THE BEE-LINE

So if you saw that animated-news-of-all-the-world film and saw Pee-wee Harris handing a nice piece of candy to a boy who isn’t a scout, you’ll know it wasn’t real candy he was handing him. That’s why he had such a generous, kind look on his face. A scout is brotherly—especially with rocks.

That was the only movie play I ever wrote. I didn’t write that, but I thought it up. Tom Gilligan said it was fine. One good thing, there were only three pictures in it. It was a scout propaganda picture. It was called Kindness Wins, or Letting Him Have a Rock. Only Tom Gilligan cut out the last part of the name.

That picture showed us all climbing over the railing of that porch, and then it showed Warde Hollister coming out and shaking his fist at us. He did that fine for a fellow that wasn’t a scout. Then it showed us telling him about our adventures and showing him the coffee-pot and all the cooking things. And then it showed our generous little hero handing him a nice piece of candy. After that the fellow said he’d like to join the scouts because they had such a lot of fun. And so he joined and they all lived happily forever and forever.

After Tom Gilligan had taken the pictures just the way he wanted them Warde Hollister threw the piece of rock at a tree and missed it because he wasn’t a scout—because scouts always aim straight, only they don’t throw rocks, but if they did they wouldn’t miss.

“Now you’re in the movies,” I said, “and you’re satisfied because that’s just what you wanted. And we thank you a lot.”

He said, “Where are you going now?”

“Oh, just across the porch if you’ll let us,” I told him, “and then across the river in a bee-line. Some job, hey? Then straight for that big tree on the ridge. You look up there late this evening and see if there’s a fire burning. Then you’ll know we’re roasting potatoes. Do you know what I think? I think the bee-line takes us right through the haunted house across the river. I bet you’re glad you’re only a scout in the movies. Pity the poor scouts, hey?”

He said, kind of hesitating, “I’m not afraid of haunted houses.”

“Are you afraid of snakes?” Pee-wee piped up.

He said, “No, I’m not. I—like roasted potatoes, though.”

“How many do you like?” the kid asked him.

“As many as I can get,” Warde said. “And I’d like to go with you fellows if you’ll let me.”

Westy said, “Do you mean you’d like to join the scouts?”

He said, “Yes, I do.”

Tom Gilligan was standing there with his camera over his shoulder and his big leather bag in his hand, all ready to go away. I guess he was going back to the station and I was sorry because I liked that fellow.

He said to Warde, “You’re a wise young fellow, you are. Go in for the real thing and don’t bother with imitations. What’s the use of jumping off a cliff made of pasteboard when you’ve got real roofs to climb over? What’s the use of doing stunts in a studio when you can go on a bee-line hike across the country? You’re a wise young fellow, you are. You stick to the boy scouts; they’ll keep you moving.”

Then he said, “Well, so long, kids.” And away he went.

I said, “Come over here right close to us and keep near us, Warde. We’re keeping this bee-line as narrow as we can.”

He jumped up on the porch rail right beside us. The others were all right there, squatting on the porch or sitting on the rail. We could see across the river and past the old ramshackle buildings there and right over the village of Little Valley to the ridge. That big tree stood up higher than all the others and it seemed just as if it were all alone off there. I guess it was about one o’clock then.

I said, “We’re going to cook some eats as soon as we get to the river, because we like to eat near where there’s water. Then we’ll have to think how we’ll get across.”

“Did you come straight all the way from your house?” Warde wanted to know.

“Just as straight as we could,” I said. “If we side-stepped anything we didn’t mean to. There’s no use saying you’re going to do a thing, and then kid yourself about it and not do it. Maybe a bee-line hike is kind of crazy, but it’s hard, too. It’s easy to make yourself think the line runs between two houses when it doesn’t. It’s sort of the same when you get to be a scout. It’s like a bee-line hike—sort of.”

We all just sat there and nobody said anything until Westy said, “That’s right.”

“Maybe you don’t understand,” Dorry said.

Warde said, “Yes, I do understand.”

After that nobody said anything, not even Pee-wee, and we just sat there.

“Sure you can go with us,” I told him. “And just as I said, you’ll see we’re kind of crazy. But just the same we don’t sneak around and we don’t turn back; not till we have to, anyway. You can join the scouts just for the fun of it if you want; the same as you can start on a bee-line hike and go zigzagging around the easiest way if you want to. Maybe you don’t understand just exactly what I mean,” I said to him. “Anyway there’s a place to be filled in my patrol.”

“Could I get in—maybe?” he asked.

I said, “Sure you could. Who’s stopping you? Even one of our fellows came after you, didn’t he? And you see for yourself how the movie people come after us. You don’t see us running after them. They know where adventures are, all right.”

“And no war tax either,” Westy said.

“And plenty of eats,” Pee-wee piped up.

Then for a little while again none of us said anything.

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