CAMP LENAPE ON THE LONG TRAIL

CARL SAXON
Author of “Blackie Thorne at Camp Lenape” and “The Mystery at Camp Lenape”

BOOKS, INC.
NEW YORK BOSTON

CHAPTER I
A FEUD BEGINS

Brick Ryan was bending over a washtub out behind the Lenape lodge when the big, shiny automobile roared up the road into camp.

Brick paused in the act of wringing out his best and only flannel shirt, straightened, took one look at the glittering limousine, and whistled.

“Whew! Will you look at the golden chariot!” he exclaimed to himself. “Brick, my boy, can it be that a young millionaire is comin’ to Camp Lenape?”

He bent his flaming mop of copper-colored hair over the tub once more, but kept a watchful blue eye on the big car, which had now drawn up beside the kitchen wood-pile.

From the wheel of the limousine stepped down a man smartly garbed in the uniform of a chauffeur. He swiftly threw open the silver-trimmed rear door, saluted, and offered his arm as the first of the occupants of the car descended. This person was a lady, somewhat stout, with a worried look on her face. Brick saw the flash of many diamonds glitter on her hands as she turned and spoke to those still remaining within the shadowy interior.

“Dirk, dearest, here we are! Gracious, what a rough and dusty road it has been! This camp must be in a perfect wilderness! John, you must come with me right away to see the camp director. I simply must explain to him about Dirk’s diet, and I do hope he will see to it that Dirk wears his rubbers and heavy underwear when it rains!”

Her husband, an older man with hair gray about the temples, nodded reassuringly as he joined her. “There, there,” he said soothingly, “it will be all right, I’m sure. The director knows his job; he’s quite accustomed to looking after all the boys.”

“But you know Dirk has always been so delicate! I declare, I wish we had sent him to Wild Rose Camp again this year—the nurse there was so sympathetic. But you would insist that he be brought to this outlandish place, even when you knew that none of the boys of our social set would think of coming to such an ordinary sort of camp!”

“I know, Marcia,” the man replied. “But Dirk is growing up now. I want him to mix with a regular gang of fellows his own age, and do all the things they do. Maybe at first it will seem a bit like roughing it, but he’ll soon get used to it and be into everything with the best of them. Isn’t that right, old man?”

“That’s splendid, dear,” the mother said. “I know you will be a brave lad. Now, your father and I are going to speak to the director about your diet. Benson will help you with your luggage, and you can find out which house you are going to sleep in.”

“Tents! You see, John, what sort of place you have chosen! And you know how easily Dirk catches cold! The idea of having the boys sleep in drafty tents! I really must speak to the director at once!” She picked her way delicately down the hill toward the front of the lodge, followed by her apologetic husband.

“Gollies!” Brick Ryan muttered to himself, and watched for further developments.

They were not long in coming. The chauffeur went around to the heaped luggage-rack of the car, and began unloading its bulky contents. Several shiny suitcases landed on the ground, followed by a leather hat-box, a bag of golf-clubs, two tennis racquets, a gun-case, fishing rods, and finally a large wardrobe trunk, which the man handled with difficulty. Shouldering the latter, the man also disappeared down the hill. Brick scratched his head, stared at the pile of baggage that still remained, and hung a patched pair of khaki pants on the line to dry in the fresh morning air.

He wheeled about as the same drawling voice he had heard from within the car came to his ears.

Brick looked at the speaker with open mouth. He saw a tall, pleasant-looking boy of about his own age, with brown eyes and yellow hair, spick and span in white flannels and straw hat. Brick was so startled by the fact that the stranger wore a stiff white collar and necktie that at first he did not comprehend what the boy had said.

“I said,” the newcomer repeated carefully, “that I would like you to help me with all this luggage of mine. That is, if it won’t interfere with your laundering work.”

Brick slowly drained the soapy water from the tub, and considered this request. Then he took a second look at the strange lad.

“What’s the matter with you grabbin’ some of those bags and hikin’ down with ’em yourself?”

“You don’t understand,” the other said patiently. “Of course I shall carry my rod and racquets, but I don’t care to lug these heavy bags about myself. Just take them down to my tent like a good chap. I’ll pay you, naturally.”

“Say, Mr. Dirk Astorbilt, or whatever your name is, you’ve got me all wrong! Where did you get the idea that Camp Lenape fellows were a bunch of Pullman porters, standin’ around waitin’ to carry bags for a ten-cent tip? Just because I happen to be washin’ out my duds so I wouldn’t look like a hobo, you must think I’m a bellhop or somethin’. Well, up here, mister, every man totes his own pack, see?”

“But—— Do you really mean that you are a fellow-camper, like myself?” the blond boy asked awkwardly.

Brick snorted, stuck his hands in his pocket, and stared pugnaciously at the other.

“Go climb a tent-rope!” he exclaimed rudely, and swaggered off down the hill toward the grove of pine trees that shadowed the white canvas dwellings of the Lenape campers.

In the shade beside the flagpole, he sat down on a log to cool off. With a blue bandana handkerchief he mopped his freckled brow and snub nose. A pine-scented breeze fluttered down the mountainside at his back and ruffled his unruly red hair. Perhaps he had been a little too hasty in taking affront at the new boy’s request. He sniffed the air, and its fragrance soon made him forget the unpleasant encounter with the strange boy in white flannels. For the thousandth time, he gazed over the spreading campus of Lenape, and peace descended on his fiery soul.

Before his eyes, under the limpid blue sky of August, between the mountains and the little lake, lay Camp Lenape, summer home of a hundred lively boys and the dozen councilors who guided their many outdoor activities. Over his head, on the long porch of the lodge, he could hear the uplifted voices of Jake and Jerry Utway; the twins were skylarking about, followed by the laughter of “Happy Face” Frayne, the genial assistant director. Beyond, from the kitchen, came a clatter of pans and a snatch of song as Ellick, the chef, and his dusky minions prepared lunch. Brick looked down the steep hill to the boat dock, where a rowboat full of boys with fish-poles was just coming in from a trip to the south end of Lake Lenape. He yawned sleepily, and stretched. From the rows of tents to his left someone shouted his name.

A group of campers trailed through the bushes in the wake of Mr. Carrigan, the camp naturalist. Among the boys who were thus returning from a nature-study hike were Blackie Thorne, Soapy Mullins, and Lefty Reardon, the latter of whom had called out.

“Hi, Ryan!” Lefty repeated. “Come on down to the tent, you loafer, and clean up for inspection!”

“Right away!” Brick answered lazily, but did not stir. He hated to break the spell of contentment that lay over him.

Brick Ryan loved Camp Lenape. It meant everything to him, the camp life, and for three summers now he had whooped with delight when the time came to leave the hot city streets behind and make for the Lenape hills for two months of busy, carefree sport in the green out-of-doors. Here, among his camper friends and the wise leaders like the Chief and Happy Face and Lieutenant Eames and Mr. Carrigan, he could do to his heart’s content the things he loved—swim and fish and get up shows and take long hikes through the mountains—— And this year, for the first time, he would be allowed to go on the Long Trail——

The blare of Ted Fellowes’ bugle, sounding Recall, broke forth over his head. He rose, stretched, and sauntered down to Tent One, his new quarters for the next two-week period. Every fortnight during the season was moving day for Lenape; then some of the boys who could not stay the entire summer would leave, and other boys would come up from the city to take their places. At this time, too, the tent assignments were shifted about so that each camper could get to know, and live as tent-mates with, a wide variety of other boys. Brick, who had that morning been given a bunk in the tent nearest the lodge, presided over by “Sax” McNulty, the comical leader who directed camp dramatics, wondered idly what sort of gang his new tent-mates would turn out to be.

As he entered the tent, Lefty Reardon looked up as he was spreading his blankets neatly over his canvas bunk.

“Well, it’s about time you were on the job,” he grinned. “What you been doing, Brick? Picking daisies? How about doing a little fancy work with a broom?”

“All right, Mr. Tent Aide,” Brick answered good-humoredly, and set about making his own bed. “What have you guys been doin’ all mornin’—lookin’ for filly-loo birds up in the tall timber?”

“Mr. Carrigan showed us some partridge. That’s better than loafin’ in the sun. Say, have any of the pups hit camp yet?”

This was Lefty’s belittling way of referring to new boys, tenderfeet who were that day coming to camp for the first time. Brick groaned.

“Don’t remind me—I’d almost forgot about it! Gollies, I was just exchangin’ sweet words with one of the juiciest specimens that you’ve ever seen! Mr. Chauncy Montmorency, the Dude from Swellville! Such a pretty boy, too!”

“You’d have to see it to believe it. Mama and Papa and the shover all come along in the family limmyzine to see that little Algy gets here without getting his tootsies wet! ‘And I sye, me good feller,’” he mimicked, “‘would you be kind enough to carry me bags down to the ho-tel?’”

“Wait till you see him! He’s the Millionaire Baby, and no mistake! I pity the poor guys that get in his tent——” Brick Ryan broke off suddenly as a shadow fell over his shoulder. He looked up, and gasped.

At the door of the tent stood a blond young fellow in white flannels. A few paces away a chauffeur in uniform stood respectfully, laden with shiny suitcases and sporting goods.

“Oh, there you are again,” the lad said breezily. “Sorry to trouble you, but is this Tent One? If it is, I believe I shall have the pleasure of sharing it with you chaps. My name is Dirk Van Horn, and the camp director has assigned me to stay here. I hope that we shall all be very happy and friendly tent-mates!”

CHAPTER II
“BRICK RYAN’S NOT FOR SALE!”

Brick was too aghast to think of anything to say. He scowled, threw up his hands helplessly, and deliberately turned his back on the smiling Van Horn.

But Lefty, whatever he might think about “pups” in private, had been appointed councilor’s aide for Tent One, and as such was camper-leader in charge when Sax McNulty was not in sight. He rose and extended a hand to the newcomer.

“Glad to meet you, Van. My name’s Reardon. I see you’ve got a baseball glove there among your things. We need good fielders on the camp team—some stiff games are coming up. We’ll talk about it later. Yes, this is Tent One. I hear you’ve met Brick Ryan, over here,” he said easily. “The rest of the bunch will be along pretty quick, except for some of the new boys that are hitting camp today.”

“Thanks. We passed a hay-wagon full of young chaps down the road a few miles,” answered Van Horn. “They seemed to be having lunch.”

“They’ll be along later, I guess. Hope we get some good ones for Tent One. Sax McNulty went down to show them the way. He’s our leader—you ought to hear him shake out a tune from that saxophone of his! Then, outside of you and Brick and myself, we’ve got little Joey Fellowes and Slim Yerkes—— But dump your stuff down here on the floor, and after lunch I’ll show you where to stow things.”

Benson, the chauffeur, gladly stacked his load of baggage inside the tent, and returned for the remainder. His young master spread his legs apart and looked over the tent with a patronizing air.

“Nice little place you’ve got here, but it could be fixed up better. I’ve got some pennants and a few pictures in my trunk that we can stick around to make it look quite homelike, I fancy.”

Lefty smiled grimly. “We mostly do our decorating up at the lodge, where there’s plenty of room. With seven fellows and a leader in a tent this size, we have to save space for the things we use every day. You seem to have a lot of junk there—enough to take up a whole tent yourself. After lunch we’ll weed out what you need and the rest can be stored under the lodge.”

“I don’t know about that. A chap wants to be comfortable, doesn’t he? Oh, I guess there are my folks coming to say good-bye! Hello, Mama!”

Brick scornfully watched the approach of the fond parents. The lady, after embracing her boy, looked disdainfully about the tent and its simple furnishings. She did not sniff, but she looked as if she might at any moment.

“Gracious, John, do you really think we should leave Dirk here? I’m glad we thought to bring up his spring cot and mattress—the idea of having a growing boy sleep on plain canvas stretchers like these!”

“Fine! Fine! Well, young men, Benson is bringing down a big watermelon for Dirk’s tent-mates. Guess you won’t mind a cool slice later on? Now, Dirk, your mother and I are going. We’ll have lunch in Elmville. If you want anything, write or wire me and we’ll see what the old man can do. That canoe ought to be along in the morning.”

“Thank you, Papa.” Dirk turned to Lefty. “Back in a minute, old chap.” He waved a hand and accompanied his parents up the hill toward the waiting automobile, where no doubt a fond farewell was to take place.

“What a fine sister we drew!” he exclaimed. “Well, what do you think of the Millionaire Baby now?”

Lefty returned to his task of tidying up the tent beside his bunk. “Aw, lay off, Brick. It isn’t his fault he’s a poor little rich boy. He seems to me like a pretty decent sort, and that watermelon will come in mighty handy, too. Just because he took you for a kitchen mechanic, you’ve got it in for him. Snap out of it! There goes First Call, and here’s the tent still in a gosh-awful mess. Stir yourself!”

Brick Ryan bent moodily to the work. After a moment, he snorted as his eye fell once more on the shiny heap of luggage and sport outfits, and his scorn broke forth anew.

“Just the same, Lefty my son, Little Lord Fauntleroy will need a bit of polishin’ before he’s a true-blue Lenape man, and F. X. A. Ryan is the lad to give it to him,” he muttered darkly. “Mark my words, young Chauncy is in for a lot of fine adventures he never dreamed of back in dear old Swellville!”

During lunch, Brick listened with ill-concealed disgust while young Van Horn chatted with Lefty about baseball and prep school and asked the usual list of silly questions that a new camper always puts. When the meal was over, Brick and silent Slim Yerkes washed the dishes in short order, and then retired to the tent for quiet hour. Slim soon left to visit a friend in a neighboring tent, and Brick stretched out on his bunk with a copy of the life-saving manual, to study up for the various tests that were a part of the badge requirements. But no sooner had he settled himself than Dirk Van Horn, followed by the admiring little Joey Fellowes, came down from the camp store.

“What a silly rule they have here, that a fellow can’t spend more than fifteen cents a day at the store!” Dirk was complaining, munching a chocolate bar. “Up at Wild Rose Camp last year we could spend as much as we wanted, and they had everything—ice-cream cones every day. Why, I could buy out this little store if I wanted to! Here, youngster, have a bag of almonds.”

“Thanks,” said Joey admiringly. “Say, what kind of a place was that Wild Rose Camp?”

“Very select. I believe it cost me five hundred dollars a season, not counting extras, such as piano lessons, archery, and so on.”

“Well, youngster,” Dirk went on, “shall we get busy unloading all these traps of mine?”

“Sure. Say, if you could go to such a swell place as that, how come you’re here at Lenape?”

“Oh, just a notion of Papa’s. You see, he used to go to college with the camp director here. I made Papa buy me a canoe all my own if I promised to come here, but I tell you, if I don’t like this place, I shan’t stay very long.” Dirk turned airily and stooped to open the large wardrobe trunk that stood amidst his heap of luggage. “Shall we get to work?”

Brick Ryan, whose sole possessions had come to Lenape with him in a canvas dunnage-bag, pretended to read, but he kept one eye on the proceedings. Languidly Dirk, aided by the awed Joey, began to unpack his multitude of belongings. First he unrolled a thick mattress—the only mattress in camp aside from those in the hospital tent—and spread it on the lower bunk nearest the lodge. Brick felt called upon to interfere.

“Say,” he began, “that bunk belongs to Sax McNulty, our leader. All the other lower bunks are already taken. You’ll have to take one of the uppers.”

Joey broke in hastily. “Say, Van, I got a lower, but I don’t mind sleeping up in Heaven—I’m used to it. You can have mine, over here, and I’ll take the upper.”

Dirk nodded. “Thanks. Very sporting of you, youngster.” He spread the mattress on the bunk that Joey had relinquished, and with an inexperienced hand spread sheets and fine woolen blankets in the semblance of a bed.

Next he began unpacking the trunk and suitcases, and Brick Ryan’s snorts grew louder and louder as the stack of the newcomer’s possessions grew higher. In a short time the tent was strewn with clothing and objects of all sorts. The leader’s empty bunk was piled high with suits of every kind and shade, among them a trim blue yachting outfit with white cap, and a khaki uniform with Sam Browne belt and white helmet such as African explorers wear. One suitcase was almost completely taken up with books and a portable typewriter. Between reading the books and dressing up in the dozen different suits, Brick reflected, the new boy would have very little time to do any camping.

But this was not all. It seemed as if Dirk must have gone into a big sporting-goods store and ordered at least one of everything in stock. He had complete outfits for baseball, basketball, and track. Joey was set to work stringing up an aerial for a portable radio receiving set that was carefully packed in a leather case. The interior of the tent was submerged beneath such objects as a big electric lantern, a fisherman’s creel, two swimming suits, a sketching outfit, golf clubs, hats and shoes of all sorts, and a black bag such as is carried by doctors on their rounds. Dirk opened the latter, and took from its well-filled interior a bottle of pills.

“That reminds me!” he said. “Forgot to take my prescription.” He swallowed two pills, made a face, and picking up an armload of shoes and a banjo case, approached Brick.

“Excuse me, old fellow,” he said agreeably, “but would you mind awfully if I parked these things under your bed? These tents don’t seem to have any closets in them, and that clothes-line from the tent-poles doesn’t look very strong.”

Brick groaned. “Listen!” he said with some heat. “Lefty Reardon told you he’d show you where to put your stuff. He’s up at aide’s meeting now, and since Sax is still away, I don’t mind tellin’ you what the rules are. We got eight people in this tent. Suppose every single one of them had as much stuff as you’ve got?”

“Wait! We have inspection here every day, to see which tent wins the pennant. Everything has got to be in its place, and there’s a place for everything. Beds made in a certain way, clothes folded in a certain way, shoes in a line under the bunk, everything polished up and swept out. Do you figure on cleanin’ up all that stuff every day, or are you goin’ to hire Joey as a valet?”

“My advice to you,” Brick went on, “is to pick out from that mess just what you need every day, and store the rest in the lodge. Then we might have some room to move around. Do you get that?”

A crimson flush mounted from beneath Dirk’s immaculate white collar and spread over his pale features, but he said nothing. He dropped the things on the floor in a heap, and sat down on a locker-box, watching Joey sort out a collection of stockings and handkerchiefs. Brick pointedly returned to his life-saving manual.

For the first time since he had arrived at Lenape a few hours before, Dirk Van Horn paused to think. He could not see that he had done anything to merit such a harsh tone as that used by the red-headed Irish boy. Of course there was that awkward mistake when Ryan had been washing his things back of the kitchen; but that might have happened to anyone. Dirk had never before met a boy of the independent stripe of Brick Ryan. There had been no boys like him at “select” Wild Rose Camp, nor in what his mother called their “social set” back in the city. But Dirk wanted everybody to like him. He wanted Brick to like him and admire him. He went about it in the only way he knew—but it was the wrong way.

Brick was aware of a tap on his shoulder. He turned; before him stood the despised Van Horn in his citified garments. There was a smile on his face. His right hand was outstretched frankly; his left hand held a tennis racquet of the most expensive make.

“Look here, Ryan, old chap,” Dirk began. “We have to live together. Let’s be friends! What say? I know I was a chump a while ago, but I apologize, and I hope we’ll get along splendidly. Now, just to show you I think a lot of you, I hope you’ll accept this little present. It’s just a trifle, and I have two of them—but perhaps it will prove how much I want to be your friend.”

Before the amazed Brick knew what was happening, the other had pressed the handle of the racquet into his hand, and clapped him on the shoulder.

Brick stared at the gift. Fashioned of finest wood and gut, it represented at the least an amount that Brick would have had to work on his paper-route, back in the city, for a month to earn. Unbelievingly he looked from the gift to the giver. A sudden tide of red anger flooded his freckled face to the roots of his red hair. He jumped up, flung off the outstretched hand, and faced Van Horn. There was an ugly look on his face, and ugly words rose to his Irish tongue.

“Friends, is it!” he shouted. “Gollies, you and your little presents! Pup, get this! You or the likes of you can’t buy Brick Ryan’s little finger, and you can’t bribe him, either! You and all your pretty junk may go over big with kids like Joey that don’t know any better, but Brick Ryan’s not for sale!”

Dirk’s mouth fell open, and he backed off hastily. “Why—Why, I’m sorry—I didn’t think you’d take it that way! Of course, if you don’t care to accept it——”

“Yah!” cried the Irish boy. With sudden fury he flung the offending tennis racquet in a wide curve. It fell out of sight into a clump of bushes some yards away; and Brick Ryan, with clenched fists, turned on his heel and stalked from the tent.

CHAPTER III
“HELP!”

Dirk Van Horn wondered if he were going to like Camp Lenape. There seemed to be far too many uncomfortable rules that got in the way when a fellow wanted to have some fun. Then, too, outside of little Joey Fellowes, nobody had seemed duly impressed with his father’s wealth and his luxurious camping outfit. It was clear that this was going to be quite different from Wild Rose Camp, where everyone knew that he was J. T. Van Horn’s only son, and where he and his tutor had shared a cosy cottage with every convenience that money could buy.

Dirk sighed; then turned suddenly as a new idea struck him. He’d show these kids what a real sportsman could do!

“Joey, old son,” he said, “would you mind clearing up the rest of this stuff? I’m going to take a look around the woods and see what the chances are for a bit of sport.”

“Oh, just a bit of gunning. That chap Reardon mentioned at lunch that he had scared up some partridge on the mountain this morning. I thought I might get a shot at a few.”

Joey Fellowes stood aghast at such daring. “Whe—you mean, shoot them? Say, nobody at Lenape ever does that! We just go out and watch birds and animals and things, and try to study them and take pictures of them. Nobody in camp is supposed to have a gun!”

“Humph! What do they come up here in the woods for? Well, here’s one person who isn’t going to overlook a chance if he happens to see one!”

“But—but—— Why, Sax McNulty or any of the rest of the councilors would sure bawl you out if they found you with a gun! It’s against the camp rules!”

“Bother the old rules! Good heavens, McNulty may change his mind pretty quick if I present him with a nice bag of partridge ready for Tent One to eat for supper.” With deliberate casualness, Dirk slung his gun-case over his shoulder, unearthed from a suitcase a large box of chocolate cake as provisions, and paused at the door of the tent. “Come along if you like, Fellowes.”

“No—no thanks,” blurted Joey. “You better report to the Chief before you go.”

“I won’t be long,” said Dirk carelessly. “Well, then, ta-ta! If you’ve got most of my things stowed away by the time I come back, I’ll slip you a dollar or two.”

With these generous words, Dirk waved an easy farewell, and strode off through the trees, taking care to make a wide circle about the lodge, where some fussy councilor might see him and keep him from his purpose. His plan was simple. He wanted to make Brick Ryan and the rest of the campers realize what a fine fellow was now in their midst. If he could casually stroll into the tent with a dozen partridge in one hand and his shiny new rifle in the other, they would see at a glance that here was a comrade to be reckoned with! He conjured up pleasant pictures of their surprise and admiration, himself the center of the group.

Still lost in these happy visions, he crossed a sunny meadow and picked his way over the dusty, rutted country road that led to camp. Here he plunged into thick woods, making straight up the mountainside. It was cool in the leafy forest, and he would have been very well contented save that a swarm of gnats hovered over his hatless head in a buzzing cloud, following wherever he went. His coat was too warm, but he did not want to carry it as his hands were already full, and he wished to be free in case he located the desired covey of partridge.

Ahead lay a flat, marshy stretch of ground, where clumps of grass and rotting tree-limbs formed a half-submerged, muddy mass. There was no path going around, and Dirk, balancing his burdens dangerously, jumped from one solid-looking tuft to another. More than once he slipped on the rotting stuff, and floundered ankle-deep in slimy water. Long before he reached the other side, he regretted that he had not changed his city flannels for togs more suited to mountain work. His low sport shoes were caked with ooze and half full of water; his erstwhile spotless white flannels were muddied, streaked with green scum, and a triangular tear on one leg showed where he had come up against a sharp branch.

Ruefully he sank to a seat on a decayed oak-trunk and unloosened his wilted linen collar. He would have liked a drink, but he knew that the stagnant pools at his feet were unhealthy, and he settled back, inspected his glistening rifle to see that the magazine was full of .22 caliber cartridges, and then slowly began munching the cake he had brought with him.

He had barely eaten half of it, however, when he leaped hastily from his seat with a cry. One arm was afire, beneath the sleeve, with a thousand prickling stings! A simmering stream of large black ants that infested the rotting wood—no doubt attracted by the chance of refreshment in the shape of sweet crumbs of cake—was flowing over his hand and arm, and even beneath the collar of his shirt. In a painful frenzy he dropped the cake and began brushing off the stinging insects, stripping off his coat and shirt. It was several minutes before he could fight free of the crawling horde, and then, grabbing his things, he rushed off up the hillside away from the treacherous lower ground. Even then, he was reminded now and again of his misadventure by a red-hot sting in some part of his tender skin beneath his clothing.

