He wondered what they looked like in their trim khaki attire.

He could hardly hope to see them, but he did dare to hope that somehow or other he might strike up a correspondence with one of them.

He had heard of pioneer scouts doing that.
In his loneliness he pictured scouts seated around a camp-fire telling yarns.

He knew that sometimes these wonderful and fortunate beings with badges up and down their arms went tracking in pairs, that there was chumming in the patrols.

He might sometime or other induce Abner Corning to become a pioneer scout and chum with him.