In due time they passed over the divide. As agreed on, Hugh immediately gave the signal to the two boys in camp that they were coming, so that they might get busy with a bumper breakfast. Billy declared that he was ready to eat them out of house and home, such was the sharp appetite this early morning climb had given him.
The scout salute met the victorious army on its arrival, and for a brief time the air was filled with the totem cries of the various patrols, Wolf, Hawk, Fox and Otter combined in one grand pæan of victory.
Arthur Cameron was delighted because the friendly scout to whom he had entrusted his camera had made sure to take several pictures of the group with their prisoners at the mill, and again on the way over the wild uplift that separated the scene of their late adventure from the river.
First of all, Hugh, after breakfast had been enjoyed, carried Monkey to the place where the other two motorcycles had been left. Then he went back and conveyed Billy the same way. This left only the runabout to be looked after, and as they must use this in order to get their prisoners to town, the scout master once more made the trip with a passenger seated behind his saddle.
It promised to be a busy day indeed for some of the scouts. Hugh decided to accompany Gusty when the two prisoners were taken to town. Then the latter meant to start once more for the quarries with the money for the semimonthly payroll. Doubtless there would be more or less anxiety up there on account of his failure to arrive on the specified day.
Seeing that they were so near the quarries, Hugh finally changed his mind and had Gusty first of all run over with the money. After that they loaded the two bound men into the car, and managed to find places for themselves.
The hoboes were delivered safely to the police, and were promptly recognized as men long wanted for other crimes along the line of looting country stores. Once again praise of the scouts was on everybody’s lips, and they made new friends all around their home town.
Gusty pleaded with Hugh to be taken back to the island camp in order to get better acquainted with those whom he meant to join later on; and, pleased with the way things had turned out, the scout master was only too glad to accommodate him.
They still had several days ahead of them before the return voyage was to be undertaken, down the river and home by a circuitous route. Hugh decided to manage to take his motorcycle aboard and keep company with the others, for he wished to show Gusty so many things connected with scoutcraft that he begrudged losing any time. Besides, Hugh believed in striking while the iron was hot; and he did not mean that this eagerness on the part of Gusty should find a chance to wane until he was a full-fledged tenderfoot scout.
The return journey was made safely, though of course, not without excitement and fun. As vacation time was now near its close, the boys fancied that they would have to turn their thoughts somewhere else for amusement. It happened, however, that events were shaping throughout the home town in a manner to enlist Hugh and his comrades in an enterprise calculated to show the scouts in quite another light than that of the past, in which they had figured so prominently.