“Not on your life,” was Shiner’s heartless rejoinder. “Here’s where we get a chance, fellows, to make Billy stew in his own juice. It’ll break his heart to have a joke all ready to spring and nobody to listen to it.”
“But you fellows don’t know what you’re missing,” warned Billy. “Why ought a cook—”
“We’ll admit she ought, right off the reel,” interrupted Skeets, “so suppose we let it go at that.”
But Billy was not to be shaken from his prey, and he held on like grim death.
“Why ought a cook to get good wages?” he demanded.
“Because she needs the dough,” replied Mouser promptly. The suddenness of the response nearly took Billy off his feet.
“You must have heard that somewhere,” he said in a crestfallen way.
“Noah sprang that on Mrs. Noah when they were in the Ark,” jibed Mouser.
“I knew you wouldn’t have guessed it of your own accord,” retorted Billy, getting at least that much satisfaction out of his discomfiture.
Shortly after dinner, Bobby and Fred went to call on Lee. They found him in much better condition than they had expected. They had feared that the excitement of his experience the night before might have given him a set-back, but on the contrary his eyes were bright, and there was more color in his face than had been there at any time since he had been taken ill.