Some of the boys took quite a fancy to the novel food, but others nibbled and threw up their hands, saying they did not like the slightly fishy taste, though it was certainly true that the meat was as tender as spring chicken.
So another day had passed. Hugh was secretly glad that so far they had heard nothing to indicate that trouble had broken out over at the headquarters of the striking cement workers. When he prepared to settle down that night, after arranging for the watch, Hugh’s last injunction to the sentries was that they should call him if they heard any suspicious sounds in the direction of the scene of the labor war.
The night passed peacefully away, and not a single event happened calculated to cause alarm. With the coming of another day, the scouts busied themselves after their usual fashion in laying out ambitious plans, but, owing to circumstances which none of them could foresee, none of them were fated to be carried into effect.
Indeed, hardly had they finished eating than there came a sudden loud angry burst of distant shouts, quickly followed by the report of a number of guns. Then, after a brief silence, while the boys were standing there listening with intentness and anxious faces, another chorus of voices came rolling over the two miles of space that lay between the scouts’ camp and the village of the foreigners, as well as the cement works in which they had formerly labored day after day until agitators caused them to make demands upon their employers and quit in a body.
A second time the sound of scattered gunshots came to the strained ears of the boys, with many frenzied shouts that now seemed to tell of terror, as though the rioters might have been awed by the show of force, seeing so many of their number shot down in cold blood.
Again silence brooded over the land, a silence that was eloquent of terrible possibilities, and which gave Hugh one of the queerest sensations he had ever experienced as in imagination he could see the field of battle where all this fighting was taking place.
CHAPTER VIII.
SCOUTS HEED THE CALL TO DUTY.
“They’ve gone and done it after all, Hugh!” exclaimed Alec Sands, as he turned a rueful face toward the scout master.
Nor was Alec the only one who looked puzzled and worried, for other faces showed positive signs of pallor. Hugh himself was not entirely free from experiencing the deepest anxiety since he knew only too well how men’s passions can run away with their better judgment.
“That was a regular battle, as sure as anything,” said Arthur Cameron, shuddering as he recalled how terrible those last cries had sounded, fraught as they were with what seemed to be fear.