“Yes,” added Jerry, as if it might be an afterthought, “and while you’re about it, Will, just mention to Uncle Felix that there are four husky boys around, with considerable time to burn just now, and if he wants anybody to take that trip for him we might be coaxed into doing it, if he’d stand for expenses.”
At that all of them laughed, as though they considered it a joke. Will left them shying a few snowballs at a tin can Bluff had set on a fence-post.
“If we’re going to get in many affairs like the one we just had with Andy Lasher and his crowd,” the latter remarked, “it stands to reason we want to tune up some in our heaving. My baseball arm is out of practice, and I’m ashamed to say that three out of four balls I fired missed their mark.”
“Oh, well, I noticed a lot of dodging being done,” commented Frank; “and only for that all of us might have made more bull’s-eyes.”
“Chances are that Andy will have a circle around his left eye after that smash he got,” observed Jerry. “A hard snowball can sting like fun when it catches you there.”
“Yes, look at my right cheek, if you want to prove that,” Bluff advised them. “I got caught there, and it keeps on burning like a hot iron. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a piece of coal or a stone in that ball. They must have fixed up a lot of ammunition that way before they tackled us.”
“Seems to me Will’s a long time coming out again,” complained Jerry. “He’s always so much taken up with that photography of his that any old time he’s liable to remember something and go to work at it, forgetting all about his chums, who may be kicking their heels in the back yard waiting for him.”
“Oh, I don’t think he’s quite that forgetful!” laughed Frank. “You know he said Uncle Felix, who loaned us his houseboat to make that trip down the Mississippi to New Orleans, was expecting some important mail to-day. Perhaps he’s held Will up to tell him about something. You know Uncle Felix thinks heaps of our chum; yes, and of all the rest of us in the bargain.”
“There he comes!” exclaimed Bluff.
“And, say, he seems to be in a terrible hurry,” added Jerry, beginning to show a touch of excitement himself. “Look at him waving his hat over his head? And do you see how he’s grinning from ear to ear? Now what d’ye reckon can have happened?”