Percy Keese Fitzhugh

“ Slowly, with its great nickel headlights glaring, the big machine moved forward toward the obstruction. It stopped, then advanced very slowly a few feet more. Then, with heart thumping, Pee-wee beheld something which made his blood run cold—a bright-colored shawl with spangles that shone brilliant in the moonlight and a dusky woman with a bandage around her forehead.
But this was not all. For sitting at the wheel was the most villainous looking man that Pee-wee had ever seen, a man with a mustache of a pirate or a Spanish brigand. ”

“ Neighbors presently availed themselves of the spacious Ashley porch which became a sort of grandstand for the neighborhood.
People who had not thought enough about the parade to wait on Terrace Avenue were ready enough to step out or to throw open their windows, now that the motley procession was passing their very doors. In less than half a minute the quiet side street was seething with excitement. Women hurried, babies cried, lions roared, the steam calliope drowned the stirring music of the band, a gorgeous float bearing a fat woman and a skeleton lumbered around the corner. ”

“ At last, by a hazardous gymnastic effort, he managed to get an uncertain hold on a rock doubtfully embedded in the crumbling plaster on top of the wall. He then ventured to rest one foot on the ragged end of the plank and succeeded in lifting himself to a standing posture. He felt a certain sense of elation along with his tremulousness. There is a kind of fascination in the knowledge that safety, even life, hangs by a thread. Emerson stood upon his uncertain foothold, reaching above him and clutching the rock on the wall. ”

“ Any one of the Bridgeboro boys would have found something excruciatingly funny in this little gentleman tripping about in that grim old ruin. But none of them would have been less sensitive to the ghostly surroundings than he.
He paused in his exploration of the chaotic place and glanced about. Some small creature of the night, a rat, perhaps, scurried away, breaking the solemn stillness with its flight.
“Is there any one here?” Emerson asked aloud. He waited a few seconds, then spoke again, his voice emphasized by the stillness and darkness. “Is there any one here?” ”

“ And his queer, adult phraseology had aroused unholy mirth. It would hardly do to say that a boy should not be too refined, yet extreme refinement in a boy is apt to tell to his disadvantage. At all events, it had been so with Emerson.
But the spirit of self-reliance, if it exists, will manifest itself in large ways as well as in small ways, given only the occasion. And Emerson Skybrow, baffled, lame, distraught, would not go to the nearest house and put his business into some one else’s hands. He had not stumbled upon little Margie Garrison, he had gone seeking her. ”

“ In half an hour, they were back on the state road and hurrying into Bridgeboro. The town was dark and deserted. A lone auto sped up Main Street as they crossed, and its swift passing seemed to reduce the sleeping town to insignificance, so much greater is a speeding auto to a sleeping town in the still, small hours of night.
They hurried through Terrace Avenue where the school (scene of Pee-wee’s famous coup) seemed like a thing dead. Not a sound was there, nor a soul upon the street. They turned into Elm Place, then to Carver Street and to the cottage of the Garrisons. ”

“ A jungle of bales, sacks and huge bundles of loosely tied papers and rags decorated the middle of Terrace Avenue. It seemed inconceivable that any single truck could have contained so much. The street was transformed into a rubbish dump.
It is said that music has charms to soothe the savage beast, but the swelling strains of an approaching band, which could now be distinctly heard, did not soothe the driver of the truck. Pee-wee had entertained no idea that he was as many things as the driver called him. ”

“ Pee-wee said. “You know scouts have to do good turns, don’t you? They have to do one every day. Anyway, gee whiz, I’m glad that truck broke down. If a circus parade turns, that’s a good turn, isn’t it—for the people that live on the street where it turns?”
“Oh, absolutely, positively,” laughed an amused lady.
“There goes a leopard,” Pee-wee said. “I know a way you can catch a leopard with fly-paper, only you got to have a lot of it. Leopards have five toes, do you know that? I can make a call like a leopard, want to hear me? Scouts have to know how to imitate animals so as to fool ’em.” ”

“ Pee-wee pulled with all his might and main, part of the bush came away, the puppy pounced upon the fleeing fragment, it dropped from the cord, and the puppy with refreshed energy caught the flat-iron handle again, bracing his forelegs for the tussle, his tail wagging frantically. Thus has every great scientist encountered hardships and obstacles. ”

