Robert Shaler

“ The deafening applause, that made the rafters of that big town hall quiver, drowned whatever else the gentleman meant to say; but while the tumult was still going on, the banner was placed in the hands of the happy leader of the Wolf patrol; and after that, there was no getting the meeting under control again.
So ended the exciting competition for the lead among the four patrols of the troop. There were heart burnings, of course, for boys can feel bitter disappointment as well as any one; but as scouts, they were bound to banish all envy and try to rejoice with the fortunate ones. ”

“ And there are lots more of the same kind ahead of him yet.”
“Do you see a trailing rope, boys?” asked Hugh. “Sometimes they let one down and have a weight on it for a drag anchor. Seems to me I can glimpse something of the kind now and then.”
“You’re right, Hugh, it’s there!” ejaculated Arthur, who had already snapped off one view of the advancing balloon.
“Everybody get ready to lay hold and fight like everything to check the runaway,” Billy remarked, squaring himself for action in a way he had, just as if he expected to enter a contest of skill and endurance with a prize at stake. ”

“ Billy snorted with disdain as he said hastily,
“Huh! guess Alec isn’t much on reading character, then, if he thinks Hugh Hardin would get weak-kneed for a little thing like that. And every one of the Wolves are made of the stuff that fights harder than ever when they see that they’re up against a tough job. But anyway, you’ve made me feel better, Hugh. Someway I always do seem to look at things in a different light when you are around.” ”

“ Bud entreated.
“Here’s where we’ve got a fighting chance to pull down the biggest wad of points you ever heard of. Wasn’t it two hundred and fifty that was to go to the patrol containing a scout who had been instrumental in saving a human life since the contest started? Well, what’s the matter with our claiming a thousand? Hasn’t our leader saved all our lives by his judgment in this hollow tree business? How about that, Hugh? Think we’d stand any show of getting our claim admitted by the committee?” ”

“ Don’t you see that it’s hollow to the core?” declared Arthur, pointing as he spoke. “Why, chances are the whole kitting lot of us could squeeze inside; and if the storm comes from the direction of that thunder, not a drop of rain would beat in on us. Well, why don’t somebody say what you think of my bully scheme?”
“How about that, Hugh?” asked Billy, as if in doubt. “Seems to me I’ve been given to understand that a big tree isn’t the best place to get under when a thunder and lightning storm is buzzing around. ”

“ With a wisdom that would have done credit to an older head, Hugh had carried a roll of broad, surgical, bandage tape along with him when starting out on the trip. Probably he had had it along on the preceding day also, though there had been no call for its services. His experience and training had led him to “be prepared” for any accident that might happen to his comrades as they tramped and climbed in the woods.
“Give me a helping hand, Billy, won’t you?” asked the patrol leader. ”

“ Most boys are good climbers, and Hugh was especially at home in a tree. He could do all sorts of agile tricks, using some convenient limb as his trapeze, when he felt in the humor for exercising. But just now he was out for business, and once the boys had boosted him up to the first limb, in order to hasten his progress, he had but one object in view, which was to reach the spot where the man who had been torn from the basket of the balloon was caught and held fast. ”

“ Bud went on to say reflectively. “Time was when he just hated Hugh here like everything. Then for a while Alec turned right around, so that he seemed to be as good a friend as Hugh had in the whole troop; but I’ve taken notice lately that Alec’s showing signs of his old trouble. You know he’s a spoiled darling at home and thinks everything ought to come his way. He’s straining every nerve to count points, and says he’s got that fine banner as good as won. Huh! like fun he has! Wait till the Wolf patrol is heard from!” ”

“ Many a foolish man has been killed just by doing something like that. No, we’ve either got to take our ducking and stand for it, or else find some other place under shelter.”
“But just where could we go, Hugh?” Arthur questioned uneasily, as all of them saw a vivid flash of lightning shoot across the heavens where a small clearing permitted a view. It was soon followed by a detonating crash that seemed to make the very ground tremble underfoot.
“A barn would be just as bad as a tree, wouldn’t it, Hugh?” asked Bud, who, it appeared, knew something about such things. ”

