The Boy Scouts Under Fire in Mexico

As the boys looked in at this picturesque exhibition of family life, a tall, lank Indian man sauntered up and muttered a few authoritative words to the woman at the loom. She stopped her work and went over to the child, trying to hush its cries by shaking a string of bright beads before it.

"Huh!" grunted Tubby, looking after the departing man. "He only wanted us to see that he was 'big chief' here! Huh!"

When the east-bound train stopped at Albuquerque an hour later, each one of the boys had purchased a few small souvenirs. Rob had the tiny square rug of Navajo weaving that had caught his eye, a round, almost flat workbasket, and a little pair of bead-embroidered moccasins.

Merritt and Andy had selected a few inexpensive, gaudily decorated gourds and strings of beads for their boy friends. At the last moment, Tubby decided to burden himself with what he considered an artistic bit of pottery. Rob warned him that vases and jugs and urns were breakable, but Tubby persisted in bargaining for the piece that he had chosen.

"Two dolla'," the woman who held it said as he hesitated beside her.

"No, no. One dolla'," Tubby offered.

"One dolla'," the woman agreed; and then as Tubby extended his hand for the vase and gave her the money, the woman drew back and said frowningly, "No, no! Two dolla'!"

At this Tubby seized his purchase and rather inelegantly rejoined, "Not on your life!" as he made off for the car.

At St. Louis the boys were glad to break the long railway journey and to visit the places noted in the itinerary that Dr. Matthews had provided. This included an automobile ride about the city, which gave them an excellent idea of its arrangement, its fine system of parks and its public buildings. At the end of the ride they felt quite ready to follow the next suggestion, which directed them to a popular restaurant. And after luncheon they still had time to walk across the great bridge that spans the Mississippi and to return by ferry, before their train was due to depart for Washington.

They reached the National City early in the morning, and here, too, they were advised by their typewritten directions to save time by taking a sight-seeing automobile and sitting near the "personal conductor" of the car in order to view quickly the important sections of Washington.

Having engaged their seats, the four boys sat in the big machine and studied diligently the map of the city and the guide books that they had bought at the station, until the usual hour for the daily morning trip arrived. Then, eagerly interested, they gave their whole attention to the vistas that opened momentarily before them and to the descriptions that interpreted the sights. They made many mental notes of places that they would like to see again: the Capitol, the Congressional Library, the Smithsonian Institute, the Washington Monument, the White House and a dozen other interesting buildings. But when the ride was over, they decided to accept the advice on the touring agent's list and spend most of their remaining time in the Capitol and Congressional Library.

"We'll engage a guide here," said Rob as they ran up the broad flight of steps leading to the western entrance of the Capitol. "I know that it is the customary thing to do, and it will save a lot of time, too."

Scarcely had they entered the Rotunda before a blue-uniformed attendant approached them and offered his services, and no time was lost in making a start.

The historical paintings gave the guide the text for his opening speech, and from then to the end of the trip the boys followed him closely and listened to his explanations with keen interest.

Coming so recently from scenes of civil strife, the scouts had a new respect for the torn and soiled battle flags that they saw, and for the significant typo for magnificent paintings that illustrated scenes of martial victory.

"I'll bet Cornwallis hated to give up," ejaculated Tubby thoughtfully, as he gazed at the picture of the surrender at Yorktown.

"We don't often think of his feelings when we remember our victory," responded Rob, "but it is just as well to know that there are two points of view for every crisis."

"This way, please," called the guide, and the boys hurried after him into the Statuary Hall.

While Tubby stood lost in contemplation before a statue of Daniel Webster, the guide led Andy quietly out of sight behind another marble figure.

"Now whisper a message to your friend," directed the guide softly.

"Hey, Tubby, how would you like to be the man on the pedestal?" whispered Andy, seeing that there was some joke in store for his fat chum.

Tubby whirled around quickly at the question, and looked vastly surprised not to find Andy at his elbow.

"Where are you?" he asked, bewildered.

