Then I heard one of the fellows shouting, “Look who’s here!” and I saw the fellow who had been sitting on the steps coming toward the float, and I could tell it was Artie Van Arlen. Then I could hear Pee-wee dancing on the cabin roof and screaming, “The plot grows thicker! The plot grows thicker!”—good night, the kid was almost having a fit.

“If it wouldn’t be too much trouble,” I said to Artie, “would you please relate your adventures. I see that you’re not dead.”

“Well, not so you’d notice it,” he said, “but I guess I came pretty near it.”

Then I could see he was all in and must have had a pretty hard time of it, but I couldn’t help kidding him, because I was feeling so good to know he was safe. Believe me, that fellow had some adventure.

“It was lucky for me,” he said, “that you tied this crazy canoe or whatever you call it——”

“That is an Indian dugout, if anyone should ask you,” I said, “and if I wanted to sell it to an antiquary——”

“A what?” Pee-wee shouted down from the cabin roof.

“An antiquary,” I said; “comes from the Latin word aunt and the Chinese word query, meaning to ask questions—otherwise the same as Pee-wee. As I was saying, if I wanted to sell it to an antiquary I could get a large check for it.”

“How large?” Pee-wee shouted.

“About eight inches by two and a half inches; now, shut up!” I said.

Cracky, you should have heard those fellows laugh.

“Well, whatever it is,” said Artie, “it’s lucky for me that you tied it just under the cabin window, because I fell into it—I fell in good and hard.”

“I think you fell in soft,” I said; “it shows how thoughtful I am. A scout is foresighted——”

“You make me sick!” Pee-wee shouted.

“Tell Doc Carson to give you some medicine,” I answered.

Laugh! Because, you see, we were all feeling so good about Artie being saved that we’d laugh at nothing, like a lot of girls. But girls are all right, I have to admit that.

Let’s see, where was I? Oh, yes, I was telling you about Artie. You see when I first arrived with that canoe I tied it just under the cabin window and then scrambled up through the window. So there it was all the time. Lucky thing, too. Only the funny thing was we never missed it—we were punk scouts, that’s sure.

Then Artie told us how it was. “After the smoke got so thick that I was dizzy and couldn’t see, I got scared and groped around for Wig. I couldn’t find him anywhere and he didn’t answer. I didn’t know whether all of the signal had been sent or not, but anyway I knew I couldn’t stand it in there any longer. I thought Wig must have climbed out of the window. So I decided I would do the same thing. Oh, but didn’t I have some job finding it! I lay down flat, I knew enough to do that anyway, and then I crawled around with one hand up feeling for the window sill. When I found it I was so dizzy I just hung to it and I thought I was a goner sure.”

“I know how you felt,” I said, “because I was in the same trouble myself.”

Then he said how he dragged himself up to the window sill and tried to shout, but couldn’t. Then he fell across it and kind of wriggled out. He didn’t have his senses, but he knew enough to know that there was a narrow part of the deck, just a passageway sort of, outside, and he thought he’d fall on that. But it was lucky he didn’t. He fell past it right into the water and that brought him to his senses, kind of. So he sputtered and groped around till he happened to clutch the Indian dugout and it rolled over with him and the anchor that we had laid in it with a rope to hold it fast to the houseboat, the anchor rolled out, and the first thing he knew he was drifting up the river, hanging onto the dugout for dear life.

He was feeling so weak and sputtering so on account of his lungs being all filled with smoke, that he couldn’t shout and after a while he drifted up on the bar near Second Bend. Then he got the dugout set right side up on the mud while he bailed it out by splashing in it with his hands and afterwards making them into a cup.

After that it was easy drifting up stream and when he got to about a quarter of a mile below the boathouse, he managed to paddle over to the shore and then he pulled himself along by holding on to the weeds and things.

“You had a pretty narrow escape,” Pee-wee said.

“It was a narrow boat, why shouldn’t he have a narrow escape,” I said; “I had a good wide escape, anyway.”

“Didn’t you have your hat with you to bail with?” somebody asked Artie.

“All I had was my copy of Initiation Drill,” he said.

“Why didn’t you drill a hole in the boat then,” I said.

“What for?” Pee-wee shouted.

“So the water could get out as fast as it came in.”

“What are you talking about? You’re crazy!” he yelled.

“There should be two holes in every boat,” Connie Bennett said, in that slow way he has; “one for the water to come in and the other so it can get out.”

Gee-williger! You should have seen Pee-wee.

Anyway, I suppose you think by this time that we’re all crazy. I should worry.