Half a dozen boys

CHAPTER XI.

THE DISADVANTAGES OF SCIENCE.

"I am sorry, Miss Bess. I was sorry the minute I'd said so, but Ted's bragging about his lessons always makes me mad."

"He didn't 'brag,' dear. I had asked him about school, and you were telling what your class did. You can't blame him for standing up for his own class, can you?"

"No," admitted Fred, "but he needn't go to crowing over ours."

"True. But you needn't have resented it as quickly as you did. If you could have seen Teddy's face, Fred, and how hard he tried to keep from answering you sharply, I don't think you would have been so angry for a little inconsiderate word."

"That's just it!" said the boy forlornly. "Things seem so different now from what they used to, and I never know just how they are going. 'Tisn't much use for me to try to be good, Miss Bess! I go along well enough for a little while, and then all of a sudden I spoil it all." And Fred gave the carpet an impatient kick, as he sat on the floor at Bessie's feet. Then, reaching up for her hand, he pulled it down and laid his cheek against it.

"You see," he went on in the comically wise, old-mannish tone of explanation that his voice took on at times, "I believe I wish I'd had some brothers and sisters. Till I came here, I didn't see so much of the boys, except at school, for mother didn't like to have them round the house, and I guess, being the only one, I did get sort of cranky, and now I'm here, even, I don't get over it."

There was silence for a few moments, and then Fred continued confidentially,—

"Do you know, Miss Bessie, I don't think my father and mother care for me just the same way Rob's and Ted's do for them."

"Why, Fred!" said Bess, with a start of surprise. "What can have given you such an idea?"

"Well, lots of things; their going off and leaving me—but I'm awfully glad they did that, because it's more fun to be here than at home, and they don't write often, nor care to hear from me, only once a month. I've thought it all out, and it's reasonable enough. You see, I can't do things much now, or by and by when I am a man, and they want somebody that can. Father used to say that he hoped I would study to go into his office; and mother wanted me to take dancing lessons, so I could go to parties and things; but of course I can't do that, and I s'pose they are sorry. I don't wonder a bit. I don't mean that they don't care anything about me. Mother said to me one day not long before she went, 'I love you just as well, Fred, as if you weren't blind.' That was the first I'd thought much about it, and then I began to think it over. I don't suppose she does, quite; do you, Miss Bessie?" And he turned his face wistfully up to hers.

"Why, of course, Fred. If anything, my boy, we all love you more than ever, and it is just because we care for you so much that we want you to be a man we can feel proud of."

"Do you honestly like me just as well?" persisted the boy. "I am sure mother doesn't, for she doesn't like to have me round very much, and she never pets me the way she used to do. I heard her tell father once that she used to wish I'd hurry and grow up, but now she never did, because she couldn't see what they'd do with me. It's horrid to feel you're in the way, Miss Bessie!"

"I wish I could keep you always, Fred," said Bess seriously, for she felt the pain in the child's voice and face, as he spoke of his absent mother.

"I just wish you could! You are as good as a mother and sister and brother, all at once. But you said that night, ever so long ago, that I mustn't wish I was dead, or out of the way, or anything, because that's cowardly; but what can I do, when I know I'm going to be in everybody's way?"

"But you aren't, Fred. We all need you and want you with us. You help fill up this house now and make it brighter for us, so we couldn't get along at all without you. And, wherever you go and whatever you do in the future, I want you always to remember that you have this one friend who is looking for the time when her Fred will be a good and true man, and she knows that it will come some day. And always, Fred, when things go wrong, come straight to me, and we will talk it all over together, and see if we can't find the right of it. But don't for a moment think that just because you can't see, we care for you any less, instead of a great deal more than ever."

"More than before I went to Boston?" asked Fred wonderingly. "And you aren't ashamed to take me round with you?"

"Fred!" exclaimed Bess, shocked at the idea. "What could ever suggest such a thing to you?"

"Nothing, only I know mother was. She never took me anywhere with her, and I heard her say so one day, when she didn't know I was there; and so I just thought I'd ask you about it. I'm glad you don't mind. And I'll tell Ted to-morrow night that I'm sorry. Good-night."

As was her usual habit, Bess went up-stairs a little later to say good-night, and see that the boy needed nothing. When she came downstairs again, tempted by the warm June moonlight, she went out to the piazza and dropped into a hammock. The tall trees on the lawn threw dark patches of shade on the grass, that came and went as the evening wind moved the leafy branches, or vanished in one dull, uniform shadow as the full moon went behind some fleecy bit of cloud. A distant whippoorwill, singing his sad night song, was the only sound that broke the stillness. Bess swung there with her hands clasped above her head, and one toe resting on the floor, enjoying the quiet beauty of the night.

"How lovely it all is!" she thought. "And Fred has none of it to enjoy. Poor child! And with such a mother!"

The next evening was Saturday, and with it came the boys, all in high glee, for their school had closed the day before, and the endless vista of the long vacation and its prospective good times was stretching before their eyes, and even the trial of a rainy Saturday was not as hard to bear, when thirteen weeks of continual Saturday lay in the near future.

"Phil and I had a fine scheme coming up here," said Bert, as he took off his dripping rubber coat; "Phil had a bag of peanuts, and we just stuck the umbrella handle down my neck to hold it, so we could both eat, all the way."

"Yes," put in Phil, as he furtively swallowed the last of his feast. "But I didn't get much of the umbrella, just the same, and my legs got awfully wet, for they hung out behind it, too. Any boys here yet?"

"Nobody but me," said Fred, strolling into the hall. "There come Rob and Sam," he added, as a step was heard.

"I don't see how you tell so quick," said Phil admiringly. "They all sound just alike to me; don't they to you, Bert?"

"Yes, they do to me," said Bert gently, as he passed his arm through Fred's and started for the library; "but if I just had to listen all the time, I think I should know you all apart. But I don't suppose I care to try; do I, Fred?"

Teddy was the last arrival.

"I stopped to get these," he explained, tossing a huge bunch of many-colored roses into Bessie's lap. "And here's an extra smelly one for you, Fred." And he put into his hand a great pink blossom whose stem was carefully divested of every thorn.

The subject of the evening was, by Rob's choice, the shell-fish found along the shore; and the boys entered into it with an enthusiasm that moved Bess to suggest,—

"You boys seem so interested in animals and things of that kind, why don't you start a museum of specimens?"

"What should we get to put in it?" asked Phil, as, with both hands behind him, he endeavored to crack a nut without being caught in the act. A click of the shell betrayed him, and he blushed furiously, as Bess raised her eyebrows at him, while Rob answered promptly,—

"Oh, bugs and butterflies."

And Sam added,—

"Stones and shells."

"Want any snakes?" asked Ted wickedly.

