FORWARD, MARCH!

Hope’s departure was a good thing for one person at least, and that was Simon Hasbrook, the farm-boy, for Mr. Goodale gave him a holiday on Saturday. The farmer hesitated, however, to loan a pig or a calf, and so the members of the new partnership sawed a doorway in the back of their gala caravan and put some boxes and milking stools inside for seats.

Since there was no one at the farm but Mr. and Mrs. Goodale and Mrs. Harris, the plan was to organize a party en route, which should loll in and about the float, to give an impression of youth and merriment at Goodale Manor Farm.

“You have to have action,” Pee-wee informed Simon, who seemed greatly edified. “It doesn’t make any difference how many decorations you have, you have to have a lot of people. So we’ll ask everybody we see to get in and we’ll start them singing and all like that. We’ll take a lot of apples and cookies and things and have them eating, too.”

Nothing could dampen Pee-wee’s ardor and confidence, not even the weather which was misty and cheerless. The float looked gay and even beautiful, thanks to Hope’s tastefulness, and carrying out her decorative scheme, the boys had wound bunting around the horns of the stolid, patient oxen surmounting each horn with a crude rosette which it is to be feared, lacked her deft and magic touch. The swishing tails were also provided with streamers so that each ox seemed to wield a kind of patriotic cat-and-nine-tails.

The long whip with which Simon was to insinuate his authority to the meek beasts was a thing of gaudy beauty, with a wealth of tails which made it look like some festive devil-fish. Simon and Pee-wee wore girdles of bunting, and somewhere in the folds of Pee-wee’s colorful array nestled modestly his dangling compass, for though there was a road to Snailsdale Manor he wished to be prepared for emergency if by any chance the road should suddenly disappear.

His scout hat, that invariable reminder of his wild and heroic character, was laid aside for this glorious occasion, and his curly head was swathed with fold upon fold of endless streamers, so that (except for the bread and jam that he was eating) he looked like an East Indian rajah.

The caravan paused for a few moments before the porch for the admiration of Mrs. Harris, while Pee-wee procured another dripping slice of bread, and then, our hero having pulled up his unruly stocking and taken a mammoth bite to fortify himself, gave the order to advance. A quarter of a mile or so down the road they passed Mr. Goodale’s ice house and then entered the unpeopled wilderness through which no bunting-draped caravan had ever passed before.

The journey to Snailsdale Manor was uneventful. A drizzling rain fell most of the time and the road was filled with those cunning little red lizards which always herald and accompany damp weather. The distant mountains could not be seen for the mist; a kind of gauze curtain seemed to hang in the countryside subduing everything to its own dull shade. It was not a penetrating rain, it was hardly a rain at all, but a kind of gossamer wrap which covered everything. The clammy dampness stood out in little beads all over the boy’s clothing. One could draw one’s finger through it and leave a mark, as in an area of dust. The decorations wilted under this all pervading moisture and the gay rosettes dropped in despair. But the colors did not run.

Neither did the oxen. All efforts to hurry them were in vain. The snapping of the motley whip aroused neither their fears nor their patriotic ardor. They plodded leisurely along, dutiful, reliable, slow.

Pee-wee wet his trusty right forefinger and held it up to determine which way the wind was blowing, and found from the sudden chill against one side of it that the wind was in the south.

“You mean the east,” said Simon.

“Your finger can’t lie,” Pee-wee said; “that’s a scout stunt. It’s blowing from there.”

“Yes and that’s the east,” said Simon amiably.

“How can the south be the east?” Pee-wee demanded with withering scorn.

“It can’t,” said Simon, “and ’tain’t neither.”

The wind’s east but it’s comin’ roun’. Moren’ like it’ll be clear this afternoon n’ rain again at night. See the spider-web across that woodchuck hole over in the field? It’s noon and he ain’t out yet. That means likely he won’t come out till to-morrow. It’ll rain to-night moren’ like.”

“As long as it’s clear this afternoon I don’t care,” said Pee-wee, somewhat squelched by this bit of knowledge. “I bet you can’t tell time by the sun. I can tell what time it is by holding a nail slanting-ways on the back of my watch and letting the sun shine on it.”

“Why don’t you look at the front of your watch?” Simon asked innocently.

“That shows how much you know about scouting,” Pee-wee fairly shouted. “Suppose—suppose my watch should be slow?”

“I wouldn’t think them scouts would have their watches slow,” said Simon.

“Even the clock on the City Hall is slow sometimes,” Pee-wee thundered, in despair for an argument. “Do you mean to say I’m smarter than a city hall is? Gee whiz! A scout has to be resourceful and he doesn’t depend on watches. That’s why he carries a nail.”

“The nail is no good if he has a watch and it’s no good if he hasn’t got a watch,” Simon said soberly. “He can’t have the back of a watch unless he has the front of a watch.”

“You’re crazy!” Pee-wee yelled. “Suppose—suppose—suppose it’s night and he can’t see the hands of his watch, he might see a nail shining. So there! Do you know what preparedness is?” he added blightingly.

“Is it being able to tell time by the sun at night?” Simon asked.

“That shows how much you know!” Pee-wee shouted, almost beside himself. “Suppose the sun should break—I mean your watch. You’d have the back of it, wouldn’t you? And besides, I can tell when it’s twelve o’clock when there isn’t any sun at all. Do you know how?”

“No, how?”

“By my stomach.”

“Do you mean laying a nail against it slanting-ways?”

“By my appetite,” Pee-wee yelled; “and it’s twelve o’clock now, so there!”

“Your appetite is a little fast,” Simon said; “it’s half past eleven.”

“Well, anyway I have my appetite kind of set ahead,” Pee-wee explained.

So they went inside their cosy caravan and ate lunch.