Читать книгу Tom Slade at Shadow Isle - Percy Keese Fitzhugh - Страница 3

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There was something about Peter Pearson that struck a responsive chord in Tom Slade. He felt it the very first time he saw the little pioneer scout sitting quite alone outside the “eats” shack at Leatherstocking Camp.

Peter’s attention was fixed upon the lake. A certain wistful expression shadowed his tanned face and crinkled the skin about his temples. His mouth was puckered as if in thought and his two small hands were clasped about his drawn up knees.

Tom watched him through the window just over his desk. No one was in the Lodge and he had time to ponder over many reasons that could have brought about Peter’s self-imposed exile.

Tom had lived and worked with boys so long that he could tell at first glance why and when a boy didn’t fit in. And he had only to glance at Peter’s misty eyes to know that he wasn’t fitting in at all.

The corners of Tom’s generous mouth smiled understandingly. He had seen so many kids at the end of their first day in camp, sitting in that same pensive attitude. They all sat apart from the bustling camp life after supper just as Peter was doing. But unlike Peter they all looked wistfully down toward the wagon trail that led out to the main road and thence to Harkness and the railroad station—to home. That is, all except the happy-go-lucky ones. To them, home was a place to go to when they couldn’t go anywhere else. Tom knew that type well.

Certainly Peter did not fit under that category. Neither did he add his name to the list of those who watched the wagon trail. He was simply in a class by himself, Tom thought. For never before in the short history of Leatherstocking Camp had any scout gazed so steadily upon the sombre waters of Weir Lake after the supper hour. It was a record worth noting.

With the sun going down, the lake presents more or less of a depressing picture. No last lingering scarlet ray of sunset ever skims its leaden surface. Old Hogback, like the perverse, towering giant it is, shuts out Weir’s full measure of daylight and sunlight, and casts great, black misty shadows full upon it in a premature twilight. It is a scene to turn away from.

Still Peter stared on.

Tom’s curiosity was aroused. He rose determinedly and strode quickly out of the Lodge. He just had to find out the why of Peter Pearson.

At Peter’s side, he stopped short and turned, facing the lake. He said not a word, hoping the scout would voluntarily enlighten him as to the mist’s evident allure.

Peter glanced sideways without moving his head. He said nothing and looked confused. Tom felt disappointed but decided on another course.

He leaned over and gave Peter a cordial smack on the shoulder. “What’s so interesting out there?” he asked. “Are you wondering whether you’ll get trout for breakfast?”

Peter grinned sheepishly. Tom gave him a friendly shove and sat down beside him on the bench. “Come on,” he urged gaily, “what is it all about? I’m here to hear all that’s to be heard. Don’t you like our Camp?”

Peter chuckled audibly. “S-u-ure,” he answered falteringly. “I like it fine, Mr. Slade.”

“But you don’t like the kids. Is that it?” Tom queried.

“Oh, honest—” Peter began.

“That’s understood,” Tom laughed. “The main thing is to unload all your difficulties before bedtime. You’ll sleep better. Are you getting enough to eat?”

“Uh huh,” Peter answered. “I even had more than I could eat.”

“Well that’s better than not enough, isn’t it?” Tom smiled.

Peter nodded.

“Outside of being homesick, there’s no other difficulty that I can think of just now. Perhaps you could tell me a new one.”

Peter’s face brightened and he moved closer to Tom. “I like the scouts here, Mr. Slade,” he confessed in a low voice. “I do like them. Only I never met any scouts before I came here. I never even talked to boys, except big fellers. That’s the trouble—I don’t know what to talk about.”

“Explain all that,” Tom said, kindly.

“It’s funny,” Peter said softly, “about me, I mean. I can see I’m funny, just since I came here today.”

Tom looked down at him inquiringly. “How do you mean?” he asked.

Peter flushed. “I mean I can see I’m different from other boys,” he answered. “I spose it’s ’cause Grandpap never lets me have any friends or nothing. He taught me how to read and write and everything. I’ve never been inside a school even. I guess that’s what made me different, don’t you think so?”

There was a sort of appeal in Peter’s question. Tom sensed it. He put his hand over on the boy’s knee. “That’s not such a difficulty to get over, kid,” he said, consolingly. “You’ll know every boy here by next week and you won’t have time to feel different. Get the idea?”

