“That’s about the size of it,” sang out Billy, with a wide grin, for now that his chums, and particularly Hugh Hardin, had reached the spot, his late fears had evidently subsided, and he only saw the comical side of his predicament.
“D’ye mean to say you can’t get a foot out?” asked Ralph Kenyon, as he and the other two came to a halt on the low shore.
“Well, that’s the trouble, you see,” explained Billy, composedly. “Now watch me lift my right foot, and you’ll see that the other sinks down several inches when I put all my weight on it.”
He thereupon proceeded to show them how it came about, much to the wonderment of Ralph and Bud.
“He’s caught as fast as if he was in a vise,” admitted the former; “and if he had to depend on himself, I guess Billy’d have a hot old time getting out of that fix.”
“What’s the good of having chums if you don’t make use of them?” demanded the one who was standing in the shallow stream, holding his Flobert rifle in one hand, and getting deeper in the mire every time he moved.
Ralph and Bud turned to the scout master.
“What’s the answer, Hugh?” asked the latter.
“That’s why I had you fetch the rope,” Hugh told him. “Somehow something seemed to give me an idea it might be either sucking mud or a quicksand. When a fellow is trapped in either one, and there’s no chance for help coming, he must set about saving himself by his quick wits.”
“Yes, that’s all right, Hugh,” explained Billy, making a grimace, “and I pounded my poor brains like everything trying to think of some way, for I hated the worst kind to play the baby act and call for help. But there wasn’t a single thing I could hatch up, seemed like. Tell me, what can be done in such a case? Oh! don’t mind me any, because I’m comfortable, and I know I’ll be yanked out of this right soon. How about it, Hugh?”
“Well, if the fellow who’s caught happens to be only in half-way to his knees,” explained the other, “the best thing for him to do is to throw himself flat and scramble for the firm ground in that way, no matter how much he soils his clothes; because then you see all his weight doesn’t come on a small point like his foot, and so he can crawl or roll to safety.”
“But if he’s in too deep for that?” asked Ralph.
“In that case it’s much more serious,” Hugh told them. “If he happens to have a rope along, he can make use of it by noosing some object, and then dragging himself out. If a tree is overhead, and he can get hold of a limb, the rest is easy. I’ve even read of a man who was in above his hips remembering that his horse was staked not far away. He whistled, and the animal, breaking loose, came running to him; then the lariat was fastened to the saddle, the loop put under the man’s arms, and the intelligent animal dragged him free.”
“Fine!” ejaculated Billy. “But I didn’t have a horse nor yet a rope, you see. There’s a tree above me, but no limb within five feet of my hands. I guess I’d have had a tough time of it only for the camp being so near by.”
“Well, now to get you out of that hole, Billy!” said Hugh, with a confidence so refreshing that Billy actually laughed gleefully.
First of all, Hugh climbed up in the tree and managed to reach the limb that was directly above the imperiled scout. Billy, by stretching his arm, was able to hand up his gun, which in turn Hugh passed along to the others close by.
“Now, I’m going to lower the rope, Billy,” the scout master continued. “It has a running noose at the end, you see. Slip that under your arms, with the knot across your chest. After that, when we start to pulling, do everything you can to work your feet free from the clinging quicksand.”
“That’s O. K., Hugh, and I can do it to a dot!” sang out the one below, as he took hold of the dangling rope the scout master had lowered.
Fortunately that same rope, a stout braided clothes-line or window-sash cord belonging to Hugh, was long enough to pass over the limb, and from there extend to solid ground.
“You two fellows get down on the firm bank and be ready to heave when I give you the word,” Hugh told Ralph and Bud; and after they had done this he continued: “Pull steadily now, and not with a jerk. That’s the way to do it. Work your legs as much as you can, Billy. Are you moving any?”
“Yep, and I’m being sawed in half, too, I reckon!” gasped the other; “but mebbe I c’n stand that better than being smothered, so keep it goin’, boys. ‘One good turn deserves another.’ Yo-heave-o! away she goes! That time I lifted three inches, and it ought to be easier now. Whee! good-by, old quicksand! Sorry to leave you, but ‘the best of friends must part!’”
