know them and like them sort of.

Then pretty soon we came to a creek that ran through the woods and I
could see it was deep and all shaded by the trees. Oh, jiminy, it was
fine. And you could hear it ripple too, just like the water of Black
Lake up near Temple Camp. If I was a grown-up author I could write
some dandy stuff about it, because it was all dark and spooky as you
might say, and you could see the trees reflected in it and casting
their something or other--you know what I mean.

"Can you follow a trail?", Mr. Donnelle asked us.

"Trails are our middle names;" I told him, "and I can follow one--"

"Whitherso'er--" Pee-wee began.

"Whither so which?" I said. Because he was trying to talk high brow
just because he knew Mr. Donnelle was an author.

So he led us along a trail that ran along the shore all in and out
through trees, and he said it was all his property. Pretty soon I
could see part of a house through the trees and I thought I'd like to
live there, it was so lonely.

"You mean secluded," Pee-wee said. Mr. Donnelle smiled and I told him
Pee-wee was a young dictionary--pocket size.

Pretty soon we reached the house and, good night, it wasn't any house
at all; it was a house boat. And I could see the fixtures for a wireless
on it, only the wires had been taken down.

Then Mr. Donnelle said, "Boys," he said, "this is my old workshop and I
have spent many happy hours in it. But I don't use it any more and if
you boys think you could all pile into it, why you are welcome to it for
the summer. It has no power, but perhaps you could tow it behind your
launch. Anyway you may charter it for the large sum of nothing at all,
as a reward for foiling a spy."

"I--I kind of knew you were not a spy all the time," said Pee-wee.

Well, I was so flabbergasted that I just couldn't speak and even Pee-wee
was struck dumb. We just gaped like a couple of idiots, and after a while
I said, "Cracky, it's too good to be true."

"So you see what comes from collecting books for soldiers and for keeping
your eyes open," Mr. Donnelle said; "you have caught a bigger fish than
you thought. N ow suppose I show you through the inside."

Now here is the place where the plot begins to get thicker and, believe
me, in four or five chapters it will be as thick as mud. We were just
coming up to the house-boat to go aboard it, when suddenly the door flew
open and a fellow scampered across the deck and ran away.

I could see that