After a long look around, Mark and Bob decided to pitch their camp near a brook and a short distance away from the others in that vicinity. At the general store they had purchased a small but good tent and this they erected, and then cut a ditch around it, that the rain might run off.
"Now we can stay here until we are ready to begin the long trip overland," said Bob; and so it was settled.
CHAPTER VII
TAKING IN ANOTHER PARTNER
They soon became acquainted with several folks camping in that vicinity. Next to them on one side was a man from Iowa named Josiah Socket, who had with him his wife and five children, three boys and two girls. Socket was a quiet individual, but his wife could talk enough for a dozen people.
"How do you do?" said the woman, the morning after Bob and Mark had settled down. "Nice morning, isn't it, but the sun is going to be warm. All alone, and only boys, too! Do you expect to get all the way to California? But of course you do, or you wouldn't be here. It's going to be a long trip, so I'm telling Josiah—I mean my husband. Doing your own cooking, too, I see. You ought to have some woman to do that. Where are you from, if I'm not asking what I hadn't ought to?"
"We're from Pennsylvania," answered Mark.
"Land sakes alive! You've had a pretty big trip already, haven't you? Did you come on that mule? I like mules almost as well as horses. At home my father had six mules, and they worked——"
"Ann, don't talk those boys to death," interrupted Mr. Socket.