So far, his expedition had not been successful. He had not seen any sign of a partridge or any other small game. Even had there been any of the birds in that part of the mountain, his stumbling progress would undoubtedly have given them warning long before he could train his rifle on them. But he kept on up the slope, smashing his way through the thick underbrush and trying not to turn his ankles on the rocky ground underfoot.

To his right he saw through the leaves a long scar of gray rock outcropping on the hillside. This promised easier going than the tangled underbrush. Besides, he thought, if he could get high enough, he might be able to look around and see in just which direction lay the camp. His flight from the marsh had twisted him around somehow, and a glance at the sky gave him the feeling that the sun was not where it should rightly be at this time in the afternoon. He altered his course and began scaling the sloping, moss-encrusted rocks.

Before he was half-way up the rocks, he began to wish he had not chosen such a steep and rough road. His shoes and trousers were in pitiful shape. Still he scrambled upward in the hot sunshine, dripping perspiration, ascending on hands and knees and trailing his rifle after him. He was glad to see that the rocks ended a few feet above his head in an overhanging bank of earth and matted shrubs. Over the top! He charged the little cliff, seized with his free hand the roots of a sapling oak that grew on the edge, and tried to haul himself up. His first heave loosened the soil; he could feel his hold slipping. He cast a fearful eye backwards; if he fell on those sharp rocks——!

A shower of dirt, twigs, and small pebbles rattled down upon his head; with a rending noise, the roots he was gripping parted. Clawing the air helplessly, Dirk fell backwards, and slid painfully a few feet down the smooth rocks. His rifle flew from his hand, described a short circle in the air, and landed with a bruising crash upon his outstretched right leg.

Dirk cried out, and rubbed his shin. The sharp blow brought tears of pain into his eyes, and he gritted his teeth. He realized now that it had been a foolish thing to trust his weight to such a sketchy hand-hold. Well, he had suffered for his error!

He clutched the rifle, whose wooden stock was badly scarred by the fall, and began crawling across the rocks to the shelter of the brush. Every movement heightened the ache in his leg, which was now throbbing brutally. When he gained the wooded hillside, he rose and tried to walk; but after a few steps he gave up, sat down, and began rubbing his shinbone once more.

Dirk was not used to giving up an idea easily, and he hated to think of limping back to camp with torn clothes, and lacking the game he had set out so proudly to get. Here would be a very different return from that he had visualized! But now he began looking about him and puzzling just in which direction lay Camp Lenape.

The sound of a bugle call floating up from the lake came to his ears, and faintly he could hear shouting, off to his right, where the woods were thickest. He could not be exactly sure where it came from, but evidently camp was not far away. Of course, he could back-track on his own trail, but that would mean going through the marsh again. There must be a short cut that he could take. He rose and began hobbling through the trees, hoping to find a stream where he could quench his hot thirst. As he went he thought of his mother and father, by this time far on the way back to the city. Dirk Van Horn was just a little homesick.

Again came the bugle-call. But this time it sounded from behind him! He wheeled about, listening. Where was camp? He could see nothing through the trees. Perhaps if he could climb high enough, he might catch a glimpse of the flagpole or the tents; but his leg was now swollen and stiff, and useless for climbing. Where was he, anyway? Could it be that he was lost among the mountains? Lost! Dirk began to run unsteadily through the thick brush. His eyes were wild, and the little hammers of panic were beating in his brain.

Brick Ryan was slipping into his swimming suit in Tent One when Sax McNulty, followed by a racing pack of boys, appeared at the lower end of the campus. The new recruits had hit camp just in time for afternoon swim period.

“Hi, Sax!” the red-headed boy greeted his leader. “You look hot. Just in time for a dip.”

The long-faced young man gave him a mournful look. Sax always looked gloomy, even when he was saying his funniest things.

“I’m a little sunbeam,” he announced. “I can keep smiling even after piloting twenty little greenhorns up from Elmville. Dusty but smiling. Say, who made my bed so nicely?”

“Good lads.” Sax sank on his bunk and began stripping off his dust-laden garments. “I met two of the new fellows who’ll be with us this section. Nig Jackson was one—you remember him from last year. Another is a new kid, Eddie Scolter, who claims he can play a clarinet. But one fellow didn’t come after all, I guess. The Chief said his name was Van Horn.”

“Oh!” grinned Brick, “you mean the Millionaire Baby! Well, don’t worry about him. He got here this mornin’, and has been around all day, big as life and twice as natural.”

Brick pointed to the scattered array of suitcases, clothes, and other possessions that Joey Fellowes had given up trying to sort out and arrange. Sax McNulty whistled as he looked at Dirk’s heaped outfit.

Sax shook his head. “Can’t have that. Where is he, anyway? He’ll have to stow that stuff before Nig and Eddie and the rest get here.”

“Search me,” Brick shrugged. “Haven’t seen him since siesta. He’s probably off tellin’ the little kids what a rich guy his dad is, and how Wild Rose Camp is much sweller than this joint.”

The leader pulled on his swimming suit, and looked up thoughtfully. “Don’t tell me he’s the son of Van Horn, the bank president! Don’t tell me that!”

“And he’s going to be here in Tent One this section. Well, well, and a couple more wells! You don’t seem to have taken to him very kindly, Brick.”

“Well, he’ll be all right after a couple days here. No quarreling, now! We must all be like little birdies in the nest, Brick—— Hark!”

He jumped to his feet, and the two, leader and boy, stared solemnly into each other’s faces. Then McNulty grabbed for a pair of rubber-soled tennis shoes, and began furiously lacing them on his bare feet.

“Come along, Brick!” He dived for the door of the tent and up the wooded hillside, his red-headed follower close on his heels. “Somebody in trouble on the mountain! We’ve got to run, old boy—and I mean run!”

CHAPTER IV
DIRK JUMPS

In the wake of his racing leader, Brick Ryan dashed through the thickets behind the tent, and crossed the road. Here Sax paused and shouted toward the mountainside.

Ahead came a faint cry in answer, and a spitting crack. Something buzzed through the leaves of a maple overhead, and a detached twig drifted down.

“That was a gun!” said Brick in amazement. “Somebody shootin’ through the trees.”

Sax was angry. “The fool!” he cried. “Is he trying to pick us off?” He raised his voice and shouted again to the unknown. “Cut out that shooting! We’re coming right along!”

Again he plunged into the woods. Brick, who had been rubbing his uncovered arms and legs where his swimming suit had not protected him from scratches and whipping branches, panted at his side. “Over this way it came from, Sax,” he said. “Not very far off, either.”

McNulty saved his wind for running, and his long legs bounded out of sight. In short order, Brick heard the man’s voice upraised in stinging rebuke.

“Put that gun down! Here, give it to me, before you kill a few of us! Now, What do you mean by this——”

Brick came to the edge of a little glade, and saw the leader standing threateningly above a youth who crouched on the sward, guiltily handing over his weapon. His body was covered with a stained blue coat and the wreckage of a pair of white flannel trousers; his yellow hair was rumpled; and on his pale face there was a look of mingled relief and dismay.

Sax McNulty seized the rifle and poured out the contents of the magazine into his hand. “What are you trying to do?” he asked. “What do you mean by shooting around Camp Lenape? Who are you, anyway?”

Brick came up, and grinned at his councilor, indicating the prostrate figure on the ground. “It’s the guy I was tellin’ you about, Sax,” he sneered. “Young Moneybags. What else could you expect?”

“A camper? You?” McNulty was scornful. “Well, you must be in the wrong camp. At Lenape we don’t go around firing rifles all over the place.”

Dirk Van Horn swallowed, and began clambering to his feet. “I—I got lost,” he began. “I read somewhere that three shots was a signal for help. They didn’t sound very loud, so I shouted, too. I imagined that someone might hear me and direct me back to the camp ground. You see, sir, I hurt my leg——”

“No—I can walk on it now. But then I got a trifle frightened, I suppose, and things got mixed up somehow.”

Brick broke into a rasping laugh. “Lost, is it! He gets lost a few hundred yards from camp, and yells for help! You got a job ahead of you, Sax. He don’t need a councilor—it’s a nurse-maid he needs!”

“That’s enough, Brick,” the man said shortly. “Now, Van Horn, if you can walk all right, we’ll go back to the tent. I understand you’ve been assigned to my outfit. Well, first off, if you’ve got any more guns, they’re going to be locked up with this one. We can’t have bullets flying about. Come along—I’ll show you where camp is. After swim, we’ll see about clearing up that mess of stuff you left on the floor.”

He led the way back toward the campus, bearing the forbidden weapon, followed by the crestfallen Dirk. Brick Ryan began cautiously picking a path through the underbrush—a swimming suit was not the best uniform for mountain rescue-work. He chuckled. “Lost, he was! And Sax and I thought we were goin’ to pull somebody out of trouble!”

The bushes ahead crackled as somebody ran through, and Brick paused. The face of his friend Kipper Dabney appeared from behind a tree.

Brick answered the question with a laugh. “You may think you’ve seen greenhorns at Lenape, Kipper,” he said, “but I want to tell you we’ve got the juiciest tenderfoot in Tent One that you ever saw. He’s a lily, he is! There he goes—Sax McNulty just grabbed his gun in time to keep him from shootin’ us for a couple of moose.”

Kipper was interested. “You sound as if you figured on doing something about it.”

“Maybe I will,” smiled Brick wickedly. “Out of the goodness of my heart, I might show him a few handy tricks. He sure needs a workout!” He lowered his voice. “About twelve o’clock tonight, eh? What about it, my boy? Are you game?”

“You mean—pass him the runaround?” the other asked doubtfully. “He looks like a pretty husky fellow. He might go for us.”

“Not a chance! But if you’re nervous, we’ll get Ugly Brown to come too. This baby is easy. Is it a go? Swell! Now let’s get down to the dock—that guy and his fool stunts have made me miss half my swim!”

Dirk Van Horn did not fall asleep until some while after taps had sounded bedtime for the Lenape campers, and their big bonfire had died down to embers. He had gone through one of the liveliest days he had ever known, but although weary, he was too wakeful to join his tent-mates in their slumbers. He lay stretched on his bunk, staring up at the dim, quiet stars glowing above the sighing branches of the pines, and recalling the events of the crowded day.

Around him, snug in their blankets, slept his new tent-mates. It was a strange feeling. Last night he had gone to bed in his familiar room back home in the city, with his father and mother close at hand. Tonight he lay out under canvas, in the forest-clad Lenape hills, listening to the unknown noises of the night and the deep breathing of his new-found companions—Mr. McNulty, and Lefty, and Joey, and the other Tent Two boys he had met at supper. On the line from the ridgepole hung his brand-new camping togs, and the other things he needed were neatly stowed beneath the bunk or in his wooden locker, as Lefty had shown him. Lefty had said that some baseball games were coming——

Dirk sighed. Lefty must know all about his ignominious return from his hunting trip that afternoon. If Lefty thought him a chump, perhaps he wouldn’t put him on the camp team! He could see now that he had made a fool of himself with his silly rifle, but how was he to know all the camp rules? And that Brick Ryan chap had snickered at him! Why did Ryan dislike him so? Thinking of Brick Ryan, the new camper drifted off into slumber....

He opened his eyes. His cheek was tingling. Something had trailed across his face in the dark!

Through the trees he saw the yellow sickle of a new moon. He remembered now. He was at Camp Lenape—— But whose was the voice close to his ear, whispering cautious words?

He turned his head, and saw the outline of a strange face above him. A boy whom he did not know had thus quietly aroused him in the dead of night.

“Put on your slippers and bathrobe and come on!” the voice urged. “Don’t wake up anybody else. This is just for you.”

“But what—what——” Dirk asked hoarsely. “I don’t believe I know you. What do you want me for?”

“Hurry up!” the strange boy urged. “It’s a party. We want you to be our guest. Just a little fun after taps, old man. Quick, now!”

Wonderingly, Dirk obeyed. He found his slippers and robe in the pale light, while his guide waited motionless. Taking care not to make the least noise to disturb the sleeping leader and the other boys of Tent One, Dirk crept softly out into the thin moonlight. His guide took his arm, and led the way down a path that skirted the upper row of tents, and then wandered into the mysterious shadow of the forest. A hundred yards beyond the farthest tent, the unknown boy stopped, and whispered close to Dirk’s ear.

“We’re giving a party for you, Van,” he explained. “Very select. Some of the best blood in camp is waiting to greet you.”

“Why—that’s very kind of them.” Dirk was flattered. “Where are we going?”

The other hesitated. “Well, you see, our meeting-place is supposed to be kept a secret. Would you mind wearing this for a minute?”

Before Dirk knew what his guide was about, he felt a large handkerchief drop over his eyes. He muttered a protest, but already the blindfold was knotted about his head, and even the dim glow of the night was shut from his sight.

“Just hang on to my arm,” said the stranger reassuringly. “We’re not far off now. This way.”

He gave Dirk a slight push ahead. Slowly, with arms outstretched, Dirk felt his way forward along the rough path. He did not quite know what to make of this midnight game of blind-man’s-buff; but he had no reason to think that the other boy meant him harm. He remembered that at Wild Rose Camp last summer, it was often the thing to have quiet little “spreads” after bedtime, without the knowledge of the councilors. Seemingly, Lenape also enjoyed this adventurous custom; and he took it as a tribute to himself that he, a newcomer, should have been selected to be honored on his first night on the campus.

While he was pondering this he was stumbling ahead over the rough ground, now and then tripping over a rock or tree-root and leaning heavily on the arm of the boy at his side. Suddenly, that arm was withdrawn; he felt a rude thrust into his back; he stepped forward to catch himself, found his ankles snared in a rope that had been stretched across his path. He tripped and crashed to the earth, throwing his arms out with a grunt of pain. He had landed with a smashing thud into a thicket of scratching branches.

The shock of the impact had driven his breath out of him; he could not cry out. He thrashed about upon the rocky ground, trying to tear the blinding bandage from his eyes. But a sharp knee was now pressing into the small of his back, and even as he struggled, someone unseen lashed his hands together with a skillful handcuff knot.

“Take it easy, Baby!” urged a mocking voice above him, and the knee dug deeper into his aching back. “How do you like our little party?”

He thrashed about, striving to regain his feet; but the torturing knee pinned him fast.

“Don’t get worked up,” his tormenter advised. “We just want you to do a few little tricks for us. Lift him up, Kipper!”

Dirk was jerked roughly to his feet, pinioned on both sides by strong arms. Behind him rose again the jeering voice of Ryan.

“Now, don’t go wild and hurt yourself. If you’re a nice baby, and do what we tell you, maybe we’ll let you off easy—maybe!”

Dirk choked, and found his voice. “You are a coward, Ryan! A coward and a bully!”

“Shut up!” came the savage answer. “Do you want to wake up the whole camp?” A sharp point of metal prodded the flesh of Dirk’s leg. “Feel that? Any more hot air and you’ll get a touch of this! Now, march!”

Biting his lip to keep back the cry that rose to his tongue, Dirk Van Horn was dragged through the woods. His blindfold was still knotted tightly over his eyes, and he was helpless in the hands of his captors. Soon, he could tell by the’ feel of smooth earth under the thin soles of his slippers that they had come to some sort of clearing. Here his torturers—he judged that there were three of them—halted. Again Ryan spoke.

“Now, you’ve got so much sportin’ goods with you, we thought you must be a swell athlete. We want to see what you can do on the high jump and the dash and the obstacle race. That right, boys?”

“I won’t do it,” said Dirk stubbornly. “Let me out of this, Ryan. If the camp director knew you were hazing me——”

“Shut up! Now, the first event will be the runnin’ high jump. When I say ‘go!’ you take off and show us how to break a record! Don’t try to pull off that blindfold, either, or you’ll get another jab with my knife. Ready?”

The restraining arms were drawn away, but Dirk stood motionless, refusing to reply. Sightless, he knew that he could not run, or even walk, more than a few steps before he would again be brought to the ground with a crash. Where was he? Far from any help, any sympathetic leader who could put a stop to the cruel hazing. Was Ryan determined to push him, helpless, through the motions of a travesty of a track meet, in disregard of bruises and broken bones?

Dirk flinched as he felt the sharp knife-point pierce the skin of his thigh. His terror was rising, but he did not cry out.

A horrible moment of waiting; then Dirk heard his unseen tormenter laugh wickedly to himself.

“He won’t play with us, boys! Well, that’s his hard luck! Too bad! It’s over the cliff for him!”

“Over the cliff!” echoed the henchmen hollowly. “We gave him his chance. Come on, you!”

Again Dirk was dragged through the forest, more roughly than before. His captors twisted about so that he had not the least idea in which direction they were heading, but it seemed as if ages passed before they halted at last. During the painful journey he had tried to make some plan for escape; but it was of no use—there were three of them, holding him closely; he could neither see them nor his surroundings, and his hands were tightly bound. Was their threat merely a sham, or were they really now nearing some steep, jagged wall of rock in the forest?

“Don’t move!” warned Ryan suddenly. “We’re right on the edge of Indian Cliff! Now, Baby, we’ll give you one more chance. Will you behave and do your stuff in our moonlight track meet? Or do you want to end up a hundred feet below, down on those big rocks, with a busted neck?”

Dirk’s head was whirling. He tried to fight free, but the clutch of the restraining arms tightened, and an ungentle hand made sure his blindfold was still secure. He cautiously felt out with one slippered foot. A few inches before him, the grassy earth ended in a crumbling edge. A tingle of horror rose up the boy’s spine.

“Indian Cliff,” Ryan’s voice assured him harshly. “That’s where they’ll find you in the mornin’. Well, what about it? Yes or no?”

“You don’t dare go through with it!” Dirk cried. “You’re trying to frighten me! Well, I won’t be fooled! I don’t believe you!”

“He don’t believe us!” jeered Brick. “We’ll have to show him. Get ready. Let him go, my lads!”

The two henchmen fell back. Dirk turned swiftly; but the point of the knife caught him in the side, and he recoiled to the treacherous edge of the embankment.

“So long, Baby! One jump, and it’s all over with you! Well, will you jump yourself, or will we have to heave you over?” Another prod of the blade accented his words.

Dirk swallowed heavily, and tears came into his shrouded eyes. “You’ll be sorry for this, Ryan, you mucker!” he shouted. His teeth were chattering, and a faint breeze fanned his brow where beads of cold sweat stood out. “You’re a coward——”

“That’s enough!” Ryan’s tone was ugly. “Do I have to prod you again, or will you jump?”

CHAPTER V
THE SINKING OF THE Sachem

Dirk drew himself up on one elbow, choking. His mouth was filled with powdery dust, and every bone ached. Frenziedly, he thrashed about, and found he had shaken free of the rope that had bound his hands together. He reached up and tore off his blindfold.

In the light of the waning crescent moon, he looked up. A few inches above his head lay the bank from which he had leaped into the unknown. Standing there, doubled with silent laughter, were the three figures of his torturers. Instead of jumping to death from a precipitous cliff, he had plunged dramatically from a ledge barely a foot high!

He knew where he was now. To his scattered senses came the knowledge that he had landed sprawling in the dirt road that led to camp. The tents could not be far away, although, blindfolded, he had thought that Ryan and his gang had led him for miles through the woods. He scrambled painfully to his feet and ran up the road.

Behind him rose an alarmed, muffled shout from Brick Ryan. “Head him off, Kipper! He’s goin’ back to camp! Get him, Ugly!” The shout only made him run faster. Up the rutted road he sped, flying to security—anywhere, away from the clutches of those who had so brutally mistreated him. His pursuers scattered, seeking to head through the woods and cut him off from the tent. Dirk lost a slipper, but did not pause. If they got their hands on him again——!

A shape darted out at him from behind a tree. He dodged, and raced ahead, gasping for breath. Now he could see the gray sheets of canvas that marked the tents close beside the dark silhouette of the lodge. Behind him hammered the running feet of Brick Ryan. He was almost upon him!

Dirk stumbled into Tent One, and fell upon the bunk where Sax McNulty slept the sleep of the weary councilor.

The leader started up open-mouthed, blinking his eyes. “What—who——” he mumbled. “Get off!”

“Save me, sir! It’s Brick Ryan, and he made me jump over a cliff, and they chased me—— Don’t let him get me again!”

Others in the tent stirred. Slim Yerkes, in the bunk above the councilor, sat up and silently looked at the sobbing figure beneath him. Young Eddie Scolter woke and giggled uncomprehendingly at the scene.

“Why, it’s Van Horn!” exclaimed McNulty. “Having a nightmare, old chap? Wake up!”

Brick Ryan had halted just outside the tent, and taking advantage of the commotion, sought to gain his bunk unobserved. He had not intended that his captive should escape him and return thus to the tent and arouse the ire of the leader. He began shedding his garments quickly, hoping to be found peacefully snoring when Sax should waken sufficiently to take charge. But McNulty caught a glimpse of him just as he was pulling the blankets over his head, and read the situation in an instant.

“This some of your work, Brick?” he asked grimly. “There, there, calm down, Van, old man—why, you’re shaking like a leaf! What happened?”

“They hazed me!” Dirk gulped back the tears. “I’m sorry to make such a fuss, but it hurt——”

The councilor snapped on the flashlight he always kept under his pillow, and examined the haggard boy at his side. “Anything serious the matter with you? No bones broken, or anything like that?”

“I—I don’t think so, sir. I’m ashamed to act this way,” Dirk stammered bravely, “but you see, there were three of them, and they were pretty rough——”

“All right. Now, just get back to bed, and we’ll straighten things out in the morning. We’ve already roused the whole tent, so don’t make any more noise tonight.” McNulty climbed from his bunk, helped the shaking boy to his own blankets, covered him gently, and looked about the tent to assure himself that all was well. Then he crossed to where Brick Ryan lay crouched, listening furtively.

“You know what the Chief thinks about hazing, Brick,” he said sternly. “You’ll start the day tomorrow with two hours on the wood-pile.”

“All right, Sax,” the Irish boy answered sullenly. “But I didn’t know the big baby was going to run and tattle! Why didn’t he take it like a man?”

“That’s enough! Now, everybody get to sleep again. We’ve had enough riot for one night.”

Dirk stretched out his aching body, and closed his eyes. Through the dark drifted the vengeful tones of his enemy.

“All right! But anyway, he’s a tattle-tale, and I’ll fix him for it—you see if I don’t!”

The morning period of camp duty found Brick Ryan on the wood-pile, serving his time chopping sawn logs into stove lengths and vowing vengeance upon the boy who had brought the punishment on him. He looked darkly from time to time toward the rear door of the camp kitchen, where the rest of the Tent One campers were helping to make the ice-cream for the Sunday dinner. Among them lounged Dirk Van Horn, who now and then lent a hand at the job of turning the heavy churn in the freezer, or packed some more salted ice around the revolving container. Brick noted that his foe was now dressed in garments more suited to a Lenape camper—basketball shorts and a light, sleeveless shirt. If Van Horn didn’t watch out, Brick mused, he would be laid up with a bad case of sunburn, for his shoulders were pale and lacked the protective coat of tan that marked the boys who had already spent a month in the mountain sunshine.

“Some people never learn,” Brick muttered, viciously splitting a stick of smooth birchwood. “Runnin’ home to mama just because we was havin’ a little fun with him, and squealin’ to Sax so he’d make me do wood-pile duty! Well, all I can say is, my time will come yet!”

He was interrupted by the noisy clatter of the motor of the camp flivver which, driven by Mr. Lane, rattled down the road and drew up at the rear of the lodge. In the back of the small truck, tightly lashed to prevent jolting, was a long, curved object wrapped securely in burlap. As Brick watched, Dirk Van Horn gave a shout and ran to the driver, who was just descending.

“That’s my canoe you have there, isn’t it, sir? Listen—doesn’t it say it’s for Van Horn? That’s me!”

“Yes, it’s for you, I guess,” answered Lane; “and the dickens of a time I had bringing it over these roads up from Elmville. We’ve got plenty of canoes here at camp—what any boy wants with one all to himself, I don’t know.”

Dirk was not listening. He ran to the group around the ice-cream freezer, and summoned them excitedly.

“Come on, you chaps! I made my father buy me a new canoe because I promised to come to camp, and here it is! Help me unpack it, and then we’ll try it out. It’s a beauty!”

“Listen!” Lefty Reardon protested. “We’re on squad duty—we have to make this ice-cream, and if we go away now, it won’t freeze——”

His tent-mates paid no attention to his objection. Dirk darted into the kitchen and returned with a long butcher-knife, with which he began ripping the seams of the burlap that wrapped the canoe. In a few minutes the casing was torn away, and the beautiful slim craft, painted a bright crimson, lay on the ground with its paddles along its bottom.

Dirk was jumping around excitedly, pointing out the features of the superb workmanship that made the canoe a delight to the eye. “Look at her lines, you fellows! See those soft seats. Those duck-boards on the bottom are to keep your feet dry. I tell you, you have to pay plenty of money for a boat like this! She’s a real Indian canoe, and I gave her a real Indian name, too. See?” He pointed to the shapely bow, where in golden letters was blazoned the name Sachem. “Now, who wants to help me try her out?”

