Four Afoot: Being the Adventures of the Big Four on the Highway

by Ralph Henry Barbour

  CHAPTER I

  IN WHICH THE BIG FOUR SET OUT FOR JERICHO

  “On to Jericho!”

  Dan Speede took the car steps at a bound and was out on the stationplatform looking eagerly about him before the other three boys hadstruggled through the car door. Swinging his pack to his shoulders, hewaved an imaginary sword about his head and struck an attitude in whichhis right hand pointed determinedly toward the country road.

  “Forward, brave comrades!” he shouted.

  The brave comrades, tumbling down the steps, cheered enthusiastically,while the occupants of the car in which the quartet had traveled fromLong Island City looked wonderingly out upon them. But as the presentconduct of the boys was only on a par with what had gone before, thepassengers soon settled back into their seats, and the train puffed onits way. Tom Ferris waved gayly to the occupants of the passing windowsand then followed the others along the platform. The station was asmall one, and save for a farmer who was loading empty milk cans into awagon far down the track, there was no one in sight.

  “Which way do we go?” asked Nelson Tilford.

  For answer Bob Hethington produced his “Sectional Road Map of LongIsland, Showing the Good Roads, with Description of Scenery, Routes,etc.,” and spread it out against the side of the station.

  “Here we are,” he said. “Locust Park. And here’s our road.”

  “That’s all right,” answered Nelson, following the other’s finger. “Isee the road on your old map, but where is it on the landscape?”

  “Why, down there somewhere. It crosses the track just beyond thestation.”

  “Certainly, but you don’t happen to see it anywhere, do you?” asked Dan.

  Bob had to acknowledge that he didn’t.

  “Come on; we’ll ask Mr. Farmer down here,” said Tom.

  So they went on down the track to the little platform from which themilk was loaded on to the cars and hailed the farmer.

  “Good morning,” said Dan. “Which is the road to Jericho, please?”

  The farmer paused in his task and looked them over speculatively.Finally,

  “Want to go to Jericho, do you?” he asked.

  “Yes,” answered Dan.

  “Are you in a hurry?”

  “Why--no, I don’t suppose so. Why?”

  “’Cause there’s a train in about an hour that’ll take you toHicksville, and it’s about two miles from there by the road.”

  “But we just got off the train,” objected Nelson.

  “So I seen,” was the calm response. “Why didn’t you stay on? Didn’t youhave no money?”

  “Yes, but we wanted to walk,” answered Bob. “Which way do we go?”

  “Want to walk, eh? Well, you won’t have no trouble, I guess. Prettyfair walkers, are you?”

  “Bully!” answered Dan.

  “Fond of exercise, I guess?”

  “Love it!”

  “That so? Well, there’s lots of good walkin’ around here; the roads isfull of it.”

  “Oh, come on,” said Tom impatiently. “He’s plumb crazy!”

  “Hold on,” interposed the farmer. “I’m tellin’ you just as fast as Iknow how, ain’t I?”

  “Maybe,” answered Dan politely, “but you see we sort of want to get toJericho before Sunday. And as it’s already Monday morning----”

  “Thought you said you weren’t in no hurry,” objected the farmer.

  “Well, if you call that being in a hurry,” Dan replied, “I guess welied to you. If you happen to have any idea where the Jericho roadis----”

  “Well, I’d oughter, seems to me. I live on it. Are you all going?”

  “Every last one of us,” answered Nelson.

  “Tell him how old we are and the family history and let’s get on,”suggested Dan _sotto voce_.

  “Well, there’s four of you, eh?”

  “I think so.” Bob made pretense of counting the assembly with muchdifficulty. “Stand still, Tom, till I count you. Yes, sir, that’sright; there are four of us.”

  “Well, two of you could sit on the seat with me and two of you couldkind of hang out behind, I guess.”

  “Oh, much obliged,” said Bob. “But really we’d rather walk. We’retaking a walking trip down the island.”

  “You don’t say! Well, you go back there about a half a mile and you’llfind a road crossing the track. You take that until you fetch thecountry road going to your right. Keep along that and it’s about ninemiles to Jericho.”

  “Thanks,” said Dan.

  “You’re welcome. That’s the best way if you’re real fond of walking.”

  “Oh,” said Bob suspiciously. “And supposing we aren’t?”

  “Then you’d better go the shorter way and save about two miles,”answered the farmer gravely.