"Never!" replied Bess with fervor. "I don't want anything alive. I only meant moths and butterflies, or perhaps pressed flowers and curious stones and shells, that would help us understand the world we live in, and teach us all to keep our eyes open for fresh discoveries."

"What should we do with them?" inquired Ted, who had been meditatively sticking out his tongue, as he pondered the subject of the museum.

"Which, discoveries or specimens? We can decide when we get them," answered Bess, laughing, while another crack from Phil's direction showed that that youth's hunger was not yet appeased.

"Let's put in Phil," suggested Rob. "He's as fond of peanuts as a monkey at a circus, and if we caged him up, he'd make a splendid animal to start with."

"We'll put you in for a hyena," retorted Phil good-naturedly. "You howled like one at rehearsal last night."

"We might start a menagerie among ourselves," said Bert. "Ted could be the elephant, and Sam a"—

"Bear?" inquired Sam. "No, thank you; I'd rather get up a collection of smaller game. Now vacation has come, we'd have plenty of time"—

"Speaking of vacation reminds me," said Bert, interrupting him; "I made a mistake the other day about my history mark. Miss Witherspoon found another mistake afterwards, and that made it lower than I told you. I just thought I'd speak about it, Miss Bessie, as long as I'd told you too high before."

Bess was about to say that Bert's honor in telling her this was far better than the mere getting a high mark, when Teddy, the irrepressible, suddenly broke in,—

"I've a conundrum for you young lads. What's Phil's favorite slang?"

Phil looked up curiously, while the boys ventured various suggestions.

"Give it up?" queried Ted. "Why, how stupid you all are! Cracky, of course!" And there was a shout at Phil's expense.

The talk ran on, and no further mention of the collection was made. Bess thought nothing more about it, until the next Monday afternoon, when she sat sewing on the piazza, hurrying to finish some bit of work. Suddenly Fred, who was swinging idly in the hammock, announced,—

"Here come the boys."

"I don't hear them," said Bess, after listening for a moment.

"I do, then. They are coming, but not very near. You wait and see."

"I never saw such ears, Fred!" said Bess, laughing. "They are so long, I shall call you my rabbit."

Fred rubbed his ears reflectively.

"Yes, they are good size, but I have to see and hear with them both. But what do you think about the boys now?" he added, as Rob, Ted, Sam, and Phil, a noisy quartette, turned in at the gate.

"I think your ears were better than my eyes," answered Bess, as she rose to receive her guests.

"Oh, cousin Bess, we've got lots of specimens!" shouted Rob from afar, and Ted added,—

"A good start for our museum, sure enough!" while the boys settled themselves on the piazza rail, and pulled various boxes from their pockets.

"Here are five moth-millers and a hornbug," announced Sam, producing some rather dilapidated specimens, for the hornbug had lost three legs, and of the moths, one was minus both antennæ, and another had a great slit in one wing.

"I've got eight moths," said Phil. "I picked them up under the electric light. They're real good ones, only they are singed a little. I s'pose that's what killed them. And here," diving into his trousers pocket, "is a bumblebee my father killed yesterday. Oh, dear! His head's come off. Can't we stick it on?"

Ted had also brought his share of mangled veterans, and Rob showed three or four moths, quite well prepared, and a pair of golden yellow June bugs.

It was with some difficulty that Bessie preserved her gravity as she saw the ruins spread out before her. But, always mindful that much of her influence over her boys lay in her hearty sympathy in all their hobbies, she looked them over with an air of deep interest, and then sent Rob into the library for a certain book that not only had fine pictures of all sorts and conditions of insects, but also gave full instructions for their capture and preservation.

"If you are going to do anything about it, my boys," said she, "you would much better start in the right way at the very first, so we can have a really good collection; and then we can try to have a full one, of all the insects in the region. If you must collect, this is better than the barbarous, cruel habit so many boys have of stealing birds' eggs, too often nest and all. The eggs themselves won't teach you anything about the birds; while from these, you can get some idea of the life and habits of these little creatures."

"Just look at this one!" exclaimed Ted, pouncing on one of the two perfect specimens, a pale green lunar moth. "Oh, dear! There goes one of his wings. What are these fellows so brittle for?"

"That is another thing. You mustn't handle these specimens or they will break. Now, let us see what we can find out about them."

And the next hour was spent in a pleasant talk about the form and habits of these tiny creatures, a talk that the boys never forgot, for it taught them, for the first time, the great plan of creation, that develops in each living creature the bodily form which will help it most to live its little life, an explanation so clearly and vividly given that even Fred felt no need of the pictures to understand the mechanism of their small bodies.

The collecting fever spread, and the boys were often seen skipping about the fields, or plunging headlong over fences, net in hand, in pursuit of some gaudy butterfly. Bessie tried faithfully to make the boys feel that the main object was not the catching and killing the insects; but that this was only to help them to a fuller understanding of the nature and varieties of their prey. Their whole energy was directed in the line of insects, and boxes of specimens so rapidly collected, that the prospect was that the whole Carter family would soon have to move out of the house, to make room for the army of moths and beetles, cocoons and butterflies, that speedily accumulated. Even long-suffering Mrs. Carter protested when, one day, on the piazza, she chanced to knock down a box containing a huge green worm that Rob had carefully provided with food and air-holes, and shut up, in the hope that he would spin himself into a chrysalis; for, as the cover of the box fell off, out dropped, not only the captive worm, now dead, but also a multitude of little yellow wrigglers, that quickly squirmed away.

"The worst of it all is," said Bess ruefully, when her mother brought up the subject, "people seem to think that I am having this done for my own especial pleasure and profit. I don't see what they think I want of them, unless I collect them, as the Chinese do the bones of their ancestors and friends, to bury them in some particular, consecrated spot. I was writing the other day, in a great hurry to finish my letter to Mr. Allen in time for the steamer, when Bridget came up to my room, and said some little girls wanted to see me. I went down to the back door, and there stood the five Tracy children, in a row. As soon as I appeared, the oldest, who acted as spokeswoman, came forward and solemnly presented me with three tattered butterflies. I had such hard work to be just grateful enough to satisfy them, and yet not encourage them to bring me any more. And the last time Mrs. Walsh called, that day you were out, she produced a small box that held a common little white moth, and told me Bert said that I wanted all those I could get, so she had brought me that one. Well, laddie, what now?" she added, as Fred came into Mrs. Carter's room, where they were sitting.

"There's a boy down-stairs," he replied, "that wants to see you. I don't know who he is. He saw me on the piazza, and went round there to me."

"I wonder who he is," said Bess, as she laid down her work and went out of the room.

She soon came up again, looking both amused and disgusted.

"Another!" she exclaimed, as she took up her sewing.

"What is it now?" asked her mother, laughing.

