“Only a couple of miles,” replied Dave. He turned to Phil and Roger. “That’s about all,” he whispered. “Keep it to yourselves.”
“We will,” they replied.
“Somebody else going to carry this hamper?” cried Chip Macklin. “It’s getting rather heavy.”
“I’ll carry one end,” said Ben Basswood.
“And I’ll take the other,” added Phil. “Dave, you and Roger go ahead and bring down a couple of deer, and a bear, and one or two tigers, or something like that,” he continued, with a grin, for he wanted to get Dave’s mind off of his troubles.
“Nothing but an elephant for mine,” answered Dave, with a forced laugh. “I don’t want to waste my powder.”
“As the society belle said when she left the mark of her cheek on the gent’s shoulder,” remarked Buster Beggs, the fat lad of the group.
“Say, that puts me in mind of another story,” came from Shadow. “Once on a time a Dutchman heard that a certain lady was a society belle. He wanted to tell his friend about it, but he couldn’t think of the right word. ‘Ach, she is von great lady,’ he said. ‘She is a society ding-dong!’”
“Wow!”
“There’s a ringer for Shadow!”