Page:Castlemon--Joe Wayring at Home.djvu/421

 which," had suddenly been called away on important business, and the probabilities were that if they took their contemplated trip at all it would not be until near the end of the vacation; and then it would have to be a very short one. But Joe didn't get sulky, as some boys would have done under like circumstances. He wrote to his uncle, found out when he was coming home, and suggested an immediate return to Indian Lake. Arthur and Roy were delighted with the proposal, and I was at once given into the hands of a skilled mechanic, who in two days' time mended my broken joint so neatly that no one could tell, even with the closest scrutiny, that there had ever been any thing the matter with it. Joe came after me on the afternoon of the second day, and when he carried me to his room and stood me in the corner where I was to stay until something that he called "ferrule cement" had had time to harden, whom should I see but my old friend, the canvas canoe, occupying his usual place in the recess, and looking none the worse for his forced sojourn among the Indian Lake vagabonds.