"I want to get a stamped envelope," he said.
At the writing shelf he tore a sheet out of his scout blank book and wrote:
"Dear Roscoe:
"I got your letter and I'm glad you got registered and that nobody knows. If you had told, it would have spoiled it all.
"I see I did get misjudged, and if they want to think that I tell lies and break promises, let them think so. As long as they think that, anyway, I've decided I will go and help the government in a way I can do without breaking my word to anybody.
"You can see, yourself, I'm not one of the kind that tells lies.
"I've got my mind made up now; I made it up all of a sudden like, as long as that's what they think. So I'm not coming back to Bridgeboro. I'm going away somewhere else. The thing I care most about is that you got registered. And next to that I'm glad because it helped us to get to be friends, because I like you and I always did, even when you made fun of me.
"Your friend,
"Tom."
He put the letter in his pocket, thinking it would be better to mail it from New York. Then he went out and over to where young Archer was sitting.