“And this is the day for it,” added Alvin, who had scarcely uttered the words when a threshing of the wood was heard, accompanied by the sharp cracking of a whip and a resounding voice:
“Gee up! Consarn you, what’s the matter with you? You’re purty near there!”
Two powerful horses, tugging at a ponderous open wagon piled high with boxes of supplies, labored into sight, while the driver, a lean, sandy-haired man perched on the high seat, snapped his whip, jerked the lines, clucked and urged the animals to do their best, which they certainly did.
The boys stepped aside out of the way of the team, and saluted the driver as he came opposite and looked down upon them. He nodded, but nothing more, for his animals required his attention. Our young friends fell in or followed the wagon to the edge of the lake only a brief distance away, where the driver flung his reins to the ground and leaped down. He was bony, stoop-shouldered, without coat or waistcoat, and had his trousers tucked into the tops of his cowhide boots.
“Say, I see by your dress you b’long to the Boy Scouts,” he remarked, addressing the whole party.
“We are proud to say we do,” replied Alvin.
“And the Boy Scouts be proud to have us belong to ’em,” added Mike.
“I should think they would be blamed proud of you,” said the man with a grin.
“Your perciption of the truth is wonderful, as me mither exclaimed whin Father Meagher said I was the purtiest baby in Tipperary.”
“And you chaps believe in doing a good turn every day to some person?”