The Boy Scout pathfinders

Two members of any staff, even though they are only boys, cannot disappear as though the earth had swallowed them without a suspicion of foul play.

In the office above the chamber which had witnessed the stirring events narrated in “The Boy Scout Firefighters,” in which both Beany and Porky Potter had been actors, there had been great anxiety. When General Pershing received the report, he at once sent couriers and scouts to every station where the boys might have gone. The sentries one and all declared that the boys had not been seen outside of the building. This resulted in a combing out of every cranny that could possibly hold a boy alive or dead.

The hours dragged on. There was a continual passing to and fro for hours until at last there seemed to be absolutely nothing more to do until morning. The tired staff threw themselves into the office chairs, while the General, at the typewriter, commenced a letter. Out of respect to him, there was a complete silence in the room.

On and on clicked the typewriter while the waiting men dozed or smoked or thought of home.

“What’s that?” said one of them suddenly, listening intently.

The General stopped writing and looked at the speaker.

“What’s what?” questioned a captain, frowning.

“That tapping,” said the first speaker. “Sounds like code.”

“You have been asleep,” said the captain, grinning.

“I hear it,” said the General.

There was a general gathering up of forces, as the whole room tried to place the faint, monotonous tapping.

“The call for help!” said the first speaker triumphantly. “I knew I heard it. The code is my native language almost. It sounds as though some one was calling from below the floor.”

“Send an answer, Lieutenant Reed!” ordered the General.

The young officer obeyed, while his hearers listened breathlessly. Tap-tap went the spurred heel, dash and dot, dash and dot in many combinations.

The reply followed swiftly. The Lieutenant, rather pale, turned to the General. “It’s the boys!” he reported. “They are together, in a closed chamber,--a dungeon, I take it--right below us. They are in danger. Don’t say what. Something about spies and dynamite. Want help instantly.”

“How?” asked the General.

“There’s a secret door in the oak panel in the hall. They gave directions for opening it.”

“Go at once, six of you--you six nearest the door!” The officers designated rose.

“Rush!” said Lieutenant Reed crisply. For the moment he was in command. He alone knew how to open the panel. They hurried outside, where Reed felt swiftly but carefully in the place described by Porky. Twice he went over the heavy carving, pushing here and there unavailingly. Then without a sound the secret door opened and before any one could enter the passage that yawned in inky blackness before them, there was a rush of running feet and the two boys, carrying Beany’s coat between them, bolted into the hall. Porky made a motion for silence, and listened.

There was no sound.

“Somebody chased us!” he panted. “Somebody was close behind us in the dark!”

“Men?” asked an officer in an excited whisper.

Porky wanted to say “No, sir, rabbits!” but he knew that every one felt nervous and edgy and, besides, he did not want to be disrespectful to the officer who had spoken.

“They came in through the other door,” he said. “A door at the other end of the passage that is on the other side of the two big rooms down below there.”

“Let’s go down,” said one of the men, loosening his revolver.

“Please don’t try it!” begged Beany. “We could never get down without light and then they would have the drop on us. It’s no use now. Besides, they could go out of that outside door without the least trouble after they had shot us all up.”

“The kid is right,” said Lieutenant Reed. “He knows how the land lies down there. Come up to the General, boys, and make a report. He will tell us what he wants done.”

Sliding the panel shut, the Lieutenant called a guard and, leaving the hallway patrolled by a couple of stalwart Americans, the group surrounding the two boys entered the office and saluted the General.

General Pershing bent his serious, keen gaze on the boys, then a bright, sudden smile lighted the strong, handsome face that had grown sad and still in the troubled, anxious months at the front.

“Always up to something, boys,” he said. “Well, your friend the Colonel warned me how it would be. Now suppose you tell me all about it.”

Beany with a sigh of relief lifted his blouse and deposited it on the table. It struck the surface with a clank and as he pulled the cloth away a regular flood of gold pieces covered the papers where the General had been writing.

“Part of the story, sir,” said Beany. And then talking together, or taking turns, as the spirit moved them, the boys pieced out the account of their adventures. The part that Beany kept harking back to was the presence of the prisoners in the big room. He described carefully and accurately the appearance of the young soldier and told as well as he could about the limp, unconscious girl who had been carried out into the dark garden. Beany shuddered as he spoke.

“I am sure the girl was dead, sir. She laid there for hours, I guess, and she never moved at all, never batted an eyelash. And she was white.... I never saw anybody so white. It was as though all her blood had been drained out of her.”

“Was she wounded?” asked the General.

“She must have been, sir,” answered Beany. “I saw blood, just a little of it running down her wrist under her sleeve. She had nice clothes on, and I had a hunch all the time that I ought to know who she was; but I couldn’t tell. Wish we knew what they did with them. When it comes light, General, I can show you just where the door is. I am sure I know where it opens.”

“It is light now,” said the General, pointing to the window. Every one looked. Sure enough, the whole sky was a mass of pale gold and pink and greenish blue, as lovely and soft and joyous as though the distant rumble of the big guns was not shaking the casement as they spoke. It was light; morning had come.

The General ordered coffee and rolls and insisted on both boys eating something. They were tired and heavy eyed but excited at the thought of unraveling perhaps a little more of the mystery of the past night.

When at last the General dismissed them with a few terse orders, they sped ahead of their escort through the silent garden, fearless and curious and unconscious of the careful marksmen who followed, protecting each foot of their advance.

Beany had spoken the truth. With the sureness of a young hound he took his way through a wilderness of stones and bricks and beams and plaster through the tangled, torn old garden, and round to a spot marked by what seemed to be a clump of dense bushes like low growing lilacs. Approaching this, Beany parted the branches and peered in. Then he drew back with a cry of horror.

“Look!” he whispered.