nd
let's scamper down the canyon merely for the joy of flying with wings on
our feet. You're It, young man, just It!"

Donald was sitting on a boulder. On another in front of him he was
operating on the trout. His hands were soiled; his hair was tousled;
he was fairly well decorated with fine scales. He looked at Linda
appealingly.

"Am I 'It' with you, Linda?" he asked soberly.

"Sure you are," said Linda. "You're the best friend I have."

"Will you write to me when I go to college this fall?"

"Why, you couldn't keep me from it," said Linda. "I'll have so many
things to tell you. And when your first vacation comes we'll make it a
hummer."

"I know Dad won't let me come home for my holidays except for the
midsummer ones," said Donald soberly. "It would take most of the time
there would be of the short holidays to travel back and forth."

"You will have to go very carefully about getting a start," said Linda,
"and you should be careful to find the right kind of friends at the very
start. Christmas and Thanksgiving boxes can always be sent on time to
reach you. It won't be so long for you as for us; and by the time you
have Oka Sayye beaten to ravelings you will have such a 'perfect habit'
that you will start right in with the beating idea. That should keep you
fairly busy, because most of the men you come up against will be beaters
themselves."

"Yes, I know," said Donald. "Are you going to start me to college with
the idea that I have to keep up this beating habit? If I were to be one
of fifty or a hundred, wouldn't that be good enough?"

"Why, sure," said Linda, "if you will be satisfied with having me like
fifty or a hundred as well as I do you."

"Oh, damn!" said Donald angrily. "Do I have to keep up this top-crust
business all my days?"

Linda looked at him with a queer smile on her lips.

"Not unless you want to, Donald," she said quietly; "not unless you
think you would rather."

Donald scraped a fish vigorously. Linda sat watching him. Presently the
tense lines around his eyes vanished. A faint red crept up his neck
and settled on his left cheek bone. A confused grin slowly widened his
naturally wide mouth.

"Then it's me for the top crust," he said conclusively.

"Then it's me for you," answered Linda in equally as matter-of-fact
tones; and rising, she gathered up the fish and carried them to Katy
while Donald knelt beside the chilly stream and scoured his face and
hands, after which Linda w