d Sam with a grin. "You're at a bad age.
Well, I have spoken. What's the use of having an older brother if he
can't do you some good?"

It being only four o'clock, Skippy decided to look up the Gutter Pup,
who with the Egghead, represented the school contingent at Gates Harbor.
Lazelle, more familiarly known as the Gutter Pup, Gazelle, Razzle-dazzle
and the White Mountain Canary according to the fighting weight of the
addressee, lived just across lots.

With three months' respite ahead from the tyranny of the chapel bell,
three months of home cooking, fifteen dollars in his pocket and nothing
to do but to romp like a colt over pastures of his own choosing, Skippy
went hilariously over the lawns, hurdled a hedge and hallooed from below
the well-known window.

"Hi there, old Razzle-Dazzle, stick your head out!"

A second and a third peremptory summons bringing no response, he went
cautiously around the porch.

"Why it's Jack Bedelle," said the Gutter Pup's sister from a hammock.
"Gracious, I never should have known you!"

"Hello yourself," said Skippy, acknowledging with a start the difference
a year had brought to the tomboy he had known. "Say, you've done some
growing up yourself."

He ended in a long drawn out whistle which Miss Lazelle smilingly
accepted as a tribute.

"I say, Bess, where's the old Gazelle?"

"Charlie? Why he's gone out canoeing with Kitty Rogers."

"What!"

Miss Lazelle repeated the information. Skippy was too astounded to
remember his manners. He clapped his hat on his head, sunk his fists in
his pockets and went out the gate. The Gutter Pup spending his time like
that! He made his way to the club where more shocks awaited him. On the
porch was the Egghead feeding ice cream to Mimi Lafontaine. On the
tennis courts Puffy Ellis and Tacks Brooker were playing mixed doubles!
Skippy could not believe his eyes. What sort of an epidemic was this
anyhow? He went inside and immediately a victrola started up a two-step
and lo and behold, there before him whirling ecstatically about the
floor, held in feminine embraces, were Happy Mather and Joe Crocker, the
irreconcilables of the old gang!

"Hello, Skippy, shake a foot," said Happy Mather encouragingly. "Want to
be introduced?"

"Excuse me," said Skippy loftily. "What's happened to the crowd? Can't
you think of anything better than wasting your time like this?"

"Wake up!" said Happy, making a dive for a partner. "You're walking in
your sle