Peter smiled. “Sure,” he answered. “Only you can’t understand what it is to be me, Mr. Slade. Even if I do get to know the scouts here I’ll have to be careful not to be like them so I might as well stay alone by myself. Grandpap’d be mad if I came home acting and talking like other boys—I had to promise him I wouldn’t before I could even come here. He hates everybody in the world he says and that’s the reason he doesn’t want me to be like everybody else.”

“Your grandfather must be an odd number,” Tom said half aloud.

“He is,” Peter agreed. “Everybody over at Rhodes (that’s the mainland), they say he’s queer and that he’s trying to make me queer too. No one is friendly with him, not even old Jones. He’s Grandpap’s helper and he lives with us. Sometimes he’s nice to me.”

Tom looked puzzled. “Where do you live, Peter?” he asked.

“At Shadow Isle, Maine. It’s a mile from the mainland.”

“How is it,” Tom spoke at length, “that your grandfather allowed you to come here? How is it he will recognize scouting if he hates all the rest of our civilization?”

“He says most of scouting is sensible,” Peter answered. “He says it isn’t like other modern things—a lot of trash where you don’t learn anything. He just let me have this one vacation he says because I’ll soon have to learn to tend the light.”

Tom whistled low. “Oh,” he said, “so you’re a lighthouse scout, eh?”

“Yep,” Peter answered. “I’d rather do other things though. I like the land better than the ocean all the time. That’s why I got the idea of selling fish over at the mainland. I go in the spring and summer twice a week and I earned enough money to come here. A man I sold some fish to gave me a scout handbook. Grandpap wouldn’t let me read it for a long while.”

“But then he finally did,” Tom interposed.

“Yes, all of a sudden,” Peter went on. “He never was so nice to me before. He gave it to me and he said I should write to the scout headquarters and find out what camps there were and that I could pay my way with the money I had saved. Gee, I was surprised because he’s always been so cranky about me talking to anybody.”

“So that’s how you come to pick on the Adirondacks and Leatherstocking Camp, eh?”

“Yes,” Peter admitted. “It’s fine here I think, especially that great big cabin you call the Lodge.”

Tom smiled. “It is pretty nice,” he said. “This was once owned by a very rich man and he lived in the Lodge in the summer. We built all the cabins since the Scouts took it over. It was intended for a scoutmaster’s training camp but afterward they decided to use it for all purposes. That’s the reason I’m here—to take charge of you kids.”

Peter grinned. “Well I’m glad it’s you, Mr. Slade,” he said, naively. “It’s nice to have an older person treat me like I was grown up. Grandpap don’t do that. He’s most always mad at me.”

“Except when he decided you could come here,” Tom said. “He couldn’t have been mad then, I guess.”

“Oh no, he wasn’t,” Peter admitted proudly. “Gee, he acted like I wasn’t going away fast enough. Even old Jones noticed it because he asked me one night what had come over Grandpap to get so kind hearted all of a sudden. But I couldn’t tell him. I was only too glad to come here and see what the rest of the world was like.”

“You poor kid,” Tom said sympathetically. “Is it the first time you were ever away?”

“Sure,” Peter answered. “That is, as far back as I can remember. Grandpap said my father and mother died when I was a baby. He said I was born at the lighthouse and afterward they took me away for a couple of years.”

“Do you remember any of it?” Tom queried with interest.

“Well, a little,” Peter answered. “It’s sort of like a dream. I remember a nice tall lady—I guess she was my mother. And I remember a great big man that I called Father and we were out on the ocean like, because the waves were high just like I’ve seen them at the light in a storm. After that I sort of got sleepy and the next thing I knew my Grandpap had me in his arms and was climbing up the rocks to the lighthouse. That’s all I know.”

“That’s strange,” Tom said, aroused. “How do you know that it wasn’t all a dream?”

“I’ve always been sure it wasn’t a dream, Mr. Slade,” Peter said. “But Grandpap says it was a dream and if I tell it to anybody he’ll give me a licking. So don’t you ever tell on me, will you?”

“I should say not, Peter,” Tom promised. “You can depend upon that.”