"S'pose I could work you in on the game!" cried Burt enthusiastically. "That'd help a lot if the folks knew you were going, too, and if your dad would fall for it we might take you as some kind of assistant! I tell you—I'll take you as my personal servant, my valet! How'd that strike you, just for a bluff?"
"Strike me fine," responded Critch vigorously. "I'd be willin' to work my way—"
"Oh, shucks! I didn't mean that. I mean to get your expenses paid that way, see? After we got going—"
"Come out of it!" interrupted Critch. "You talk as if you was really going. Where do you reckon my dad comes in? S'pose he'll stand for any game like that? Not on your life! Dad's figgering on pulling me into the office when school's out."
Burt left for home greatly sobered by the practical common sense of his chum. He was quickly enthusiastic over any project and was apt to be carried away by it, while Critch was just the opposite. None the less, Burt was determined that if it was possible for him to go, his chum should go too.
After dinner that evening while the family was sitting in the library, Mr. Wallace cautiously introduced the subject to Burt's parents. Burt was upstairs in his own room.
"Etta, isn't that boy of yours getting mighty peaked?"
"I'm afraid so," sighed Mrs. St. John anxiously. "But we can't make him give up that scholarship. I'll be glad when school is over next week."
"I guess we'll pack him off with Howard," put in Mr. St. John. "I'll send 'em up the Kennebec on a canoe trip."