"True enough," said Moritz von Arnheim, with a grimace. "But here comes Johnny Banner, and he'll do it if any one can."
"Hurrah for the boy who can't be hurt!" shouted several voices, as a big square-built lad, with a bold, bluff, sunburned face, joined the group. "Why, Johnny, man, how dusty you are!"
"And so would you be, if you'd just been run over by a wagon," grunted Johnny.
"Run over by a wagon!" echoed the boys, staring.
"Just so. You see, I was up in the big elm yonder, having a swing on one of the boughs, when Farmer Jansen, not seeing me, let fly at a rook that had perched there, and put a charge of shot through my cap. Look here;" and he held up the riddled cap to view.
"Another escape, I declare," laughed Moritz. "We shall have to call you 'Jack-of-Nine-Lives,' at this rate."
"So then, as you may think," pursued Johnny, "I came down again faster than I went up, and got into the road just in time to meet old Nils, the carrier, rattling along at his usual slap-dash pace. In trying to avoid him, I slipped and fell right before the cart, and horse and cart and all went merrily over me. Luckily, I had fallen lengthwise, so that the wheels went on each side of me, and here I am, all right."
"Well, old boy," cried Karl, "here's another chance for you. Try if you can get those eggs up yonder for little Olaf. None of us can."
The words were hardly spoken, when Banner was over the fence, and the next moment he was seen scrambling up the side of the house by the notches which time and weather had made in the masonry. Once he slipped, and came down with a run; but he only set his hard mouth a little more firmly, and went to work again. Inch by inch he worked his way upward, the boys holding their breath as they watched him, until at length a general shout proclaimed that he had got a firm hold of the ivy.
Once there, the rest was easy. Another minute brought him within reach of the nest, and the eggs were carefully stowed away in a kind of pouch in the breast of his jacket.