"Well, this hike won't, bet you a cookey!" remarked the other, stubbornly.
"He's right behind you, and coming like a house afire."
"Then what in the dickens are you keeping me waiting here for?" demanded Lil Artha, indignantly.
"I'll tell you," replied the leader of the four, mysteriously.
"Hurry up, then, and let me go ahead," ordered the tall lad.
"We've been talking it over, you see," began the other.
"It's plain enough that talking is something in your trade," commented Lil Artha, bitterly; and Elmer heard Toby alongside him chuckle softly, as though he might be enjoying these caustic remarks of their tall chum mightily.
"And we've come to a conclusion, Lil Artha," went on the other, as though he was not to be moved by any thrusts from the tongue of the contestant.
"All right. Glad you've come to something. Hurry up and spit it out, and then give me a clear road, won't you?" the one who was being held up remarked, sharply.
"The honor of good old Hickory Ridge is at stake," continued the unknown, in a solemn tone that suggested graveyards and all that sort of thing, Chatz Maxfield would have declared.