When Wilfred mentioned to Tom Slade that there were “two of them” whom he blamed, he referred, of course, to Edgar Coleman. The other was Charlie O’Conner. He bitterly resented Charlie’s origination of the nickname Abandon Duty Cowell, because it seemed to involve his sister. But he realized that from the standpoint of the Elks he had abandoned his duty and he could not (indeed he did not have it in his heart) subject Charlie to the same bizarre style of discipline that the astonished Coleman had suffered. So he kept away from the Elks. Wilfred had no desire to win prestige through the vulgar medium of fighting and he loyally refrained from mentioning the little episode in Tent Lane to any one. In this, he was as characteristically faithful as he had been in keeping that harder promise to his mother. If any one had put this and that together and found a connection between Edgar’s ear and the respectful notice that appeared upon the bulletin board, no one mentioned it.
The apology was skilfully couched in such terms as to make it seem voluntary, as if a scout’s conscience (or perchance an autocratic scoutmaster) rather than a scout’s fist, had been at work. So Wilfred, as usual, achieved no prestige from his triumph, and was still Wandering Willie, a misfit and a joke in camp. But he kept his promise to Edgar Coleman.
All that day it rained and the auspicious date in Wilfred’s life passed, leaving him only a secret triumph. Among the trustees and scoutmasters and “parlor scouts” it was thought that Edgar Coleman was a very nice boy to prostrate himself in expiation of a harsh word thoughtlessly uttered. And so on, and so on.
But there was one other thorn that stuck in Wilfred’s side, and now that he had his long-awaited legacy of freedom, he resolved to remove it. There was one person in camp, and only one, to whom he was willing to confide the reason of his long-standing disgrace. That was young Doctor Loquez. He believed now that the seeing of the doctor was merely perfunctory, but it was an incidental part of his promise, and he would terminate his ordeal in the way he had been instructed to.
Besides, he remembered the incident of meeting the genial young doctor at the roadside and of how Doc had said, “You’ll win,” in that cheery, confident way of his. Well, he had not won, he had not even swum, or been present at the big event, and he would like this cordial young champion of his to know why. In point of fact, the young doctor had not borne the episode of their meeting in mind at all, he had told a dozen boys that they would win, and he surely had not held Wilfred to any obligation. But Wilfred, sensitive and of a delicate honor, felt that he must explain his failure to take care of this responsibility. Perhaps it was because no one ever praised him or expressed any hopes for him that he cherished the doctor’s casual compliment. Poor Wilfred, it was all he had.
I am to tell you this just as it occurred, as I heard it from Uncle Jeb, and later from Tom Slade—when he was able to talk. And from Doctor Anderson, father of the Anderson boy in the Montclair outfit, who chanced to be visiting camp. I exclude the highly colored narrative of Pee-wee Harris, he being a warrior rather than a historian.
It was a little after six o’clock on that tempestuous night that Wilfred strolled over to Administration Shack to see the doctor. Where he had been throughout that gloomy day of driven rain and creaking tent poles, and banging shutters, no one knew. He was certainly not with any of the groups nor in the main pavilion where the more philosophically disposed had spent the long day in reading and playing backgammon and checkers.
Brent Gaylong, long, lanky, and bespectacled, who had no prejudices nor active dislikes, said afterward that he saw Wandering Willie standing in the woods during a freakish hold-up of the rain and that he had paused to speak to him. He had pulled up the boy’s shabby necktie to glance at ............