We sat a while without saying a word, then Mark clicks his teeth and says, “I’m goin’ to try it.”
“You ain’t,” I says. “He’ll bust you in two.”
“I don’t b’lieve so. At any rate, I don’t in daylight.”
“You ain’t foolin’?”
“N-no.”
“And you want us to go over to the island and kick up a row like there was four of us, so’s he’ll think nobody’s here?”
“Yes.”
“Come on, fellers,” I says. “If Mark’s gump enough to play he’s bait in a bear-trap I guess we can kick up his racket for him.” We got up and started down hill, leaving Mark in front of the cave looking after us sort of regretful. We weren’t more than half-way down before I began to feel on bad terms with myself. Somehow it didn’t look just right to go off deserting Mark, especially after binding ourselves to stick together in whatever peril come when we made up the Ku Klux Klan.
“Wait a minute,” I told Binney and Plunk. “This ain’t no way to do. You fellers got to yell loud enough for four; can you do it?”
“I guess so,” says Plunk. “Why?”