“Whatever can we do, Giraffe?”
asked Bumpus, presently, after he had sighed several
times, in a most forlorn way.
“Oh!” remarked the other,
making out to be little concerned about the matter,
although his manner did not deceive the fat boy in
the least, for he knew Giraffe was worried greatly;
“there are lots of things we can do, all right;
but you see the trouble is, Bumpus, they ain’t
agoin’ to help out much.”
“We’re in a tough hole,
all right,” grunted the other, disconsolately.
“Talk about Thad and Step Hen
camping out;” Giraffe went on to say, “why
their troubles couldn’t be mentioned in the same
breath with ours, and you know it. They had aplenty
of matches along, and could get all the blaze they
wanted.”
“And say, think of having the
best part of a fine young buck to cook!” burst
out Bumpus, with another groan. “As for
us, we’ve got the game all right; but however
can we get down to eating partridges that ain’t
ever even been near a fire.”
“Quit talkin’ of eating,
Bumpus; you fairly set me wild,” declared the
tall boy, rubbing his empty stomach, as though its
calls were growing more insistent with a knowledge
that they must pass unheeded now.
“Then you must be hungry?” suggested Bumpus.
“Hungry ain’t no name
for it,” Giraffe replied. “That’s
always the way, I’ve been told. When there
ain’t no water, a feller feels as if his tongue
was stickin’ to the roof of his mouth. And
Bumpus, bein’ hungry ain’t the very worst
of it, either!”
The fat boy sat up, and looked at
his companion in misery as though startled.
“What you mean, Giraffe, by
slingin’ that scare into me; I’d like to
know what’s worse than starvin’ to death
in a single night?” he demanded.
“Oh! shucks! don’t you
worry about that,” the other went on, with a
sneer. “Not so much chance of our comin’
to such an end in so short a time. But there
is real danger around us, Bumpus.”
“Say, do you mean about them
wolves?” exclaimed Bumpus, with a tremble in
his voice.
“That’s just what I do
mean,” came the reply “When they tackled
our comrades, why they were bold as anything, even
if the boys did have a fire burning all the time.
Think of how we’re up against it, without a
single match to start a blaze.”
“Then there’s only one thing for us to
do, Giraffe.”
“Suppose you tell me what that is?” demanded
the tall scout.
“Climb a tree,” replied Bumpus, promptly.
Giraffe made an impatient gesture.
“Of course we could do that,
as a last resort, Bumpus; but the chances are, if
we did, we’d freeze before morning!” he
declared. “I’ve heard old hunters
say that of all the agony they ever endured, being
kept in a tree all night was the worst. Feel
in your pockets again, Bumpus; try everywhere, and
see if you can only scare up one single match.
If you did, we’d be mighty careful not to waste
it, I tell you. This is a case of ‘my kingdom
for a match!’”
So the fat scout commenced a systematic
search, Every single pocket did he feel in with trembling
fingers, while his comrade watched his face anxiously,
knowing that it was likely to indicate the success
or failure of the search.
When he saw a sudden grin come upon
that broad countenance Giraffe felt like bursting
out into a yell of joy.
“Got one, haven’t you
Bumpus?” he exclaimed, eagerly. “That
was a bully good idea of mine after all, you see,
having you look again. Say, won’t we be
careful of that one precious match, though? And
won’t we have the fine dry stuff all ready to
kindle, as soon as I strike it. You must let
me handle things, Bumpus, because, you know, I’m
more used to what’s the matter with
you? Don’t tell me it ain’t
a match after all? Oh! thunder!”
Bumpus had slowly drawn his hand out
of his pocket, and held some object up between his
forefinger and his thumb. It was about the length
of a match, but had a sharpened point, instead of
a blunt head.
“A a miserable toothpick
that I just dropped into my pocket when we ate that
dinner at the restaurant!” groaned the wretched
Bumpus, staring first at the offending object, and
then turning a piteous face toward his comrade.
Giraffe managed to rise to the occasion.
Perhaps he remembered that Thad had really committed
the other into his charge; and that it was to him
the scoutmaster would look to give a good account of
the expedition. And then again, Bumpus was so
shocked by the series of calamities which had befallen
them that he looked almost ready to collapse.
So Giraffe drew himself up, and assumed
a confidence that he was far from feeling.
“Don’t take on so, Bumpus,”
he went on to say, almost cheerily. “It
may not be so very bad, after all. Don’t
let’s forget that we’re scouts; and must
keep a stiff upper lip whenever things turn out wrong.
We’ll just do the best we can; and I reckon
it’ll all come out right in the end. It
nearly always does, you know.”
At least his words and manner had
some effect on the almost exhausted fat boy, who brightened
up more or less.
