at him and Sam told us he
fired a foot back and before he had gone very far we had the air full
of eyes, heads and legs and arms, feet and hands and everything else
that goes to the making of a dummy. In fact I have almost come to
believe that Sam is pretty well made up himself. When he comes down
to-morrow I'm going to ask him to let me take out his eyes, take off
his hair, pull out a foot and an arm, and when he gets through I'll see
just how much there is of the real Sam anyway."

The boys laughed as Fred pictured the condition in which the loquacious
Sam would be left.

Their interest, however, was still great in the exciting events through
which they recently had passed. Mr. Button was an interested listener
and when the story had been all told he said quietly, "Mr. Stevens has
been down here several summers. I have been afraid of that girl every
year. If she doesn't find herself in the bottom of the river some time
soon, I don't believe the fault will be hers."

"Why, what's the matter with her?" inquired Fred.

"She's too much of a tomboy."

"What's that?" inquired Grant, winking at the other boys as he spoke.

"Why, she does most of the things that the boys do. She plays tennis,
shoots a rifle, paddles a canoe and manages the Stevens family."

"And that is why you call her a tomboy?" inquired Fred.

"Yes, sir, it is," said the old gentleman solemnly. "Girls didn't act
that way when I was young."

"How did they act?"

"Why, they were taught to be ladylike."

"And what is ladylike?" asked Fred.

"Why, it is to act like a lady."

"Yes," protested Fred, "but why shouldn't a lady do these things you're
speaking of?"

"Because they are not ladylike," replied Mr. Button testily.

"But why aren't they?" persisted Fred. "I don't see."

"That's because you haven't learned any sense yet," said his
grandfather, irritated at last by the failure of his grandson to agree
to all that he had said.

Fred laughed goodnaturedly, for behind the manner of his grandfather he
knew there was a heart that was big and generous. Mr. Button
occasionally stormed about the "present generation" being so markedly
different and deficient in all the good qualities that marked the young
people of his own younger days.

"What about that bond?" inquired John. "Have you heard anything more
about it?"

"Not a word," said Mr. Button sharply.

Before the old gentleman turned away, however, for Fred suspected that
the subject w