“Remember it yourself,” growled Hal. “There’s mighty little honor in telling tales.” And with this parting shot he strode off to the wigwam.
Walter’s preoccupation and sober face were bound to attract the attention of his mates, and he came in for a lot of guying.
“Who is she, Walt?”
“Is her papa a big chief?”
“Take us round and give us a knock-down, Walt.”
“Romance of the big woods! Walt, the tenderfoot, falls in love with an Indian princess!”
Walter’s replies to all these sallies were only half-hearted, and seeing that something was really amiss with him the boys dropped their banter. He retired to his bunk early, only to twist and toss uneasily all night long. Over and over till his brain grew weary he kept repeating the perplexing question, “Ought I to tell? Ought I to tell? Ought I to tell?”
The problem was no nearer a solution when in the gray of dawn he slipped a canoe into the water the next morning and turned her bow toward the setback. Pat was waiting for him on the old raft and, true to his word, he had a pocket full of lively little frogs, which were giving him no end of trouble in their efforts to escape. Walter took him aboard, and they were soon skirting the lily-pads at the upper end.
Here Pat bade Walter rig his rod and, producing a lively green frog from his pocket, he impaled it on the hook by thrusting the barb through its lips, explaining that in this way the frog’s swimming was not seriously interfered with. He then took the paddle and handled the canoe while Walter cast. The frog had hardly struck the water before there was a swirl at the very edge of a patch of lily-pads followed by a strike that made the reel sing. A couple of good rushes and then, as is the way with pickerel, the fish was brought alongside with hardly a struggle. Pat deftly scooped it into the canoe and killed it with a blow that broke its spine. It was fair for a beginning, weighing perhaps four pounds, and Walter prepared to try again.
For half an hour they worked along the pads, taking several smaller fish.