"Wait," said Bill, pulling a letter out of his pocket. "I'll read you what he says. Here it is: 'Father wants me to go up to a camp in Canada called Camp Tadousac. It is situated east of the Saguenay River and there is some wonderful fishing to be had there. I've decided to go and I hope that your father will let you come along. It will be a new experience for us. This camp has no permanent quarters but the members go from one part of the country to the other and live out of doors all the time. They use shelter tents sometimes but often they will be away for a week with only one's pack and sleeping bag as protection against the weather. I'm eager to try it for father says that it is fine sport. He's been up in that country and says it is a sportsman's paradise. He was farther west in the Lake St. John region, but it should be even better farther east. So, Bill, get busy. Talk it up with father and write me that you'll be with me.' That sounds good, don't it?" concluded Bill.
"It 'listens' very well," said Pud. "But, don't you let Professor Gary hear you say 'Don't it' again or you'll get into trouble."
"Doesn't it. Doesn't it, you boob," said Bill impatiently. "Mr. Shields told us a good one this morning about a boy who would write 'I have wrote' instead of 'I have written.' The teacher kept him in after school one day and made him write it out one hundred times. The teacher was called from the room and the boy got through his task. He waited a few minutes but as the teacher did not return, the boy wrote a note as follows. 'Dear Teacher, I have wrote "I have written" one hundred times. You have not came back so I have went home.'"
"Ha, ha, ha!" roared Pud. "That's a good one, but to get down to cases, are you really going up to Canada with Bob?"
"I am if I can get father and mother to let me go," replied Bill.
"Well, I'll see what I can do, for I think that a month or six weeks up in those Canadian woods would make me real husky."
"You, real husky," said Bill in a commiserating tone. "I suppose that you're not as hard as nails and nearly two hundred pounds in weight. Now, don't get in wrong at home by telling them that you would like to go to Canada to get husky. That would be no reason at all for you to go there. Tell them anything you like but that."
"I'll see them to-night and let you know to-morrow," said Pud.
The two boys then separated, Pud to go in to get his baseball suit and Bill to go out to the diamond, as he already had his suit on. Both boys were members of the school team. Bill was now the best player in the school, having made quite a reputation in scholastic circles as a pitcher. He was the captain of the team, which shows better than anything else how he had developed since first we met at Camp Pontiac's Junior camp.
Pud was waiting for Bill the next morning at the school gate.