"Then you and Tommy will
thankfully entrench yourselves in here at dusk, and listen to the
singing hordes dashing themselves against the netting in the effort to
get at you!"
"That's the kind of thing they used to tell me on the Nauru," Bob said
laughing; "but I didn't quite expect it from you, Mr. Linton!"
The squatter chuckled.
"Well, indeed, it's no great exaggeration in some years," he said. "They
can be bad enough for anything, though it isn't always they are. But an
open-air room is never amiss, for if there aren't mosquitoes a lamp will
attract myriads of other insects on a hot night. That looks all right,
Bob; you've managed that door very well."
"First rate!" said Jim and Wally approvingly, returning arm in arm.
"You're great judges!" David Linton rejoined, looking at the pair. "Have
you returned to work, may I ask, or are you still imitating the lilies
of the field?"
"Jim is; he couldn't help it," said Wally. "But I have been studying
that oak tree out in the front, Mr. Linton. It seems to me that a
seat built round it would be very comforting to weary bones on warm
evenings--"
Bob gathered up his tools with decision in each movement.
"Wally has come to that state of mind in which he can't look at anything
on the place without wanting to build something out of a packing case
in it, or round it, or on top of it!" he said. "When the sheep come I'll
have to keep you from them, or you'll be building shelves round them!"
"Why, you're nearly as bad yourself!" grinned Wally.
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