“ I noticed several ledges standing out that ought to shelter us from most of the rain, unless the storm shifts and comes back again. Now, each fellow find a place to crawl under the rock!”
Encouraged by these words, the other three scouts hurried forward. Hugh generously pointed out the first refuge, and told Arthur and Bud to get under shelter as fast as they could manage it.
“How about you and Billy?” cried Arthur, unwilling to profit in this way from the scout master’s discovery.
“Move along in here; a scout’s first duty is to obey orders!” ”

“ I don’t reckon anybody ever believes his house is going to burn down; but he only wants to have his mind easy.”
“Well, lots of the stunts scouts learn are just so much insurance, as you might say,” Hugh declared. “And the more a boy stocks up with this stuff, the better he’s equipped for life. That’s where it counts big, I’m telling you.”
“And there is where we tucked ourselves away from the cloud-burst!” announced Billy, being the first to glimpse the queer rocky formations in the shape of shelves, that jutted out for six feet or so from the face of the hill. ”

“ While every boy and girl in town seemed to have come out to the baseball green, there were also many grown-ups on hand, curious to see what the scouts would do in their ambition to win certain “points.”
Mr. Perkins, the aeronaut, still lingered in town. That his arm was in a sling did not prevent his taking the liveliest kind of interest in the outcome of the prize banner contest. He had made certain that his rescue was known in influential circles, and was quite satisfied that Hugh and his fellows of the Wolf patrol were sure to win the prize, notwithstanding the field tests yet to be tried. ”

“ If it continues to spread as fast as it seems to be doing now, I can see where the coming American young man will be many times over better fitted and equipped for the battle of life than those that are in the field to-day, fighting for a living. But it is too bad if my coming causes you boys to go back to town without trying out those cliff-climbing stunts that Hugh had in mind. If you set me on the trail, I’ve no doubt I could follow it, somehow, till I got to the road ”

“ That gave the men the first scare they had felt. Up to then, they had considered that they only had to deal with a pack of school-boys, dressed in khaki and campaign hats and leggings, to imitate the National Guard. Now it really began to look as though these Boy Scouts might have come up to this part of the country to help the wardens find the missing convicts; because in these latter days patrols are being found useful in many fields of endeavor. ”

“ In the latter case, perhaps the scouts might find themselves called upon to show “first aid to the injured.” Indeed, on a number of other occasions they had proved themselves apt pupils in the art; and it would be a lucky thing for the balloonist, should he be badly hurt, that fortune had allowed him to fall into the hands of trained boys. Ignorant countrymen would let him bleed to death, simply through a lack of knowledge of the essential things that should be promptly done.
Hugh led the van, with Billy a close second, while Bud kept pretty close at the latter’s heels. ”

“ Billy said in return. “We’re scouts, you see, and it is one of the rules of the organization never to refuse to put out a helping hand to any one in trouble. I guess it is getting to be a disease with some of us, because we’re on the lookout most of the time for a chance to do something that’ll satisfy a sort of craving to be useful. So if you feel that thanks are due, sir, the whole troop ought to share ’em.” ”

“ There’s getting to be no limit to your——”
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“Just hold on there, Billy,” broke in Hugh. “I think this time Arthur deserves the thanks of the whole Wolf patrol for his stick-at-it-tiveness, as Walter Osborne always calls stubbornness. Think of what a heap of satisfaction it’s going to be to all of us, when we look over some of these thrillers he’s snatched with that snapshot box of his! Leave Arthur alone. While we’re all making history, he’s going to be the one to keep it fresh in our hearts and eyes. We’re proud of him.” ”

“ He must feel pretty weak after what he went through, and his arm must pain him, too. We may have to make a litter and carry him.”
“Well, for one thing, let me tell you he’s got a heap of grit,” said Billy softly, for he did not want the others to hear what he was saying as they came up. “You bet every man that goes up in the clouds has got to be full to the brim of nerve. If we let him rest every little while, you’ll see that he’ll make the riffle, all correct. I’ve sized him up already.”
Hugh and the aeronaut now came up. ”

