeezeks, I'll tell you what you do. You call a meeting of the Foxes and lay this matter on the table-"
"Why should I lay it on the table?" I said; "you'd think it was a plate of soup. I'll stand on the table and address them, that's what I'll do."
He said, "All right, you just picture the hardships to them. Tell them that for whole hours at a time, we may have to go without ice cream sodas. Tell them that we'll have to penetrate a wilderness where there is no peanut brittle. Tell them that we'll have to enter a jungle where gum drops are unknown. Tell them that we may have to live on grasshoppers. Tell them about the vast morass near Kingston, where you can't even get a piece of chocolate cake; miles and miles of barren waste where the foot of white man has never trod upon a marshmallow-"
"Sure you can find marshmallows in the marshes," I said. "We should worry."
"You ask Willie and Tommy and Dorrie and the others if they are prepared to make the sacrifice-and I'll do the rest. I'll speak to Mr. Ellsworth. But remember about the heartless desert with its burning sands just above Newburgh. Now go chase yourself and round them up. I guess you know how to do it."
So I got all the Silver Foxes into our patrol cabin and gave them a spooch. I guess I might as well tell you who they all are. First there's me-I mean