r! How are you feeling to-day?'

"'Why--why--why!' exclaimed the professor--you know his funny way of
speaking. 'Why--why--why--I was very well when I started out, I thought.
But I don't know what's come over me. Do you know, I've developed a
pronounced limp since leaving the house!'"

"Well, the boys like him," Wyn said, when the girls' laughter had
subsided.

"I thought I saw Dave Shepard and that 'Tubby' Blaisdell around here
when I hurried down from school to light the fire," remarked Grace.

At that moment a strange, scraping sound was heard right above the
girls' heads. Bess and Mina jumped up.

"What's that?" cried Grace.

"It's something on the roof," declared Wyn.

Now, Canoe Lodge was built on a high bank over the river. One stepped
from the level sward into the living room. The roof on one side was a
short, sharp pitch; but over the river it ran out in a long, easy slope
to shelter the canoe landing.

Suddenly there was a crash, and the very house shook. There was a wheezy
shout of alarm, the sound of another voice in wild laughter, and some
heavy body slid down the long side of the roof with the noise of an
avalanche.

"The Busters!" shrieked Percy, and ran to a window overlooking the
river.

CHAPTER II

THE BUSTERS

The girls could overlook the lower slope of the long roof through the
bay window at the end of the living room. They crowded to it after Percy
Havel, and beheld a most amazing as well as ridiculous sight.

A very fat youth, in a blue and white striped sweater and with a
closely-cropped yellow head, was face down upon a length of plank, which
plank was sliding like a bobsled down the incline of green-stained
shingles.

"It's Tubby!" gasped Frank Cameron.

"Oh! oh! oh!" squealed Mina. "Is he doing that for _fun_?"

Before any further comment could be made, the boy on the plank shot out
over the edge of the roof and dived, with a mighty splash, into the deep
water of the pool, adjoining which Canoe Lodge was built.

"He'll be drowned!" cried Grace, wringing her plump hands.

"It'll serve him right if he is!" exclaimed Bessie. "What business had
he on our roof, I want to know?"

"Poor Tubby!" cried Wyn, choked with laughter.

"Isn't he the most ridiculous creature that ever was?" rejoined Frank.
"See there! he's come up to blow like a frog."

"It's a whale that comes up to blow," Wyn reminded her.

"Well! isn't Tubby Blaisdell a regular whale of a boy?" returned