"I'll find out," Pee-wee said; "don't you worry. I'll fix it."
He started along the street, going scout-pace, and we sat there in themachine for about ten minutes, waiting for him. Gee whiz, I think I wasnever so hungry in my life.
"I could eat a house," Grove said.
"I could eat a whole row of apartments," I told him.
"I could eat some bread and jam," little Skinny piped up.
"Good for you, Alf," Harry said; "if I met a piece of pie myself, Iwouldn't be afraid to face it. I guess Pee-wee'll scare up someinformation for us."
And believe _me_, he did! Pretty soon, back he came, panting all out ofbreath and trying to shout.
"_Hurrah, hurrah_!" he was calling.
"Did you find anything to eat?" Harry asked him.
"_Better than that! Better than that!_" he shouted, coming up to thecar. "A scout is--is--a scout is a brother to every other scout. If he hasfood--and--he has to--he has to share it. There's a party of scouts up thewoods road--they're having a big blowout--they've got liver--a man onhorse--a man on horseback told me--I called to him--come on, let's findthe woods road!"
"They've got what?" Harry asked him.
"_Liver!_" Pee-wee panted. "Don't you know what liver is? It--it--italways goes with bacon. Don't you know scouts always have liver andbacon when they're--they're camping?"
"Sounds good to _me_," Harry said; "where is this sumptous liver andbacon blowout being held?"
"I told you," Pee-wee panted; "up the woods road."
"_Mmm, mmm!_" I said, "I'd just love to meet a slice of fried liver inthe woods to-night."
Harry said, "Well, I guess we'll have to make a raid on our scoutfriends, that's all."
"We'll track them to their camp," Pee-wee said; "I'll show you how."
CHAPTER X--WE ATTEND A BLOWOUT
Believe me, that was good news. Hotels are all right--I'm not sayinganything against hotels--but when it comes to eats, oh boy, a scoutblow-out in the woods has got my kindest regards. And one thing about ascout camp is that anybody is welcome, especially scouts.
Harry said he guessed the car would be all right, because it was allwrong and no one could start it anyway. He said that just then he'drather have some liver and bacon than the car. So we left it standingthere and started back along the street, hunting for the woods road. Wewent a little way up a couple of different roads, but they both ranthrough open country. At last we hit into another road that went throughwoods. It was narrow and rocky and up-hill and the woods were so thickthat the trees were all tangled over-head and it was awful quiet.
"Well, this is the right sort of a place for scouts," Harry said;"they've got the right idea."
"Keep your eyes peeled in the woods for a camp-fire," Grove said.
"I'm getting hungrier every minute," Pee-wee shouted.
"Same here, only more so," I said.
Pretty soon one of us saw a light. It was pretty small and if it was acamp-fire, the camp must have been quite a way off.
"_There It is! There it is!_" Pee-wee piped up, "it's----"
"It's in the road, I think," Harry said.
In about a couple of minutes we heard voices and some one said, "Raiseher a little more."
Then, good night, before we knew it, we were around a turn and walkingplunk into a Ford car with a half a dozen fellows standing around, whileone of them was blowing up a tire.
"Any scout camp around here?" Harry asked them.
"This is the only scout outfit I know of," one of them said; "we had ablowout."
For about a half a minute we just stood there and none of us spoke. ThenHarry said very calm like, to Pee-wee:
"Is this the blowout that you had in mind? Are you sure the man onhorseback said _liver_?"
"He--he was going very fast," our young hero blurted out.
"I see," Harry said; "we are foiled again."
"_Good night!" I_ just blurted out, "the man must have called _flivver_!Pee-wee, you're a scream."
All of a sudden some one said, "That you, Blakeley?"
I said, "Why are you----"
"Don't you remember Brent Gaylong?" he said.
CHAPTER XI--WE MEET AGAIN
That's always the way it is with our young hero, Scout Harris. He neverhits what he aims at, but he always hits something. If he loses his way,he has an adventure. If he falls down, he finds a penny while he's onthe ground. If he should be blown up by dynamite, he'd land in theball-field and save his fifty cents admission. You can't beat him.