“ Pee-wee shouted at the top of his voice. Every one in the car turned to stare. “You’re going to say you should have had your wits about you and I’m glad you didn’t, because now you’ve got to join the scouts, and that’s one good thing about the Erie Railroad anyway, oh, gee whiz, we’re going to go right past Bridgeboro, and I’m glad, and I’ll show you the way home through the woods from Westfield because I got a compass, so now you got to be a scout, so will you? Because on account of your honor you’re to be trusted, so will you? Oh, boy, I bet you’ll like hiking home through the woods!” ”

“ Gee whiz, can’t you see I’m a—I’m in the official patrol? Maybe you think I didn’t mean what I said when I motioned. Now, you see, you’ve got only yourself to blame. Gee whiz, that shows what you get for defying the law—geeee whiz!”
“It serves him right,” little Irene whispered to Pee-wee, as if she were afraid to advertise her loyalty. “It serves him a good lesson.” ”

“ Teachers (who are universally referred to as old by their pupils) were young again in those slow, expectant, listening moments. “Old” Cartright, “Old” Johnson, “Grouchy” Gerry, “Keep-in” Keeler were all there, with their clustering, elbowing charges about them, waiting to see the parade.
The large windows of the gymnasium were packed. So were the windows of the big assembly room. “Old” Granger, the music teacher, seemed almost human for once, as he actually elbowed his way to a front place where Doctor Sharpe smilingly awaited the coming of the great show. ”

“ He then went up Main Street into Ashburton Place and thence to the Little Valley road. He looked singularly unlike a scout in his natty, conventional suit and shallow-crowned, telescoped hat.
His walk seemed to match his way of talking, although one could not possibly say anything worse about it than that it was a gentlemanly walk. ”

“ Pee-wee reassured the complacent watcher. “Because scouts they always keep their words; no matter what they say they’ll do, they’ve got to do it. That’s where you make a mistake not being a scout. Because if you were a scout, you’d know just how to get those tickets.”
He had unwound a sufficient length of twine from a ball he had carried in his pocket since his encounter with his aerial, and now he made a mysterious, hurried tour of all the neighboring trees, feeling them and inspecting them critically.
“I bet you wonder what I’m doing,” he said. Emerson did wonder, but he said nothing. ”

“ He was Bluebeard and Captain Kidd and all the thieving, kidnaping gypsies of the world rolled into one horrible, appalling, brutal spectacle!
And then Pee-wee realized that he was face to face with the escaping gypsies and the Hunkajunk car. He was terrified, trembling. But he would not shirk his perilous duty now.
“Run to the house,” he whispered to Emerson; “try not to let them see you; crawl on the ground for a ways. Hurry up.” ”

“ An open lunch basket stood on the painted ground.
“That’s just the way scouts are,” Pee-wee said. “So now wouldn’t you like to be one?”
“They look rather stiff,” said Emerson. He was not without a sense of humor. “You mean that scouts are dummies?”
“What d’you mean, dummies?” roared Pee-wee. “That shows just the way they live in the woods when they go camping. If that scout in the canoe wants to know what time it is, do you know how he can tell?” ”

“ Even the irate driver of the truck paused in the midst of the chaos he had wrought to gaze at the imposing spectacle which emerged around the corner and advanced down the wide thoroughfare of Terrace Avenue. Behind the red-coated band Pee-wee beheld three pedestrians walking abreast, and he knew that they would not be obedient to his raised arm. These were huge elephants, complacent, serene, contemptuous of the law.
“Oh, look—look!” gasped little Irene. “They’re efilants, they’re real efilants! Will they eat you?” ”

“ Emerson seemed to think that he would not care greatly for that either. He was a queer boy.
“Scouts always have to have their wits about them,” Pee-wee said. “They have to be prepared and be observant and all that. Did you ever go away and forget to take matches? Scouts don’t care if they do that, because they can get a light with two sticks; they don’t care.” ”

“ Pee-wee demanded. “I’m the boss of that patrol. I’m not the patrol leader, but just the same I’ve got a lot to say about it. Gee whiz, I’d like to hear anybody say they don’t want you. Just you let me hear them say it!”
“I should think any one would like to have dinner in the woods,” said Emerson, with a frankness that was pathetic.
“You don’t say dinner, you say grub,” said Pee-wee. “Or if you want to, you can say eats. Some scouts say feed. But I like eats best, don’t you?” ”

