Wyn's Camping Days Part 9

But on the morning of the departure not one of the girls prophesied misfortune. As for the boys, they were bubbling over with fun.

Professor Skillings was going to paddle up the river with them, although Mrs. Havel would take the afternoon train to the lake. The professor had gone on ahead; but Dave Shepard arranged the two clubs in line and boys and girls marched through the streets and down to the river, being hailed by their friends and bidden good-bye by their less fortunate mates.

Somebody started singing, and the twelve young voices were soon in the rhythm of "This is the Life!" Dave and Tubby were ahead, their paddles over their shoulders, each carrying his blanket-roll in approved scout fashion. The roll made Tubby Blaisdell look twice his real size.

As the party struck across the sward toward the boathouses Dave suddenly dropped his paraphernalia and started on a run for the river.

"Hi, there!" he shouted. "The professor is in trouble, boys!"

The Busters bounded away after him, and the girls, catching the excitement, followed along the bank of the swiftly-flowing Wintinooski.

There was Professor Skillings in his canoe, drifting rapidly into the middle of the current, and plainly without his paddle. Indeed, that useful--not to say necessary--instrument, capped the pile of Professor Skillings' impedimenta on the bank. He had evidently--in his usual absent-minded manner--stepped into his canoe and pushed off from sh.o.r.e without getting his cargo aboard.

Amid much laughter Dave and Ferd Roberts got a skiff and went after their teacher. Professor Skillings chuckled at his own troubles.

Although he was well past the meridian of life, he had neither lost his sense of the ridiculous nor his ability to laugh at a joke when it was on himself.

While the boys were rescuing their friend and mentor, the Go-Ahead Club proceeded to get out their own canoes and load them. The weight had to be distributed in bow and stern of the light, cedar craft; but Wyn and her mates had practised loading and launching their boats so frequently that there was little danger of an overset now.

Grace was still growling about the food and cooking apparatus distributed among the canoeists. Wyn said, laughing:

"That is still the bone of contention; is it, Gracie?"

"What _is_ a 'bone of contention'?" demanded Mina, innocently.

"Why, the jawbone, of course, silly!" cried Frank.

"Don't you mind about my jawbone, miss!" snapped Grace.

"Oh, don't let's fight, girls," Mina said, soothingly.

"Better a dinner of herbs with contentment than a stalled ox and trouble on the side," misquoted Frank.

The six girls quickly shot their canoes out into the stream. At this point the current was swift; but above Denton the river broadened into wide pools through which the current flowed sluggishly and it would be easier paddling.

The girls set into a steady stroke, led by their captain, and pa.s.sed the pretty town in a few minutes. Wyn could see the upper windows of her home and noted a white cloth fluttering from one. She knew that her mother was standing there with the field-gla.s.ses and Baby May. Perhaps the little one was trying to see "sister" through the strong gla.s.ses.

So Wyn pulled off her cap and swung it over her head and the six canoes immediately fell out of alignment.

"Don't do that, Wyn!" shouted Bess. "Those boys will catch up with us."

"Well, we want them to; don't we?" asked the captain of the Go-Aheads, good-naturedly. "We're going to lunch together, and if we make the poor boys work too hard they'll eat every crumb we've got and leave nothing for poor little we-uns."

"So _that's_ why you made us bring all this food?" demanded Bess, in disgust. "Can't those boys feed themselves?"

"Oh, they'll do their share," Wyn replied, laughing. "You'll see. Don't you see how heavily laden Tubby's canoe is? I warrant he has enough luncheon aboard for a small army."

"I can't look over my shoulder--I never can," quoth Bessie. "Paddling a canoe takes more of my attention than riding a bicycle."

"Or a motorcycle. Those things are just awful," cried Mina Everett.

"Shucks!" exclaimed the lively Frankie. "A motorcycle is only an ordinary bicycle driven crazy by over-indulgence in gasoline."

"How smart!" cried Bessie. "But you'd better save your breath to cool your porridge----"

"Or, better still, to work your paddle," commented Grace, with a swift glance behind. "Those Busters are coming up the river, hand over fist."

"With poor Tubby in the rear, of course," said Frank, glancing back.

"The tide is certainly against _him_."

"Oh, dear me!" giggled Percy, "poor Tubby was more than 'tide' last week when he took Annabel Craven out on the river. Did you hear about it? You know--the night before graduation."

"I believe that fat youth is sweet on Annabel," announced Bessie, shaking her head seriously.

"What do you suppose Ann thinks of Tubby?" cried Grace.

"You know how it is," chuckled Frank. "n.o.body loves a fat boy. Go on, Percy. What happened to poor old Tubby?"

"Why, he inveigled Annabel down to the river and got her into a boat and was going to row her around in the moonlight. You know it was just a scrumptious night."

"M-m-m! wasn't it?" agreed Frank.

"Well," said Percy, "Tubby got in without overturning the boat and settled to work. The current was pretty swift and he struck right out into it and headed up stream.

"And there he tugged, and tugged, and tugged, giving all his attention to the oars and having none to spare for Annabel. By and by, after Tubby had tugged, and grunted, and perspired for half an hour, he said:

"'Say, I never saw anything like this current to-night--not in all my born days! I've been pulling like a horse for half an hour and I don't see that we've made as much as a dozen feet!'

"And then Annabel spoke up real pretty, and says she:

"'Oh, Mr. Blaisdell! I've just thought of something. The anchor fell overboard some time ago and I forgot to tell you. Do you suppose it could have caught on something?'"

The other girls were intensely amused at this, for they all appreciated Annabel Craven's character as well as poor Tubby's good-natured blundering. But while they laughed and chattered in this way the Busters crept steadily up on them.

"I told you how it would be," said Bess, tartly, "if we didn't hurry up."

"What's the matter with you girls?" demanded Dave Shepard. "One would think you were sent for and couldn't come, by the way you paddle. You'll get to the lake before noon at this rate."

"Not much danger of that, Davie," returned Wyn. "And you know we agreed to stop at Ware's Island for lunch."

"Oh, I wish that was right here!" grunted a voice from the rear, where Tubby Blaisdell was paddling away with almost as much splashing as a small side-wheel steamer.

"My goodness, boy!" cried Ferd Roberts. "You're not hungry so soon, are you?"

"Soon?" repeated Tubby, with disgust "It's so long since breakfast that I've forgotten what I had to eat."

"What do you want to eat, Tubby?" asked Frank, giggling.

"Not particular. Anything--from a marshmallow cake to a tough steak,"

grunted the fat boy.