So now he began shouting, "Now you see, I brought you to the veryfellows you were talking about. Do you mean to tell me that long lostfriends aren't better than eats?"
All I could say was, "Pee-wee, you win."
Harry Donnelle couldn't say anything, he just sat down on a rock andlaughed and laughed. "Brent," he said, "this is the Honorable ScoutHarris, our young hero, who was leading us to a sumptuous repast in thesolemn woods. But this is something better than we expected."
And you can bet it was! There was Brent Gaylong and little WillieWide-Awake and the rest of the Church Mice--six of them altogether. Ohboy, it was good to see them.
As soon as we introduced Grove and Pee-wee and little Alf to them, Harrysaid, "And what in the dickens are you doing here, you old CalamityJane? The last time we had the bad luck to run into you and yourtraveling kindergarten you were in hard luck--no scoutmaster, nofriends,----"
"Oh, we're rolling in wealth now," Brent said; "I mean we're rolling inour flivver--latest model, self-stopper and everything. We don't speak tocommon scouts like you any more. We're on a trip--a series of trips--weleft Newburgh this morning, and we've had four trips so far. I hope wedon't get tripped again. Remember how we were out for adventure? Well,now we have it. If you want adventure, get a flivver."
"Where are you going?" Harry asked him.
"I haven't the slightest idea," he said. "Can't you see we're _not_going. The only kind of treatment we haven't given this machine isasperin. Anybody got an asperin tablet? We won this machine for puttingout a fire in Newburgh. We had it wished on us. I'm sorry we put thefire out--it was a nice fire."
I said, "Brent, you crazy Indian, you sound just the same as last year.You haven't changed a bit."
"I couldn't even change a dollar," he said.
"Well, this is some streak of luck anyway," Harry said. "We've got a1920 Cadillac stalled down in the village. We're on our way to searchfor buried treasure--up near Lake Ontario. We think we've got a clew to acouple of bags of gold. Want to join us? At present, we're starving. Youhaven't got such a thing as a cheese sandwich loafing around, have you?"
"The last cheese sandwich I saw was on its way down little Bill'sthroat," he said, "but we have some cold corned beef, and crackers andrye bread, and a few other odds and ends that you're welcome to. What doyou say we make a camp?"
So we all went into the woods and got a fire started just for old time'ssake, and sprawled around it and had some eats. Believe _me_, it seemedgood to be with those fellows again. Brent said that wherever we went,they would go too. He said they were on a vacation and they didn't carewhat happened to them. He said that if he could only make one stab forburied treasure, he would feel that he hadn't lived in vain. That wasalways the way he talked--crazy like.
CHAPTER XII--WE GET THE CAR STARTED
We spent about an hour in the woods near the road, sitting around thefire and telling all about our adventures since the time we had seeneach other before. Those fellows were on an auto trip, the same as wewere, and they had a camping kit and everything. They were just startingto follow the Old Forge road north and wriggle around through theAdirondacks, that's what Brent said. But he said as long as we weregoing in search of treasure, they'd go with us. He said that treasurewas his middle name.
Harry said, "Well, you seem to be something of a dabster with engines;suppose we all go back into the village and maybe you can get our oldboat started. Then we'll hit the trail for the next berg and see if wecan g
et a place to bunk until morning."
"We bunk in the woods," one of those little fellows sung out.
Harry said, "Yes, but you're good scouts; you came prepared to do that."
Brent said, "All right, pile in as many of you as want to."
"We'll walk with Harry Donnelle," little Willie-Wide-Awake shouted.
So that was the way we fixed it--Pee-wee and Grove and Skinny and I wentahead with Brent Gaylong in the Ford, and Brent's patrol followed alongwith Harry.
"Where is the old scow, anyway?" Brent called to Harry.
