Twenty days you’ll have bad luck.
He was so engrossed with this present acrobatic enterprise (to the unspeakable dismay of the little boy who had summoned him) that he did not at first perceive Councilor Wainwright standing in the doorway smiling down upon him. Indeed he was not aware of the councilor until, triumphant, he hopped breathless into the official’s very arms. The tenderfoot was appalled.
“Well, you succeeded, Hervey?” Mr. Wainwright commented pleasantly. “Suppose we step inside. I see you never give up.”
“When I start to do a thing, I do it,” said Hervey.
“Only sometimes you start to do the wrong things,” the councilor commented sociably. “Well, Hervey,” he added, dropping into a chair and inviting the boy to do the same, “here we are at the end of the season. How many rules do you suppose you’ve broken, Hervey?”
“I don’t like a lot of those rules,” said Hervey.
“No, I know you don’t,” laughed Mr. Wainwright, “but you see this isn’t your camp. If you want to have rules of your own you ought to have a camp of your own.”
“That’s true, too,” said Hervey.
“You see, Hervey, the trouble is you don’t seem to fit. You’re not bad; I never heard of you doing anything very bad. But you don’t seem to work in harness. You’re pretty hard to handle.”
“You don’t have to handle me, because I’m not around so much,” said Hervey.