Uncle Dick's eyes wrinkled in a smile as he and the sturdy sea-captain started on down and walked to the town. At the farther end they were met by the three boys and by three nice-looking ladies, each prosperous-looking and well dressed, and each bearing a very anxious expression of countenance.
"I tell you it's absolutely absurd, Richard," began one of these, as they approached--"your putting such notions into the heads of these boys."
"It's all utterly impossible, of course," said Rob's mother, in turn, her mouth closing tightly as she looked around at her son.
Mrs. Wilcox said less, but kept her hand on Jesse's shoulder. "What would you do at night with no one to see you safe in bed, my son?" said she, at length.
"I'll take care of the boys," said Uncle Dick, at length. "I won't mollycoddle them, and they will have to shift for themselves, but I'll see that they get through all right. Think it over, good people. It will be the making of the kids."
"Oh, well now, Richard," began Mrs. Hardy, once more, "how do we know when you are coming back?"
"Oh, I'll get them back in time for the fall term. Boats are coming down from Kadiak every month or so."
"But they say the storms out that way are perfectly frightful," began Mrs. McIntyre.
"We'll not be in any storms. The cutter _Bennington_ anchors in the harbors, and, besides, the boys will be ashore in town at Kadiak. You don't suppose that Uncle Sam will let me have them around underfoot all the time, do you? I'll have something else to do."
"But what could the boys do, then?" inquired Mrs. McIntyre.
"Nothing much. Hunt seals and otters and whales and bears, and a few little things like that--catch more codfish and salmon than they ever thought of around here--go boat-riding with the Aleuts--"
"Tippy bidarkas," nodded Uncle Dick; "and go egg-hunting on the gull rocks, and all sorts of things. Why, they'd have the time of their lives, that's all."
"But not one of the boys has a father at home now to advise in the matter," hesitated Jesse's mother. "They are all inside, and won't be back for a week."
"They'll all be back just a week too late," answered Uncle Dick. "In about three-quarters of an hour from now, as Captain Ryan here will advise you, we start; and these boys, I think, will be on board the _Yucatan_ headed for Kadiak. You want to remember that this is Alaska, and that these are Alaskan boys. They've got to grow up knowing how to take care of themselves in this country. They're not sissies, with red morocco shoes and long yellow curls--they're the stuff we've got to make men out of up here. How'd Alaska ever have been found, in the first place, if there hadn't been real men raised from real boys?"