By the time Billy’s feet had come in sight above the scanty water, his hands were able to fasten on the limb. With the waiting Hugh ready to assist him, it was not so very difficult for the boy to scramble up until he found himself astraddle there.
“Lemme breathe a little here first, fellows!” wheezed Billy, as red in the face as a turkey. “You joshed me when I was startin’ out, Ralph, and said mebbe the old bullfrogs might turn on me. Well, they didn’t, but their best friend, the creek, did everything it knew how to take revenge.”
“But didn’t you get any frogs; we heard you shoot lots of times?” Bud asked.
“Sure I did, one with every shot, and there’s a round dozen lying up on the bank, where I tossed ’em after I found I was stuck in this sand. I’m rested some now, boys, and I think I’ll get ashore.”
When he had successfully negotiated the limb and descended the trunk, Billy was seen to affectionately pat the bark as though he should always cherish fond memories of that friendly tree.
“I’m going to coax one of the fellows to take a picture of it for me,” he declared, “and every time I look at it, I’ll think what a nice thing it is to have a friend in time of need.”
They soon found the big frogs where the hunter had tossed them. Billy admitted that he fancied he had had enough of the sport for one day. As there were a baker’s dozen in all, and it was not certain that every fellow would care to taste such an odd dish, his decision was perhaps wise.
So he washed his soiled legs, and put on his shoes and socks, which he had been carrying suspended from his belt up to the time he thought it best to hurl them ashore after his game.
Some of the boys took quite a fancy to the novel food, but others nibbled and threw up their hands, saying they did not like the slightly fishy taste, though it was certainly true that the meat was as tender as spring chicken.
So another day had passed. Hugh was secretly glad that so far they had heard nothing to indicate that trouble had broken out over at the headquarters of the striking cement workers. When he prepared to settle down that night, after arranging for the watch, Hugh’s last injunction to the sentries was that they should call him if they heard any suspicious sounds in the direction of the scene of the labor war.
The night passed peacefully away, and not a single event happened calculated to cause alarm. With the coming of another day, the scouts busied themselves after their usual fashion in laying out ambitious plans, but, owing to circumstances which none of them could foresee, none of them were fated to be carried into effect.
Indeed, hardly had they finished eating than there came a sudden loud angry burst of distant shouts, quickly followed by the report of a number of guns. Then, after a brief silence, while the boys were standing there listening with intentness and anxious faces, another chorus of voices came rolling over the two miles of space that lay between the scouts’ camp and the village of the foreigners, as well as the cement works in which they had formerly labored day after day until agitators caused them to make demands upon their employers and quit in a body.
A second time the sound of scattered gunshots came to the strained ears of the boys, with many frenzied shouts that now seemed to tell of terror, as though the rioters might have been awed by the show of force, seeing so many of their number shot down in cold blood.
Again silence brooded over the land, a silence that was eloquent of terrible possibilities, and which gave Hugh one of the queerest sensations he had ever experienced as in imagination he could see the field of battle where all this fighting was taking place.
“They’ve gone and done it after all, Hugh!” exclaimed Alec Sands, as he turned a rueful face toward the scout master.
Nor was Alec the only one who looked puzzled and worried, for other faces showed positive signs of pallor. Hugh himself was not entirely free from experiencing the deepest anxiety since he knew only too well how men’s passions can run away with their better judgment.
“That was a regular battle, as sure as anything,” said Arthur Cameron, shuddering as he recalled how terrible those last cries had sounded, fraught as they were with what seemed to be fear.
“And all that shooting wasn’t for nothing, either,” added Bud Morgan. “When I saw the kind of men those armed deputies were, I knew there would be something doing if the strikers tried to break their way into the cement works to get at the men who had taken their jobs. They did just what I thought they would.”
“What can we do, Hugh?” asked Ralph Kenyon.
Ah! that was the question—what would it be safe for them to try and do under the conditions? That was the problem Hugh was tossing about in his mind then and there.
