THE TWO PERFECTLY LOVELY FELLOWS
Before they had gone far it developed that young Fuller Bullson and his
friend, Raysor Rackette, were born for the sake of Pee-wee,
notwithstanding that they had been born some years before our hero’s
advent on earth. They were exponents of the very type of adventure which
Pee-wee had invented.
According to their account they gloried in not knowing where they were
at. Indeed they were somewhat in advance of Pee-wee, for while he used
moss and the gentle breeze to guide him, they used just nothing at all.
A compass they regarded as superfluous, since they did not care in which
direction they went.
“Trails we don’t care about,” said Ray Rackette, “because most of them
go somewhere. The ideal trail is one that goes around in a circle and
doesn’t go anywhere.”
“Like the equator,” said Fuller.
“The equator is good,” said Ray; “so’s the tropic of Cancer.”
“How can you follow the equator when you can’t see it?” Pee-wee
demanded.
“All the more fun,” said Fuller; “if you don’t see it, it doesn’t worry
you.”
It was very amusing to see these two sitting side by side on the fender,
dangling their legs, with apparently not the slightest curiosity about
where they were going.
“That’s one thing I don’t like about the Earth,” said Ray; “it travels
in an orbit; you know just where you’re going. Otherwise I like it.”
“Oh, the Earth isn’t so bad,” said Fuller. “You’re crazy!” Pee-wee
shouted. “Railroads go to places; everything goes to places. You have to
know where you’re going.”
“No you don’t, Scout,” said Fuller in a way of thoughtful consideration.
“The way we go on a vacation is the best way. How about that, Ray?”
“Absolutely,” said Ray.
“Now at Hydome this is the way we do when vacation comes around,” said
Fuller. “The first thing we do is to throw ourselves off the track. Let
me explain to you. We decide that we want to go somewhere—”
“_There_, now you see!” Pee-wee said. “You admit—”
“Just a minute, Scout. We decide that we want to go _away_. That is the
only place we have in mind. We next go down to the railroad station in
Hydome. In the ticket office is a ticket agent. Behind the ticket agent
are a lot of pigeon-holes all full of tickets. I was born on the sixth
of the month and Ray here was born on the seventh. That makes thirteen,
an unlucky number—”
“I was born the day before the Fourth of July,” Pee-wee vociferated.
“So we count six pigeon-holes to the right and then seven pigeon-holes
down,” Fuller continued. “Then we say to the ticket agent, ‘Sir, we
would like two tickets out of that pigeon-hole.’ The idea is not
original, it was derived from the grab-bag. Then follows an altercation
with the ticket agent, but in the end we triumph.”
“Like me, I always triumph,” said Pee-wee.
“We then look at our tickets to see where we are going. Sometimes we
count three across and ten down so as to change our destination. Only
the numbers must make thirteen or else we won’t have any bad luck. Last
summer we went to a little village in— Where was it, Ray?”
“Don’t ask me,” said Ray.
“Well, it was somewhere,” said Fuller; “we found that out later. When we
got out at the station we started up the road and stopped at the _third_
house we came to—we always do that. But this summer we took the Drerie’s
summer resort book after we had discovered that we were going to
Snailback Impoliteness or whatever you call it and we turned to
Snailback and went over the ads. counting _eenie, meenie, minee, mo_,
and mo landed us at the Snailback House.
“So here we are, on our way to Good-for-nothing farm. Everything happens
as it should, only different. Summer before last we got off at—oh, what
was the name of that place in Wisconsin where we tried to follow the
shore of a lake because somebody said that when you’re lost it’s always
best to follow water? We came out just where we started. There was good
fishing there. I don’t know whether the lake had any name or not.”
“You’re supposed to follow the _streams_,” Pee-wee said contemptuously.
“Yes, but you see, Scout, we’re fond of going around together so we
followed the shore of the lake. We got the idea from a barrel-hoop.”
“You’re crazy,” Pee-wee informed them, “but just the same I like you.”
“Thanks awfully Scout, we’re crazy about _you_.”
Pee-wee had up to this time cautiously refrained from mentioning Hope
Stillmore for fear that on hearing of her, the party (and especially the
two perfectly lovely fellows) would still wish to go to the Snailsdale
House. But now that they were almost at the farm he spoke rather freely,
and rather untactfully.
“Anyway, will you stay at the farm?” he asked. “Because, gee whiz, it’s
a dandy place and there was a girl there named Hope Stillmore and she
was partners with me making this float and we were going in the parade
up at Snailsdale and then all of a sudden a feller by the name of
Braggen came and got her away, but anyway I punched a hole in his
straw-hat for him—”
“Great!” said Ray.
“Bully for you!” said Fuller.
“You don’t even know him,” said Pee-wee.
“We hate him without knowing him,” said Ray.
“And when he told her that you were coming up to the Snailsdale House,
and all these people but especially you, do you know what she did? She
made her mother go up to the Snailsdale House, because she’s so crazy
about fellers and dancing and all that, and West Point uniforms but, gee
whiz, I’ve got a scout uniform and that’s just as much of a uniform as a
West Point uniform, isn’t it?”
“Positively,” laughed Chesty Marshall; “more so.”
“So I say we all stick together,” Pee-wee continued enthusiastically,
“and stay at the farm and that’ll serve her right and then she’ll wish
she was back again because, gee whiz, I can see she’d like you a lot.
Anyway I have to admit she’s pretty. But, gee, she didn’t have a right
to go back on me when she was my pal, did she?”
“She was horrid,” said Pocahontas Gamer.
“Scout,” said Fuller Bullson, “they’re all alike.”
“They’re not!” said Pocahontas Gamer; “I don’t care anything about you
and your dancing, _so there_.”
“We get you,” said Ray; “I mean they’re all alike only different.”
“So you will stay?” Pee-wee asked excitedly. “And we’ll kind of have a
conspiracy and—”
“Scout, we’re with you to the death,” said Fuller Bullson.
“_Hssh_,” Ray whispered to Pee-wee; “the old fellow inside is worth a
barrel of money; his name is Koyn and he wears a check suit—and all the
checks are certified. He’s very high and mighty. _Shh_, he’s going to
buy the Drerie Railroad and close it up. If the farm strikes him right,
we’ll hold him up and make him come across with a brass band. His whole
family is coming up.
“We’ll pull off a couple of pink teas and have a barn dance and make
Trotsky in there play his fiddle and we’ll have Stillwater Hopeless
asking for an armistice inside of a week. It’s all over but the
shouting, Scout. Goodmere Farm is the best place I’ve never seen.
Goodyear tires may be the _best in the long run_ but Good-bye Farm, or
whatever you call it, is the best in the long walk. _Shh._ I’m glad you
confided in us, Scout. And you can see the advantage of not knowing
where you’re going to.”
“And—and if you start out again like that,” Pee-wee asked excitedly,
“and get tickets that way, can I go with you? No matter how far it is?”
“Absolutely,” said Fuller Bullson.