Bert had looked all around the
lake as far as their eyes could reach, "and that's all there is of
it. But we'll not give up our trip. We'll go in the sail-boat."

The sail-boat had been dismantled, and the masts, sails, rudder and
everything else belonging to her had been stored in the shop under
cover. While Bert was gone after the oars, Don drew the boat up to
the jetty, and having stowed the guns away in the stow-sheets, he got
in himself and took another survey of the lake to make sure that the
canoe was nowhere in sight. It was hard to give it up as lost.

Bert came back in a few minutes, and having shipped the oars shoved
off and pulled down the lake. A quarter of an hour afterward they
landed on the beach in front of Godfrey's cabin. They found David
wandering listlessly about in the back yard with his hands in his
pockets; and when he came up to the fence in response to their call,
they saw that he had been crying again.

"David," exclaimed Don, putting his hand into his pocket, "we've got
news for you that will make you wear a different looking face when
you hear it. After you went home, we rode down to see father, and he
told us--Eh!" cried Don, turning quickly toward his brother, who just
then gave his arm a sly pinch.

"Let me tell it," said Bert. "We'd like to see you at our house this
evening about five o'clock; can you come?"

"I reckon I can," answered David. "Was that the good news you wanted
to tell me?"

"No--I believe--yes, it was," said Don, who received another fearful
pinch on the arm and saw his brother looking at him in a very
significant way. "You come up, anyhow."

"We've got some work for you to do up there," said Bert. "It will not
pay you much at first, but perhaps you can make something out of it
by-and-by. It will keep you busy for two or three weeks, perhaps
longer. Will you come?"

David replied that he would, and turned away with an expression of
surprise and disappointment on his face. The eager, almost excited
manner in which Don greeted him, led him to hope that he had
something very pleasant and encouraging to tell, and somehow he
couldn't help thinking that his visitors had not said just what they
intended to say when they first came up to the fence.

"What in the name of sense and Tom Walker was the matter with you,
Bert?" demanded Don, as soon as the two were out of David's hearing.
"My arm is all black and blue, I know!"

"I didn't want you to say too much," was B