Tom Slade at Black Lake

by Percy Keese Fitzhugh

  William Barnard!

  And he had given the three cabins on the hill to Scoutmaster Barnard'stroop in Dansburg, Ohio.

  No one but Tom had arrived at the office and for just a few moments,standing there near Miss Ellison's typewriter and with the prosy letterfiles about, he was again in France. He could hear the booming of thegreat guns again, see the flashes of fire....

  He sat down and wrote,

  DEAR MR. BARNARD:

  I got your letter and I am the same Tom Slade. I was going to ask you where you lived in America so I could know you some more when we got back, but when the doctors came to take me away, I didn't see you anywhere. I had to stay in the hospital three weeks, but it wasn't on account of my arm, because that wasn't so bad. It was the shell-shock that was bad--it makes you forget things even after you get better.

  I was sorry early this morning that I gave you those cabins, because they're the same ones that my own troop always used to have, and it was a crazy thing for me to forget about that. But now I'm glad, because I have thought of another scheme. I thought of it while I was lying in bed last night and couldn't sleep. So now I'm glad you have those cabins. And you bet I'm glad you wrote to me. It's funny how things happen.

  Maybe you'll remember how I thought I was going to die in that hole, and you said how we could dig our way out with your helmet, because if a fellow _has_ to do something he can do it. I'm glad you said that, because I thought about it last night. And thinking of that made me decide I would do something.

  I would like it if you will write to me again before summer, and you can send your letters care of Temple Camp, Black Lake.

  When you come, you bet I'll be glad to see you.

  Your friend, TOM SLADE.

  When Tom had sealed and stamped this letter, he laid the other one onMiss Margaret Ellison's desk, thinking that she might be interested toread it.

  CHAPTER XI

  TOM AND ROY

  Anxious that his letter should go as soon as possible, Tom went down inthe elevator and was about to cross the street and post it when he ranplunk into Roy, who was waiting on the steps.

  "Good night, look who's here," Roy said, in his usual friendly tone; "Imight have known that you were upstairs. You've got the early birdturning green with envy."

  "I always come early Saturdays," Tom said.

  "I want to tell you that I'm sorry about the way I spoke to you lastnight, Tom," Roy spoke up. "I see now that it wasn't so bad. I guess youhave a whole lot to do up in the office, and maybe you just forgot abouthow we always had the hill cabins. You can't do _everything_ you wantto do, gee I realize that."

  "I can do anything I want to do," Tom said.

  Roy looked at him as if he did not quite understand.

  "Going back on people isn't the way to square things," Tom said. "Yougot to make things right without anybody losing anything. There's alwaystwo ways, only you've got to find the other one."

  Roy did not quite understand the drift of his friend's talk, it was notalways easy to follow Tom, and indeed he did not care much what Tommeant; he just wanted him to know that their friendship had not beenwrecked--could not be wrecked by any freakish act of Tom's.

  "I don't care thirty cents what anybody says," Tom said; "I got to befair."

  "I'm not mad, you old grouch," Roy said, "and you should say sixtycents, because the price of everything is double. We should worry. I waswaiting here to meet you so as to tell you that I don't know why youdid that and I don't care. People have done crazier things than that, Ishould hope. We can bunk in tents, all right. So don't be sore, Tomasso.I'm sorry I said what I did and I know perfectly well that you justdidn't think. You don't suppose I really meant that I thought you knewanybody in that troop out in Ohio, do you? I just said it because I wasmad. Gee whiz, I know you wouldn't give anybody the choice before_us_--before your own fellows. I was mad because I was disappointed. Butnow I know how maybe you were all kind of--you know--rattled on accountof being so busy.

  "I ain't mad," said Tom, in his dull, stolid way; "I got to go acrossthe street and mail this letter."

  "And you'll come to meeting next Friday night?" Roy asked, anxiously.

  "I don't know," Tom said.

  "And I'm going to tell the fellows that you assigned five, six, andseven, to that Ohio troop just because you were thinking aboutsomething else when you did it, and that you didn't know anything moreabout those fellows than if they were the man in the moon," Roy paused amoment. "Did you?" he said conclusively.

