"But can I go after the boat when I——"
Mrs. Ring caught up a flat piece of wood from the back of the kitchen range, and laughingly but firmly put an end to the coaxing, Jerry retreating hastily to the shelter of his bedroom.
Both Jerry and his father stood in awe of tiny Mrs. Ring, who barely reached to overgrown Jerry's shoulder.
"Wake me up at twelve, will you, ma?" called Jerry, in his most wheedling voice. His mother only laughed, but Jerry felt sure she would. Besides, there was his dollar alarm clock.
Jerry repented his request when sharp at twelve o'clock he was called for noonday dinner. He was sleepy and cross and not a bit hungry. His muscles were sore, and the drill to Lost Island did not have quite the romance by broad daylight that it had had a few hours before.
Jerry watched his father put on his hat and hurry back to work, with a great deal of relief. His mother was much easier to handle in a case of this sort.
"You won't mind if I don't get back till late?" he asked, hoping she would give her unqualified consent to his remaining away as long as he saw fit. "You promised me I could go camping this summer—let me take it now, please, ma."
"Will you promise me to come back and let me pick the birdshot out of you after you've made a landing on Lost Island?" she asked in mock anxiety. As a matter of fact, Mrs. Ring was about as proud of her big boy as a mother well could be without making herself a nuisance to the neighbors. From his earliest boyhood she had cultivated the independence of spirit he showed with his first pair of real trousers, and now she often strained a point to let him exercise it. To be sure, she sometimes wondered how much was genuine self-confidence and how much was a reckless love of adventure.
Now she raised her eyebrows in denial, but at the eager look on the boy's face she relented. "Trot along, Jerry," she agreed, with a quick pat at his shoulder—the Rings were not much at kissing each other. "If you can't take care of yourself by now, you never will be able to. I know you're as anxious as you can be about Tod—I do hope it turns out that you are right about him."
With a muttered, "I've got to be right," Jerry set about making himself a couple of substantial sandwiches and stuffing them in the pocket of his canvas hunting coat, which he took along for emergencies. "Good-bye, ma," he called over his shoulder. "I'll be back as soon as I can bring Tod with me."