“Mr. Archibald,” said Mrs. Archibald, when they had retired to their room, “I did not agree with you when you wished we could have started for camp to-day, but now I am quite of your mind.”
Tuesday was fine, and preparations were made for the Archibald party to start for their camp after an early luncheon.
The bluff and hearty Peter took such an interest in everything that was being done for their comfort, giving special heed to all the possible requirements of Mrs. Archibald, that the heart of Mr. Archibald was touched.
“I wish,” said he to his good-natured host, “that you were going with us. I do not know any one I would rather camp with than you.”
“If I could do it,” replied Peter, “I’d like it ever so well. So far as I have been able to make you out, you are the sort of a man I’d be willing to run a camp for. What I like about you is that you haven’t any mind of your own. There is nothing I hate worse than to run against a man with a mind of his own. Of course there have to be such fellows, but let them keep away from me. There is no room here for more than one mind, and I have pre-empted the whole section.”
Mr. Archibald laughed. “Your opinion of me does not sound very complimentary,” he said.
“It is complimentary!” roared Peter Sadler, striking the table with his fist. “Why, I tell you, sir, I couldn’t say anything more commendable of you if I tried! It shows that you are a man of common-sense, and that’s pretty high praise. Everything I’ve told you to do you’ve done. Everything I’ve proposed you’ve agreed to. You see for yourself that I know what is better for you and your party than you do, and you stand up like a man and say so. Yes, sir; if a rolling-chair wasn’t as bad for the woods as the bicycle that Boston chap brought down here, I’d go along with you.”
Mr. Archibald had a very sharp sense of the humorous, and in his enjoyment of a comical situation he liked company. His heart was stirred to put his expedition in its true light before this man who was so honest and plain-spoken. “Mr. Sadler,” said he, “if you will take it as a piece of confidential information, and not intended for the general ear, I will tell you what sort of a holiday my wife and I are taking. We are on a wedding-journey.” And then he told the story of the proxy bridal tour.
Peter Sadler threw himself back in his chair and laughed with such great roars that two hunting-dogs, who were asleep in the hall, sprang to their feet and dashed out of the back door, their tails between their legs.
“By the Lord Harry!” cried Peter Sadler, “you and your wife are a pair of giants. I don’t say anything about that young woman, for I don’t believe it would have made any difference to her whether you were on a wedding-trip or travelling into the woods to bury a child. I tell you, sir, you mayn’t have a mind that can give out much, but you’ve got a mind that can take in the biggest kind of thing, and that is what I call grand. It is the difference between a canyon and a mountain. There are lots of good mountains in this world, and mighty few good canyons. Tom, you Tom, come here!”