He knew what chances there were for trouble unless they could in some way convince the ignorant foreigners that they were friends. Should the angry men discover them coming up from the rear, their first thought would naturally be that they had been caught in a trap, and that these fellows in khaki uniforms must be members of the State Militia seeking to surround them.
In that case the strikers would either fly madly, or believing themselves in a trap, they would start an attack, determined to break their way through.
Hugh knew that the chances were many of them were armed. Those who did not have firearms of some sort would carry the favorite weapon of their type, the stiletto, and unable to properly make them understand that they came only as friends who wanted to assist their wounded, the bewildered and furious mob might turn upon them like so many mad wolves.
If ever the scout master found himself up against an occasion when he had need of deep thinking, that time was the present.
“The fighting seems to have been short and swift,” remarked Bud Morgan; “and from that we can guess that it must have been the guards who won the scrap.”
“Yes,” commented Billy. “If the strikers had managed to break through the gates that are in the stockade surrounding the cement works, as we’ve been told, they’d be yapping still, as they chased every strike-breaker around. No, they were up against a harder proposition than they reckoned on, and that last volley scattered the mob like sheep.”
“But think of those who must have been shot down,” said Arthur Cameron, with a look of deepest pity on his face. “Their friends have run away and deserted them; and the men in the works will be afraid to come out so as to do anything for them; so there the poor chaps must lie, bleeding to death it may be for want of a little attention.”
He looked appealingly at Hugh as he said this. The scout master knew what was in Arthur’s mind. He understood what a fascination the subject of “first aid to the injured” had been of late to Arthur, and what signal advances he was making in his studies along this line, with an expressed determination to some day become a regular surgeon like one of his uncles.
Still, Hugh wanted to be very sure that he was doing the right thing before he gave his consent to advance in the direction of the disputed territory now given over to anarchy and bloodshed.
In the absence of Lieutenant Denmead, the complete charge of the troop was placed in his keeping, and the responsibility weighed heavily on Hugh. Humanity called on him to accept the opportunity that had suddenly opened up before him; on the other hand, his duty to his chums, as well as to those many parents at home in Oakvale, demanded that he take no unnecessary risks.
The picture which Arthur’s words had conjured up, of poor fellows lying there in danger of bleeding to death because there were no helping hands stretched out to aid them, gave Hugh a cold feeling in the region of his heart. Had he only himself to think about, he would have cast discretion to the four winds, and hurried away on his mission of mercy, regardless of any peril to himself.
Feeling that the responsibility was too much for him to decide alone and unaided, the scout master turned to that solution always available, and which divided the burden, share and share alike.
So he turned hastily on his chums, saying earnestly:
“I can’t find the answer to this thing by myself, fellows, and I want you to decide it for me. Had some of us better start across and try to do something for those who may have been wounded in that fight? When the news gets to the city I suppose the authorities will send out hospital nurses and attendants; but they might take hours in getting on the ground. Ought we go or stay here; that’s what I want you to settle, and I’m not going to tell you what I want to do. Every fellow who believes it to be our duty as scouts to try and help those poor foreigners, hold up his hand.”
He was thrilled to see that there was not a single dissenter; for every hand instantly went up, and when Hugh feebly added, “Contrary no, hold up a hand!” there was not one to be seen.
Hugh sighed with relief. It was just what he wanted, hoped for, and was delighted to have come about. At the same time he felt secret fears lest something terrible follow their forward move.
The next step was to select those whom he knew could be of the greatest good in the work they laid out to attempt. Not every scout has the necessary nerve to hover over a wounded person, and play the part of nurse or doctor; some boys are afflicted with weak nerves, and feel sick at the sight of blood; others are clumsy by nature, and hardly capable of attempting the washing of ugly wounds, with the subsequent binding up of them.
“I want five to go with me,” said Hugh, decisively. “Arthur for one, then Billy, Ralph, Alec, and let me see, you can make the fifth one, Bud. Gather any old bits of cotton or linen you can find, for our supply in the medical kit may soon be exhausted. And hurry, above everything else.”
All this talk and exchange of ideas had taken but a few minutes. As not only the chosen five scouts but their comrades as well jumped at a lively rate to get things ready, another brief interval sufficed to complete the job.
