“Yes, he needs something like this to give him self-reliance. Bumpus was always ready to follow at the heels of some one who led; but who ever knew him to start out on his own hook?” said Allan.
“If only we could be sure of finding him again, after a couple of days had gone by, it wouldn’t be so bad,” declared Smithy.
“Who’ll tell his folks?” asked Davy Jones, dejectedly.
Thad turned on him like a flash.
“Here, we don’t want any of that sort of talk,” he said, severely. “We’re going to find our missing comrade again, all right. Get that fixed in your mind, Davy. It may be to-morrow, or the day after, or even a week from now, but we’ll find him sooner or later, and he’ll know more than he ever did before, too.”
“You just bet he will,” chuckled Giraffe, as he mentally pictured the fat boy stalking through that great tract of timber, solemnly consulting his compass from time to time, and yet utterly unable to say whether the camp lay to the north, south, east or west.
“It’ll just be the making of Bumpus, fellers,” ventured Step Hen.
“But see here,” remarked Thad, “if he disappeared this morning, how is it you two, Davy and Smithy, let the whole afternoon go by without trying to communicate with us?”
Davy Jones took it upon himself to answer.
“You see, Thad,” he began, “in the first place we didn’t know for sure the poor old silly was lost, till late in the afternoon. We just kinder felt a bit uneasy, but every time I came to camp after fishin’ an hour or so, I expected to see him sitting here.”