ery day in the week." He took up his
tray and went down the car, offering his wares to the bored, frowsy
passengers who wanted only to reach journey's end.

The next round he made, he stopped again beside Jack. They talked of
fishing--Jack saw to that!--and Jack learned that Lake Almanor was
nothing more nor less than an immense reservoir behind a great dam put
in by a certain power company at a cost that seemed impossible. The
reservoir had been made by the simple process of backing up the water
over a large mountain valley. You could look across the lake and see
Mount Lassen as plain as the nose on your face, the peanut butcher
declared relishfully. And the trout in that artificial lake passed all
belief.

Every time the boy passed, he stopped for a few remarks. Pound by
pound the trout in Lake Almanor grew larger. Sentence by sentence Jack
learned much that was useful, a little that was needful. There were
several routes to Lake Almanor, for instance. One could get in by way
of Chico, but the winter snow had not left the high summits, so that
route was unfeasible for the time being. The best way just now was by
the way of Quincy, a little town up near the head of Feather River
Canyon. The fare was only seven or eight dollars, and since the season
had opened one could get reduced rates for the round trip. That was
the way the friend of the peanut butcher had gone in--only he had
stopped off at Keddie and had gone up to the dam with a fellow he knew
that worked there. And he had brought back a trout that weighed
practically eight pounds, dressed. The peanut butcher knew; he had
seen it with his own eyes. They had it hanging in the window of the
California Market, and there was a crowd around the window all the
time. He knew; he had seen the crowd, and he had seen the fish; and he
knew the fellow who had caught it.

Unless he could go with a crowd, Jack did not care much about fishing.
He liked the fun the gang could have together in the wilds, but that
was all; like last summer when Hen had run into the hornet's nest
hanging on a bush and thought it was an oriole's basket! Alone and
weighed down with horror as he was, Jack could not stir up any
enthusiasm for the sport. But he found out that it would not cost much
to reach the little town called Quincy, of which he had never before
heard.

No one, surely, would ever think of looking there for him. He could
take the evening train out of San Francisco, and in the mo