“Uh-huh—it’s awfully funny,” Joshua agreed. “Where’d you learn so many funny words?”
“In camp.”
“But you didn’t say whether your father’d take me and Les out West with ’im.”
“What could you do?”
“We could do anything,” he told her with assurance. “We’d oughta be able to drive a team if you can.”
“But I just do it for fun. And you’d have to do it all day long. I guess you’re both too young”—she looked at him speculatively—“to work all day on a job like that. But one of you might be water boy. That’s about all there is for a kid to do in a construction camp that’s workin’ in dirt. If we were rockmen, you might get a job as powder monkey, and carry powder to the dynos and drills to the blacksmith shop to be sharpened. You didn’t say how old you are.”
“I’m pretty near fifteen,” said Joshua. (He lacked nine months of being fifteen.) “How old are you?”
“Eleven, but I’m large for my age. How old’s your brother?”
“Who, Les? Why, le’s see. I guess he’s about thirteen. I ferget. Say, I’ll go get him. And don’t you think there’d be a chance for us?”
“I could speak to Pa about it. It’s lots o’ fun—traveling with a construction outfit. You take all the stock with you, you know—the horses and mules. I mean you ride on the same train with them. We always go in a converted boxcar, and—”