“We’re ready, Hugh!” announced Alec Sands, who looked as though he felt under heavy obligations to Hugh for picking him out as a member of the life-saving corps.
Once upon a time Alec had fought the rising star of Hugh Hardin with all his might and main; for he had had ambitions of his own to be supreme in the councils of the Oakvale Troop of Boy Scouts. After many serious encounters in which Alec generally got the worst of it, he had bowed to necessity and admitted that Hugh was better fitted for the position of leader than he could claim to be.
Since that time the two boys had come to know each other better, and were now the warmest of friends. Alec formerly had shown some ugly traits of character; but these were pretty thoroughly overcome after he turned over that new leaf; and latterly he had developed a popularity among the members of the troop second only to that of Hugh himself.
“Then let’s be off,” the scout master called out. “We must do some tall running, because there are two miles between us and the cement works, and more than that by way of the road, Farmer Stebbins said. But the running will be easier if we keep on to the main pike, and take that the rest of the way.”
Those who were to be left behind hated to see them go, for they envied the fortunate five selected to accompany Hugh. Crushing down the feeling of keen disappointment as best they could, they gave the little group a parting cheer.
“Good luck, boys, and here’s hoping you’ll be equal to everything that you run up against!” called out Ned Twyford, who also made it a point to secretly promise himself that from that time on he was going to take considerably more stock in that “first aid” movement, because here was a plain example of what great value a knowledge along those lines would be to any scout.
Along the road the six boys ran like greyhounds, leaping and bounding with the exuberance of young blood fresh after a good night’s rest. They were following in the tracks of the band of strike-breakers whom they had seen pass the camp on the previous day.
As he ran, Hugh was turning it all over in his mind. He arrived at the conclusion that the new workers must have been smuggled into the works without the knowledge of the strikers; but in some way the truth had become known in the morning, and this was what had brought about an attack in force, followed by the shooting, and the flight of the mob.
All was as silent as death ahead of them, and Hugh considered this an ominous sign. Had the foreigners come back for their wounded, they must have made some sort of outcry, and the lack of such sounds could only mean an absence of care for those who had probably been shot down, and now lay there suffering.
“Seems to me we ought to be getting pretty near the place,” commented Alec, as they jogged along at a fair clip, even Billy showing himself persistent as a runner, though he could hardly be placed in the same class as some of the other fellows.
“We are,” Hugh told him, shortly. “I expect to see signs of that settlement at any minute now.”
“Terribly quiet, I think,” remarked Bud Morgan.
“It always is just before a storm breaks,” chirped Billy, between breaths.
“In this case it’s the deadly lull after the storm has done its worst,” suggested Ralph Kenyon. “Lots of times I’ve known ’em to curve around and come back again over the same old ground.”
“Yes,” added Arthur, “and they say the second time is apt to be a whole lot worse than the first. If those foreigners get mad after what’s happened, goodness knows how the thing will end.”
“Well, I’d keep that white flag in plain sight right along, if I was you, Hugh,” advised Alec.
“That’s what I am doing, Alec,” the scout master replied.
Before leaving camp, Hugh had secured a piece of white muslin and tied this to a stick three or four feet long. His idea was that a flag of truce, being understood by people of every nation, is as a rule respected. If the strikers seemed disposed to be ugly toward the scouts and threatened an attack, perhaps the waving of this flag might hold them in check.
All Hugh wanted was a fair chance to explain the motive that was bringing himself and comrades into the fighting zone. Surely after the men and women learned that they only came with the intention of caring for those poor unfortunates who may have been shot down by the guards at the works, they could not continue to bear the boys any animosity.
He knew that the sight of their uniforms was apt to be the worst feature of the case, for this would prejudice the ignorant foreigners against them. The situation was fraught with considerable risk, and Hugh realized that it would require all the diplomacy he could display in order that they might avoid a rupture with the sullen men and the furious women among the foreigners.
“Listen! wasn’t that someone talking in an outlandish jabber?” asked Bud, all of a sudden, holding up his hand.
