A QUESTION OF DUTY

Pee-wee’s advice to Joe in this predicament was rather singular, and the scout law on which he based it covered a rather larger field of obligation than was necessary in the circumstances.

“Go ahead over,” he whispered; “you have to obey your parents and all other duly constituted authorities.  I’ll lay keekie for you while you’re gone; go ahead over, I’ll keep watch.”

“Yes, you will!” said Joe incredulously.  “I know youz guys, y’ll put one over, that’s what y’ll do.  Wat’d’yer mean, constute—­con—­authorities?  Yes yer will, not!”

“That shows how much you know about scouts,” Pee-wee said, always ready to explain the ins and outs of scouting.  “Do you think I’d cheat?  Gee whiz, I’ve got to be faithful to a trust, haven’t I?  If I say I’ll do a thing I’ll do it.  You go ahead over and I’ll keep watch and if I don’t do it you can punch me in the eye the next time you see me.”

It was not so much this proffer of indemnity as a supplementary threat from the window across the way which decided Keekie Joe.  He did not believe in Pee-wee for he did not believe in anybody.  But he was a bit puzzled at this self-possessed little stranger from another world.  There was a straightforward, clear look in the little scout’s eyes which bespoke both friendliness and sincerity and Keekie Joe did not understand this.  The emergency decided him to repose faith in the strange boy but it was not in him to do this graciously.

“You keep yer eyes peeled till I git back, and giv’m the high sign, d’yer hear?” he said with insolent skepticism, “or the first time I see yer on Main Street I’ll black up both yer eyes fer yer, d’yer see?”

“That’s one thing I like about you,” said Pee-wee; “gee whiz, you obey scout laws without even knowing them.  That shows you’re a kind of a scout and you don’t know it.”

Keekie Joe did not look much like a scout, as he shuffled across the street; he did not even look like the rawest of raw scout material.  But statues are carved out of hard rock.  And Keekie Joe was a very hard rock indeed.

Pee-wee vaulted up onto the ramshackle fence, placed one of those granite bricks known as a licorice jaw-breaker in his mouth, and prepared for his indefinite vigil.  He was not thinking of the “constituted authorities,” he was not thinking of the crap-shooters either; his back was turned to them and his all seeing eye was fixed on the distant street corner.  He was thinking of Keekie Joe and of how Keekie Joe had tried to obey one of the good scout laws by being faithful to a trust.  And there you have Pee-wee Harris in a nut-shell . . .

The game in the middle of the large field must have become exciting, for its votaries were gathered into a close group.  None of the players seemed able now to spare so much as a cautious glance toward the street.  Once, during his intense preoccupation, Slats Corbett gave a quick, furtive glance afar, but it was only in a sort of sub-consciousness that he glimpsed a figure sitting on the fence, its back toward him.  That was enough.