"It was that little red-haired Irish boy that lives in behind the church. I don't know what his name is, but alas! he knows me. He came to bring me some twigs, apple, I should think, and on each one was a horrid great worm"—and Bess shivered at the recollection—"covered with red and yellow bristles, I told him I was much obliged, but I really didn't know where I could keep them; but the poor little fellow—I shouldn't think he was more than seven or eight—looked so disappointed that I finally took them. I grieve to say that I cremated them as soon as he had gone. Fred, if you love me, do, oh, do tell the boys that we only want dead specimens. My plan was for a museum, not a menagerie; but if matters go on like this, the club will soon become my bugaboo."

CHAPTER XII.

THEIR SUMMER OUTING.

"ISLAND DEN," THOUSAND ISLANDS,
                    July 27, 18—.

My Dear Bess,—I know you always have been a good, kind-hearted little soul, and now I am going to throw myself on your benevolence and ask a favor of you. Say yes, that's a dear little sister! It is just this that I want,—a two weeks' visit from you. "Island Den" was never half so cosy as this summer, and there were never half so many pleasant people over at the hotel. The change will do you good, and I have already heard from mother, saying that she can spare you as well as not. Jack and the children want to see you as badly as I do.

But as long as I know you'll never consent to drop all care—you've had too much these last months for a young thing like you—and leave that boy of yours at home, as would be ever so much better for you, bring him with you, if you think he will be contented here. Jack says two boys take up no more room than one, and Rob had better come too, to be company for him after we have talked each other to death. Isn't he impertinent? But it is a good idea, for they will amuse each other and leave us more time. Rob has never been here, and I am quite curious to see your other charge. Do hurry to come, for I am impatient to see you. I should think you might start by the first of next week.

Jack wishes me to enclose these tickets for the journey, as a last inducement. He says I am to tell you that they will be wasted unless you use them, and that will be sure to bring you, as your frugal soul cannot bear to waste anything.

I won't say any more, for you will be here so soon; and then how we will talk!

Your loving sister,
                ALICE.

This was the letter which had caused a sensation in the Carter household. Alice Carter, ten years older than Bess, had married a wealthy New York banker, and was now the mother of two little girls. "Island Den," their luxurious summer home, was on one of the Thousand Islands, whither for years they had gone to spend the months of July and August, and keep open house for their friends.

It was now three years since Bess had been able to accept her annual invitation to go there, for it was an expensive little trip, and of late some treacherous Western loans had decidedly lessened her father's income, and reduced the family from the comfortable position of doing just about as their rather simple inclinations led them, to the need of carefully counting the smaller expenses that so quickly absorb money,—no marked change, only they did not travel quite as much, nor keep a horse and carriage, nor have quite so many gowns, while those they had they made themselves. The more than liberal sum that Mr. Allen was paying them for the board and care of Fred was far more helpful than he had realized when he had made them the offer, although the money bargain had been by no means a determining cause in their taking Fred into their home. And, this year, Bess had felt that it would be more than ever impossible for her to go away to leave Fred, both on her mother's account and the boy's own, for the child clung to her more and more closely, with a devotion touching to see.

But Alice and Jack had smoothed away every difficulty, and Bess, with her conscience at rest, could now accept their threefold invitation. Now there was a prospect of change, the girl admitted to herself that she was a little tired, and well she might be, for, in addition to her other duties, she had given constant thought and care, as well as much time and countless steps, to the boy who had so grown to depend upon her. But if, at the close of a long day, the thought of her own weariness ever crossed her mind, the memory of all that the child had lost, and of the brave fight he was making against the burden of his blindness, made her scorn the thought of self, as unworthy of the courage and patient endurance she was daily preaching to the child, and gave her new strength to go on.

Rob was in raptures over the prospective journey, and, during the week before they were to start, he made almost hourly calls on Bess, to see how her preparations were coming on. The morning after he was told of his invitation and its acceptance, he was up early, and, before breakfast, had gone into the attic, scattered over the floor the usual contents of a small trunk, long past its days of active service and now only used for storage, and secretly conveyed the trunk to his own room. By dinner-time, many of his possessions were stowed away in its depths; books, games, his air-rifle, several yards of mosquito netting for butterfly-nets, a choice collection of fish-hooks, and an odd assortment of strings and small articles of hardware that filled it to the brim, leaving room for not so much as a single handkerchief. Each day he added to his hoard, to the amusement of his mother, who let him have his way until the final packing, when she should bring order out of chaos.

Fred scarcely looked forward to their going with as much pleasure as Rob, for at the idea of the journey and of meeting so many strangers, his shy sensitiveness returned in all its force, and he would gladly have spent the time alone with the servants at his father's house, rather than run the gauntlet of the curious and thoughtless, though not unkind comments that always met him when he went among strangers.

However, it was a merry party that, one cloudy August morning, Mr. Carter escorted as far as Boston, and settled in the train for Albany, where they were to change to a sleeper. Rob, in a light summer suit, armed with a jointed fishing-pole and his tennis racket, his mother's compromise in the affair of the trunk, led the way into the car. Mr. Carter followed with a lunch basket of noble proportions, for experience had taught Bessie that boy appetites are unfailing, and, on Fred's account, she dared not depend on railway dining-rooms. Bess, with Fred, brought up the rear of the procession. Rob was bubbling over with fun and nonsense, so that Fred caught his spirit and answered jest with jest. As Mr. Carter left them, Bess turned and surveyed her charges with a feeling of almost maternal pride. Two more bonnie boys it would have been hard to find that day.

"I wonder if I look like their mother, or what people think I am," she thought, as she looked from the quiet boy at her side to the lively one opposite her. "I don't care very much— Oh, Rob, be careful," she exclaimed aloud, as that youth, in changing the position of his fishing-pole, recklessly battered the rear of the respectable black bonnet worn by an old woman in front of him.

Rob instantly turned to offer a meek apology, but it had no effect on the irate woman, who grasped her bonnet firmly with both hands, as she exclaimed,—

"Needn't knock a body's head off! Folks shouldn't take boys on the keers till they know how to behave!"

"I am very sorry, ma'am," ventured Rob again.

"So you'd ought to be!" was the snappish rejoinder. "I hope you are ashamed of yourself to go hitting a woman old enough to be your mother with your nuisancing contraptions!" Then, with a backward glance, she added, as if to herself, "That other one looks more as if he'd behave himself somehow. I guess I'll move round and set behind him."

And she gathered up her belongings and moved back, where the worthy soul lent an attentive ear to all their conversation, and watched Fred with curious eyes, while from time to time she scowled disapprovingly on Rob, who was quite subdued by his misadventure.

