“How far is that from here?” asked Carl. The delivery boy looked over the landscape, as if estimating distances, and at the same time establishing his own importance, and answered that it was not far from ten miles. Ben and Jimmie, awakened by the rattle of the rickety wagon wheels, now came out of the shelter tent and joined in the conversation. They looked curiously at the boy for a moment, and then turned their attention to the driver, listening intently to his repetition of the brief story of the wrecked aeroplane. “Well,” the driver said presently, beckoning to the boy, “we may as well be going, Kit.” “I’m going with the machines!” answered the boy. Ben and Jimmie looked from Kit to Carl but said nothing. “Ain’t I going with the machines?” demanded the youngster of Carl. “What would your folks say?” demanded Ben. “Huh!” said the delivery boy. “He hain’t got no folks. He just sleeps around and gets his meals wherever he can.” “I sent him after the gasoline,” Carl explained, “and paid him in advance. He came back all right.” “Did you think I wouldn’t come back?” asked Kit, indignantly. Before the question was answered, Jimmie pulled Ben lustily by the sleeve. Carl saw what was in the boy’s mind and remained silent. “Come on, let’s take him!” Jimmie urged. “He’s all right.” “I’m willing,” replied Ben. “In fact, I’m getting tired of riding alone in the _Bertha_. The little fellow will be good company.” The delivery boy departed quickly, and Kit at once began making himself useful, assisting Jimmie in the preparation of dinner. “Don’t you ever think I can’t cook!” Kit exclaimed, as he sat by the fire watching the skillet of ham and eggs. “Don’t you think I don’t know how to get up a square meal. I’ve helped cook lunches many a time.” “Perhaps we’d better make you chef of the expedition!” laughed Ben. There seemed to be something on the boy’s mind as he gave his attention to potatoes roasting in the hot ashes, and after a time he turned to Carl with a puzzled face. His brows were puckered as he asked: “Why didn’t you ask the delivery boy about that smashed machine?” “I did ask him about it,” replied Carl. “You heard me.” “Well you didn’t ask him about the man that got smashed up in it,” continued Kit. “The man who got smashed up in it,” the boy went on, “hid in Robinson’s barn, where I slept last night, and lay groaning and whining with a broken arm so that he kept me awake. This morning, when he saw me, he gave me a dollar to get a doctor there without telling anybody, and I went and got Doctor Sloan. I promised not to say a word about it, but you boys have been mighty good to me, and I think you ought to know.” “What kind of a looking fellow is he?” asked Carl. “A monkey-looking fellow, with hunched shoulders and ears like cabbage leaves,” replied the boy. “He don’t look good to me.”