  “Which way’s that?”

  “Right down the track here for a quarter of a mile till you come to aroad going to the left. Take that for half a mile and then turn to yourright on the country road.”

  “Thanks again,” said Bob. “You’ve had a whole lot of fun with us,haven’t you?”

  “Well, you’re sort of amusin’,” answered the farmer with a twinkle inhis eye. “But I been more entertained at the circus.”

  Bob smiled in spite of himself, and the others grinned also; all saveTom.

  “B-b-b-blamed old ha-ha-hayseed!” growled Tom. “Hope he ch-ch-ch-chokes!”

  The four took their way down the track, Bob highly pleased to find thetruthfulness of his map established; although Dan declared that a mapthat would lie nearly a quarter of a mile couldn’t be fairly calledtruthful. When they had gone a hundred yards or so the farmer hailedthem.

  “What is it?” shouted Bob.

  “Got friends in Jericho, have you?” called the farmer.

  “No,” answered Bob, adding “confound you” under his breath.

  “Going to take dinner there, be you?”

  “I guess so. Why?”

  “Well, you go to William Hooper’s place about a mile t’other side ofthe village, and say Abner Wade sent you. He’ll look after you, Williamwill.”

  “Thank you,” called Bob.

  “He seems to be a decent chap after all,” said Nelson.

  “The only trouble with him is that he’s like Dan,” answered Bob. “He’sgot an overdeveloped sense of humor.”

  They tramped on, and presently found the road that crossed the railway.Turning into this they struck due north; at least that’s what Tomdeclared after consulting the compass which he carried in his pocket.Bob looked at his watch.

  “Nine-fifteen,” he announced. “We’ve got lots of time. Seven miles inthree hours is too easy.”

  “If that old codger told us the right way,” amended Tom.

  “He did, because the map shows it,” responded Bob.

  “Don’t talk to us about that old map,” said Dan. “It’s an awful liar,Bob.”

  And while they are quarreling good-naturedly about it let us have alook at them.

  The boy walking ahead, swinging that stick he has cut from a willowtree, is Nelson Tilford. Nelson--sometimes “Nels” to his friends--livesin Boston within sight of the golden dome and is a student at HilltonAcademy; and next year he expects, if all goes well, to be a freshmanat Erskine College. That apparent slimness is a bit misleading, forthe muscles under the gray flannel suit are hard as iron, and whatNelson lacks in breadth and stature is quite made up in strength andagility. In the same way the quiet, thoughtful expression on his facedoesn’t tell all the truth. Nelson is a good student, fond of books andinclined to think matters out for himself, but at the same time he isfond of sports and has been known to get into mischief.

  Next to him walks Tom--familiarly “Tommy”--Ferris; residence, Chicago;age, fourteen years--almost fifteen now. Tom is inclined towardstoutness, has light hair and gray eyes, is at once good-naturedand lazy, and has a positive talent for getting into trouble. Tommyexpresses himself clearly until he becomes excited; then he stuttersl
udicrously. Tommy is also a Hillton boy, but is one class behindNelson, a fact which troubles him a good deal, since he wants very muchto go up to college with his friend.

  The big, broad-shouldered boy with the red hair and rollicking blueeyes is Dan Speede. Dan, who hails from New York, is fifteen yearsold. Whereas Tom spends a good deal of his time getting into troublehimself, Dan is tireless in his efforts to get others into trouble;and he usually succeeds. For the rest, he is fond of fun, afraid ofnothing, and hasn’t an ounce of meanness in him. Dan is in his senioryear at St. Eustace Academy, and he, too, has his heart set on ErskineCollege.

  The last boy of the four--and the eldest--is Bob Hethington, ofPortland, Maine. Bob is sixteen--nearly seventeen--and is big,quiet-appearing, and unexcitable. He has curly black hair and eyes andis distinctly good-looking. Bob, too, is booked for Erskine.

  Perhaps you have met these boys before, when, at Camp Chicora,last summer, they gained the title of the Big Four. If so, you areundoubtedly wondering how it happens that we find them on this brightmorning in early September swinging along a country road on LongIsland. Well, it was all Dan’s fault. Dan took it into his head to getsick in early summer. As he had never been sick before to amount toanything, he thought he might as well do the thing right. So he hadtyphoid fever. That was in June, just after school closed, and he spentthe succeeding two months at home. He didn’t have a good time, and evenwhen the doctor declared him well, Dan felt, as he himself expressedit, like a last summer’s straw hat. So there was a family council.Dan’s mother said Dan ought to stay out of school and go abroad. Dansaid, “Nonsense.” So the matter was left to the physician. He said whatDan needed was outdoor exercise, plenty of fresh air, and all that.

