"Don't be like the day nursery," put in Roy. "All their trouble is caused by having very little patients."
"Very bright," said Mr. Ellsworth.
"Eighteen candle power," retorted Roy. "I ought to have ground glass to dim the glare, hey?"
The special scout meeting, called to make final preparations for the momentous morrow, had just closed; the other scouts had gone off to their several homes, and these three—Tom Slade, Roy Blakeley and Walter Harris (alias Pee-wee)—were lingering on the sidewalk outside the troop room for a few parting words with "our beloved scoutmaster," as Roy facetiously called Mr. Ellsworth.
As they talked, the light in the windows disappeared, for "Dinky," the church sexton, was in a hurry to get around to Matty's stationery store to complete his humdrum but patriotic duty of throwing up a wooden railing to keep the throng in line in the morning.
"The screw driver is mightier than the sword, hey, Dink?" called the irrepressible Roy, as Dinky hurried away into the darkness.
"All I wanted to say, Tom," said Mr. Ellsworth soberly, "is just this: let me do your thinking for you—even your patriotic thinking—for the time being. Do you get me? Don't run off and do anything foolish."
"Is it foolish to fight for your country?" asked Tom doggedly.
"It might be," retorted the scoutmaster, nothing daunted.
"I'm not going to stay here and see people drowned by submarines," muttered Tom.