“Down to the lake!” shouted Dirk. “Here, Slim, grab hold of that end. She’s light as a feather—we’ll have her in the water in no time!”

Slim Yerkes obediently lifted one end; Eddie, Nig Jackson, and Joey Fellowes seized the sides, and led by the excited Dirk, the group made off down the path to the boat dock, bearing the gleaming canoe aloft, leaving her burlap wrappings to clutter the ground. Lefty, wrestling alone with the heavy churn of the ice-cream freezer, shouted a last warning to them, but by this time his truant comrades were out of sight down the hill, bent on taking part in the first launching of the lovely little vessel.

Brick gazed after them disdainfully, impressed in spite of himself. It was a swell canoe, all right, and no boy could help being proud of it. Think of hitting the Long Trail in a craft like that! But the fellows had no right to leave their squad duty and run off to play with Van Horn’s new toy——

An amazed shout rose from the back of the kitchen. Sax McNulty, who had been working up in the ice-house, digging out large blocks of ice and heaving them down to his young assistants, 62 had finished and returned to the scene to find that his squad, with the exception of the faithful Lefty, had disappeared.

“Hey, what’s happened? Where is everybody, Lefty? Have they walked out on the job?”

Lefty grunted, struggling with the freezer handle that grew stiffer at each turn. “Yeah, Sax—I told ’em not to beat it, but Van Horn just got a canoe, and they all took it down to the lake to christen it.”

“They did, eh? Well, they’ll have to learn that they can’t run away like this when their duty is still to be done. Here, let me take a turn at that, Lefty. When you’re rested, you can chop some more ice. Huh! If you hadn’t stuck to the job, the camp would be missing its dessert this noon, all right!”

The leader grappled with the freezer. Brick turned to his chopping once more, and at the sound of his ax, McNulty looked over toward the wood-pile and saw him.

“Sure, Sax. What do you want?” replied Brick, sinking the ax blade into the chopping block.

“Chase down to the lake and head off that bunch of runaways. Tell ’em to come right back and finish what they started, before playing around with canoes and things.”

Brick needed no urging. He wanted to see what would happen at the lake shore. By this time, the canoe was no doubt already in the water. He ran off down the hillside in a bee-line for the dock. Behind the lower row of tents he sped, across the stone wall, and cut across the edge of the baseball field to the grove of trees that fringed the rocky lake shore. Here he almost tumbled over the bent backs of Wally Rawn, director of water sports and captain of the camp life-saving crew, and the seven boys who made up his tent-group. Rawn had chosen as his squad duty the task of repairing the steps that led down the steep bank to the dock; and Brick had to circle around the busy group to gain the edge of the lake where the boat dock jutted out from the shore.

Here, in the shallows of the bathing beach, the Sachem was already afloat, riding high above the rippling, shadowed waters of Lenape. She was held at one end by the proud Dirk, while the other boys gazed admiringly at her daintiness, that made the moored string of round-bottomed steel rowboats of the camp fleet look like clumsy craft indeed.

“Watch me get in her!” Dirk was shouting in a high voice. “Let me paddle her around a bit, and then maybe I’ll take you all for a ride!”

He drew the light vessel close beside the flooring of the dock, and balancing the paddles in one hand, started to step into the bow. Brick clattered on to the end of the pier.

“Say, you fellows!” he began. “Sax says to come back on the job right away. He’s pretty mad, too—you’re not supposed to sneak off squad duty.”

Dirk turned upon him coldly. “Don’t be foolish, Ryan. Can’t you see we’re busy christening the Sachem? If you don’t make a fuss, I’ll take you for a little spin after a while.”

The blond boy was not listening. He was too much interested in making his maiden trip in the newly-launched crimson canoe. Teetering precariously, he stepped into the bobbing bow. Before he could clutch the piles of the dock to hold the craft steady, the Sachem sheered off and, overburdened by the standing figure at one end, began rocking dangerously from side to side. Dirk swayed, trying to keep his balance as a wave slapped the dancing vessel.

Dirk, alarmed, dropped the paddles overside and grabbed at the gunwale to keep himself from following them into the shallow waters of the beach. In sudden panic, he scrambled to a seat; but it was too late. The Sachem heeled over across the wind; a sheet of water slid easily over the low side, slapped the light canoe to leeward, and dipped it once more below the surface. Water filled half the interior, sloshing about and rocking so that still more water was taken over the gunwale. Dirk gripped the seat desperately, trying to right the canoe; but his efforts were now of no avail.

Slowly, steadily, the Sachem sank to rest on the pebbled shallows beneath the surface of the lake, and Dirk Van Horn, with a comic look of amazement on his face, found himself sitting waist-deep in the water with his lovely possession beneath him, out of sight.

CHAPTER VI
FIGHT! FIGHT!

“Sunk!” he roared. “You sure scuttled yourself, all right! You don’t know any more about canoes than a baby! The Prince of Whales, that’s what you look like!” The other boys joined in laughing at the joke.

Dirk still sat helplessly in the sunken canoe, his mouth half open. He didn’t know a boat could act like that. His clothes were drenched. He had thought he was making a brave show, pushing out boldly in his fine canoe, and now they were all laughing at him for a lubber.

He scrambled out somehow, and splashed about in the shallow water, dragging the water-filled craft to the land beside the rock. A shout was heard, and a man came galloping down through the trees. It was Wally Rawn, who had witnessed the performance from the hillside, but who had arrived too late to stop it.

“He’s Van Horn, the Prince of Whales!” put in Brick. “Old Sink-Easy, the boy sailor—that’s him!”

“Well, Van Horn,” said Wally, looking down at the sodden, crestfallen figure, “stop trying to pull off that canoe’s bottom by dragging it on those rocks, and listen to me. I could see in a minute that you don’t know the first thing about a canoe. Where did it come from, anyway?”

“H’mm. Well, before you can go out paddling in it, you’ll have to learn how to treat it. And you’ll have to learn how to step into it without sinking the poor thing. In the first place, you ought to know that this is no time for campers to go boating—when squad-duty period is over, and you have reported to whoever is in charge here at the dock, you might be given permission to go out. In the second place, no boy is allowed to take out a canoe unless he has passed his swimming and boat tests. You haven’t done that, I know.”

“Well, you see, sir, I just wanted to try the canoe and see how it looked in the water——”

“Whew! This beats me!” The councilor scratched his head, and turned to the other boys. “Isn’t there anybody here who has any sense? Here a new boy comes down without a leader, and without knowing how to swim, puts a canoe in the water and sinks it under him! Suppose you had launched it from the end of the dock, Van Horn, where the deep water is—what would you have done if you had gone over then? That’s the reason we have canoe tests—so a boy won’t go out unless he can take care of himself in the water, no matter what happens. Now, lift that canoe on the dock, drain the water out, and leave it to dry. Then get back to your work. When we have swimming instruction tomorrow morning, come down and I’ll try to show you how to swim. It will be several days before you know enough even to take out a rowboat; but if you work hard, maybe I can teach you how to take care of yourself and your canoe. That’s all.” He turned on his heel and went back to his work.

Sheepishly, Dirk obeyed, and with the help of his grinning comrades, drew the canoe on the dock and tilted it so that it would drain. Then Dirk once more waded about, rescuing the drifting paddles he had lost. At last, dripping and downcast, he joined the others. Brick looked at him with a wry grin.

“Well, if you’re not a sweet sight! It’ll be a long while before your old canoe gets another bath, believe me. She’ll be laid up until you pass your canoe tests—and you can’t even swim! The Prince of Whales!”

“Aw, let him alone, Brick,” put in Slim Yerkes. “We should get back and help with that ice-cream.”

“You can bet you should! Sax is sure mad. Well, if the Prince is ready, let’s go.”

The group straggled up through the trees. Dirk stalked along, saying not a word; but Brick did not give him a chance to forget his misadventure. Instead, he kept up a running stream of ridicule that would have penetrated a skin much thicker than Dirk’s. Something of the bully still remained in Brick Ryan, even though he had spent three summers at Lenape; and now it came out in his words. Besides, he was still smarting from the punishment he had been given for his midnight hazing escapade, and he did not intend to let the despised tattler get off easily.

They skirted the lower corner of the baseball field, and, crossing the wall, entered the meadow below the campus. Brick had not stopped jeering all the while, and now his remarks were growing more and more cutting.

“Yeah, a baby, that’s all you are—a tattle-tale, canoe-sinkin’ baby. I haven’t forgotten what happened last night, and I’ll fix you for it, too, Baby.”

For the first time, Dirk replied to the irksome words. He stopped, turned, and spoke with his head up.

Brick stuck out his chin, and put his hands on his hips mockingly. “Oh, I am, huh? Did you hear that, boys? F. X. A. Ryan is a mucker! Dear, dear, it must be true—the Millionaire Baby says so! Well, what are you goin’ to do about it, Baby?”

Dirk refused to lose his temper. “I shan’t listen to all your talk any longer, that’s all. From now on, please don’t speak to me unless it’s necessary. If we can’t be friends, we’d better keep apart.”

“Dear, dear! Now he won’t speak to me! My heart is breakin’, boys!” Quickly Brick dropped his mocking tone, and his next words were threatening. He scowled fiercely into the face of his enemy. “Now, listen, you! I hate sissies, and I hate tattle-tales, and if you don’t like the way I talk, you may wake up with a ring around your eye, and a lily in your hand!”

Slim Yerkes tried to interpose. “Come on, Brick—don’t pick on him too much. Let’s get back to the lodge.”

Brick wheeled on the peacemaker. “He’s lookin’ for trouble, Slim, and he’s more than likely to get it. I’ve got half a mind to poke him one right now for good luck.”

“Huh! Tough, aren’t you?” His open hand darted out swiftly, and unexpectedly shoved Dirk off his balance. Dirk cried out, caught himself, and his fists clenched. He was pale save for two red spots that glowed in his cheeks.

“That’s enough, Ryan!” he said, his lip trembling. “If you really must settle this by scuffling like a street boy, who—— I’ll fight you!”

Brick’s laugh was unpleasant to hear. “He’ll fight! Listen, sissies like you take a chance on gettin’ murdered if they talk fight to Brick Ryan! Why, you mama’s boy, I’ll knock you so cold you’ll think you’re at the North Pole!”

His words were louder than he thought. From a tent a hundred yards away, a tousled head appeared, and shouted something to those within the tent. “Fight! Fight!” In no time at all, the two Utway twins, followed by Al Canning, had run down from the tent and joined the little ring of boys from Tent One.

“You’re really going to go against Brick Ryan?” Slim Yerkes asked in astonishment.

Brick, a grim smile on his pugnacious face, was secretly sizing up the lad whom he had driven by taunting words to defend himself with his fists. He was not quite so sure, now, that Dirk was the sissy he had proclaimed him to be; those shoulders and arms looked quite husky and muscular, now that he looked closely. Brick decided that the thing to do was to pitch in at once and overpower his opponent from the start.

Jerry Utway was looking around the circle eagerly. The Utway brothers were never far away when a scrap arose; it would seem that they smelled the signs of battle from afar. “Gee, Jake!” he exclaimed, “the Van Horn fellow is going to tackle Brick! I’m going to be his second!”

“And I’ll be Brick’s second,” responded his twin. “Come on, men, form a ring here. Let’s have this scrap with regular rules. Al, you can be referee. It’s a good thing no leaders are around to stop it!”

“Just a minute more,” answered Jake. “Come on, Brick, strip off your shirt. Gosh, this will be a real fight—bare knuckles to the finish!”

Brick shook him aside. “Aw, I won’t need anything like that. It’ll take me just one good smack to finish this fight. He’s a coward.” But inwardly Brick was not so sure. Dirk Van Horn had said nothing since he had issued his amazing challenge. He had calmly prepared for the fray, and stood waiting quietly with no sign of fear on his set features. He did not cower in fright, or try to bolster up his courage with a string of biting words; and there was nothing amateurish about his pose as he stood with his clenched fists hanging loosely at his sides.

“Good,” said Al. “When I say ‘Time!’, you can start. All set? Time!”

At the summons, Brick Ryan plunged forward over the grassy ground, fists doubled, head down, and struck a sweeping blow at his enemy. To his surprise, his flailing arm landed on thin air. Dirk had side-stepped easily, and still stood with his arms hanging loosely at his side, his face still calm.

Brick whirled about and spat. “Come on and fight, will you? None of this duckin’ like a snake. And you guys get back, so I can have some room.” He plunged again at his foe, and aimed a second wide swing at Dirk’s face.

This time Dirk did not dodge. Instead, he parried with the palm of his left hand, and his right fist shot forward, taking the surprised Brick in the side. It was a stinging blow, and Brick stepped back with a grunt. He had not expected this. There were few boys at Lenape who would dare to stand up against Brick Ryan even in a friendly bout with gloves; yet here was the despised Van Horn, the pampered city boy who couldn’t even swim, not only defending himself skillfully from the Irish lad’s attack, but even striking back!

The blow had made Brick more wary. This time he did not leap in with his head down—too much chance of getting caught off guard again for those tactics! He circled cautiously, trying to find an opening where a thrust would do most good. His anger was rising, too. The breathless watchers looked at his face, and waited awestricken for the terrible moment when the aroused Brick Ryan would wade in and demolish his daring opponent.

Jerry Utway, his eyes ablaze with excitement, jumped up and down, urging his champion with delighted cries. “That’s the boy, Van Horn, old scout! Wade in and tap him one!”

“Shut up, Jerry!” his brother Jake put in. “Let them alone, or there’ll be two fights going on here! Whee, look at that one! Go it, Brick!”

Brick was again in the lists, this time depending upon speed and the violent fury of his attack. It seemed to the onlookers that no one could long withstand the force of his charge; his arms whirled and jabbed, and his face was red with the exertion of his onslaught. Indeed, Van Horn was quickly driven backwards, and more than once a doubled fist made its red mark on his naked chest. But he still kept his feet, and although he was given no chance to take the offensive, he guarded his face skillfully. Yet slowly he gave ground; Brick had maneuvered about until he was above where the other stood, and was driving him down the sloping hillside.

Nig Jackson gave vent to a yell. “He’s got him now! Go it, Brick! Wow, he’s down!”

Al Canning, in his capacity as referee, rushed forward. Dirk was sprawled out upon the uneven ground, crouched on one side. His face was whiter than ever.

“Slipped on some grass,” he mumbled through swollen lips. “I—I’m all right.” Unaided, he staggered to his feet, and looked about in a dazed way. Brick, who had stepped aside when his foe had fallen, now advanced confidently for the final sortie.

“Finish him off, Brick!” yelled Eddie Scolter. Ryan, encouraged by the shouts of the watchers, marched slowly and triumphantly to a stand just beyond arm’s length of where Dirk stood, dazedly shaking the sweat from his eyes.

“Had enough?” Brick taunted. His blows had taken effect in more than one place on Dirk’s face and body, and one shoulder was badly scraped by his fall. But Brick himself did not go unmarked from the fray; his cheek was coloring where a clenched fist had got through his guard, and his right arm was weak from panting effort.

Dirk Van Horn clenched his teeth without answering. For an instant, the watching boys saw a stab of fury flare up in his dark eyes. He set his feet, held his head high, and his arms swung into the guard position.

Brick advanced still one further step. “Had enough, Baby? I won’t ask you again. If you’ll apologize, I won’t hurt you any more today——”

He was too close for his own safety. Dirk grunted as he shot his arm forward in a telling blow straight from the shoulder. His bunched knuckles caught the surprised Brick on the point of the jaw.

A ludicrous look of amazement came over Brick Ryan’s face. For an instant he tottered, grinning stupidly at the staring circle of boys; then, with a soft groan, he slid backward, his knees gave way gently, and he slumped senseless upon the ground.

CHAPTER VII
THE RED HAND REVENGERS

“Yay, Handsome Van, the K. O. Kid!” cried Jerry Utway, hammering his champion upon the back. “Gee, what a beautiful swat that was!”

Brick Ryan opened his eyes. His head was still spinning from the force of the blow that had vanquished him. As through a mist he could see the dim faces of the boys about his prostrate form. Among them stood out the triumphant, smiling features of Dirk Van Horn.

A hand shook his shoulder, and Jake Utway spoke in his ear. “Are you all right now, Brick? Tough luck. He sure packs a wallop!”

Brick tried to grin, and groaned in spite of himself. His jaw still ached mightily where his antagonist’s doubled fist had struck, and his swollen lower lip was bleeding slightly.

“I have to hand it to him,” he mumbled, and with Jake’s help clambered unsteadily to his feet.

“I guess I was.” Brick smiled ruefully. “Van Horn, I guess we’ve been gettin’ each other wrong. There may be some things about campin’ that you don’t know, but when it comes to scrappin’——! Say, you beat me square, but I don’t hold any grudge. From now on, let’s forget everything and be friends. What do you say?” He held out his hand in a frank gesture.

“Ryan,” he said deliberately, “I said you were a mucker, and I still think so. Any time you want another boxing lesson, come around. Otherwise, kindly keep to your own affairs and leave me to mine.” He pointedly turned his back, picked up his wet shirt, and stalked off up the path to the lodge.

Brick bit his lip, and his hand dropped with an angry gesture to his side; but he said nothing. Jerry Utway left the group and ran after Dirk, catching up with him and walking at a fast pace by his side.

“Hey, Van, will you show me some time how you made that knockout? I want to try it out on my brother next time we have a row. Gee, if anybody had told me you could put out Brick Ryan’s lights, I wouldn’t have believed it! Where did you learn how to fight like that?”

“My father has seen to it that I had the best boxing lessons that money could buy.” Dirk smiled grimly. “Yesterday Ryan seemed to think that having money wasn’t of much value; but I hope that now he has learned that scientific self-defense is a good thing to acquire. And because my father could pay for those boxing lessons, I don’t have to be bullied by any street-boy that comes along.”

“It sure did make Brick sit up and take notice,” chuckled Jerry. “But why didn’t you make up with him afterward?”

“It’s not so easy. He hazed me pretty badly last night, and I’m not done with him yet.”

“But Brick is a pretty good fellow when you get to know him. Why don’t you——” Jerry broke off, and cocked his ear as bugle-notes rattled down from the porch of the lodge. “Say, we better hurry—there goes Church Call.” He glanced with amusement at the battered features and wet, stained garments of the boy at his side. “Gosh, you sure are a sight! You and Brick Ryan will look like a swell pair, sitting on a bench together at church this morning!”

Dirk was quite late for church. He went to the empty tent, washed, and changed his wet clothing for garments more suitable for Sunday service; and the hour of camp worship was more than half over by the time he slipped into a log seat in the woodland chapel overlooking the lake. Brick was down at the front with the rest of the complement of Tent One, but did not turn his head. One or two boys near by looked at Dirk’s marked face curiously, and Jake Utway once caught his eye, winked, and grinned from behind a hymn-book.

During the bountiful Sunday dinner in the lodge, Dirk, sitting with his councilor on one side of him and Nig Jackson on the other, intercepted many inquiring glances directed from neighboring tables toward himself and Brick Ryan. The red-headed boy, for his part, ate with his head down, saying nothing. If Sax McNulty had heard of the fight, he gave no sign.

When dessert was served, Sax looked whimsically at the plate of ice-cream before him.

“Your consciences ought to hurt you slackers,” he observed. “If Lefty hadn’t stuck to his guns, the camp would be missing their ice-cream today, all right. I’ve never had my squad sneak out on a job before. What do you fellows think about it?”

Dirk Van Horn felt the leader’s eyes upon him. He flushed and tried to look unconcerned; but the ice-cream, for some reason, stuck in his throat, and he soon pushed the plate away, to melt into a shapeless mass.

When the time came for announcements, Dr. Cannon, who was officer of the day, awarded the pennant for highest points in inspection to Wally Rawn’s tent; then, with a grin, marched over to the Tent One table and, amid the good-natured jeers of the assembled campers, presented a different sort of emblem. It was a big tin oil-can, across which was printed in white letters: “Booby.”

“Tent One wins the Goof Loving Cup,” the doctor announced with a flourish, “for being lowest in honor points for today. And the first shall be last!”

“What’s that for, Sax?” Eddie Scolter asked, pointing to the strange object.

“It means we have to hang that up on our tent-pole in full sight, so everybody in camp can see we’re a bunch of dubs,” explained the leader, with a glance around the table. “And that’s just what we’ve been today. Van Horn, you may have the privilege of carrying this little token down to the tent.”

Dirk opened his mouth to protest, but the whistle sounded just then, and the campers leaped to their feet and began pouring out the doors. Picking up the loathed booby-can, Dirk started walking down toward the tent. He had not gone far when he felt a hand on his arm, and he looked up, frowning, to see Sax McNulty’s serious face.

“I didn’t say anything at the table just now,” began the leader, “but of course you know you’re to blame for most of our demerits today. I’m afraid you’re not getting off to a very good start at Lenape, Van.”

“Well, I don’t, exactly. The other fellows should have known better than to drop their duty and help you launch your canoe this morning—but you’ll have to admit you were the main cause of it. Then, Wally Rawn told me about your fool stunt at the lake. Also, and moreover, when the inspection staff came around this noon, our tent was cluttered up with your things strewn all over the place, wet clothes dumped on the floor—plenty demerits. You’ll have to learn not to do the first thing that enters your head, Van Horn—you’ll have to think of the other fellow, and consider what will be for the good of the camp and your own gang. I haven’t mentioned anything about your fight with Ryan, but——”

“I won’t interfere there,” promised McNulty gently. “Ryan is a decent chap, and so are you; and I know that after a couple of days you will get along together fine. Try to get his point of view. We’ve got a fine bunch of fellows in Tent One this time, and as soon as we get to pulling together, we’re going to show Lenape some speed! I didn’t mean to make you listen to another sermon today,” he ended wryly, “and I don’t expect you to learn everything about camping in a few hours. Come to me next time you feel the urge to do something startling, and I’ll try to put you wise first.”

Dirk smarted under the words, but held back the bitter reply that rose to his lips. He slammed the booby-can on a nail sticking into the front tent-pole, and retired sulkily to his untidy bunk. The other boys, with the exception of the two who were doing the dishes, were stretched about, taking a restful siesta after their bountiful dinner. Across from Dirk sat Brick Ryan, busied as usual over his life-saving manual, and apparently unaware that there was anybody named Van Horn within a thousand miles of him. For the first time, Dirk noticed that Brick wore a curious insignia stitched to the front of his jersey. It was outlined in green and white, and showed a large L superimposed upon a swastika. Dirk’s eyes passed to Lefty Reardon. Lefty also wore the green L.

Dirk decided that the camp monogram would look most attractive on one of his sweaters. He jumped up, and hurried back to the lodge before the small camp store closed.

On the porch of the lodge, a short string of boys stood before the window, waiting their turn to make small purchases of candy, peanuts, and gum. Dirk joined the end of the line. When he came abreast of the window, he issued his demand.

Long Jim Avery, the lanky councilor charged with the duty of looking after the camp supplies, leaned far over the counter and looked at the boy with astonishment.

“Oh, you know what I mean, sir—one of those green and white things with an L on them. I want to buy one.”

“Somebody’s trying to play a joke on you, Van Horn. Why, I thought even a new boy knew that you can’t buy an honor emblem!”

Dirk flushed. “But—some of the chaps have them. Where do you get them, then?”

“My, my! You can’t buy one—you have to earn it, and then it’s awarded to you at Council Ring. That’s a good one! Why, before you have the right to wear an honor emblem, you have to pass a lot of tests—you have to know a bunch of trees and birds and flowers and rocks and stars, and how to swim and handle a boat, and hike and cook and build woodcraft objects, and—oh, lots of things! Here, I’ll get you a card with all the requirements printed on it, and when you pass a test, the leader who passes you will put his initials down. Campers have a chance to pass the tests all the time. If I can help you learn some of the things, come around.”

“Never mind,” stammered Dirk miserably, backing away. “I didn’t know—— I guess I don’t want to start in right now.”

He stumbled off down the steps. They were making fun of him again! The boys would spread the story around—how he had tried to buy an honor emblem at the store—and soon the whole camp would be laughing at his latest fool stunt! No matter what he started to do at Lenape, it always turned out to be the wrong thing! Now McNulty would have more of his comments to make!

Dirk was feeling very sorry for himself. Tears of helpless rage welled into his eyes, and he did not see that someone was standing in front of him until he heard his name called in a mysterious whisper.

Dirk looked up. The speaker was a runty-looking boy with a large nose and close-set black eyes. He took Dirk’s arm with a familiar gesture, and patted him on the back.

“Say, I want to tell you. I heard about how you licked Red Ryan. Gee, that was swell! I wish I’d seen you do it!”

