“I came to tell you that I’m the one who turned in that false alarm,” said Hervey. “I did it because a feller that I met dared me to. Maybe he was a burglar, but anyhow you got to prove it to me first. Maybe the police are only fools thinking he’s a burglar. Those two scouts are a couple of fools because they admit they were up at the corner and they didn’t even see me, they’re such punk scouts. I can show you my own tracks in the field. So you better let Chesty McCullen go home, because he didn’t do it.”
“Go easy, young feller,” warned the officer, “you’re puttin’ too many fools in your talk. So you sent in the alarm, huh? What’s your name?”
The chief strolled in, leaned against the desk and listened while Hervey told the story of his encounter with the stranger who had thought up the hot tamale stunt. Then this scout who was no scout, or this happy-go-lucky boy who was one (suit yourself) was held on the charge of malicious mischief.
“So that’s what you call a hot tamale, is it?” the sergeant asked.
“It’s a hot tamale,” said the chief. It was not clear whether he was characterizing the stunt or the fact of Hervey’s coming and giving himself up. That was a pretty good hot tamale. The chief was in about the same uncomfortable predicament that Councilor Wainwright was in when he dismissed Hervey from Temple Camp. But like Councilor Wainwright he had his duty to perform.
So Hervey was held on the charge of malicious mischief and they called up Walton’s Stationery Store and told poor Mr. Walton about it. And meanwhile, they liberated little Chesty McCullen and told him that he had better not loiter around on corners and near fire boxes. He went scuffling home where his poor, scrawny, overworked mother was relieved to learn that her elder son, absent from home, was no longer wanted. Thus Chesty McCullen got a sort of a backwash from scouting; he was later to be borne upon its rising tide.
Poor Mr. Walton hurried to the station, a lanky, elderly man with a troubled countenance. They knew him and respected him. He was more troubled than Hervey, for Hervey was triumphant, whereas Mr. Walton was just humiliated.
“Well, Hervey,” was all he said.
“He came and told us of his own accord,” said the chief. “He’s a little devil, but a white one.”
Mr. Walton nodded.