"Oh! it won't take long for him to get rid of all those things," said the other, confidently. "Already we've seen him accept that tattered old pair of pajamas from Davy Jones; either of us might have hesitated to put 'em on, because of the laugh they'd raise. I think Davy only fetched them along to get a rise from the boys. Smithy is all right, Thad. Given a few months with us, and his mother won't know her darling angelic little boy."
"Say, Thad," sang out Step-hen just then; "what d'ye reckon could have happened to the fellers that own the bear? We've been talking it over, and no two think alike. Some say they got tired feeding the beast, and turned him loose on the community, to browse off poor scouts, camping out for the first time. Then others got the notion that p'raps some hobos might have stopped the show foreigners, and took their money, letting the bear shuffle off by himself."
"We'll just have to take it out in guessing, and let it go at that," was the reply Thad made. "You see, we haven't anything to go by. The bear wasn't carrying any message fastened to his collar, or anything of the sort that I could see."
"Now you're joking, Thad; the only message he had about him was a hungry one, and it showed on his face and in the way he begged," Bob White remarked.
"But, oh! dear me, don't I hope then that the two foreign chaps are hot on the trail of their lost performing pet; and will show up here bright and early to-morrow morning; for just think what an immense stack of precious grub that bear can put away inside of forty-eight hours."
Nobody but Giraffe could have had a thought along these lines.
"Well, he's tired as all get-out now, it seems," said Step-hen; "for there he's lying down like he meant to go to sleep in the shadow of that tree. Makes himself right at home, I must say. I reckon he likes us, fellows."
"Please don't say that, Step-hen; it makes me nervous," remarked Bumpus, wrapping his blanket around him after the way an ancient Roman might his toga, as if, in spite of its warmth, he had started shivering again, as the significant words of Step-hen awakened unpleasant thoughts in his now active mind.
"But how about appointing a sentry to stay on guard during the night?" suggested Giraffe, turning to the scout-master.
"What for?" asked Thad, winking at Allan.