Читать книгу Westy Martin in the Rockies - Percy Keese Fitzhugh - Страница 10

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The Martins, notwithstanding their moderate prosperity, kept no car. Because people broke their necks with cars. Likewise, notwithstanding their moderate prosperity, Westy was not going to go to college. Because he wanted to go in for football and in that way boys broke their necks. Mr. Martin was not a bad sort of man, he was just (as Doris said) impossible.

The first summer that Westy went to Temple Camp a solemn promise had been extorted from him that he would not go on the water. Adventure, particularly big adventure with moderate risks, did not fit into Mr. Martin’s scheme of life. He called Tom Slade a daredevil. He was certainly not opposed to the moral side of scouting, he subscribed to all the scout virtues. But the adventurous side he could not contemplate calmly. He did not believe in boys going away from home. His idea of young manhood was embodied in the person of Mr. Archibald Captroop.

Mr. Archibald Captroop was twenty-four and he never went without his rubbers when it rained. There was a young man for you! He did not sport negligee khaki and go without a hat as Tom did. He worked in Wall Street and commuted and earned forty dollars a week. He lived in Raleigh Park about five miles from Bridgeboro so it was something of a coincidence that Doris and her mother had met him at Mountainvale during the summer. Doris had played tennis with him. After the return of the Martins to Bridgeboro, Archibald proved a frequent caller, making the journey to and from Raleigh Park by the trolley. That was one thing Mr. Martin liked about him, he had no automobile.

Archibald had no attraction for Westy. He was pleasant enough and not unmanly, but he was a smug little business man before his time. Mr. Martin approved of his saving his money instead of buying a Ford and he liked him immensely. He thought that Tom Slade, assistant at Temple Camp, might take a lesson from this steady young commuter. Mr. Martin could not believe that helping to manage a camp was really a business. The idea that a man could be a scout and guide in the silent places and call it a business was preposterous. To him old Uncle Jeb was a dubious character who had carried a gun, but never really had a business.

On his way home from school the next day Westy stopped up at the Van Arlen place. Artie was limping about, but getting better, though he was not to return to school for a week or so.

“I came to see you the first thing,” Westy said; “I’m on my way home from school.”

“I don’t have to go, thanks to you,” Artie said with his pleasant smile.

“Yes, I hear you say so,” Westy answered. “A lot you have to thank me for. It looks even as if I can’t pay you back like I meant to do.”

“Pay me back? Did you have a good time up there alone with Uncle Jeb? I was thinking about you alone up there. I bet it was nice just the pair of you. Two’s a company, hey? I couldn’t do much else beside sit and read, so I was thinking of you.”

“What were you reading?” Westy asked.

“Oh, wild-west stuff.”

“Listen, Artie,” Westy said. “I’ll tell you now that you were the one I was going to ask to go out West with me. I guess you know that, don’t you?”

“How should I know it?”

“Well, you just didn’t let yourself think of it, but anyway, you were the one. The only reason why I didn’t say anything about it up at camp was because—well, you know how my father is. I was kind of afraid all the time that maybe he’d say nix and I wanted for you not to be disappointed. I kind of didn’t let myself think of it till I got back, but all the while I was a little sort of shaky about what he’d say.”

“What did he say?” Artie asked.

“Oh, he’s just sort of begun to say I can’t go; I know how it’ll be. It’s all off and I suppose I have to write to Uncle Jeb. Dad says your folks wouldn’t let you go either after what happened to you.”

“Oh, yes, they would,” Artie laughed; “they’d be glad to get rid of me, I guess. My father said when I—— He said how a soldier——”

“Yes, what did he say when you—— You asked him if you could go in case I asked you, now didn’t you?”

“Well, yes, I did,” Artie said, embarrassed, but still amused at himself.

“So you wanted me to ask you, you old——”

“Don’t hit me on the foot,” Artie laughed, as Westy’s arm was raised in good-humored menace; “any place except on the foot.”

“Yes, and what about the soldier?”

“The soldier? Oh, yes, my father said there was a soldier who got wounded in eleven places and he was in six hospitals in France and he was gassed besides, and he got over all that and when he got home he slipped on the back steps and broke his neck. My father said it’s just as bad to break your neck in one part of the country as another. That’s what Pee-wee calls logic, hey? No, gee whiz, my father would be glad to see me go, my mother too. I know the cook would.”

“That’s what my father’s always saying about breaking my neck,” Westy said. “He let me go to Yellowstone that time because it was the Rotary Club and they’re all business men. But he thinks Uncle Jeb is some old bandit, I guess. Anyway, it’s all off, Art; he didn’t exactly say so, but I can see it coming. Only I just wanted to tell you that you were going to be the one to go with me. Now that I know what’s what I can tell you.”

“That’s all right, Wes,” Artie said. “As long as you tell me that I’ll admit I wanted to go. But I wouldn’t go unless you did, that’s sure. We should worry, hey? Gee, it’ll seem funny up at Temple Camp next summer without Uncle Jeb there. How’s school anyway? Is Grouchy Gordon teaching the fourth grade yet?”

“Sure, and Four-eyes is teaching drawing yet, too.”

“I thought she was going to get married,” said Artie, carefully changing his position on the porch swing seat so as not to hurt his foot. “False alarm, I guess, hey? Don’t move, there’s plenty of room, only I have to be careful of my plaguy foot.”

“Seen any of the fellows in the troop yet?” said Wes.