LITTLE HELPING HANDS.
It was all the result of a violent discussion in Stoughton's room. Hudson held that four miles an hour was an easy walking gait; Stoughton and Gray said it wasn't.
"I tell you," said the latter, "when you are doing better than three and a half, you are hitting it up pretty well, and you couldn't keep it up for any length of time. Don't you remember, Dick, we timed ourselves when we walked out from Boston the other night? It took us fifty minutes from the corner of Charles and Cambridge Streets, and that is just about three miles."
"Yes, and we went at a pretty good pace too," added Stoughton.
"That was probably after a supper at Billy Parks'," Hudson explained; "under those circumstances you undoubtedly covered a great many more miles than the crow flies between here and Boston."
"No, witty youth, it wasn't anything of the kind. We don't follow in your footsteps," retorted Dick to this innuendo. "No, sir, you couldn't walk four miles an hour all day to save your neck."
"I'm betting I could," Hudson replied, "I have done it often out shooting."
"I dare say you thought so; have you ever tried it over a measured stretch?"
"No, but I can guess at about what rate I am walking, and four miles an hour is a good easy swing. I'll bet you a V that I can do twenty-four miles in six hours."
"I'll take that," answered Stoughton, promptly.