At Albany a boy boarded the train with a huge basket of sandwiches, each neatly wrapped in paraffin paper, and Red Deer successfully negotiated with him for his entire stock. As a scout never throws papers about wantonly, either indoors or out, it fell out that these papers were held by their various possessors until Gordon conceived the notion of gathering them up. “What you up to now, Kid?” asked Tom Langford, as Gordon stopped at his seat.
“Tickets, please,” said Gordon, grabbing the paraffin paper and passing on.
“Playing conductor, Gordon?” Dr. Brent asked cheerfully, as Gordon passed.
But it turned out that this was Gordon’s first maneuver in the direction of one of his own particular, genuine, original good turns (for not even Black Wolf himself, with all respect to him, could stand up with G. Lord in this particular phase of boy scouting). He hoped that no one but himself would remember the law which had just gone into effect in the State of New Jersey, prohibiting the public drinking-cup in railroad trains and elsewhere, and he made no answer to the jocular remarks of the boys, as he carefully folded the papers and tucked them away in his pocket.
When they reached New York and boarded the Oakwood train, there was the usual cooler filled with ice-cold water, but no glass. The day was very warm, and only one or two of the passengers carried drinking-cups. Then Gordon, in his element, went through the car, deftly rolling his paraffin papers into little cornucopias, and handing them with a word of explanation to the astonished passengers.
“I never even knew there was such a law,” remarked one old gentleman, to his companion.
“They’re a wide-awake lot—those Boy Scouts,” his friend replied.
“Thank you so very much,” said a young lady, taking the makeshift cup. “I’m dreadfully thirsty, too—you’re a public benefactor.”
“Let me fill it for you,” said Gordon, grinning delightedly. As he handed it to her, the train pulled into Oakwood, and before he had refilled it for her to enjoy a second draught, every member of the troop had left the car, and the train was puffing out of the station.
“Hurry up, my boy, train’s starting,” the old gentleman called cheerily after him; “you’ll have to jump.”
“That’s nothing,” Gordon answered, as he swung off.
Thus it was that Master Gordon Lord, Scout, missed his train by stopping to do a good turn, when he started away, and almost missed his station by doing another one, when he came home. The good turns had not lessened his pleasure in the least; one of them had opened the way for a variety of adventures, and, as he later remarked to a gentleman representing the National Council, who was visiting Oakwood, and to whom he had “recounted his adventures,” “The more you do of them, the more fun you have, and oh, cracky, I’m glad I met Miss Leslie that first morning!”
The mention of the national councilman leads us, by a short cut, to an important event, but in order to get to it we must take a running jump over another one.
It was a great day when a score or more of youthful inventors and a very fair audience of adults besides gathered on the golf links of the Oakwood Field Club to see the trials for the aviation cup which the Oakwood News had offered. The golfers stopped their play in honor of the occasion, and the contestants on the tennis courts laid down their racquets and wandered over to the field. Even so grouchy a character as old Cobb, the club steward, had to leave his accustomed duties and loiter out to the field as if he really didn’t care what was going on, but just happened to be ambling in that direction. His half-interested manner deceived no one, and his arrival was hailed by a score of voices:
“Don’t let yourself get excited, Mr. Cobb.”
“This is what Mr. Cobb has been counting on for a month.”
“Give Mr. Cobb a front seat.”
“Goin’ to have an air race with those things?” Cobb finally condescended to grumble, though he knew perfectly what was afoot.
“No, we’re going to have a swimming match,” said a High School boy.
“Humph,” said Cobb.
Mr. Carson, the manual-training teacher in the High School, was on hand with half a dozen boys whose aeroplanes had been entered, and a good many more, whose aeroplanes were not entered, but whose lungs were in good condition to cheer. Will Garret, son of a local architect, was there with a perfect model of the Van Anden machine. Howard Brent, Matthew Reed, Ben McConnell, and Tom Langford had each entered a model. The local Y. M. C. A. had its aviators too, who had brought their several machines.
There was one other contestant, besides. He sat in a big touring-car which was drawn up among several other vehicles,—an odd, pale little fellow, all nerves and excitement. He lived in the great stone mansion on the hill, and he was not very well known in Oakwood yet. He seemed a very little boy to live in such a big house and to sit in such a big car.
“There are some dandy ones there,” he said to the burly chauffeur, who sat beside him.
“There’s none of ’em has flown acrost Lake Champlain, at all,” the loyal chauffeur answered. “Has there, Mister Arrnold?”
