Did it speak to any one, this voice calling in the dark? Did any one
understand it? Were there no telegraph operators in any of the stations
along the line? They would understand. Was there no one?

No one?...




CHAPTER XIX

PAGE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FOUR


If Pee-wee had stolen a glimpse from the buffalo robe at about the time
that he was writing under difficulties his momentous message to the
world, he might have noticed a little old-fashioned house nestling among
the trees along the roadside.

At that time the house was dark save for a lamp-light in a little window
up under the eaves. Little the speeding hero knew that up in that tiny
room there sat a boy engrossed with the only scout companion that he
knew, and that was the scout handbook. It had come to him by mail a few
days before.

This boy lived with his widowed mother, Mrs. Mehetable Piper. His name
was Peter, but whether he was descended from the renowned Peter Piper
who picked a peck of pickled peppers, the present chronicler does not
know. At the time in question he was eating the handbook alive. The
speeding auto passed, the mighty Bridgeboro scout pinned his missive to