"We dug the worms last night—a lard pail half full—down back of his cabbage patch. And while we were sitting on the porch along comes his father—you know how absent-minded he is—and reaches down into the bucket and says, 'Guess I'll help myself to some of your berries, boys.'"
"Bet you that's why Tod isn't here, then."
"Why, Frank Ellery, seventh son of a seventh son? Coming so early in the morning, your short-circuit brain shockers make us ordinary folks dizzy. This double-action——"
"Double-action nothing, Dave Thomas! I heard Mr. Fulton tell Tod yesterday he was to pick four quarts of blackberries and take them over to your Aunt Jen. Tod forgot, and so his dad wouldn't let him go fishing, that's all."
"Sun's up," announced Jerry Ring.
"So's Tod!" exclaimed Dave Thomas, who had climbed to the first high limbs of a near-by elm and now slid suddenly down into the midst of the piled-up fishing paraphernalia. "I just saw him coming in from the berry patch—here he comes now."
A lanky, good-natured looking sixteen-year-old boy, in loose-fitting overalls and pale blue shirt open at the throat, came loping down the path.
"Gee, fellows," he panted, "I expect you're cussing mad—but I had to pick those berries before I went, and it took me so long to grouch out the green ones after it got light."
"I see you brought the very greenest one of all along," observed Dave dryly.
"Oh, you here, too, little one?" as if seeing him for the first time. "I didn't know kindergarten was closed for the day. I make one guess who tipped over the bait can."