“Yes, we must be getting close to their settlement,” announced Hugh, as his jaw became more firmly set, and his eyes took on a determined expression.
“I think we’ll open it up as soon as we pass around that clump of trees on the side of the road, Hugh,” Ralph Kenyon was heard to remark.
“The road takes a sharp bend there,” said Hugh, “and I’ve no doubt we’ll find the camp not far away. It may be we can see the cement works at the same time, for there isn’t more than a quarter of a mile between them, I understand.”
They kept on running, and in less than two minutes more turned the bend in the road. As they did so Bud Morgan called out:
“There are the shacks now, fellows!”
“Gee! what a tumble-down place!” exclaimed Billy.
“And look at ’em rushing around, would you?” added Ralph Kenyon. “I’d say they’re right excited as it is, and when they glimpse us coming it’s going to be worse still.”
“There, they’ve done it already!” cried Arthur; “see that man rushing around and shouting like he was crazy! I’ve heard screech-owls make a row like that, but never a human being. What will we do, Hugh?”
“Steady, fellows!” cautioned the scout leader. “We must make them understand that we come in peace and not in war. Slow down to a walk, and let me go on ahead with this white flag!”
Hugh was waving the makeshift flag of truce furiously over his head as he continued to walk toward the camp of the strikers. A near-panic had broken out there when the ignorant foreigners suddenly discovered what they thought must be the advance guard of the soldiers charging their village. Men, women and children were rushing to and fro in the wildest manner imaginable, many of them shrieking at the top of their voices, so that it seemed as though Bedlam had broken loose.
“Hold up!” called Hugh, suddenly, “we’d be foolish to go any closer while all that row is keeping on. Let’s take a stand here and keep on waving this rag. Sooner or later someone who’s got a more level head than the rest must understand that all we want is to talk with one of the lot. We’ve got to avoid a mix-up; and that’s what might happen if we allowed some of those half-crazed women to get their hands on us. They’d tear the clothes from our backs, and beat us black and blue.”
No one offered the least objection to Hugh’s plan. Indeed, if the truth must be told they secretly heaved sighs of relief upon hearing that the leader did not contemplate advancing directly into that maelstrom of shouting humanity. It was only a short time before that they had been reading in history what terrors the Amazons of Paris had shown themselves to be during the Revolution; and consequently they felt a certain amount of respect for excited women’s prowess as fighters.
All at once there was a shot, and the scouts plainly heard the “ping” of a bullet singing over their heads, and not so very far away, either.
“Hugh, they’re starting to shoot at us!” gasped Billy.
It was really the first time in their lives these boys had experienced the strange chilly feeling of being under fire. To their credit it must be said that not a single one of them flinched, even though they may have turned a bit pale, and no one could blame them for that.
“Steady!” said Hugh, continuing to move his flag back and forth. “Hold up both hands, every fellow, to show them we have no guns, and have come to them unarmed.”
It was a bright thought. Actions must take the place of words at such a time as this, and ignorant though these foreigners might be from the standpoint of an American boy, surely they ought to comprehend such a plain fact as this.
Hugh was staking everything on it. He felt that there must be some sort of leader among these strikers who would be above the average in intelligence. All the while he stood there in front of the others, and in waving his emblem of peace, Hugh was endeavoring to pick out this man from among those who were rushing around wildly, gesticulating, shaking their fists in the direction of the scouts, and shrieking in their native language.
“I see him!” Hugh suddenly exclaimed. “There he comes out to the front now, that big man with the red handkerchief knotted around his neck, and the brass earrings. That must be the padrone, the man who is the big boss. Yes, see him trying to choke off some of the shouters. If only he can do that it’s going to be all right.”
“I hope he squelches that fool who fired at us, so he doesn’t try it again,” Billy was heard to say; but it might be noticed that although his words indicated uneasiness of mind, Billy was far from showing himself to be a coward, for unwilling to have Hugh shield his person, Billy had stepped out in order to be in plain sight and share the danger with his chief.
That was Billy’s way, and one of the reasons why his chums loved him as they did; generous to a fault, he was always willing to share everything with his comrades, even to court peril.
