Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/384

 Before him lay the open Garden of Eden, the garden wherein grew the forbidden fruit, and wherein lurked, he grimly reminded himself, a very shrill-voiced serpent. The logs drifted down the languid current and filled up the boom space. One escaping truant he rescued just in time. Then he made sure that the others were safe, calmly studying his would-be course, should his escape prove a hurried one.

Finally he stept ashore, and crawled up the grassy bank that sloped so gently down to the water's edge. Here, he felt, was an adventure worthy of his steel.

Lonely looked about, gopher-like, dropping flat on his stomach as the side door of the Captain's house opened. It was his one-time stay and support in things of the spirit, Miss Mehetabel Wilkins, bidding a voluble good-day to Miss Arabella.

When the coast was once more clear he crept as far as he dared up the sloping river-bank. There he studied the situation at closer range. Tree by tree, his squinting young eyes went over the orchard, until, at last, he caught sight of the forbidden fruit itself.