ing the long silence that followed Bud's remark.

"By jiminy, it looks that way to me," said Jiminy Gordon emphatically.

"It's procrastination that--"

"Whoops! Hi! what was that word? Ho, ho, say it again, Bruce," shouted
Romper Ryan hilariously.

"He's worked for months on that _Boys' Life Dictionary Contest_," said
Ray Martin, "that's what's the matter with Bruce. What does it mean?
Maybe it's something to eat!"

"Aw, say, quit your joshin' me," said Bruce, "that's a real word. It
means--ah--er--well--"

"Sure it does, we knew it all the time, didn't we, Romper?" said Nipper
Knapp.

"That's exactly what it means," said Bud quite soberly.

"Well, it means that we've been putting off work. We haven't come down
to brass tacks. And now we're up against it and our motorboat
proposition falls through," snapped Bruce.

"Well, if that's what it means then you told the truth," said Bud,
resuming his indignant attitude. "We fellows haven't been on the job. I
haven't made a cent in three weeks and neither has any one of the rest of
you. Now be honest, have you?"

"No, we haven't," said Dug Maston.

"I guess we are actually growing lazy," said Romper solemnly.

Then Babe Wilson, the sarcastic fat scout, added:

"No, we haven't been lazy, we've just been waiting for opportunity to
knock at our door--"

(_Rap--rap--rap, rap--rap--rap--rap._)

Babe looked startled and swallowed hard. Then, his sense of humor
bobbing to the surface again, he grinned.

"That's Mr. Opportunity," he said.

"No, it wasn't," said Romper, rushing to the window, "it was a blasted
old bill poster tacking a sign on Headquarters-- Hi! git out o' there!
This isn't an old barn!" he shouted to the bill poster.

But that individual never heard him and kept tacking away until the bill
was up. Then he went on down the road whistling merrily.

"Hang it, Headquarters will look like a billboard soon. I'm going down
to pull his blooming old sign off our wall," said Romper, as he
disappeared through the doorway and stamped down the stairs. But a few
moments later he seemed to have changed his mind, for he was heard to
shout:

"Hi, fellows, come on down. It's worth reading anyway." And what the
scouts read when they crowded about him was:

$200 In Prizes for Brown Tail Moth Exterminators.

The Town of Woodbridge is offering $200 in prizes to the individuals who
can advance and demonstrate a practical method of exterminating the