The Boy Scout Camera Club; Or, the Confession of a Photograph

  Produced by the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.

  "Say" Cried Frank, "That's a child's face up there!"]

  The Boy Scout Camera Club

  or

  The Confession of a Photograph

  By

  Scout Master G. Harvey Ralphson

  CHAPTER

  I LOST: A FOREIGN PRINCE!

  II THE HOLE IN THE ATTIC FLOOR

  III WHAT THE BOX CONTAINED

  IV A CAMP IN THE MOUNTAIN

  V JIMMIE AND TEDDY MISS A MEAL

  VI SIGNALS IN THE CANYON

  VII A MINT IN THE MOUNTAINS

  VIII UNCLE IKE PRESENTS HIMSELF

  IX A LANK MULE AS A DECOY

  X "PACKED AWAY LIKE SARDINES"

  XI JACK'S ELEGANT CHICKEN PIE

  XII THE BLACK HAND GAME

  XIII THREE DAYS TO MOVE IN

  XIV POINTING OUT THE TRAIL

  XV A NIGHT ON THE SUMMIT

  XVI THE CALL OF THE PACK

  XVII JUST A LITTLE DARK WASH

  XVIII BRADLEY BECOMES INDIGNANT

  XIX NED PLAYS THE MIND-READER

  XX SHOOTING ON THE MOUNTAINSIDE

  XXI TOLD BY THE PICTURES

  XXII A RECRUIT FROM THE ENEMY

  XXIII RACING MOTORS ON THE WAY

  XXIV THE MAN-TRAP IS SET

  XXV THE CONFESSION OF A PHOTOGRAPH

  The Boy Scout Camera Club

  or

  The Confession of a Photograph

  CHAPTER I

  LOST: A FOREIGN PRINCE!

  "Two Black Bears!"

  "Two Wolves!"

  "Three Eagles!"

  "Five Moose!"

  "Quite a mixture of wild creatures to be found in a splendid clubroomin the city of New York!" exclaimed Ned Nestor, a handsome, muscularboy of seventeen. "How many of these denizens of the forests areready to join the Boy Scout Camera Club?"

  "You may put my name down twice--in red ink!" shouted Jimmie McGraw,of the Wolf Patrol. "I wouldn't miss it to be president of the UnitedStates!"

  "One Wolf," Ned said, writing the name down.

  "Two Wolves!" cried Jimmie, red-headed, freckled of face and asactive as a red squirrel, "two wolves! You're a Wolf yourself, NedNestor!"

  "Two Wolves, then!" laughed Ned. "Of course Jimmie and I can form aclub all by ourselves, and he can be the officers and I can be themembers, but we'd rather have a menagerie of large size, as we aregoing into the mountains of Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina,Kentucky and Tennessee."

  The boys who had not yet spoken were on their feet in an instant, allclamoring for membership in the Boy Scout Camera Club. Ned lifted ahand for silence.

  "Why this present rush?" he asked. "I've been thinking that Jimmieand I would have to go to the mountains alone! Why this impetuosity?"

  "The mountains!" shouted Frank Shaw, of the Black Bear Patrol. "It isthe mountains that get us! We've been thinking that the club you wereorganizing wouldn't get outside of little old New York, but wouldloaf around taking snap-shots of the slums and the trees in theparks. But when you mention mountains, why--"

  "I'm going right down stairs and pack my camera!" Jack Bosworth, ofthe Black Bear Patrol, declared. "When it comes to mountains!"

  The clubroom of the Black Bear Patrol was on the top floor of thehandsome residence of Jack's father, who was a famous corporationlawyer, and the boys persuaded Jack to wait until they had completedthe organization of the Camera Club before he started in packing forthe journey to the mountains!

  "You'll want an Eagle, if you're going to the mountains!" shoutedTeddy Green, of the Eagle Patrol. "I'll fly home and get my wardroberight now!"

  Teddy Green was the son of a Harvard professor, and was inclined tofollow in the footsteps of his father in the matter of learning--afterhe had first climbed to all the high spots of the world anddescended into all the low ones! He insisted on exploring the earthbefore he learned by rote what others had written about it!

  "All right!" Ned grinned. "We'll need an Eagle!"

  "And a Bull Moose!" yelled Oliver Yentsch, of the Moose Patrol."You've got to have a Moose along with you!"

  Oliver was the son of a ship builder, and had a launch and a yacht ofhis own. He was liked by all his associates in spite of his tendencyto grumble at trifles. However, if he complained at small things, hemet large troubles with a smile on his bright face. He now seizedTeddy about the waist and waltzed around the room with him.

  "And that's all!" Ned decided, closing the book. "We can't take morethan six."

  A wail went up from the others, but they were promised a chance atthe next "hike" into the hills, and soon departed, leaving the sixmembers of the Camera Club to perfect arrangements for theirdeparture. It was a warm May night, still Ned closed the door leadingout into the wide corridor which ran through the house on that floor.

  "We can't afford to take others into our plans," he said, "for thisis to be another Secret Service expedition."

  "For the Government?" demanded Frank Shaw. "Then," he added, withoutwaiting for a reply, "I'll call up dad's editorial rooms and have areporter sent up here. Top of column, first page, illustrated! That'sour Camera Club in the morning newspaper!"

  Frank's father was owner and editor of one of the big New Yorkdailies, and the boy always took along, on his trips, plenty of blankpaper for "copy," but never sent in a line! His letters to hisfather's newspaper were usually addressed to the financialdepartment, upon which he had permission to draw at will!

  "Huh!" Jimmie commented, wrinkling his freckled nose, "if you shouldever furnish an item for your daddy's newspaper he'd never live itdown! You've been on all our trips with Ned, and never wired in aword!"