“Why, everybody in camp knows about it! You’re a hero, that’s what you are! A real tough fighter, you must be! There are lots of guys in this camp that don’t like Ryan, and are glad he got it good at last! Say, we don’t want anybody to notice I’m talkin’ to you, see? Come on, duck in here and I’ll tell you somethin’ real important!”

Dirk, fearing some new pitfall, followed suspiciously; but the mysterious manner of the big-nosed little fellow impressed him in spite of himself, and he allowed himself to be drawn under the shadow of the overhanging porch of the lodge. Here several small rooms had been built—a dark-room for the convenience of the camp photographers, and a larger compartment in which were stored trunks, suitcases, old tents, and the like. Through the door of the latter room he followed his guide, who shut that door carefully and then sat on a pile of lumber.

“Don’t talk too loud, see?” he warned Dirk. “We don’t want nobody to guess what we’re after.”

“Well, what are you after anyway?” Dirk asked impatiently. “Who are you, and why are you acting so mysterious about everything?”

“My name’s Blum,” the other whispered hoarsely. “‘Dumb’ Blum, the guys call me, but that’s only a nickname—I’m not so dumb as most people think. Now, listen. You’ve got it in for Brick Ryan, haven’t you?”

“Well, we haven’t got along together so far. But what has that to do with you?”

“You’ll see! And you don’t like Sax McNulty any too well, do you? He bawled you out pretty heavy a little while ago, didn’t he?”

“I know lots of things!” the other chuckled. “Some people in this camp are not treatin’ you right, Van! But me and some other guys can see what a swell feller you are, and we’re ready to help you.”

“Revenge! That’s what! How would you like it if you could get back at everybody that ever does anything to you around here? Brick Ryan, for instance—if somethin’ pretty terrible happened to him, nobody would guess who done it; but you could laugh up your sleeve all the time!”

“I got a gang. We do pretty well what we like around this camp, and if anybody don’t like it—even leaders, or even the Chief himself—why, they’re good and sorry for it! We have meetings in the middle of the night, and we sign the oath with our own blood, and swear that if anybody hurts any one of us, why, we get revenge! We go under the secret name of the Red Hand Revengers, and we want you to join with us, see?”

CHAPTER VIII
SHENANIGANS FOR BRICK

It didn’t seem a bad idea, the way Blum put it. The Red Hand Revengers, with their mysterious meetings in the dead of night, their oaths of blood brotherhood, and their secret signs and deeds of vengeance against those who thwarted them, sounded most exciting. Even before the leader of this mystic society had finished speaking, Dirk Van Horn had made up his mind.

“Oh, you won’t need to be initiated,” Blum assured him. “We’ll have our first meeting tonight after taps, and you can meet the rest of the guys. We all wear masks over our faces, and have secret names. My Revenger name is——Swear on your heart and liver you won’t tell anybody?”

“Well, I’m known as the Headless Green Dragon, see? When you send me a secret note, always draw a picture of a headless dragon, and I’ll know it’s for me. If you want to, you can be the Silent Dagger, or anything like that——I know! How about Iron Gauntlet, on account of the way you knocked out Brick?”

“All right. That sounds splendid. And I’ll bring a watermelon to the meeting tonight. My father brought it up to give to the other fellows in the tent, but they don’t deserve it. And listen——”

“I’ll write home and have my mother send up a big box of cake and candy and stuff, just for the Revengers!” said Dirk. “And when they let me use my canoe, we’ll all go out in it, and——”

“No!” objected Blum. “Don’t forget we mustn’t be seen together! When I want to get in touch with you, I’ll leave a note under your pillow. Now, we’ll have to separate pretty quick. I’ll get you when everybody is asleep tonight, and we’ll have our first meeting. You stay here a couple minutes after I leave, so nobody will guess what we’re up to. And right today, Iron Gauntlet, old revenger, we’ll start putting the Red Curse on that varlet Brick Ryan!”

That night Brick Ryan returned from Indian Council Ring to find the first of his troubles upon him. The campers had been summoned to their quarters after an evening spent about the four-square fire of friendship, and by the light of the tent lantern, the inhabitants of Tent One were undressing for the night. Brick Ryan slipped into his pajamas and turned down his blankets, ready to jump in. An angry cry escaped him.

“Somebody’s hashed my bunk, that’s what!” the Irish boy exclaimed. “Look there, will you? The whole bed is stuck full of cockleburrs! I can’t sleep in it!”

“Gee, that’s too bad,” said his friend sympathetically. “Here, I’ll help you pull ’em out. Sax will be back in a few minutes—why don’t you tell him about it? What a dirty trick to play on a fellow!”

“If I knew who did it, I sure wouldn’t have to tell a leader about it!” said Brick through clenched teeth. He looked about in the dull light at the faces of his mates. All of them looked innocent; Dirk Van Horn looked suspiciously so, and there was a faint trace of a smile on his good-looking features. Could Van Horn have——? But the heartless trick must have been done during Council, and Dirk had been sitting in his place every moment of the time.

“Somebody must have it in for you, Brick,” commented Lefty as the two bent over the blankets and began pulling out the prickly burrs with which they were covered. “Gee, this is going to be a long, slow job. Who do you suppose hates you so much that he’d do a mean thing like this to you?”

“I don’t know,” admitted Brick. “But I’m sure going to find out, and when I do, you can bet he’ll get paid back for his low, sneaking work!”

Brick slept but poorly that night, for it had been impossible to remove all the sharp, pin-like burrs with which his blankets had been coated. He tossed and turned, and kept finding new spines that had penetrated through the woolen mass to irritate him. Muttering to himself, he at last drifted off to sleep. Later, he awoke for a moment, and looked across the tent, where some unseen person was crawling back into his bunk; but he thought nothing of it, and in the morning had forgotten all about it.

The morning was cloudy, and a cool wind swept down from the northeast. When Brick piled out of his uncomfortable bedclothes at Reveille, he thrust his feet into his shoes, as usual. But the state of those shoes was far from usual. Brick let out a yell of rage. His shoes were brim-full of icy water, and the strings were knotted a dozen times. He had to hurry to setting-up drill barefoot over the rough ground; and to crown it all, his bathrobe was missing, and he shivered in the raw breeze until he caught sight of the garment hung in a pine tree far below the parade ground. And he found that when he went to brush his teeth before breakfast, his tooth-paste tube had been stuffed with soap; but he did not find out until his mouth was burning with the choking stuff, and he was frothing and blowing sudsy bubbles, much to the delight of two small boys who scrubbed away beside him. He washed out his mouth, but the vile taste remained until long after the morning meal.

Brick began to wonder if he were bewitched. What was the meaning of this series of afflictions? He could find no trace of whoever had committed these acts. If it was Dirk Van Horn, he covered it up pretty well. Besides, why should Van Horn resort to such stealthy tricks, the acts of a cowardly soul? Van Horn had fought him the day before, and won fairly; why should he now begin a campaign of cockleburrs, watered shoes, and soapy tooth-paste?

The bewildered Brick spoke to his friend Lefty about it when the two were walking up from morning swim.

“And when I got back after breakfast, I found a big hoptoad in my clothes locker,” he concluded, “and nobody was around but a little kid from Tent Seven. Who do you suppose it can be, Lefty? How long will it go on? I swear, I’m about ready to soak somebody in the nose if I catch him getting into my things. Am I haunted, or what?”

“You are,” agreed Lefty promptly. “You’re haunted by some sneaking coward who is trying to get your goat. Van Horn fought you fair yesterday, didn’t he?” he went on in a matter-of-fact tone.

“Sure. I didn’t mind that. But the Millionaire Baby, although he has some crazy ideas, wouldn’t stoop to those tricks, I guess.”

“If he did, he wouldn’t stand a show of getting on the baseball team, Shawnee game or no Shawnee game,” said Lefty. “As long as I’m captain, we’ll have only square-shooters playing for Lenape. You comin’ down for practice this afternoon, eh?”

“You bet, if my glove hasn’t been stolen by that time. I swear, Lefty, I’m gettin’ so I’m scared to turn around, for fear somebody will swipe my pants when I’m not lookin’! But, say, do you think this Van Horn guy is really baseball material?”

Lefty shrugged. “We’ll try him out. Goodness knows we can’t pass up any promising players, when we only have today and tomorrow to get ready for the Shawnee game. I hear Shawnee has got back Hook Bollard and Widelle this year, and that catcher of theirs—what’s his name?—that made three runs last time we played them. If Lenape wants to take the best end of the score on Wednesday, we’ve got to show some steam!”

When the announcements were made at lunch, Lefty Reardon rose and read a list of names of the campers who had been chosen to form the team that would defend Lenape’s honor on the baseball diamond on the following Wednesday. On that day, the whole of Lenape would trek northward to the shores of Iron Lake for a visit to their rival, Camp Shawnee. The crowning event of the day would be a ball game between the two camp teams, thus renewing a yearly custom of friendly sportsmanship. Lenape had been badly beaten the season before, and among the campers there was much talk of the coming encounter, and predictions that this time they would pay back the old score with a rousing victory.

Dirk Van Horn noted with disappointment that his name was not among those called; but no sooner had Lefty seated himself than he turned to Dirk and said: “Say, Van, I hear you’re supposed to be a fielder. If you want to come down to the diamond with the rest of the team, we’ll try you out and see if we can find a place for you.”

“Sure, try out!” urged Sax McNulty. “You were on your prep school team, weren’t you, Van?”

Dirk nodded. “I’ll come down, sir.” He had spent the morning lolling in his bunk with a book of stories, and had disregarded Wally Rawn’s offer to teach him to swim. Neither had he made any move to join in the many other activities of the camp routine. But baseball was different, he felt; he knew and liked that sport best of all, and had little doubt that with his school training, he could hold a position on a scratch team such as he thought the Lenape squad to be.

When the bugle sounded recall, Dirk, resplendent in a brand-new baseball suit and bearing a well-oiled glove under his arm, sauntered down to the field and reported to Captain Reardon, who with Kipper Dabney was warming up a few curves. Lefty slammed a sizzling drop into Gil Shelton’s padded mitt, and turned to Dirk with a nod.

“You can get out there with the bunch and get under a few of those fungoes that Mullins is knocking,” he directed, “and show us what you can do. Later on, we’ll have batting practice and you’ll have a chance to prove you can hit.”

Dirk, with a confident smile, trotted out into the tall grass behind third base, and for half an hour, in company with Ollie Steffins, Blackie Thorne, and a youngster named Tompkins, he fielded lofty flies and grounders from Soapy Mullins’ resounding bat. Now and then he glanced at the other members of the squad. The infielders were tossing the ball back and forth with easy skill, and Brick Ryan, hovering over first base, missed few of the shots that came near his post.

When the players were warmed up sufficiently, they lined up one after another to face the delivery of Captain Lefty and his relief pitcher, Dabney. At last it came Dirk’s turn. He selected a bat and approached the plate with a cocky grin. Lefty, noting his short grip, thought to teach this arrogant newcomer a little lesson, and slipped over a neat inshoot that took him up short.

“Strike!” called out Lieutenant Eames, whose service on the West Point team qualified him as volunteer umpire.

Dirk did not lengthen his grip; but when Lefty sought to repeat his trick, he was ready for it. As the whirling ball neared the plate, Dirk stepped back a pace and his levelled bat met the horsehide smartly. A clean single flew through the infield well inside the lines and through the fingers of Ken Haveland, who was covering the domain of shortstop. The few scattered spectators set up a quick shout of approval.

When the period of practice was over, Lefty announced that there would be a short game with a team of leaders the following afternoon; and the players strolled in twos and threes back to their tents to prepare for swim. Lefty, on his way to the lodge burdened with bats and other equipment, found Brick Ryan sitting on a bench under a huge black cherry tree at the gate.

“Why so thoughtful?” Lefty hailed him. “And by the way, where were you for batting practice? You slipped off without telling me.”

“No, it gave somebody else an ache, but not in the head. I put a stop to all these shenanigans that have been raisin’ cain with my belongin’s—at least, I put a stop to them for a while, anyway. I sneaked up on Tent One durin’ battin’ practice. Not a soul was around, except that nasty little Toby brat from Tent Eight. Do you know, I caught him in the very act of dumpin’ a pail of water right on my bed!”

Lefty threw back his head and laughed. “Better not let young Sherlock Jones hear about it,” he advised. “He’ll pester around with clues until he’s dizzy. Well, I’m glad Van Horn didn’t have anything to do with it. He was down at the field all the while.”

“Well, he’s stretchin’ his bunk right now, readin’ bedtime stories. How did he look in there today?”

“Not bad. He’s a better fielder than Terry Tompkins, that’s sure. And he’s fairly brainy with a bat. Tomorrow we can see what he can do against the councilors.”

Lefty picked up his equipment and started on. He had only gone a few paces when Brick, who had not moved, called after him in a low voice:

Lefty considered. “Why, it might be Red-Hot Rhubarb, or Right-Handed Rattlesnake, or anything. Why do you ask?”

“Nothin’,” muttered Brick. “But maybe tonight I’ll find out, and if I do, Lefty me boy, I’ll tell you all about it!”

CHAPTER IX
DIRK HEARS OF THE LONG TRAIL

Six masked figures sat with their heads together in the starlight of the deserted Council Ring. It was late. Two hours gone, Camp Lenape had retired to a rest welcome and well-earned. But here in this lonely spot, their presence unknown to their fellows and councilors, the mysterious six plotted mischief. In the shadow of the tall stone seat of the Chief, on the north side of the ring, they crouched, listening to the graveyard tones of their undersized leader.

“Brother Revengers, we will now have a report from the Stealthy Stabber. He’s goin’ to tell us all about the Ryan Curse affair, see? Speak up, Stabber!”

“He walloped me!” spoke up a shrill voice, more whimpering than bloodthirsty, and the little fellow rubbed himself tenderly at the painful memory.

“And served you right, too!” put in a third Revenger. “I didn’t know you were going as far as you did. I think it was a bunch of cowardly tricks—soaping up his tooth-paste and trying to soak his blankets with a pail of water—and if I had known, I wouldn’t have let it happen!”

“Aw, say, Iron Gauntlet, old fellow,” whined the leader; “you ain’t goin’ to back out like that, are you? Why, Stabber and Red Rover and the rest of us only did all this stuff to help you out!”

“I don’t need that sort of help, thank you,” replied Iron Gauntlet, settling back in his place. “It was mean, and from now on I want to tell you that I——”

“What’s that?” cried a small lad to his right, starting up in his place and listening fearfully. The leader laughed sneeringly.

“Don’t get scared, kid. Ain’t the Headless Green Dragon here to protect you? That was only an owl hootin’. Gee, you guys are sure a bunch of babies. A fine gang of Revengers you turned out to be!”

“But it sounded pretty terrible, Dumb,” muttered the lad, shivering. “I don’t like it here in the woods—it’s too spooky! Suppose a bear or something came after us!”

Dumb Blum laughed again. “No bears around here. And even if there was, I guess they wouldn’t bother me! Now, we got to figure what to do next. If Iron Gauntlet here thinks we ought to lay off Brick Ryan for a while, why, there’s lot of other varlets around camp we could torture—— Ooh! Look there!”

The bold master of the dread secret society pointed a shaking hand. His small followers fell back, several of them squealing with terror.

Dirk Van Horn looked in the direction at which Blum was fearfully pointing. Above the stone dais of the Chief before them rose a horrible shapeless form, gleaming with unearthly fire. Slowly, as they watched, rooted to the spot, the monster stirred, the folds of its skin glowing with a pale green luminescence, and uttered at the horrified boys a sepulchral bellow!

“It’s—it’s the Green Dragon!” babbled the Stealthy Stabber, with chattering teeth.

Even as he spoke, the gaping mouth of the creature yawned open. A fizzing spurt of yellow sparks darted from the cavity. With a blinding flash, a ball of crimson fire shot out at them, throwing a bloody glow over the scene. The horror was coming after them, belching flame and smoke!

Another ball of fire, this time a deathlike blue in color, burst in their midst. Without a further glance, the terrified youngsters took to their heels and ran through the underbrush, stumbling, falling, crying out as they fled from that ghastly spot. Far in the van was the doughty Blum, almost out of his head with fear, racing as though that glowing green devil was right at his heels!

Dirk Van Horn had risen to his feet, and had backed away from the oncoming monster. He could flee no further; his legs were weak with fright; his back was braced against the towering totem-pole of the Lenape tribe; and his teeth were clenched to keep himself from crying out. Straight toward him shambled the glowing shape, showering many-colored sparks as it came!

He stared petrified. The dragon paused in the center of the ring, shot forth a final rain of sparks, and collapsed to the ground, its phosphorescent hide thrown back. From within its folds rose a high-pitched, mocking laugh that was harder for Dirk to bear than the blood-curdling groans it had formerly given forth.

That laugh! Dirk drew out his forgotten flashlight, and snapped the button. A ray of light shot out, and revealed Brick Ryan, rolling on the ground in a tempest of mirth, clutching in one hand a smoking thick tube of paper. At his side lay the cast-off skin of the “dragon” that had put to rout the brave band of Red Revengers.

Always Brick Ryan! Dirk sank limply to a seat, and put his head in his hands. The shock had been greater than he thought.

Brick, still chuckling, rose and came toward him. “Gollies! Did you see those bold lads run for it! They won’t stop until they’re safe in bed with the covers pulled over their heads! And nothin’ after them but F. X. A. Ryan wrapped up in an old piece of canvas rubbed with phosphorus!”

“But that terrible fire—those lights——” murmured Dirk. “Why—how——”

Brick burst into another peal of laughter. “Just a little old Roman candle left over from the Fourth of July! And in case you want to know how I found out what was up, I discovered a bit of a note under your pillow this afternoon, tellin’ all about your fine meetin’ and how you were goin’ to fix Ryan for keeps. But when Ryan came himself to see these brave laddies, they scooted like the pack of rabbits they are! Revengers! Huh! Dumb Blum and his gang of babies may be all right for sneakin’ around and messin’ up a fellow’s things, but they sure aren’t very happy out here in the woods at night!”

Dirk lifted his head wearily. “I wanted to speak to you about that, Ryan. I didn’t know they were going to fill your shoes with water and steal your things, or I wouldn’t have stood for it. Those were coward’s tricks; and I want you to know I’m sorry.”

“Bein’ sorry won’t help you much. Maybe I believe you, and maybe I don’t; but anyways, you were out here with that bunch, cookin’ up trouble, and you sure looked pretty cheap. Blum was tryin’ to get you to do his dirty work, and he’s such a coward himself he has to pull this secret society stuff and make little kids that don’t know any better follow him around like he was somebody, the nasty little brat. So that’s the kind of a friend you pick, huh?”

Dirk sighed. “I said I was in the wrong, Ryan, and I apologized. I’m sorry I got mixed up in this affair. What else can I say?”

“You’ve said enough, as far as I’m concerned. Now, unless we both get back to Tent One pretty quick, you and I will be spendin’ tomorrow on the wood-pile. Those scared kids have probably wakened up the whole camp.”

Dirk nodded, rising to his feet. “But before we go, Ryan, tell me just one thing. I—I guess I’m not the right sort of chap to get along here at Lenape. I try to do the right thing, but I always seem to end up in trouble. Tell me, what is the matter with me?”

Brick, taken aback at the other’s frankness, looked at the ground. “I’m no preacher,” he mumbled slowly. “When—when I first came to Lenape, I guess I was just as bad as you, and a lot worse. And maybe my trouble was the same as yours. I was always thinkin’ first of Brick Ryan, and never stoppin’ to wonder how it struck the other fellow. Then one of the leaders got me to see that I could get most fun out of campin’ by doin’ things for Lenape instead of bein’ selfish and tryin’ to show how smart a guy F. X. A. Ryan was. I—I guess that’s what they mean when they talk of camp spirit,” he ended lamely; “thinkin’ about the good of the crowd instead of just showin’ off for your own benefit. Now, let’s get along!”

“You mean—— Say!” cried Dirk with glowing eyes, “I’d like to do something for the camp! No, I don’t mean asking my father for some money and buying stuff for everybody to use. I mean, well—if we won that baseball game Wednesday, I guess it would be a thing to be proud of! Ryan, I’m going to play as I never played before—for the honor of the camp!”

“That would be a starter,” Brick admitted. “Now, for gosh sakes, let’s get out of here!”

The two made their way back to their bunks without mishap, and turned in to take a much-needed sleep. However, before he shut his eyes for good, Dirk pondered over the events of the night; and he decided that he would not forget the advice that his red-haired tent-mate had offered him in the Council Ring.

Next morning, as Dirk was racing down to Indian Dip in the sparkling lake along with the rest of the newly-risen campers, he found Dumb Blum at his side.

“Say, what happened last night, anyway?” asked the erstwhile leader of the Revengers. “Did that thing catch you, or what? What was it, Van?” he asked with Wide eyes.

“It was Brick Ryan,” Dirk replied; and ignoring the other’s cry of amazement, went on: “He made me realize what a silly thing we were doing, having a secret society and all that foolishness. Listen, Blum; I think you’re a coward, and if I find out that you and your friends are having any more meetings of your absurd R.H.R., I promise I’ll make you regret it.”

“I won’t have anything to do with it!” he promised. “Don’t hit me, Van Horn!” He fell back, and Dirk, unmindful, trotted down to the dock, leaving the despised Blum far in the rear.

That afternoon the promised game with the councilors kept the Lenape team on the jump to defend their positions against prime competition. With Lieutenant Eames on the mound for the leaders, and Chief himself, in mask and chest-protector, behind the plate, the camper squad were hard put to it to score. However, Soapy Mullins got home on a two-bagger made by Lefty Reardon, and in the fifth inning, which was by agreement the last, Blackie Thorne surprised himself as much as the others by hitting a long fly that landed among the rocks of the stone fence, and was not found until he had completed a tour of the bases for the second tally. But when the leaders came up for the last time, they began a merry procession that ended only with Swim Call, leaving the final score 5-2 in favor of the councilors.

“You had us going for a while, Captain,” the Chief called to Lefty as the game ended. “If your team plays as well on Wednesday, Shawnee will have to use ten men to beat you!”

“Thanks, Chief,” responded the pitcher, with a grin. “But it won’t be a cinch by any means. They have the toughest outfit this year they’ve ever had, and I’m sure going into the box with my pockets full of four-leaf clovers!”

Although the game had not been a victory for the camper team, it had ended happily for Dirk Van Horn. Inspired by his resolve of the previous night, he had never played a better game in all his days at prep school. He had fielded like a veteran, and once he scooped in a pop fly in such quick time that he had slammed it down to Brick Ryan on first for a double play against the unprepared Mr. Lane, who was caught trying to regain first base. At the finish, when Lefty told him that his position in left field would be confirmed for the Shawnee game, he glowed with the most pleasant feeling he had enjoyed since he first put foot on the Lenape campus.

He strolled back to Tent One with Lefty, chatting eagerly of their prospects. When the pair reached the tent, they found Sax McNulty and the rest of their comrades gathered in an excited group around Brick Ryan, who was grinning broadly and trying modestly to conceal his pride.

“We just got the news that our gang will be represented on the Long Trail this year!” answered the councilor. “Congrats again, Brick! He’s going to help plant the Lenape pennant on old Mount Kinnecut. Stand up, you red-headed riot, and bow to the ladies and gentlemen!”

Brick blushed beneath his freckles. “Aw, it’s not so much to talk about.” He choked as his friend Lefty Reardon pounded him on the back heartily.

“You’re wrong there, old scout!” Lefty shouted. “I went last year, and it was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. Talk about fun! And we had some exciting adventures, too. Boy, when you’re tenting by Lake Moosehorn and catching a mess of bass for your supper, think of poor Lefty back at Lenape, wishing he was along again this season!”

Sax McNulty stared into the distance. “I scaled Kinnecut five—no, six—years ago, it was,” he said softly. “I’ll never have such a great time if I live to be a hundred and fifty! Tiny Krouse, my canoe-mate, was chased two miles by a mama-bear who thought he was trying to kidnap her cubs! And the view from the Lookout! Why——”

Dirk, who had been looking from one to another of the eager boys, now broke in. “Yes, but first tell me what all this is about! What is Brick going to do, anyway? Where is the Long Trail?”

“Well, Van, it’s this way. The Long Trail is an old Lenape custom that was started by six fellows the first year the camp began. They went for a sixty-mile trip from here to Mount Kinnecut, up the river by canoes and over the ponds to Lake Moosehorn, then hiking through the big timber and climbing the mountain. Since then, every year, six boys under a leader make the same trip, and now there are nine Camp Lenape pennants nailed to the tallest tree on the very top of old Kinnecut, to show that the chosen campers can come through a long endurance test with flying colors. It’s not an easy trail, and so only the fellows who are best fitted for it can go. Once you’ve made the trip, you can’t go again—only Mr. Carrigan, who is in command, has been over it before. I want to tell you youngsters that it’s the one big thing at Lenape that you can never forget! Brick, I say it again, you’re a lucky bum!”