Andy chuckled softly and, at a nod from the smiling guide, whispered, "This side of the Rio Grande!"

"Where is Andy, fellers?" questioned Tubby, looking at Rob and Merritt. "Honest, his voice sounded right in my ear!"

At that Andy stepped into view, and the guide explained that the hall had the properties of a "whispering gallery," and that half his fun in life came through playing this simple trick on unsuspecting visitors.

"It is a good trick, all right," admitted Tubby, grinning, "and I won't hold it against you, Mr. Guide!"

From this room, – in Daniel Webster's day the Hall of Representatives, – the boys were led to the doors of the present legislative chambers and permitted brief views of the imposing desks, arranged in semi-circular rows, at which the men sent from all over the nation sit in long sessions of serious deliberation. On the day of the scouts' visit, Congress was not in session and there was nothing to prevent the boys from peopling the empty seats with men of their own imagination.

"Some day maybe you and Merritt will sit there," said Tubby to Rob.

"Why not you, Tubby?" asked Merritt quickly.

"Oh, me?" questioned the fat boy in alarm. "This is no place for me. Give me a good steady job that I can keep at till it's finished. Perhaps I'll join the Secret Service!" And Tubby patted the pocket where the odd shaving lay.

After lingering briefly in admiration before the paintings that adorned these rooms and the statues that punctuated the long corridors, the guide conducted the boys to the foot of the stairs that led to the lofty dome above the Rotunda.

"Better not hurry," he cautioned them, glancing at Tubby's bulk. "There are three hundred and nineteen steps between us and the top gallery."

"I'm game," said Tubby quickly. "Come on, fellers. It can't be so bad as horseback riding in Mexico!"

When about two-thirds of the way up, the guide halted the boys to demonstrate a second "whispering gallery," and there he placed Rob and Merritt sixty-five feet apart to enjoy a private conversation! Tubby refused to be convinced without a trial himself, so he and Andy tested the acoustic properties of the gallery until they were satisfied that the guide's claims were well founded.

When they reached the highest point available within the dome, Rob made a discovery.

"Boys, will you look at that mess of color over your heads? From 'way down below I thought that was a very beautiful painting!"

"And so it is," put in the guide.

"One of the kind where 'distance lends enchantment,'" commented Merritt, gazing at the thick patches of paint on the ceiling above them.

"That is quite right," said the guide. "This painting was put here to be seen from the floor of the Rotunda, and that is one hundred and eighty feet below."

"Jiminy," ejaculated Tubby, "our heads must look like mere specks to the people who are looking up here now!"

"And the people down there look like flies and ants scuttering around," added Andy with his usual chuckle, as he peered over the lofty railing.

On the way down, the attendant showed the boys a fine view from the dome, and pointed out many of the prominent buildings and towers that they had already passed in their morning's ride.

As they paid the excellent guide in thanks as well as coin and went out of the great eastern portico, Tubby patted the front of his coat suggestively.

"Fellers, my feelings tell me that it is long past noon," he said.

Rob pulled out his watch.

"For once your feelings are to be trusted, Tubby. It is one o'clock. We'll get a hasty lunch nearby and try to visit both the Library and the Monument this afternoon."

An hour passed, however, before the boys were again free to go sight-seeing. In Washington, distances are deceptive and time flies.

"Well, which shall it be, boys?" asked Rob. "It is two o'clock, and we have two hours before we must start for the station."

"Let's make it the Monument," suggested Merritt.

"Agreed," said the others.

"And we'll ask this policeman the quickest way to get there," added Rob, jumping after a passing uniform.

The man pointed out a coming street car, gave them a few definite directions, and the boys were off once more.

At the Monument luck favored them again, for they were just in time to catch an ascending elevator. In spite of all that they had seen, they were greatly surprised at the extent and the beauty of the view from the top of the tall shaft. It was fortunately a clear day and they could trace easily the glint of the broad Potomac for many miles.

