“If you have an apple and I have an apple and you give me yours, that’s a good turn, isn’t it? And if I give you mine that’s another good turn, isn’t it? And we’re both just as well off as we were before. That’s recip—” He had to pause to lick some trickling lemon juice from his chubby chin, “rical.”
Pepsy seemed greatly impressed, and Pee-wee continued his edifying lecture. “I should worry about two hundred and fifty dollars because you saw how people always get paid back only sometimes it isn’t so soon like with the apples. Everything always comes out all right,” continued the little optimist between tremendous sucks, “and if you’re going to get a punch in the nose you get it, and you can see how Mr. Bungel got paid back auto—what d’you call it?”
“Automobile?” Pepsy ventured.
“Automatically,” Pee-wee blurted out, catching a fugitive drop of lemon juice as it was about to leave his chin. “Good turns are the same as bad turns, only different. Do you see? I bet you can’t say automatically while you’re sucking a lemon stick.”
“Is it a—a scout stunt?” Pepsy asked.
Pee-wee performed this astounding feat for her edification, catching the liquid by-product with true scout agility. Whether from scout gallantry or scout appetite, he did not put Pepsy to the test.
“I’m glad of it, anyway,” she said, “because now we can stay here and have our store and there isn’t anybody like that pros—like that Mr. Sawyer to be afraid of.”
“Do you think I’m afraid of prosecutors?” Pee-wee demanded to know. “I’m not afraid of them any more than I’m afraid of June-bugs; I bet you’re afraid of June-bugs.”
“I’m not,” she vociferated, tossing her red braids and looking very brave.
“Then why should you be afraid of prosecutors? I wouldn’t be afraid of anything that doesn’t sting.”