“Well, they have to be in first-class shape all around—healthy, full of pep and camp spirit, and they have to know their way around on the water and in the woods,” said McNulty. “And Wise-Tongue Carrigan has made a good choice this year, if you ask me. Besides Brick, he’s picked Steve Link, Wild Willie Sanders, Spaghetti Megaro, Cowboy Platt, and Ugly Brown. Ugly is younger than the rest, but he’s a fine little woodsman and can handle a canoe like an Indian. I tell you, Van Horn, if you make the most of your chances this summer, I wouldn’t be surprised to see you leading the list of Long Trailers next season!”

Dirk stared at the friendly face of the leader, and at Brick Ryan’s happy grin. It must be the most wonderful adventure in the world, the Long Trail. But next season—that was a long time to wait!

CHAPTER X
OFF FOR CAMP SHAWNEE

“Come in!” called the Chief, looking up from the papers on his desk. “Oh, hello, Dirk! Sit down and tell me what’s on your mind.”

Dirk Van Horn carefully closed the door of the little office, and faced the genial camp director.

“Never too busy to talk to campers! But it’s a fact that I haven’t seen very much of you, Dirk, since your folks brought you up here to Lenape. Of course”—the Chief smiled slightly—“I’ve heard reports of your doings, now and then. How do you like Lenape so far?”

The boy looked at the man ruefully. “I’m beginning to wonder,” he said, “if you shouldn’t ask how Lenape likes me!”

“I have learned a lot. I’ve only been here a few days, Chief, but even I can see that I have been an utter chump, all along. It’s taken me a long time to get things straight, and I’m still pretty green, I guess. But from now on, I want to tell you I’m trying to be a real camper!”

The Chief leaned back in his chair, and rubbed his chin reflectively. “You seem to be in the right frame of mind to do it, Dirk. We leaders can help some, but unless a boy learns these things from other boys and by thinking about them himself, we can’t do very much. But I know,” he went on, “that you didn’t come here this morning just to tell me you want to be a true Lenape camper. What’s on your mind?”

Dirk gulped. “It’s a big thing to ask,” he blurted, “and maybe I shouldn’t say it.”

For some space of time after this pronouncement, the man said nothing. Dirk, searching his chief’s face for some sign, breathed a heavy sigh of disappointment, and rose to go.

“Sit down, Dirk! The Long Trail, eh? I suppose you know what you’re asking?”

Dirk, with new eagerness in his eyes, sank again into his chair. “Mr. McNulty and some of the chaps have been talking about it, and Ryan, in our tent, is going. It must be a splendid experience, sir, and I—I—— Yes, I know I’m not much as a woodsman—why, I got lost within a little way from the camp!—and I guess I’d be a drag on the rest of the fellows on a long trip like that. But, oh, sir, give me a chance!”

The Chief stared through the little window over his desk, a tiny square through which came a glimpse of the pines and the rippling waters of Lake Lenape.

“The boys that Mr. Carrigan has chosen are all picked campers,” he said at last. “Most of them have spent three seasons here, and in that time have learned the many things they must know to take care of themselves on a long trip that would test the endurance of many grown men. Moreover, these boys realize that in order to get through and plant our banner on Mount Kinnecut, they must work together as one, must share alike for the good of the tribe, as the old Indians and scouts used to do. Out of the hundred boys here each summer, only six are ever chosen to take this trail for the honor of Lenape. Now, knowing all this, do you still want to go?”

Dirk nodded dully. “But I’m bigger and stronger than Ugly Brown, and he’s going! And I’d do my best to learn everything, and try to keep up with the rest of the party——”

“Brown is one of the best young campers we have,” observed the Chief, “even if he is small. If you knew a tenth as much as he does about the woods and the water, you might stand a chance. Come, now, Dirk, I know how you feel. I’ve known your dad for years, and I can guess that if you ever wanted anything, he would get it for you. But this thing you speak of is different. You can only get it for yourself; and the harder you work to earn it, the more you’ll value it. Learn as much as you can this summer, and next year, we’ll see about letting you hit the trail for Kinnecut! How about it?”

Dirk, not trusting himself to speak, shook his head dumbly, and looked at the floor. He might have known the Chief would say no, but—but——

The director was watching him with new interest. “Well, you are persistent!” he exclaimed. “That might count for something in your favor. Now, let me ask you a question. You’ve been at Lenape for four days. What have you learned that will stand you in good stead on a stiff hike and canoe-trip through some of the wildest country in the state?”

“Nothing, I guess,” confessed Dirk humbly. “I haven’t even learned to swim, and even the littlest fellows make fun of me wading around in the shallow water. But I’ll try, Chief, I will! Only let me——”

“Yes. Mr. Rawn said he wouldn’t let me take it out until I could swim and learn how to handle a paddle. I—I haven’t bothered to learn. I can see I’ve wasted my time fooling around with silly things, and loafing——”

“All right. That’s enough. Dirk, you have lots of stuff in you that, if you want it badly enough, can help you become a first-rate camper. You’ve shown it by getting out and chasing flies on the baseball team, and that’s a fine start. If you really believe what you’ve told me just now, your spirit in the future will be the finest thing that could come to you. You can see that your chances of holding your own on the Long Trail this year are pretty slim. But, since you’re so eager, I don’t mind telling you that there is a chance!”

Dirk’s eyes widened, and he jumped up. “You mean—— What do you want me to do, Chief?”

“I’ll make a bargain with you. Man to man. The Long Trailers will start next Monday for the river. That gives us five days. If, during those five days, you can pass all the requirements for the Lenape honor emblem, I’ll ask Mr. Carrigan to take you along!”

“Do you really mean it? Why, Chief, that’s a wonderful offer! And I’ll do it—I know I will!” Dirk cried.

The director was amused. “Don’t be too sure, Dirk. You don’t know what you are up against.” He opened the drawer of his desk and drew out a printed card. “Here is a list of the things you will have to do. It’s a long list, and four days is a short time. Remember, too, that you must not neglect your regular camp duties to work on any of the tests. One of the requirements, and the biggest, is that you must show a fine, all-around camp spirit; and that means you will have to think of the honor of your tent and the welfare of everybody and everything in camp. But if you do a good job out there in left field tomorrow at Shawnee, I’ll sign this card in this space calling for participation in an inter-camp athletic contest, and that will be one less test for you to do before Sunday night.”

Dirk took the card, and glanced at the rows of print upon it. “It’s a bargain!” he cried. “And I’ll start working on the tests this very minute!”

“Hold on! There’s one thing more I want to say before you rush out and start your job. Remember what I’ve told you—your chance of fitting yourself for the Long Trail is a very slim one indeed. Promise me that, in the event you don’t come through with your part of our bargain, you will take it like a sportsman, and even though you miss out this season, you will continue in the same spirit that you are starting now. It may be bitter medicine to take, but take it like a man!”

Dirk fumbled for the doorknob, his heart full of gratitude and a determination that was new to him. He found himself outside the office, standing on the porch with a cool wind about his hot forehead. Through blurred eyes he scanned the printed card in his hand, reading the list of things that he must do within the coming days, if he was to join Brick Ryan and the rest on the Long Trail:

Dirk whistled as his eye ran down the list. No wonder Brick and Lefty and the others wore their green L badges with pride! And now, in the few days remaining before the canoes cut the water on the first leg of the journey to Kinnecut, he must do all these things, or stay behind. But, although he had never in all his life faced such a task as this, he did not admit even to himself that he might fail.

He buttoned the card carefully in his breast pocket. Then, with a new light in his eyes, he ran down the steep path toward the lake shore. Mr. Wally Rawn, on duty at the dock before morning swim period, was startled by the tall figure of a boy who clutched his arm, and gasped breathlessly: “Wally, sir! Do you think you could teach me to swim a hundred yards today? I want to learn to swim, and I want to learn now!”

By nightfall, Dirk had not learned all that there is to know about swimming, but Wally’s first lesson had given some confidence in handling himself in the water, as well as a hope that diligent practice should enable him to swim the required number of yards at no distant date. Moreover, the boy’s lips tilted in a satisfied smile as he glanced at the spaces on the requirement card in his hand. Three items were already initialed. Wally Rawn had found time to teach him the rudiments of managing a rowboat. Lefty Reardon, a bit doubtful of this sudden interest in campcraft by the new boy but unaware of its cause, had been persuaded to coach him upon trees and rocks, and Van Horn’s collection and identification were vouched for by the initials of Mr. Jim Avery.

“Only ten more to go!” Dirk breathed to himself. “I’ll get somebody to show me the stars tonight, and in the morning——” He caught his breath. “Why, how could I forget? Tomorrow is the day of the big game with Shawnee!”

“What’s come over you, young lad?” the leader asked. “I didn’t know you loved to chase flies so much that you’re bubbling with boyish glee.”

“But not that much. There’s something else. I never saw anybody in such a burning hurry to have an honor emblem pinned on his shirt. I’m suspicious.”

McNulty snorted. “Do you have to ask? Now, hop into your bathrobes, you birds—What will become of Camp Shawnee if you sleep all day?”

“Shawnee” was the word that rose oftenest in the babel at the breakfast table. All the boys were in hiking clothes, ready for the ten-mile trail that fringed the mountains running north. Within a few minutes after the meal was over, Dirk had seen disappear into the woods all his tent-mates with the exception of Lefty and Brick, who, with the rest of the Lenape nine, were to ride to Shawnee and thus keep fresh for the big contest of the afternoon.

Dirk fingered his glove nervously, and wondered what sort of ball field the Shawnee campus would provide. Somebody slapped him on the back. It was Spaghetti Megaro, second baseman, and a gay light shone in the Italian boy’s eyes.

“You’re worried, huh? Well, forget it! If we don’t win, we lose. But I think we win! Come, the truck is loaded—pile on and hang tight. If you can ride this flivver, the bucking broncho is nothing!”

“Sure, Spaghett.” Dirk joined the crowding band that jostled each other laughingly as they sought places in the body of the camp truck. Stirring up a cyclone of dust, the car left Lenape deserted, and rattled off up the rutted lane. Dirk Van Horn, clinging to the dashboard with both hands, stared into the distance.

“I think we win!” he repeated softly. “And I—I must do a good job, the Chief said. Well, in just a few hours I’ll have my chance!”

CHAPTER XI
THE CAPTAIN

It was the end of the fourth inning, and Camp Shawnee had players on second and third with two out. The eager boys were on their toes, taking long leads and praying that Widelle, at bat, would bring them in with one of his famous sky-high clouts.

Lefty wound up and delivered a whistling curve that landed in Gil Shelton’s mitt with a satisfying smack.

“Strike two!” called Judge Kinney of Elmville, umpire for the day. The boys of Camp Lenape, grouped along the sidelines of the Shawnee diamond, raised a cheer of praise for their pitcher’s prowess.

Widelle, who wore on his jersey the red arrow-head insignia of Lenape’s rival camp, shifted his bat slightly and set himself, ready for what might prove the final toss of the inning.

“You got him measured for a homer!” Captain Hook Bollard was encouraging his team-mate with loud yells. “Take it on the nose!” He, as well as the two hundred other spectators, invader and defender alike, held his breath as Lefty uncorked a fast one. More than one person in the stands didn’t see that ball coming. But Widelle saw it; moreover, he connected.

It was a perfect hit; a bit too lofty for security, but nevertheless pretty. Two hundred pairs of eyes watched the horsehide sphere climb over left field, then drop with increasing speed toward the earth. Widelle was nearing first, and already had his eye on second. The man on third was trotting confidently toward the home plate. But no one saw them. Lenape and Shawnee eyes were fastened on that descending ball; and now they were aware of a lithe figure in a tailored baseball suit, streaking backwards with head tilted to avoid the afternoon sun. Back, back the figure raced; a sudden daring leap, a slap as leather hit leather.

“He dropped it!” howled Bollard. The Lenape ranks groaned as the fielder fell sprawling; but the groan changed to unbelieving cries as they saw that one arm was still raised aloft, and a hand still clutched the fatal sphere! The fielder was on his feet again, slamming a long, easy toss to Brick Ryan at first. Brick touched the bag, and the Lenape team trooped in to take their turn at bat.

Dirk trotted toward the bench, and the cheers of his fellow campers grew. He tried to put on a modest, matter-of-fact look, but he could not hold back a confident grin. The Chief was there; he must have seen that catch, and the least he could do would be to sign his card for inter-camp athletics. Now, he would come to bat this inning, and then he’d show these kids some real prep-school league hitting——

“You know what I mean! With the score three to one against us, why do you have to go playing tiddley-winks to the grandstand? Another pass like that, and you’ll be holding down the job of water-boy for this team!”

“What was the matter with that play?” grumbled Van Horn sulkily. “They went out, didn’t they?”

“What was the matter? Everything! These kids here in the cheering section thought you were a regular daredevil, but I know better! Try that stunt again and you’ll get a rain-check instead of a bouquet. Talk about playing to the gallery! That was an easy catch—but you had to make it look like hero stuff. And taking all those chances, falling down and so on, just to look like the bozo that saved the day! Well, Terry Tompkins ain’t got a swelled head, and if you don’t button up quick, you’ll be benching for the rest of the season. And I’m saying it!”

He turned away, leaving Dirk with a flaming face. Suppose he had made that catch seem a bit harder—what was the harm? He really had stumbled, but there had been no danger of dropping the ball. What right had Reardon to call him a swell-head, just because——? But secretly, Dirk knew that Lefty had spoken justly.

With burning cheeks, he watched Soapy Mullins fan out. Brick Ryan, after tipping two fouls, was allowed to walk. Ken Haviland stalled, taking two strikes while Brick stole second, and outguessed on a fast inshoot, dropped his bat as the umpire called him out.

A little chill chased itself up his spine as he grabbed his own bat and hurried to the plate. But as he stepped up and faced Bollard’s wind-up, all his nervousness left him. He’d show these kids—and Lefty Reardon in particular—that he could save their old ball-game yet. He knew he was good. He knew he was going to hit.

He hadn’t moved. Bollard was worried, and he kept a wary eye on Brick, who was fully prepared to steal to third at an instant’s notice. The Lenape boys set up a roar.

Dirk’s face did not show that he had heard. He was out after a hit. He let the next one go by, and waited for a good one. It came.

Sock! He had placed it just right, a red-hot cannonball that went through shortstop like a rocket. Dirk’s cleats spurned the dusty track that led to first base.

Behind him rose the shrieks of Lenape and Shawnee. Among them he thought he heard the voice of Lefty Reardon, but he gave it not a thought. That swat was good for a two-bagger or nothing. He tapped first with his toe, and streaked for second. The shouts grew louder, but there was nobody in his path. Evidently the fielder was still tangled up in his own feet. Maybe a three-bagger——? Dirk leaped on second base, shook the sweat out of his eyes, and looked ahead.

There was a knot of players at third, and one of them must have the ball. Another was on the ground—— Why, it was Brick Ryan! Dirk had forgotten all about Brick; but there he was, with one arm stretched out, just touching the bag. Another boy, a Shawnee baseman, was crouched at his side, while above them stood a man who, as Dirk watched, shouted “Safe!” It was the field umpire.

Remorse showered on Dirk like a torrent. Brick had made it, but only because he was a top-notch player; while he, Dirk, had been to blame for the worst fool stunt in his baseball career. He could feel Lefty Reardon’s despairing eye on him, and could imagine what the captain was thinking. “Grandstand stuff again!” Van Horn, thinking only of himself and his own glory, had made a two-bagger, but had forced Ryan into a tight fix at third; it was only a matter of an instant’s decision that had saved the Lenape team from missing their big chance to score.

For half a minute, Dirk was rattled. The knot at third base broke up; the boys resumed their places, and Brick, grinning, rose and dusted his trousers while keeping an eye on Bollard, who strolled back into the box. The Shawnee team was now on the defensive; the pitcher had two men to watch, and Megaro was up—Megaro, the heaviest slugger on the Lenape side.

“I won’t quit!” Dirk swore under his breath. “It was a fool trick—but I’ve got to play it through!” He took his eyes from Reardon, at the bench, and watched the pitcher. Bollard put across two wild throws, and Megaro tipped a foul. Dirk took a wary lead, and Brick Ryan did the same.

A roar from two hundred throats sounded from the watching crowd. Crack! When the dust lifted, Megaro was safe at first; Brick Ryan was clear of home plate and Dirk Van Horn stretched over that same plate with the umpire’s cry in his ears: “Safe by a mile!” He had slid for the tying run almost on Ryan’s heels.

But there was no joy for Dirk in the rousing applause of the watchers. From the tail of his eye, he saw Lefty approaching, and knew what was coming.

Brick Ryan put in a word. “Let him alone, Lefty! You know those things happen.”

“Never mind, Brick,” snapped Reardon. “It was only luck you got out of it, and I already warned him. He’s done. Tompkins will play left field for the rest of this game.”

“Aw, don’t you see he cleared himself? We made two runs, and that ought to make you happier, Lefty. Gollies sakes, it’s all in a ball game——”

“Thanks, Ryan, old chap—you’re white about it, but Lefty’s right,” admitted Dirk. “I forced you, just to show off. Maybe some day,” he ended miserably, “I’ll learn how to play on a team.”

Many a curious glance followed him as he pushed through the admiring bunch of Lenape boys who clustered on the sidelines; but Ollie Steffins was at bat, and the invading campers, thirsting for more rapid-action runs, did not notice him as he headed behind the tent-houses that ringed the Shawnee diamond. He passed the lodge overlooking the brown waters of Iron Lake, and started down the road by which the hikers had marched that morning into the rival encampment. There were still two innings to play, but Dirk Van Horn did not want to see the end of that game. Camp Lenape was ten miles away, and he must hike. He went on his way; and as he went, he thought....

That night there was jubilation in Camp Lenape. Hated Shawnee had been taught a lesson on the diamond, by the slender margin of one run made in the last inning by Blackie Thorne. There were comments at the supper table, however, upon the sportsmanship and hospitality of the defeated camp, who had taken their defeat in good nature, and in parting had promised vengeance at the next inter-camp tilt. Tired hikers ate like wolves, assuring each other between mouthfuls that it had been a swell day.

Dishes had to be washed. At Tent One table, Lefty and Eddie Scolter were due for this detail. The latter, however, could hardly keep his eyes open—the long hike, the swim in Iron Lake, and the excitements of the day’s visit at Shawnee had been almost too much for the small lad. He nodded gratefully when Dirk Van Horn offered to take his place. Sax McNulty raised his eyebrows at this generosity, but made no remark.

Lefty busied himself with a broom and piled the dishes while Dirk mixed up suds in the pan. It was Lefty who spoke first.

“I got a bit heated up this afternoon,” he confessed casually. “Hope you didn’t take me too seriously, Van. Sometimes, when a guy is captain of a team, he has to say things and do things he doesn’t like.”

“I’m sorry if you’re sore about it,” the aide went on. “Brick Ryan was taking your part, on the way home, and darned if he didn’t convince me that I was wrong in bawling you out the way I did.”

“I am sore,” admitted Dirk; “but at myself, not at you. You were quite right to kick me out. It’s—it’s not easy to say it, but I’m pretty much of a swell-head any way you put it. Will you do me a favor, Reardon?”

“Well, next time you see me getting ready to do any more stunts like that, will you oblige me by a swift kick in the seat of my pants?”

Lefty laughed. “I will! Now, I want to ask you something. You want to go on the Long Trail, don’t you?”

The blond boy stared and almost dropped a dish on the floor. “How did you know?”

“Oh, I can see! But the Long Trail is a pretty stiff proposition. What makes you think you can tackle it?”

“It’s just a crazy hope. But the Chief said there was a slim chance, and I want to go more than I ever wanted to do anything.”

“You’re right—it’s worth working for, I’ll say! So now you’ve given up bunk-stretching and are going full speed ahead on your emblem and winning ball-games and thinking of the other fellow first—— Well, I’m here to say I’ll help you all I can, and any other older camper will do the same! Now, what things do you still have to do to get your emblem?”

CHAPTER XII
THE MYSTERIOUS WATCHER

Dirk pushed back his unruly hair, pulled a sheet of paper from the roller of his portable typewriter, and read what he had just written.

The writer surveyed this composition thoughtfully, scratched his ear, and replacing the page in the machine, added a brief paragraph.

Slipping his letter into an envelope addressed to “Mr. John T. Van Horn, President, Commerce National Bank,” Dirk stuck on a stamp and his missive was ready for the mail. He had just stepped outside the tent when he caught sight of Brick Ryan, lugging a sack on his shoulders and making his way down the hillside at a fast pace.

“Hi, Brick!” Dirk hailed him. “Say, wait for a chap! Is that the mail-bag you have?”

Brick halted and nodded. “Long Jim gave me the chance to take it down to Heaven for him today. He’s busy at the store.”

“Well, here’s a letter I want to go in, special.” He caught up to his red-headed tent-mate and slipped his letter into the top of the canvas sack. Brick grunted.

“Everybody must be writing to their mamas and sweethearts today, all right. Gollies, what a hefty load! Say, Van, do you want to go along and help row the boat? Give you some practice.”

“Could I?” Dirk became reflective. “I’m supposed to be acting as aide today, but maybe I can go. I sure would like to help. I tell you—you go on down, and if I can get away, I’ll be down to the dock in a jiffy.”

They parted, and Dirk raced to the lodge, where he found his councilor practicing with the camp orchestra in preparation for a vaudeville show that was on the program for the following night. Securing his ready permission to assist the mail-carrier of the day, Dirk cut through the trees below the tents and reached the dock almost as soon as the burdened Brick arrived.

Selecting a steel-bottomed rowboat from among those moored in the lee of the diving tower, the two boys pushed off on the waters of Lake Lenape. Dirk, amidships, took the unwieldy oars and with unskilled motions began sculling in the direction of the north end of the lake, where a landing jutted from the weedy shore, beyond which faintly showed the roof of Heaven House, the little cottage that was used for the accommodation of parents and guests who visited the mountain camp.

They had gone only a few hundred yards when Brick, lounging easily on the stern-sheets with the mail sack between his knees, made an offer.

“Well, cut over a few points toward the shore, and we’ll just stop in up the creek a ways. They have their nest in a hollow stump. We’ve got plenty of time to take a look, if we hurry.”

Dirk pulled on his oars with renewed vigor, and the boat headed toward the reed-masked inlet of the marshy creek that cut into the camp side of the lake. He was already getting the knack of handling the little craft with greater ease, so that they slipped softly under an overhanging maple branch and entered the weed-bordered reach of water without a splash.

“That’s right!” whispered Brick. “Keep quiet, or you’ll scare ’em. Say! Who’s that guy?” He pointed.

Dirk clumsily shipped his oars, and at the sound a man on a little hillock above them wheeled sharply and stared, at the same time whipping one hand behind his back. The keel of the boat grated on the shore, barely missing a slender bamboo fishing rod that lay there neglected.

“Sorry, sir!” cried Dirk cheerily. “We seem to have spoiled your fishing for you.”

The stranger did not return his smile. He stared for a second, then queerly enough, exclaimed: “Why, if it ain’t young Van Horn!”

For a space there was silence, except for the resounding thuds of axes on wood and the far shouts of boys toward the head of the creek where, Dirk recalled, a woodcraft squad was building a bridge of birch-trunks. He surveyed the unknown fisherman. The man was short and slender; and his dress was poorly adapted to the waterside, for he wore a suit of creased and dusty serge, and thin-soled, pointed low shoes. A cloth cap was pulled down over his pale face, almost hiding a pair of the steeliest blue eyes Dirk had ever seen, that stared at him coldly all the while as the man stood, hands behind back, biting his lip as if he would have cut short his surprising cry of recognition.

Brick Ryan had all this time spoken no word. Finally Dirk broke the uncomfortable silence.

The man hesitated. “Why—I guess everybody knows by sight a famous kid like you. I thought I was right. Your old man’s the banker, ain’t he? Say,” he went on more easily, “how would you and your smart-lookin’ partner there like to take a little joy-ride around the country with me for half an hour or so? I got a little car over by the road, and you can drive a ways if you want to.”

Such an offer a few days previously might well have tempted Dirk’s adventurous instincts; but he remembered that he and Brick were charged with a mission to perform.

“That’s nice of you, especially since we upset your fishing here,” he returned; “but Brick and I have to take care of the mail. Besides, we don’t leave the camp without permission.”

Dirk nodded, and began backing water. The man made a quick step toward them, and his right arm jerked impulsively; but he made no effort to detain them. He stood gazing at them with his cold blue eyes until they vanished again beyond the leafy screen that hid the entrance to the creek.

Once more heading across the lake toward Heaven House, all thoughts of kingfishers’ nests forgotten, Brick spoke reflectively.