"Time to be moving if we walk down," said Rob, after they had tried to locate everything visible in the panorama spread out before them.

"We must walk down," urged Merritt. "There is so much to see in the rare stones and relics set all the way down in the inside of the tower walls, – so I've been told."

"If we read all the inscriptions it will take too much time," warned Rob, "but we can spend half an hour more here."

At the end of that time the boys emerged from the lofty shaft with a feeling that they had been on a long journey. From all over the world had come the mementos that they had just seen, – from foreign battlegrounds, from fields of exploration, and from places of historic sentiment.

"That was as good as a lesson in 'Ancient and Modern History,'" claimed Tubby, reluctant to go.

"Yes, but now let's beat it to the station," Andy urged, "or we'll miss our train."

"Should you care if we missed it, boys?" asked Rob, stopping deliberately and facing them.

"What do you mean?" inquired Merritt.

"Just this: We have purposely refrained from giving our folks the exact date of our coming home, and this itinerary does not bind us to any definite train. Why not get a glimpse of the Smithsonian Institute, visit the Congressional Library this evening and take the midnight sleeper for New York? Then we can walk in at home soon after breakfast is over to-morrow morning and surprise everybody. What do you say?"

"We say 'Yes'!" chimed in the three other voices.

"It is a great idea," Merritt added. "They say that the Library is really wonderful at night."

And this was the program decided upon and carried out effectively. Tubby and Andy were perhaps more enthusiastic over the collections in the Institute than over the color decorations in the Library; but Rob and Merritt observed no lack of interest, their own pleasure in everything being so complete.

It was a tired quartette of scouts who tumbled into their berths that night half an hour before the "owl train" pulled out of Washington, but not one of them thought of complaining of their weariness. They were more than satisfied at the delightful ending of their hasty flight to Mexico.

CHAPTER XXVII.

TUBBY SOLVES THE MYSTERY

"Well, I've got some great news for you, fellers!" Tubby exclaimed as he came panting into Rob's den, where Andy and Merritt were comfortably coiled in easy chairs, about a week after they had returned home from their eventful trip down across the Rio Grande.

"Another accident happened to the poor old Academy, just when they've got the unlucky building fit for school! And perhaps a lovely journey for us, away across the continent this time to Sunny California!" suggested Andy, sitting up suddenly with a look of eagerness on his boyish face.

Tubby shook his head in the negative.

"You're no good at guessing, Andy; perhaps now, Rob, here, or our corporal, might hew closer to the line."

Rob had been looking at the excited, triumphant face of the fat chum. He remembered what a great fellow Tubby was to hang on to anything, just like a bulldog might, and there flashed into his mind how he had once caught Tubby looking at a certain little object which he had carried carefully with him all the way to Mexico and back.

"You've struck something new about that boat business, that's what, Tubby!" he cried, pointing his finger at the other.

"Oh! say, that is hardly fair," grumbled Tubby. "I expected to have you all up in the air guessing; and here Rob goes and hits the facts the very first pop."

"Then you've made a discovery, is that it, Tubby?" asked Merritt.

"I should say I had, and in the most remarkable way ever heard of," the stout scout declared. "Talk about your luck – but then, if I hadn't been prepared and kept my eyes open, it wouldn't have happened, that's what. Yes, sir, it pays to have eyes in your head, and some gray matter in your brain, if I do say it myself that oughtn't. Remember that, Andy Bowles, and don't think you're doing your whole duty as a scout when you just blow that bugle of yours now and then."

"Oh! come, tell us what's happened, Tubby, and never mind about me," suggested Andy with a broad grin. For it was like putting the cart before the horse to have clumsy, good-natured, but careless Tubby tell another boy how to prove himself worthy of bearing the name of scout.

"All right, I won't keep you wondering too long," Tubby continued, being in reality just wild to relate his story. "You all remember how, when I picked up that little curled shaving floating on the water that was in Rob's sailboat, and noticed how it had a queer raised ridge running all along, I said that the bit that had been used to bore that round hole must have a good-sized nick in each of the two cutting edges? Well, I was right; it has!"