  "You can tell them whatever you want to," Tom said. "You can tell themthat I didn't know anything about them if you want to. I don't care whatyou tell them."

  Roy paused, hardly knowing what to say. In talking with Tom one had toget him right just as a wrestler must get his victim right and Roy knewthat he must watch his step, so to speak.

  "You can tell them they won't lose anything," Tom said.

  "They'll lose something all right if they lose _you_, Tomasso," Roysaid, with a note of deep feeling in his voice. "But we're not going tolose you, I can tell you that. They think you have no use for the scoutsany more, because you met so many people in France, and know a lot ofgrown-up people."

  "Is that what they think?" Tom asked.

  They both stepped aside for Margaret Ellison, the Temple Campstenographer, to pass in, and spoke pleasantly with her until she hadentered the elevator.

  "I don't care what they think," Roy said; "a scout is observant. Can't Isee plain enough that you have your pioneer scout badge on? That showsyou're thinking about the scouts."

  "I put it on for a reason," said Tom.

  "You bet your life you did," Roy said, "and it shows you're a scout.Once a scout, always a scout; you can't get away from that, Tomasso."

  "Maybe you'll find that out," Tom said, his meaning, as usual, a littlecloudy.

  "I don't have to find it out, Tom," Roy said. "Don't you suppose I knowwhere you stand? Do you think I'll ever forget how you and I hikedtogether, and how we camped up on my lawn together, when you first gotto be a scout--do you think I will? I always liked you better than anyfellow, gee whiz, that's sure. And I know you think more of us than youdo of any one else, too. Don't you?"

  "I got to go and mail this letter," Tom said.

  "First you've got to say that you're for the scouts first, last andalways," said Roy gayly, and standing in his friend's path.

  Tom looked straight at him, his eyes glistening.

  "Do you have to ask me that?" he said.

  And then was when the trails went wrong, and didn't cross right and comeout right. Roy went up in the elevator to get some circulars from TempleCamp office, and Tom, on his way back from across the street went intothe bank to speak with Mr. Temple's secretary. And the girl spoiledeverything, as Peewee Harris always said that girls are forever doing.

  She was in a great hurry to get the cover off her machine and othermatters straightened out, before Mr. Burton came in, so she did nottrouble herself to talk much with Roy. She did, however, think to callafter him just as he was leaving and he heard her words, with a kind ofcold chill, as he stepped into the elevator.

  She called to him in her sweetest tone, "Isn't it too funny! Ascoutmaster, named Barnard, from out in Ohio who is going to be up atcamp knew Tom in France. Won't they have a perfectly _scrumptious_vacation together, talking about old times?"

  CHAPTER XII

  THE LONG TRAIL

  "You can tell them whatever you want to. You _can tell them that Ididn't know anything about them_ if you want to. I don't care what youtell them." These were the words that rang in Roy Blakeley's mind as hewent down in the elevator, and they made him sick at heart. That Tom hadso much forgotten about the troop, _his_ troop, as to assign their threecabins to strangers--that Roy could overlook. He could not understandit, but in his fondne
ss for Tom, he could overlook it, as his talk withTom had proved.

  But that Tom should lie to him and make him a party to that lie byauthorizing him to repeat it, that he could not forget or forgive. "_Youcan tell them that I did not know anything about them if you want to_."And all the while he, Tom, had known this Barnard, or whatever his namewas, and had fixed things so that he and Barnard might be together atTemple Camp. Barnard was a grown-up fellow, Roy told himself, and asoldier, and he didn't exactly blame Tom, but....

  And then their trails crossed again, right there at the foot of theelevator shaft, where Tom was waiting to go up.

  Roy's first impulse was to brush past his friend saying nothing, butwhen he had all but reached the door he wheeled about and said, "If youwant to hand out any lies to the troop, you'd better do it yourself; I'mnot going to do it for you."

  "What?" said Tom, a little startled out of his usual stolid manner.

  "Oh, you know what, all right," Roy answered sneeringly. "You thoughtI'd never find out, didn't you? You didn't think I'd go up to theoffice. You thought you'd get away with it and have me lying to thetroop--the fellows that used to be your friends before you met Barnyardor whatever you call him. I know who he is, all right. If you wanted togive him our cabins, him and his troop, why didn't you come and say so?Gee whiz, we would have been willing to do them a good turn. We'vecamped in tents before, if it comes to that."

