"It all goes to show," the Overseer of the Poor afterwards explained philosophically, "what a fool a fellow is to be afraid to go back and look at his work. It's the same spirit that makes automobile cowards afraid to stop the machine and go back to look at the child they've hit. Any fellow that's afraid to go back and look at his mistake is bound to be mainly unhappy in life." A very few days afterwards Dick & Co., still propelling the push cart by turns, arrived in Gridley toward dark one late July evening. They had so much to tell their relatives and friends that none of them got to bed very early on that occasion. However, the month of August lay before them. These boys now planned the greatest summer vacation trip that they had ever enjoyed. Part of the trail of this vacation lay over in Tottenville. So, by ten o'clock the next morning, Dick Prescott, alone, hurried up the side street on which he lived. Just as he neared the Main Street corner he beheld a trolley car labeled "Tottenville" pass the corner. Dick's shrill whistle rang out, but the conductor failed to hear it. Away raced Dick in the wake of the speeding trolley car. Down the street for two blocks he dashed after it. At first it looked as though the high school boy would overtake the car. But when he saw the car turn a corner and go off on the Tottenville road, young Prescott slowed down, panting and wiping his perspiring face. "Hey!" called a man standing in a group of others on the curbstone. "Were you trying to catch that car." "Was I trying to catch the car?" echoed Dick Prescott, his eyes opening wide in amazement. "No, sir! I made a wager that I could chase that car right off of Main Street! And I won the bet," Dick added proudly. "You all saw me do it!" Then, while the man who had asked the question reddened under the laughter of his companions, Prescott strolled slowly back up Main Street to watch for the next car bearing the "Tottenville" sign. "Good morning, Prescott," came a greeting from Lawyer Ripley, just then coming out of a store. "How did you young men enjoy that collapsible canoe?" "That canoe, sir? It made the vacation trip a perfect one. But were you the one who sent it, Mr. Ripley?" "Yes," assented the lawyer, "though acting as agent for another. You remember how much Mr. Page wanted to do for you boys, after your splendid work for him last summer? Mr. Page wanted to do something for you this summer, and he and I hit upon the collapsible canoe as a remembrance so simple and inexpensive that you young men were quite likely to accept it." "Mr. Ripley," begged Dick earnestly, "will you accept the very best thanks of us all for that canoe? And will you please convey our deepest gratitude to Mr. Page? We couldn't have had anything that would have delighted us as much." Readers of the preceding volume of this series are well aware of the reason of Mr. Page's great gratitude to Dick & Co.