“I don’t mind that,” Gordon answered.
“Well, you would if you were I. But I’ve got a way to fix them. It’s my corporal’s idea. You’re going to be here through to-day, aren’t you? Well, you’ll see some fun. I’ve got to attend council at ten-thirty, and after that I’ve called a special patrol meeting to consider the plan.”
“Peek-a-boo, Frankie,” called a passing boy.
“That’s one of the worst of the lot,” said Frankie, confidentially.
“What’s the plan?” Gordon asked.
“You’ll see—it’ll be the Laughing Elephants by to-night.”
In a little while came the call to prayers, then breakfast. There was a camp historian in the Albany troop whose business it was to record the doings of each day and to read the entries of the day before, every morning before the campers rose from the early meal. Since the patrols often went about their pleasures separately and the boys were wont to wander off in pairs for a day of fishing, stalking, or exploring, it fell out that this record often contained matter unfamiliar to the camp as a whole, and so its reading was awaited with interest.
This morning, owing to the affair of Walter Lee, it would have a special interest. For Mr. Wade had been so much occupied during the evening and night before that none had ventured to question him.
When the meal was finished Henry Earle, the historian, rose at his place and, according to custom, first announced the camp routine for the day.
Plans for any special expeditions were submitted to Mr. Wade and then handed to Earle. From these he now read: