In his heart Paul knew that there was nothing
anybody could do which he could not.

They hung the slimpsy slices of bacon from forked sticks, Paul showing
Mr. Welles how to thread his on, and began to cook them around the edges
of the fire, while the two little trout frizzled in the frying-pan. "I'm
so glad we got that last one," commented Paul. "One wouldn't have been
very much."

"Yes, it's much better to have one apiece," agreed Mr. Welles.

When the bacon was done (only burned a little at the edges, and still
soft in the thicker places in the center of the slice), and the fish the
right brown, and 'most shrunk up to nothing, they each of them put a
trout and a piece of bacon on his slice of bread and butter, and
gracious! didn't it taste good.

"You must have done this before," said Mr. Welles, respectfully; "you
seem to know a good deal about camping."

"Oh, I'm a good camper, all right," agreed Paul. "Mother and I have gone
off in the woods, lots of times. When I was littler, I used to get
spells when I was bad. I do still, even now, once in a while."

Mr. Welles did not smile, but continued gravely eating his bread and
bacon, his eyes on the little boy.

"I don't know what's the matter. I feel all snarled up inside. And then
the first thing you know I've done something awful. Mother can tell when
it first gets started in me, the least little teenty bit. _How_ can she
tell? And then she takes me off camping. She pretends it's because she's
feeling snarled up, herself. But it's not. She never is. Why not?"

He considered this in silence, chewing slowly on a vast mouthful of
bread. "Anyhow, we leave the little children with Toucle, if she's
there," (he stopped here an instant to inspect Mr. Welles to make sure
he was not laughing because he had called Elly and Mark the "little
children." But Mr. Welles was not laughing at him. He was listening,
_really_ listening, the way grown-ups almost never did, to hear what you
had to say. He did like Mr. Welles. He went on,) "or if Toucle's off
somewheres in the woods herself, we leave them down at the Powers' to
play with Addie and Ralph, and we light out for the woods, Mother and I.
The snarleder up I feel, the further we go. We don't fish or anything.
Just leg it, till I feel better. Then we make a fire and eat."

He swallowed visibly a huge lump of unchewed bread, and said, uncorking
a thermos bottle, "I asked Mother to put up some hot coffee."

Mr. Welles seeme