Scoutmaster Ned's theory about camping was to keep open house. If he lacked discipline (which it is to be feared he did) he made up in pep, and the surprises that he was forever springing on the camp were a perpetual joy. I suspect that he was not well versed in his scoutmasters' handbook. He was a sort of human north wind. He adopted the pose of being driven to distraction by "those kids" and he denounced them roundly and said there were too many of them and that he was going to pick out one and drown the rest. Then he would show up with a new one. He was a sort of free-lance scoutmaster and I wonder how he ever drifted into the movement. Probably he didn't drift in, but blew in. Scoutmaster Safety First (Bill) was his balance-wheel. "Where is she? I'll talk to her," he said to Peter. So he talked with Mrs. Piper while Peter stood by. He sat down in the kitchen and drank a glass of milk and ate a piece of pie and told her that it was the first real piece of pie he had ever eaten in his life. Would he have another? Well, he'd say he would! Mrs. Piper thought he was about the finest "young gent" she had ever seen. He told her all about his adventures of the night as if she were a pal and when she said she had slept through all the rumpus outside, he said, "Well, you've got West Ketchem, where I come from, beaten twenty ways. Could I have just one little sliver--no, not as much as that--well, all right. That town, why you couldn't wake it up, Mrs. Piper, not with an earthquake. It would just fall down through the crack in the earth and go right on sleeping--no I couldn't eat another speck. We must be off." "We?" "Oh yes, Pete's going with me. He's going to make us a little visit for a week or two. We have lessons and everything, study nature, and all that, and all he wants to eat. I'll bring him back, he wants to see the real scouts in captivity. No accounting for tastes, hey, Mrs. Piper? You'd better bring along a coat, Pete; but don't change your clothes, you're not going to church; come just as you are, so I'll be able to tell you from the rest in case I should decide to kill them all. That lets you out, see? Come ahead before your mother changes her mind." Poor Mrs. Piper had not yet made up her mind, so she could not very well change it. Scoutmaster Ned had made up her mind for her. "I'll have to get Sally Flint ter come over and visit with me," said Mrs. Piper doubtfully. "Just the one," said Scoutmaster Ned. "She'll keep you company and you'll have a little peace with this youngster gone. Mrs. Piper, if I had my way I'd chloroform every boy in creation. I wonder you look so young with a wild Indian like that around." "Oh, I ain't lookin' so young," she smiled, greatly pleased.