The Cowells were new to Bridgeboro and in the emergency had called Doctor Brent at random. He was brisk and efficient, seeming not particularly interested in the tragedy of the rubber ball nor the viewpoint of the juvenile audience. His prompt attention to the patient imposed a silence which made the moments of waiting seem portentous. Out of this ominous silence would come what dreadful pronouncement? He felt the boy’s pulse, he lifted him and listened at his back, he applied his stethoscope, which harmless instrument has struck terror to more than one fond parent. He said, “Huh.”
“I think he must have been very nervous, doctor,” Mrs. Cowell ventured.
“No, it’s his heart,” said the doctor crisply.
Mrs. Cowell sighed, “It’s serious then?”
“No, not necessarily. He was running too hard. Has he ever been taken like this before?”
“No, never. He always ran freely.”
“Hmph.”
“No history of heart weakness at all, huh? Father living?”
“He died fourteen years ago but it wasn’t heart trouble.” Mrs. Cowell seemed glad of the chance to talk. “We lost a little son—it wasn’t—there was nothing the matter with him—he was stolen—kidnapped. Mr. Cowell refused a demand for ransom because the authorities thought they could apprehend the criminals. We never saw our little son again. It was remorse that he had refused to pay ransom that preyed upon my husband’s mind and broke his health down. That is the little boy’s photograph on the piano.”
The doctor glanced at it respectfully, then, his eye catching Arden, he said pleasantly, “You look healthy enough.”
“She’s very highly strung, doctor,” said Mrs. Cowell.
“Well,” said the doctor, in a manner of getting down to business, “sometimes we discover a condition that may have existed for a long time. We ought to be glad of the occasion which brings such a thing to light. Now we know what to do—or what not to do. He hasn’t been sick lately? Diphtheria or——”
“Yes, he had diphtheria,” said Mrs. Cowell surprised; “he hasn’t been well a month.”
“Ah,” said the doctor with almost a relish in his voice. “That’s what causes the mischief; he’ll be all right. It isn’t a chronic weakness. Diphtheria is apt to leave the heart in bad shape—it passes. Didn’t they tell you about that? That’s the treacherous character of diphtheria; you get well, then some day after a week or two you fall down. It’s an after effect that has to work off.”
“It isn’t serious then, doctor?” Wilfred’s mother asked anxiously.
“Not unless he makes it so. He must favor himself for a while.”
“How long?” the boy asked wistfully.
“Well, to be on the safe side I should say a month.”
“A month from to-day?” the wistful voice asked.
“You mustn’t pin the doctor down, dearie,” said Mrs. Cowell; “he means a month or two—or maybe six months.”
“No, I don’t mean that,” the doctor laughed. Then, evidently sizing the young patient up, he added, “We’ll make it an even month; this is the twenty-fifth of June. That will be playing safe. Think you can take it easy for a month?”
“I can if I have to,” said Wilfred.
“That’s the way to talk,” Doctor Brent encouraged.
“He can read nice books,” said Mrs. Cowell.
“Well,” said the doctor, “I’ll tell you what he mustn’t do, then you can tell him what he can do.” He addressed himself to the mother but it was evident that he was speaking at the boy. “He mustn’t go swimming or rowing. He ought not to run much. He ought to avoid all strenuous physical exertion.”
“You hear what the doctor says,” the fond mother warned.
“Couldn’t I go scout pace?” came the wistful query. “That’s six paces walking and six paces running?”
“Better do them all walking,” said the doctor.
“Then I can’t go to camp and be a scout?” the boy asked pitifully.
“Not this year,” said his mother gently; “because scouting means swimming and running and diving and climbing to catch birds——”
“Oh, they don’t catch birds, mother,” said Arden.
“They catch storks,” said Mrs. Cowell.
“You’re thinking of stalking,” laughed Tom.
“Gee, I want to go up there,” Wilfred pleaded. “If I say I won’t do those things——”
“It would be so hard for him to keep his promise at a place like that,” said Mrs. Cowell.
“Scouts are supposed to do things that are hard,” said Tom.
“Yes—what do you call them—stunts and things like that?” Mrs. Cowell persisted.
