had a
letter from them yesterday; I saw it."

"Was it in their own handwriting?"

"What do you mean?" Pee-wee demanded disgustedly. "How can a troop have
a handwriting?"

"They must be very ignorant," Roy said. "Can you send an animal by
mail?"

"Sure you can't!" Pee-wee shouted.

"That's where you're wrong," said Roy. "I got a letter with a seal on
it."

"Can you unscramble eggs?" Pee-wee demanded.

"There you go, talking about eats again. Can't you wait two hours?"

There was nothing to do but wait, and watch the drops as they pattered
down on the lake.

"This is the longest rain in history except the reign of Queen
Elizabeth," Roy said. "If I ever meet Saint Swithin----"

This sort of talk was a sample of life at Temple Camp for seven days
past. Those who were not given to jollying and banter had fallen back on
checkers and dominos and other wild sports. A few of the more
adventurous and reckless made birchbark ornaments, while those who were
in utter despair for something to do wrote letters home.

Several dauntless spirits had braved the rain to catch some fish, but
the fish, themselves disgusted, stayed down at the bottom of the lake,
out of the wet, as Roy said. It was so wet that even the turtles
wouldn't come out without umbrellas.

Rain, rain, rain. It flowed off the pavilion roof like a waterfall. It
shrunk tent canvas which pulled on the ropes and lifted the pegs out of
the soggy ground. It buried the roads in mud. Hour in and hour out the
scouts sat along the back of the deep veranda, beguiling their enforced
leisure with banter and riddles and camp gossip.

On Friday afternoon a brisk wind arose and blew the rain sideways so
that most of the scouts withdrew from their last entrenchment and went
inside. You have to take off your hat to a rain which can drive a scout
in out of the open.

It began blowing in across the veranda in fitful little gusts and within
an hour the wind had lashed itself into a gale. A few of the hardier
spirits, including Roy, held their ground on the veranda, squeezing back
against the shingled side whenever an unusually severe gust assailed
them.

There is no such thing as twilight in such weather, but the sodden sky
grew darker, and the mountainside across the lake became gloomier and
more forbidding as the night drew on apace.

The few remaining stragglers on the veranda watched this darkening scene
with a kind of idle half interest, ducking the occasional g