“There’s something funny about that bird,” he began. “Ever seen him before, Van?”

“Why, not that I remember. Funny he knew my name. I guess we spoiled his fishing—too bad.”

Brick snorted. “Haven’t you got eyes? He’s no fisherman—not in that outfit. His rod didn’t even have bait on the line, and besides, any sap would know that there’s no fish in that part of the creek.”

“He was spyin’, that’s what!” the red-haired boy exploded. “Spyin’ on the camp, or I’m a monkey’s uncle! I guess you didn’t notice when we first saw him, but he was standin’ there on the hill, lookin’ through the trees with a pair of field glasses, straight at the lodge! He’s after no good, if you ask me!”

“Sure, I’m sure! What I want to know is, what’s his game? ‘Let me take you for a joy-ride,’ he says. Huh!” Brick spat into the rippling wake of the boat.

Dirk pulled thoughtfully at the oars. They were now nearing the wharf that was their goal.

“It’s puzzling, all right. But I still think you’re too suspicious, Brick.” Nevertheless, he was not altogether sure that Ryan’s distrust was wholly without grounds, and he could not rid himself of the feeling that he had somewhere before seen that pale grim face and frosty eyes.

The two boys tied their craft at the end of the jutting wharf, hauled the mail-sack ashore, and between them carried it up the path to Heaven House. The little cottage was empty at that time, but the flower garden in front was carefully weeded and tended. As they reached the gate, a cloud of dust bearing up the Elmville road told them that they had delivered their burden with little time to spare.

The rattling flivver that served the rural route drew up before them with a screeching of brakes, and Lem Shuttle, the driver, took off his straw hat and wiped his bald head.

“That there the camp mail, boys?” he asked. “Hot today, bean’t it? Got a mighty heap of letters for ye to take back, and a couple parcels.”

Brick heaved the sack into the rear seat of the rattletrap car. “Say, Lem,” he said, “we just saw a strange guy fishin’ down by the creek. Know who he is? Wearin’ a blue suit, and doesn’t know much about how to catch fish.”

Lem scratched one ear. “Heard tell of him as I come along. Peaked kind of little feller, eh? Yep, he drove up to the Petties last night in a blue sedan, and they took him in to board. Give his name as Brown or McGillicuddy or Harkins or some such. Claimed he wanted to do a bit of fishin’.”

“Well, he was tryin’ to catch ’em without any bait on his hook. Down by the creek, too.”

The mail-carrier chuckled. “Don’t surprise me a mite, now! Them city folk is all of ’em crazy as coots! Most of ’em don’t know oxen from buttercups! Wal, got to be goin’.” He tossed out the sack of incoming mail, released the brakes, and stepped on the gas. “Giddap, Napoleon!”

The boys watched him as he careened off down the dusty road. Brick Ryan nodded reflectively.

“H’mm! He wants to catch some fish, so he takes along a pair of field glasses to see ’em with! Stayin’ up at the Pettie house. Well, Van, old oyster, I’ll bet you this won’t be the last time we see Mr. Nosey Fisherman, or my name’s not F. X. A. Ryan!”

CHAPTER XIII
ON THE MARCH

The mysterious fisherman, none the less, was pushed out of Dirk’s mind by the crowded hours of the camp routine. There were still half a dozen blank spaces on the emblem card that pointed his way to the Long Trail; and as the end of the week drew near, he was in a fever of excitement, wondering if ever he would complete all the needful tests in time.

His day of service as aide to Tent One was finished without mishap; and late the same afternoon he managed, after scorching a pan of rice and burning his fingers, to produce an edible meal cooked over an open fire built by himself. On Friday morning he rose before Reveille and in company with Long Jim Avery and Nig Jackson penetrated silently into the dewy woods, noting the plumage and song of many birds that Long Jim pointed out to the interested boys. At the performance that evening of the Lenape Vode-Villians on the improvised stage in the lodge, he won applause with a short act entitled “A Wee Drop of Scotch.” In golf sox, a kilt made of a plaid blanket, and a tam-o’-shanter, he sang several songs of Scotland and cracked all the jokes he knew about the canny race, marking his points with a crooked and knobbed cane cut from one of Farmer Podgett’s apple trees.

One by one the blank spaces on the card were filled in by the initials of some councilor. On Saturday afternoon Dirk, after helping Jim Avery after lunch at the store, raced to the boat dock and took his final swimming test, diving into the water head-first as Brick Ryan had taught him, and rounding a life-boat stationed fifty yards out, in all handling himself so neatly that he won a nod from Wally Rawn and a promise to be allowed to help keep the score in the inter-tent Boat Regatta that afternoon.

Dirk arose at dawn on Sunday morning, when around him all the camp was asleep. He shivered as he looked into the misty drizzle that fell among the pines; but screwing up his resolution, threw off the warm blankets and slipped into his heavier clothing and high laced boots. His woodcraft exhibit, a rustic birchwood bench circling the wild-cherry tree beyond the lodge, was still uncompleted; and his skill at axmanship was far from great. He sighed as he shouldered his hand ax and went through the dripping woods to a grove of birches beyond the Council Ring; but the work warmed him in short order, and he was soon whistling as he trimmed the smooth white saplings and split them for his purpose.

It still lacked half an hour to Reveille—which always came later on Sundays—when Dirk stepped back from his work at the base of the cherry tree, and surveyed his progress. The little bench needed only a few more slats in the seat to be completed and ready for the use of all campers; the braces were as steady as Dirk could make them, each sunk some inches into the ground and set with wedged rocks. The boy stood sucking his thumb, which had received a blow of his ax-head instead of the nail at which he had aimed; and thus he was unaware that the Chief had approached in his silent fashion and was at his elbow.

The Chief’s face was as unreadable as ever as he nodded in answer to Dirk’s “Good morning!” merely striding to the bench and testing it with his weight. Sitting there, he gazed at the eager lad and smiled gravely.

“H’mm. Dirk, what would you say if I told you that, even if you finished these two things, you couldn’t go on the Long Trail this year?”

“I—I’d say you know best about that sir,” but his lip trembled with disappointment.

The Chief, who had been watching him closely, laughed—rather cruelly, as Dirk thought.

“Let me see your emblem card.” He took it from Dirk’s hand, and pointed to the thirteenth item. “It says here that any boy winning the Lenape honor emblem must show at all times the finest spirit as an all-round camper. Well, any boy who can answer me as you have just done——Look there!”

He pointed behind the lodge, where a large hay-wagon pulled by two horses came into sight, sweeping toward the road leading up the mountain. Upon it were securely lashed three canoes—and on top, gleaming red, was the Sachem. The Sachem!

The Chief was scrawling his initials on the two empty spaces of the card. Dirk let out a whoop like an Iroquois on the warpath.

“I’m going, Chief!” he cried. “You mean it! I’m going on the Long Trail!”

“It looks that way. Last night I got an answer from my telegram to your father. He’s given his permission for you to join Sagamore Carrigan’s trailers. You still have much to learn, Dirk, but with this new spirit of yours, I think you’ll win out!” He clasped hands with the dancing boy.

At breakfast, Mr. Carrigan ordered that all Long Trailers report to him immediately to have their outfits inspected, and to receive instructions. Within fifteen minutes Dirk and Brick Ryan had carried several armloads of belongings up to the lodge porch and stacked them alongside of the kits of their five comrades who had been chosen to bear the Lenape flag. Cowboy Platt, lounging at the rail, opened his eyes wide as he took in the heap of things that Dirk had thought necessary to bring.

“You shore must be goin’ to take a pack-hoss along to tote all that,” he remarked in his sleepy drawl. “Wait till old Wise-Tongue sees that pile, pardner!”

Sure enough, when Mr. Carrigan arrived a few minutes later, his first words were on the necessity of “travelling light.”

“We’re going Indian fashion,” he began, “and since each one of you will have to carry all your outfit on your back, we must take only the things that we cannot do without. Now, Dirk, suppose that when we come to the first portage, you have to pack all those clothes and shoes and that big flash-lantern, as well as your blankets and your end of the canoe! Let’s see what you can do without.”

The councilor began laying aside only those belongings that would be needed on the trip. When he had finished, Dirk found his kit reduced to a sturdy hiking outfit of khaki shirt and breeches, puttees, and high shoes, a change of underclothing, a warm sweater, and four pairs of socks. In addition, he had for canoe-work a pair of shorts and light shoepacks. Since two boys would sleep together, one large warm blanket and rubber poncho apiece was adjudged sufficient, even though the mountain nights would be cool.

“I’m glad to see you have a pocket compass and a good knife,” concluded Sagamore Carrigan. “I’ll take my large woodsman’s ax, and Sanders will take his hand ax—that should be enough for the whole party. Cowboy Platt here has offered to do all the cooking, if we take turns at K.P. I’ve drawn from the kitchen only the grub that we can’t get along the way, and we’ll save it for ‘iron rations’ in the back-country. Ellick also gave me some pots and pans, but each trailer will have to take his own cup and plate and fork. Before we leave tomorrow, I’ll have another inspection and try to see that we don’t forget anything we need. Have your blanket-rolls ready immediately after breakfast. Any questions about outfits?”

Spaghetti Megaro and young Brown had need of the councilor’s advice about selecting certain of their garments. After he had given it, he unrolled a large map and tacked it to the pine shingles of the lodge wall, where all could see.

“I want you trailers to get every line of this map into your minds,” he urged. “Learn it so you could draw it blindfolded. It will be riding in my pocket for the whole trip, and whenever any of you has a minute to spare, study it. You can see that I’ve lined in the Long Trail in red ink.”

Dirk breathed faster as his eyes followed Sagamore Wise-Tongue’s pointing finger.

“Here’s Lenape, and way off here in the corner is old Mount Kinnecut, where nine green-and-white pennants are flying. That’s where we’ve got to go, and we’ll make it in three days, if all goes well. The first day’s run—tomorrow—will be an easy stage, just to get in trim and harden up. And see that your feet are in good shape, for that’s what you’ll have to travel on most of the way. We’ll stop at Pot-Hole Glen at noon, and make the river before dark. The canoes left on a wagon this morning, and we’ll find them at Skinner’s Ferry when we get there. Now, I’ll leave this map posted here for the rest of the day, so that you can get its details clear in mind before we leave. Anything else?”

Sagamore Wise-Tongue smiled, and drew from his blouse a triangular bit of green bunting on which was stitched a large L in white. “The trailer who carries this,” he said, “will have to be watchful and cunning, for he will bear with him the honor of all of us, and the honor of Lenape. I’ll leave it to you to choose which trailer it shall be.”

Before anyone else could speak, Dirk cried out: “Brick Ryan! He’s the best of us! Let it be Brick, sir!”

“Sure,” agreed Megaro, “I bet you my life Brick is the one. I vote for him too.”

The others added their votes with shouts of approval; even Ugly Brown, who secretly had hoped to be the standard-bearer, swallowed his disappointment, and taking the banner, presented it to Ryan, whose face grew almost as red as his flaming hair.

“I’ll take it,” he muttered with some feeling; then, looking the leader straight in the eye, added: “You can bet nobody is goin’ to get this away from me, Wise-Tongue. It’s not goin’ to leave me until we nail it to the flagpole on the big mountain over beyond!”

With a cheer, the little council of war broke up. Brick stowed the pennant inside his shirt.

“Thanks, kid,” he mumbled. “That was swell of you to say that about me.”

The day passed swiftly for Dirk, eager as he was for the morning that would mark the beginning of the Long Trail hike. He was kept busy getting his outfit into shape and seeing that everything was in order; but he found time now and again to study the map posted on the wall. The names on it gave him a thrill that he could not have explained—Flint Island, Lake Moosehorn, the Chain of Ponds, even the few scattered towns that lay among the folds of the hills that skirted Mount Kinnecut. He was a Long Trailer now!

When dusk fell, and the whippoorwills could be heard trilling in the thickets, the Lenape tribe draped their blankets about them and trooped to council. There was no happier or prouder member of that tribe than Dirk Van Horn when, at the time for awards and coups, he rose and was given his honor emblem before the throne of the Chief. It seemed impossible that little more than a week had passed since he had first landed on the Lenape campus. So many wonderful things had happened that he felt a different person from the—as he thought, looking back—pitifully ignorant tenderfoot who had tried to buy Brick Ryan’s friendship with an expensive gift. He had that friendship now, but he had won it as a man should.

He drifted off to sleep clutching his new honor, and when he awoke at dawn, rose and sewed it carefully on the front of the sweater that he would wear on the trail. Brick Ryan was astir too, dressing in his worn hiking clothes and rolling his blankets into a neat pack to be strapped over his shoulders. He winked over at Dirk and whispered: “The pennant is still safe, by gollies! I pinned it to my pajama shirt with a big blanket-pin!”

The eight trailers were off up the mountainside before nine o’clock, after a brief but thorough inspection by their leader. They travelled in close marching order, for as Sagamore Wise-Tongue explained, they were like a war-party and must not lose their strength through straggling or getting out of touch with each other. It might be necessary, when they were in wilder country, to put out scouts, but since the road to Indian Glen was well known to them, they would take it in regular stages.

Although Dirk’s unaccustomed blanket-roll was heavy and grew heavier as the morning wore on, his heart was light. He joined in the songs of the gay trailers as they threaded their way through the trees on the slope above camp, pausing as they reached the road at Fiddler’s Elbow and taking a last glance at the placid waters of the lake and the white tents they were leaving behind. Dirk laughed aloud as he thought of all the adventures he would have before he again caught sight of Camp Lenape. But had he guessed that his life would be more than once in wild danger on the path that lay before him, he might well have shivered instead.

Up and down, over one ridge after another of the Lenape range, the boys took their way, resting now and then for a few moments in the shade beside some bubbling mountain spring. Mr. Carrigan, in the lead, bearing a first-aid kit and many other necessities in the knapsack over which his blankets were strapped, strode along silently, ever on the alert for some wilderness creature that he might point out to his eager followers. Once he pointed out the marks of a fox, and several times their progress stirred up a covey of stupid, drumming partridge. And in one breathless instant, before they came to the end of the forest, he paused and pointed through the trees. Dirk caught a glimpse of a swift-moving dun-colored animal that with a flick of its stubby tail was off in long easy leaps to the shelter of the far thickets—a young deer, the first he had ever seen in its native haunts.

He marched beside Brick and Ugly Brown, the young, snub-nosed lad whose blunt, sun-burnt face was somewhat likable in its very ugliness. He remembered that these two, with Kipper Dabney, had hazed him one moonlight night—long ago, it seemed—but he made no mention to them of that night when he had leaped, blindfolded, over Indian Cliff.

“Ain’t you ever been there? Say, it’s a swell place. We hike over here lots of times. Whillikers, I’m ready for a swim there right now, even if the water feels as if it had just melted from snow. It’s called Pot-Hole Glen because down below, the water has run across the rocks so fast that there are a bunch of deep, smooth holes worn down by pebbles whirlin’ around—right through solid rock. It used to be an old Indian camping place, I’ve heard. We’ll be there soon, right after we cut across the fields over yonder.”

At that moment Mr. Carrigan turned off the dusty road and cut through a meadow where a herd of white-faced cows grazed. Dirk climbed the rail fence slowly, for he was hot and more than a little tired by the march; but he joined in the whoops of his companions as they raced the short distance that separated them from the goal of their noonday pause and the swim that was to come. And thus Dirk Van Horn came to Pot-Hole Glen, which he was never in his life to remember without a chill of horror creeping up his spine—the horror of strangling death.

CHAPTER XIV
THE WATCHER AGAIN

The little plateau above the Glen was a pleasant place enough—a smooth, shadowy stretch of greensward marked here and there with the remains of more than one Lenape campfire. Here the trailers paused only long enough to cast off their blanket-packs, and then raced in a body for the steep, twining path leading down the wall carved out in past ages by the running stream at its foot.

“Now for a swim!” was the cry as, helter-skelter, the boys scrambled down the path that zigzagged through the underbrush.

Dirk paused at the bottom of the cleft, and falling slightly behind the others, searched for the pot-holes that Ugly Brown had described. There they were—smooth shafts of varying widths, sunken into the rocky floor over which the stream trickled softly. Taking a stick, Dirk probed one of them, and found at the bottom a few water-worn stones whose action had drilled, in the course of many decades, a deep hole in solid granite.

“The biggest hole of all is under the falls,” Brick Ryan shouted from below him. “Come on, my son—all the other guys are gettin’ wet already!”

He disappeared from sight at a turn in the path leading down-stream, from whence Dirk could hear the boisterous shouts of his comrades rising above the splashing roar of falling water. None the less, he did not hasten, for the wonders of the Glen were too many to be hastily passed over.

He walked slowly, gazing at the many-colored flowers and unknown trees that arched the stream. Several hundred yards down, the path wound about a steep drop over which the water boiled and bubbled—a miniature Niagara. From his place, Dirk could look directly down into a seething basin hollowed in the rock. Below this fell away the bed of the stream in an incline of sheeted, mossy shale, upon which sprawled the naked forms of the trailers. Wild Willie Sanders, with ear-splitting yells, was coasting down the slide head first, and landed in the broad pool below like a noisy otter.

Spray from the falls sprinkled Dirk’s face, and he hurried to strip off his dusty garments and join in the fun. As he took his place on the slide, the rills of water from the side of the falls were so icy that he cried out.

“Get warmed up swimming down here in the pool,” advised Sagamore Carrigan, who was floating about in the crystal water beneath the slide. “Then you won’t feel it!”

Dirk watched Spaghetti Megaro, who was plunging a long pole into the great pot-hole directly underneath the falls. The pole sank out of sight, and shortly after shot into the air, to be caught by the Italian lad.

“That’s plenty deep, you bet!” grinned Megaro. “They call this one the Devil’s Cauldron. Some shower-bath if you get in this tub! Once when I was here, Wally Rawn got in and tried to dive down to bottom—but he didn’t find no bottom, not at all. He got out plenty quick.”

Dirk hastily removed himself from the brink of the treacherous-looking hole, and joined the divers who plunged into the pebble-bottomed pool below. The swim period was short, not only because the hikers were hungry, but because the water was so chill that too long exposure might be dangerous to health. After a brisk rub-down the trailers, glowing with vim, donned their cast-off clothes and started for the plateau above, where Cowboy Platt was already building a small cooking-fire for the noonday meal.

Lingering behind alone, Dirk dressed slowly, pausing now and then to watch the flight of a bird, or to mark some strange formation of rock along the walls of the Glen. At last he picked up his dripping towel and started up the path to rejoin his friends.

When he came once more to the bend directly above the falls, he paused for a last look at the impressive sight. As he stared down at the racing waters, a clump of star-shaped flowers on a tough-leafed bush caught his eye. He had never seen such strange bright blossoms before, but Sagamore Carrigan could tell him all about them. It struck him that it would be a good thing to get some and take them with him to the others.

Spreading his feet firmly on the slippery path, he reached down to snatch the plant from its perch in a crevice in the rocky cliff. It was too far. He knelt, and dropping one leg over to balance himself, made a second attempt. Still the nodding flowers were a tantalizingly few inches from the tips of his fingers. Tossing his head with annoyance, he made a swift swoop. As his hand touched the fringe of the bush, he felt the earth beneath his weight stir and slip.

In sudden terror, he dropped the fragment of the bush and dug in the toes of his heavy shoes, painfully trying to scramble back to safety. He grunted with the effort; but inch by inch the treacherous loose dirt gave way. A fearful glance over his shoulder, and he shut his eyes, dizzied by the hissing rush of the leaping rapids beneath his kicking legs. A rattle of stones; and then, with a despairing shriek, he plunged backward into the foaming falls!

The breath was knocked from his chest as he struck the seething surface of the giant pot-hole—the Devil’s Cauldron! Down, down he sank, freezing water filling his nose and open mouth and shutting off all chance of summoning help. The sunshine was far above him, seen dimly through a glassy green froth, and the roar of the rattling falls was drumming in his ears.

Desperately he kicked his leaden feet and fought his way upward, the blood hammering in his veins. One outstretched arm caught at the slippery edge of the hole and clung fiercely.

He had barely time to suck in a mouthful of air when the force of the spinning current tore his handhold loose, and again he dropped into the Cauldron’s depths. This time he felt weaker, chilled by the glacial stream and beaten by its pounding force. It was dark now. Dimly he wondered if they would ever find his body in that bottomless well....

An unseen hand was gripping him by the hair, hauling him upward toward light and life. Again the bullets of water struck his face and throat, but strong arms were about his shoulders. His chest scraped against the jagged margin of the pool; like a sodden bag of meal, he was pulled out of the clutch of that grim torrent.

He gasped, spat, and rolled over on his back. Somewhere above him, a bird was whistling. He opened one eye. Bending over him, with a serious look on his freckled face, was Brick Ryan.

“Now, don’t try to talk. Take it easy for a minute. There, that better? Gee, you sure must have had a bad time of it! I was comin’ along down the creek to see what was keepin’ you, and heard you yell.”

Above him, through his moist eyelashes, he saw the coveted blossoms swaying slightly in the midday breeze.

“Huh! Well, that’s called rhododendron, and it’s against the law to pick it in this state! If you’re feelin’ better, I’ll help you up to camp, and we’ll dry out your duds.”

Fearing that delay might bring severe consequences, Dirk crawled to his feet, and shivering in his sodden garments, allowed himself to be led up-stream, leaning heavily upon the lad who had pulled him from that deadly bath. At the foot of the path leading to the camping place, he turned and faced his friend.

“Brick,” he said soberly, “you’ve saved my life. I—I can’t put it in words, but if ever there’s anything——”

The red-haired boy grinned and patted his arm. “Forget it!” he muttered gruffly. “You’d have done the same if it had been me.”

At the summit, the rest of the trailers were lying about on their packs, and there was a brisk smell of wood-smoke and frying bacon in the air. Mr. Carrigan leaped to his feet as he saw the two boys, and without asking for any explanation, had Dirk’s dripping garments stripped off in short order, and after a rough rub-down he was stowed between a pair of warm blankets and told to rest.

Dirk had been living in the open for more than a week now, and long before his wet clothes were dried before the fire, he felt none the worse for the mishap that might so easily have taken his life. The councilor brewed him a cup of warm, heartening soup that brought his strength back quickly; and when an hour had passed he convinced the man that he was himself again and ready to travel.

“We don’t have far to go now,” announced Sagamore Carrigan. “It’s only a couple miles to the river and Skinner’s Ferry, where the canoes are; and from there we can paddle to Kittahannock Lodge in no time—that’s where we stop for the night.”

Once more the hikers put their blanket-rolls over their shoulders and set out, following the dirt road that led westward from the Glen toward the river. The councilor now had a hard time to keep them together, so anxious were they to reach the ferry where the canoes waited for them; but he held them to the same steady pace. Dirk was forced to admit to himself that he was tired now, and he was glad when they crossed a stone bridge over a creek and came in sight of the ferry.

An unpainted, low frame building with a roof of “shakes,” or shingles split with an ax, lay beside a rude wharf at which was moored a flat-bottomed scow. Such was the ancient Skinner’s Ferry that dated back to Revolutionary days. On the wharf lay the three Lenape canoes, ready for their voyage into the wilderness. There was now no thought of restraining the eager lads, and Dirk, with the rest, broke into a run that ended on the narrow wharf. An old and bent ferryman came from the house to announce that the equipment brought from camp on the wagon awaited them within.

Now began a busy half-hour of packing and launching the light craft. It was settled that Dirk and Brick Ryan would handle the Sachem, in which would be stowed the cooking outfit, rations, and odds and ends of camp outfit, while the other members of the party divided into two crews of three campers each to manage the Red Fox and the Whiffenpoof. When the equipment had all been stowed inside the rubber tarpaulins and lashed firmly to the thwarts, so that it would not be wet or lost in case of an upset, Dirk and his partner each took an end of their vessel and dropped it overside into the sheltered water below the wharf. As Dirk climbed into his place at the bow, he took care to make sure that his first misadventure with his canoe at Lenape should not be repeated; and in the wake of the other two craft, they shoved forth into the stream, shouted a farewell to the bent ferryman, and began paddling swiftly.

Mr. Carrigan, in the stern of the Red Fox, led the way, with Megaro at the bow paddle and Ugly Brown riding amidships. At a distance of a few lengths followed the Whiffenpoof, carrying Cowboy Platt, Saunders, and Steve Link. Dirk dipped and pulled his paddle in fast time, for their course lay diagonally across the current, which at this place rippled whitely over its stony bed.

Ahead the broad river made a turn, and at the bend a tall white flagpole rose from a clump of trees, tinged with sunset gold. Dirk gave it a glance, and bent to his straining task, while Brick fulfilled the delicate job of keeping the light vessel on its path. On flew the Sachem, as if glad to be afloat and bearing her owner farther and farther toward the northern wilds.

