Tom Slade with the Colors

and pride-racking surroundings back in his home town, now led up through a quiet woodland, where there was no sound but

, and once, when he climbed a tree to get his bearings, he could see, far in the dista

hmore was on a visit to his former "pals" in the West, and the camp

eemed very far away now, and though he was in a country which he loved and which meant much to him, h

to reach, before dark, the clearer path which he himself had made and blazed from the vicinity of Temple C

where there was no more sign of path than there is in the sky, he eme

ngled underbrush, his old clothes had some fr

est, and now, as he reached the little trail which was not without its

It's good he didn't have to go t

ched hat, his rolled-up sleeves, and the belt axe which he carried in his hand, bespoke the rugged power

ed some antiseptic over the sc

he muttered, "even if they won't l

might indicate that the path had been recently traveled. Once his hopes of finding Roscoe were dashed by the discovery

footprint, and presently its meaning was confirmed when h

new now for a certainty that he was right. He had kno

pon an exposed root, and as he fell sprawling on the gro

ruelly, and when he put his hand to his forehead he found that it was bleeding. He tried

olding his throbbing head and lifting his f

ntly. "I was a fool to start running

ry and spent that when, in the new assurance of success, he

e breathed heavily; "like Roy always

ain was too great, and his head sw

the troop's First-Aid Scout. "It-it was just-because I di

ing less profusely. After a few minutes, feeling less dizzy, he stood upon his feet, with

anaged to get along. More than once he stopped, clinging to a tree trunk, and raised his foot to ease the anguish. His head throbbed with a

I'd be going to that-racket--" h

his shirt. A great bloody scratch was visible upon his cheek. His hands were cut by brambles. There was a grim look on his dirty, sc