The Boy Scout Aviators | Page 9

the rioters,
who, getting over their first surprise, were threatening again.
"For shame!" he cried. "Do you think you're doing anything for
England? War's not declared yet -- and, if it was, you might better be
looking for German soldiers to shoot at than trying to hurt an old man
who never did anyone any harm!"
There was a threatening noise from the crowd, but Franklin was
undismayed.
"You'll have to get through us to reach them !" he cried. "We --"
But he was interrupted. A whistle sounded. The next moment the police
were there.

CHAPTER III
PICKED FOR SERVICE
The coming of the police cleared the little crowd of would-be rioters
away in no time. There were only three or four of the Bobbies, but they
were plenty. A smiling sergeant came up to Franklin.
"More of your Boy Scout work, sir?" he said, pleasantly. "I heard you
standing them off! That was very well done. If we can depend on you
to help us all over London, we'll have an easier job than we looked
for."
"We saw a whole lot of those fellows piling up against the shop here,"
said Franklin. "So of course we pitched in. We couldn't let anything
like that happen."
"There'll be a lot of it at first, I'm afraid, sir," said the sergeant. "Still, it
won't last. If all we hear is true, they'll be taking a lot of those young
fellows away and giving them some real fighting to do to keep them
quiet."
"Well, we'll help whenever we can, sergeant," said Franklin. "If the
inspector thinks it would be a good thing to have the shops that are kept
by Germans watched, I'm quite sure it can be arranged. If there's war I
suppose a lot of you policemen will go?"
"We'll supply our share, sir," said the sergeant. "I'm expecting orders
any minute -- I'm a reservist myself. Coldstream Guards, sir."
"Congratulations!" said Franklin. He spoke a little wistfully. "I wonder
if they'll let me go? I think I'm old enough! Well, can we help any more
here tonight?"
"No, thank you, sir. You've done very well as it is. Pity all the lads

don't belong to the Boy Scouts. We'd have less trouble, I'll warrant. I'll
just leave a man here to watch the place. But they won't be back. They
don't mean any real harm, as it is. It's just their spirits -- and their being
a bit thoughtless, you know."
"All right," said Franklin. "Glad we came along. Good-night, sergeant.
Fall in! March!"
There was a cheer from the crowd that had gathered to watch the
disturbance as the scouts move away. A hundred yards from the scene
of what might have been a tragedy, except for their prompt action, the
scouts dispersed. Dick, Mercer and Harry Fleming naturally enough,
since they lived so close to one another, went home together.
"That was quick work," said Harry.
"Yes. I'm glad we got there," said Dick. "Old Dutchy's all right - he
doesn't seem like a German. But I think it would be a good thing if they
did catch a few of the others and scrag them!"
"No, it wouldn't," said Harry soberly. "Don't get to feeling that way,
Dick. Suppose you were living in Berlin. You wouldn't want a lot of
German roughs to come and destroy your house or your shop and
handle you that way, would you?"
"It's not the same thing," said Dick, stubbornly. "They're foreigners."
"But you'd be a foreigner if you were over there!" said Harry, with a
laugh.
"I suppose I would," said Dick. "I never thought of that! Just the same,
I bet Mr. Grenfel was right. London's full of spies. Isn't that an awful
idea, Harry? You can't tell who's a spy and who isn't!"
"No, but you can be pretty sure that the man you suspect isn't,"
suggested Harry, sagely. "A real spy wouldn't let you find it out very
easily. I can see one thing and that is a whole lot of perfectly harmless
people are going to be arrested as spies before this war is very old, if it

does come! We don't want to be mixed up in that, Dick -- we scouts. If
we think a man's doing anything suspicious, we'll have to be very sure
before we denounce him, or else we won't be any use."
"It's better for a few people to be arrested by mistake than to let a spy
keep on spying, isn't it?"
"I suppose so, but we don't want to be like the shepherd's boy who used
to try to frighten people by calling 'Wolf! Wolf!' when there wasn't any
wolf. You know what happened to him. When a wolf really did come
no one believed him. Wo