“Sure,” said Tom; “keeping a promise might be a stunt.”
“Oh, I don’t think it would be wise, Mr. Slade; I’m sure the doctor would say so.”
But the doctor did not say so. He glanced at the young fellow in khaki negligee who had sat in respectful silence during the examination and the talk. They all looked at him now, Mrs. Cowell in a way of rueful objection to whatever he might yet intend to say.
“Of course, if the doctor says he can’t go, that settles it,” said Tom. “But I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about scouting. The main thing about scouting, the way we have it doped out, is to be loyal to your folks and keep your promises and all that. I thought Billy was going up there with me to beat every last scout in the place swimming and rowing and tracking—and all that stuff. I had him picked for a winner. Now it seems he has to beat them all doing something else. He has to keep his promise when you’re not watching him. It seems if he goes up there he’ll just have to flop around and maybe stalk a little and sit around the camp-fire and take it easy and lay off on the strenuous stuff. All right, whatever he undertakes to do, I back him up. I’ve got him picked for a winner. I say he can do anything, no matter how hard it is.
“The scouts have got twelve laws”—Tom counted them off on his fingers identifying them briefly—“trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient (get that), cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverent. There’s nothing in any one of them about swimming and jumping or climbing. You can’t run when you stalk because if you run you’re not stalking. Billy’s a new chap in this town and I intended to take him up to Temple Camp and watch all the different troops scramble for him. Well, he’s got to lay off and take it easy; I say he can do that, too.”
“You got a doctor up there?” Doctor Brent asked.
“You bet, he’s a mighty fine chap, too.”
Doctor Brent paused, cogitating. “I don’t see any reason why he couldn’t go up there,” he said finally. “You’d give your word——”
“He’ll give his word, that’s better,” said Tom.
“Probably it will do him good,” said the doctor.
“I don’t want anybody up there to know I have heart trouble,” said Wilfred. “I don’t want them to think I’m a sick feller.”
“You’re not sick,” said his mother.
“Well, anyway, I don’t want them to know,” Wilfred persisted petulantly.
“Well, they don’t have to know,” said Tom. “I’ll get you started on some of the easy-going stuff—stalking’s about the best thing—and signaling maybe—and pretty soon they’ll all be eating out of your hand. You leave it to me.”
“Well then,” said the doctor, “I think that would be about the best thing for him. And as long as he’s going away and going to make a definite promise before he goes, we might as well make it hard and fast—definite. That’s the best way when dealing with a boy, isn’t it, Mrs. Cowell? Suppose we say one month. If he keeps thinking all the time about doing things he’s promised not to do, the country won’t do him much good. So we’ll say he’s to keep from running and swimming and diving and climbing and all such things for a month, and not even to think about them. Then on the first of August he’s to go and ask that doctor up there whether he can—maybe swim a little and so forth. Understand?”
“Yes, sir,” said Wilfred.
“And do just exactly what he says.”
“Yes, sir.”
“He’s there most of the time,” said Tom. “Sometimes he’s fussing with his boat over at Catskill.”
“Well, wherever he is,” said Doctor Brent, winking aside at Tom, “you go to him on the first of August and tell him I said for him to let you know if it’s all right for you to liven up a little. Go to him before that if you don’t feel good.”
“I won’t because I don’t want any one to know I’m going to a doctor,” said Wilfred.
“Leave it to me,” said Tom reassuringly.
“May we come up and see him?” Arden asked.
“You tell ’em you may,” said Tom.
As Arden opened the street door for the doctor to pass out, the clang and clatter of the little Wentworth girl’s ramshackle wagon (it was her brother’s, to be exact) could be heard offending the summer stillness of that peaceful, suburban street. She renounced her fugitive ball long enough to pause in her eternal pursuit and shout an inquiry about her stricken hero.
“Ain’t he got to go to school no more?” she called.
It made very little difference, for school would be closing in a day or two anyway and the little Wentworth girl’s mad career of solitary glory would be at an end. Her brother, released from the thraldom of the classroom, would reclaim his abused vehicle. And the hero who was to make such bitter sacrifices on account of his gallantry would be off for his dubious holiday at Temple Camp.