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UNDER BOY SCOUT COLORS

by

JOSEPH B. AMES

Author of "Pete, Cow-Puncher," "The Treasure of the Canyon," etc.

Illustrated by Walt Louderback



[Illustration: He jerked backward with all the strength he could summon]







[Illustration]

Approved by the "Boy Scouts of America"

New York
The Century Co.
1917

Copyright, 1916, 1917, by
The Century Co.

Published September, 1917




TO

THE MEMBERS OF TROOP FIVE

FROM A GRATEFUL SCOUTMASTER




CONTENTS

  Chapter                                                     Page
        I THE LIVE WIRE                                          3
       II THE NEW TENDERFOOT                                    12
      III THE SILVER LINING                                     26
       IV ON THE GRIDIRON                                       39
        V TROUBLE AHEAD                                         53
       VI THE QUARREL                                           65
      VII IN THE LAST QUARTER                                   77
     VIII THE GOOD TURN                                         86
       IX AN ODD THANKSGIVING                                   96
        X THE SURPRISE                                         108
       XI ELKHORN CABIN                                        121
      XII A CRY IN THE NIGHT                                   130
     XIII WHAT THEY FOUND                                      140
      XIV THE BOY WHO COULDN'T SWIM                            147
       XV THE RESCUE                                           157
      XVI TREXLER'S TRANSFORMATION                             171
     XVII DALE'S CHANCE                                        184
    XVIII A QUESTION OF MONEY                                  193
      XIX THE ACCIDENT                                         202
       XX FIRST AID                                            212
      XXI LOST MINE HILL                                       223
     XXII AROUND THE COUNCIL FIRE                              232
    XXIII A SURPRISE FOR VEDDER                                237
     XXIV THE MISSING SCOUT                                    243
      XXV LOST MINE FOUND                                      253
     XXVI THE WISH OF HIS HEART                                264
    XXVII THE SURPRISE                                         272
   XXVIII WAR                                                  282
     XXIX "EVERY SCOUT TO FEED A SOLDIER"                      294
      XXX THE SILVER CROSS                                     301
     XXXI THE RIOT WEDGE                                       308




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

                                                              Page
  He jerked backward with all the strength he could
  summon                                              Frontispiece

  "Aw, quit it, fellows! It wasn't anything"                    43

  "What d'you want?" he demanded                                99

  The stick slid over the jagged edges of the hole             153

  The car crashed into the weather-worn railing of
  the bridge                                                   209

  In an instant he was surrounded by excited boys              257

  "Ranny!" he exclaimed impulsively. "You--you--"              269

  "Hold fast, boys!" he cried. "Brace your feet and
  don't let them break the line"                               311




UNDER BOY SCOUT COLORS




CHAPTER I

THE LIVE WIRE


Dale Tompkins slung the bulging bag of papers over one shoulder, and,
turning away from the news-stand, walked briskly down the main street
of Hillsgrove. The rain had ceased, and the wind that had howled fiercely
all day long was shifting into the west, where it tore to tatters the
banks of dun gray clouds, letting through gleams and patches of cold
blue sky tinged with the pale, chill yellow of a typical autumn sunset.

The cold look of that sunset was well borne out by a keen nip in the air,
but Dale was too thankful to have it clear at all to complain. Besides,
he wasn't exactly the complaining sort. Turning up the collar of a rather
shabby coat, he thrust both hands deep into his trousers' pockets and
hurried whistling along, bent on delivering his papers in the quickest
possible time.

"I ought to get home by seven, anyhow," he thought calculatingly. "And
if Mother'll only give me a hurry-up snack, I'll be in time for meeting."

He rolled the last word under his tongue with the prideful accent of a
novice. Then, with a sudden start, one hand jerked out of his pocket
and slipped between the buttons of the thread-bare coat. For an anxious
moment it groped there before the fingers closed over a metal badge,
shaped like a trefoil, that was pinned securely to the flannel shirt.
A somewhat sheepish grin overspread the freckled face, and through
an open gate Dale shot a paper dexterously across the porch to land
accurately in the middle of the door-mat.

"I'd hate to lose it the very first week," he muttered, with a touch
of apology. Mechanically he delivered another paper, and then he sighed.
"Gee! A month sure seems an awful long time to wait when you know about
all the tests already. I could even pass some of the first-class ones, I
bet! That handbook's a dandy, all right. I don't guess there was ever
another book printed with so much in it, exceptin', maybe--"

The words froze on his lips, and he caught his breath with a sharp,
hissing intake. From somewhere in the next block a scream rang out
on the still air, so shrill, so sudden, so full of surprise and pain
and utter terror that Dale's blood turned cold within him, and the
arm, half extended to toss a folded paper, halted in the middle of its
swing, as if encountering an invisible obstacle. The pause was only
momentary. Abruptly, as if two hands were pressed around a throbbing
throat, the cry was cut off, and in the deathly silence that followed,
Dale hurled the paper hastily, but accurately, from him, and turned
and ran.

Eyes wide and face a little white, he tore across the road, splashing
through puddles and slipping in the soft mud. Whirling around the corner
into Pine Street, he saw a woman rush bareheaded out of a near-by
house and two men come running down an adjacent alley. Rather, he noted
them with that odd sense of observation which works intuitively, for his
whole being was concentrated on the sight of that slight, boyish figure
lying motionless in the roadway.