“ Still, Arthur must take a picture of this tree to-morrow, and we can put in a claim for points in woodcraft. It will be a good thing for every scout in the troop to hear about; and when they see what happened to the big oak with the fine hollow in its trunk, they’ll never allow themselves to be tempted to crawl into such a trap when lightning is in the air.”
As the four boys hurried on Bud remarked drily: “A little common sense went a long way this time.” ”

“ The boys managed to eat more or less of the good things put before them, while first one and then another of the party told the story of the balloonist’s rescue. And then, as Mr. Perkins declared himself feeling fit to make the last run of the journey to a doctor, the scouts went back for the hidden wheels,—all but Hugh, who sat up on the driver’s seat with the wounded aeronaut between himself and Mr. Appleby.
At Hugh’s request the farmer promised to keep the secret of the rescue, for the leader, having reasons of his own, did not want it known just yet. ”

“ We men who pit ourselves against the forces of Nature, learn to take the good with the bad and call it all a day’s work. I’ve really accomplished what I set out to perform, because only for a change of wind I’d have dropped down on the coast before this hour. You’ll not hear me complain. And now tell me something about yourselves and your Wolf patrol. ”

“ Scout Master?”
“I wonder if it could be one of those tenderfoot recruits that expect to make up the new Owl patrol of our troop? How about that, Hugh?”
“As you’ve put it up to me straight, Billy, I’ll tell you what I think. It’s out of the question for one of those greenhorns to be away up here in the woods; and it was too deep and heavy to be the call of even a big Virginia horned owl. If you fellows will take the trouble to look up through the treetops you’ll notice that there’s a lot of queer flying clouds racing overhead right now.” ”

“ Blake is all wool and a yard wide; nothing small about him. He said, ‘No matter who wins out, let’s get the greatest lot of queer pictures together that ever were.’”
“And I reckon we will,” declared Billy positively, “as long as you’re able to toddle around with us Wolves, Arthur.”
“I’m wondering what next we’ll run across,” remarked Bud reflectively, as they watched Hugh assisting the wounded aeronaut to gather his scattered traps together. ”

“ Hugh declared.
“What do you think about it, Hugh?” asked Billy. “Have they found out some way to add a lot of tallies to their string,—an easy way, and yet one that would come inside the restrictions set by the committee? If that’s so, then the rest of the patrols might only be wasting their time trying.”
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“Don’t you believe that,” the other instantly told him. “No matter if they are beaten in the race, there’s no discounting the good the patrols will get out of the effort they make to roll up a strong count. ”

“ So it was that when Hugh had found out the truth and imparted the information to the rest of the boys, Billy and Arthur quickly discovered, also, the unlucky aeronaut.
“Show me, won’t you?” begged Bud, who appeared unable to locate the exact spot in his excitement. So they bent their heads close together, allowing him to get the range of their extended fingers.
“There he is,” said Billy, “just where that last fair-sized branch shoots out toward the left. Look hard, and you’ll be sure to see something caught in the crotch. That’s the man, Bud. ”

“ You know he’s been going in strong of late along the same lines as our chum here; and they do say he shows more or less talent about taking queer things. But my stars! he never could even dream of such re-markable stunts as have been crowding in on us of late, commencing with that storm yesterday!”
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“Well, Blake Merton has done some good work for the Hawks, too, they tell me,” Arthur admitted, for he was a modest boy and always willing to give a friend credit when it was due. ”

“ Billy explained, indicating how they had carefully gone over the entire pile of wreckage, even overturning the basket, as though it might have hidden something.
“That’s where you’re mistaken, then, because I saw him as plain as anything,” the newcomer asserted, and Arthur could be pretty stubborn when he wished.
“All right, then, get busy and find him, if you can,” Bud told him. “We throw up the job, don’t we, fellows? Hello! what’s Hugh going to do now?” Their attention being called to the leader by this remark from Bud, the others saw that Hugh had hurried back and up the rise a little. ”