"Had I done that you fellows wouldn't have stopped talking about it for a month," complained Stacy.
Walter Perkins was too deeply engrossed in his letter to give heed, but after he had read it through he read the letter aloud to his companions.
"You haven't any letters for me secreted about your person, have you, Tad?" questioned Chunky humbly.
"No; that is the only letter I have, or had," answered Tad.
"Chunky, perhaps you will get yours in the next mail," suggested Ned.
"Yes; I expect that it will come by airplane route, but I hope it isn't a package. It might hit someone when it fell."
"You wouldn't object were it a package of food, would you?" questioned Tad teasingly.
"Well, that might make a difference," agreed Stacy. "In that event perhaps I could stand having it land on my head."
Tad, during the afternoon, got better acquainted with Cale Vaughn. He found the guide to be a well-read and intelligent man, different from the type of guide that the Pony Rider Boys had known on their previous summer outings in the saddle. Cale was less taciturn, too, and seemed to take the keenest possible delight in the jokes and pranks of the boys that he was to guide through the Maine wilderness.
Vaughn was not much of a horseman, and he had brought a pony along, not because he expected to ride much, but because he needed something to carry his pack. When Cale was looking over Tad's pony, "Silver Face," the boy discovered that the man knew little about horses, though Tad was too polite to mention the fact.