Welton exploded.
"Look here, you little squirt!" he cried, "I'd have you know I'm riding logs yet. I don't suppose you'd know a log if you'd see one, you' soft-handed, degenerate, old riverhog, you! A golf ball's about your size!"
"No," said Orde; "a fat old hippopotamus named Welton is about my size—as I'll show you when we land at the Marsh!"
Welton grinned.
"How's Mrs. Orde and the little boy?" he inquired.
"Mrs. Orde is fine and dandy, and the 'little boy,' as you call him, graduated from college last June," Orde replied.
"You don't say!" cried Welton, genuinely astounded. "Why, of course, he must have! Can he lick his dad?"
"You bet he can—or could if his dad would give him a chance. Why, he's been captain of the football team for two years."
"And football's the only game I'd come out of the woods to see," said Welton. "I must have seen him up at Minneapolis when his team licked the stuffing out of our boys; and I remember his name. But I never thought of him as little Bobby—because—well, because I always did remember him as little Bobby."
"He's big Bobby, now, all right," said Orde, "and that's one reason I wanted to see you; why I asked you to run over from Chicago next time you came down. Of course, there are ducks, too."