"You did, Sir Walter, and would that we had taken your advice; but I trusted the engine and it has evidently been using the gasoline while our backs were turned. _We_ should worry! You don't suppose it would run on witch hazel, do you?" "Didn't I tell----" began Pee-wee. "If we could only reduce friend Walter to a liquid," said Roy. "I think we could get started all right--he's so explosive." "Bright boy," said Tom. "Oh, I'm a regular feller, I am," said Roy. "I knew that engine would stop when there wasn't any more gasoline--I just felt it in my bones. But what care we! 'Oh, we are merry mountaineers, And have no carking cares or fears-- Or gasoline.' Get out the oars, scouts!" So they got out the oars and with the aid of these and a paddle succeeded in making the shore where they tied up to the dilapidated remnants of what had once been a float. "There must be a village in the neighborhood," said Tom, "or there wouldn't be a float here." "Sherlock Holmes Slade is at it again," said Roy. It would have been a pretty serious accident that Roy wouldn't have taken gayly. "Pee-wee, you're appointed a committee to look after the boat while Tomasso and I go in search of adventure--and gasoline. There must be a road up there somewhere and if there's a road I dare say we can find a garage--maybe even a village. Get things ready for supper, Pee-wee, and when we get back I'll make a Silver Fox omelet for good luck." The spot where they had made a landing was at the foot of precipitous hills between which and the shore ran the railroad tracks. Tom and Roy, carrying a couple of gasoline cans, started along a road which led around the lower reaches of one of these hills. As Pee-wee stood upon the cabin watching them, the swinging cans were brightened by the rays of the declining sun, and there was a chill in the air as the familiar grayness fell upon the heights, bringing to the boy that sense of loneliness which he had felt before.