“But you don’t hear me laughing at all, Bumpus,” Thad told him; “and I understand just how you feel about it. Nature gave you a tender heart, and made Giraffe on different lines; but I tell you plainly, I’ve often wished some of the other fellows were more like Cornelius Hawtree!”
“Oh! have you, Thad?” said the fat boy, with a suspicious tremor in his voice. “Thank you, thank you ever so much for saying that. I’d rather have your good opinion, than that of any other fellow I ever knew.”
And somehow he felt so light-hearted after receiving that little sincere compliment from the watchful scout-master, that he really found no great difficulty in keeping wide-awake during the entire term of his vigil; for there is nothing equal to a little praise to set a boy thinking, and therefore remaining vigilant.
When the time came to make a change he spoke to Thad as soon as the other drew near his position.
“Never batted an eye once, Thad, and that’s a fact,” he announced, proudly. “Oh! I’m on the road to better things, I tell you. And while I heard lots of queer old grunting and groaning deep in the swamp, I didn’t see a suspicious thing. Will you get Giraffe and Bob White out now?”
“Yes, because they come tailing after us, according to the programme;” and while Thad crept into the second tent to arouse the boys, Bumpus hung around so as to inform Giraffe that he had fulfilled his duties as sentry to the letter.
However, the tall scout seemed to want to hurry past him, and only gave a grunt in reply when Bumpus launched forth on an elaborate account of how he had proved himself equal to the test. In fact, one might have thought that Giraffe was holding his breath as though he feared to take cold by breathing the cool night air too suddenly, after coming out from his snug blanket.
When Thad and Bumpus had also crawled under the flap of the first tent, all immediately became quiet again, the new sentries having taken up their positions as marked out by the patrol leader, in whose hands such things must lie, as he is always in charge of the camp.
Bumpus heard a little restless moving about when he tried to settle down, as if at least one of the other occupants of the tent might be trying to change his position. But the fat scout was too tired and sleepy to bother his head about any trifle like this; besides his cold seemed to get no better, and he was apt to give a loud sneeze at any time.
He distinctly remembered allowing his head to drop on the rude pillow he had fashioned out of his shoes, covered with his clothes-bag; and then seemed to be carried away on the wings of dreams.