“Why don’t you go and inquire?” asked Mr. Farnsworth.
“They wouldn’t speak to you,” snarled Tom. “They’re little upstarts; I can tell that from here by the frills they throw on.”
Loren and his brother didn’t care if they were. The signs seemed to indicate that they were coming to Mount Airy to live, and if that was the case, they wanted to know something about the boys they would have for their associates. So as soon as the drill was brought to an end and the ranks were broken, they set out to scrape an acquaintance with the master bowman and bugler, Tom following them with rather a listless, indifferent air. But in reality he was as eager as his cousins were. Would he not be willing to give something handsome if he could make himself the leader of a select band like that?
LOREN and Ralph Farnsworth, in spite of Tom’s predictions to the contrary, had no trouble in scraping an acquaintance with the first bowman they met. It was Arthur Hastings, the secretary of the company and one of the best shots in it. They drew his attention by touching their hats to him as he passed (that is, the brothers did, Tom being in too bad humor to be civil), and Arthur seeing that they desired to speak to him, stopped and opened the conversation himself.
“I know almost every stranger here this summer, but I don’t remember to have seen you two before,” said he, pulling off his white gloves and extending a hand to each of them.
“We came on the early morning train,” replied Ralph. “We were just in time to witness your parade, which I assure you was something we did not expect to see up here in the woods. You bowmen are bully soldiers.”
“Thank you,” said Arthur, raising his hand to his hat in response to Tom’s very slight nod. “There must be something in what you say, for every one who comes up here tells us the same. The truth is, we ought to be proficient. We have been under the strictest kind of a drill-master, and have done plenty of hard work since our organization two years ago.”
“What first put the idea into your heads?” inquired Loren. “You got it out of your history, didn’t you?”
“And if you did, why don’t you dress up like Indians and adopt their system of tactics?” chimed in Tom, who for the moment forgot that he had resolved that he would not have a word to say to any of the bowmen. “I have read that the Sioux have a drill of their own which is so very bewildering that our best troops can’t stand against it. It seems to me that you make hard work of something that might, under different management, be made to yield you any amount of pleasure.”