  “Let him get into an old suit of clothes,” said the doctor, “andtake a walking trip.” (You see, the doctor was a bit old-fashioned.)“Nothing like walking; sea trips and sanitariums aren’t half as good.He needn’t hurry; just let him wander around country for two or threeweeks; that’ll set him up, you see if it doesn’t.”

  Dan liked the idea, but the thought of wandering around the countryalone didn’t appeal to him. “If I could only get Nelson or Bob or Tommyto go along,” he said.

  “Perhaps you can,” said his father.

  So three letters were written and dispatched and soon three answerscame. Nelson was glad to go, Bob was equally willing, and Tom was“tickled to death.” Bob and Nelson had been at Camp Chicora most ofthe summer, while Tom had spent his vacation at one of the Michiganlake resorts. The last week in August there was a jolly gathering ofthe clans at Dan’s house, a happy reunion, and an excited discussionof ways and means. Mr. Speede engineered affairs, and by the fourthday of September all was ready. There had been much discussion as towhere they should go. Nelson recommended his own State, Bob thoughtPennsylvania about right, and Tom favored the Adirondacks. It was Dan’sfather who thought of Long Island.

  “In the first place,” he pointed out, “it’s right at our back door,and you won’t have to waste a day in getting there; and as you’vegot only three weeks at the most before school begins, that’s worthconsidering. Then, too, if anything should happen to you, I couldget you here in a few hours. Long Island isn’t the biggest stretch ofcountry in the world, but there’s over a hundred miles of it as tolength, and I guess you can keep busy. Besides, the towns are neartogether and you’ll be able to find good sleeping accommodations; andI’d rather Dan didn’t do too much sleeping out of doors just at first.”

  So the map of Long Island was produced and studied, and the more theystudied it the better they liked it. It was unknown territory to themall, for even Dan’s knowledge of the place was limited to Coney Island,and the names of places--names which amused Tommy vastly--and theevident abundance of good roads won the day.

  “Me for Long Island!” declared Nelson.

  “Same here,” said Tommy. “I want to go to Jericho.”

  “And I want to go to Yaphank,” declared Bob.

  “And Skookwams Neck for mine!” cried Dan.

  So they started to lay out a route. They laid out six. The firstleft out Lake Ronkonkoma, and Tommy declared he just had to see LakeRonkonkoma. The second omitted Ketcaboneck, and Bob said he couldn’tgo back home without having seen Ketcaboneck. The third slightedAquebogue, and Nelson refused to go unless that charming place was onthe route. And so it went, with much laughter, until finally Mr. Speedeadvised them to settle only on a place to start from, take the mapwith them, and decide their itinerary as they went along. That pleasedeven Tommy.

  “I shall visit Quogue if I have to go alone,” he said.

  What to take with them was a question which occasioned almost asmuch discussion. Tommy had brought his trunk and wanted to take mostof its contents along. In the end Mr. Speede’s counsel prevailedand each boy limited his luggage to the barest necessities. Lightrubber ponchos--squares with a hole cut in the middle which could beslipped over the head when it rained--were purchased, and these wereto be used as knapsacks, the other articles being rolled up inside.The other articles included a towel, bathing trunks, brush and comb,toothbrush, extra shoe laces, a light-weight flannel shirt, threepairs of stockings, and handkerchiefs. Each boy carried a collapsibledrinking cup in his pocket, Bob took charge of the map, and Tom was theproud possessor of a compass. Tom also carried a folding camera, havingat length been prevailed upon to leave a choice library of fiction, asingle-barreled shotgun, and two suits of clothing behind him.

  Old clothes, stout shoes, cloth caps, and light flannel shirts withcollars was the general attire. And so clothed, each with his pack inhand, the four said good-by to Mr. and Mrs. Speede on Monday morning,took car to the ferry, crossed the river, and boarded an early trainfor Locust Park, at which point their journey on foot was to begin.And so we find them, Dan a trifle pale of face but as merry and happyas any, trudging along the road toward Jericho, each prepared for agood time and eager for adventures.

  And adventures were awaiting them.