Of course, Rob wished to take a lunch before they were fairly outside of Boston, and, equally of course, he desired to patronize every trip of the newsboy, and the vender of prize packages of cough candy, each one of which was warranted to contain a rich jewel; but on these small points Bess was firm, and he abandoned himself to the alternate pleasures of gazing out at the car window at the miles of back doors, each filled with a family as much interested in the train as if it were some rare and curious object, and of inspecting his fellow-passengers, the usual assortment. Across from them was a young Japanese, who had intensified the effect of his swarthy skin by mounting a white felt hat. With him sat a man who was so drowsy that his head constantly dropped forward on the round silver knob that headed his cane, at the imminent risk of putting out his eyes. The force of the blow never failed to waken him, and he straightened himself up with a sheepishly defiant air, as if to refute any possible denial of his wakefulness. Behind him sat a spinster of sixty, with lank side curls and a fidgety manner of moving her satchel about. There was the usual number of commercial travellers—why have they appropriated the name?—who, with their silk hats carefully put away in the racks, and replaced by undignified skull-caps, took out their note-books and wrote up the record of their last sales; there was the usual Irish mamma with five small children, who walked the entire length of the car and planted herself in the little corner seat next the door, with her offspring about her, budget in hand, ready to leave the train at a moment's notice; and there were a few young women, each absorbed in her novel or magazine, whom Rob surveyed with disfavor, as not being as pretty as cousin Bess.

Leaning far forward, he was just describing some of these people for Fred's benefit, when a sudden voice behind them made all three of the party start. It was the woman whose bonnet Rob had hit.

"I want to know what's the matter with that 'ere boy," she demanded in no gentle tone, as she pointed at Fred. "Can't he see, or what on airth's the matter with him?"

Poor Fred! His laugh died away, and, turning very white, he leaned back in his corner, while Bess answered their inquisitive neighbor with an icy politeness, as she gave the boy's hand an encouraging pat. The brutal abruptness of the question was more than the child could bear, and it was long before he could speak or join in the conversation. Rob, meanwhile, was vowing vengeance. His opportunity soon came.

Directly in front of him, in the seat vacated by his enemy, sat a middle-aged man, who was carrying in his pocket a small gray kitten, probably a gift to some child at home. Rob had noticed the little animal as the gentleman came in, and from time to time he had turned to peep over at it, when its owner was absorbed in his reading. At length the man laid aside his paper, and turned to give his attention to the cat, which, however, was nowhere to be found. He began to search about for it, looking rather anxious. A sudden, naughty idea flashed into Rob's brain. Rising with an air of polite sympathy, he inquired in a loud and cheerful voice,—

"Can't I help you, sir? Which was it, a rattler, or just a common snake?"

The effect was instantaneous.

"Massy on us!" piped the aged heroine of the bonnet. "Snakes! Ow!" And she climbed nimbly up on the seat, an example quickly followed by her opposite neighbor. And though the cat was soon found and exhibited, the two worthy women sat sideways on the seat, their feet and skirts carefully tucked up beside them, until they left the train at Albany.

"Rob, how could you?" said Bess reprovingly, when quiet was restored.

"I don't care, cousin Bess. She was so mean to Fred that I did it on purpose, and I sha'n't say I am sorry."

And Bess prudently changed the subject.

After a long delay at Albany, our travellers settled themselves anew in their sleeper. Neither of the boys had ever before travelled all night, and it seemed so cosy to go gliding away through the darkness that was slowly shutting in the landscape. There were few people in the car, and Rob prowled up and down, investigating his quarters, and making the acquaintance of the porter; while Bess chatted with Fred, at ease once more now that his dreaded neighbor had departed.

"I wish people wouldn't say such things," he told Bess. "Once in a while I forget, but somebody always reminds me again, and it just makes me feel as if everybody was watching me."

"It was a cruel question, cruelly asked," said Bess with some energy, as she pulled off her gloves and took off her hat, preparatory to a comfortable evening. "If people only knew how such remarks hurt! I wish I could save you from them, laddie."

At this moment, Rob came back to his seat, and remarked with conscious, but impenitent pride,—

"Didn't I just pay up that old woman? Mean old thing!"

Then he devoted his attention to the porter, as he converted the seats into diminutive bedrooms, partitioned and curtained off and sumptuously furnished with a mirror and a wall pocket.

Long after the boys were stowed away for the night, Bess could hear them whisper and giggle when a particularly loud snore from their next neighbor broke the stillness; and at each stopping-place she heard Rob's curtain fly up, to let him look out on the silent towns.

"Doesn't our Bess look matronly!" exclaimed Alice Rogers the next morning, when she saw Bess and her two companions coming towards her. "That one with her must be Fred Allen. Isn't he stunningly handsome, Jack?"

"Poor little cub!" said Jack sympathetically, as he hurried forward to meet them.

After the first confused moment of greeting and hand-shaking, question and answer, Alice, a plump blonde who still kept much of her girlish beauty, turned to the boys.

"Can this be my little cousin Rob, grown up to this?" she said, as she kissed him, to his secret disgust, for Rob scorned kisses except from Bess. "And this, I think, is Bessie's adopted boy, Fred, isn't it? I am so glad to have you both here, for I like boys almost as well as Bess does."

Two days later, Rob sat on the piazza at Island Den, painfully fulfilling his promise to write to his mother. Near him, Fred was swinging in a hammock, holding beside him the two-year-old daughter of the house. Little Alice had taken a violent fancy to the boy, who amused himself with her by the hour at a time. Up-stairs, in the warm August morning, the two sisters were lounging and talking "like magpies," as Jack had said when he left them. And this is what Rob wrote:—

Dear Mother,—We got here all right. We came in a sleeping-car to Clayton, and there we took a boat and came here. On the way we had a good time, only a woman was mean to Fred. I paid her up, though. I will tell you about it some day. I liked the porter on our car. I think I'd like to be one. All you have to do is to make beds and bring drinks to people and get them tables and black their boots, and most everybody gives you a dollar. We had ours, supper, I mean, on a table, and it was lots of fun. Have the rats eaten any more chickens? Island Den is a lovely house, very large, and it is right by the water. There isn't any other house on the island, but on the next there is a great big hotel. There are lots of islands. To-morrow cousin Alice says I may go fishing at the end of the island. She isn't as nice as cousin Bess, but she is pretty good. I don't think Fred likes her much. They have a tennis court here and a boat. Has Phil come home? Puck liked the book you sent her. She has written to tell you so. I think it is a good letter for a little girl only five years old. Fred is in the hammock with Alice. She says, Don't you fink boys is naughty? I hope you don't forget the worms for my turtle. He wants five a day every day. I think this is all I can think of now. Fred sends love, so no more now.

Your affectionate son,
            ROBERT MACMILLAN ATKINSON.

P.S. I forgot to tell you that the box under my table has a worm in it that I want to have spin himself up, so don't move it. R.M.A.

P.S. Number 2. Tell Ted I forgot to give him back his bat. It is in the corner of the closet in my room. ROB.

