“All right, you kids just stay here and hang around Thorn, if you want to!” he said. “But I’ll fix this camp! I’m going home and tell all over town what is happening, and I’ll bet your fathers and mothers will come running for you.”
“You just go ahead and do that, Plum!” advised Buck. “When the parents come out here we’ll show them that we are still in camp and that you were the only one who got scared and ran home! You, the biggest boy in the camp, went home, because you were afraid to stay!”
At once Plum saw his case. He could not possibly remain in camp after his thrashing from Ted and if he went back to town and told any stories the result would be as Buck had pictured it. He had lost all around and the knowledge was a bitter one.
He turned and walked out of the camp without a word or a backward glance.
They stood and watched him go in silence, the ring still unbroken. Then first one boy and then another of the ones who had packed to go with him, shed his knapsack and blanket, tossing them in the tents. The atmosphere seemed to have cleared magically.
“Well, sir!” enthused Buck, slapping Ted on the back. “That was a bang-up fight! Now that he is gone things will be a little sweeter around here. He was the big disturbing element.”
“Except the fellow who has been annoying us all this time,” reminded Ted.
“Yes, that is so. If we could only get rid of him as you did of Plum.”
“Maybe we can,” said Ted. “I have thought out a plan to trap that party.”