Camp Lenape on the Long Trail

by Carl Saxon

So far, his expedition had not been successful. He had not seen any sign of a partridge or any other small game. Even had there been any of the birds in that part of the mountain, his stumbling progress would undoubtedly have given them warning long before he could train his rifle on them. But he kept on up the slope, smashing his way through the thick underbrush and trying not to turn his ankles on the rocky ground underfoot.

To his right he saw through the leaves a long scar of gray rock outcropping on the hillside. This promised easier going than the tangled underbrush. Besides, he thought, if he could get high enough, he might be able to look around and see in just which direction lay the camp. His flight from the marsh had twisted him around somehow, and a glance at the sky gave him the feeling that the sun was not where it should rightly be at this time in the afternoon. He altered his course and began scaling the sloping, moss-encrusted rocks.

Before he was half-way up the rocks, he began to wish he had not chosen such a steep and rough road. His shoes and trousers were in pitiful shape. Still he scrambled upward in the hot sunshine, dripping perspiration, ascending on hands and knees and trailing his rifle after him. He was glad to see that the rocks ended a few feet above his head in an overhanging bank of earth and matted shrubs. Over the top! He charged the little cliff, seized with his free hand the roots of a sapling oak that grew on the edge, and tried to haul himself up. His first heave loosened the soil; he could feel his hold slipping. He cast a fearful eye backwards; if he fell on those sharp rocks——!

A shower of dirt, twigs, and small pebbles rattled down upon his head; with a rending noise, the roots he was gripping parted. Clawing the air helplessly, Dirk fell backwards, and slid painfully a few feet down the smooth rocks. His rifle flew from his hand, described a short circle in the air, and landed with a bruising crash upon his outstretched right leg.

Dirk cried out, and rubbed his shin. The sharp blow brought tears of pain into his eyes, and he gritted his teeth. He realized now that it had been a foolish thing to trust his weight to such a sketchy hand-hold. Well, he had suffered for his error!

He clutched the rifle, whose wooden stock was badly scarred by the fall, and began crawling across the rocks to the shelter of the brush. Every movement heightened the ache in his leg, which was now throbbing brutally. When he gained the wooded hillside, he rose and tried to walk; but after a few steps he gave up, sat down, and began rubbing his shinbone once more.

Dirk was not used to giving up an idea easily, and he hated to think of limping back to camp with torn clothes, and lacking the game he had set out so proudly to get. Here would be a very different return from that he had visualized! But now he began looking about him and puzzling just in which direction lay Camp Lenape.

The sound of a bugle call floating up from the lake came to his ears, and faintly he could hear shouting, off to his right, where the woods were thickest. He could not be exactly sure where it came from, but evidently camp was not far away. Of course, he could back-track on his own trail, but that would mean going through the marsh again. There must be a short cut that he could take. He rose and began hobbling through the trees, hoping to find a stream where he could quench his hot thirst. As he went he thought of his mother and father, by this time far on the way back to the city. Dirk Van Horn was just a little homesick.

Again came the bugle-call. But this time it sounded from behind him! He wheeled about, listening. Where was camp? He could see nothing through the trees. Perhaps if he could climb high enough, he might catch a glimpse of the flagpole or the tents; but his leg was now swollen and stiff, and useless for climbing. Where was he, anyway? Could it be that he was lost among the mountains? Lost! Dirk began to run unsteadily through the thick brush. His eyes were wild, and the little hammers of panic were beating in his brain.

Brick Ryan was slipping into his swimming suit in Tent One when Sax McNulty, followed by a racing pack of boys, appeared at the lower end of the campus. The new recruits had hit camp just in time for afternoon swim period.