CHAPTER XIX
The Bear Hunt—In Which the Boys Discover that the Bear Doesn’t Do All the Hard Work
Right after breakfast the next morning they got the cars out and left behind at the hotel all the luggage they wouldn’t need on the bear-hunting trip. Mr. Stone was exhibiting his new camera, an astonishing invention which he held in his hand like a kodak, while it took twenty-five feet of film (he could carry as much as two hundred feet of extra reels in one side pocket, too), when Pep appeared in his “antique.” They heard him before they saw him, in fact. The car was a runabout. The paint apparently had vanished about 1918. The muffler was broken so that she roared and spit like a motorcycle. One mud-guard was so cracked that it half hung from the car and flapped and rattled. The other three were bent and dented. The wind-shield was cracked, and the radiator was covered with iron rust where the water had boiled over and run down the sides. When Pep put his foot on the brake to stop, she shrieked and wailed like a sick cat.
Bennie walked over to this car and stared intently.
“Some boat!” he said. “Some boat! Say, Spider, a scout is always respectful and kind to the aged and infirm. Remember that. What’s its name, Mr. Peters?”
“Its mother never named it,” said Pep. “I’ve called it a lot of things, but they aren’t very polite.”
Dumplin’ laughed. “I know what its name is, all right.”
“Yes?”
“Its name is Methuselah.”
“I thought Methuselah died when he was only nine hundred,” said Bennie.
“Say, if you boys make fun of my car, I won’t let you ride in it,” Pep threatened.