off and play ball and let us fellows do all the
work on the boat and then he'd go in it up to Temple Camp. Gee, that's
one thing a scout never is-mean. We had it all fixed up to work and then
he flunked and let us do it all.

First I thought maybe I'd kind of not tell Mr. Ellsworth all about that
phone call and say I couldn't hear very plain, and all like that. But I
saw if I did that, I'd be worse than Westy. It was bad enough having a
slacker in my patrol without having a liar.

No, siree!

So I just went up to him and I said, "Mr. Ellsworth, he's out playing
ball somewheres and I guess he didn't intend to come. I admit it
disgraces my patrol and it disgraces the whole troop. I was going to ask
you if you thought maybe I could go away for an hour or so to follow a
track I found, but I won't now; I'll just stay here and work twice as
hard so as to make up for him. And the other fellows in my patrol will
too. Maybe that will make it seem not quite so bad."

CHAPTER XV

DURING NOON HOUR

One of the things that made me feel especially bad was that Wig Weigand
and Artie Van Arlen were there working, even after being nearly
killed the night before, and Artie was kind of lame, too, from straining
his ankle when he fell. Gee, I had to hand it to those fellows. And even
Pee-wee was working away with the rest of the Ravens and running to buy
nails and everything.

Both of the other patrols were all there except Tom Slade in the Elks,
but they kept his place open for memory, sort of.

After a little while Mr. Ellsworth strolled over to where I was working
and said to me--gee, he was awful nice the way he said it--he said,
"Roy, if you want to follow up that trail you may as well go ahead and
come back after lunch. We're going to hit the eats pretty soon now."
That's the way he always says it, "hit the eats."

"I was expecting Westy to go with me," I told him.

"Well, no matter," he said; "Go alone and don't worry any more about
Westy. It wasn't because Westy or any other single scout was needed
here for we have plenty of scouts on the job, but it was just that he
didn't show up when we all planned to be here, that's all. I don't
like to think of any; of my scouts falling down."

"It's the same about my patrol," I said, "and I'm ashamed, that's one
sure thing."

He said I shouldn't feel that way and that he guessed playing baseball
was good exercise anyway. But he only said that so I wouldn't feel bad.
Anywa