"Go right up the village street," Harry said, "and turn into a roadbranching off. You'll see it standing near a house; it's a newCadillac--seven-passenger--nineteen twenty. We'll be there long before youget it started."
"You'll know it, because the headlights are the only two lights in thewhole village," I said to Brent; "we ought to charge them forilluminating the town."
"The lights are dimmed," Pee-wee said.
"It isn't an old scow," Skinny piped up, in that funny way of his; "it'sa new scow."
"Well, I'll bet a Canadian dime I get it started," Brent said. "Harry'sall right on adventure and he'd give you the coat off his back, but Ithink he's a punk mechanic."
"He understands engines!" little Skinny sang out. "Don't you sayanything against him, because he understands everything; he sewed abutton on for me."
"Bully for you, Alf," I said.
"Oh, I don't say he doesn't understand engines," Brent said; "but Ithink that engines don't understand _him_--they don't appreciate him."
"He understands _everything_," Skinny shouted.
"Well, he understands how to get on the right side of scouts," Brentbegan laughing.
Pretty soon we got into the village and came to the place where the roadbranched off the main street.
"This the place where I turn?" Brent asked us.
"Yes," Pee-wee said.
"No--wait a minute," Grove spoke up.
"Go a little further," I said, "and you'll see a road--wait aminute--where are we?"
"This is a fine outfit of scouts," Brent said; "you'd get lost in adepartment store. Guess again.
"You turn in this road," Pee-wee shouted.
"No, you don't," Grove said; "wait a minute, yes, you do."
"_Oh, goody, goody, goody!_" I began shouting. "Everybody's wrong, asusual, except me--I mean I. There's the machine now; look between thosetwo houses. A scout is observant."
In the dark we could see across a lawn between two houses, and there wasthe car, sure enough.
"Go up to the next road," I said, "and turn in."
"Anything you say," Brent laughed.
"For a minute I didn't know where I was at," Grove said.
He drove around into the road where the car was standing and right up toit and then got out. The flivver looked awful funny alongside it.
"Some Cadillac!" he said.
"Isn't it a peachy car?" Pee-wee asked him. "Isn't it a beaut? Look atthose shock-absorbers. Feel the leather on those seats--boy, boy!" Geewhiz, you'd think the kid was trying to sell the car.
"Very snifty," Brent said.
"It's only four months old," Pee-wee said.
"Maybe that's the reason it hasn't learned to walk yet," Brent told him."Well, we'll take a squint."
Brent opened the hood while the rest of us piled into the car.
"You can't make it go," Skinny piped up; "if Harry couldn't, _you_can't."
"What do you bet?" Brent said.
"You can't," Skinny said.
I don't know what Brent did to the motor, but pretty soon he closed thehood, whistling to himself all the while, and got into the car. All of asudden, br, br, br, br, br, she was purring away like an old cat.
"What do you say now?" he began laughing. Poor little Skinny didn't haveanything to say.
"What did you do to it?" I asked.
"Just smiled at it," Brent said; "the scout smile always wins."
Believe me, we were all too surprised to speak.
"Any of you kids know how to run a Ford?" Brent asked us.
"Sure, Grove does," we said. Because they have a flivver at Grove'shouse.
"I haven't got any license," Grove said.
"All right, hop in there and follow us," Brent told him; "we'll movealong and meet them and save them a walk."
So we swung into the woods road, with Grove coming along behind us inthe flivver, and just as we reached the place where the woods began, wemet Harry and Brent's patrol, hiking along.
"All right, hop in," Brent said.
"Well--I'll--be--jiggered," Harry began.
"Hop in," Brent said, "and don't stand there talking, if you want aplace to sleep to-night. You couldn't even run a carpet-sweeper."
"You're a wonder, old man," Harry said; "what was the matter with her? Itried everything."
"Did you say _please_?" Brent asked him.
"No, but I said about everything else," Harry said.
"Do you want to run that Ford or shall I?" Brent asked him.