“ Roy, despite his habit of victimizing Pee-wee with unholy banter, was after all his friend—his closest friend.
“Do you mean—do you really think he won’t—that when it comes down to it he won’t join?”
“Who, Arabella?”
“Do you mean it?”
“Good night, kid, have some sense on your birthday. Why didn’t he come with us if he was willing to be one of us? What did he do? Turned around and walked home. There you are; what more do you want?”
Pee-wee was thoughtful. As he could not decide what he wanted to do or say, he fell back on doing something which he was absolutely positive he wanted to do. ”

“ The Bridgeboro boys had not often made fun of him to his face; particularly the scouts had not. But just the same, they had left him out of their lives and plans, and among themselves (as he now saw) his name had been a byword for effeminacy.
It is fatal for a boy to talk too well and use an approved phraseology. It was this misfortune which had won for Emerson his various posts of monitorship in school. And by a universal law no monitor can be popular. ”

“ Queen Tut, she’d be the one to give it away herself because she’s a girl—I mean she was—I mean she would be if she wasn’t a mummy, but girls can’t be mummies because they can’t keep still. Do you mean to say——”
“I’m sure we’re not saying a word, Walter,” said his gentle mother.
“Scouts never give away secrets,” Pee-wee continued vociferously. “Don’t you know a scout’s honor is to be trusted? It’s one of the laws. Gee whiz! A scout’s lips are, what d’you call it, they’re sealed!” ”

“ Do you think I’m a—a caterpillar?”
“No, you mustn’t do that,” said his mother firmly.
“Well, then,” said Pee-wee conclusively. “Gee whiz, both of you claim to like music and concerts and things. If I get my radio up you can hear those things. Gee whiz, you can hear lectures and songs and all kinds of things. You can hear famous authors and actors and everything. All you have to do is come in my room and listen. Gee whiz,” he added wistfully, “you wouldn’t catch me giving away a secret. No, siree!”
“Walter,” said Elsie, trying to repress a smile. ”

“ Pee-wee, suddenly recalled to his duties, shook off his mood of contemplative reverie and reached for the flat-iron handle. Never in all its homely, domestic career had that flat-iron handle been cast for such a sensational role. Pee-wee held the cord which ran to the porch roof. ”

“ Neighboring units were always within call and the woods echoed with cheery, hopeful voices. Now and again a sudden shout far to east or west brought all searchers to a stop; there would be a moment of suspended elation, then the parties would trot on again. Every hubble of the ground, every object apparently foreign to the woods, every stump and rock was noticed, and investigated. There was probably not a yard of territory in those dark woods that was not seen that night by the prying eyes of scouts. ”

“ Having accustomed himself to the clamor and turmoil of the Jamboree Jazz Band and begun to enjoy the novelty of the distant, unseen entertainment, he would have preferred to let well enough alone. But he was beginning to learn that one who followed Pee-wee must be prepared for anything or must be willing to do anything whether he is prepared or not. ”

“ All classes were herded into the assembly room, the principal introduced “Some one whom you will all be glad of the opportunity to hear,” the speaker spoke, the pupils became restless, the principal asked for a vote of thanks, the student body joined in an unanimous lie, filed back to their class rooms, and the agony was over till the next minor celebrity hit Bridgeboro. Emerson was probably the only one who liked these frantic mobilizations for no cause whatever. ”

“ Do you know ravens can talk? Just like parrots, they can. They talk all the time.”
“Is that why you’re a Raven?” Emerson asked.
“The Silver Foxes in my troop, they’re all crazy,” said Pee-wee. “Gee whiz, those fellers tried to tell me that your favorite book is Webster’s dictionary. They’re a bunch of jolliers in that patrol.
“Roy Blakeley—he’s their patrol leader—he says that a civil engineer means an engineer that’s polite; that shows how crazy he is, and they have him for leader. He says that goldfish are sun-fish that got sunburned. ”

“ Following the elephants came the camels and they too swung around; it was all the same to them. Followed an uproarious steam calliope which made the turn with a clamor to wake the dead. Then came the rolling cages with their ferocious tenants. And all these turned into Allerton Street following the calliope which followed the camels which followed the elephants which followed the band which followed the drum-major who followed the direction authoritatively indicated by Pee-wee Harris. ”