They watched the actions of the padrone with keen interest. It was apparent that he understood the object of that white banner better than any of the rest; or else he may have discovered that the six figures in uniform were not men but boys, and therefore hardly to be feared.
“He’s coming this way, Hugh!” announced sharp-eyed Ralph Kenyon.
“Yes, and if he holds up part way, I’ll step out and meet him, which would be only fair,” Hugh told them.
“See what he’s got in his hand, will you?” said Billy.
“It’s a pretty tough specimen of a white flag,” jeered Alec; “but anything goes I guess with them. He means all right, don’t you think, Hugh?”
“No doubt about it at all,” came the ready answer. “Now, if you see me start out toward him in case he stops, please stay where you are, everybody.”
“We’re on, Hugh,” Billy assured him; “but I only hope he can understand enough English to grab what you say to him, that’s all.”
The leader of the striking laborers continued to advance straight toward the little group of khaki-clad scouts. Hugh kept his truce flag waving constantly, as if he meant to impress upon the suspicious minds of these people that they had nothing to fear from himself and companions.
Just as Hugh had anticipated, the man suddenly came to a halt about fifty feet off. Undoubtedly he had reached the limit of his valor, and believed one of the strangers in uniform should come out to meet him. Yes, he was even then making violent beckoning gestures with his hand, and holding up one finger, which doubtless meant that he wanted but a single member of the group to meet him.
Accordingly, Hugh immediately started off to join him, with his flag over his shoulder. Quickly he advanced, and was soon up to the man, whom he found to be a fellow with a strong face, and undoubtedly well fitted for his position as a leader among his people.
“Can you speak English?” was the first thing Hugh asked, and to his surprise as well as pleasure the man nodded his head as he replied briskly:
“Sure. Anglish I spick ver’ well.”
“That’s good,” the other hastened to say, and looking as friendly as he could. “Do you know what the Boy Scouts are? We do not belong to the soldiers, but we wear this uniform so we can be known from other boys. We were in camp over there,” and he pointed back along the road as he said this, “when we heard the shooting. We feared some of your people must have been hurt, and that you mightn’t have a doctor here to help them. So we have come to do what we’re able, to stop the bleeding, to bind up the wounds, and make them as comfortable as we can.”
The big man with the dark face had listened intently. His face lighted up with intelligence, and Hugh realized that the other must have grasped the idea he was trying to convey after a fashion.
“Oh, you doctor, you know how keep men alive after they be shot? Why, you only boy. I never know boy can be doctor over here. How is that so, tell me?”
When the padrone said this he looked suspiciously at Hugh, as though it may have begun to filter through his brain that after all this might be some shrewd trick on the part of the enemy to gain access to their camp. A concerted rush on the part of civil and military authorities would mean the capture of the ring-leaders of the strike that was turning out to be so riotous an affair.
Hugh’s answer was prompt and to the point. With admirable discretion he had thought to carry along with him his medicine kit, and this he now opened so that the padrone could see its entire contents. That ought to be enough to convince him as to the pacific intentions of the six lads who had come running all of two miles just to lend a helping hand to those in distress.
It did, for when Hugh looked up again he saw that the suspicious frown had left the dark face of the other, and was succeeded by an eager expression.
“You learn how so be doctor in this what you call Boy Scout biz?” the man asked huskily; “it is ver’ good thing you come here. I think one, two men die if that bleed not be stop soon. Nobody can do nothing, and it soon be too late.”
“Then will you let us try the best we know how; can we come into your camp, and will you tell your people we are friends?” asked Hugh, quickly.
When he saw the padrone nod his head violently several times in the affirmative, Hugh turned and beckoned to his chums; who, reading the signal aright, hastened to join him.
When the padrone came hurrying back with the six boys, they were immediately surrounded by an excited mass of jabbering foreigners. Many dark faces glowered at Hugh and his chums. It was as though all the fury in these excitable natures had been aroused when the indiscreet guards, back of the stockade surrounding the cement works, had fired those cruel volleys at the men and women who were pressing forward, not to try and destroy property but to expostulate with the manager because he would not give them work when their children were near the point of starvation.
