Boy Scouts in the Canal Zone; Or, The Plot Against Uncle Sam

by G. Harvey Ralphson

“Well,” said Gastong, “Lieutenant Gordon was on the squad here, you know, before he went to Mexico, and I used to meet him now and then.”

“And he told you, on the first night of our arrival at camp, that we might need looking after?”

“Well, he told me that it would do no harm to let him know if I saw a mob of New York boys wandering about the works,” laughed Gastong.

“So that is how you happened to be patrolling the Culebra cut in a motor car on the day the boys ran into Col. Van Ellis at the old house?”

“Well,” said Gastong, “Tommy, here, kept me posted in a way, and I thought I might be useful out that direction.”

“It was clever of the lieutenant,” laughed Ned. “Suppose you now turn your attention to him? He may need the help of the Boy Scouts to get out of a hole himself.”

“I reckon you could help him, all right,” Gastong replied, confidently, but still with a look of anxiety on his face. “He has a heap of confidence in you, Mr. Nestor, but he thought best to take every precaution for your welfare. That is the reason why he surrounded you, as far as possible, with secret service people.”

Ned was more than amused at the statement, for all the discoveries that had been made had resulted from the activities of the boys and himself. In fact, the only help Gordon’s chain of secret service men had given his party was the thwarting of the plans of Van Ellis at the old house.

This had been important, in a sense, as the boys would otherwise have been held prisoners there and so would not have been able to come to the rescue of Ned and Jimmie at the old temple. Still, Jack Bosworth had been in that incident, and it was a question in the mind of the patrol leader if the result would have been the same without him. However, he gave the lieutenant full credit for his cautious way of going at the matter.

“The Japs, as you call them,” he said to Gastong and Tommy, “have gone on toward Colon. I’m going on after them, but it may be well for you to remain here on the chance of meeting the lieutenant. He may have plans of his own for to-night.”