“Now, that’s nice of you
talking that way, Giraffe,” he said. “You’re
the right kind of a chum to have in time of trouble.
But say, ain’t it gettin’ cold though?
Is that why you’re slapping your arms around
so?”
“Try it, and see how quick you
feel warmer, Bumpus,” replied the other, with
the patronizing air of one who is superior in knowledge,
and willing to impart all he knows; “you see,
the violent action starts the heart to beating nearly
twice as fast as it does ordinarily; and that pumps
the blood harder, so it gets to the very end of your
extremities. That’s what Thad says, anyhow;
and it sure enough works.”
So, for a minute or two both lads
kept up a strenuous exercise, though it was too much
for poor Bumpus, who presently stopped.
“Feel better, don’t you?” demanded
Giraffe imperiously.
“A whole lot; but doin’ that has one bad
point, I find,” said Bumpus.
“As how?” asked his companion.
“Why, it keeps on making you
all the hungrier; exercise always has that effect
on me. Why, Giraffe, I feel like I could eat a
whole ham right now.”
“Didn’t I tell you to
let up on that style of talk; you’re just making
me groan inside every time you speak of eatin’.
We ought to be tryin’ our level best to better
our condition.”
“But I don’t know anything
that would help us, Giraffe; so it’s up to you
to get us out of this ugly hole. Perhaps we might
use a shell from my gun, and by taking out most of
the powder, snap it off, and start a fire going.”
Strange to say, Giraffe did not seem
to take to the idea, simple though it was; and later
on commended by Thad and Allan, when they heard about
the trouble. The fact was, Giraffe had suddenly
remembered something.
“You leave it to me, and see
if I don’t pull out a trick worth while,”
he remarked mysteriously; and Bumpus saw him turn aside
to get down on his knees.
For some time the fat boy sat there,
apparently lost in bitter reflections. Now and
then he would give a start, and look around him hastily,
after which he would heave a great sigh, or else groan
dismally. From this it might be assumed that Bumpus
was allowing himself to dwell upon many a glorious
supper he had devoured in the company of his Boy Scout
chums; and just then he was enjoying things the best
he knew how, he would remember the desolation that
confronted himself and Giraffe.
Then he would pick up one of the two
partridges that had fallen to his new Marlin ten bore,
look critically at it, feel the meat on the plump
breast; and then shake his head, as though the idea
of having to turn cannibal, and devour the game raw
did not appeal at all to him.
On one occasion, when he aroused himself
from this abstraction he became conscious of a strange
humming sound.
“What you doin’ there,
Giraffe?” he demanded, as the noise certainly
proceeded from the spot where his chum was down on
his hands and knees.
“Why, you see,” replied
the other, slowly, “I fetched my little bow and
fire-makin’ outfit along with me, thinkin’
I might have a chance to try a scheme I got in my
head. I’m gettin’ right into it now,
because I want to start business before it’s
real plumb dark!”
But far from reassuring the dejected
Bumpus, these words only made him grunt. Had
he not watched Giraffe working away for dear life with
that miserable little outfit a dozen times, and always
with the same result getting perilously
near success, but always missing it by a hair’s
breadth?
What chance did they have of securing
the much desired fire, if all depended on Giraffe
succeeding in inducing that twirling stick to generate
enough heat to throw off a spark that would catch in
the dry tinder? None at all. It was only
a hollow mockery. Some smart scouts might be
able to do the little trick; but up to now it had baffled
the skill of Giraffe. Why, even Thad had lost
pretty much all hope of his ever succeeding, Bumpus
suspected; and believed that the only good thing about
the tall scout’s labors was his persistence.
So, shaking his head again dolefully,
Bumpus allowed himself to once more figure out a bill
of fare that he would like to commence on, if he only
had the good fortune to sit down at a table in a first-class
restaurant. It seemed to give him untold satisfaction
just to imagine the heaping platters that were being
brought before him in rapid succession. Why,
in his vivid imagination he could almost get the delicious
odors of the various dishes that had long been favorites
with him; particularly the liver and bacon and fried
onions. Oh! how tantalizing to suddenly arouse
himself with a start, to look around at the rapidly
darkening scene of those lonely pine woods, and hear,
instead of the waiter’s cheery voice, only that
continual grinding sound, as the boy with the never-give-up
nature kept sawing away with his miserable little
bow; and the poor stick kept whirling back and forwards
with a violent motion, in the socket that held one
end.
In the estimation of Bumpus, that
was coming down from the sublime to the ridiculous.
He had little confidence in all this labor of Giraffe;
though goodness knows, that if ever success would prove
a boon to a couple of stranded hunters caught in the
darkness of a wintry night, with not a match in their
possession, it was then.