"I've found 'em! Just to think of me putting the blessed wings so carefully away in that same cubbyhole, and then forgetting all about it? But you knew they were there all the time, I'm dead sure you did, George! And how cruel of you to let me waste away to skin and bone, mourning for them!"
"Well, you never asked me if I knew where you stuck 'em," retorted the skipper, with a big grin. "And, after all, I rather liked to hear you grunt about losing 'em."
"Yes, a whole lot you did, when you threatened to eat me, or throw me to the alligators if I kept it up. But I guess you were only bluffing, George. I don't think you could be quite that barbarous," said Nick, reproachfully.
"Well, what are you going to do with them now?" demanded the other. "You know how to swim the best ever; and sure you wouldn't be guilty of wearing those silly wings. And I refuse to carry the cargo any further. How about it, Buster?"
"Yes; we want to know," added Jack.
"They'll do for babies, but not fellows who have mastered the noble art of swimming, so make up your mind," said Josh, grandly.
Nick took one last look at the affairs he had once deemed so essential to his happiness. Then he calmly strode over, and amid the shouts of the rest, dropped the swimming wings upon the fire, where they were speedily reduced to ashes.
"You're right," he observed, moving his arms like a swimmer; "a fellow who has graduated has no need for artificial fins. I'm in your class now!"