The padrone immediately told some of those near by what the boys had come to do for them. Somehow it seemed to soothe the angry feelings of the most violent, to some extent at least. There was no longer a hostile demonstration on the part of the crowd. Some looked at the boys apathetically, as though they could not quite understand what it all meant; others showed a little interest, while one man plucked Hugh by the sleeve, and attempted to lead him away.
“You, doctor, come, my woman she seek, she be bad hurt!” this fellow was saying, piteously.
Hugh, knowing that a start must be made somewhere, allowed himself to be led off.
“Keep along with me, boys,” he said to the others; “I may need your help.”
He knew that Arthur Cameron was likely to prove his mainstay in catering to the needs of these poor people who were in such distress. At the same time all of the other scouts were capable of doing more or less along the line of stopping a wound from bleeding, and binding it up after the recognized principles of field surgery—something to tide over an emergency until a better examination could be attempted by a regular surgeon.
A minute later and they reached a spot where a heavy-set old woman lay upon a dirty blanket. Several other women were gathered around. They had a tin basin with water in it, and seemed to be trying in their clumsy fashion to attend to the gunshot wound the woman had received.
Hugh took hold of the case immediately. When the eagerly watching padrone saw the business-like way of the boy as he started to wash the jagged cut in the upper arm, after which he proceeded, with Arthur’s assistance, to lessen the bleeding as he had been taught to do, a pleased look crept over that grim dark face.
“See how his earrings dance when he nods his head that way,” whispered Alec Sands to Billy. “He knows we can deliver the goods now. He approves of scouts as field surgeons. And say, let me tell you, the boys are making a bully job of that woman’s arm. It’s a nasty cut, all right, and I’d hate to tackle it alone, though I reckon I’d try to do my level best.”
When Hugh found that a point had been reached where he could safely leave the rest of the binding up to some of the others, he called upon Billy and Ralph to get busy.
“They say there is another man here who is badly hurt, and I’m afraid several others may be still lying out there on the field. We’ll try to rig up some kind of stretcher and get them here a little later. Alec, suppose you and Bud see if you can find some stuff to make one out of—poles, with bed ticking or burlap fastened across. It’ll be saving time, you know.”
“Only too glad, Hugh,” replied Alec, cheerfully; for he disliked inaction above all things, as many boys do. Give them something to do, let them feel that they are of some importance in the working out of plans, and they will show themselves eager to do their very best.
It was found that the man had been shot in the back. Hugh felt that he was badly hurt, though with care he might pull through. The boy had never attempted so serious a task as he now found on his hands, and he was glad that Arthur was there to back him up.
First of all he asked the padrone to make the people stand back, for they were crowding close in, all eyes filled with wonder at seeing mere boys performing the grave duties of army surgeons.
Their wonder grew as they saw how Hugh and Arthur seemed to know just what best to do, and how deftly their fingers worked. The dark frowns began to disappear, and confidence replaced suspicion. It would no longer be dangerous for any boy wearing that khaki uniform to move among those strikers, after they had seen with their own eyes that the mission bringing these boys to the camp had been one of peace and not of war.
Meanwhile Alec and Bud were doing their best to carry out the suggestion made by the scout master, though they found it no easy job. By dint of looking around they managed to pick up two stout poles that would answer for the sides of the stretcher, but finding a suitable substitute for the usual canvas upon which the wounded are laid, proved a still more difficult task.
They were beginning to despair when, seeing the old padrone crossing in front of them, Alec flew up and seized hold of him.
“We want something to make a stretcher out of; something strong like bagging, or a mattress tick,” he told him, gesticulating at the same time with both hands in order to emphasize his words. “You show us where to find something; we carry the wounded men here from over there by the works.”
The padrone looked puzzled at first; then as Bud quickly laid the two poles on the ground and threw himself prostrate between them, while Alec made out to take hold of the near ends, the other gave a cry as though it had dawned on his mind.
He nodded his head and, darting into a shanty close by, came out bearing a tough-looking mattress. Drawing out a knife, he sliced down one end, and deliberately proceeded to empty the corn husks it had contained upon the ground.
