Mr. Cook turned to Joe. “How about it? You’re the guide around here. Think we’ll make Mormon Crossing?”
Joe walked over and put the frying pan with its johnnycake batter on the fire. “We’ll be there before lunch,” he predicted. He winked over at Mr. Cook and Sandy. “If we can get Sleeping Beauty there on his feet bright and early.”
Mike, who always took a long time to wake up in the morning, ignored this remark. Leaning back comfortably, he began to chew thoughtfully on a blade of grass. “You know,” he said, “I read a book once that said that all the great thinkers of the world like to sleep late. Brainy fellows like us,” he explained, “just seem to need more rest. Besides,” he reflected, “we do most of our heavy thinking at night.”
“So that explains it,” his father remarked.
“Explains what?”
“That noise that comes out of your sleeping bag every night.”
“You thought I was snoring?” Mike seemed surprised.
“Yes,” Mr. Cook admitted. “I’m afraid I did.”
Mike laughed disdainfully. “If you only knew the problems I have to solve! Night after night I turn them over in my mind, searching for the right answer....” He paused and looked at them seriously. “I tell you, those problems are heavy. When I turn them over they make a big racket. That must be what you keep hearing, Dad,” he confided.
“Oh, oh!” Joe grinned. “Better stuff some cotton in your ears tonight,” he said.