“Maybe so,” says I, pretty dubious, but before we were out of the woods I got so I agreed with every word Mark said. Without his reading hitched on to his imagination I guess those Japs would have had Motu and would have eaten him in a sandwich, for all we could have done to prevent it. I’ve come to see that imagination’s all right when you can compress it and shoot it into a cylinder with a piston in it like you do steam. Mark Tidd was a cylinder built to run on imagination.
CHAPTER IX
“The first thing to remember just n-now,” says Mark, “is to act like we didn’t have any worry. They don’t know Motu’s here. So we’ve got to act natural and do just like we would do if he wasn’t here at all.”
“As how?” says I.
“Plunk and Binney b-better go fishin’ as soon as supper’s over. Motu’ll be just keepin’ out of sight. You and I’ll project around here to see what we can scheme out.”
So we got supper and ate it inside where Motu wouldn’t be seen. Afterward he went up-stairs, I expect to his hiding-place, and Mark and I went out on the big front porch. We sat there and talked for a while. All at once a big rabbit shot out of the bushes with its ears back like it was planning on making considerable speed. He was coming blind, but I got up to take a shy at him and he saw me. Well, sir, he was one flabbergasted rabbit. He stopped and then jumped sideways and then jumped the other way. For a minute he tried to run four ways at once, which is a hard thing to do. Then he made up his mind and scooted off along the shore till he got to a clump of little trees and disappeared.
“Uh!” says Mark.
“What you gruntin’ for?”
“F-funny-actin’ rabbit,” says he. “What d’you calc’late made him come rushin’ out like that?”
“Somethin’ scared him,” says I.