“By jingo! there they be!”
“You’re right; that’s them,” added his brother.
The two tramps, who have already figured to some extent in these pages, were descried as the team turned a corner, walking in the middle of the road. He who had lost his hat had managed in some way to secure another. Half of the rim was missing and his frowsy hair showed through the crown. As the rattle of wheels reached their ears, he who was known as Biggs looked around. Immediately the paths of the two diverged, one going to the right and the other to the left of the highway. Both limped as if the act of walking was painful. Naturally the team soon overtook them. Jake, who had been talking the matter over with his friends, stopped his horses.
“Whoa! wouldn’t you gentlemen like me to give you a lift?”
“Now ye’re shouting, boss,” replied Biggs as he and his companion each approached a front wagon wheel, “but where are yer going to put us?”
“You won’t mind setting on the bottom of the wagon in front of the stuff piled there?”
“Not a bit, boss; ye’re a trump.”
Resting one ragged shoe on a hub, the hobos clambered in and sat down behind the three men, who said nothing but tried to restrain their chuckling. They knew what was coming.
Biggs and Hutt drew up their legs and compressed themselves as much as possible. Still, with the best they could do they were cramped. It seemed to Biggs that a slight shifting of the freight behind them would help matters. He hesitated for a minute or two and then stealthily raised one corner of the canvas covering, his companion watching him.
Thus it came about that the revelation burst upon the two in the same instant. A howl of terror rang out from each, as they bounded to their feet and dived over the side of the wagon. They forgot their lameness, and ran in the direction of Gosling Lake as if they were contestants at Stockholm for the Marathon prize. That single peep under the canvas had shown the same appalling thing that drove them headlong from the canoe. It was actually near enough to touch them, and the wonder was that they were not smitten with a mortal dread.