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 Bill worked the tip of his crutch into the ground. "Well," he said, "this is all right just for now, but I wouldn't want to do it as a steady thing. It would get mighty tiresome."

"What would you want to do?" Dolf asked suspiciously.

"I'd want a job. You get tired of loafing. I found that out in the hospital."

However, for the present, Bert was well-content to drink his fill from the cup of leisure. There came a day when, with the tide of adventure running strongly in his veins, he set out for the big city. It was twenty miles there, twenty miles back, but the distance did not awe him. The whole day stretched ahead. He left Springham behind and rode the wide sweep of the county highway. A summer breeze murmured past his ears; the miles came and went on his speedometer. Once he halted to rest, and then was a-wheel and on again. It seemed a pity to linger when he could be in motion.

Twelve miles out he came to a crossroads that he had never noticed before. The same itch for adventure that had urged him forth, now painted this new road with alluring possibilities. He forgot his original intention and turned into it. Travel had packed down the dirt and the going was not bad.

"If it gets bumpy," he told himself philosophically, "I can turn back and no harm done."