“Wild Indians?” asked Ned, and all the boys listened eagerly for the answer.
“No,” said Paul, contemptuously; “they’re the tamest kind of tame ones.”
This was dreadful, yet Ned thought he would try once more. “How did you come to know so much about buffaloes?” he asked.
“I saw two in Central Park, in New York,” Paul replied. “Oh, boys! boys! you’re dreadfully sold.”
“Say, Paul,” said Benny, edging to the front, and looking appealingly at his friend, “you’ve been away out West, anyhow, haven’t you?—because you told me you knew about it.” Benny awaited the answer with fear and trembling, for he felt he never would hear the end of the affair if he did not get some help from Paul.
“No, I’ve never been farther West than Laketon,” was the disheartening reply. “All I know of the West I’ve learned from books and newspapers.”
“Dear me!” sighed Benny; and for the first time in his life he wished the bell would ring, and give him an excuse to get away. Within a moment his wish was gratified, and he scampered up-stairs very briskly, but not before Bert Sharp had caught up with him, and called him “Smarty,” and asked him if he hadn’t some more dreams that he could go about telling as truth. Poor Benny’s only consolation, as he took his seat, was that Notty had been the first to suggest the Indian theory, and he ought therefore to bear a part of whatever abuse might come of the mistake.
At any rate, he had learned that Paul had been in Maine and New York; certainly that was more than he had known an hour before.
Chapter VIII.
DARED.
