Читать книгу Roy Blakeley's Motor Caravan - Percy Keese Fitzhugh - Страница 4

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What do you think my father said? He said he wished he was young enough to go along. Oh, but he’s a peach of a father! So is my mother. My sister Marjorie said she’d like to go too. Harry said that no girls were allowed. He said that girls were supposed to stay home and receive picture post-cards. Gee whiz, I’m sorry for them. I’m glad I’m not a girl. But if I wasn’t a boy I’d like to be a girl.

That night we had our regular troop meeting. Cracky, you can’t get that bunch quiet enough to tell them anything. You know how it sounds in a graveyard? And you know how it sounds in a saw mill? Well, a graveyard sounds like a saw mill compared with the noise at one of our meetings. So I told our scoutmaster, Mr. Ellsworth, that I had something to say and he said they should let me have the chair. Then they began throwing chairs at me. It’s good he didn’t tell them to let me have the floor, or they’d have ripped that up, I suppose.

“I’d like to get your ear,” I shouted.

“You’ll get our goat if you don’t say what you’ve got to say,” Doc Carson yelled.

“I’m trying to say it if I can get your ear,” I said.

“You can have anything except my mouth,” Pee-wee piped up. Good night, he needs that.

Then Mr. Ellsworth got them all quieted down and I told them how Harry Domicile wanted the Silver Fox Patrol (that’s my patrol) to go out west and how he wanted Pee-wee to go too, even though he was one of the raving Ravens. I said the reason he wanted Pee-wee to go was so he could blow up the tires and we wouldn’t have to have any pump. Pee-wee likes auto tires, because they’re the same shape as doughnuts—that’s what I told him.

There’s one good thing about our troop and that is that one patrol never gets jealous of another. If my patrol gets a chance to go somewhere the other fellows don’t get mad, because they get more to eat. Absence makes the dessert last longer. In our troop each patrol does as it pleases—united we stand, divided we sprawl. Each patrol always has more fun than the other patrols. So if everybody has more fun than anybody else, they ought to be satisfied, I should hope. Pee-wee is in the Ravens, because he got wished onto them when the troop started, but he belongs to all three patrols, kind of. That’s because one patrol isn’t big enough for him. He spreads out over three.

So this is the last you’ll see of the Ravens and the Elks in this story. Maybe you’ll say thank goodness for that. They went up to Temple Camp. There were fifty-three troops up there and everybody had more dessert because Pee-wee wasn’t there. So that shows you how my patrol did a good turn for Temple Camp. Gee whiz, you have to remember to do good turns If you’re a scout.

Now this story is all about that trip that we made to bring back those four machines, and believe me, we had some adventures. If you were to see Jolly and Kidder’s big delivery van now, all filled up with bundles and things C. O. D., you’d never suppose it had a dark past. But, believe me, that past was darker than the Dark Ages. You learn about the Dark Ages in the fifth grade—that’s Miss Norton’s class. She’s my favorite teacher because she has to go to a meeting every afternoon and she can’t keep us in.

So now I guess I’ll start. The next morning who should show up but Brent Gaylong. He didn’t even bother to wire. He said he didn’t believe in telegrams and things like that when it came to adventures. He’s awful funny, that fellow is—kind of sober like. He’s head of a troop up in Newburgh and we met him when we were on a hike once. He can drive a Ford so easy that you don’t know it’s moving. He says most of the time it’s not moving. He’s crazy about adventures. Good night, when he and Harry Domicile start talking, we have to laugh. He said he’d do anything provided we got into trouble. Harry told him there ought to be plenty of trouble between Missouri and New York. That fellow tries awful hard to get arrested but he never can.

Now I’ll tell you about the other fellows. Harry was the captain—he had charge of the whole outfit. I bet Mr. Junkum trusted him a lot. But one thing, Harry never does anything for money. He says money is no good except when it’s buried in the ground and you go and try to find it. That’s the kind of a fellow he is. He didn’t get killed three times in France. But he came mighty near it. He’s got the distinguished service cross. He lives in Little Valley near Bridgeboro. Bridgeboro is my town. I don’t mean I own it. Harry’s got a dandy Cadillac car of his own. He takes my sister Marjorie out in it.

There was one other big fellow that went on that trip and that was Rossie Bent who works in the bank. He got his vacation especially so he could go. He’s got light hair. Often when he sees me he treats me to a soda.

Tom Slade went so as to drive the fourth car, and he’s a big fellow too, only you bet your life I’ll never call him a big fellow, because before he went to the war he was in our troop. And even now he’s just like one of us scouts. I guess maybe you know all about him. Believe me, the war changed him more than it changed the map of Europe.

That leaves Pee-wee and the rest of the fellows in my patrol. So now I’ll tell you about them. First comes Roy Blakeley (that’s me), and I’m patrol leader. That’s what makes me look so sober and worried like. I have to take strawberry sundaes to build me up, on account of the strain of managing that bunch. Next comes Westy Martin; he’s my special chum. He’s got eleven merit badges. He’s awful careful. He does his homework as soon as he gets home every day, so in case he gets killed it will be done. I should worry about my homework if I got killed. Next comes Dorry Benton, only he was in Europe with his mother so he didn’t go with us. If he had gone with us he would have been there. Hunt Manners couldn’t go because his brother was going to be married. The rest of the fellows were Charlie Seabury and Will Dawson and the Warner twins, Brick and Slick. They’re just the same, only each one of them is smarter than the other. You can’t tell which is which, only one of them likes potatoes and the other doesn’t. That’s the way I tell them apart. If I see one of them eating potatoes I know it’s Slick. That leaves only one fellow, and gee whiz, I’m going to give him a chapter all to himself and I hope he’ll be satisfied. Some day he’ll have a whole book to himself, I suppose. Good night!