As for Blythe he witnessed this merry progress with simple, grateful pleasure. He had expected to see the work done, but he had not expected to see it conjured by scout magic into a kind of play, nor the neighborhood of their joyous labor transformed into a scene of rustic comfort.
By the merest chance the scouts had come and seen and conquered, and presently the scene had that wholesome air of scout life about it. It seemed to poor Blythe as if he had awakened and found himself in fairyland, with a score or more of small brown gnomes climbing and scrambling about his domain, singing, jollying, planning, laughing, working, cooking, eating, kindling big camp-fires with odds and ends of wood, and telling such nonsensical yarns as he had never heard before. Pee-wee and Roy in particular amused him greatly. “Go on, make fun of him,” he would say to Roy. And then he would deliberately take sides with Pee-wee against the whole troop. But he was more prone to listen than to talk.
“Haven’t you got any adventures to tell?” Pee-wee asked him around camp-fire one night.
“Sure,” said Roy, “look in your pockets and see if you can’t find a couple.”
“I guess I’m not much of a hand for adventures,” Blythe laughed. “I like to hear about them though.”
“I’ll tell you some,” Pee-wee said. “I’ll tell you how I found a wallet–”
“And a dime,” Westy interrupted.
“Tell how you saved a fish from drowning at Temple Camp,” Roy said.
“Sure, that’s a fish story,” Connie piped up.
So Pee-wee launched forth recounting instances from his career of glory at Temple Camp, the boys prompting and jollying him, all to the simple delight of their new friend. His enjoyment seemed always an incentive to banter and nonsense....