For a second Dale stared blankly, unable to understand. His first
thought was that some human agency had done this thing, but almost as
swiftly he realized that there was no one in sight who could have
struck the child unconscious, nor had there been time for such an
assailant to get away. Then, as he hurried closer through the gathering
dusk, he caught sight of a trailing wire gripped convulsively in the
small hands, and in a flash he realized the truth. In a flash, too,
he realized that the body was not as motionless as he had supposed. A
writhing, twisting movement, slight but ceaseless, quivered through
the helpless victim, from his thin, black-stockinged legs to the blue
lips. To the white-faced lad bending over him it seemed to tell of great
suffering borne, perforce, in silence--and he was such a little kid!

From Dale's own lips there burst a smothered, inarticulate cry. Every
idea, save the vital need of tearing loose that killing grip, vanished
from the older boy's mind. Heedless of a warning shout from one of the
men, he bent swiftly forward and caught the child by one shoulder.

What happened then Dale was never afterward able to describe clearly.
It was as if some monstrous tingling force, greater, stranger than
anything he had ever known, struck at him out of the air. In a twinkling
it tore him from the boy on the ground and hurled him almost the width
of the street. He crashed against the stone curbing and for a second
or two lay there, dazed and blinking, then climbed painfully to his feet.

"I oughtn't to have--touched him--with my bare hands," he muttered
uncertainly. "I must have got nearly the whole charge!"

He felt faint and sick and wobbly. From the horrified group gathered
helplessly around the unconscious boy across the street, a woman's
hysterical cry beat on his brain with monotonous iteration: "What can
we do? What can we do? It's terrible! Oh, can't you do something?"

"If we only had rubber gloves--" murmured one of the men, vaguely.

"Where's a 'phone?" interrupted another. "I'm going to get 'em to shut
off the current!"

"You can't," some one replied. People were constantly rushing up to gasp
and exclaim, but do nothing. "The power-house is clear over at Medina.
It'll take too long to get the connection."

"I'm going to try, anyhow," was the sharp retort. "It's better than doing
nothing."

As he dashed past Dale and disappeared into a neighboring house, the boy
moved slowly forward. He splashed through a puddle, and something he
had read, or heard, came back to him. Water was a perfect conductor,
and he had been standing in a regular pool of it when he grabbed the
child. No wonder he had been shocked.

"Insulation," he murmured, his head still swimming. "That's it! The
handbook says--"

The bag of papers bumped against his thigh, and somehow Dale's numbed
brain began to clear swiftly. How could he have forgotten that paper was
a non-conductor as well as silk or rubber? Rubber! Why, the bag itself
was made of some kind of waterproof stuff. He thrust aside a half-grown,
gaping youth.

"Give me a show, can't you?" he cried almost fiercely. Thrilled,
exhilarated with a sudden sense of power, he jerked the bag off his
shoulder. "The kid'll never live if he waits for you fellows to do
something." With extraordinary swiftness he pulled out several
thicknesses of newspaper and wrapped them about one hand and arm.
Similarly swathing the other, he dropped the rubber-coated bag to the
ground and stepped squarely on it. His eyes were wide and almost black
with excitement. "Oh, cut that out!" he snapped over one shoulder to a
protesting bystander. "Don't you s'pose I _know_ what I'm doing? I'm a
scout!"

A second later he had gripped the unconscious child again by an arm and
shoulder. This time there was no shock, only a queer, vibratory tingling
that Dale scarcely noticed, so intent was he on doing the right thing.
He must not bungle now. He remembered perfectly what the book said
about releasing a person in contact with a live wire. It must be done
quickly and cleanly, without unnecessary tugging, or else the shock
and burning would be greatly increased. Dale braced his feet and drew a
long breath. Then, suddenly, he jerked backward with all the strength
he could summon. The next thing he knew he was sitting squarely in a
puddle with both arms around the child, whose grip on the deadly wire he
had broken.

Instantly the hitherto inactive group was roused to life and movement,
and amidst a Babel of talk and advice they surged around the unconscious
lad and his rescuer. Before the latter realized what had happened, some
one had snatched the little chap from him and started swiftly toward
one of the near-by houses. After and around them streamed a throng of
men, women, and children, pitying, anxious, or merely curious, but, now
that the danger was past, all equally voluble with suggestions or advice.

Dale rose slowly to his feet, and stood for a moment staring after them
with a troubled frown. "Why don't they give him air?" he said. "If only
they wouldn't bunch around him like that--"

He paused hesitatingly, watching the procession mount the steps and cross
a wide veranda. The stress and excitement that had dominated him till
now seemed to have vanished, and a reaction set in. He wondered whether
folks wouldn't think him too "fresh" for thrusting himself forward as
he had done. The remembrance of the man to whom he had talked back made
him wriggle uncomfortably; it was one of his oldest customers. "Gee!" he
muttered, with a touch of uneasiness; "I reckon I must have sassed him
pretty well, too!"

Dusk had given place to night. Under a flaring gas-light at the curb
two early arrivals, who had stayed behind to guard the deadly, dangling
wire, were busy explaining the situation to several wide-eyed later
comers. They formed an animated group, and Dale, standing in the shadow
behind them, felt curiously out of it and alone. The wind, sweeping
up the street, struck through his wet clothes and made him shiver.

"Time I was getting started," he thought. "It must be awful late."

As he bent over to pick up his bag, the movement set his head to
throbbing afresh. His exploring fingers encountered a lump, where he
had hit the curb, that felt about the size of an ostrich-egg. Dale's
forehead wrinkled, and he opened the bag mechanically, only to find
the remaining papers were soaked through and ruined. Those he had wrapped
around his hands lay in the mud at his feet