Читать книгу Pee-wee Harris on the Briny Deep - Percy Keese Fitzhugh - Страница 5

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Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin strolled over to the festive scene and bought marshmallows and frankfurters and lemonade and watched the exhibitions which were given for their especial entertainment. One lonely boy from Bridgeboro’s small slum neighborhood accompanied them around and seemed more awed by those wealthy patrons than by anything the Chipmunks had to offer. This stray visitor to the enchanted scene had made a most timely expenditure of his ten cents at the hedge gate, for Mrs. Baldwin treated him to everything and gave him a quarter besides.

“Now ladies and gentlemen,” Pee-wee shouted from the pavilion porch, “we’re going to give you a wonderful exhibition of how scouts can carry a scout if he gets injured falling from a tree only scouts know how to climb, so they don’t fall from trees, but anyway, I mean if they did.”

This thrilling demonstration was witnessed by the ill-assorted audience of three. It consisted of Pee-wee himself sliding down one of the porch supports and precipitating himself in a heap on the platform. He was then bandaged and carried into the pavilion by the Jansen brothers whence he presently emerged quite restored and announced that the next exhibition would be that of tracking a vanished animal across the grounds.

That night Pee-wee and his comrades camped in the pavilion and this feature of his enterprise was in all ways successful. The next day brought only a few stragglers and the fortunes of the Chipmunks were brought so low that they were reduced to the not altogether unpleasant necessity of eating their own frankfurters and marshmallows and waffles, and of drowning their sorrow in “ice cold lemonade.”

If the whole troop, under the auspices of the local council, had undertaken an enterprise of this kind, it would have been a success. But the Chipmunk affair was only a joke, and on the third day of its unhappy history its dubious outlook was greatly complicated by the arrival of the Ravens, the Elks, and the Silver Foxes, who offered no solace to their struggling colleagues who were running the carnival. But at least they furnished diversion.

“If you’re not going to spend money you have to get out,” said Pee-wee. “All you came in for was to start a lot of nonsense instead of paying respect to an educational exhibit. All you do is talk a lot of nonsensical nonsense.”

“We thought maybe you’d have a bear to show Stubby,” said Warde Hollister of the Silver Foxes.

“Hey, Kid,” said Roy.

“You keep off the porch!” shouted Pee-wee, “that’s for the management.”

“Hey, Kid,” said Roy, “did you hear the news? Dorry Benton is going to move out West and Stub is going to join the solid silver positively warranted sterling foxes. Off with the old love, on with the stew. He’s going up to camp with us this summer. So you can offer him your condolences on getting into the finest patrol that boys all over the country want to get into. Don’t they write me letters from all over wanting to move to Bridgeboro so as to go on hikes with us? I’ll leave it to Warde Hollister. Stubby’s in luck, he’s—”

“Will you shut up!” Pee-wee roared. “Did you come here to talk crazy nonsense? If Stubby joins the Silver Foxes it shows he’s a fool. Geeeee whiz!”

“You should pity and not condemn him,” said Westy Martin. “He has no motor to guide him.”

“He’s going to be a member of my patrol,” said Roy, “and if you say anything about him that’s true, it’s false, and you’ll have to answer me, Roy Blackeye!”

This was the kind of scene that Stubby so much enjoyed; he was captivated by Roy and loved nothing so much as to see him in mortal comeback, as they called it, with Pee-wee. Most of the scouts of the troop, having seen the few things the carnival offered, wandered away, leaving Roy and his Silver Foxes sprawling on the grass below the veranda, with Pee-wee denouncing them from the steps. The Liventi brothers stood behind their gorgeous instrument, bashful and smiling. They seemed always outsiders in the troop, and a trifle afraid to enjoy the discomfiture of their mighty leader. There was something winsome about their hesitant smile.

