"There he is now," broke in Carlito, hearing a firm step on the stairs.
"Howdy, fellows," hailed the aviator, as he came into the already crowded room.
"Good morning, Scout Master," greeted Dunk, bowing low, while the other boys followed suit.
"I see I have another job on my hands now," said Hawke, good-naturedly, "But then I don't think you'll be hard to train."
"We're sure glad you're going to be one of the bunch," answered Herb cordially.
"These are our scout outfits," explained Fred, noticing that Hawke was regarding the packing boxes with wrinkled brows.
"Just going to open them," added Fly, anxious to get at the work.
"Let me help," exclaimed Hawke, peeling off his light coat, and rolling up his shirt sleeves before any protest could be made.
For the next few minutes they busied themselves with the lid of the largest box.
"Uniforms," they shouted, when Herb had opened one of the smaller pasteboard boxes of which there were a number contained in the larger enclosure.
"This is yours, Fly," he added, noting the name and measurements which were pinned on the trousers.
As the packages were properly labeled, each boy was soon in possession of his own suit.
After a quick but admiring inspection of the outfits, the second box was eagerly torn open. It contained a hospital corps pouch for each boy, penknives, haversacks, mess kits, signal flags, whistles, sanitary drinking cups, canteens, Red Cross first aid outfits, camp supplies, and last, but not least, seven brand new shining Remingtons.
Each new article was met with shouts of delight and surprise.
"I don't remember ordering these," gasped Fred, when at last they had reached the bottom of the box.
"Oh, dad thought yuh might as well have a good supply," explained Herb, "so he wrote to a friend of ours in New York and got these to surprise yuh."
"Ain't your father never going to quit doing things for us kids?" asked Dunk, stroking the slender, glittering barrel of his new gun.
"I wish we could do somethin' real fine for him," chipped in Jerry.
"Dad don't want thanks. He just likes to be doin' somethin' for somebody all the time," Herb assured them. "He always was that way."
"Well, we're certainly going to get after that sheep stealer," declared Carl.
