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CHAPTER I—Joe Gets Bad News About His Lungs—His “Pipes,” as Spider Called Them

“What’s the matter, Joe, lost all your pep?” asked Tom Seymour, as he slowed his pace down so that his tired companion could keep up with him. It was a Saturday morning in May, and the two boys, in their scout suits, with heavy shoes on, were tramping through the woods, where the spring flowers were beginning to appear and the little leaf buds were bursting out on the trees. Both Tom Seymour and his chum, Joe Clark, loved the woods, and especially in early spring they got into them whenever they could, to see how the birds and animals had come through the winter, and then a little later to watch for the flowers and see the foliage come.

But this day Joe seemed to be getting tired. They were tramping up a hillside, through mould softened by a recent rain, that made the footing difficult, and though Joe was trying to keep up, Tom realized that something was the matter.

“Say, Joe, old scout, what ails you, anyhow?” he asked again.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Joe answered. “I’ve had a cold for a month, you know, and it’s pulled me down, that’s all. Ma’s giving me some tonic. I’ll be all right. But I do get awful tired lately.”

He stopped just then and began to cough.

“I wish you’d shake that old cold,” Tom said. “I’m getting sick of hearing you bark in school—you always tune up just as Pap Forbes is calling on me to translate Cæsar. And if you don’t shake it, you’ll be no good for the team, and how’s the Southmead High School going to trim Mercerville without you on second bag?”

Joe stopped coughing as soon as he could, and demanded, “Well, you don’t think I keep the old thing around because I like it, do you? I’ll give it to anybody who’ll cart it off. Come on—let’s forget it!”

They started up the hill again, which grew steeper as they advanced, and presently Tom realized once more that Joe couldn’t keep up. As he had to breathe harder with the increased steepness, too, he began to cough again.

“Say, have you been to see a doctor?” Tom demanded.

“Oh, sure,” said Joe, sitting down on a rock to rest “Ma had old Doc Jones in first week I was sick, and he gave me some stuff—tasted like a mixture of kerosene and skunk cabbage, too.”

“Doc Jones is no good,” Tom declared. “My father says he wouldn’t have him for a sick cat. He doesn’t even know there are germs. Mr. Rogers told me the Doc thought it was foolish to make us scouts boil the water from strange brooks before we drank it. Haven’t you been to anybody else since, when you didn’t get better?”

“Say, what do you think I am, a millionaire?” said Joe. “I can’t be spending money on fancy doctors, and get through high school, too. Ma’s got all she can handle now, with food and everything costing so much.”

“I know all that, old scout,” Tom answered, putting his hand on Joe’s shoulder. “But I guess it would cost your mother more if you were laid up, wouldn’t it? Now, I’ve got a hunch you need some good doc to give you the once over. Are you tired all the time like this?”

“Oh, no,” Joe replied. “Or only at night, mostly,” he added. “I get kind of hot and tired at night, and I can’t do much work. That’s why I’ve been flunking Cæsar. Old Pap thinks I’m lying down on the job, but I really ain’t. I try every evening, but the words get all mixed together on the page.”

Tom sprang to his feet with the quick, almost catlike agility which, in combination with his thin, rather tall and very wiry frame, had earned for him the nickname of Spider.

“You come along with me,” he said.

“Depends on where you’re going,” Joe laughed.

“Say, I’m patrol leader, ain’t I?”

“You are, but this isn’t the patrol. We aren’t under scout discipline to-day.”

“You are,” laughed Tom. “You’re going to do just what I tell you. Come on, now!”

He grabbed Joe by the wrist and brought him to his feet. Joe didn’t resist, either, though Tom expected a scrap. He came along meekly down the hill, through the wet, fragrant woods. Once on the village street, Spider led the way directly to Mr. Rogers’ house, and ’round the house to the studio, and knocked on the door.

The scout master opened it. He was wearing his long artist’s apron, and had his big palette, covered with all the colors of the rainbow, thrust over the thumb of his left hand.

“Hello, Spider; hello, Joe,” he said. “What’s the trouble? Has the tenderfoot patrol mutinied?”

The boys came in.

“No, sir, but Joe’s windpipes have,” said Tom. He quickly told about his chum’s cold, and how he got tired now all the time.

“Now, cough for the gentleman, Joe,” he added with a laugh.

Joe laughed, too, which actually did set him to coughing.

But Mr. Rogers didn’t laugh. He looked very grave, and began to take off his apron. He washed his hands, put on his coat, and with a short, “Come, boys,” started down the path.

There was a famous doctor in Southmead who didn’t practice in the town at all. His patients came from various parts of the country, to be treated for special diseases, and they lived while there in a sort of hotel-sanitorium. It was said that this doctor, whose name was Meyer, charged twenty dollars a visit. The boys soon realized that Mr. Rogers was headed for his house.

“Say, who does he think I am, John D. Rockefeller?” Joe whispered to Tom.

“Don’t you worry,” Tom whispered back. “He’s a friend of old Doc Meyer’s, all right. He’ll fix it. You trot along.”

They had to wait in the doctor’s anteroom some time, as he had a patient in the office. Finally he came out and greeted Mr. Rogers warmly. He was not a native of Southmead, but had come there only two or three years ago from New York, to have his sanitorium in the country, and he had always been so busy that most of the townspeople scarcely knew him. Tom and Joe, while they had seen him, had never spoken with him before. He was a middle-aged Jew, with gold spectacles on his big nose, and large, kindly brown eyes, which grew very keen as he looked at the boys, and seemed to pierce right through them.

The scout master spoke to him a moment, in a low voice, and then he led all three into his office. It wasn’t like any doctor’s office the scouts had ever