"Then you prowled around, and poked into everybody's tool-chest till you found such a bit, did you?" demanded Andy.

"I meant to," admitted Tubby, "but so many things have kept coming up since our getting back from Mexico that it just seemed as though I couldn't make a start. But only this very morning I told myself I'd get busy, and see if I couldn't wipe that old mystery off the slate. Then that wonderful streak of good luck ran slap up against me, and I took advantage of my opportunity. Every true scout has to grab a golden chance when it comes along, Andy; you know that?"

"Oh! go on, and quit your preaching," grunted the other scout.

"Well, I was walking along the main street of Hampton just half an hour ago, and all at once I happened to spy just such an object as I had in my mind right then. It was a carpenter's brace, and was carried under the arm of a man I immediately recognized as Jacob Ramsay."

"H'm! the father of that bad boy, Max Ramsay," exclaimed Merritt, with a wise nod of the head, as though he already knew what was coming.

"Of course," continued Tubby, "that interested me a heap, and I wondered why he was carrying a brace with him. Then he went into the hardware store. That made me think quick, and so I hurried after him. Just as I got inside, I heard him saying something to the dealer about his largest bit having been badly nicked some months ago when he was cutting into a heavy plank that had a lot of rusty nails in it, and that he wanted a duplicate; also, that he'd fetched the bit along so as to make sure the new one fitted."

"Fine, Tubby!" exclaimed Rob laughingly. "You'd surely make a pretty good detective. Wouldn't he, fellows?"

"Well, I know that he's got a splendid detector for any kind of grub that is lying around," Andy declared; "but I never before thought he could follow up a clew that didn't have the odor of cooking about it."

"And here's the broken bit!" Tubby said triumphantly, as he drew something out of his pocket and held it up. "Mr. Ramsay got his new one, and never bothered taking the old bit off the counter, because it could never be fixed again. And I asked the hardware man if he cared to let me have it, which he said was all right. And now, Rob, here's that shaving I've been lugging around with me ever so long; just make a try, and see if that raised ridge fits the nicks in the cutting edges, will you?"

"Surely I will, Tubby," replied the scout master, reaching out his hand for the two articles, and all the others bent their heads closer to watch the result.

After Rob had made repeated trials it was manifest to everyone that they were positively looking on the identical bit used in boring that hole through the bottom of Rob's boat. The circumstantial evidence was as complete as any that ever sent a criminal to the gallows or the electric chair.

"Well, what d'ye say, Rob?" demanded the fat scout eagerly.

"Shake hands on it, Tubby," remarked Rob. "You've proved your case as clean as a whistle, hasn't he, boys?"

"No question about it," replied Merritt, also grasping the pudgy fist of Tubby and giving it a squeeze that made the tears come to the boy's eyes.

"Looks as though you'd hit on the right borer of holes," admitted Andy, "but now, what are you going to do about it, Tubby? The boat wasn't lost, so you couldn't have Max arrested, charged with malicious destruction of property. And I don't think you're contemplating giving him a licking for being so mean, because that isn't in your line very much – even if you weren't a scout and dassent!"

"I'll tell you what I thought," said Tubby. "Rob, your boat had the mischief done to it, not mine; I've only been the means of finding out who played that low-down trick on you that might have cost us dear. Suppose now you take this bit and curl of shaving, and confront Max. Let him know you'll tell his father all about it unless he says he's sorry and promises never to try such a contemptible thing again. I reckon that is what a scout's duty would be in a case like this."

"And you're right about that, Tubby," said Rob, secretly pleased to see how seriously the other took the affair. "I'll accept the mission, with many thanks to you for finding out what you did. It was a clever job all around. Lots of fellows would have forgotten all about that shaving weeks ago, but you've been keeping it on your mind right along. I even saw you looking at it away down in Mexico, and I had a pretty good hunch you'd run that rascal down sooner or later."

