ave a seventieth birthday again," replied Reade
thoughtfully. "My! A man at that age ought not to have to bother
with working. It's pitiful. It's a shame!"

"Maybe he finds his only happiness in work," Darrin suggested.
"I have known old people like that."

By this time Dan had taken one of the lanterns into the tent,
and was undressing. Dave soon followed, then Greg and Hazelton.

"Do you want to take a little walk down to the road, where we
can get a better look at the sky?" Dick proposed to Reade. "We
ought to take a squint at the weather."

"That will suit me," Tom nodded, so away they strolled toward
the road.

"If you fellows stay away from camp long, don't you be mean enough
to talk, or make any other noise when you get back to the tent,"
Darrin called after them.

Down by the road there was a breeze blowing, and it was cooler.

"I'd like to bring my cot down this way," Tom suggested.

"There's no law against it," Dick smiled. "The owner's permission
extended in a general way to all the land right around here."

"Will you bring your cot, too?" Tom asked.

"Certainly."

So, before any of the other fellows were asleep, Dick and Tom
reentered the tent to get their folding cots and bedding.

"Cooler down by the road, is it?" asked Darrin wistfully. "Then
I'm sorry you didn't find it out before I undressed."

"We'll sleep in our clothes," Dick replied. "Come along, Tom,
and give the infant class a chance to get to sleep."

After lying, fully dressed on their cots, which they placed within
ten feet of the road, Dick and Tom found themselves so wide awake
that they lay chatting for some moments.

At last Reade mumbled his answers; next his unmistakably deep
breathing indicated that he was asleep. Prescott thereupon turned
over on his side and dozed off.

It was shortly after their first few moments of sleep had passed
that a noise in the road close by awoke both boys.

Dick sat up leaning on one elbow, listening. Someone was coming
toward them.

As the stranger came closer, Dick, his eyes seeing well in the
dark, made out the unmistakable form of Reuben Hinman, the peddler.

"What's he doing out here at this hour of the night, and on foot?"
wondered Dick Prescott half aloud.

"Eh? What?" asked Reade in a low, drowsy voice, as he opened
his eyes.

"It's Mr. Hinman, the peddler," Prescott whispered to his chum.
"But I wonder what's wrong with him?"

"I wonder, too," Reade assente