Harry, who sat on the long step of the car, looked up and laughed. He had gone about the field in his quiet way looking at the dainty little models, some of which were masterpieces of clever construction. He had handled Will Garret’s silver-painted flier and praised it. He had sized up the graceful monoplanes made under Mr. Carson’s competent direction. Then he had walked over to the auto and ruefully examined the little aeroplane that Penfield held. It was not very well finished. The sticks of the motor base were held together with the cap of a fountain pen, by way of a ferrule, and Harry recognized various other results of his own suggestions. The alarm works were bound rather far forward, and several strands of live, red elastic hung slack between the little striking bar and the propeller, which was in the rear. The clockwork power was communicated to the propeller by a flat-linked brass chain. This whole mechanism was mounted beneath two planes, monoplane fashion, thirty-eight inches long and ten inches in width.
Harry examined it closely. The fact is, he was anxious. He could not bear to think of Penfield’s disappointment, but he feared that, after all, this novel device would prove impracticable.
Suddenly, the Oakwood band, which had been playing, stopped and the voice of Billy Carter, the club’s gardener, rose above the buzz of conversation.
“Hurrah for Billy Carter!” shouted a dozen boys.
It took Billy a few minutes to down the testimonials to his own popularity, and then he made his announcement.
“The first contestant for the Oakwood News Aviation Cup is Henry Archer, flying model of Santos-Dumont’s monoplane, La Demoiselle.”
Archer stepped up to the chalk-line, winding his propeller. Holding his machine steady, and pointing it slightly upward, he sent it forward. It lurched and fluttered to the ground. He picked it up and disappeared into the laughing crowd. There was no need to measure his flight.
“Matthew Reed, of 1st Oakwood Troop, Boy Scouts,” shouted Billy, consulting a memorandum, “flying miniature reproduction of Antoinette model.”
For a moment the cry of the Hawks and the hand-clap of the Beavers filled the air. Matthew wound his propeller till the elastic band was knotted, then let it fly. Amid much cheering it sailed about one hundred feet, then fluttered down. The distance was officially marked at 92? feet. Then came a Bleriot model; then a Cody biplane, which looked as if it had been fashioned from a box kite. Both fell short of Matthew’s record. Then Tom Langford stepped up with his little willow-framed, silk-covered, swallow-tailed affair, and sent it gliding over the course. It crept upward at a gentle angle, never swerving, exhausted its power in air and coasted easily downward.
“Two hundred and ten feet,” called Billy, and referred to his paper.
“William Ormond, of Oakwood High School, flying monoplane of his own design, clockwork power.”
The boy stepped up to the line, winding his motor. The graceful little craft darted forward, its propeller spinning. Its flight was steady and its descent slow. It dropped about two hundred and eighteen feet from the line.
“They can’t beat that,” some one said.
“That’s very ingenious,” remarked another.
“William Garret, of Oakwood High School, flying modified reproduction of Van Anden biplane.”
William stepped up, holding high in air the neatest model that had been shown. Its frame was of dowel sticks, its covering made from a silk umbrella, and the contrast of the black silk and the silver-painted frame gave it a unique and attractive appearance. It was trussed up with a veritable network of fine wiring, and its planes were flexed to perfection with the pliant ribs of a lady’s fan. Its two propellers, red and highly polished, shone in the bright sunlight. It was whispered about that William’s father had had something to do with this, and the little craft looked well worthy of a skilled and practiced hand. Gordon walked over to the touring-car and sat on the step beside Harry.
“Looks pretty slick, doesn’t she, Kid?” said Harry.
And she went “pretty slick,” too. When both propellers had been wound tight, the beautiful little model was started on its aerial excursion. For fully one hundred and fifty feet it cut its way upward and onward, amid loud cheering. Harry watched it critically. Its long strands of elastic band, fully two feet in length, extended its power over a longer interval of time than that of any craft thus far. And its rigidity and proportions gave it wonderful buoyancy. It had passed the alighting place of every previous flier when, glittering in the sunlight, its propellers slowing down and its elastics hanging slack, it coasted downward at a long angle. Its course had been straight as an arrow, and it had covered four hundred and one feet.
Following came several crank devices, none of which made much of a showing. Then Announcer Billy seemed to be puzzling over his schedule.
“What’s the matter, Billy?” the boys called.
“Struck a snag, Billy?”
“Try hard, Billy—there you go!”
“Master Penfield Danforth, of the 1st Oakwood Troop, Boy Scouts, flying the—a—model of his own design—propelled by the Cham—the Cham—”
“Once more, Billy—three strikes out!”
“—the Champastic—Torsubber—Pen—Pen—”
“Penwiper,” some one suggested.
“—the Pen—alarm—motive system,” Billy concluded triumphantly, amid much cheering and laughter.
“What kind of a wrinkle is this?” some one asked.
