“No, but there’s an old five-gallon tank,” Pee-wee shouted; “It’s on a grocery box that says Lingate’s soap is best and it’s got some oil in it. There are lanterns up here, too, a couple of red ones and a white one and there’s a picture of an actress out of a newspaper tacked on the wall. There’s a big spider-web, too, and there’s a wasp caught in it; he’s dead.”
It was hard to divert Pee-wee’s inquisitive mind and eagle eyes from their exploration of this new discovery. And indeed, even to Townsend’s imagination, these homely, deserted memorials of a former time appealed strongly. The little tower house was so much removed from the world as to have some of the enchanting qualities of a desert island.
“I can hear oil splashing in it when I shake the can,” Pee-wee shouted. “There’s an old red flag up here, too, and a picture of a prizefighter; I guess it was on the wall but it fell on the floor; there was a centipede under it, I stepped on him—a great big one.”
The prizefighter flat on the floor (where prizefighters so often find themselves) and the actress on the wall hinted that the former towerman had been a lover of the ring and of the stage.
“Take a squint up the road,” Townsend called, “How about it?”
“I’ll tell you,” said Pee-wee.
“Please do,” called Townsend.
“About a half a mile away, maybe three-quarters of a mile, is a village; it’s right in the road. And about—wait a minute—about—about—halfway between here and there—maybe not so much as quite half-way—there’s some chewing gum up here, too, it’s hard like a rock—there are mountains!”
“Where is the chewing gum and where are the mountains?” Townsend called.
“Up here—there’s kind of something the matter like, along the road. Throw me up my field-glass, it’s rolled up in my sleeping blanket with my camera.”