"Our beloved scoutmaster," who was rowing one of the skiffs, only smiled.

"I know more about geography than you do," shouted the irrepressible Pee-wee; "_he_ thought Newburgh was below Peekskill," he added, contemptuously.

"_He_ thought Sandy Hook was a Scotchman," retorted Roy. "Well, what's the news, Jeb, anyway?"

"Yer didn't give us no chance ter tell yer," drawled Jeb, as they drew the boats up on sh.o.r.e. "Mebbe yer think yer wuz the fust arrivals, but yer wuzn't."

It was good to hear Roy's familiar nonsense; Raymond, who was quiet and easily amused, saw with joy that the ancient hostilities between Roy and Pee-wee were still in full swing; and for all Roy's dubious picture of an overcrowded boat (and so it must have been) they had found it possible to stop down the river for Garry Everson and bring him along.

"Last of the Mohicans," said Roy, as he dragged Garry forward; "all that's left of the famous Edgevale troop-left over from last summer. The only original has-been. Them wuz the happy days."

There was Tom Slade, too, quiet and stolid as he always was and with no more sign of the scout regalia than he had shown when he was a hoodlum down in Barrel Alley. His gray flannel shirt and last year's khaki trousers were in odd contrast to the new outfits which the other members of the Bridgeboro Troop wore. But then Tom was in odd contrast with everything and everybody anyway.

Two troops which had come up by the train had joined them at Catskill Landing so the new arrivals descended like an all-conquering host upon the quiet monotony of the big camp.

"And I'm going to stay till September," said Raymond, clinging to Garry and talking to both Garry and Roy. "Mr. Temple sent the money. Do you remember how I couldn't raise the flag last summer?"

"You were about as tough as a Welsbach gas mantel last summer," laughed Roy.

"Well, now I can raise it with one hand and I can hike to Leeds and back.

But listen-_listen_; we've got a mystery-it just happened--"

"Give it to Tom," laughed Roy. "He's the fellow for mysteries."

But in another minute he had abandoned his gay tone as the little company stood gazing down upon the dead hawk, while Jeb held a lantern, and listened to Raymond's breathless account of what had happened.

It had a sobering effect upon them all, and as Mr. Ellsworth, the Bridgeboro Troop's scoutmaster, held that pathetic note and read it in the lantern light, with the scouts cl.u.s.tering about him, he shook his head ruefully.

The note was pa.s.sed about among the boys, who fingered it curiously.

"It's a stalking blank, isn't it," said Tom, as he handed it to Westy Martin, of the Silver Foxes, who wore the stalking badge. "The printed part has been torn off so's to get it into that little holder. See?" he added, rubbing his finger along the edge, "it came off a pad-a stalking pad-one of--" and he named the sporting goods concern which made them.

"It's the same kind you and I used at Salmon River."

The announcement, made in Tom's usual stolid, half-interested way, fell like a bombsh.e.l.l among them.

"Oh, can we find them? Can we find them?" cried Raymond.

"I'm afraid that doesn't do us much good," said Mr. Ellsworth. "We already knew that the message was sent from some isolated place or help would have been procurable. That being the case, I don't see how the sender happened to have a pigeon handy."

"He had more than one, don't you see?" said Tom, quietly, "but the other died-Spotty. It must have been sent by some one who's stalking and a fellow who's that much interested in birds would be just the kind of a fellow that might have carrier pigeons-it's good sport."

"Yes, but where is he-or they? There's two of them, anyway," said Doc Carson.

"That's for us to find out," said Tom. "I'm not going to sit down here and eat my supper with someone dying." He kicked the body of the hawk slightly as if to express his disgust that this insignificant creature could cause such trouble and baffle even scouts. "We don't know much about it but we'll have to use what little we do know. I know that when people try out carrier pigeons they always get a high ground, and I know that up on that hill over there-in the woods-there were chalk marks on the trees last summer. Maybe someone was stalking there then. Anyway, I'm going to get to the top of that hill and see if I can find anyone up there. I want Doc to go with me. Anybody else can go that wants to. If there's anybody there we'll wigwag or [1]smudge it to you in the morning."

For a moment there was silence. It was exactly like Tom to blurt out his plans with a kind of stolid bluntness, and if he had contemplated a trip to the moon he would have announced it in the same dull way. He seldom asked advice and as seldom asked authority. He was a kind of law unto himself. If anyone knew how to take Tom it was Roy Blakeley, but Roy often threw up his hands in despair and said he gave it up-Tom was a puzzle. He stood there among them now, his face about as expressionless as an Indian's-coa.r.s.e gray flannel shirt open halfway down to his waist, a strap by way of a belt, and his shock of thick hair down on his forehead. Why he had eschewed the scout regalia while the others came resplendent in their new outfits was a mystery. What advantage over a belt the thin strap had, no one knew.

