“Whom do you suppose Mr. Durland will pick out to go to the lumber camp to-day?”
“I haven’t the least idea,” Jack replied. “I’d like nothing better than to go myself. After I’d warned Mr. Flannigan of his danger, perhaps he would show me around the camp. It would be great fun, for I’ve always wanted to go over one thoroughly, but have never had the chance. We only got a glimpse of it the other day.”
“If you went, you could count on me to go, too, and old Don, here—he’d never consent to being left behind, would you, boy?” To which Don promptly gave a decided negative.
Although the boys had been talking in whispers, it was just enough to arouse the rest of the Scouts, and in a twinkling the lodge was filled with sleepy boys’ voices.
“I don’t want to get up,” complained one.
“I don’t, either! Nothing would suit me better than to stay just where I am for a couple of hours!”
“I wish I could take a dip and lie in the sun until I was dry, the way Don does. He never has to bother with clothes.”
However, a Scout’s sense of duty is always stronger than his love of ease, so in a few minutes the boys all filed out to take their morning plunge. It was only a few minutes until each Scout, refreshed by a dip in the cold water, and filled with the joy of living, rushed to the mess tent and began his day in a way approved from the beginning of time.
After the bedding had been aired and the cots made up, the boys were called together by the Scout-Master’s shrill whistle. They were then divided into squads, and each squad was assigned some special work for the day that was always play to the wood-loving boys.
“I think,” Mr. Durland said, “that since Jack knows the woods so thoroughly, he had better be the one to warn Mr. Flannigan of the plot. I suppose,” he added, turning to Jack, “that you want Tom to go with you, as usual, and of course Don couldn’t be kept in camp while you were out of it. If I were you, boys, I’d start right away, so that you can get back to camp early.”