“Why,” I said, surprised, “it’s the patch that you and Peg sewed on my old corduroy pants.”
One time when I was playing at Scoop’s house I tore an awful hole in the seat of my pants, a knock-about pair that I wore on Saturdays. Peg was there. And he and Scoop, in fun, took me down and sewed a heart-shaped patch over the hole. They even went to the trouble of putting a red edge on the patch, using some of Mrs. Ellery’s fancy darning cotton. I didn’t mind their joke. I got just as much fun out of it as they did. Afterwards Mother wanted to rip off [[94]]the patch and put on something less showy. But I wouldn’t let her change it.
“I heard the kid’s pants rip,” Scoop went on, “when he went through a barbed-wire fence. And when I came to the fence, there was this patch. I thought it was the one that I had helped to sew on Jerry. I wasn’t sure though.”
Peg scratched his head.
“But how could a strange kid get hold of Jerry’s pants?”
“You tell me,” said Scoop, wagging his head, “and I’ll tell you.”
“Are you sure it’s your patch?” Peg inquired of me.
I told him that it was, beyond all doubt. And I tried to remember the last time that I had worn the old corduroys. It came to me slowly that I hadn’t seen them in my clothes closet for a good many weeks.
How had they come into the possession of this strange boy? Why was he wearing them instead of his own pants? Who was he?
I pondered the mystery, puzzled. [[95]]