“Wish we had a step-ladder,” says I.
“Might as well w-w-wish for a pair of st-st-stairs,” says he. “We got to find some other way.”
We left it to him; he was better than we were at finding ways; and, most likely, if one of us had found a way he wouldn’t have used it, no matter how good it was. He was pretty fond of thinking up things himself. He liked to astonish folks.
Not that this was very difficult. All he did was have the table moved under the opening and a chair put on it. By standing on the chair it was easy for an ordinary boy to get up into the loft. It wasn’t quite so easy for Mark, but he got around that part of it by piling a box on the seat of the chair and getting on top of that. When he stood there his shoulders were through the opening. He got his arms in and began to wriggle through. It was a tight fit, and there’s no doubt it was mighty funny to watch. Mark wriggled and squirmed. His legs thrashed around and sawed the air, but he kept at it. He grunted and groaned and tugged and pulled. For a while it looked as though he was too big for the hole and would stick in it till we hauled him down by the legs, but after ten minutes of hard work he pushed and hunched himself up.
For a while he sat with his legs dangling and panted. When he was rested he called down to us, cautious-like, and says: “Pass up the spear. And k-keep quiet. One of you c-can come up. The others better s-s-sneak to the back window and watch. But keep still. D-don’t breathe.”
I was up on the table and half through the hole before the other fellows had a chance to object, so they had to go to the back window.
Mark crawled to the back of the house, careful and slow. You had to be careful, whether you wanted to or not, because there wasn’t any floor—just joists with lath and plaster between. I followed him as close as I could. There was a little window about a foot square that overlooked the tent where the enemy were, and Mark was making for it.
“Wonder if it’ll c-c-come out?” he whispered.
“Dun’no’,” says I.
We tried it, but it didn’t seem to want to open. Mark studied it awhile and fussed around with it. It was hot and dusty and uncomfortable up there, and I hoped he would be able to let a bit of air in before long. Just then the window gave with a little creak, and came back in Mark’s hands.