“Tell us another.”
“That one is true. When they get up where it’s cold, he gets into the chap’s pocket and pulls down the flap. That’s a fact. There was a story about it in the papers and a picture of the pair of them in the plane,” Howard insisted.
“Reckon we’ll have to believe it.” Jim eyed a small monkey who was clinging, frightened to his mother. “If it wasn’t for your parents, I’d take you along,” he called, and as if the mother understood, she ran along the branches until she was ahead of the boat, then stopped and scolded furiously. “It’s all right, you needn’t get so het up about it—I haven’t taken him.”
“He’s admiring him, you flapper,” Bob shouted. “You should be flattered instead of mad.”
“Now we’re on the last stretch,” Howard announced as the boat turned again. “It’s five miles by water to the village; three by airline.”
“It was great of you to take us around,” said Jim.
“Surely was,” added Bob.
“Glad you liked it. We don’t usually take parties over the route because they are not always careful, but I had what you American boys call a hunch that you would appreciate it and not do any damage. The site of the work isn’t generally known because the professors did not want to be pestered with too many visitors, but a few have come. Some of the scientific publications have sent writers to get articles, but several of the men working here send out that sort of stuff themselves, so only special men have been taken around the works,” Howard explained.
“Sounds as if we are nearing the village,” Jim remarked a bit later, because he heard voices quite distinctly.
“We are near, and not near. We couldn’t get across here, but it’s only about a quarter of a mile if we could go through. It’s a mile and a half by the boat.”