"Did the Indianth uthe it?" Dicky asked as he laid his trophy in Roger's hand.
"I rather think they did," returned Roger excitedly. "It looks to me as if this was a hammer or a hatchet. See--" and he held it out for the girls and James and Tom to see, "they must have lashed this head on to a stout stick by a cord tied where this crease is."
"It would make a first-rate hammer," commended James.
"The Indians didn't manufacture as many of these as they did arrow heads, because, of course, they didn't need as many. I rather guess you've made the big find of the afternoon," and Dicky swelled with pride as his brother patted him on the shoulder.
When it became time to go home the Ethels offered to take the short cut to Rosemont and get the rubber tips for the children's arrows.
"If we go across the field and the West Woods we come out not far from the stationer's, and we can leave the tips up at Rose House on the way back so they'll be ready for you to put on to-morrow and the youngsters can have the bows and arrows to play with right off."
"All right," agreed Roger. "Be careful when you go over the railroad track, girls. Mother isn't very keen on having Dicky learn that road, you know."
They promised to be careful and set forth in the opposite direction from the rest of the party whom they left putting together the remnants of the feast and packing away the plates.
It was an interesting walk. They played Indian all the way. Ethel Blue's imagination had been greatly stimulated by the tale of the attack on Deerfield and she pretended to see an Indian behind every tree. Ethel Brown pretended to shoot them all with unerring arrow, and Dicky charged the bushes in handsome style and routed the enemy with awful slaughter.
"This is just the kind of game we ought not to play if we want to make Dicky think of peace and not of war," declared Ethel Blue at last when she had become breathless from the excitement of their countless adventures.
"That's so. It's funny how you forget. It's just as Delia says--we don't realize how fighting and soldiers and thinking about military things is put into our minds even in games when we're little."
"I'm really sorry we've done this," confessed. Ethel Brown as they fell behind their charge. "Dicky's 'pretending' works over time anyway, and he may dream about Indians, or get scared to go to bed, and it will be our fault."
