He had told Tom that if
he only once found a trail, nothing would stop him--_nothing_. Very
fine. All that talk about there being something higher than the Eagle
award was nonsense, and Tom Slade knew it was nonsense. "He said I'd do
it, and I'm going to," Hervey muttered to himself.
Hervey had no patience with obstacles, he must be always moving, so now
he began frantically scrutinizing the ground to see if he could find
some sign of the marks which had eluded him. Since he could no longer
distinguish the stream bed, he looked for some sign of those marks
outside the stream bed.
And presently he was rewarded by the discovery of tracks, animal tracks
sure enough, without any ribbon, so to speak, printed between them.
There they were upon the hard, bare earth, two lines of claw marks,
continuing to a point where they disappeared again at the edge of a
close cropped field. Evidently his mysterious predecessor had known just
where he wished to go and had forsaken the stream bed when it no longer
went in his direction. These were no aimless tracks, they were the
tracks of a creature that had particular business in the southwest, and
that knew how to get there.
CHAPTER XIII
THE STRANGE TRACKS
Hervey had not the slightest idea in which direction he was going, but
in point of fact he was heading straight in the direction of Temple
Camp. But he had found his precious tracks and nothing would stop him
now. He would go over the top in a blaze of glory next day, and then
perhaps a telegram could be sent to scout headquarters to have the Eagle
badge sent up immediately so that he could receive the very award itself
on Saturday night.
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