“Here’s the trail, boys,” he shouted, “and to judge by the fresh look of the break in this branch it can’t have been placed here very long.  The small stone by the large one means to the left.  We’ll run Rob Blake down before long for all his skill if we have good luck.”

“Say, Corporal Merritt,” exclaimed a perspiring lad, whose “too, too solid flesh” seemed to be melting and running off his face in the form of streaming moisture, “don’t we get a rest?”

A general laugh greeted poor Bob or Tubby Hopkins’ remark.

“I always told you, Tubby, you were too fat to make a good scout,” laughed Corporal Merritt Crawford, “this is the sort of thing that will make you want to take some of that tubbiness off you.”

“Say, Tubby, you look like a roll of butter at an August picnic,” laughed Simon Jeffords, one of the second-class scouts.

“All right, Sim,” testily rejoined the aggrieved fat one, “I notice at that, though, that I am a regular scout while you are only a rookie.”

“Come on, cut out the conversation,” exclaimed Corporal Crawford hastily, “while we are fussing about here, Rob Blake must be halfway home.”

With a groan of comical despair from poor Tubby, the Boy Scouts darted forward once more.  On and on they pushed across country, skillfully tracking their leader by the various signs they had been taught to know and of which the present scouting expedition was a test.

Their young leader evidently intended them to use their eyes to the utmost for, beside the stone signs, he used blaze-marks, cut on the trees with his hunting knife.  For instance, at one place they would find a square bit of bark removed, with a long slice to the left of it.  This indicated that their quarry had doubled to the left.  The slice to the right of the square blaze indicated the reverse.

Suddenly Corporal Crawford held up his hand as a signal for silence.  The scouts came to an abrupt stop.

From what seemed to be only a short distance in front of them they could hear a voice upraised apparently in anger.  Replying to it were the tones of their leader.

“Seems to be trouble ahead of some kind,” exclaimed Crawford.  “Come on, boys.”

They all advanced close on his heels—­guided by the sound of the angry voice, which did not diminish in tone but apparently waxed more and more furious as they drew nearer.  Presently the woodland thinned and the ground became dotted with stumps of felled timber and in a few paces more they emerged on a small peach orchard at the edge of which stood Rob Blake and a larger and older boy.  As Crawford and his followers came upon the scene the elder lad, who seemed beside himself with rage, picked up a large rock and was about to hurl it with all his might at Rob when the young corporal dashed forward and held his hand up to stay him.

“Here, what’s all this trouble?” he demanded.

“You just keep out of it, Merritt Crawford,” said the elder lad, a hulking, thick-set youth with a mean look on his heavy features.  “I’m just reading this kid here a lesson.  This orchard is my father’s and mine and you’ll keep out of it in future or suffer the consequences, understand?”