CHAPTER II

“BRICK RYAN’S NOT FOR SALE!”

Brick was too aghast to think of anything to say. He scowled, threw up his hands helplessly, and deliberately turned his back on the smiling Van Horn.

But Lefty, whatever he might think about “pups” in private, had been appointed councilor’s aide for Tent One, and as such was camper-leader in charge when Sax McNulty was not in sight. He rose and extended a hand to the newcomer.

“Glad to meet you, Van. My name’s Reardon. I see you’ve got a baseball glove there among your things. We need good fielders on the camp team—some stiff games are coming up. We’ll talk about it later. Yes, this is Tent One. I hear you’ve met Brick Ryan, over here,” he said easily. “The rest of the bunch will be along pretty quick, except for some of the new boys that are hitting camp today.”

“Thanks. We passed a hay-wagon full of young chaps down the road a few miles,” answered Van Horn. “They seemed to be having lunch.”

“They’ll be along later, I guess. Hope we get some good ones for Tent One. Sax McNulty went down to show them the way. He’s our leader—you ought to hear him shake out a tune from that saxophone of his! Then, outside of you and Brick and myself, we’ve got little Joey Fellowes and Slim Yerkes—— But dump your stuff down here on the floor, and after lunch I’ll show you where to stow things.”

Benson, the chauffeur, gladly stacked his load of baggage inside the tent, and returned for the remainder. His young master spread his legs apart and looked over the tent with a patronizing air.

“Nice little place you’ve got here, but it could be fixed up better. I’ve got some pennants and a few pictures in my trunk that we can stick around to make it look quite homelike, I fancy.”

Lefty smiled grimly. “We mostly do our decorating up at the lodge, where there’s plenty of room. With seven fellows and a leader in a tent this size, we have to save space for the things we use every day. You seem to have a lot of junk there—enough to take up a whole tent yourself. After lunch we’ll weed out what you need and the rest can be stored under the lodge.”

“I don’t know about that. A chap wants to be comfortable, doesn’t he? Oh, I guess there are my folks coming to say good-bye! Hello, Mama!”

Brick scornfully watched the approach of the fond parents. The lady, after embracing her boy, looked disdainfully about the tent and its simple furnishings. She did not sniff, but she looked as if she might at any moment.

“Gracious, John, do you really think we should leave Dirk here? I’m glad we thought to bring up his spring cot and mattress—the idea of having a growing boy sleep on plain canvas stretchers like these!”

“The other boys don’t seem to have suffered,” Mr. Van Horn smiled feebly.

“This is Reardon, Papa,” his son said. “Plays baseball, you know.”

“Fine! Fine! Well, young men, Benson is bringing down a big watermelon for Dirk’s tent-mates. Guess you won’t mind a cool slice later on? Now, Dirk, your mother and I are going. We’ll have lunch in Elmville. If you want anything, write or wire me and we’ll see what the old man can do. That canoe ought to be along in the morning.”

“Thank you, Papa.” Dirk turned to Lefty. “Back in a minute, old chap.” He waved a hand and accompanied his parents up the hill toward the waiting automobile, where no doubt a fond farewell was to take place.

As soon as they were out of sight, Brick faced his friend.

“What a fine sister we drew!” he exclaimed. “Well, what do you think of the Millionaire Baby now?”

Lefty returned to his task of tidying up the tent beside his bunk. “Aw, lay off, Brick. It isn’t his fault he’s a poor little rich boy. He seems to me like a pretty decent sort, and that watermelon will come in mighty handy, too. Just because he took you for a kitchen mechanic, you’ve got it in for him. Snap out of it! There goes First Call, and here’s the tent still in a gosh-awful mess. Stir yourself!”

Brick Ryan bent moodily to the work. After a moment, he snorted as his eye fell once more on the shiny heap of luggage and sport outfits, and his scorn broke forth anew.