P.S. 3. The best worms are in the bed where the verbenas are. R.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE BOYS MEET AN OLD FRIEND.

"Help! Help! He-e-elp!"

It was a boy's voice that rang out across the waters of the Saint Lawrence, from a dainty little rowboat that was lazily drifting down the river. The boy was Rob. He stood up in the bow of the boat, looking to the right and left for help; while Fred had dropped to the seat in the stern, where he sat, white and still, waiting and listening.

"Nobody yet," said Rob, trying to speak bravely, although his tone was far from cheerful. "We shall run across somebody soon."

"Aren't there some rapids down below here?" asked Fred anxiously.

"Ye-es," admitted Rob. "But I don't know just where they are. They're the salt—something or other. I've heard cousin Alice tell about going through them in a steamer. I wish I'd studied my geography a little more, and then I'd have known how far down they are."

This was the outcome of Rob's fishing expedition. Early that August afternoon, he and Fred had gone down to the lower end of the island, at some distance from the house. After Rob had fished for a half-hour, with but poor success, he proposed to Fred that they should sit in the little green and white boat that was drawn up on shore, and he would fish from there. Fred fell in with the idea, and the next minute the boys were luxuriously lounging in the stern, quite unconscious of the fact that their motions had rocked the boat until it had left the bank and was quietly drifting off down towards the Atlantic, with never an oar on board.

If the boys had but known it, their situation was far from alarming. It was still quite early, so there were yet several hours of daylight before them, and they would soon be seen and rescued. Still, it was not exactly pleasant to be slowly moving away from home, with a very uncertain prospect of returning in time for dinner. And added to Rob's alarm for himself was the uncomfortable feeling that he had been the means of getting Fred into a scrape, and that cousin Alice would wish she had not invited him to her house.

"Boat ahoy!" called a clear voice across the water.

Rob looked around and saw a little boat with one occupant suddenly turn from the shore, where it was creeping along in the shade, and come darting towards them, with a long, steady sweep of the oars that told of an experienced rower. He answered the call, and then turned to communicate the good news to Fred, as the other boat came quickly alongside.

"Throw me your painter," said the young man who was in the boat; "I'll take you in tow. But how did you two youngsters ever happen to get in such a plight?"

Rob briefly explained their situation, honorably taking all the blame for the carelessness.

"Well, never mind. You'd better come into this boat," said their rescuer. "I can row you better that way."

Rob carefully helped Fred to step from one boat to the other, with the assistance of the young man, who at once noticed Fred's infirmity, and, taking his hand, guided him to his seat in the stern, where he gazed at him attentively, almost curiously, while Rob was seating himself by his side.

"Now," went on the stranger, when they were settled, and the other boat made fast, "where are you boys trying to go? And where did you come from?"

"Island Den," answered Rob. "Perhaps you don't know where that is, but it's up by the hotel. We'll be ever so much obliged if you will take us back."

"I can do it as well as not," said their new friend. "I am on my way to the hotel now. And I do know Island Den, for I was going to call there to-morrow."

"Why, do you know cousin Jack?" asked Rob in astonishment.

"If cousin Jack is Mr. Rogers," said the stranger, laughing at Rob's surprise, "I know him quite well. But how does it happen that I have never heard of this small cousin?"

"Oh, he's no real cousin. Cousin Alice, Mrs. Rogers, is my cousin, and I've never been here before. I'm Rob Atkinson, and I came here with cousin Bess and Fred, this fellow, three days ago."

At the mention of these three names, a sudden idea seemed to cross the young man's mind, and, looking closely at Fred again, he said,—

"I thought I had seen Fred before, and now I know I have."

"Yes," assented Fred quietly. "I knew your voice as soon as you and Bob began talking. Aren't you Mr. Muir?"

"I certainly am," he answered, "and very glad to see you again. I was sure I knew your face as soon as I saw you. And this is the Rob who tied up the cat's feet in papers, is it?"

"Oh, Mr. Muir," began Rob, blushing at the recollection, "I didn't"—

"Never mind that," said Mr. Muir; "but how odd that Miss Carter should be related to Mrs. Rogers, and that I should meet her up here!"

"They're sisters," said Rob, "but cousin Alice is lots older. She's real nice, but she isn't like cousin Bess one bit, and I don't think I like her as well."

Fred looked horrified at Rob's alarming frankness, but Mr. Muir only laughed, as he said,—

"I think perhaps I agree with you, Rob."

As the boat drew near the landing, no one was in sight about the piazza or lawn of Island Den. Frank Muir pulled out his watch.

"Only half-past three now," he said, as if to himself; "still, I think I shall risk a call, even if it is rather early, and I am not in full dress. Rob, do you think your cousins would see me now? As long as I am all here, I think I'll not go away without seeing them."

"Oh, I'm sure they will," said Rob confidently, as he offered his arm to Fred, and they turned towards the house. As they came under the windows, he called out loudly,—

"Cousin Bess, come on down here! Fred and I were carried off down the river, and I want to tell you how we got home again."

"In just a minute, Rob," answered Bessie's voice from above.

Rob turned to his new friend with a smile of pleased anticipation.

"I thought I'd give her a surprise party," he explained, "and not tell her you were here."

Now it happened that the day was so warm that the sisters, feeling safe from all interruption, were lounging in Alice's room, having a long afternoon rest before dressing for dinner. At Rob's summons, Bess hastily twisted up her hair, put on a long wrapper of some creamy, clinging wool, and thrust her feet into an ancient pair of slippers, whose soles and uppers were rapidly parting company. Thus attired, she ran lightly down the stairs, and out on the piazza, exclaiming,—

"What have you boys been"—

And then stopped aghast, as she caught sight of Mr. Muir, who rose to meet her.

"There! I told you she'd be astonished," commented Rob triumphantly. "Only think, cousin Bess, he found us floating off down the river, and he knows cousin Alice and all."

A week later, Rob was waked early one morning by a sound of splashing water. For a moment he lay in that pleasant interval between sleeping and waking, dreamily listening to the morning twittering of the birds, and feeling vaguely that something very pleasant was in prospect. But an inquisitive sunbeam would shine directly into his eyes, and, as he rolled over, he opened them to find that Fred was not in bed.

"Why, Fred, where are you?" he exclaimed.

"Here," responded a voice from the other side of the room. "I haven't been asleep for ever so long, and my face felt so funny and hot I got up to put some cold water on it. I don't know what's the matter, but it feels so queer."

Rob raised his head from the pillow, and eyed his friend curiously for a moment.

"Queer!" he said then, "I should think it might! You just ought to see yourself, Fred Allen. It's all red and speckled—I'll tell you, you must have hit some poison yesterday morning when we were out in the woods."

"I wonder if that is it," said Fred rather disconsolately. "My head aches enough to have it almost anything. How long does it last, Bob?"

