Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp

by Percy Keese Fitzhugh

"They told us we should have a life preserver for everybody on board and a fog horn."

Cracky, wasn't I relieved. "Isn't Pee-wee fog horn enough?" I said.

Just the same it started me thinking about Lieutenant Donnelle again, and after I went to bed I kept on thinking about him, so I couldn't get to sleep. One thing, I knew I liked him a lot, that was sure. But now since I knew about the new law, that a motor boat has to have a license, I wondered why Jake Holden didn't have one and have the number on his boat, like everybody has to. Anyway, it was lucky for him that he didn't have any number on, because now they'd have a hard job finding him, especially because I knew he didn't give his right name. And then I began wondering about the adventure that Jake and Lieutenant Donnelle had. One thing sure, it must be pretty bad to be out on the ocean like that in a little boat and be almost dead. I was wondering if there was any more to it than Lieutenant Donnelle told me, maybe. Anyway, he'd had lots of adventures in his life, that was sure. I was glad he said we'd go on a hike some day.

After a while, when I couldn't get to sleep, I got up and went out on the deck and sat in one of the big steamer chairs. Oh, it was fine. It was all pitch dark and all you could see were the lights on the boats. All of a sudden I heard a sound and saw a face and the hair round the face was all hanging down and it gave me a scare, kind of.

Then I saw it was Skinny. He said, "Can I sit down alongside of you?"

I said, "You ought to be in bed," and he said, "I can't go to sleep because I keep thinking and I want to stay right near you. I ain't mad at you, anyway. Were you thinking about how they got mad at you?"

All the while he came closer and he took hold of my arm with his hand and his hand was hot—even through my khaki shirt I could feel it. And his eyes didn't look like the other fellows' eyes.

I said, "I couldn't sleep because I was thinking about a fellow that's a hero. He's a big fellow. You know what a hero is?" I said.

"Are you a hero?" that's what he said. That's just what he said.

Anyway, one thing I didn't know then, and that was that Skinny was going to have more to do with Lieutenant Donnelle than I was. Poor little kid, he didn't know it either. That was one good thing.