Once Dirk paused momentarily to catch his breath. He looked back to the shore that they were leaving. A road wound along the edge of the river, above the ferry, and along it crawled a small automobile with a plume of dust rising behind it. Dirk saw it only for a moment before it disappeared from sight behind a low hill. But he was sure, as he turned again to his paddling, that the car was a blue sedan, and that he knew the slight figure of the man that hunched over the wheel. It was the mysterious fisherman they had surprised on the shore of Lake Lenape some days before.

CHAPTER XV
THE TRAP ON FLINT ISLAND

Sagamore Carrigan and his trailers were greeted in hearty fashion by the campers of Kittahannock Lodge, and the director, who each year was glad to extend his hospitality to the Lenape Long Trailers, offered an empty tent-house to the canoe party. He also invited them to supper at the lodge, but when Mr. Carrigan explained that they had provisions with them, assigned them a grassy spot above the river. Here, after they had washed up in the camp bath-house, the trailers were drawn about the fire by the aroma of Cowboy Platt’s cookery, and attacked with no little gusto the meal he handed out.

As soon as each man had washed his plate and fork, the trailers joined in the campfire merriment of the Kittahannock tribe within the lodge of hewn timber, on the walls of which were hung many examples of their woodcraft skill and collections of natural objects. The band was a lively and merry crowd, and the Lenape lads joined in the fun in friendly spirit. Games and stunts passed the time until the call to quarters sounded, and the eight hikers sought their cabin sleepily with many thoughts of their exciting first day on the trail.

Sagamore Carrigan yawned as he pulled his blankets over him and switched off his flash-lantern. “Not many stars out,” he remarked; “and I didn’t like the way the campfire smoke hung low in the chimney tonight. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we had a wet cruise tomorrow, fellows.”

Dirk woke in the night to hear a splatter of drops on the roof of the tent-house; and he fell asleep again thinking drowsily that the leader’s words had come true. The next morning dawned mistily over a wet world, and a swirling fog hung low over the river, shrouding the farther shore. The gloomy weather, though, penetrated no deeper than the ponchos of the Lenape boys, who after a warming breakfast, were afloat at an early hour. In a mysterious silence they pushed off into the overhung waters to continue their cruise up-stream, keeping close together so that no canoe should be separated from the others in the fog.

After an hour’s stiff paddling against the stubborn current, they saw the sun shine through once or twice, and the fog cleared away. But it was plain to be seen that the rain would continue steadily throughout the day. Through the downpour, Dirk caught sight of the river banks, now much closer together than they had been at Skinner’s Ferry. Shallow rapids became much more frequent, and Brick in the stern had to exercise unusual care to see that the Sachem’s bottom was not ripped on some jagged rock.

Dirk, paddling doggedly with his arms thrust through the slits in his rubber poncho, felt the muscles of his shoulders stiffening with the unwonted labor; and he was happy when, in the middle of the morning, the little fleet came into sight of the white houses of the small river town of Port Jermyn. They tied up at the wharf where the main street of the town ended, and strolled about through the rain-swept village while the councilor, assisted by Steve Link, purchased the supplies that would be their sole provisions until their return from the wilds into which they were about to plunge.

The stop at Port Jermyn, short as it was, refreshed the paddlers, and Dirk found that he had gained his second wind. He still retained his place in the bow, however, for he did not feel that he owned the skill necessary to guide the Sachem through the ever-increasing shallows of the river above the town. Feeling that he had left civilization behind for some time to come, he worked with a will, chewing a piece of butterscotch and waiting patiently for the signal that would mean a halt for the midday meal.

Shortly after noon, Mr. Carrigan beckoned to the following canoeists to turn off the main stream into the mouth of a wide creek flowing from the west. A few hundred yards from the outlet, they turned their craft toward the bank, and climbed out stiffly to stretch and gather dry wood for a smoky fire built beneath the shielding branches of a large oak. The canoes were turned on their sides, ponchos were taken off and stretched on sticks above the openings, and within these snug shelters the trailers lounged on their backs and lazily devoured heaping plates of beans and bread and slightly damp cookies.

“We-all are goin’ to fix some spaghetti for supper, in your honor, Wop!” Cowboy Platt twitted Megaro. “How will you like that?”

“O. K., I bet!” answered the Italian boy. “Say, maybe I catch some bullheads in Lake Moosehorn, and if I get more than fifty, I give you one to eat in your honor!”

Dirk laughed, not because the joke was good, but because he was well fed and warm and happy to be with such a game crowd of campers. Although the rain might have dampened the holiday moods of many boys, not one of these lads had uttered a word of complaint. Later that eventful day, Dirk was to look back wistfully at that scene; for neither he nor Brick Ryan was fated to partake of that contemplated meal of fish and spaghetti on the shore of Lake Moosehorn.

Refreshed and rested, the boys broke camp and prepared to leave the broad river behind. Dirk recalled that this stream they were now following must be the Sweetwater Creek shown on the map that Sagamore Carrigan carried in his breast pocket. If so, it would lead to the first of the Chain of Ponds, where the first portage would begin.

His surmise was correct. Close together, their bows sometimes brushing overhanging limbs of trees as they rounded a bend in the creek and a new reach of rain-spattered water met the paddlers’ eyes, the three canoes wended up-stream. On either side the walls of the forest closed in about them, and in some places it was as gloomy as though it had been nightfall instead of broad afternoon. Before two miles had slipped past their dripping paddles, the creek ended in a rough dam of logs that marked the outlet of the lowest of the ponds; and here was the first portage.

It was a short one, merely circling the dam and so to another launching on the dark mirror-like water of the pond. The boys landed and hauled their canoes ashore; then, without bothering to remove the contents, they each seized an end and carried the craft up a narrow trail, slippery with weeds and mud, to the edge of the pond. Once more afloat, they pulled through the dripping rain in the rippling wake of the Red Fox. Dirk, brushing the drops from his glistening face, wondered how the leader could find his way through the winding passage. Reeds and ugly, misshapen snags jutted upward from the murky, black bottom covered with dead leaves, and somehow brought a chill to the boy in the canoe, so close were they beneath his paddle. He wondered what would happen to any daring soul that might try to swim in the dark forbidding water.

Sagamore Carrigan knew his way, however, and unerringly came out at the end where the next portage began. This was a long one, for these two ponds were connected only by a swampy trickle that wound across hummocks of mud. For half a mile the boys threaded through the ankle-deep muck; and though the councilor sent Spaghetti Megaro back to bear a part of the overburdened Sachem, Dirk was ready to call a halt before a third of the way had been traversed. Gritting his teeth, he tried to forget the cutting, swaying load pressing his aching shoulders, meanwhile thanking his stars that his shoes were strong and waterproof.

By the end of the afternoon all the trailers, although they would not have admitted it under torture, were heartily sick of ponds and portages. Everlastingly climbing in and out of the vessels, slipping and sliding through an overgrown footpath with one end of a staunch canoe on one’s shoulder and dripping branches catching at garments and whipping into one’s face, all in a semi-darkness that depressed the heartiest spirit—it seemed to all of them that they could not last out another hour of this winding progress through the lowlands, when from the van came Sagamore Wise-Tongue’s cheering cry: “Lake Moosehorn ahead!”

The broad expanse of clear water uplifted the souls of all. Dirk, feeling glad that reeds and snags and winding dark ponds were left behind at last, threw himself on a grassy bank beside his canoe, breathing a sigh of relief. It was late in the afternoon and the rain had slackened to a filmy drizzle. Across from them loomed the hump of Flint Island, while over the tree-clad summit of Mount Kinnecut toward the west, the descending sun was bravely trying to show forth before sinking into night.

“We’ll be pitching camp inside an hour, men,” said the leader. “Our headquarters will be at the old spot at the far end of the lake, up by that tall dead spruce. From there we’ll have to use our feet instead of our paddles, to make the summit of Kinnecut.”

“Huh!” remarked Ugly Brown. “I’ve been usin’ my feet all day. I don’t mind hikin’, if I don’t have to carry a canoe with me. Why, after today, I’ll probably race up to the top of that little mountain tomorrow just to get an appetite for breakfast!”

“We’ll never even pitch camp before dark if you yearlings don’t stop argufyin’ and get started,” drawled Cowboy. “I want lots of wood cut for the fire, and somebody mentioned he was goin’ to hook some fish.”

“Well, we’ll move along, then, and do our resting when we get to camp,” said Mr. Carrigan. “It’s the old earth that will be your bed tonight, if I don’t cut some spruce tips for mattresses—so let’s be on our way!”

The Red Fox and the Whiffenpoof pushed out on the lake for the last lap of the day’s long journey.

“Well,” asked Brick Ryan, paddle in hand, “aren’t you goin’ to stir, my son?”

“I suppose so.” Dirk rose stiffly, and stretched. “Gollies, I hate to move, though. I could go to sleep right now.”

“Not here, my bucko.” The red-headed boy playfully prodded his canoe-mate in the ribs. “Stir your stumps. Look, the other guys are almost out of sight around Flint Island. Old Wise-Tongue is wavin’ for us to come on.”

The two foremost canoes vanished behind the bulk of the little island as the Sachem pushed out.

“Steer over along the shore of the island, will you?” asked Dirk, after a moment. “I thought I saw something moving in the bushes. It looked like——See it? Why, it’s a man! And he’s waving to us! What do you suppose he wants?”

He quickened his stroke, and they pulled toward the rocky edge where the waterline of the lake marked the island. A low, hoarse cry rose from the twilight of the thickets.

A man’s head was visible through a gap between the trees. The hair was long and black, the skin dark, and the features that could be made out were rugged and wild-looking. The voice was that of one in pain.

“Why, it’s an Indian! Hurry, Brick—he’s hurt. Maybe a tree fell on him!”

“Nonsense! He needs us right away. Here’s a good place to land.” Dirk leaped ashore as he spoke, and ran to the spot where the Indian lay moaning in his broken pidgin-English.

As he approached, the man rose to his feet and leaped at the boy like a wildcat. As the outstretched arms caught Dirk about the shoulders and threw him backward, he realized, too late, what was happening.

“Get away, Brick!” he screamed. “It’s a trick!” He fell on the rocky ground, with the strange Indian upon him, holding his body so that he could not move an inch, nor see what Brick was doing.

“No, he won’t get away,” said a cruel, level voice. “And if you yelp once more, young Van Horn, you’ll get a bullet in your noisy mouth!”

Dirk felt the heavy body above him suddenly removed; the Indian was rising to his feet. The boy staggered upward, and was again thrown to the earth by a fierce thrust.

“Lie there and cool off!” ordered the unseen. “Yes, I’ve got a gun on you, and on your smart pal, too. Get out of that canoe quick, Red, if you know what’s good for you.”

“If you didn’t have that pistol on me,” muttered Brick Ryan savagely through clenched teeth, “I’d—I’d——”

At last Dirk made out the form of the man who, with the aid of the rascally Indian, had trapped them. He felt only a dull throb of surprise as he recognized him. Brick’s warning at Lake Lenape had been justified, after all. The mysterious fisherman had tracked them down and caught them alone at last.

The man deliberately walked up to Brick, the gleaming nose of his pistol showing in his right hand. With his left he thrust swiftly upward. There was the sound of a blow against flesh, and Brick fell heavily upon the pebbled shore.

“Lie there, both of you. Now, Mink,” their captor addressed the Indian, “dump that stuff out of their canoe and put it in ours. We need it more than that dumb bunch of kids up the lake. Then tie up these two birds tight, and dump them in too. We’ve got to get away before the ones up ahead come back to see what’s wrong. Wish I could see their faces when they find out!”

The stranger laughed unpleasantly. “You’ll find out soon enough, kid. Ready, Mink? That’s good. Now, turn over that fancy red canoe and shove it way out in the channel, so that when the main gang come back, they’ll know for sure that these two wise little scouts are drowned to death and sunk to the bottom of the lake!”

CHAPTER XVI
FIRE IN THE FOREST

Trussed with light rope like a pair of fowl ready for slaughter, the two boys were lifted one by one in the Indian’s arms and laid in the bottom of his dirty canoe. Neither could speak, for bandana handkerchiefs were knotted tightly between their teeth, so that they had barely a chance to breathe. They lay on the unyielding ribs of the craft, which apparently leaked, for several inches of chilly water sloshed about beneath them and ran down their necks, soaking their already damp clothing.

The tarpaulin-wrapped bundle containing the provisions stolen from the Lenape trailers was dumped next to their heads. The man with the pistol crouched in the bow, his slicker thrown open, now that the rain had stopped. His dark-skinned henchman, whom he had called Mink, cast another glance at the Sachem, which was caught in the channel current and, bottom upward, drifted toward the outlet. Then, seizing his paddle, he pushed off the heavy-laden vessel and began paddling furiously toward the far shore.

Although they were effectively hidden from the eyes of any returning Lenape canoeists as long as they kept the length of the island between them, the two men kept a wary lookout until they gained the shelter of the far shore, where the deepening twilight hid them from any possibility of discovery. Dirk, squirming painfully in his bonds, could see only the body of the muscular Mink above him, his moving head and arms outlined against the purple sky, in which one star already gleamed. He could hear Brick Ryan breathing heavily beside him, and bit at his gag angrily, realizing that he could help neither his comrade nor himself. If only he had departed with the other members of the party, the two desperate men would not have had opportunity to snare them as they had done. It had been all his own fault, Dirk condemned himself. If only he had listened to Brick——

But why were they thus trapped and taken from their friends toward an unknown fate, leaving an overturned canoe behind to give the cruel impression that they had drowned? What was the meaning of it? Why had this man, who now sat slumped in the bow of the leaky canoe, followed Dirk so relentlessly into the wilds?

He puzzled until his head throbbed, but could piece out no answer to those questions. The steady rhythm of the paddle might have lulled him off to a fitful stupor, so weary was he; but the filthy water in the bottom of the canoe slapped him again and again into wakefulness. It seemed as if hours passed before the canoe made a sudden swerve shoreward, and the bottom beneath him scraped on a gravel spit of land.

It was already quite dark. The two lads were bundled out of the canoe and were glad to be relieved from their painful position. Had their captor not untied all their bonds save those holding their hands behind their backs, they would have fallen over when they were first put on their feet; as it was, Dirk was forced to lean against a tree to keep himself erect.

The Indian’s master pulled the gags from their mouths with a warning. “Not a word out of either of you! Not that it would do you any good, at that. You don’t know where you are, but I can tell you it’s miles from anybody that could hear you, or would care what I did to you if you yelled. So be good little kids and follow my half-breed friend Mink. And remember, I still have my gun handy.”

The half-breed, who during this time had been pulling his canoe ashore and hiding it in a pile of brush near by, now silently raised the pack of provisions to his shoulder and began stolidly tramping through the darkness. The driven boys stumbled in his wake, too weary to know or care where the overgrown path might lead. Behind them marched the nameless man, who now and then uttered an oath as he tripped over a root or sank ankle-deep in a forest pool.

After half a mile, the guard dropped so far behind that Dirk ventured a cautious whisper in the direction of his friend; although, since the half-breed looked back from time to time, it was impossible to attempt a flight.

Brick shook his head hopelessly. “Don’t know—too dark to see. I think we’re on the west side of Moosehorn, but maybe not.”

“I’m sorry I was such a fool as to let them take us so easily. If I’d listened to you——”

“Don’t worry, my lad.” Brick’s voice was somehow cheering. “They won’t hurt you. Me, maybe, but not you.”

“You mean—you know why they captured us? I’ve been trying to figure it out. Why, why did they do it?”

“Mean to tell me you don’t know? Why, I’ve been suspectin’ it since the first time I saw that guy with the gun. Don’t you realize that he kidnaped you so that he could make your dad pay a wad of money to get you back?”

Dirk Van Horn gasped incredulously. “But—kidnapers! Why, my father isn’t a wealthy man! He’s quite well off, but even if he is president of a bank, he doesn’t own all the money in it!”

“Well, wouldn’t he give all he’s got to have you back home safe again? Sure, he’d do that, and this tough bird that’s got us counts on it. No, you’re safe until he gets some ransom for you.”

“Quiet, there!” commanded an angry voice, with a curse. Their guard had caught up to them, and a wave of his weapon put a stop to their whispered comments. But Dirk at last understood why he was a prisoner. He understood, too, the strange invitation of the man when they had surprised him at Lake Lenape. He had tried to lure them away from their friends, and failing in that, had kept watch on the boy’s every movement. Seeing that a capture was impossible so close to the camp, he had somehow found out about the long trail expedition, and no doubt hiring the villainous half-breed Mink to help him in his criminal purpose, had gone before them and waylaid them at Flint Island by a ruse, at a time when the two boys were by chance separated from the main party.

At long last the man ahead stopped and put down his burden. A dim shape loomed before them, a rough hut of logs chinked with mud, that was evidently the dwelling of the half-breed. He fumbled with the latch on the door. The man in the slicker tossed away a glowing cigarette, and pushed them inside, harshly ordering Mink to shut the door and cover the window before lighting the lantern.

In the glow of the battered oil-lantern that the half-breed brought forth, the boys looked about with half-shut eyes. A heap of cured skins lay in one corner, and the single room smelled vilely of stale smoke and damp walls and animal remains. The Indian knelt on the hearth of the rough stone fireplace, but his master stopped him with a word.

“Quit that! Do you want to tell the world where we are? They could see that smoke ten miles away! We’ll grab a cold supper tonight, and tomorrow when you’re here with them, don’t take any chances, or you’ll end up in the jug! There must be some stuff in that bundle that we can eat.”

He sank down on a stool and lit another cigarette, while the half-breed rummaged in the Lenape provision-sack and discovered some cans of fruit and vegetables, which he opened with the blade of an ax. The two prisoners, too tired to care what befell, sank to the floor and lay there half-asleep, until the Indian roused them roughly and shoved food at them, untying their chilled hands so that they might eat.

Hungrily, they wolfed down the unappetizing fare. Cold corn from a can, dry bread, and still dryer prunes do not constitute an ideal repast for famished boys, but they made the best of what was given them. Brick, indeed, was so strengthened by the meal, poor as it was, that his Irish fighting spirit came back to him. Chewing a crust, he lifted his head and directed a fierce glance at their enemies.

“Still full of pep, eh? Well, Redhead, it won’t take us long to put that out of you! Young Mr. Millionaire Van Horn here will be all right if Papa comes across tomorrow, but you ain’t worth a nickel to me, and don’t forget it!” His cold blue eyes widened. “Say, what’s that thing stickin’ out of your shirt?”

Brick drew back, fumbling at his breast, where the honor of Lenape, in the shape of a rumpled bit of green-and-white bunting, had been carried throughout the journey.

“It’s—nothin’, just a flag,” he muttered, trying to stuff it out of sight.

His tormentor laughed jeeringly. “Just a flag, eh?” With a sudden movement, he tore it from the boy’s grasp. After a slighting glance, he crumpled it in his fist, strode to the door, and tossed the Lenape pennant into the mud outside the step.

He whirled to meet Brick’s leap. Dirk sprang to help, but was disdainfully pushed aside by the silent half-breed. When next he looked, Brick lay sprawled out on the floor, with an ugly red blotch on his forehead and helpless rage crackling in his eyes.

The man’s doubled fist threatened further punishment. Then, with another empty laugh, he turned on his heel.

“Go to sleep, you brats,” he flung out over his shoulder. “Toss them some blankets, Mink. I’ve got to get some rest if I’m hoofing over to Yanceyville in the morning.”

The blanket-rolls of the two trailers had been taken from their canoe along with the larger pack; and these were now thrown over them as they crouched in one corner of the hut. The walls and crude floor-boards let in draughts of chill, damp night air, and they hunched together dumbly for warmth and companionship. With the moaning of the wind through the trees above their heads as a doleful lullaby, they sank into the despairing slumber of the captive.

After a century of nightmares in that dark, noisome hole, Dirk stirred his cramped limbs and opened his eyes to find a ray of daylight slanting through the single window. His enemy stood with one hand on the latch of the door, giving parting orders to his servile guide. The man’s pasty face showed the effects of an existence that was not natural to him, whose haunts were those of the city. His serge suit was stained and creased, while his cheek bore a clotted scratch where he had scraped it against the projecting limb of a tree during the dark passage of the previous night.

“And remember,” he was snarling, “that you ain’t to let those brats out of your sight for a minute! They’re slippery little imps, especially that red-headed one. If all goes well and the old man comes across with the money, I’ll be back with your share by night.”

“Sure, Mink. We’re partners on this—split the dough fifty-fifty. I’ll telegraph old Van Horn from Yanceyville, and if he’s got any sense, he’ll send the cash by wire right away. It’s a cinch.”

He passed out into the sunlight, scratched a match, and began puffing the eternal cigarette. As he disappeared, the Indian shrugged and set about putting together a breakfast as cold and cheerless as the meal of the previous night.

Miserably the boys roused themselves to face another day of imprisonment, in the tumbledown cabin of the half-breed, who handed food to them silently and whose watchful, savage glare made them break off each time they attempted to speak to one another. In fact, so closely did he watch their least move that Dirk, after an hour, gave up all hope of finding any avenue of escape from beneath the half-breed’s eye.

More than two hours had passed, Dirk judged, since the departure of their nameless foe, who was evidently now well on his way to Yanceyville on his nefarious errand of attempting to extort a large sum of money from Dirk’s father as a ransom. What would happen? Even if the money were paid promptly, would this man free them at once, or would he attempt some further villainy to prevent them from putting the law on his track as soon as they had won to civilization?

Mink, who had been sitting on his stool with his back against the door, passing the time by whittling idly at a stick of firewood, sat up suspiciously. His nose was in the air, sniffing like a hound that has lost the scent. He rose with a clatter and paced, still sniffing, to the dead fireplace. After a few seconds, he shrugged and returned, apparently satisfied, to his post.

Dirk went back to his gloomy thoughts, which were now turned toward his companions, who had set out so blithely with him on the Long Trail. Were they even now mourning his death and Brick’s, as victims of a canoe accident? He recalled his clumsiness the first time the Sachem was launched—no doubt they thought him still a lubber who would upset his craft and drag his friend with him to the watery depths. But Mr. Carrigan was wise; and though their captors were cunning, they had left several clues that might be read. For instance, the provision-sack had been tightly lashed within the canoe; Sagamore Wise-Tongue would think it strange that it had worked loose when the canoe overturned. They had left no tracks, except a trampled spot in the bushes on Flint Island, but perhaps, perhaps the Lenape men had not given up hope. Their stock of food was gone, but they would find some way to exist, even in the wilderness——

He woke from his reverie. Mink had again jumped to his feet, nose in air. Dirk sniffed too. Something stronger than the heavy odor of the cabin was sifting through the chinks in the logs. It smelled like the lodge at Lenape, in the evening with the whole tribe gathered around the fireplace——

With a wild cry, the Indian threw open the door, leaped across the threshold, and slammed it behind his retreating form. A frozen instant of hushed wonder—the smell became undeniable—a smell of charring timber——

Dirk dashed for the window, but Brick was before him. Together, the boys stared through the dirty pane. The forest showed them no danger signals, but from over their heads came the thuds of a scrambling body and the low hiss of flames in dry shingle-boards.

“This cabin must be afire, Dirk!” he muttered, trying to keep down the exultation in his heart. “Gollies, listen to that! The roof must be blazin’ like sixty!”

It was true; rising above the beats of his heart, the listening Dirk could hear the crackling of hungry flames.

“Our chance!” Brick’s eyes were dancing. “Come on! Old Mink sure will be busy for a minute, and he won’t think about us. Now’s our chance to make a getaway!”

CHAPTER XVII
THE FLIGHT INTO THE HILLS

The two captives were out the door of the burning cabin in an instant, and broke wildly for cover in the thickets beyond the clearing.

Dirk, as he fled, cast a desperate glance over his shoulder. Mink, their half-breed guard, had climbed somehow to the roof of his shanty, and with his khaki shirt, which he had torn off in haste, was striving to beat out the licking flames that fed on the dry, rotten shakes. His back was toward them, and he was so immersed in his furious task that he took no notice of their flight.

With Brick at his side, running stealthily and gasping for breath, he found himself beneath the shadow of a clump of pines. Pausing now to look about and get some feeling of the direction of the lake where their friends must be, he was startled by having his comrade seize his arm and shake it roughly.

“Gollies, how could I forget?” the red-headed lad panted. “I left the flag back there at the hut—the other guy chucked it in the mud last night!”

“No! Sagamore Carrigan give it to me to keep safe—it’s the honor of Lenape, he said! I got to get it! Say, Van, these birds don’t want me. It’s you they’re after—you keep runnin’, and maybe I’ll catch up with you!”