“Just the same, Lefty my son, Little Lord Fauntleroy will need a bit of polishin’ before he’s a true-blue Lenape man, and F. X. A. Ryan is the lad to give it to him,” he muttered darkly. “Mark my words, young Chauncy is in for a lot of fine adventures he never dreamed of back in dear old Swellville!”

During lunch, Brick listened with ill-concealed disgust while young Van Horn chatted with Lefty about baseball and prep school and asked the usual list of silly questions that a new camper always puts. When the meal was over, Brick and silent Slim Yerkes washed the dishes in short order, and then retired to the tent for quiet hour. Slim soon left to visit a friend in a neighboring tent, and Brick stretched out on his bunk with a copy of the life-saving manual, to study up for the various tests that were a part of the badge requirements. But no sooner had he settled himself than Dirk Van Horn, followed by the admiring little Joey Fellowes, came down from the camp store.

“What a silly rule they have here, that a fellow can’t spend more than fifteen cents a day at the store!” Dirk was complaining, munching a chocolate bar. “Up at Wild Rose Camp last year we could spend as much as we wanted, and they had everything—ice-cream cones every day. Why, I could buy out this little store if I wanted to! Here, youngster, have a bag of almonds.”

“Thanks,” said Joey admiringly. “Say, what kind of a place was that Wild Rose Camp?”

“Very select. I believe it cost me five hundred dollars a season, not counting extras, such as piano lessons, archery, and so on.”

Brick Ryan said “Humph!” in a loud tone, but Joey was visibly impressed.

“Well, youngster,” Dirk went on, “shall we get busy unloading all these traps of mine?”

“Sure. Say, if you could go to such a swell place as that, how come you’re here at Lenape?”

“Oh, just a notion of Papa’s. You see, he used to go to college with the camp director here. I made Papa buy me a canoe all my own if I promised to come here, but I tell you, if I don’t like this place, I shan’t stay very long.” Dirk turned airily and stooped to open the large wardrobe trunk that stood amidst his heap of luggage. “Shall we get to work?”

Brick Ryan, whose sole possessions had come to Lenape with him in a canvas dunnage-bag, pretended to read, but he kept one eye on the proceedings. Languidly Dirk, aided by the awed Joey, began to unpack his multitude of belongings. First he unrolled a thick mattress—the only mattress in camp aside from those in the hospital tent—and spread it on the lower bunk nearest the lodge. Brick felt called upon to interfere.

“Say,” he began, “that bunk belongs to Sax McNulty, our leader. All the other lower bunks are already taken. You’ll have to take one of the uppers.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Joey broke in hastily. “Say, Van, I got a lower, but I don’t mind sleeping up in Heaven—I’m used to it. You can have mine, over here, and I’ll take the upper.”

Dirk nodded. “Thanks. Very sporting of you, youngster.” He spread the mattress on the bunk that Joey had relinquished, and with an inexperienced hand spread sheets and fine woolen blankets in the semblance of a bed.

Next he began unpacking the trunk and suitcases, and Brick Ryan’s snorts grew louder and louder as the stack of the newcomer’s possessions grew higher. In a short time the tent was strewn with clothing and objects of all sorts. The leader’s empty bunk was piled high with suits of every kind and shade, among them a trim blue yachting outfit with white cap, and a khaki uniform with Sam Browne belt and white helmet such as African explorers wear. One suitcase was almost completely taken up with books and a portable typewriter. Between reading the books and dressing up in the dozen different suits, Brick reflected, the new boy would have very little time to do any camping.

But this was not all. It seemed as if Dirk must have gone into a big sporting-goods store and ordered at least one of everything in stock. He had complete outfits for baseball, basketball, and track. Joey was set to work stringing up an aerial for a portable radio receiving set that was carefully packed in a leather case. The interior of the tent was submerged beneath such objects as a big electric lantern, a fisherman’s creel, two swimming suits, a sketching outfit, golf clubs, hats and shoes of all sorts, and a black bag such as is carried by doctors on their rounds. Dirk opened the latter, and took from its well-filled interior a bottle of pills.

