“So Pug Kennedy is a scrapper, is he?” observed Jerry, when Ned told him the result of the talk with the other boy. “Well, it’s as well to know that first as last. I hope he isn’t sent to our camp. But, if he is, we’ll have to make the best of it.”
It was noted that “Pug” answered to the title of Michael, and it was assumed that “Pug” had been the characterization given him because of his fancied resemblance to a dog of that breed—a resemblance more real, in certain ways, than fancied.
In the following days the recruits were measured, weighed, tested in various ways, and finally were all sworn in as privates in the United States army that was eventually to fight, in France or elsewhere, the troops of the Central Powers.
To Bob’s distress he was held up by one doctor, as being overweight, and was close to being rejected. But his chums took him in hand, and for a day starved him on a most reduced diet, and made him take so much exercise that Bob lost about five pounds, and passed.
“But it was a close call,” said Jerry, when all was safe. “Don’t go to stuffing yourself with pie or crullers until after you’re in the camp. Then they won’t put you out, I dare say.”
“I’ll be careful,” promised Bob, now quite anxious.
And, three days later, the motor boys, with a number of their friends from Cresville, and with others whom they did not know, including the unpleasant Pug Kennedy, were sent to Camp Dixton, there to be given a thorough training for their new life in the army.