The Rival Campers; Or, The Adventures of Henry BurnsSmith, Ruel Perley
General
The Rival Campers; Or, The Adventures of Henry Burns
Smith, Ruel Perley
Boats and boating -- Juvenile fiction; Camping -- Juvenile fiction
“Get his clothes off quick, now,” cried Tom. “I have the hot blankets
ready to wrap him in, and some coffee when he is able to take it.”
In a twinkling Harvey was stripped and rolled snugly in the blankets,
while Tom busied himself in rushing up with cloths heated hot, and
applying them to the soles of his feet. After a time he lifted Harvey up
and poured a few spoonfuls of the coffee down his throat. This seemed to
revive Harvey, for he opened his eyes, muttered something that was
unintelligible, and sank back to sleep.
“He’s all right now,” said Tom, passing his hand over Harvey. “He is
getting warm again. He’ll be all right now when he gets his sleep out.”
Tom and Bob were thoroughly tired. They lay stretched out before the fire
on blankets for a time, too weary to more than barely reply to the
questions of the crew as to the mishap that had befallen Harvey.
Presently Tom rose up and said: “Well, Bob, it’s late, and we’ve got to
be getting started or we’ll never get back to the cottage.”
“We shall be down again to-morrow to see how Harvey is,” he added,
turning to the crew, who sat a little apart, somewhat abashed by the turn
of affairs and the consciousness of the debt of gratitude they now owed
to the boys whom they had wronged. “We’ll send a doctor down if you want
us to, but I don’t think there’s any need of it. He’ll be all right by
morning. Good night.”
They were about taking their departure when Harvey struggled for a moment
with the clothing that enveloped him, lifted his head slightly from the
ground, and said, weakly, “Hold on.”
“What is it?” asked Tom, as they stepped inside the tent again and sat
down beside him.
“Don’t go,” said Harvey, huskily. “Please don’t go. I want you to stay
here to-night,—that is, if you will. I’ve—I’ve got something—something to
say to you in the morning. I can’t say it now. I’m too weak. But I want
the crew to hear it in the morning.”
Tom and Bob looked at each other in astonishment. Then they nodded, and
Tom replied to Harvey:
“All right, Jack. We’ll stay. Go to sleep now. You’re all right.”
The crew quickly spread some boughs for them, and brought more blankets
from the yacht.
“Tom,” said Bob, as they stood alone for a moment, while the crew were
busily engaged, “it looks like our revenge.”
And then, before they had the blankets half-wrapped about them, they were
sinking off to sleep,—to sleep in Harvey’s camp, alongside Harvey’s crew.
CHAPTER XVI.
A TREATY OF FRIENDSHIP
It was late the following morning when Tom and Bob awoke. The sun was
well up, and the light was streaming into the tent. Their eyes opened on
unfamiliar objects and on strange surroundings.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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