Harry grabbed the aeroplane, as Penfield got down, and taking a bottle from his pocket, doused the spring and wheels with kerosene oil. “Trot over, Pen, old boy,” he said. “Good luck to you!”
The little fellow, smiling nervously, carried the dripping model over to the line. The crowd eyed him and his odd-looking monoplane with good-natured indulgence. One or two taunts were heard, but most of the spectators laughed amiably.
“What’s that, an ice-wagon?” said Garret, who stood near the line, holding his own trim little craft. “Keep still, Garret!” said another boy.
“Let her go!” said another.
Any one could see that the hand which held the machine was trembling nervously. The boy looked back toward the touring car for Harry, who smiled back reassuringly. He would not for the world have had Penfield know that he felt any doubt.
The little monoplane darted from Pen’s hand, silently. He watched it intently as it rose, plowing its way forward. At a distance of, perhaps, two hundred feet its propeller slowed down.
“That’s better than I thought,” some one said.
For the fraction of a second it fluttered and its rear end settled, as if to sink. Then a strange thing happened. There was a sudden clicking sound in the air, and the crude little monoplane darted forward and upward, making a bee line for the cupola of the clubhouse. Up it went, shaking, but rising steadily. The crowd was too dumfounded to cheer. It cleared the cupola and disappeared. And when Billy, followed by a score or more of curious and excited spectators, picked it up more than six hundred feet from the starting point, it began to buzz spasmodically, as if it had forgotten all about its aerial mission and were bent on waking some tired sleeper.
“What under the sun is that, anyway?” asked a gentleman, pushing his way into the crowd. “I never saw such a thing in my life!”
“It’s guaranteed to go for ten minutes if you don’t get up and stop it,” answered Penfield. “It came out of a patent alarm clock.”
When Penfield went home that day, he proudly bore in his hands the silver cup.
“Harry,” said Dr. Brent, as they wandered from the field, “I believe you’re more excited than when you won the boat-race—you’re all worked up.”
“Oh, no, I’m not,” said Harry, smiling.
“I bet Harry goes in his blue shirt,” said Mac, a week later. “You’d better trot up the hill, G. Lord, and use your influence with him. Tell him Miss Crosby went up in the Danforth’s auto from the 3:30.”
“That wouldn’t faze him,” said Morrel.
“I bet he doesn’t show up at all,” suggested Tom. “He’s afraid somebody will offer him a prize.”
“Honest, I wish I were like that fellow,” said Matthew Reed, earnestly. “He isn’t afraid of anything in the world except being praised.”
“He looked like a regular coward when Red Deer was telling Mr. Wade about the glider feat,” commented Roy.
“Kid says it took Mr. Danforth about five minutes to size him up.”
“It took him only one minute,” corrected Gordon.
“He’ll kill us when he hears of that letter we all signed.”
“Well,” concluded Roy, “as Red Deer says, he was just born that way; he can’t help it.”
“It’s great to have a character like that,” Mac added. “Everybody seems to catch a little of it.”
“He’s all to the good, is Harry boy.”
“Only he doesn’t know much about maidens,” said Gordon.
“Well, I guess I’ll toddle over home and fix up,” said Matthew. “See you to-night.”
It was a large audience that gathered in the Town Hall to see and hear the well-known gentleman representing the National Scout Council, whose visit to Oakwood had been duly heralded in the Oakwood press. But they were not gathered wholly to hear him, either, for Oakwood was proud of its scout troop. The wholesome, cheery, chivalrous, khaki-clad boys who flitted about her shaded streets were a part of her local charm. If there is any one who is not attracted by Boy Scouts, he must be either blind or crazy. They have made the scout smile epidemic. Quietly they come and go, picking up your parcel for you, or opening the shop door for you to pass in or out. In Oakwood they had planted flowers along the public way. They had raised a flagpole on the green. They had made tall baskets and placed them at intervals along the streets for scraps of paper and other refuse. Not a resident of the town but had paused, smiling, in his walks abroad and listened to their bugle or patrol calls in the neighboring woods. Not a lady but had seen some slouch hat, cocked jauntily up at the side, pulled quickly off in deference to her as she passed.
No wonder a line of autos stood outside the Town Hall that night. No wonder the Field Club dance had been postponed till the little flurry blew over.
The troop sat on the stage, one patrol occupying each side, with chairs in the center for the scoutmaster and the members of the local council. The corporal of each patrol held its banner on the end of a scout staff. On two pedestals in the background were mounted a stuffed hawk and a beaver—the gifts of Mr. Lord. On a rustic, rough-hewn board, suspended above the center of the stage by ropes tied in the standard knots which every scout must know, was printed the scouts’ motto,
BE PREPARED
 
Most of the boys had already taken the............