“My, nobody has eaten like this in my house for a long time!” she said, “and a housekeeper does like to see her food enjoyed. John”—this to her husband—“why don’t you climb Lafayette every day, so you can get up a real appetite?”
“I wouldn’t, alas!” he laughed. “I’d just get lame legs and a headache. Lafayette’s for the young folks. Have some more ice-cream, Peanut?”
“Gee, I’d like to—but I’m full,” said Peanut, so honestly that everybody roared.
“I don’t suppose you carry an ice-cream freezer in your packs, do you?” Mrs. Goodwin laughed.
“We don’t,” said Rob, “nor grape fruit nor napkins, either. I’m afraid this luxury will spoil us for camp to-morrow!”
“Do you know,” Mr. Goodwin said, “I’m tired of luxury, myself. If I was twenty years younger, I’d get a blanket out and go with you boys for the next few days, and eat bacon and flapjacks out of tin plates, and have the time of my life.”
“Come on!” the Scouts cried.
And Peanut added, “You ain’t old. Why, Edward Payson Weston’s lots older than you are!”
“And he walked from San Francisco to New York didn’t he?” Mr. Goodwin laughed. “Well, I guess his legs are younger than mine. Where do you go to-morrow, by the way?”
This reminded Mr. Rogers of the book, so he asked if he could lend him a copy of Hawthorne’s “Twice Told Tales.”