“A scout’s honor is to be toasted—trusted,” continued Roy. “You told Stubby that scouts are connected with wild animals and he called your bluff. Show him a bear and he’ll join the Chipmunks. Hey, Stubby? He’ll bring you boats and tents and cooking sets and everything. Won’t you, Stubby? Yes, you won’t. I never told him there were any wild animals at Temple Camp except mosquitoes. A Silver Fox tells the truth. I never even told him the Silver Foxes were solid silver. It pays to tell the truth. Hey, Stubby, how about that wireless sending set your father’s going to donate? My idea about the rifles is that—”

“Will you shut up!” Pee-wee fairly screamed.

“Look out, you’ll blow your tongue out,” said Roy.

“Did you come here to see the carnival, or did you come here to start a lot of nonsensical nonsense?” Pee-wee demanded.

“Where’s the carnival?” asked Will Dawson, glancing innocently about.

“It’s inside of you,” said Roy. “All there is to it is marshmallows, frankfurters and waffles and we ate them all. We ate a whole carnival. You can’t see it because your eyes are on the outside.”

“Do you want a demonstration or not,” Pee-wee demanded.

“Can we eat it?” asked Dorry Benton.

“Where is it?” Warde Hollister asked. “We couldn’t use it just now, we’re so full of frankfurters, but we’d like to take it away with us.”

“What is it?” Stubby smilingly asked. He liked Pee-wee even though he had no desire to be a Chipmunk.

“A demonstration?” Roy asked. “It’s made with two heaping teaspoonsful of mustard stirred well in a cupful of fountain pen ink and baked for sixty minutes and two hours by a half-baked scout. Only a Chipmunk can make them.”

“Now you see! Now you see!” Pee-wee fairly screeched at poor Stubby. “Now you see what kind of a patrol they are. And you want to join them! It’s because you’re a new feller in town and you don’t know anything about them—they’re all crazy. It’s kind of a not a patrol at all—”

“Why don’t you join the new patrol?” Ralph Warner asked.

“What one’s that?” Stubby inquired.

“The police patrol,” said Ralph.

“That’s full already, it’s got eight cylinders,” said Roy. “Eight’s the limit—if you want to know anything about scouting ask me. I’m an information bureau. Pee-wee’s a cooking cabinet. Hey kid, tell Stubby how you tracked a snail to his savage lair. The Chipmunks are short one member, and every member is short. Pee-wee .... lives close to nature, his head’s too near the ground. I’ll leave it to Warde, am I wrong as you usually are?”

“You’re right by mistake,” said Warde.

“The pleasure is yours,” said Roy; “we all make mistakes, that’s better than buying them, a scout is supposed to be resourceful—that means full of sauce, especially applesauce. Hey Stub, speaking of the new tent, I was thinking—”

“Don’t you believe him, he doesn’t know how to think,” thundered Pee-wee. “If you join his patrol you’ll have everybody laughing at you, even girls, and you’ll have to go on crazy hikes, walking backwards and going around in circles and never getting anywhere—they haven’t even got any destinations—”

“That’s a lie, Scout Harris!” said Roy. “We didn’t come in here to be consulted, I mean insulted. We have a great many destinations only we don’t carry them around with us, I’ll leave it to Westy. If you get to a destination you don’t have it any more—we keep our destinations for a rainy day. And I’ll tell you something to put down for a rainy day—”

“What’s that?” Stubby asked.

“The windows,” snapped Roy. “No sooner said than stung.”

“Now you see what they are!” roared Pee-wee. “And you want to join them! Geeeeeee whiz!”

“He takes us for better or worse,” Roy said. “We’re more to be pitied than scolded—we need tender care, also tender waffles—have you got any more waffles? Will you trust us for a dozen more? We’re financially embarrassed owing to the drop in stocks, I mean socks.”

This sly observation referred to Pee-wee’s rebellious stocking which was always descending to his ankle, especially in his strenuous moments of sublime wrath.

“Pull up your stocking, Scout Harris,” said Warde.

