Dub said--he was trying to be serious--he said, “Well it seems funny to me that if you save a life you don’t get the life-saving badge. If I could only do that, then I could finish my Eagle tests and get the Gold Medal too. You see I’ve got a towering ambition. What I’m thinking about is that Ellen Burnside award of a hundred dollars that goes with the Gold Medal. I thought I might save somebody’s life and get the medal and the hundred dollars, then get my Eagle badge on the strength of the life-saving stunt and then I could live up in Eagle Crag Cabin for the rest of the summer----” “And have me visit you,” I said. “Good-night, Napoleon didn’t have anything on you,” Sandy said. “If you had a bean-shooter up at Eagle Crag Cabin you might conquer Temple Camp,” I said, “and you could send Pee-wee with a large detachment to demand the surrender of the cooking shack.” Dub said, “Well I guess it can’t be did. First I was crazy enough to be counting on our getting some kind of a reward for finding that will, and then I was thinking maybe we’d get the reward for finding some bandits.” “All you think about is money,” Sandy said. “All I’m thinking about is staying till the end of the season with you fellows,” Dub said. “Just us four, I wish we could stick together till camp closes. We’ve had a lot of fun doing nothing. Gee, I like you fellows----” that’s just the way he said. He said, “That’s the way I am, I’d rather get in with just three or four fellows and bang around with them than be in with everybody. I’ve been here a week and I don’t know many Scouts at camp--only you fellows. Christopher, I wish I could stay with you. I’m kind of sorry I came up at all now, because it will be so hard to go back. Crinkums, you sure have kept me laughing.” After he spoke like that we all just hiked along a little while and nobody said anything. Even Pee-wee didn’t say anything. Pretty soon Sandy said to me, “How soon do you and Pee-wee have to go home?” “Not till the camp closes up,” I told him. “Oh boy!” Dub said. “Me till August twenty,” Sandy said. “Me till next Saturday,” Dub said. “Hard luck, hey? After I get home I’ll be thinking about you jollying Pee-wee.” “Will you think about me answering him back?” Pee-wee piped up. “How I beat him in arguments?” “Sure,” Dub said. And he just went along, kind of smiling and not saying anything. None of us said anything. After a while the kid said, “Why do you have to go back?” “Shut up,” I whispered to him. Sandy looked at the kid, too, and sort of frowned. “Oh just because,” Dub said. “It’s like having one little sliver of pie--you only want more. I wasn’t thinking about it when we started out. Will you fellows be here next summer?”