It was in fact not so very long ago when Lige Corbley had been something of a thorn in the side of Hugh Hardin and the scouts. He had scoffed at their aspirations, made sport of their helpfulness to others, and seldom missed an opportunity to annoy them. How it came about that Big Lige saw the error of his ways, and made such a complete change in his habits that he actually joined the troop has been entertainingly told in a preceding volume, so it need not be recounted here.
Lige knew that several of the boys, including Walter, were not quite as sure of his loyalty to the laws he had promised to obey, as Hugh and the rest might be. He also understood that this little shaft of suspicion was meant for him; but Lige simply grinned, and apparently paid no attention to it. As long as Hugh had faith in his reformation he was willing to stand for anything. Deeds, and not promises, were what counted, and he believed he was daily proving that he had cut aloof from the old life forever.
After the subject was threshed out thoroughly, so much had been said that some of the fellows declared they hardly knew whether they were standing on their heads or on their heels.
“But order will come out of chaos after a bit, you know,” said Alec, confidently. “It’s always this way at first. By degrees the wheat gets separated from the chaff, and in the end things look clear.”
“I’m willing to leave it all to Hugh!” declared Ralph Kenyon. “Seems like he always does know just what is best to do. I’ve never known him to get far astray in anything he undertook.”
Ralph had good reason to feel this confidence in the assistant scout master. He could look back to the time when he knew absolutely nothing of the finer motives that influence the true scout; when he delighted in spending his winters in trapping harmless little animals both for the fun it afforded him, and the small amount of money he received for their skins when sold to dealers in furs.
Then Ralph had become acquainted with Hugh, who had managed to convince him that there must be many other ways of earning money without giving pain to little creatures, most of them harmless, and even taking their lives away in the bargain. After his eyes had been opened, Ralph Kenyon had spent more time hunting wild ginseng roots, and found that it profited him three times as much as his former cruel occupation.
“We’ll meet here again on Monday night,” said Hugh just then, as they prepared to leave the room. “By that time I’ll have it all figured out, and each one will receive his orders in black and white. Mayor Strunk himself came to see me, for you know he is the head of the Fair management. He said he expected great things of the scouts, because they had made such great use of their opportunities in the past.”
“Mr. Marsh is one of the managers, too, you remember, fellows,” said Blake Merton. “His wife is president of the Town Improvement Association. She hasn’t forgotten what we did that time to make Oakvale a better place to live in. These things all count. What our boys do is sure to come back to them, just as chickens come home to roost.”
“That’s right, and I know it every day,” called out Lige Corbley. “The hardest thing any fellow ever tries to do is to live down a reputation. Lots of people think they can see the horns sticking out right along. They keep saying it’s only a little veneer or polish, and will rub off. Some of ’em even try to help rub it off; but thank goodness there are others who stand by a fellow, and keep him from going back on the rocks.”