Rob was as good as his word, and did astonish Max Ramsay one fine day by confronting him with the evidence of his rascality, to the utter consternation of the boy. Finding himself cornered, Max confessed that he had done the deed, but he stoutly declared that he had not dreamed that anything like danger would result. He knew that, if the water suddenly poured into the boat when the plug was dislodged, no harm would follow, because Rob could swim like a fish.

He professed to be sorry, but Rob fancied that this was assumed more in order to keep the other from informing his father, who was already angry because of his many pranks about town, than from any compunction that he felt.

All the same there was considerable satisfaction to Tubby, Rob and the other two scouts, because the mystery had been cleared up. It was noticeable in the future, however, that none of those fellows would ever go out sailing without first carefully inspecting the bottom of the boat, to make sure that it had not been tampered with.

Tubby still keeps that nicked bit, as well as the shaving and the plug that filled the hole in the bottom of the sailboat, to remind him of what happened that dull November afternoon when, with his three chums, he was wrecked three miles up the bay from Hampton town.

The roof of the Academy having been properly repaired and the interior put in shape again, school was resumed, and in the pursuit of their studies Rob and his friends did not find many opportunities to get outdoors while the winter lasted, save on Saturdays and holidays, when the sports of the season claimed their undivided attention.

But the weekly meetings of Hampton Troop, led by the Eagle Patrol, continued to be held in their old quarters; and frequently on other nights Tubby, Rob, Andy and Merritt would get together in one of their homes and talk of the great adventure that had come to them when favoring circumstances allowed them to go all the way to Mexico. They read of the rebel chieftain, whose name figured daily in the papers, with far deeper interest than ever before, since they now had a personal knowledge of the man whose warlike doings kept several nations on the anxious seat.

"That was a great experience, fellers," Tubby often sighed, after they had gone over the familiar scenes again and again, always finding something new to discuss; "and I'm afraid we'll never meet with such a heap of good times again. It doesn't stand to reason that we'd ever be that lucky, does it, now?"

And, while the other three reluctantly conceded that Tubby might be right, events proved just the contrary. The scouts of the Eagle Patrol were fated to come across other still more unexpected adventures, such as were calculated to call heavily upon their knowledge of scoutcraft, in order that puzzles might be solved and dangers avoided. What these experiences were the future only has the power to disclose.

The boys often wondered what had become of Jared Applegate, whether he really did make an effort to reform, or whether he fell back into his old mean ways that seemed bound to get him into serious trouble continually. So far as they knew, his father and mother had heard nothing from him, though Rob thought it his duty to let the old people know that they had seen Jared while down in Mexico, and that he was in Texas when they came away, bent on seeking work on some cattle ranch.

They did have a letter from Lopez, telling them that he had heard the "call" and was about to enlist in the army under the wonderful Villa, meaning to march with the general to take the City of Mexico later on.

Uncle Mark grew steadily better after he knew that a part of his once large fortune had been saved to him through the gratitude of the man whose life he had once been enabled to keep from slipping away. But he feared that never again would he be able to endure the severe labor and perils of penetrating dense jungles and tropical forests in search of rare orchids, or of exploring unknown countries.

In the future the old traveler would have to be content to sit quietly and take his pleasure in reading of the achievements of other daring souls, who were still in the heyday of their vigorous manhood and capable of enduring privations.

He was deeply interested in all the doings of the Boy Scouts, seeing that the movement was the greatest thing that had ever come to pass for developing the finest American characteristics in the future men of the republic.

Hampton Troop never had a more enthusiastic admirer than Uncle Mark became, and indeed, in all quarters now, the scouts gained a fine reputation for courage, true manliness, and knowledge of the thousand-and-one things a boy ought to know, if he expects to climb up the ladder of advancement. At the time we take leave of our young friends, the prospects of the scouts never looked so bright, and we shall hear more of their adventures in the succeeding volume, entitled

"The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields."THE END