This present series, which is intended to describe the vacations of our Gridley High School boys in between their regular school years, opened with the preceding volume, “The High School Boys Canoe Club.”  Within the pages of that volume are set forth the manner in which Dick & Co. secured, at an auction sale of a Wild West show, a six-paddle Indian war canoe.  All their problems in getting this canoe into serviceable condition made highly interesting reading.  The host of adventures that surrounded their vacation at Lake Pleasant proved thrilling indeed to our readers.  How they met and contested with the canoe clubs from other high schools was delightfully set forth.  The efforts of Fred Ripley to spoil the fun of Dick & Co. during that vacation, formed another strong feature of the tale.

We now find our young high school friends, just after the Fourth of July, at a very exciting point in their careers.  As has been intimated, Harry Hazelton’s and Dan Dalzell’s parents had grown nervous about the canoeing sport, and had urged their sons not to enter the craft again.  As Dick & Co. had always been companions in all forms of sport, the other four chums had promptly decided to sell the canoe, if possible, and to devote the proceeds to going off in the “real woods” to camp.

And now a probable customer at Porthampton had been found, and Dick had departed by train to see whether the sale could be effected.

“I’ve twenty cents left.  Is there money enough in the crowd to buy five ice creams?” asked Tom Reade, displaying two dimes.

“I’ve a whole half dollar, though you won’t believe it until you see it,” laughed Dave Darrin.

“Then there’s enough for cream,” decided Tom.

“I’ll put in my half, if you fellows say so,” Dave went on.  “But we may soon be in need of quite a bit of money.  Wouldn’t it be better to hold on to our fruit of the mint?”

“When we sell the canoe we’ll have plenty of money,” suggested Danny Grin.

“Very true, old Smilax,” nodded Dave.  “But what if Dick doesn’t sell it?”

“Then we won’t have plenty of money,” responded Greg promptly.

“If Dick doesn’t make a sale to the parties he has gone to see,” Dave went on argumentatively, “we may want money to buy him a ticket to some other town.  It won’t be wise to spend our little capital until we see some more money coming in.”

“That sounds like common sense,” agreed Reade, dropping his dimes back into his pocket.  “Still, I’m sorry that we’re not rich enough to finance the ice cream proposition and still have enough capital left.”

“So am I sorry,” sighed Danny Grin.  “This waiting for Dick Prescott to get back with the news is a wearing proposition.”

“Come down to my house,” suggested Dave.  “I’ve got that catalogue from the tent and camping goods house.  Let’s go and look over the catalogue, and try to decide just what we want to buy for our camp when Dick gets the money for the canoe.”