“If you’re not going to buy anything more,” said Pee-wee, “you’d better get out, because I own this field while we’re here and even I can have you injected, so you better get out. All you came here for was to start a lot of nonsense so as to show off in front of Stubby, and now he can see what nonsensical fools you are and still he wants to join you and give you new tents and everything, when he might join the Chipmunks with fellers like Bruno and Tasca and Ben Maxwell and me, and be in a regular patrol, geeee whiz!”

These last observations were made with a covert eye at Stubby whose reaction the head Chipmunk shrewdly noted. “Even if all he wants to see is a bear—”

“Sure, show him one,” interrupted Warde. “Even if it’s only a little one,” said Dorry.

“If he could even show him Bear Mountain,” added Ralph Warner.

“Or a bottle of Great Bear Water,” said Roy. “Anything just to prove that he’s telling the truth. All Stubby wants to know is that a scout is truthful; he wants to join a truthful patrol. Hey, Stub?”

“Hey, Stubby, listen,” said Warde; “this is good.”

“Is it truthful?” demanded Roy.

“I’m telling you the bare facts,” said Warde.

“Grizzly bear facts, or what kind?” Roy demanded. “Careful with your bears now; we don’t want to lose Stubby.”

“Listen,” said Warde. “Our scoutmaster—”

“Mr. Ellsworthless,” Roy added.

“That shows how you haven’t got any respect for your own scoutmaster!” Pee-wee roared. “His name is Mr. Ellsworth.”

“Pardon me, my error,” said Roy. “Go on with your story.”

“Our scoutmaster,” said Warde, “said we had troop spirit, and Pee-wee thought it was a ghost and he went hunting for it—”

“That shows—” Pee-wee exploded.

“I can tell you something better than that about him,” said Roy. “He thought that stalking meant hunting for a stork, so he—”

“Will you get out of here!” Pee-wee thundered. “The carnival is over so now we’re going to cook our own supper, so will you get out of here with all your crazy stuff! And if Stubby wants to join you, let him do it, only when he sees how everybody up at camp, even Tom Slade and Brent Gaylong and Uncle Jeb, and everybody has a lot of respect for my patrol, even they’ve got more merit badges than yours, then he’ll be sorry he didn’t join a patrol that doesn’t sprawl all over the ground all the time and jolly each other when they haven’t got anybody else to try and make a fool of only they can’t because in my patrol we’re real scouts and we’ve got something better to do than kick around on the grass even being disrespectful to their own scoutmaster and anyway we’ve got the signalling badge, that’s more than you’ve got!” He paused for air. When Pee-wee was thoroughly aroused he omitted his punctuating pauses; his tirades were in the elemental style of thunder.

“So you can go and join their crazy patrol if you want to,” he said to the smiling Stubby. “Only some time when they make you go on a hike whichever way the wind blows or going around in circles and everything like that, and you get all hungry with being famished—then you’ll be sorry! You’ll be sorry because you’ll be almost starved maybe, on one of those idiotical hikes. And all the time you might join a patrol that’s got the Bronway Award for music and a Star Scout——”

“We’ve got a Moon Scout, in our patrol,” interrupted Roy.

“There’s no such thing! Don’t you believe him, Stubby,” Pee-wee roared. “Even I bet he don’t know what a Star Scout is, he doesn’t. A lot they care about the Handbook.”

“A Star Scout is one that has studied astronomy,” said Roy. “The same as a Life Scout is one that has saved a life—I mean lost his own life in saving another.”

“That shows you’re a nonsensical, idiotical, insane fool of a lunatic!” screamed Pee-wee. “And all your patrol are like you!”

“Those are harsh words, Scout Harris,” said Roy. “A scout is kind.”

“He’s kind of crazy!” roared Pee-wee. “Go ahead, you join them,” he added turning contemptuously upon Stubby. “You join them and you’ll be sorry. Do you want to have remorse?”

“Have you got any? How much is it?” Roy queried.

Poor Stubby, he could only laugh. It was such an honest, wholesome, friendly laugh; no wonder that Roy wanted him in his patrol.