"Stay where you are," Harry said. "I'll run the Ford. Go ahead, we'llfollow."
Some of the kids piled into the small car and the rest of them came inwith us. We were all separated together.
"This treasure-hunt is developing into a parade," Brent said. "Lookbehind, will you? He can't even get the flivver started."
But pretty soon we saw them coming along, quite a distance behind us.
I looked at the clock alongside the speedometer and saw that it wasnearly two o'clock in the morning. "Time flies," I said.
Grove said, "Sure, it should be arrested for speeding."
CHAPTER XIII--WE ARE IMPLICATED
I guess we had been going about fifteen minutes when Brent said, "Let'ssee those papers you were telling us about."
Pee-wee felt in the side pocket and then in the opposite side pocket andthen began shouting, "They're not here! They're not here! The papers arestolen!"
"Good night," I said, "the plot grows thicker."
"Maybe Harry has them in his pocket," Grove said.
We looked behind, but the Ford wasn't in sight.
"The papers are stolen! The papers are stolen!" Pee-wee kept shouting,"There's a plot! Hurry up, drive faster! I bet it was that soda clerk inBennett's."
"The papers aren't so necessary," Grove said.
"Sure they're necessary," Pee-wee screamed; "that letter reveals thesecret. Drive faster!"
Brent didn't drive any faster, he just laughed; and all the while therest of us were rooting around, trying to find the papers.
"Look under the seat," Grove said.
We got up from the back seat and lifted it and Pee-wee poked his headaround underneath and groped with his hands.
"Is he there?" Brent asked him.
"Who?" Pee-wee hollered.
"The soda clerk from Bennett's," Brent said.
"No, but the mystery grows deeper," Pee-wee shouted. "Give me theflashlight--quick. There's some buried treasure here! Look! Here are somespoons. Here's a silver thing like they have hot chocolate in! He putthem here--look! I knew he was a villain!"
Grove and I, who were in the back part of the machine, looked into thespace under the seat, and _good night_, as sure as anything, there was asilver bowl and some spoons in a box all lined with plush. Theflashlight made them all bright Just as I was looking, Pee-wee opened abig plush box and there was a gold watch and a dandy long pearl necklaceand a lot of other things.
"_Now_, what have you got to say?" he shouted in my face.
Brent looked around, kind of laughing, but he didn't bother to stop thecar. I guess he was too anxious to get to Utica.
"What do you think it means?" Pee-wee said, in a kind of whisper. "We'dbetter wait for them to catch up, hey?"
"Wait nothing," Brent said, all the while laughing.
I said, "I think it means that Harry's people were bringing the stuffhome in the car from somewhere, maybe, and forgot to take it out; that'swhat
I think. If the rest of them are as careless and happy-go-lucky ashe is, that's probably what happened."
"He _isn't_ careless and happy-go-lucky," Skinny piped up. He was halfasleep under the big buffalo robe, and his voice sounded awful funny, asif he were talking in his sleep.
"Maybe Harry stole them," I said.
_Good night_, off went the buffalo robe and Skinny sat up like ajack-in-the-box. "He _didn't_!" he shouted.
I guess we were all too tired and sleepy to think much about thosethings that Pee-wee had discovered. Pretty soon our young hero wassprawling on the floor of the car, dead to the world and Skinny wassound asleep on the front seat under the buffalo robe. Grove and Istayed awake, but we didn't talk much.
It was nearly four o'clock in the morning when we got to Utica and westopped at a hotel where there were sheds for automobiles. Oh, boy,weren't we some sleepy bunch! Brent ran the car under one of the shedsand then we all staggered into the hotel. While we were waiting for ourrooms, along came the Ford with Harry and Brent's patrol. They couldhardly stand up, they were so sleepy.
He was an awful nice fellow, that hotel man was. He said he didn't knowwhere he could put eleven people, but he guessed as long as we werescouts, we wouldn't mind bunking up. So he gave us three rooms and I hadPee-wee and Skinny wished onto me.