The Boy Scout

The Boy Scout, by Richard
Harding Davis

The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Boy Scout, by Richard Harding
Davis
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: The Boy Scout
Author: Richard Harding Davis

Release Date: October 8, 2006 [eBook #19501]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BOY
SCOUT***
E-text prepared by Jacqueline Jeremy and the Project Gutenberg Online
Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) from page
images generously made available by Internet Archive/American
Libraries (http://www.archive.org/details/americana)

Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which
includes the original illustration. See 19501-h.htm or 19501-h.zip:
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/9/5/0/19501/19501-h/19501-h.htm) or
(http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/9/5/0/19501/19501-h.zip)
Images of the original pages are available through Internet
Archive/American Libraries. See
http://www.archive.org/details/boyscoutthe00davirich

THE BOY SCOUT
by
RICHARD HARDING DAVIS

[Illustration: Jimmie dropped the valise, forced his cramped fingers into
straight lines, and saluted. [Page 10]]

New York Charles Scribner's Sons 1914 Copyright, 1914, by Charles
Scribner's Sons Published May, 1914
[Illustration]

THE BOY SCOUT
A rule of the Boy Scouts is every day to do some one a good turn. Not
because the copy-books tell you it deserves another, but in spite of that
pleasing possibility. If you are a true scout, until you have performed
your act of kindness your day is dark. You are as unhappy as is the
grown-up who has begun his day without shaving or reading the New
York Sun. But as soon as you have proved yourself you may, with a

clear conscience, look the world in the face and untie the knot in your
kerchief.
Jimmie Reeder untied the accusing knot in his scarf at just ten minutes
past eight on a hot August morning after he had given one dime to his
sister Sadie. With that she could either witness the first-run films at the
Palace, or by dividing her fortune patronize two of the nickel shows on
Lenox Avenue. The choice Jimmie left to her. He was setting out for
the annual encampment of the Boy Scouts at Hunter's Island, and in the
excitement of that adventure even the movies ceased to thrill. But Sadie
also could be unselfish. With a heroism of a camp-fire maiden she
made a gesture which might have been interpreted to mean she was
returning the money.
"I can't, Jimmie!" she gasped. "I can't take it off you. You saved it, and
you ought to get the fun of it."
"I haven't saved it yet," said Jimmie. "I'm going to cut it out of the
railroad fare. I'm going to get off at City Island instead of at Pelham
Manor and walk the difference. That's ten cents cheaper."
Sadie exclaimed with admiration:
"An' you carryin' that heavy grip!"
"Aw, that's nothin'," said the man of the family.
"Good-by, mother. So long, Sadie."
To ward off further expressions of gratitude he hurriedly advised Sadie
to take in "The Curse of Cain" rather than "The Mohawks' Last Stand,"
and fled down the front steps.
He wore his khaki uniform. On his shoulders was his knapsack, from
his hands swung his suitcase and between his heavy stockings and his
"shorts" his kneecaps, unkissed by the sun, as yet unscathed by
blackberry vines, showed as white and fragile as the wrists of a girl. As
he moved toward the "L" station at the corner, Sadie and his mother

waved to him; in the street, boys too small to be scouts hailed him
enviously; even the policeman glancing over the newspapers on the
news-stand nodded approval.
"You a Scout, Jimmie?" he asked.
"No," retorted Jimmie, for was not he also in uniform? "I'm Santa Claus
out filling Christmas stockings."
The patrolman also possessed a ready wit.
"Then get yourself a pair," he advised. "If a dog was to see your
legs----"
Jimmie escaped the insult by fleeing up the steps of the Elevated.
* * * * *
An hour later, with his valise in one hand and staff in the other, he was
tramping up the Boston Post Road and breathing heavily. The day was
cruelly hot. Before his eyes, over an interminable stretch of asphalt, the
heat waves danced and flickered. Already the knapsack on his
shoulders pressed upon him like an Old Man of the Sea; the linen in the
valise had turned to pig iron, his pipe-stem legs were wabbling, his
eyes smarted with salt sweat, and the fingers supporting the valise
belonged to some other boy, and were giving that boy much pain. But
as the motor-cars flashed past with raucous warnings, or, that those
who rode might better see the