“There’s something in that,” nodded Bob reflectively. “Well, he’s canned for a while, anyhow. He’ll have to lie low and mind his p’s and q’s. Hope he doesn’t try later to take his spite out on Schnitzel. I guess Schnitzel’s not afraid of him, though. What he did for Iggy proves that much.”
“Schnitzel’s too much of a man to let a sneak like Bixton get his goat,” asserted Jimmy. “He’ll plod along just as he’s done before and pretend not to notice that yellow cur. We ought to do something to show Schnitzel that we think he’s O. K. I’ve never had much to say to him ’cause I’ve always thought he’d rather be let alone. Now I’m going to make a stab at getting acquainted with him.”
“So stab I, too,” agreed Ignace promptly, which raised a laugh at his expense.
“You’ve done enough ‘stabbing’ to hold you for a while.” The smile faded from Jimmy’s lips. “Do you know that your thirty days’ll be up just one day after Thanksgiving? You’ve given the ‘strong poonch’ to a plan of mine. I wanted all three of you fellows to go home with me for Thanksgiving. I’d already fixed it up with Mother. Now you’ve gone and queered yourself on my account, so I guess we’d all better stay here for Thanksgiving and keep you company.”
Ignace eyed Jimmy wistfully. “No,” he announced with heroic positiveness, “never you stay here for the Thankgivin’. You go home, along Bob and Roger. You stay here, I am the mad. No speak you, no look you, no nothin’. I am no the pig. You go by Jimmy?” he demanded anxiously of Roger and Bob.
“This is so sudden,” murmured Bob. “It takes my breath.”
“You and Jimmy will have to settle it between you, Iggy,” laughed Roger. “It’s not up to Bob and me to choose. All I have to say is that it’s mighty fine in you and your folks, Blazes, to want us with you for our Thanksgiving furlough.”
“It certainly is,” Bob agreed warmly.
“You see?” Ignace turned triumphantly to Jimmy. “Bob and Roger want go by your house. So is it.” Having made up his mind on this important point, Ignace was firm.
True to his word, that very evening Jimmy sought out Schnitzel and invited him to go for a stroll about the camp, in company with Bob and Roger. The man’s gloomy face brightened perceptibly as he somewhat hesitatingly rose from his cot, laid aside a book he had been reading, and followed Jimmy to the stairs, where his two friends stood waiting. Due to his reticent, stand-offish manner, it was the first invitation of the kind he had received since his arrival at Camp Sterling.