"Oh, I'll go with you! I'll go with you!" shouted the irrepressible Pee-wee. "I'll--"

"You'll just sit down and have some supper," laughed Mr. Ellsworth.

It is to be feared that the scoutmaster had small hope of anything coming from Tom's proposed expedition, but he was not the one to discourage his scouts nor obtrude his authority. So the little party was made up (for whatever slight prospect of success it might afford) of Tom, Doc Carson, Raven and First Aid Scout, Connie Bennet of Tom's patrol, and Garry Everson who, though not a member of the troop, was asked because of his proficiency in signalling. Roy, who would naturally have gone, was asked by Mr. Ellsworth to remain at camp to help him get the troop's baggage distributed in the several cabins that had been reserved for them.

So the four scouts, having taken a hasty bite of supper, set out in the darkness on their all but hopeless errand. Tom carried a lantern; across Doc Carson's back was slung the folding stretcher; Connie Bennet carried the bandages and first-aid case, and all wore belt axes, for the hill which they meant to climb was covered with a dense thicket and even in the lower land between it and the camp there was no sign of path or trail after the first mile or so.

CHAPTER III ROY'S CAMPFIRE YARN

"That's what you get for being small," sighed Pee-wee to Raymond Hollister, as they strolled about together while waiting for supper.

"When you say you want to go with them or tell them about an idea you have, they just laugh at you, or don't pay any attention. It just goes in one ear and out the other-because there's nothing to stop it, as Roy says. Gee, you have to laugh at that feller. He makes me awful mad sometimes-when he gets to jollying-but you have to laugh at him."

"Do you know what he told me last summer?" said Raymond; "he was telling me about the echoes and he said if I called Merry Christmas good and hard it would answer Happy New Year!"

"That's just like him," said Pee-wee, "you have to look out for him. When I first joined his patrol he told me a lot of stuff. He said if a feller had a malicious look it was a sign he belonged to the militia. He'll be jollying you and me all the time we're here-you see if he isn't. He calls me a scoutlet. And it'll be the same with you, only worse, because you're even smaller than I am. What do you say we stick together?"

"I'll do it," said Raymond, "but I like Roy," he added. "I like him better than any of your patrol-I like him better than Tom Slade-a good deal."

"Tom isn't so bad," said Pee-wee, "but he's kind of queer."

"He doesn't look like a scout at all-not this year," said Raymond.

"He's thinking mostly about his patrol," said Pee-wee, "he's nutty about his patrol. He needs one more member. Roy and two or three others-Westy, he's pretty near as bad-they made a big rag doll with a punkin for a head and brought it to scout meeting as a new member for Tom's patrol. Coming up the river there was a scarecrow in a field and Roy said, 'There's your new member for you, Tom.' Oh, gee, but we did have some fun cruising up.

Sometimes I got mad when they kidded me, but most of the time I had to laugh-especially when Roy gave an imitation of a dying radiator-gee, that feller's the limit!"

Raymond enjoyed these tidbits of gossip about the Bridgeboro Troop, the members of which were all more or less heroes to him.

"I like Garry best of all," he suddenly announced.

"Everybody likes him," said Pee-wee.

"He's just as smart as any scout in your troop," Raymond added, with the faintest note of challenge in his tone.

The welcome sound of the supper horn brought their talk to an end. It was a merry company that gathered about one of the three long boards (the other two were as yet unused) and to the scouts who were visiting Temple Camp for the first time this late evening meal, served by lantern light under the sombre trees with the still, black lake hard by and the frowning hills encompa.s.sing them, was most delightful.

There were few among them (least of all Jeb and the scoutmaster) who believed that anything would be accomplished by Tom's expedition but even a hopeless enterprise seemed more scoutish than doing nothing and Mr.

Ellsworth was certainly not the one to deny his scouts any adventure even though it offered nothing more than a forlorn hope.

After supper some one suggested campfire and soon the cheerful, crackling blaze which seems to typify the very spirit of scouting was luring the boys back from pavilion and cabin and they lolled on the ground about it as it grew in volume and glittered in the black water.

"What d'you say we tell riddles?" suggested Pee-wee.

"All right," said Roy, who was poking the fire. "Riddle number one, How much is twice?"

"Do you stir your coffee with your left hand?" shouted Pee-wee.

"No, with a spoon," said Roy; "no sooner said than stung!"