"I've always been told that the fish in the basket never looks so fine as the one in the water. It's so with Lanky, any way. He wants to forget the splendid dinner he's just put away, and think only of the one ahead. How is it with you, Ralph?"
"Just now I don't care whether school keeps or not. It seems to me I could never get real hungry again, and I wonder how it feels to be just wild for a bite. But I know that will wear away, as you say, Frank. When do we get busy and start for home?" came the reply.
Ralph was of course thinking of other things, wondering whether any one could have arrived at Columbia station since they left town that morning; and if he would be greeted by a mother's caresses when he reached there.
Frank knew what was passing in his mind. He did not say anything, but could sympathize with the anxious lad.
"I suppose we might as well start at once, and take things a little easy on the return trip. One thing seems to be in our favor, and that's the wind," he said after considering a moment.
"Yes, it will be at our backs much of the time," declared Ralph.
"And then again, fellows," remarked Lanky, as he joined the talk, "we'll be going down-hill all the time. That may not be noticeable, but it counts in the long run. I wonder now——"
"What's struck you, Lanky? Thinking of a place where we might stop halfway home to put out some more fire and earn another meal?" asked Frank.
"Huh! what d'ye take me for, a reservoir, a grain elevator or a cemetery? Now, I was thinking of that runaway chap in the striped suit. He went down-river, you know. What if we meet him?"
"In that case I rather guess Bill would hide in the brush. He's seen all he wants of this crowd for to-day. Don't you believe he'd attack us! The chances are he's got no weapons, having just escaped, and he knows he'd have little show with us empty-handed. Forget Bill, Lanky. He's a back number so far as we're concerned," and Frank waved his chum aside.