“I wonder where the hares are now?” said Dick, rather pensively.
“Back at Templeton, perhaps,” said Heathcote, “having iced ginger-beer, or turning into the ‘Tub.’”
“Shut up, Georgie,” said Dick, with a wince. “What’s the use of talking about iced ginger-beer out here?”
They lay some minutes, each dreading the first suggestion to move. Coote feigned to have dropped asleep, and Heathcote became intensely interested in the anatomy of a thistle.
Dick was the only one who could not honestly settle down, and the dreaded summons, when at last it came, came in his voice:—
“You lazy beggars,” cried he, starting up, “get up, can’t you? and come on.”
Rip Van Winkle never slept more profoundly than did Coote at that moment. But alas! Rip had the longer nap of the two.
An unceremonious application of the leader’s toe, and a threat to go on alone, brought the “Firm” to their feet in double-quick time, and started them up the steep side of the Beacon Hill.
Demoralised by their halt, they fared badly up the slope, and had it not been for Dick’s almost vicious resolution, which kept him going and overcame his own frequent inclination to yield to the lazier motions of his companions, they might never have done it. Dick saw that the effort was critical, and he was inexorable. Even Georgie thought him unkind, and Coote positively hated him up that slope.
Oh, those never-ending ridges, one above the other, each seeming to be the top, but each discovering another beyond more odious than itself!