“It’s not your fault, old man,” he said; “but Helen was right—­this thing is too sharp.”

“I’ll tell you what to do, Roger, get some of those rubber tips that slip on the ends of lead pencils.  The English stationer must have some.  If you put them on all these arrows they can’t do any harm.”

“Meanwhile the kiddies had better not have them,” Mrs. Schuler decided, so they were put aside with the basket, to be finished later when the needed tips should be procured in Rosemont.

“You got off pretty well, that time, sir,” laughed Roger.  “What were you trying to do?”

“I wath an Indian thooting bearth.  Vladimir wath a bear.”

“A Russian bear.  You got him all right; but let me tell you, young man; you must be mighty careful what you aim at, for international complications may follow.”

“What’th that?”

“That means it’s dangerous to aim at anybody.  I’ll make you a target and when you get so you can hit the bull’s eye three times out of five at a distance of fifteen feet I’ll give you a better bow.  Is it a bargain?”

Dicky shook hands on it solemnly.

“Remember now, no shooting at any living thing.”

“Not a cat?”

“Not a cat or a bird, a dog or any other animal on two legs or four.”

“All right,” nodded Dicky, and Roger knew that he would keep his word, for that is a part of the training of a soldier’s son.

The experiences of the afternoon were not yet ended.  The arrow episode over the children looked about for other amusement.  They drifted away from the group still gathered about the embers of the dying fire and made their way among the bushes standing uncut on the edge of the new clearing.  Once in a while their laughter was borne on the breeze.  It was a long time before any one thought of seeing what they were doing.  Then Ethel Brown rose and sauntered in the direction whence the sounds came.

“With Dicky in the lead,” she thought, “it’s just as well to keep an eye on them.”

As she approached the woods she saw the little army of rompered youngsters, each armed with a switch, and each doing his best to strike something high over his head.  They all stood with their eager faces looking upward and their arms working busily with what muscle the summer had given them.  Leaves were falling from the bushes and the lower branches of the saplings that were struck by their rods, and it was evident that they were causing great destruction to the foliage, whatever the real object of their attack.

Ethel’s wonderment increased.

“Children do get the greatest amount of fun out of the smallest things,” she thought.  “What can they be doing?”