"They will stop guying if I hear them," said Lee doggedly. "The boy has every kind of courage that there is and some day will prove it. But never, never if it will distress his mother. He will bear all the slurs and insults in the world rather than hurt her."
"Jimminy, old fellow, you take it too hard!" said Lem, laughing. "All the fellows do is guy him, and we will see to it that they stop that, you can bank on it. Chance here and me will never see the kid abused. I am some scrapper myself, if it comes to that!"
He pounded Lee cheerfully on the back and that young man smiled in spite of himself. Turning, he caught Lem, a six footer and heavy, and with what seemed a playful little clasp raised him from the ground and tossed him over his shoulder where he hung balanced for a minute before Lee gently eased him to the ground. Chauncey was round-eyed with amazement and Lem sputtered, "Lee, you wizard, you! How in the world did you do that? Why, I am twice your size!"
"Just a little Indian trick that I learned a good while ago when I used to visit some cousins of mine. There were two young bucks who used to wrestle with me, and I learned a lot from them. I have been teaching Bill, and he can almost beat me at my own game. You don't have to be big like you, Lem. Do you want to see me throw you twenty feet over my head?"
"Why, you loon, I should say not!" said Lem, backing off.
"Oh, be a sport, Lem, and let me see the fun!" cried Chauncey.
But Lem refused to be obliging. For a man who did not care how high or how far he flew, he was strangely unwilling to let himself be tossed out on the prairie to amuse Chance or anyone else.
Lee walked off laughing. The others stood looking after him.
"The only Indian thing about him is his color and his walk. Do you notice how he puts one foot down right in front of the other as though he was walking along a narrow trail?"
"He is one of the straightest fellows I have ever known," said Lem, feeling of his neck and waggling his head to see if it was all right after its late experience with Lee. "I am glad to know about Bill. He understands every last thing there is about a plane, and it did seem so funny that he would never leave the ground. It is a wonderful chance for those kids to stand in over here, you know. They are getting the best training in the world in the flying game. I had commenced to think Bill was a perfect sissy. That little automobile of his is a wonder—a regular racing car on a small scale—and yet he goes crawling along at fifteen miles an hour. Well, I am glad to know how it is."