The surrender came after supper.
[Chapter XIX]
First Aid by Wireless
IT never rains but it pours, and the conversion of Mrs. Bennett to scouting was shortly followed by the greatest catch of the season.
Charlie O’Connor came into the troop on the same wave which brought Connover, and East End contingent, though it did not surrender as yet, retired to the sweltering and almost deserted Bridgeboro, and tried to kindle a fire in Temple’s lot after the Camp Ellsworth fashion. The effort was not very successful.
The next day Jakie Mattenburg, on the strength of talk he had overheard in camp, tried his hand, or rather, his foot, at stalking, and was surprised to find that it was rather more interesting to watch the movements of a sparrow than to throw stones at it.
It could hardly be said that this band of seasoned hoodlums made much immediate progress toward scouting, but they remembered their rescue from the river at Roy’s hands, and they accorded him thereafter a grudging measure of consideration which, in the fullness of time, blossomed into genuine friendship. They were, in fact, the future Elk Patrol in its chrysalis form; but their career as scouts is part of another story.
A few days after the events of the preceding chapter the troop’s birthday was celebrated in camp and Connover and Charlie O’Connor submitted themselves to Roy, who tied a pink ribbon about the right arm of each. From Connover’s ribbon depended a card reading,
Chief
With Many Happy Returns from
The Silver Foxes
while Charlie O’Connor was presented as the gift of the Ravens.