“No. Society is an enlarged family, and wouldn’t like it. But this summer, when we camp.”
“How do you know we’re going to camp?”
“The things we know best we don’t always know how we know.”
“Well, then,—if we camp—”
“When we camp—let’s live without a watch.”
“You’d need one to get there.”
“Take one, and let it run down.”
As it turned out, my “when” was truer than Jonathan’s “if.” We did camp. We did, however, use watches to get there: when we expressed our baggage, when we sent our canoe, when we took the trolley car and the train; and the watch was still going as our laden craft nosed gently against the bank of the river-island that was to be our home for two weeks. It was late afternoon, and the shadows of the steep woods on the western bank had already turned the rocks in midstream from silver to gray, and dimmed the brightness of the swift water, almost to the eastern shore.
“Will there be time to get settled before dark?” I asked, as we stepped out into the shallow water and drew up the canoe to unload.
“Shall I look at my watch to see?” asked Jonathan, with a note of amiable derision in his voice.