“If there aren’t any stockings and stone-walls in it,” someone suggested.
“All right, here goes,” said Roy, settling, himself into his favorite posture before the fire, with his hands clasped about his drawn-up knees and the bright blaze lighting up his face.
“You see, it was this way. Pee-wee Harris is the what’d you say his name is—Lord? Pee-wee Harris over there is the Gordon Lord of our troop. And Tom Slade is our famous detective—Sherlock Nobody Holmes.
“Well, Tom and Pee-wee and I started ahead of the others last summer to hike it up here. Pee-wee got very tired (here he dodged a missile from Pee-wee) and so we were all glad when we got a little above Nyack and things began to happen. They happened in large chunks.
“On the way up Pee-wee captured a pet bird that belonged to a little girl (oh, he’s a regular gallant little lad, he is); he got the bird down out of a tree for her and to show how happy she was she began to cry.”
“Gee, they’re awful funny, ain’t they?” commented Gordon Lord.
“Well, we beat it along till we hit the Hudson, then we started north. The shadows of night were falling.”
“You read that in a book,” interrupted Pee-wee.
Little Raymond was greatly amused. So was Mr. Ellsworth who poked up the fire and resumed his seat on the old bench beside Jeb Rushmore.
“Team work,” someone suggested, slyly, indicating Gordon and Pee-wee.