“Okay, fellows, let’s cut it out, huh?” Tiger jumped down and stood eyeing Phil sternly. “That’s enough. Leo doesn’t have to ask anybody anything. He didn’t mean to make us lose, it was an accident. It could happen to anyone.” “Yeah? He didn’t have to do it. He was just showing off, being a wiseguy. Aren’t I right, fellows?”
Phil looked around for support. Wally was the first to respond. “Yes, you’re right,” he said; Dump and Monkey nodded agreement.
“We didn’t ask for him to be in here,” Phil went on. “We could get along fine without him.”
“Well, he is here,” Tiger declared, “so quit your bellyaching for cripes’ sake.”
Phil’s scowl deepened. “Say, Abernathy, whose side are you on, anyway?”
“I’m not on anybody’s side. We’re all friends here. If Jeremiah lost a couple of points, it’s not the first time. You’re making a mountain out of a molehill. Forget it.” “Yeah, let’s can it,” said the Bomber. “I’m hungry.”
“I won’t forget it. If you ask me, it’s about time somebody did something.” With that Phil turned and marched out the door. “Wally – you coming?” he called from the line-path. Ever quick to respond to Phil’s orders, Wally hopped to, and Leo watched the pair cross the playing field, walking side by side. In his mind the two campers had fused into a single entity, like the partners in a law office or a haberdashery, Phil amp; Wally, Inc. After a moment, Dump ducked out the side and went chasing after Phil, and seconds later, without a word or look, Monkey sidled away; he too caught up with the group, which left Eddie reluctant to make a move.
“Looks like it’s four against four,” the Bomber said dourly, watching the others disappear beyond the rise. Leo’s shoulders rose and fell in a silent sigh. He felt bad that he’d let them down, made them lose top score. But how could he have known his great feat would backfire this way? All he’d wanted to do was prove he wasn’t afraid; and shine a bit. Looking around at the empty bunks, so recently filled with his accusers, he suddenly felt an alien in Jeremiah, as if he’d dropped in from outer space, a little green man with goggle eyes.
But then, “Nobody’s against anybody.” Tiger said, putting on his cap. “Come on, guys, let’s shag it.”
The Bomber gave Leo a friendly punch. “Ya done good, kiddo,” he said. “Didn’t he, Tige?”
And together, the three, plus Eddie, trudged off across the playing field and joined the trekkers heading up-camp to the dining hall.
On a gray, windy morning several days after the Water Carnival, Leo found himself part of the detail assigned to police the Nature Lodge – such clean-up details were standard operation procedure at camp, a rotation duty, like waiting on table or KP – in preparation for the “ghost-story telling” that, the weather being coolish, would take place in the room tonight, instead of in the council ring. In the midst of an uncommon amount of industry, the great horn chandelier had been lowered to the floor to have its two dozen chimneys washed and its wicks trimmed, while sweepers manned the brooms and dust rags flew, and a couple of Endeavorites raked ashes in the two fireplaces and restocked the fuel supply. Leo, with a rag, a sponge, and a bucket of vinegar-water, was washing windows, as well as the glass in the various exhibition cases; it was a job he liked, and he went at it with a will.
Second only to the council ring in the life of the camp, the main room of the Theodore Roosevelt Nature Lodge was the site not only of theatrical events like Major Bowes Amateur Night but of an uncommon variety of activities, from Ping-Pong and checkers tournaments to nature talks and (during periods of inclement weather) the biweekly council fire. Centered at each end were large fireplaces built of local fieldstone, one graced by “George,” a stuffed eagle named after the Father of the Country, the opposing one by the framed portrait of Buffalo Bill (the Great Plainsman wore fringed buckskins and carried a silver-chased rifle). In addition to the nature exhibits arrayed along the walls between multiple windows – a horned owl, a gray fox with a still-bushy tail, a collection of snakeskins, the deadly-looking rattles of a diamondback, Leo’s growing collection of spiders, and, in its own cage, the bullfrog that had become Peewee Oliphant’s special pet – and the Indian exhibits – assorted masks and headdresses, even a beaded buckskin dress, all “on loan” from Dagmar – the room contained the two objects of primary importance at Friend-Indeed: the Hartsig Memorial Trophy Cup, which rested in a position of prominence, in the center of the eight-by-eight beam built into the stonework of the north fireplace, where its silver shape gleamed lustrously, even on the dullest days, and the Buffalo Bill War Bonnet which, when not being worn by the camp’s designated Moonbow Warrior, was displayed on a stand of pinewood in a tall glass case nearby.
Now, as the dust and talk both flew, Oats Gurley, in whose loose and liberal charge the clean-up detail went about its business, was himself dusting the shelves of books that were his personal library, a collection of well-thumbed volumes on various natural phenomena, including the local flora and fauna, volumes (especially one on spiders) with which Leo was by now familiar.
Ah-choo! Ah-choo! Ah-choo!
Sweeping the floor with commendable zeal, Emerson Bean had raised a cloud of dust whose particles floated in the air. Tactful as always, Oats quietly suggested to the camper that he lower his energy level by half and damp down the dust with a good sprinkling of water.
Leo, giving one last swipe to the spider case, moved along to the Hartsig Trophy, noting his distorted reflection in its silvery, orotund curves, huffing his breath to shine up the plaque on which at summer’s end the names of the lucky winners would be engraved.
More than ever Leo was determined to prove that he could be a true-blue Jeremian, not just another Stanley Wagner. He wanted his name on the cup as much as any of the others, and, despite his screw-ups, wasn’t he doing his best to make that happen? His spider exhibit alone had already assured Jeremiah of a full one hundred points – more than Dump’s arrowhead display, which was merely an addition to a collection started by others – and his article on tarantulas in The Pine Cone had brought in several points more.
Unfortunately he had garnered his share of blackies as well – one for a wet bathing suit accidentally left on the line before inspection, another for having a sheaf of Katzenjammer comics hidden under his pillow, two for rolling his shorts more than the permissible double turn -so that with Jeremiah’s unexpected defeat in the canoe tilt (undeniably his fault), he was now responsible for more minuses than any other Jeremian.
He was going to have to try even harder, that was all, as Reece had gone to the trouble of pointing out to Tiger. The fact was that since Sunday Reece had not only been unwilling to let bygones be bygones, he had chosen deliberately to misunderstand Leo’s innocent intention, and to misrepresent it to others, which had put Leo in a bad light, and not just among the Jeremians; cadets and seniors a-like were saying Wacko had been acting wacko. Almost nobody would believe he hadn’t been burlesquing Reece.
In his bunk with a book yesterday evening during the after-supper free period, Leo had caught snatches of a conversation coming from the vicinity of Old Faithful.
“I just don’t get it,” Reece was saying while Tiger dropped his lips to the water spout. “Why do you bother with him, anyway?”
“No bother. I like him. I know he goofs up sometimes, but he knows lots of things, he’s smart, and he’s funny, too.”
“I don’t think he’s funny. And he’s breaking up the team! Don’t you get it, fellah? He’s just not our kind. He’s different. You can see that, can’t you?”
“Maybe we’ll rub off on him,” Tiger said, tongue-in-cheek. “Or maybe he’ll rub off on us.”