"Quit! Never!" declared Shelby. "Go home when you like, or stay as long as you please, but no quitting!"
"It's goin' be nice now," put in Joshua, who was always sensitive to any discontent with his beloved North land. "Nice fishin', nice sleepin',—oh, yes!"
And there was. Rest that night on couches of spruce branches, that rocked like a cradle, and smelled like Araby the Blest, more than knit up the raveled sleeve of the hard day before.
And when they fished in a small, rocky stream, for heaven sent trout, contentment could go no further. Unless it might have been when later they ate the same trout, cooked to a turn by the resourceful Joshua, and then, lounging at ease before a camp-fire that met all traditions, they smoked and talked or were silent as the spirit moved.
The black firs showed gaunt against the sky; the stars came out in twinkling myriads and the dash and roar of the river was an accompaniment to their desultory chat.
"If I were a poet," Blair said, "I'd quote poetry about now."
"Your own, for choice?" asked Shelby, casually.
"You are a poet, Gil," said Peter. "I've noticed it all the way along. You don't have to lisp in numbers to be a poet. You just have to——"
"Well, to what?" asked Blair, as Peter paused.
"Why, you just have to want to recite poetry."