"Oh, two or three weeks," answered Rob encouragingly. "I've been poisoned lots of times, and it's horrid. Pretty soon you'll begin to itch, and then you mustn't scratch it, or it will be worse. Want me to call cousin Bess?"

"Not now," said Fred, as he struck the repeater that his father had bought for him soon after his return from Boston. "Only five o'clock, three hours to breakfast time. It would be too bad to disturb her."

Rob subsided into drowsiness for a few moments, but his conscience would not let him sleep, when he knew Fred was so uncomfortable.

"I'll tell you, Fred," he said suddenly, "they told me once, just as I was getting over it, that plantain leaves are good for poison. You just keep quiet, and I'll go look for some."

And he sprang out of bed and hastily pulled on his clothes, without stopping for shoes and stockings. Out he ran, barefooted, over the dewy lawn, looking here and there for the coveted plant. But it was not in vain that Jack Rogers had a fine gardener for his summer home, and to the water's edge the smooth, even turf was broken by no weed. At last, out by the back door, Rob discovered two of the green leaves, and, seizing them in triumph, he tiptoed up the stairs, past Bessie's door, to his own room.

"I've found two, Fred," he announced. "I've forgotten just how they said use them, but I think it was just to put them on outside. You'd better put one on each cheek, for they are the worst."

"How shall I make them stay?" asked Fred, after trying to balance the smooth, slippery things on his face.

Rob pondered a moment.

"Wet them," he suggested. "That ought to make them stick."

And he crept into bed again, clothes and all, and quite regardless of the mingled dew and dust on his small bare feet.

"I don't see why I had to go and get poisoned," said Fred, as he thoughtfully rubbed his puffy countenance. "Just the last of the time we're to be here, too."

"Say, Fred," asked Rob suddenly, "don't you wish we hadn't found Mr. Muir that day?"

"I should say he found us," said Fred. "But I like him ever so much; don't you?"

"Not very well. He's nice enough, but he's been round all the time. He has been here every single day, and cousin Bess is always playing tennis or going rowing with him, when I want her to do something, and— Hullo! there goes one of your leaves." And Rob carefully replaced it on the reddest part of Fred's face.

"Well," said Fred, "she's always ready to do things for me. Mr. Muir is here ever so much, I know, and somebody has to entertain him; but Mrs. Rogers is generally busy, so I suppose Miss Bess has to do it."

"I don't think she minds much," replied Rob grimly. "And last night, you know, I told you it was bright moonlight, and they were out on the piazza ever so long. After you went to sleep, I heard them. I don't want him round in the way, and I am glad we are going home next week. And, you know, Fred, she always dresses up when he comes."

"I don't see what that's for," answered Fred loyally. "She's always pretty enough."

"Yes, I know," said Rob loftily, from the height of his thirteen years' experience of life and its problems; "but women do that kind of thing, when they like anybody. Say, how do you feel, Fred?"

"Horrid!" said Fred tersely.

"Didn't those leaves do any good?" inquired Rob, as he sat up in bed.

"Not yet, Bob. But I wish Miss Bess needn't know, for to-day they're all going on that picnic up the river, and I'm afraid she won't go."

"Can't you?" asked Rob anxiously, for as this was to be the crowning festivity of their visit, his heart had been set on it, and ever since he had discovered Fred's poison, he had been longing, yet fearing, to start the subject.

"I don't feel much like it," said Fred. "I don't care at all, for picnics aren't as much fun for me as they used to be." Here Rob gave his friend's hand a consoling squeeze. "But you can all go and leave me, Bob. I shall be all right, and I want you to go just the same."

When Rob entered the breakfast-room, two hours later, he said to his cousin,—

"I wish you'd go up to Fred, a minute."

"Is anything the matter?" asked Bess, who was always anxious about her charge.

"No, only he doesn't feel very well," answered Rob, as he followed her out of the room. When they were alone in the hall, he went on hurriedly, "He's poisoned a little, I think, but he doesn't feel like going to-day, and he wants us all to go and leave him. You make him think we will, and I'll start with you, and then, after you are gone, I'll come back to the house again. I truly don't care about it."

Bess read her little cousin's generous motive, and as they went up the stairs, she insisted that he should join the frolic, and let her stay; but Rob held firm, and she had to yield, much against her will, for she knew how the boy had anticipated the day's fun.

A striking picture met Bessie's gaze, as she went into the boys' room. Fred had attempted to get up, as usual, but after dressing, he felt so ill and miserable, that he had thrown himself down again. His face had swollen until his eyes were half closed, and its ruddy hue was heightened by its contrast with his white flannel blouse and the two bright green leaves that Rob had again plastered on his face, just before he went down-stairs. The remedy, applied in that way, was so original that Rob was at once dubbed "the doctor," a name that clung to him, to his disgust, till the end of the visit.

It was hard to see the gay party starting off in their three boats; Mr. Muir rowing Bess in the first, Jack, Alice, and the children in a second, and the third in charge of a servant, with a tent and the lunch. Several friends from the hotel were to meet them, and among them was one little girl, with whom Rob had established quite a friendship. Yes, it would be great fun, but there was Fred, blind, ill, and alone, and the thought of his friend helped him to smile bravely and answer decidedly all their entreaties to go.

"I think Fred doesn't need you," Bess had said. "I am glad to have you willing to stay, Robin, but I am sure he really won't mind being alone."

"I'd rather stay," said Rob, and nothing could change his purpose.

But as the boats vanished around a point of land, Rob's resolution failed, and for a moment his face twitched. Then he started off, and tramped twice around the shore of the little island, as if running a race with himself. That done, he went into Bessie's room, took a book that she was reading aloud to Fred, and presented himself before the boy, who, now stripped of his foliage, had settled himself for a long, dull day.

"Got left," he said briefly, as he seated himself.

And Fred understood the sacrifice.

CHAPTER XIV.

PHIL'S FIGHT.

The first of September found the boys all at home again, after their summer fun and wanderings. Phil had been visiting his grandmother in Vermont; Sam had gone with his family to Newport, where his boyish soul was greatly tried by their attempts to live in a truly fashionable manner; Bert had been in Western New York, visiting some farmer friends, who feasted him on milk and honey, and let him go fishing and ride the horses bareback, to his heart's content; while poor Ted was left to pine at home. But every joy has its accompanying sorrow, and glad as they were to be together once more, the immediate prospect of school was a cause for mourning. To Fred, it seemed strange to hear the other five boys bemoaning their fate, when he so wished he could go back into school again, and he could scarcely realize that only lately he had shared their feelings. He needed no urging to return to his pleasant lessons with Bess; but the others, who had so many more resources, were by no means reconciled, and the first Monday in September saw them walking slowly, very slowly, towards the schoolhouse, with their books in their hands and rage in their hearts.

