“Don’t kill the snake, Percy,” objected Ben. “There are lots more just like him, and it won’t help any to kill one. Besides, they never start a quarrel.”
“All right, old S. P. C. A.,” said Percy, as relieved as the snake, which immediately glided off into the bushes as if it had actually understood that Ben was making a plea for its life.
With subdued giggles they released Nancy from the clutches of the brambles. The feather was broken in half and dragged dejectedly over the crown of her hat, and there was a long scratch across her left cheek.
“Do you remember Jim Phipps in the Fourth Grade, Ben,” began Percy, pointing to Nancy’s hat. “Do you remember the poem called ‘Absalom’ he recited? That is, he began it but he never got any farther than the first line, because he started out by saying, ‘Abalsom, my son Abalsom.’”
The laugh was against Nancy, but she took it good-naturedly and joined in, while she broke the feather in half and left the lower end standing up in the band in a straight cockade.
And now the path, although it was on level ground, seemed to grow more and more difficult. Ben, glancing behind him, doubtfully remarked:
“As long as there are only two miles of this, I suppose we can stand it, but if any person feels tired, sing out and we’ll start back without trying to make Indian Head.”
“We are all right,” they assured him.
For a long time they walked on in silence. The ground was soft and squashy under foot, and Billie privately believed that the trail lay only in Ben’s imagination.
“Ben,” she said at last. “I think maybe we had better start back. We don’t seem to be getting anywhere, and this ground is like a sponge.”