"Patrol leader! No!" he said, and I could see he was only trying to get on the right side of me, and that he didn't know what a patrol leader is at all.
"Can patrol leaders keep secrets?" he said.
I told him if it was a good secret, they could. Then he hit me a good whack on the shoulder and he winked at me awful funny and said:
They are fools who go and tell
Wisely has the poet sung.
Man may hold all sorts of jobs
If he'll only hold his tongue.
"Are you a tramp?" I asked him.
"A tramp!" he said, "that's pretty good. I dare say I look like one."
Then he jumped up on the railing and began laughing so hard I was afraid he'd fall backwards into the water. I told him he'd better look out, but he only laughed more, and said I was a great kid. Then all of a sudden he happened to think and he looked around to see if anyone was coming. Then he said,
"Are you game to help me in a dark plot?"
Gee, I didn't know what to tell him. "It depends upon how dark it is," I said. Because, jiminy, I wanted to be careful and watch my step. But that only made him laugh a lot. Then he said,
"Well, it isn't exactly a black plot, but it's a kind of a dark brown."