"A thing that's bad can't be good, can it?" Pee-wee persisted. "Suppose
you should hit me with a brick----"
"I wouldn't think of doing such a thing!"
"But suppose you did. And suppose the scouts came along and gave me
first aid and after that I became a scout. Could you say you did me a
good turn by hitting me with a brick because that way I got to be a
scout? Roy--you got to be careful with him--you can't always tell when
he's jollying."
Mary looked at him intently for a few seconds. "Well, then," said she,
"since you've made a study of good turns tell me this. If Roy and Tom
were to ask you to go with them on their long hike, would that be a good
turn?"
"Sure it would, because it would have a sacrifice in it, don't you see?"
"How?"
"Because they'd do it just to please me--they wouldn't really want me."
"Well," she laughed, "Roy's good at making sacrifices."
"Je-ru-salem!" said Pee-wee, shaking his head almost incredulously at
the idea of such good fortune; "that'll be some trip. But you know what
they say, and it's true--I got to admit it's true--that two's a company,
three's a crowd."
"It wouldn't be three," laughed Mary; "it would only be two and a half."
She watched the sturdy figure as Pee-wee trudged along the gravel walk
and down the street. He seemed even smaller than he had seemed on the
veranda. And it was borne in upon her how much jollying he stood for and
how many good things he missed just because he _was_ little, and how
cheerful and generous-hearted he was withal.
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