All of us who have been boys know how hard it is to leave all the frolics and idle enjoyment of the long vacation, to sit for five hours a day in a close room, amid the buzz of voices, and, with warm, sticky hands, turn over the leaves of the books that never before seemed half so prosy and dull—since last September. How all the out-door sounds that come in at the open windows, the notes of the birds, the hum of the passing voices, the distant bark of our own Nep or Rover, even the whir of a mowing machine in the next yard, tempt us to throw aside the lessons, and, braving the whipping that we know must certainly follow, to run out at the door, down the stairs, and into the clear yellow sunshine that was surely created for boys to enjoy themselves in! And how all the memories of the summer fun will come into our minds, replacing the War of 1812 with a boat-race, and making the puzzling mysteries of the binomial theorem give place to an imaginary brook and a fish-line! Well, well! It is only what comes to us grown-up children, when we have taken a day, or a week, or a month from our business, and then have to settle down to work again.

One afternoon about two weeks after the opening of school, as Bess was coming in from some errands, she found five excited boys sitting on her front steps, eagerly waiting to see her. As she approached, she heard Rob saying,—

"I didn't think Phil had so much grit. If it had been you, Bert, or Sam"—

"Well, my boys," said Bess, as she sat down in the midst of them, and took off her hat, "what is the occasion of this call? You look as if something were the matter."

"Matter enough!" said Sam. "That Miss Witherspoon hadn't ought to teach school anyway!" And he scowled darkly on the unconscious Fred, who chanced to be in range of his glance.

"Sam! Sam!" remonstrated Bess.

"It's a fact, Miss Bessie," said Bert. "She's too old and cross for anything! Just think, she's going to keep Phil after school and whip him!"

"Yes," put in Ted, "and it isn't fair."

"Phil!" said Bess incredulously. "You don't mean that Phil Cameron has to be whipped in school! What has he done?"

"He hasn't," said Rob. "I don't think he did it at all, only she doesn't know who did, and so she is going to whip Phil."

"Jiminy!" said Ted, rolling off the steps to the ground, in his excitement. "I'd like to go for her! It's a burning shame to whip Phil. There isn't a better lad in all the school, and she likes him herself, when she isn't mad."

From these remarks, however emphatic and lucid they might seem to the boys who were in the secret, Bess had gathered but the one fact, that Phil was in disgrace at school and was to be whipped. To her mind, corporal punishment in schools was degrading and brutalizing, and the idea of its being employed on a refined, gentle boy, like Phil, shocked her and roused her indignation, for she knew the lad well enough to be sure that he had done nothing to justify such extreme measures.

"I'll tell you about it, Miss Bess," said Bert. "You see, Phil has been feeling funny all day, and when we marched round to get the dumb-bells, he just turned his toes square in, and waddled along, so," and Bert illustrated the proceeding for Bessie's benefit. "We fellows all laughed, and that rattled Miss Witherspoon awfully, and started her down on him. I guess she didn't feel just right to-day, perhaps. Well, by and by, when we were studying, all of a sudden somebody snapped a great agate up the aisle, right bang against Miss Witherspoon's desk. It astonished her and made her jump, but she picked it up and only said, 'If this happens again, I shall whip the boy that does it,' and then went on with her class. Pretty soon another one went rolling along, but she wasn't quick enough to catch the boy, so she began asking us all if we knew who did it. We were all the other side of the room but Phil, and he was the only one in the room that said he did know. Miss Witherspoon asked him who it was, but he just shut his mouth. Then she asked if he did it, and he just said 'No.' And then she told him she'd whip him unless he told, but he just wouldn't, and I say, Good for him!"

"Hurrah for Phil!" said Ted, turning a somersault on the turf.

Bess looked perplexed. She knew Miss Witherspoon too well, a veteran teacher who had grown hard in the service, a nervous old maid who ruled her children with an iron rod, and then went home and wept bitter tears because they did not love her, conscientious to a fault, and at heart anxious for the good of her pupils, although no consideration would make her take back a hasty word, or lighten a punishment ordered in a moment of anger. This was the first time that one of the I.I.'s had been publicly punished in this way, and each one of them felt the disgrace as keenly as if it had been his own, while with one consent they had come to Bess for advice and consolation.

"There comes Phil, now!" exclaimed Rob.

Bess gave one look at the small figure coming along the street, with his hat pulled down over his face, and his hands plunged deep into his pockets.

"I don't believe he will feel like seeing you boys now," said she. "I want to have a little talk with him, and you had better keep away."

The boys obediently retired through the back gate before Phil had a chance to see them. He was going directly past the house, when Bess called him,—

"Come in a minute, Phil."

The boy stopped doubtfully for a moment. Then he turned and came up to where she stood waiting. Taking his hand, all red and puffed up with the blows, she led him into the house.

"Now, Phil, my boy," she said gently, "tell me all about it."

Phil's face grew red, and his lips twitched. Then he answered abruptly,—

"There's not much to tell, only Miss Witherspoon whipped me because I wouldn't tell on one of the boys, and she isn't going to let me go back to school until I tell who did it. She'll just have to wait, then, that's all."

Bess looked anxious. This was worse than she expected.

"But, Phil," she said, "isn't the boy manly enough to confess, rather than see you suffer for him?"

Phil shook his head.

"No, he'll never tell."

"And you really had nothing to do with it?"

The boy had been sitting with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands, gazing at the floor; but at this question he threw up his head proudly, and looked straight into Bessie's eyes.

"Miss Bess," he said simply, "I told Miss Witherspoon I didn't, upon my honor, and did you ever know me to lie?"

"No, Phil, I never did."

"I think she might believe me, too, then," muttered Phil, as he settled back after his momentary flash. "She thinks I did it, and won't believe me when I say I didn't. Oh, how I hate to tell my father!" And he started up to go.

"Will you tell me, Phil, who it was?" asked Bess, as she followed him to the door.

Phil shook his head again.

"But I might be able to straighten the matter out. You mustn't lose your school."

"I'll lose it always, rather than be a tell-tale."

The boys were loud in their exclamations when they heard, the next morning, that Phil was suspended from school. One after another, they coaxed, wheedled, begged, and stormed by turns, but Phil could not be induced to tell them his secret, although one word would have put him back in his classes again. At Bessie's suggestion, Fred urged Phil to tell him, as long as he was outside the school set, but it did no more good than Bessie's call did on Miss Witherspoon.

"Yes, I am sorry," that worthy woman confessed; "I was tired that day, and I think I was hasty, for I don't think Philip is a bad boy at heart. It was a little thing to punish so severely, but, if I give in now, I shall lose all my control for the future. Let the boys once feel that they can make me yield, and I might as well give up teaching."

Poor Miss Witherspoon! After all her years of teaching, she had yet to learn how quickly all pupils respect a teacher who can make herself as a little child in acknowledging a mistake, and making what reparation for it she can.

