The Boy Scouts in the Saddle — Inside the Classic

CHAPTER I. THE SUPERIOR BOY.

“Hello! there, landlord, just put five gallons of gasoline in my tank, and charge it to dad, will you? I forgot to fill up before leaving our garage in town. I reckon there’d be a lot of trouble in the big granite quarry we own if Gusty Merrivale failed to show up to-day.”

The speaker was a young fellow nattily attired, of about eighteen years of age. As he nimbly jumped out of the dusty runabout car, it could be seen that he was inclined to be rather arrogant in his manner. Indeed, one glance at his dark, handsome face betrayed the fact that he was more or less proud, and domineering.

Gustavus Merrivale was comparatively a newcomer in the pleasant town around which many of the adventures contained in this Scout Series happened. Somehow Gusty had not seemed to care to mix with the general run of boys, picking up only a few choice companions from among the “upper crust.” His father was said to be a very wealthy man, and among other properties, he owned a logging camp far up among the hills together with a valuable granite quarry where fully five score of toilers were employed throughout the entire summer.

The landlord of the village tavern apparently knew his customer. Several times before young Merrivale had motored through the village, and always just two weeks apart. By putting two and two together, the tavern keeper could easily surmise the nature of the errand that took Gus Merrivale up into that wild country so often. Had he been in doubt before, these last words of the boy must have enlightened him fully.

“Pay day in the quarry, hey?” he went on to say, as he unlocked the reservoir that doubtless contained the supply of gasoline which he sold to passing tourists and others. “Your pa’s got quite a plenty of men employed up there, I understand, Mr. Merrivale; and just as you say, they’d kick up high jinks if their pay didn’t show up on Monday twice a month.”

“Why, hello! Where did that bunch of motorcycles come from, Mr. Tubbs?” demanded the rich man’s son, pointing, as he spoke, to three up-to-date twin-cylinder machines standing in a cluster in a safe corner of the inn yard.

“Three young chaps from your town are sitting yonder on the porch awatchin’ of us right now,” returned the landlord, softly. “Mebbe you happen to know them, seeing as how they’re Boy Scouts, and that Hugh Hardin has made somethin’ of a name around this section, I’m told.”

“Hugh Hardin, eh?” exclaimed young Merrivale with a swift glance toward the side piazza of the tavern, where he now discovered several sprawling figures occupying as many chairs, and evidently resting up while waiting for dinner to be announced. “Yes, and his shadow, that Worth fellow, is along with him, and also the chap they call Monkey Stallings, who came to town just a month after I did. He fell in with that common herd right away, and joined the troop, but none of that silly scout business for me! I can see myself taking orders from a patrol leader, nit. What are they doing away up here; and where did they get those expensive machines, I’d like to know?”

“It happens that I’m able to supply the information, Mr. Merrivale,” remarked the landlord quickly. Like most of his class, he enjoyed a chance to gossip and disseminate news which he had picked up.

“Then I wish you’d be so kind and condescending as to inform me right away, sir. I was just speaking about getting a motorcycle myself; and even now I’m expecting a bunch of catalogues from which to select a machine. Those things cost all of two hundred apiece, and I fancy few boys have got as indulgent a father as I happen to own. So please go on and give me the facts, Mr. Tubbs.”