You know how girls do.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE CLEW
Pee-wee never knew until now how much he cared about his little companion of the summer and how little he cared about their roadside enterprise except so far as she was concerned in it.
All morning the almost continuous procession passed along the road reviewed by a gaping assemblage on the platform in front of the post office. Many motorists who read the enticing promises along the way paused for refreshment only to find the little rustic shelter bare and deserted.
But they were not the only ones to be disappointed. Upon the front porch of Doctor Killem’s house there sat in a wheel chair the queerest little figure ever seen outside of a soup advertisement. He was of the kewpie type, all head and eyes, and he had a kind of ridiculous air of stern authority about him as he sat all bundled up in blankets soberly reviewing the passing cars. So odd and gnomelike was he that he might have stepped out of the pages of “Alice in Wonderland.” He would have made a good radiator ornament on an automobile.
This, you will know, was little Whitie Bungel, who seemed not at all disconcerted at being elsewhere than in his own home. He had been moved about so much without any exertion on his own part that he was quite at home anywhere.
Though Pee-wee had spoken in high hope to Pepsy about their unexpected and glowing prospects, he was haunted by thoughts of the terrible thing which was to happen on the morrow. Pepsy was to be taken away, back to the big brick building which she hated, just as the planks of the old bridge had foretold.
Pee-wee’s loyalty was so staunch that he did not even consider the things his aunt had said. He was going to save Pepsy from that place and make her the sharer of the fortune that was within their grasp. He made this resolve with the same generous impulse as that which had caused him to put two hundred and fifty dollars within the reach of Mr. Bungel who had boxed his ears.
“I’m lucky,” he said to himself as he trudged down to the post office; “I’ll fix things all right. I’ll show them; I don’t care, I’ll show them. They won’t take her back to that place, not while I’m around.”