“What cher got in there?” said Bill, punching the knapsack. “A coat? You won’t need it!”
“Be careful!” admonished Fatty, cringing away. “Don’t get so gay! That’s my lunch you’re punchin’!”
“Lunch!” cried Eddie. “Say, Fat, you are a peach! To think of your bringing enough for the whole bunch. I say that’s good of you! And your mother is the best cook!”
“Well, I didn’t bring lunch for anybody but me,” exclaimed Fatty, shifting the knapsack as far as possible away from Eddie. “I did just what you said; I had my mother fix enough for me.”
“Oh!” said Eddie. “Well, that’s what we said all right. I forgot that you like to eat quite a lot. What did you bring, Skinny?”
“Cake of sweet chocolate,” said Skinny. “Mother was tired last night, and I don’t eat much anyway, and so I just brought that.”
“Not very filling,” remarked Frank, turning his kind eyes on the thin boy beside him.
“Awful nourishing though,” said Fatty, eagerly. “I saw in a paper somewhere that there is more juice to a cake of chocolate than there is to a pound of beefsteak.”
“Well, I declare!” exclaimed Frank. “I tell you what let’s do. When it comes lunch time, everybody will swap lunches with some other fellow. It will be all sorts of sport. Sort of like grab bag, because we don’t any of us know what anyone else has. I don’t even know what Bill brought.”
“Good work!” said everybody, glancing sidewise at Fatty. He said nothing at all. Experience with the boys had taught him that silence was sometimes his best weapon. He was conscious of a sinking sensation. Already the crisp early morning air was making him feel a few preliminary pangs of hunger. He knew Frank Wolfe too well to think that he, Fatty, would draw anything besides that miserable cake of chocolate!