“Pooh!” said Charlie. “How thick do you suppose this ice is?”
“An inch? Two inches?” inquired Janet.
“Will measured it at the outlet, and he says it’s twenty-four.”
“I wish Will knew his Greek as well as he knows a lot of other things,” said Uncle Billy.
“I don’t, though!” said Will. “And I don’t know that I want to, anyway. I don’t want to go to college. I want to go logging in the woods.”
“He wants to be a dunce. Would you believe it?” said Uncle Billy. “Essie, what do you suppose we are building this fire for? For fun, Ally? To warm your toes, Janet? Jack, what do you suppose lives under this ice?”
Near the fire Uncle Billy’s big chisel was cutting a hole through the solid floor, and Charlie was cutting another a little bigger.
“The most onluckiest hole ye iver cut, so it is,” Michael said afterward to Charlie.
When the holes were ready Uncle Billy began to bob strings in the dark unseen water. In a moment more Janet was bobbing one too.