  Tom stood perfectly motionless, with no more expression, either of angeror sorrow or surprise, than he usually showed. His big, tight set,resolute mouth was very conspicuous, but Roy did not notice that. Theelevator came down, and the metallic sound of its door opening wasemphasized in the tense silence which followed Roy's tirade.

  "Going up," the colored boy said.

  The door rolled shut and still Tom Slade stood there, stolid and withoutany show of emotion, looking straight at Roy. "I didn't ever tell alie--not since I got in with the scouts," he said simply.

  "Well, that makes two," said Roy mercilessly; "do you mean to tell meyou don't know what's-his-name--Barnard? Will you stand there and sayyou don't know him?"

  "I do know him," Tom said; "he saved my life in France."

  "And didn't you tell me only ten minutes ago that I could tell thefellows that you didn't know anything about--about that troop--about himand his troop? Didn't you? Do you deny that you did? You told me I couldgo back and lie to the fellows--you did! If you think I'll do thatyou've got another guess, I can tell you that much!"

  "I never told you you should lie," said Tom with straightforwardsimplicity, "and I admit I forgot about the cabins. I was away twosummers. I had a lot of different things to think about. I gotshell-shocked the very same night I met that fellow, and that's gotsomething to do with it, maybe. But I wouldn't stand here, I wouldn't,and try to prove that I didn't tell a lie. If you want to think I did,go ahead and think so. And if the rest of the troop want to think so,let them do it. If anybody says I forgot about the scouts, he lies. Andyou can tell them they won't lose anything, either; you can tell them Isaid so. I ain't changed. Didn't I--didn't I ride my motorcycle all theway from Paris to the coast--through the floods--didn't I? Do you thinkit's going to be hard to make everything right? I--I can do anything--Ican. And I didn't lie, either. You go up to Temple Camp on the first ofAugust like you--like we--always did; that's all _I_ say."

  He was excited now, and his hand trembled, and Roy looked at him a bitpuzzled, but he was neither softened nor convinced. "Didn't you as muchas say you didn't know anything about who made that application--didn'tyou?" Roy demanded.

  "I said it good and plain and you can go and tell them so, too," Tomsaid.

  "And you do know this fellow named Barnard, don't you?"

  "I know him and he saved my life," Tom said, "and if you----"

  "Going up," the colored boy called again.

  And the young fellow, scout and soldier, who would not bother to provehis truthfulness to his old companion and friend, was gone. He had hithis own trail in his own way, as he usually did; a long devious,difficult, lonesome trail. The clearly defined trail of the sidewalkleading to the troop room, where a few words of explanation might havestraightened everything out, was not the trail for Tom Slade, scout. Hewould straighten things out another way. He would face this thing, notrun away from it, just as he had set his big resolute mouth and facedPete Connigan. They would lose nothing, these boys. Let them think whatthey might, they would lose nothing. To be falsely accused, what wasthat, provided these boys lost nothing? That was all that counted. Whatdifference did it make if they thought he had lied and deceived them, solong as _he_ knew that he had not?

  And what a lot of fuss about three cabins! Had he not the power tostraighten out his own mistake in the best possible way--the scout way?And how was that? By going to Mr. Burton and taking the matter up andperhaps causing disappointment to those boys out in Ohio, for the sakeof these boys in Bridgeboro? Robbing Peter to pay Paul?

  Perhaps Mr. Burton would have done that, under all the circumstances.Perhaps Mr. John Temple, head of the whole shebang, would have approvedthis--under the circumstances. Perhaps the average clerk would haveproposed this; would have suggested hitting this convenient littletrail, about as short and prosy as a back alley. All you need on thattrail is a typewriter machine. Perhaps Tom Slade was not a good clerk.His way out of the difficulty was a longer and more circuitous way. Butit was the scout way. He was a scout and he hit the long trail.

