“Yes, we know Giraffe can make a fire that way now, because he showed us yesterday, as easy as anything; but when I tried it, never a spark could I get,” and Step Hen looked disgusted because of his lack of knowledge.
“Huh! you needn’t feel bad,” declared Giraffe. “If it took me all that time to get on to the proper wrinkle, and me a regular fire fiend, how could you have the nerve to think you could hit her up the very first thing? But Bumpus ain’t never going to question that I won that wager, fair and square. Only because if I hadn’t, we’d a gone without a supper that night, and been near frozen in the bargain. Lots of things hinged on that fire, I’m telling you, fellers.”
“I should say they did,” observed Bumpus, frankly. “Why, on’y for its cheery twinkle them two poachers, Si and Ed, wouldn’t have known we were around; and you see how we’d have missed doin’ that great stunt which will go down in the history of the Silver Fox Patrol as one of the shining examples—”
“Oh! let up on that stuff, Bumpus, and help me to some more stew,” Giraffe broke in, as he passed his platter along.
“Well,” remarked Allan, “we’ve had a pretty good time of it up here, all told, counting the two separate trips we took. And it’ll be a long time before we beat the record for big game we’ve made in Maine.”
But Allan did not know what was before the Silver Fox Patrol before many moons had passed, or he would not have uttered this rash prediction. When the summer holidays came along, they had another long journey in prospect, provided the money was received from the bank, that had been offered for the restoration of the securities carried off by the bold yeggmen captured by the scouts, and as related in the preceding volume of this series. This trip would take them many hundreds of miles from home, into a country toward which a number of the boys had long looked with yearning eyes. And that Thad and his chums were fated to meet with new and thrilling adventures that really exceeded any they had encountered before, the reader will doubtless admit if he but secures the succeeding volume to the present story, and which has been issued under the name of “The Boy Scouts Through the Big Timber; or, The Search for the Lost Tenderfoot.”
There is not a great deal more to add. Jim must have managed to send some sort of message home, for at a certain station further down the road, (after the boats had been shipped through as freight, the two guides and Old Cale accompanying the scouts on the regular train,) Jim said they would have to spend half an hour there, and that they might as well get out to stretch. And lo and behold, there came a girlish cry, and they saw a small figure flying straight toward Old Cale, bearing a small bundle, which she immediately pressed into the clumsy arms of the giant, who immediately wrapped mother and baby in a warm embrace.
Of course it was Little Lina, and Caleb Jr.; and the boys all had to be introduced to Jim’s wife. They parted from them there; but upon arriving home, one of the first things Thad and his chums did was to subscribe a round sum apiece, and send up the nicest baby’s crib they could find in Cranford; for somehow they felt a personal interest in Little Caleb.
Giraffe was feeling very proud those days. He had accomplished what looked like the impossible when he finally managed to make his “silly fire bow” work, and saved himself and Bumpus from going hungry and cold that night they were adrift in the Maine pine woods.
Indeed, all of the boys had considerable to be proud of; and from that day until school finally began, after the trustees had declared the quarantine broken, each member of the Silver Fox Patrol was always the center of an admiring crowd of listeners whenever he went abroad.