“I’ve heard tell of ’em. But right now I’m more curious about Japanese.”
“Huh!” says he. “We m-m-might as well get as much pleasure out of this mix-up as possible. You can get p-pleasure out of sittin’ on a tack if you go at it right. We’ll pretend we’re cliff-dwellers in a stone castle up on a shelf on a m-mountain. The only way to attack us is to scale the cliff with ladders. A tribe of the enemy has come down on to us.”
“I’ve heard,” says Plunk, “that cliff-dwellers ate dogs.”
“Guess,” says Mark, with a grin, “we won’t pretend that far. Motu’s dog don’t look like he’d cut up into good steaks.”
“That satisfies me,” says Binney. “Cliff-dwellers we are, and, if my ears ’ain’t gone to dreamin’, those enemies are gettin’ ready to stir up somethin’.”
“Quick!” says Mark. “You, Binney, get to the west cliff where the leetle cave openin’s are. Plunk, you watch the m-main ladder that’s hauled up. Motu and Tallow and I will f-f-fight off the main attack if it comes.”
It came, all right. There wasn’t any pretending about that. One Japanese scooted out and cut the rope that held the drawbridge, and down she dropped. Then two more put their heads down low so we couldn’t get a good pelt at them and ran as fast as they could across to the hotel.
They were gone about three minutes when we saw them coming back with a ladder—with two ladders. One was a long ladder, the other was short. We made it as pleasant and sociable for them as possible, but they dashed under cover in spite of all we could do.
“L-l-lances ready,” says Mark. Then he raised his voice and yelled to Plunk and Binney. “Keep your eyes open, guards.”
I leaned over the railing and out came three Japanese with the ladders, and what do you think they had on to protect them from shots from above? Bushel baskets! Yes, sir, every one of them had a basket on his head. They looked like some newfangled kind of mud-turtle.