ing's goin'
on famous. We've gotten the roof on, an' we're now fixin' up your
bedroom, so's you kin occupy it while the rest of the shanty's bein'
finished."

"Yes," pursued Kiddie. "But I want to be there right now. I'm
hankerin' badly to see how it looks, ter judge what it'll be like when
all the work's done and we've got the fixings in--the books and
pictures and all that. I'm envying you terrible, Rube, being there
every day and watching the thing grow. I'm envying you being able to
see the wild critters while I'm kept a prisoner here on account of a
fool saddle that was broken and mended with rotten string. I guess
you've seen heaps of things this morning--new birds, new insects, new
beasts, and wild flowers that you couldn't put a name to, eh?"

"Dunno 'bout that," said Rube. "Dunno as I saw anythin' as I hadn't
seen before."

"Ah, you've got a heap to learn yet, Rube," Kiddie rejoined. "Why,
when I'm out and about there's never a day, never an hour, hardly a
minute, but I see something new, learn something fresh in woodcraft and
scoutcraft. You don't go along with your eyes shut and your ears and
nostrils closed, do you? What did you see early this mornin', for
example, when you went across the grass patch, the dew still lying?"

"Say, now, how d'you know I saw anythin'?" Rube asked. "You was in
bed."

"Yes, but I could see you from my pillow. You went aside from the
straight trail."

"That's so," acknowledged Rube. "I was tryin' ter foller a track in
the dew--some biggish animal, I guess; but thar wasn't no
footmarks--not in the long grass--an' the track didn't lead to
nothin'--only a root of dandelion with the leaves chewed off."

"Perhaps you went the wrong way," suggested Kiddie. "Was the track
lighter than the rest of the grass, or darker?"

"Um! Now you puzzle me," demurred Rube. "I ain't just sure; but I
guess it was darker. Yes, it was sure darker. Why? What's that
gotter do with it?"

"Why? Well, a scout would sure know that grass blades bent towards him
look dark; bent away from him, light. If the trail of your biggish
animal this morning was darker than the grass, then you didn't follow
him, you were going away from him all the time. He was probably a
stoat on the track of a jack-rabbit. If you'd followed the other way,
you might have seen where that stoat chased his victim into its burrow,
and you might have seen where he came out again alone, after his feed
undergr