“Forget what, Bumpus?” asked Giraffe.
“I’ll tell you, fellers,” continued the fat boy, with a sigh that seemed to come from the very depths of his heart. “Just before I started off on this glorious trip with you my father handed me a letter which he said he wanted me to take right away to Mr. Harriman, the cashier of the Cranford Bank, as it was very important that he should have it before noon that day. I was just trying to remember whether I did go there and give it to him or not; and d’ye know, for the life of me I just can’t make sure of it.”
“That’s funny!” exclaimed Giraffe. “Ain’t you able to recollect seeing the gentleman, or anything he said to you?”
The other shook his head sadly.
“That’s the queer part of it,” he declared. “Sometimes it comes to me that I must have done it, and I think I see it all plain before me. Then it gets mixed, and I’m not so sure. You see, here’s what bothers me. That same morning I met a friend who was going about ten miles off in his dad’s machine, and he asked me to have a spin with him. Just couldn’t resist, boys, and we did go licketty-split. I’m telling you right now.”
“I saw you go past our house, riding for fair,” remarked Step Hen.
“Tell us the rest, Bumpus; what had that ride in a car to do with the important letter your father gave you to be delivered at the bank?” asked Davy Jones.
“A heap, I’m afraid,” answered the other, making a wry face. “I can just remember that my coat managed to break loose, and was flapping in the wind before I was able to grab it shut, and button it again. And fellers, I had a glimpse of something white, like a letter, that had slipped out of my pocket, and was carried over the fence into Brainard’s woods!”
“Wow! and again, wow!” exclaimed Giraffe, that being his favorite way of expressing surprise and interest in anything.
“I thought at the time that it must be only a scrap of waste paper I happened to be carrying in my pocket; but fellers, it just broke in on me a little while back that it might have been that very important letter I was to give to Mr. Harriman at the bank!”