Gerald considered. Many troubled thoughts passed through his mind, but the strongest feeling was anger. He had been so self-sufficient until this “beastly trip.” Now he was learning the sometimes bitter lesson that nobody in the world can be actually independent. He had begun by lording it over his mates, and even his hostesses, and now here he was dependent upon them for the very food he ate and the medicine he had taken. He ceased to feel himself an invited guest but rather a burden and a debtor.
“Of course, Popper’ll pay everything back if we ever get home. But—Oh! dear! How I hate it all!”
For down in his heart he realized that no amount of money could cover his obligation to these friends, and he started off in a most unhappy frame of mind.
“I’ll find that girl and teach her to mind her own business. The idea of her training those monkeys—my monkeys! Course, she’s done it all wrong, and it’s harder to unlearn a thing than learn it right first off. When they’re trained they ought to be worth ten times as much as we paid for them. I might sell ’em to an organ-grinder, if Popper’d buy out Melvin’s share.”
But at this stage of thought it occurred to him that he couldn’t picture his dandyish father dealing with organ-grinders. Indeed, the idea was so absurd that it made him laugh, and in that laughter his ill-temper vanished, or nearly so. After all, it was good to be alive! Even the freedom of the woods, after the stuffy cabin he had left, was delightful. He’d rather have had it the freedom of the city streets, but this was better than nothing.
He began to whistle, imitating the call of a bird in the tree overhead, and with such fair success that he was proud of himself. The bird ceased, startled, then flew onward. Gerald followed, still practicing that wild, sweet note, till suddenly his music was interrupted by another cry, which was neither bird nor joyous, but one of keen anxiety; then, as if it had come out of the ground, a girl begged:
“Oh! whoever you are, come quick!”
“Why, Elsa! I was looking—Hello! Of all things!”
Almost hidden by the great ferns amid which she sat Elsa held, lying across her lap, a little figure in faded gingham.
“Saint Augustine! The boy I heard ’em say was lost! How did he get here? It must be a long way from his house.”