Page:The Keeper of the Bees.pdf/373

 Cameron would be the woman who’d do it. Are you sure she said she had gone visiting and she would be gone no telling how long?”

“She didn’t say ‘no telling how long,’” said the Scout Master. “She said ‘a few days.’ I should think a few days would be a week, maybe.”

“And what,” demanded Jamie, “what am I going to do in ‘a week maybe’ with a live baby?”

“Aw, feed it to the birds and let’s get on with our work! We’re wastin’ a lot of time on the garden,” said the little Scout.

“You look here,” said Jamie, “you aren’t talking about a crust of bread. That’s a baby in that bundle, a tiny boy who wants his chance to live and to grow and to paddle a canoe and to ride a horse and to be a Scout Master just as bad as you do!”

“Aw,” said the disgruntled small person.

Then the Scout Master walked over and lifted a square of fine white flannel with a border of forget-me-nots, and peered down at what was beneath it. Suddenly the Scout Master dropped to a kneeling position, leaned forward and looked intently. Then a softened face turned to Jamie over a lean shoulder.

“You’ll have to get a baby bottle,” was the verdict. “’Tis a nice baby. It’s an awful nice baby! It’s the cutest little thing. It’s as pretty as our Jimmy was the first time I ever saw him, and I thought there wouldn’t ever be another baby as nice as he was. But they is. Far as I can see, this baby has got just as nice clothes and