When the scouts found that the material though faded was still of considerable value, so far as strength was concerned, they proceeded to bind it to the poles. It required more or less ingenuity to accomplish this, for the strain would be very great, once they started to carry a man weighing at least a hundred and fifty pounds, but they had mastered much more serious problems than this, and in the end managed to secure the bed ticking to both poles in a secure though possibly clumsy fashion.
Hardly had this been accomplished than they saw Hugh hurrying toward them. He had left Arthur to finish the work of caring for the wounded man, with Billy and Ralph to render any assistance required.
“I’m anxious to get over there where the fight came off,” Hugh told the two, after he had taken a quick survey of their completed work, and apparently given it his approval. “Nobody seems to know just how many were shot down by that murderous fire of the guards. Some say five, and others hold up both hands, as if there were at least twice that many.”
“Then you think some of the poor chaps may be lying there still, do you?” asked Alec, with a vein of real pity in his voice; for the sight of all that suffering had caused his heart to beat much more kindly for these poor foreigners.
“I hope it’s a mistake,” replied Hugh, as they all hurried off. “In case there are any who have been hurt too badly to get away, you can see how they might continue to lie there until they bled to death. The guards behind the stockade are afraid to show themselves after doing what they did; and the strikers are just as much averse to going near the works, with those men waiting to pour in another awful volley at sight of them.”
“Whew! I hope they won’t try that game on us,” said Bud Morgan, though for all that he did not lessen his pace a particle, because Bud did not know what fear was, to tell the truth.
“Oh, there’s little danger of their being so badly rattled as that,” said Hugh. “I mean to call out and tell the one in command just how we happened to be near by, and felt it to be our duty to do all we could for the strikers who were hurt. It may, in the end, save some of those reckless guards from being tried for murder.”
“Just what it might,” said Alec. “That man was shot in the back, which shows he was running away. Only a coward would fire on retreating men who were unarmed.”
“Hold on, don’t say too much just now,” cautioned Hugh. “We’re getting near the stockade, you notice. And here’s a poor fellow trying to limp along, though he’s badly hurt in the leg.”
The man saw them and looked worried as he clung to a tree waiting for them to reach him. Perhaps the white flag which Hugh again carried eased his mind somewhat, and when the boy spoke to him the tone of his voice was certainly reassuring.
“You are hurt, I see,” said Hugh, pointing to the other’s left leg, which showed all the terrible signs of a serious wound; the poor fellow had managed to tie his red bandana handkerchief around the limb, and above the bullet wound, as though he may have served in the army at one time, and knew something about the use of a tourniquet to stop the bleeding.
He must have understood what Hugh said, for he nodded his head. Then the scout waved him on, and pointed to the camp.
“Go to camp and doctor look after you—understand, with medicine like this,” and he even opened his little kit to let the man glimpse its contents which might tell him more than words could convey.
With signs and what words he could make use of, Hugh tried to find out from the injured striker whether there were others still on the battlefield who would be in need of rescue. Perhaps the man had a smattering knowledge of English, or else Hugh’s signs were wonderfully illuminating; at least he comprehended what the boy was trying to ask, for he pointed back, and then held up the fingers of both hands.
The boys exchanged horrified looks. Hugh hoped there was some mistake on the part of the man. It would be a dreadful thing if they found the field covered with dead and wounded strikers; such a calamity had not been known in the state for many a long year, and the slaughter must create a wide sentiment in favor of arbitration in these unfortunate labor disputes. “Come on, boys! No matter what is waiting for us there, we must go on,” Hugh told his two chums who carried the homely but useful stretcher.
“I can see the buildings of the cement works right ahead of us, Hugh!” exclaimed Alec, shortly after they had parted company with the limping striker who was trying his best to get back among his own people so that his wounds could be cared for.
“Steady again, everybody!” said Hugh. “We must be careful not to do anything to make them fire on us. Of course they’re bound to see that we don’t belong to that crowd, and so I don’t think we run much danger, if we keep our heads, and they do the same.”