  CHAPTER XIII

  ROY'S TRAIL

  As for Roy, he went home feeling heavy of heart, but he was not sorryfor what he had said. He had known that Tom had been slipping away fromthe troop and that his interest in the old associations had waned eversince his return from France. But that Tom should have lied to him andthat he should use Temple Camp and that old beloved spot up on the hillfor new friends, deliberately giving them precedence over thesecompanions of his real scouting days--_that_ Roy could not stand. And hetold himself that he was through with Tom, even as Tom was through withthe troop.

  The trail of Roy and his friends is short and easy to follow, and it isnot the main trail of this story. It took them into the city where theybought a tent, (not a very large one, for they could not get togethermuch money), but big enough to bunk in and enable them to spend theirvacation at the beloved, familiar spot. He said that "he should worryabout that fellow Barnard," and that he guessed Tom's fondness for thatindividual was like Peewee's fondness for mince pie--a case of love atfirst bite. But did he forget about Tom, and miss him at the meetings?

  We shall have to guess as to that. Tom was seldom mentioned, at allevents. The first member of the Bridgeboro troop to outgrow hiscompanions and turn his thoughts to new friends and associates hadbroken away from the hallowed circle and deserted them, and repudiatedthem with a lie on his lips; that was what the scouts said, or at least,thought. They had seen it coming, but it had hurt just the same.

  And so the days went by, and the breath of Spring grew heavier in theair, and the dandelions sprang up in the field down by the river, andtree blossoms littered the sidewalks, and the frogs began croaking inthe marshes. When the frogs begin croaking it is time to think of camp.

  But Tom Slade, late of the scouts, was ahead of the dandelions and theblossoms and the frogs, for on that very day of his talk with Roy, andwhile the three patrols were off on their shopping bee in the city, hewent into Mr. Burton's private office and asked if he might talk to himabout an idea he had.

  "Surest thing you know, Tommy," said his superior cheerily. "You want togo to the North Pole now?"

  For Mr. Burton knew Tom of old.

  CHAPTER XIV

  THE REALLY HARD PART

  "Maybe you'll remember how you said this would just be a kind of anexperiment, my starting to work again in the office, and maybe it wouldturn out to be better for me to go away in the country," said Tom.

  "Yes sir," said Mr. Burton, with prompt good nature intended to put Tomat his ease.

  "I w
as wondering if maybe you could keep a secret," Tom said.

  "Well, I could make a stab at it," Mr. Burton said, laughing.

  "Do you think Margaret could?" Tom asked.

  "Oh, I dare say, but you know how girls are. What's the trouble?"

  "I want to go away," Tom said; "I can't do things right and I want to goaway. I'm all the time forgetting."

  "I think you're doing fine," said Mr. Burton.

  "I want to go up to Temple Camp until I feel better," Tom said.

  Mr. Burton scrutinized him shrewdly and pursed up his lips and said,"Don't feel first rate, eh?"

  "I get rattled awful easy and I don't remember things," Tom said. "Iwant to go up to camp and stay all alone with Uncle Jeb, like you said Icould if I wanted to."

  Again Mr. Burton studied him thoughtfully, a little fearfully perhaps,and then he said, "Well, I think perhaps that would be a very goodthing, Tom. You remember that's what I thought in the first place. Youmade your own choice. How about the secret?"

  "It isn't anything much, only I thought of something to do while I'm upthere. I got to square myself. I gave the troop cabins to a troop outwest----"

  "Well, I was wondering about that, my boy; but I didn't want to sayanything. You'll have Roy and Peewee and those other gladiators sittingon your neck, aren't you afraid?"

  "They got no use for me now," Tom said.

  "Oh, nonsense. We'll straighten that out. You send a letter----"

  "The scoutmaster of that troop out west is a friend of mine," said Tom,"but I never knew it until this morning, when I got a letter from him.They think I did it because I knew it was him all the time and liked himbetter, but I don't care what they think as long as nobody losesanything; that's all I care about. So if you'd be willing," he continuedin his dull, matter-of-fact way, as if he were asking permission to goacross the street, "I'd like to go up and stay at Temple Camp before theseason opens and fell some of those trees on the new woods property andput up three cabins on the hill for Roy and the troop to use when theyget there. I wouldn't want anybody to know I'm doing it."