The Boy Patrol on Guard

by Edward Sylvester Ellis

Thus far the youth had not felt the slightest misgiving, and even now he was sure there was no cause for alarm. If he was astray it could not be for long. He was not far from some of the numerous towns and villages in that section, and if he could not find the Boy Patrol camp, he surely would not have to search far before coming upon friends. If the waning afternoon should find him in the woods, it would be no special hardship to pass the night under the trees, though he did not fancy the prospect and did not mean to stay out unless necessity compelled.

None the less it dawned upon him for the first time that his task was not likely to be as easy as he had supposed. Only an experienced woodsman can hold to a mathematical line in the trackless wilderness, which was what he must do to reach the camp of the Boy Patrol.

“It would be no task if there was a path or road, and I was sitting in an automobile, wid me hand on the steering gear or directing the Deerfut up the Kennebec, or if them byes had put up guide posts, which the same I’ll remind them to do.”

If there was one thing regarding which Mike felt certain it was that he had kept to a straight course after stepping ashore from the launch; but if such were the fact, how could it be explained that he had traveled all of this distance, and yet, so far as appearances went, was as far from his goal as when he started?

“It’s more than I can understand, as Maggie Keile said when her taycher told her ‘queue’ spelled ‘q.’ Now, if I could come upon the tracks of some person it would be all that I could ask—and begorra! here they be!”

Looking down at the ground, his eyes rested upon the very thing he wished to see: there was the impression visible in the soft leaves. Scarcely a rod from where he was standing was a yielding patch of moss where the trail showed with clearness. The outline of the broad sole of a shoe could be plainly traced until it became more obscure on the drier leaves. Mike stepped nearer and studied the “signs.”

“Now, that felly knowed where he wanted to go, and not being such a fool as me, he’s gone there. All I have to do is to keep to the course he took and I’ll come out somewhere. I’ll stick close, as the fly paper said to me whin I sat down on it.”

Not doubting that he had found the key to the problem, all anxiety vanished. It was not to be supposed that the individual who had preceded him was ignorant of the woods and the quickest ways of emerging from them. Mike even figured on coming upon him with the appearance of accident, and of keeping from him his own need of assistance in going to the Boy Patrol camp.

“It may be they’ve been here so short a time that he hasn’t obsarved the same, but Gosling Lake has been in these parts a good many years, and he’ll be sure to know where it is. I’ll draw it out of him as if I don’t care much.”

The youth had not forgotten that simplest of all expedients which is the first to come to an astray person. This was to shout at the top of his voice. More than likely he would be heard at the Boy Scout camp, and if not there, by the stranger whom he was trailing. But he was not ready to admit that he really needed help, and to ask for assistance would be a confession that he was frightened for his own safety. He would be ashamed to appear in such a plight, and Alvin and Chester would be sure to make the most of it. What more humiliating than to be introduced to a lot of strangers as one who did not know enough to travel a few miles through the woods without some person to lead him by the hand?