“You mean we expect to push right up the mountain and begin exploring the country, don’t you, Tom?” asked Josh between bites.
“Yes, and three of the fellows intend to make maps as we go, for practice,” the leader of the Black Bear Patrol explained.
“All I hope is,” commented Billy Button, anxiously, “that we don’t manage to get lost. I’ve got a very important engagement a week from Friday that I wouldn’t want to miss.”
“Huh, guess I’m in the same box,” chuckled Josh; “anyway I promised to be sitting in my usual chair with my feet under our dining table on that same day; and it’d grieve my heart if I missed connections.”
The middle of that June day proved to be very warm, and the boys decided to lie around for several hours. When the sun had got well started down the western sky perhaps there might be a little more life in the air. Besides, they were in no hurry; so what was the use of exerting themselves unduly?
“I hope it isn’t going to storm!” suggested Carl, as they sprawled under the shady tree where they had halted for the noon rest, each youth in as comfortable an attitude as he could assume.
“Oh, is there any chance of a terrible storm dropping down on us, do you think?” asked Horace Crapsey, looking troubled; for although none of the others knew it, the crash of the thunder and the play of lightning had struck terror to his soul ever since the time he had been knocked down, when a tree near his house was shattered by a bolt from the clouds.
“Not that you can see right now,” Josh informed him, a little contemptuously; with a strong boy’s feeling toward one who shows signs of being afraid; “but when it’s summer time and when, in the bargain, a day has been as hot as this one, you never can tell.”
“That’s so, Josh,” George Kingsley remarked, wagging his head as though for once he actually agreed with something that had been said; “a simmering day often coaxes a storm along. It may hit us toward night-time, or even come on any hour afterwards when we’re sleeping like babes in the woods.”
“But what can we do for shelter?” asked Billy Button; “we haven’t got even a rag for a tent; and once we get soaked it’ll be a hard job to dry our suits, you know.”