  The Boy Scouts of the Black Bear and Wolf Patrols had been throughmany exciting experiences with Ned Nestor, who, young as he was, wasoften in the employ of the Secret Service department of the UnitedStates government. Frank, as Jimmie said, had been with Ned from thestart, and had never sent in a line of "copy" for the paper.

  "I'm going to furnish a column a day this trip!" Frank declared,making a motion to seize Jimmie. "We're going to take pictures,aren't we? We'll take 'em by the acre, and dad's newspaper is goingto catch every one of them."

  "Huh!" Jimmie declared, with a freckled nose in the air. "I'm anewspaper man, too. You needn't think you're the only cherry in thepie! I used to sell newspapers before I got into the Secret Servicewith Ned!"

  From his earliest years Jimmie had indeed been a newsboy on theBowery. He had never had a home except that provided by himself, andthis, in the early days of his life, had as often been a box orbarrel in an alley as anything else.

  "Why the mountains?" asked Frank Shaw, presently. "Do you have to goto the hills on this trip? I'm glad if you do, of course, but I'dlike to know something about it before we start. Dad will have to beshown this time, I reckon! He thinks we rather _overdid_ the stuntwhen we went to Lady Franklin bay!"

  "Never had so much fun in my life!" laughed Jimmie. "When you getwhere it is forty below, there's some delight in living!"

  "What are we going to take pictures of?" demanded Teddy Green.

  "Moonshiners!" laughed Frank. "Isn't that right, Ned?"

  "Not exactly," was the answer. "This is not a whisky case at all."

  "Counterfeiters, then?" queried Oliver. "They live in the hills!"

  "No, not counterfeiters, either," Ned replied. "The government hasplenty of men to look after counterfeiters and moonshiners. All we'vegot to do is to go into the mountains and take pictures, a
nd keep oureyes open."

  "Open for what?" insisted Jimmie. "My peepers will be open for avenison steak about the first thing! You remember how fine thevenison steaks were up in British Columbia? That Columbia river tripwas some exciting! What?"

  "Well," Ned began, "you all know that I'm in the Secret Service, foryou've been with me, some of you, at Panama, in China, and under theocean, so we'll let the details go without explanation. I'm going tothe mountains to look after a precious package stolen fromWashington--from almost under the eyes of the president--three daysago!"

  "Papers?" asked Jimmie. "You know we went to Lady Franklin bay afterpapers."

  "And they think the mountaineers stole this package?" asked Oliver.

  "Tell us what it was that was taken first!" insisted Frank. "I'mbeginning to see a front-page story in this, right now!"

  "The package stolen," Ned went on, with a smile, "was more preciousthan any bundle of papers could be! It wasn't of gold, silver,diamonds, or anything possessing that kind of value. It was of fleshand blood!"

  "A child stolen!" cried Frank. "This goes to dad's sheet right now!"

  "Boy or girl?" asked Oliver. "Age, please!"

  "Boy," answered Ned. "A boy belonging to one of the ambassadors! Ageseven!"

  "But why should the mountaineers steal such a child?" asked Jimmie.

  "I said the boy belonged to one of the ambassadors," Ned correctedhimself. "I should have said he belonged at one of the foreignembassies."

  "The son of one of the attaches?" asked Teddy. "That's strange! Why?"

  "Teddy," reproved Jimmie, "you can ask more questions in a minutethan a motion picture machine can take in a hundred years."

  "The stolen boy is in no ways related to any one in this country,"Ned answered, "yet his safety is of the utmost importance. It is upto us to find him."

  "But why should the mountain men make a grab at a kid?" insistedJimmie. "I've asked that question numerous times now," he added, witha wrinkled nose.

  "It is not believed that the mountain men know anything about thematter," Ned replied. "No one suspects them of taking the child.Mountain men are not up to that sort of thing, as a rule. They willmake moonshine--some of them will--and may hide a counterfeiter, butthey don't steal children!"

  "Then who did steal him?" asked Frank. "Don't be so mysterious."

  "I want the matter to sink deep into your alleged minds!" was Ned'ssmiling rejoinder, "and that is the reason I'm drawing theexplanation out. It is thought the boy was stolen by some one whocame over the sea to do the job--some one never before in thiscountry."

  "I twig!" Jimmie declared, skipping about the room. "The stolen boyis next of succession to some measly old throne! What? And he wassent out here to get him out of the zone of danger, and now he's beennipped?"

  The boys looked at Ned with redoubled interest. It had beeninteresting, the very idea of going into the mountains in quest of anabducted child, but the thought of going after a boy who would oneday be a king! That was exciting indeed!

  "I can't tell you who the boy is." Ned went on, "but I can tell youthat he must be found! The Secret Service men at Washington have apretty good idea as to who got him, and they believe the criminalsare not above committing the crime of murder. In a certain sense,this boy is in the way in the old country!"

  "Oh, they wouldn't kill a kid like that!" Jimmie asserted.

  "Wouldn't they?" demanded Teddy Green. "If you read up on history,you'll soon find out whether ambitious men will murder children whostand in their way! I half believe the boy was murdered at the verymoment he was taken!"

  "He has been seen alive since that time," Ned responded. "This isThursday. He was taken on Monday, and was seen yesterday. Or a boybelieved to be the prince was seen yesterday, on a launch on thePotomac river."

  "Prince, eh?" cried Frank. "It is a prince, is it? Say, but won't dadbe glad to hear about this? I'd like to write the headlines!"

  "We may as well call him the prince," Ned laughed.

  Before more could be said, a servant knocked at the door and Jackopened it so as to look out. In a moment he turned back inside with aflushed face.

  "Say, boys," he said, "there's something strange going on hereto-night!"