He was off before Dirk could speak further, racing back the way they had come, perhaps into the very arms of the enraged Mink. Dirk, however, had no intention of deserting his friend. He could see nothing in the direction of the hut save a thin column of greasy-looking smoke through the trees. He threw himself on the needle-carpeted earth, his chest heaving with exertion and excitement. If Brick came back this way, with the Indian after him, perhaps he could divert his attention, lead him a chase through the underbrush——

A squawking flight of large birds, crows and bluejays among them, swooped over his head. He rose on his elbow to mark their noisy passage. Not five yards off, the low scrub-oak bushes rustled and parted, revealing a rusty-coated, sharp-nosed animal with a brushy tail. It was a fox. Dirk did not move; the fox saw him, but cast only an incurious eye on him, and trotted off swiftly as if on urgent business at a far place.

Dirk jumped to his feet. A curl of smoke crept across the slanting bars of sunlight that fell to the floor of the glade. A distant murmur like a rising wind came to him, and his mouth went dry with fear. Why wasn’t Brick back? What was happening there through the screening forest?

He took a step forward, as if to run to his comrade’s assistance. As he did so, he caught sight of Brick on the other side of the glade, waved, and ran to his side. The Irish lad’s face was pale, but he clutched in one hand the bedraggled banner he had risked recapture to save.

“I—I fell down once, and he saw me, but he couldn’t get down from the roof. Say, some of the bushes and trees are on fire—I could hear ’em sizzle. Let’s get out of here!”

“We can’t stop to think about that—we’ve got to run! Soon as he puts out the fire, that Indian is goin’ to start trackin’ us down—they can follow like a bloodhound!”

“He won’t put it out soon. Look there!” Dirk pointed into the tree tops. The crackling roar had grown louder now, and as they looked, a leaping rope of flame bridged the gap between two trees nearly overhead. A smoking twig whirled to the ground beside them, starting a slow spark in the dry pine-needles.

“We can’t tell which way to go—but I think the fire is between us and the lake! We must get away!”

He began to pull Brick forward, following the direction taken by the fleeing fox.

“Say, thanks for waitin’ for me,” gasped Brick. “But you better——”

“Save your wind!” Dirk fought his way through a scratching barrier of brush. The horror of a hissing wall of flames at their backs put wings on his heels.

They labored in silence up a steep hillside, crossed a rocky ridge, and scrambled down into a blasted ravine on the other side. Dirk was aware that his friend was muttering shakily.

Both spoke softly, as if even now some enemy, concealed near them, might overhear.

“All right,” Dirk replied, watching Brick sink down upon a moss-covered ledge of rock. “But that Indian will be following us as soon as he can, if he knows we’ve gone this way. Maybe we should go in another direction.”

“That’s true—but as near as I can see, this is the same one that goes right by the cabin. We’d only run right back into Mink’s arms. Guess we’ve got to make for the hills. Then if one of us climbs a tree, we can get our bearings.”

Brick sighed heavily, and Dirk stared at him. Their adventures had put them both in sad case. Garments were stained and torn, bareheaded and grimed with dirt were they, looking like two scarecrows. Dirk wondered why Brick was so laggard in the flight. It was not like him to drag behind. The boy’s freckles stood out against his white face, and his lip was trembling.

“Know what I think?” asked Dirk. “I’ll bet that man with the gun was the person that started the fire. Of course he didn’t do it on purpose, but he was always smoking cigarettes and throwing them away without putting them out first. This morning, when he went away, he was smoking. A spark probably caught somewhere and set fire to the shack—it’s a regular old tinderbox. Well, shall we start again?”

They began the second stage of their flight by crossing the creek, where they paused for a hasty draught of water, and then attacked the long steady slope on the far side, toiling upward through a dense growth of evergreens. It seemed as if they would never get clear of the towering trunks and branches that seemed to push down upon their shoulders, smothering them and impeding their way. When at last they attained the height, Dirk was reluctantly forced to abandon his plan to climb a tree and thus get a view of the surrounding country. The lower branches were still so far above his head that it would be impossible for the most agile boy to get a foothold on the smooth trunks.

He turned to Brick. “Say, old lad, perhaps if you give me a boost——” He broke off, seeing the pain in his friend’s drawn face. The eyes were shifting feverishly above the hollow cheeks, and the boy was biting his lip to keep back a moan of anguish. “Why, Brick, are you hurt? Why didn’t you tell me?”

Brick swayed, and had Dirk not run to his side to support his body, would have collapsed to the ground. “I’m—all right,” he gasped out. “You go on—get to the top of the darned mountain—the honor of the camp——”

“Fell down that time—the Indian was lookin’—kind of knocked my ankle over a rock——” He fell backward in his comrade’s arms, and Dirk realized that he had fainted.

That was Brick Ryan, all right—floundering along gamely without a word, although his ankle must have made him want to scream out at every step! Then a realization of the seriousness of the situation came over Dirk, and he began tearing at the loose collar at his injured friend’s throat.

Fortunately, he had not spent his time at Camp Lenape without picking up some bits of knowledge of first-aid. “When anyone faints, never try to move him—give him lots of air—lean him forward so the blood rushes to his head——” Muttering these half-remembered instructions, he bent the limp body forward and began rubbing Brick’s dangling wrists and forearms. He wished they had brought some water, but there had been no way to carry it——

Brick moaned weakly, and his eyelids fluttered. “What—what happened, huh? Is it Van? Whillikers, to think that F. X. A. Ryan passed out like a baby——”

“Don’t talk,” his friend ordered. “Just rest a minute. We’re safe for a while now. When you feel better I’ll go get you a drink.”

The injured boy fell back, his chest heaving irregularly. Dirk stripped off his sweater and folding it into the form of a pillow, placed it under Brick’s head, slightly downhill. His next care was to examine the ankle that had been struck when the boy had escaped, for a second time, from the half-breed’s clearing.

The ankle was swollen badly—no doubt about that. Dirk, feeling glad that their captors had not searched him, found his pocket-knife and carefully slashed away the strings of Brick’s shoe; he then tenderly removed it, although not without causing a slight groan from its owner. The stocking was also pulled off, exposing the wounded area.

The ankle looked puffy and discolored, but as near as Dirk could tell, it was not broken or even seriously sprained. But none the less, it was almost a catastrophe for a pair of fugitives in their plight. Without food of any kind, their ponchos and blankets left behind them when they fled from the hut, and with a savage pursuer no doubt already on their track, they must travel far and fast. Now, one of them was crippled, in pain.

“Brick,” said the boy urgently, “do you think you’ll be all right if I carry you a ways? We’ve got to get to water, and I think there’s a brook at the bottom of this hill somewhere. If you’re sure you won’t faint again——”

Brick clenched his teeth. “Go ahead,” he answered bravely. “Gee, I hate to think that I’m holdin’ up the party this way. Maybe if you left me, you might find somebody who would come back and get me.”

“Nonsense! Whatever happens, I won’t leave you, old lad. It won’t be much of a job if I take you with the fireman’s lift.”

Brick grunted as he was hoisted upon his friend’s right shoulder, his body hanging downward from the waist; but he made no outcry as Dirk bore him in this fashion down the hill. In fact, he was so silent that Dirk feared he had fainted for a second time; but since his head hung low, he was in no danger. The truth was that he was gritting his teeth to keep from moaning when the injured ankle swung slightly in their progress.

Dirk, for his part, made haste to reach the brook, for he bore no light burden. But a vision of what might happen were he to injure his own legs among the treacherous roots and rocks of the hillside made him step warily. If both of them lay hurt in the wilderness, with none knowing their plight or whereabouts, they would eventually starve, if they did not sooner die of exposure.

At long last, the burbling of water over stones was heard close at hand, and Dirk eased his burden to the ground. The rains of yesterday had swollen the little watercourse, and a fairly deep pool, overhung with brambles and scrub-oak, glistened beside them.

Dirk wiped the sweat from his face, and took a deep breath. His first care was to bring his companion a drink of water in his cupped hands, and to wash away the sticky grime that clung to Brick’s pale cheeks and forehead.

“That’s swell!” sighed Brick. “Now, if my foot was tied up good and tight, maybe I could hobble on a ways further.”

“I’m taking no chances,” answered Dirk grimly. “That hoof of yours looks bad. Here, move to the bank, right over this place, and dangle it in the cold water. Best thing to take down the swelling.”

Brick Ryan obediently did as he was told. The shock of the chill water on his ankle set his teeth chattering, for all the moist heat of the forest; but soon the injured part became numb, and the throbbing ache nearly stopped.

Almost an hour passed. During this time Dirk had not been idle. He had found a straight, tough sapling of ash with a fork at the top, and with his knife had shaped the ends to the semblance of a rude crutch.

“Mighty warm today,” he remarked to the watching Brick, as he pulled off his khaki shirt over his head. “Won’t need this.” He proceeded to tear the shirt into strips. The narrowest of these he laid aside, and bound the rest over the forked head of the improvised crutch, making a smooth padding.

Brick summoned up a tired grin. “It’s much better, Doc. You couldn’t look after me any better if you had a beautiful nurse to help you. Say, what do you keep lookin’ over your shoulder all the time for?”

“Am I doing that? Humph! Guess I’m still scared old Mink will pop his head out at us. I sure don’t want to get kidnaped again with that ugly lot, do you?”

While he was speaking, he had deftly wound the strips torn from his shirt tightly about the bruised ankle. The cold-water treatment had reduced the swelling almost completely, but the skin showed an ugly black and blue patch.

“Yell out if I hurt too much,” he ordered; “but the tighter I tie it, the better it will be.” He rose, and helping Brick to his feet, offered him the crutch he had made. “Now see if you can get around.”

Brick gingerly took a few steps. “Gollies, this is a swell crutch, all right! I’m good for a hundred-mile hike right now. But where do we head for?”

For a moment Dirk made no answer. Then something snapped inside him, and he cried out bitterly.

“I don’t know! Where are we? Where is the Lenape gang? We’ve got to find food and shelter before night, and already it’s getting late! Oh, I don’t know where to go, Brick—but we’ve got to go now, or we’re done!”

CHAPTER XVIII
THE END OF THE TRAIL

Dirk’s momentary outburst passed as soon as it had come, leaving him heartily ashamed of his despair. He should not be the one to lose hope; now, if ever, he must show the manhood that was in him.

He clapped Brick Ryan on the back, and tried to summon a smile. “There, old man, it’s all right. This whole mess is really my fault—I was dumb enough to let myself get kidnaped in the first place. If you think that crutch of yours will work, take a good drink and let’s hike.”

Brick set off eagerly, stumping across the creek and manfully following Dirk’s leadership through the forest, trying not to drag his tightly-bound foot or to knock it against the stumps and boulders that littered the earth. Dirk kept looking backward to see how his friend was progressing, stopping now and again to lend an arm in crossing some marshy bog or climbing a steep bank. He tried to keep his bearings and follow a straight line that eventually would bring them out upon high ground from which he hoped to spy the lake, the only landmark that either of them knew.

He forced Brick to stop frequently, for otherwise the red-haired lad would have gamely plodded on until he dropped. During one of the pauses, Brick asked: “Say, since it looks like we’re lost for certain, what about buildin’ a smoky signal fire? Maybe if the gang is around, they’ll see it and come to help.”

“I thought of that. But we don’t know that they are still around. Don’t forget they think we’re drowned. And we do know that Mink will be looking for us. A smoke signal would give us away—he’d get us before anybody else could find where we were.”

On, on they went at the maddeningly slow pace that made their journey seem like a dream, one of those nightmares in which the sleeper is pursued by unknown terror, but must stagger onward like a man walking under water. The sun dropped lower and lower above the endless tree tops.

“It’s no use!” he panted. “I can’t go on, Van. My foot’s achin’ like it was stung by a million bumblebees. If I had somethin’ to eat, maybe I could get a little further, but gollies, this hike is too much for me. You go on,” he pleaded, “wherever you can go, and leave me—leave me——No half-breed in any old canoe will ever turn me over and shoot me in the leg——” His crazy jargon trailed off into a feverish moan.

It was painfully clear to Dirk that his friend’s strength was completely gone, and that he was already on the fringes of delirium. The shadows were lengthening on the mountainside where they lay; during the last hour they had been climbing steadily. Soon it would be dark.

The boy looked about him helplessly. Was this the end? The end of that long trail the two comrades had followed together, through capture and fire and flight and injury——He stood on a rocky shoulder of mountain in trackless wilds, with his hurt friend huddled at his feet. If he had a part of the skill of Sagamore Carrigan, he might, even with only his jack-knife to help him, rig up some sort of shelter against the coming cold night, might find some wild food or trap a small beast. But he could lean on no other person now; he was alone with his helpless charge. A keen wind swept up from the valleys below. It was Dirk Van Horn’s dark hour.

As he stared out over the gently waving tree tops, he could see only endless ridges of hills, one beyond another, above which the red torch of the sun blazed like a burning ship. They must have circled around too far, until now they were on the other side of the slopes that guarded Lake Moosehorn. He turned his face upward, where the summit of the mountain showed against the sky. As he looked, a pale spark came into being against the dimming sky. It was a star. No! Could it be——

He cried out, and shook Brick’s shoulder in a sudden frenzy. “It’s not a star!” he screamed. “It’s—it’s a light! A light up there, Brick!”

“Never get back,” moaned the injured boy drearily. “It’s a long way from Lenape we are——”

“Wake up, Brick! I tell you, I see something up there. It looks like a tower of some kind. Brick, we’ve got to get there now!”

But Brick Ryan was beyond caring. He did not even stir as he was lifted in the arms of a haggard, wild-eyed lad whose heart burned with new hope. Saving his breath, Dirk made no further effort to speak. The body of his comrade hung in his arms, a leaden weight, as he stumbled forward, his muscles crying out in weariness, his teeth clenched in a last despairing endeavor.

A few hundred yards up the slope his feet touched a worn path, along which was strung on tree-trunks a line of black wire, leading upward. It was a telephone line. Somebody was up there, somebody who could give them food, and fire, and a place to lie in peace and safety!

“Cheer up, F. X. A. Ryan, my son!” Dirk murmured. “You’re safe now, old lad! Up we go!”

In the deck-house of the fire tower at Lookout, young Ugly Brown was staring through the gathering twilight, scanning the slopes below through a pair of field glasses lent to him by the young warden who stood at his side. He was startled to hear a ringing cry from below, among the trees bordering the trail. He could not make out the words, but the tone was desperate. He was out through the trap-door in an instant, and was half-climbing, half-sliding down the iron ladder that hung from the steel cross-pieces of the tower.

“Hey, go slow there, youngster!” the warden shouted down after him. “You’ll break your monkey neck!”

Ugly did not answer. He had a feeling that he knew the voice that had uttered the cry that had come floating up to him through the dusk.

He leaped the last few feet at the bottom, and raced down the trail. From the dimness of the woods, a strange pair staggered toward him—one ragged, stumbling ghost bearing another, a limp form in his arms, marching onward with the high valor that will not admit defeat.

“It’s Van Horn!” Ugly shouted joyfully. “Say, what’s the matter with Brick? We thought you guys were drowned, but Sagamore Carrigan wasn’t sure, and all the bunch has been huntin’ for you all day——” He broke off sharply, and rushed forward to support the tottering figures.

The young fire warden, who had only delayed in his tower to snatch a hot thermos bottle and a pair of blankets, came to his assistance, and together they knelt over the two exhausted wanderers where they had slipped to the ground.

Dirk felt himself lifted up. The steaming aroma of hot coffee was under his nose, and a strange voice was ordering him to drink. The hot fluid burned his tongue, but sent new life coursing through his veins.

He pushed away the mouth of the bottle, and sat up. “I’m all right,” he croaked. “Look after Brick. His ankle’s hurt pretty bad, and it got worse because we had to hike.”

“He’ll be all right,” came an answer. “The fire warden will fix him up pretty quick. Do you know me, Van? It’s Ugly Brown. Gee, this has sure been an exciting trip! I bet none of the other gangs that went on the Long Trail ever had as much fun as we’re havin’!”

“It may have been fun to you, Ugly, but Brick and I have had a tough time of it. Last night and today—I don’t want to think about it! Every minute we thought that half-breed Indian, Mink, was going to jump out on us and take us back to be held for ransom.”

The fire warden, who had been working over Brick and making him as comfortable as possible on a blanket, looked up from his task.

“I was sure that’s who it was, when the hut caught fire this morning,” he put in. “That is one bad Indian—or maybe I should say was. There’s a pretty good chance that he may not be in the land of the living tonight.”

The man shrugged his shoulders. “That was a pretty bad blaze they had down there at his shack. It would have been worse, only thank goodness the woods were damp after the rain; otherwise our outfit would have had a nice crown fire to fight today. Collins was patrolling down by the lake, and had to call a general alarm. By the time he got there, the whole clearing was burned over, and all that was left of the trapper’s cabin was a heap of cinders. The men are still on guard down there—several acres were burned over.”

“Nobody knows. If he wasn’t burned to death, you can bet he’s cleared out of this country for good. You’ll never be bothered with him again.”

Dirk laughed feebly. “And to think that all day we were running away from a danger that didn’t exist! We thought he was trailing us.”

“We got lost, and couldn’t find our way back to the lake.” The boy looked about him. “Where is this place, anyway, and how is it that you’re here, Ugly?”

“This is the Lookout, where the fire tower is,” explained the other boy, alive with excitement. “If you get up on top of the hill here, you can see for a million miles all over these mountains. The lake is right below. You must have come around from the other side. Mr. Carrigan looked at the canoe we found turned over. When he saw that all the stuff was gone, he said he thought somebody had captured you. Then he found where the bushes were tramped down, over on Flint Island. We couldn’t do much last night in the dark, but he got the chief warden to give us some grub and a tent. Then, since early this morning, all of us have been scoutin’ around these woods, lookin’ for signs of you. They ought to be comin’ in pretty soon. Boy, won’t they be mad when I tell ’em I was the one to see you first!”

“Don’t worry,” answered the warden. “Soon as I get back up the tower, I’ll telephone to Yanceyville, and they can wire from there. He’ll be glad to hear. There was a chance that you two might have been caught in the fire. Ever since Riccio was caught, we’ve had orders to hunt for you.”

“Why, that’s the name of the man that kidnaped you! You see, he turned up at the telegraph office in Yanceyville this morning and sent a funny message to your father. The telegraph man was suspicious, and as soon as he left, he put the sheriff on his trail. It turned out that this Riccio had a police record, and a bad one, too. He was arrested, and finally admitted that he’d caught you and that Indian Mink had you in his shack. He must have been a fool to try and get ransom money by telegraph. Well, perhaps a fat jail term will teach him a lesson.”

“Then—then——” Dirk was bewildered. It seemed as if all their troubles were ended. The half-breed dead or flown, his master in jail, and soon the Lenape trailers would again be united. “Then everything’s all right, and tomorrow we can go on to the top of Mount Kinnecut——” He stopped, for Ugly Brown could not conceal his amusement, and was laughing loudly.

“Say, Van, how do you get that way? You’re right on the top of Mount Kinnecut at this very minute!”

At the words. Brick Ryan stirred among his blankets and tried to sit up. “Mount Kinnecut?” he mumbled. “Gollies, that’s the place we got to find. Dirk will help me get there, won’t you, Dirk, my boy? Dirk’s the best guy that ever hit the trail, and I’ll lick the bird that says he’s not!”

Dirk Van Horn leaned over and patted his friend’s arm. “There, take it easy, Brick! We’re there, old chap—we’re right on the top of old Kinnecut, and you can go to sleep now.”

“Can’t go to sleep! Got to do somethin’—can’t climb, though, because I got a bum leg. You’ll do it, though, won’t you, Dirk?” He fumbled at his breast.

“Do what?” the fire warden asked gently. “What must he do? Listen, you come along with me now, and you’ll soon be stowed away in bed.”

“No, I won’t. Dirk’s got to do it first! And it’s right he should, too. He’s the best of all of us. I wanted to quit, but he fought along, game as a bull-pup, and carried me. I won’t move till I see him do it!”

“I think I know what he means,” said Dirk gently. “Shall I? I guess he won’t rest easy until it’s done.” He reached out and took the crumpled bit of cloth that Brick was clutching. “Ugly, where is the tree that has all the Lenape trailers’ flags nailed to it?”

“Why, it’s right up the trail about a hundred yards. A big old dead pine—you can’t miss it. I’ll go with you.”

Brick fell back, watching Dirk’s face. “It’s the honor of Lenape, Dirk!” he whispered. “You brought us through. There’s a couple nails in my pocket. Good luck to you, pal!”

Dirk clasped the outstretched hand, and ran up the trail alone. There was the tall pine. A few wooden cleats were fastened on the lower part of the trunk, leading up to the thick branches. As he swung himself upward, all his weariness fell away from him like a cast-off garment of care. Up, up he climbed, until he was among the smooth limbs of the pine. Upward, above the tree tops that swept down before his eyes to the sunset-dyed waters of Lake Moosehorn, that lay in a curving sweep far below, with the red spark of a campfire on its banks to mark the rallying place of the Lenape clan. Still he climbed. Now he was at the very top of the world; in all directions stretched the unbroken wilderness that he and his comrades had conquered. And now his hand touched the lowermost of a string of tattered pennons that were nailed to the peak of this mighty tree that others of the Lenape brotherhood had scaled before him, in years gone.

Dirk Van Horn smiled to himself, and waved a hand at his watching partner far below. Then, still smiling, he drew a stone from his pocket, and with a few resounding blows, nailed a bit of green and white bunting in its place. A finger of light, the last ray of the dying sun, tipped the little banner with gold, as the honor of Lenape fluttered bravely in the evening breeze.

CAMP LENAPE ON THE LONG TRAIL

CONTENTS

CAMP LENAPE ON THE LONG TRAIL

CHAPTER I
A FEUD BEGINS

CHAPTER II
“BRICK RYAN’S NOT FOR SALE!”

CHAPTER III
“HELP!”

CHAPTER IV
DIRK JUMPS

CHAPTER V
THE SINKING OF THE Sachem

CHAPTER VI
FIGHT! FIGHT!

CHAPTER VII
THE RED HAND REVENGERS

CHAPTER VIII
SHENANIGANS FOR BRICK

CHAPTER IX
DIRK HEARS OF THE LONG TRAIL

CHAPTER X
OFF FOR CAMP SHAWNEE

CHAPTER XI
THE CAPTAIN

CHAPTER XII
THE MYSTERIOUS WATCHER

CHAPTER XIII
ON THE MARCH

CHAPTER XIV
THE WATCHER AGAIN

CHAPTER XV
THE TRAP ON FLINT ISLAND

CHAPTER XVI
FIRE IN THE FOREST

CHAPTER XVII
THE FLIGHT INTO THE HILLS

CHAPTER XVIII
THE END OF THE TRAIL

Transcriber’s Notes

CAMP LENAPE ON THE LONG TRAIL

CONTENTS

CAMP LENAPE ON THE LONG TRAIL

CHAPTER I A FEUD BEGINS

CHAPTER II “BRICK RYAN’S NOT FOR SALE!”

CHAPTER III “HELP!”

CHAPTER IV DIRK JUMPS

CHAPTER V THE SINKING OF THE Sachem

CHAPTER VI FIGHT! FIGHT!

CHAPTER VII THE RED HAND REVENGERS

CHAPTER VIII SHENANIGANS FOR BRICK

CHAPTER IX DIRK HEARS OF THE LONG TRAIL

CHAPTER X OFF FOR CAMP SHAWNEE

CHAPTER XI THE CAPTAIN

CHAPTER XII THE MYSTERIOUS WATCHER

CHAPTER XIII ON THE MARCH

CHAPTER XIV THE WATCHER AGAIN

CHAPTER XV THE TRAP ON FLINT ISLAND

CHAPTER XVI FIRE IN THE FOREST

CHAPTER XVII THE FLIGHT INTO THE HILLS

CHAPTER XVIII THE END OF THE TRAIL

Transcriber’s Notes

CHAPTER I
A FEUD BEGINS

CHAPTER II
“BRICK RYAN’S NOT FOR SALE!”

CHAPTER III
“HELP!”

CHAPTER IV
DIRK JUMPS

CHAPTER V
THE SINKING OF THE Sachem

CHAPTER VI
FIGHT! FIGHT!

CHAPTER VII
THE RED HAND REVENGERS

CHAPTER VIII
SHENANIGANS FOR BRICK

CHAPTER IX
DIRK HEARS OF THE LONG TRAIL

CHAPTER X
OFF FOR CAMP SHAWNEE

CHAPTER XI
THE CAPTAIN

CHAPTER XII
THE MYSTERIOUS WATCHER

CHAPTER XIII
ON THE MARCH

CHAPTER XIV
THE WATCHER AGAIN

CHAPTER XV
THE TRAP ON FLINT ISLAND

CHAPTER XVI
FIRE IN THE FOREST

CHAPTER XVII
THE FLIGHT INTO THE HILLS

CHAPTER XVIII
THE END OF THE TRAIL