Pud Pringle, pirate

Mr. Ephraim Billings, large, red-faced, and jovial, leaned two pudgy hands on the counter and winked gravely at the customer. The customer ignored the wink and replied with impr...

Pud, his scuffed shoes wedged between the pickets, leaned across the fence and hailed his neighbor excitedly. But Tim, his back turned, was propelling the lawn-mower along the e...

The captain of the launch _Kismet_ gave the order in a fine, gruff, sailor-like voice as he pulled the throttle a trifle wider. The deck-hand, seated on the edge of the scanty a...

‘I wish he’d hurry up with that water,’ muttered Tim, his hands under his head, his straw hat pulled over his forehead, and the rest of his countenance obscured by the wilted le...

They had made the mistake of pitching the tent where the morning sun had full play, and long before either Pud or Tim wanted to get up, the canvas walls were aglow, and it was o...

It was nearly seven o’clock when they at last reached their destination. This was because, although they twice asked directions, they never did find Moorehouse Avenue. Since, in...

Pud and Tim shared a big four-poster bed in the room always occupied by the former when, once a year, he accompanied his parents to Great-Aunt Sabrina’s. This was at the back of...

The return to the launch was uneventful. They had the car to themselves most of the way, and Tim dozed off in a corner. Pud lost his bearings after they had reached the center o...

The shanty-boat, the sagging wharf, and the waving men grew small in the distance. The forest closed in once more. At last the clearing passed from sight as the launch, chugging...

Tim groped sleepily for the wheel, yawning loudly, and Pud stepped to the engine and pushed up the throttle. With the other hand he threw the clutch out. By the time this was ac...

Corbin came into sight at a little before nine o’clock the next morning, a quiet, rambling town of little homes and shaded streets commanded by a tall red water-tower. The railw...

With Harmon at the wheel, closely watched by an anxious Tim, Pud settled himself at the stern and wrote a letter to his mother. Despairing of being able to narrate all the happe...

Turtle Creek proved a shallow stream some forty feet in width at its outlet. Beyond the mouth the width varied considerably, but, in spite of an occasional snag or mud spit, the...

The launch floated out into the lake, only the ripples from its bow marring the flat monotony of the glassy surface. About them on every side were silence and solitude, uncanny...

Harmon obeyed none too amiably and Pud and Tim lifted the anchor. A hoarse laugh from Cocker called the boys’ attention to the fact that he had pulled the flag-pole from the soc...

They listened intently. A faint breath of air was stirring and there was a whispering and rustling from the bushes above them, and for a space they heard nothing else. Then the...

Tim and Harmon watched Pud until the bend of the stream intervened and then, somewhat dejectedly, nosed the skiff to the bank and sat there in silence for a while. As usual, mos...

Pud searched hurriedly, frantically in the gloom for the handle that fitted into the fly-wheel while the sounds of pursuit grew louder and nearer. He found it at last, slipped i...

Mr. Kinsey lifted some of the bills from one of the two stacks and riffled the edges with a square thumb, nodding. These were tens; the other pile held twenties. He passed one o...

The man, pausing on the top of the low bank, looked them over suspiciously. Finally his gaze fell on the skiff, bumping astern, and his faded eyes lighted a little. He nodded, a...

The return voyage began at twenty minutes to ten o’clock. At eleven they made The Flat, and, as Pud swung the launch’s nose toward the outlet of the river, they looked toward th...

They made surprisingly good time to the mouth of Fox River and then covered six of the seven miles that lay between that point and Livermore in an hour and twenty minutes. It ce...