With love and kisses from the Silver Foxes.
“Oh, it will be great!” Westy said, “we’ll do it before Mr. Ellsworth takes up the collection for the cruise, hey?”
“G-o-o-d night!” I said and I stopped short.
“I’m glad you said that,” I told him; “I forgot my two bucks.”
“I’ll go back,” Westy said; “you wait here.” There wasn’t any time to stop him and anyway, he can beat me running, I have to admit that.
“Where did you leave it?” he called back.
“I laid it right on the table,” I shouted, “and I laid an oar-lock on it to keep it from blowing away. Feel around and you’ll get it. Hurry up.”
I saw him going back up the hill for all he was worth and then I sat down beside the road to wait for him. I got to thinking about the house-boat and the fun we’d have cruising up the Hudson and how Skinny would get fat and eat a lot, and especially how he’d stare when he saw Jeb Rushmore. He’s our camp manager, and just wait till you see him, that’s all _I_ say.
But mostly I was thinking about the fun we’d have presenting Skinny to the Elks, and, oh, boy, I could just see Mr. Ellsworth laugh with that funny laugh he has—trying not to. And you can bet I was glad we had Skinny started. Because when a fellow once gets on the trail, he’s a goner. Oh, bibbie, that was going to be some meeting!
Pretty soon Westy came running back down the hill.
“Did you get it?” I asked him, but, of course, I knew he did. He was so much out of breath that he couldn’t answer and even after he stopped he had to pant it out, kind of.
“_Wasn’t there?_” I said; “you’re crazy. Sure it was there. Where did you look?”
“I looked just where you said,” Westy panted, “and all around besides. First, I felt all around with my hand and I lifted the oar-lock and it wasn’t underneath it.”
“Maybe you got the wrong oar-lock,” I said, all excited; “there are two of them.”
“The other one was hanging up,” he said; “I found your flashlight on the duffel-bag and poked the light all around and I saw the other oar-lock hanging up. I threw the light on the ground, too, because there’s a pretty strong breeze up there.”
“How could the breeze blow it away when it was under the oar-lock?” I said. “It was a new two dollar bill.”
“Well, it wasn’t there, anyway,” he said.