CHAPTER XXXI--Home Again--Joe's Christmas Present to His Motheris Sound Health Again, and Tom Rejoices
They got to Chicago the day before Christmas, and had time to goshopping for presents. Tom sneaked off by himself, and returned with amysterious parcel, which Joe imagined was for him. Twenty-five hourslater, they were getting out of the train at Southmead, into the arms oftheir parents and brothers and sisters, and amid the cheers of theassembled scouts.
"Well, you are certainly a hard looking pair!" Mr. Rogers laughed. "Andhard feeling, too," he added, poking Joe's legs and arms. "What do youweigh, Joe?"
"I weighed a hundred and fifty-nine in Chicago," Joe answered.
The next two days both boys spent telling everybody the tales of theiradventures, and Mr. Rogers took Joe up to Dr. Meyer again, who thumpedhim and listened at him as before, weighed him and tested him, and then,with a smile, declared he was as fit as a fiddle.
"And mind you live outdoors till you're twenty-one, and keep so!" headded. "And then go on living outdoors if you can, till you're a hundredand one. It's the only way to live, anyhow. I haven't been out for aweek, and I know!"
"Take that news home to your mother as a Christmas present, Joe," saidMr. Rogers.
Then he turned to Tom. "And you, Tom, gave the present of health to Joe.How do you like giving instead of receiving?"
"Giving? Giving nothing!" Tom exclaimed. "Don't you make any mistake. Ireceived more pleasure seeing old Joey get fat and strong than I'll evergive anybody!"
"That's what I like to hear a scout say," Mr. Rogers smiled, putting anarm over each boy's shoulder, and hanging his weight on them, to feelhow sturdy they were. Neither flinched an inch, but stood up likehickory posts.
Joe's Christmas present from Tom--the mysterious bundle he bought inChicago--was a developing tank and all the chemicals. Joe also receivedfrom Lucy Elkins, on Christmas day, a beautiful enlargement of a view ofGunsight Lake and Mount Jackson, to hang in his room. For the next fewdays he and Tom toiled over the tank, developing their endless rolls offilm, and then, when these were printed, they gave an exhibition at thescout house.
But it was several days before they went into the woods.
"Gee, it's too much like a prairie 'round here," Tom said, casting acontemplative glance at their eighteen-hundred-foot mountain.
Finally, however, just before school commenced, they put on snow-shoes,and tramped over a mean little eight inches of snow to the top of theirhighest hill, out on a ledge above the trees. Southmead lay below them,with all its roofs and steeples gathered in the snowy fields like a herdof cattle. The woods were still.
"It's not the Rockies," said Tom, "but it's pretty nice at that, andwe'll get out the old rope on this baby cliff in the spring."
"It's home," said Joe, "and I'm well again, and can go to school, andhelp mother, and study for the forestry service with you, and--and--oh,Spider, you're the best friend a fellow ever had!"
"No," Tom answered, "you've got the wrong dope. I've got the best friendto be a friend to a fellow ever had. Anyhow, Joey, we've given old mantuberculosis the knock out, and had a grand old time doing it. Let's seeif we can start a snowslide here."
But the snow stuck in a huckleberry bush six feet down.
"I guess it's old Caesar and geometry for us," Tom sighed, "till we beatit for the Rockies for good and all."
"Geometry's not so exciting," Joe laughed, "but I suppose we've got tohave it."
Boy Scouts in Glacier Park Page 33