“That reminds me!” he said. “Forgot to take my prescription.” He swallowed two pills, made a face, and picking up an armload of shoes and a banjo case, approached Brick.

“Excuse me, old fellow,” he said agreeably, “but would you mind awfully if I parked these things under your bed? These tents don’t seem to have any closets in them, and that clothes-line from the tent-poles doesn’t look very strong.”

“Can’t do it,” Brick answered shortly.

“Why not? You don’t seem to have a great deal of junk yourself.”

Brick groaned. “Listen!” he said with some heat. “Lefty Reardon told you he’d show you where to put your stuff. He’s up at aide’s meeting now, and since Sax is still away, I don’t mind tellin’ you what the rules are. We got eight people in this tent. Suppose every single one of them had as much stuff as you’ve got?”

“But I can see they haven’t, so——”

“Wait! We have inspection here every day, to see which tent wins the pennant. Everything has got to be in its place, and there’s a place for everything. Beds made in a certain way, clothes folded in a certain way, shoes in a line under the bunk, everything polished up and swept out. Do you figure on cleanin’ up all that stuff every day, or are you goin’ to hire Joey as a valet?”

“My dear chap, I merely——”

“My advice to you,” Brick went on, “is to pick out from that mess just what you need every day, and store the rest in the lodge. Then we might have some room to move around. Do you get that?”

A crimson flush mounted from beneath Dirk’s immaculate white collar and spread over his pale features, but he said nothing. He dropped the things on the floor in a heap, and sat down on a locker-box, watching Joey sort out a collection of stockings and handkerchiefs. Brick pointedly returned to his life-saving manual.

For the first time since he had arrived at Lenape a few hours before, Dirk Van Horn paused to think. He could not see that he had done anything to merit such a harsh tone as that used by the red-headed Irish boy. Of course there was that awkward mistake when Ryan had been washing his things back of the kitchen; but that might have happened to anyone. Dirk had never before met a boy of the independent stripe of Brick Ryan. There had been no boys like him at “select” Wild Rose Camp, nor in what his mother called their “social set” back in the city. But Dirk wanted everybody to like him. He wanted Brick to like him and admire him. He went about it in the only way he knew—but it was the wrong way.

Brick was aware of a tap on his shoulder. He turned; before him stood the despised Van Horn in his citified garments. There was a smile on his face. His right hand was outstretched frankly; his left hand held a tennis racquet of the most expensive make.

“Look here, Ryan, old chap,” Dirk began. “We have to live together. Let’s be friends! What say? I know I was a chump a while ago, but I apologize, and I hope we’ll get along splendidly. Now, just to show you I think a lot of you, I hope you’ll accept this little present. It’s just a trifle, and I have two of them—but perhaps it will prove how much I want to be your friend.”

Before the amazed Brick knew what was happening, the other had pressed the handle of the racquet into his hand, and clapped him on the shoulder.

“That’s the spirit! Now we’re fast friends, you know!”

Brick stared at the gift. Fashioned of finest wood and gut, it represented at the least an amount that Brick would have had to work on his paper-route, back in the city, for a month to earn. Unbelievingly he looked from the gift to the giver. A sudden tide of red anger flooded his freckled face to the roots of his red hair. He jumped up, flung off the outstretched hand, and faced Van Horn. There was an ugly look on his face, and ugly words rose to his Irish tongue.

“Friends, is it!” he shouted. “Gollies, you and your little presents! Pup, get this! You or the likes of you can’t buy Brick Ryan’s little finger, and you can’t bribe him, either! You and all your pretty junk may go over big with kids like Joey that don’t know any better, but Brick Ryan’s not for sale!”

Dirk’s mouth fell open, and he backed off hastily. “Why—Why, I’m sorry—I didn’t think you’d take it that way! Of course, if you don’t care to accept it——”

“Yah!” cried the Irish boy. With sudden fury he flung the offending tennis racquet in a wide curve. It fell out of sight into a clump of bushes some yards away; and Brick Ryan, with clenched fists, turned on his heel and stalked from the tent.