“Walt, you ain’t foolin’, are you? Tell me, you rabbit-footed tenderfoot, have you got proof?” implored Tug.
“Big Jim’s word for it, and a photo,” replied Walter.
Tug’s face cleared. “That’s good enough. Oh, my eye, wait till that record is posted to-night!” he chortled.
Tug was not disappointed. The record held, and the Delawares celebrated that night with a bonfire and war dance in which Walter, to his confusion, found himself the central figure. Harrison’s chagrin was too evident to escape notice, and his defeat was rubbed in with a malice born of his growing unpopularity.
The next morning when Walter met him and offered his hand Hal passed on as if the other lad were a stick or a stone. The insult was witnessed by several Delawares and by members of Hal’s own tribe. That night a meeting of indignation was held by the Delawares, and in spite of Walter’s protest and the efforts of Woodhull and one or two of the older boys, it was voted to send Harrison to Coventry so far as the Delawares were concerned, that is, he was not to be spoken to or recognized in any way.
In his own wigwam Hal was only a degree less unpopular. The leaders tried to induce him to make an apology, pointing out to him that he was violating both the spirit and word of the Scout’s oath, but the effort was without avail. The high-strung, undisciplined boy, accustomed from babyhood to having his own way, fawned upon by all with whom he had hitherto come in contact because of his father’s great wealth, was utterly unable to adjust himself to the new conditions which surrounded him, to the democracy of which he was now a part yet of which he had no understanding. So he went his headstrong way, and if in his heart were bitterness and misery he made no sign.
The Senecas stood by him with half-hearted loyalty because he was a fellow tribesman, but there was not one whom he could call a friend. So he became more and more isolated, spending his days fishing, the proudest, loneliest boy in all the big camp. The fact that he continued to score with big fish gave him a measure of standing with his tribe, and to maintain this became his chief object in the daily life.
Walter was thinking of this and wondering what the outcome would be as early one morning he headed his canoe for a setback some three miles from camp, which he had discovered the day before. The entrance was so hidden in a tangle of alders and brush that it was only with the greatest difficulty that he could pick out the channel. He had passed the spot dozens of times without suspecting that anything lay beyond.
Patiently and carefully he worked his way through the tangle, once having to get out and lift the canoe over a jam of a dozen stranded logs. Beyond this the channel was comparatively clear. Unexpectedly it abruptly opened into a broad body of water perhaps half a mile long, deep in the middle, and with the upper end covered with an acre or more of lily-pads.
Walter’s eyes sparkled. “Gee, I bet there’s pickerel in here!” he exclaimed, unconsciously speaking aloud.