The morning after their arrival they set to work in real earnest. They had not a complete equipment of axes and saws, excepting their belt-axes, but as much of the work consisted of gathering and piling the lumber, and removing nails from it, there were implements enough for all. Some of the scouts worked above, loosening the boards from the roofs, while others on the ground pulled the tar-paper and nails from these and made an orderly pile of them. Such was the nature of their work during the first two or three days and they found it strenuous but neither too difficult nor heavy. And work was relieved somewhat by the comedy element furnished by Pee-wee who rolled off a roof on one occasion while eating a sandwich. "Take the nails out of him, pull the sandwich out of his hands, and pile him up with the boards," Roy called from a neighboring roof. "He's docked thirty cents for the time lost in rolling down." "He ought to have an emergency brake," Westy suggested, as the young Raven clambered up to his place again, sandwich and all, and proceeded working with the sandwich in one hand and a hammer in the other. "Didn't you say that's all roofs are good for?" Pee-wee vociferously demanded. "To roll off of?" "To roll _down_, I said," Roy answered from his own perch among the beams of the next shack. "Did you ever hear of anybody rolling up?" the young hero demanded. "Sure," said Roy; "didn't you ever roll up and go to sleep? You never rolled _down_, and went to sleep, did you? That shows what you know about geometry." "That's not geometry," Pee-wee shouted. "I took geometry last year." "It's about time you put it back," Roy called. "Look out or you'll take another tumble," Westy added. "He didn't put the last one back yet," Roy observed. "There goes your sandwich," another one of the Silver Foxes called with glee, as that precious remnant of Pee-wee's lunch went tumbling and separating down the slanting roof. "Now you see what you made me do!" he fairly screamed. "Food is coming down," Roy laughed. This is a fair sample of the fun and banter which accompanied their work and helped to make it easy and pleasant. Occasionally a harmless missile, perchance a luscious fragment of some honorably discharged tomato, would float gracefully from roof to roof bathing the face of some unsuspecting toiler with the crimson hue of twilight. And once again the weather-stained old shacks would seem alive with merriment and laughter. As for Blythe he witnessed this merry progress with simple, grateful pleasure. He had expected to see the work done, but he had not expected to see it conjured by scout magic into a kind of play, nor the neighborhood of their joyous labor transformed into a scene of rustic comfort.