"I won't let you go now for the same reason," laughed Mark. "You'd be in a free-for-all fight in half a minute yourself. You go ahead, Dewey. Tell Mr. Wright that I demand an apology or else that he name the time and place. Throw in a few 'b'gees' for good measure, tell him a yarn or two, and make yourself charming and agreeable and handsome as usual. Tra, la, la."
Dewey tossed him an effusive kiss by way of thanks for the compliment, and then vaulted over the embankment and set out for camp, marching right merrily to the tune of "The Girl I Left Behind Me," hands at the side, chest out, palms to the front, little fingers on the seams of the trousers!
The remainder of the Banded Seven waited in considerable anxiety for the return of the "ambassador." They were one and all of them interested in their leader and hero; his triumph was theirs and theirs his.
"He'll take half an hour, anyway," said Mark. "So there's no use beginning to get impatient yet. Let's take it easy."
"Yea, by Zeus!" said the Parson. "And in the meantime allow me to call your attention to a most interesting and as yet unclassified fossil which I unearthed this very morning."
The Parson cleared his throat with his usual "Ahem!" and Mark cast up his eyes.
"I wish I had found an embassy for the Parson, too," he groaned.
But there was no necessity for Mark's alarm, as it proved. The Parson had barely time to give a few introductory bits of information about "the pteroreptian genera of the Triassic and Jurassic periods," when the "Girl I Left Behind Me" once more made herself audible and Dewey appeared upon the scene, obviously excited.
"What are you back so soon for?" inquired Mark.
"I hadn't anything to do," responded the other, hurriedly. "Wright wouldn't see me."