"Guess again," remarked Bumpus, composedly. "Well, I suppose that I'll just _have_ to tell you, because you'd never get on to such a brilliant idea in a thousand years. First thing, you didn't know I brought it along, perhaps. Don't hardly understand myself just why I borrowed it from Smithy; but I must have thought it'd come in handy, sometime or other. And it's going to, fellows; it's going to."
"What is?" shouted Giraffe, now at the end of his patience.
"Why, that cute little collapsible rubber foot bath belonging to our comrade, Smithy. You know he was such a clean feller, that he just couldn't think of going anywhere at first, without carrying that tub along. It holds quite a lot; and if we filled it with nice sweet honey----"
But poor Bumpus did not get any further in his explanation. Roars of laughter broke in upon his story; for the idea of filling a rubber foot bath with the sticky product of a bee tree was too much for the rest of the boys. And Bumpus, after staring around in a hurt way, shrugged his fat shoulders, and relapsed into silence, simply remarking.
"Oh! all right; that's all a feller gets for crackin' his brain trying to think up things for the benefit of the whole bunch. I just guess that old bear'll get the main part of our honey, after all."
"What's that? Do bears like honey, Allan?" demanded Giraffe.
"I should say they did," replied the Maine lad, readily enough. "They're just wild over it. A bear will overturn a hive, if ever he gets in a garden, and devour comb and all, like a regular pig."
"But the bees," continued the tall scout; "don't they sting him at all? Think of the thousands of little critters, each with his poison lance, stinging that poor bear."
"It doesn't seem to bother the bear one bit," Allan added. "I've known them to just clean out a hive; and when we shot the varmint just afterward, he didn't seem to have a swollen head from any stings. But if we should be lucky enough to find a bee tree, perhaps we'll coax our friend, the bear that was in this cabin, to come around; and then some of you can get a crack at him. His hide would make a rug to be proud of, especially if you had killed the beast yourself."
"Count me in on that game," said Giraffe, earnestly. "I boasted to the boys at home that I was goin' to bag a big bear; and if I don't make good they'll give me the laugh, you see. And then we'll find out whether this heavy old rifle that belonged to my uncle, ain't equal to a new-fangled little popgun that shoots spreader bullets."