But a week had passed, and Phil was as obstinate on one side as his teacher was determined on the other. In vain his father and mother urged and commanded. Angry and smarting from the injustice done him, this seemed a different Phil from the pleasant, happy-go-lucky lad they used to know. At length, Mr. and Mrs. Cameron, at their wits' end, begged Bessie to take Phil in hand.

"Oh, dear!" Bess said to her mother, on the evening after this remarkable request. "I do wish people would discipline their own children. The idea of expecting me to succeed where they fail! It is too absurd."

However, Phil was invited to dine at the Carters', whither he went somewhat suspiciously, for he regarded this as only a new plot to entrap him into telling what he had made up his mind to keep to himself. But Bess was wily. Dinner-time came and went, and no word of the dreaded subject, until Phil began to think that his had been a false alarm. But by and by Mrs. Carter had gone out of the room, and Fred went away in search of Fuzz. Then Bess moved a chair up before the open fire, and pulled a low stool to its side.

"Come, Phil, I want to talk."

Phil obediently settled himself at Bessie's feet, and prepared for the worst; but Bess only began to talk about the boys and the club. The child was just congratulating himself on his continued escape, when she suddenly asked,—

"What do you think I have started the club for?"

"I don't know. Fun, I suppose."

"Partly for that, but, still more, to improve us in all sorts of ways. And yet I find I have failed to teach you the very first lesson of all."

"What's that?" asked Phil curiously.

"Obedience, Phil. Your father and mother wish you to tell Miss Witherspoon who threw that marble, and you refuse to obey them."

"I'm not going to tell tales," said Phil sullenly.

Bess rested her hand lightly on the smooth brown head.

"Phil, the first duty you have now is to be guided by your father and mother. They know so much better than you what is right for you. I can see how hard it is for you to give in, in this case. But while a sneak and a tell-tale is the meanest of boys, you would not be either, under these circumstances."

"Yes, I should," answered Phil. "It's a mean thing to do, and the fellows would all be down on me."

"Suppose they were?" replied Bess. "Is it your parents or 'the fellows' that you want to please? I will tell you what one trouble is, Phil; you have read too many stories where the hero nobly bears the punishment for another boy, and is only cleared on the last half-page. Isn't it true?"

Phil laughed, in spite of himself.

"That would be all very well if you had no duty to any one but yourself; but, back of that, you owe obedience to your father and mother, and if they think that you ought to go back into school, that is what you should do. You are too young, my boy, to decide these things for yourself. And it is because we have so many hopes and plans for your future that we want you to do right now, every day. It will be hard for you to go back, but, even if it is, we all want you to go. Will you promise?"

Phil's face had softened at her last words.

"I won't promise, Miss Bess, for then I should have to, anyway, and I'm not sure yet, till I think it all over. I'll tell you to-morrow."

Bess patted his shoulder approvingly, for this was a concession at least. Then she went on, after a little pause,—

"Phil, dear, ever so long ago, Fred and I took for our motto a verse from your All Saints' Hymn,—'Oh, may thy soldiers,' and we are trying to win our 'victor's crown.' Why not take it for your motto, too? You boys all have a good deal of the stuff that makes heroes and fighters. Just now you are forgetting that a soldier's first duty is to obey his superior officer, and that any disobedience, even a slight one, may ruin the whole campaign. Will this small soldier join our company, and fight with us, 'faithful, true, and bold'?"

"Ye-es, I s'pose so."

"Even when you remember that your first step must be to yield your idea of right to your father's?"

"Ye-e-es."

It was a long-drawn yes, and it told of a whole battle, and a victory. As Bessie bent over the boy for a moment, she saw that the lashes over the gray eyes were a little damp, and the lips were quivering. But there was no time for Phil to have so much as a tear, for just then the door opened and Ted rushed in, capering like a mad creature, while Fred stood beaming in the doorway.

"Why, Ted, what is the matter?" exclaimed Bess in wonder, as Ted rushed up to Phil, shook both hands furiously, and then backed out into the middle of the room, where he executed a sort of clog-dance, to the rage of Fuzz, who barked himself hoarse, from the shelter of his basket, whither he had retired for safety.

"Jack Bradley fired that marble!" said Ted, interrupting his antics for a moment, and then resuming them again more vehemently than ever, while Fuzz leaped from his basket and rushed distractedly this way and that, adding his voice to the general confusion.

"How do you know?" asked Bess, although a glance at Phil's face was enough to assure her that Ted's statement was true.

"I'll tell you," said Ted, composing himself as well as he could on such short notice, while Fred deliberately seated himself in the place lately vacated by Phil.

"You see," he began, "we boys have all been mad about Phil's scrape, and we have just formed a regular league of detectives. This is the way I went to work. That marble came out of Phil's aisle. Well, it came up out of it sort of cornerwise, and bounced off the other way. That showed the direction, so I was pretty sure which side of the aisle it started from. Then, half-way down the aisle is where that little milksop of a Jimmy Harris sits. He never could tell a lie, just like Washington—don't believe he knows enough! But he's always looking round, and would have seen who fired it, if it had been anybody in front of him, so I made up my mind 'twasn't. Then I knew it must have been one of three boys, so I went to work. I kind of suspected 'twas Jack; he's a mean lad, anyhow. So yesterday I began to talk about Phil to him, and he was very talky, said 'twas a mean shame and all that, but he never once looked me in the eye. Thinks I, 'I don't believe you.' Then I asked Miss Witherspoon to let me see the agate. It was a queer one, and after school I went the rounds of the stores, looking for some like it. I found a whole lot at Smith's, and they told me they had just come in new last week. I said I thought I would take one or two, and get the start of all the boys; but the clerk said I was too late, for Jack had bought some the other day. That clinched the matter, for they were different from any I ever saw. I don't believe Jack knew he had that one in his hand, or he wouldn't have fired it. He's too stingy. Well, to-night after school, I asked him if he wanted to swap marbles. He looked rather uncomfortable, and said he hadn't had any since last spring. I asked him how about the ones he had just bought of Smith. He just turned all colors, and begged me not to tell, for he'd get a whipping, and another at home. Great baby! But I didn't tell. I just gripped my arms round him, and hauled him up to Miss Witherspoon, and told her to ask him about Phil and the marbles; that's all. I had to carry the milk, so I couldn't go to Phil's till just now, and, when I found he was here, I came right after him. And he can go into school in the morning and— Oh, jiminy—scratch!"

There was a crash. Ted, always in perpetual motion, in his present excitement had seated himself sideways in a low rocking-chair, and with one hand on the back, the other clutching the edge of the seat, he had been rocking furiously to and fro, till at this point he went a little too far, and, losing his balance, he landed in an ignominious pile on the floor, amid the shouts of the other two boys.