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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Young Surveyor;, by J. T. Trowbridge
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Young Surveyor;
+       or Jack on the Prairies
+
+Author: J. T. Trowbridge
+
+Release Date: May 4, 2009 [EBook #28680]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG SURVEYOR; ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                           THE YOUNG SURVEYOR;
+
+                                   OR,
+
+                          JACK ON THE PRAIRIES.
+
+                           BY J. T. TROWBRIDGE
+
+              AUTHOR OF "JACK HAZARD AND HIS FORTUNES," ETC.
+
+                          _WITH ILLUSTRATIONS._
+
+
+BOSTON:
+JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY,
+LATE TICKNOR & FIELDS, AND FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO.
+1875.
+
+Copyright, 1875.
+BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO.
+
+UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & CO.,
+CAMBRIDGE.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: HOW THE BOYS WENT TO THE RIVER FOR WATER.]
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+       I. "NOTHING BUT A BOY"
+
+      II. OLD WIGGETT'S SECTION CORNER
+
+     III. THE HOMEWARD TRACK
+
+      IV. A DEER HUNT, AND HOW IT ENDED
+
+       V. THE BOY WITH ONE SUSPENDER
+
+      VI. "LORD BETTERSON'S"
+
+     VII. JACK AT THE "CASTLE"
+
+    VIII. HOW VINNIE MADE A JOURNEY
+
+      IX. VINNIE'S ADVENTURE
+
+       X. JACK AND VINNIE IN CHICAGO
+
+      XI. JACK'S NEW HOME
+
+     XII. VINNIE'S FUTURE HOME
+
+    XIII. WHY JACK DID NOT FIRE AT THE PRAIRIE CHICKEN
+
+     XIV. SNOWFOOT'S NEW OWNER
+
+      XV. GOING FOR A WITNESS
+
+     XVI. PEAKSLOW GETS A QUIRK IN HIS HEAD
+
+    XVII. VINNIE MAKES A BEGINNING
+
+   XVIII. VINNIE'S NEW BROOM
+
+     XIX. LINK'S WOOD-PILE
+
+      XX. MORE WATER THAN THEY WANTED
+
+     XXI. PEAKSLOW SHOWS HIS HAND
+
+    XXII. THE WOODLAND SPRING
+
+   XXIII. JACK'S "BIT OF ENGINEERING"
+
+    XXIV. PREPARING FOR THE ATTACK
+
+     XXV. THE BATTLE OF THE BOUNDARY FENCE
+
+    XXVI. VICTORY
+
+   XXVII. VINNIE IN THE LION'S DEN
+
+  XXVIII. AN "EXTRAORDINARY" GIRL
+
+    XXIX. ANOTHER HUNT, AND HOW IT ENDED
+
+     XXX. JACK'S PRISONER
+
+    XXXI. RADCLIFF
+
+   XXXII. AN IMPORTANT EVENT
+
+  XXXIII. MRS. WIGGETT'S "NOON-MARK"
+
+   XXXIV. THE STRANGE CLOUD
+
+    XXXV. PEAKSLOW IN A TIGHT PLACE.--CECIE
+
+   XXXVI. "ON THE WAR TRAIL"
+
+  XXXVII. THE MYSTERY OF A PAIR OF BREECHES
+
+ XXXVIII. THE MORNING AFTER
+
+   XXXIX. FOLLOWING UP THE MYSTERY
+
+      XL. PEAKSLOW'S HOUSE-RAISING
+
+     XLI. CONCLUSION
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+SETTING THE STAKES
+
+JACK AND THE STRANGE YOUTH
+
+UP-HILL WORK
+
+"LORD BETTERSON"
+
+TOO OBLIGING BY HALF
+
+LINK DOESN'T CARE TO BE KISSED
+
+SHOT ON THE WING
+
+THE AMIABLE MR. PEAKSLOW
+
+VINNIE'S STRATAGEM
+
+LINK'S WOOD-PILE
+
+HOW THE BOYS WENT TO THE RIVER FOR WATER
+
+TESTING THE LEVEL
+
+OLD WIGGETT
+
+"STOP, OR I'LL SHOOT!"
+
+RETURNING IN TRIUMPH
+
+THE END OF THE CHASE
+
+JACK AND HIS JOLLY PRISONER
+
+THE TORNADO COMING
+
+PEAKSLOW REAPPEARS
+
+FOLLOWING THE WAR TRAIL UNDER DIFFICULTIES
+
+THE WATER QUESTION SETTLED
+
+
+
+
+THE YOUNG SURVEYOR.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+"NOTHING BUT A BOY."
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+A young fellow in a light buggy, with a big black dog sitting composedly
+beside him, enjoying the ride, drove up, one summer afternoon, to the
+door of a log-house, in one of the early settlements of Northern
+Illinois.
+
+A woman with lank features, in a soiled gown trailing its rags about her
+bare feet, came and stood in the doorway and stared at him.
+
+"Does Mr. Wiggett live here?" he inquired.
+
+"Wal, I reckon," said the woman, "'f he ain't dead or skedaddled of a
+suddent."
+
+"Is he at home?"
+
+"Wal, I reckon."
+
+"Can I see him?"
+
+"I dunno noth'n' to hender. Yer, Sal! run up in the burnt lot and fetch
+your pap. Tell him a stranger. You've druv a good piece," the woman
+added, glancing at the buggy-wheels and the horse's white feet, stained
+with black prairie soil.
+
+"I've driven over from North Mills," replied the young fellow, regarding
+her pleasantly, with bright, honest features, from under the shade of
+his hat-brim.
+
+"I 'lowed as much. Alight and come into the house. Old man'll be yer in
+a minute."
+
+He declined the invitation to enter; but, to rest his limbs, leaped down
+from the buggy. Thereupon the dog rose from his seat on the
+wagon-bottom, jumped down after him, and shook himself.
+
+"All creation!" said the woman, "what a pup that ar is! Yer, you young
+uns! Put back into the house, and hide under the bed, or he'll eat ye up
+like ye was so much cl'ar soap-grease!"
+
+At that moment the dog stretched his great mouth open, with a formidable
+yawn. Panic seized the "young uns," and they scampered; their bare legs
+and exceedingly scanty attire (only three shirts and a half to four
+little barbarians) seeming to offer the dog unusual facilities, had he
+chosen to regard them as soap-grease and to regale himself on that sort
+of diet. But he was too well-bred and good-natured an animal to think of
+snapping up a little Wiggett or two for his luncheon; and the fugitives,
+having first run under the bed and looked out, ventured back to the
+door, and peeped with scared faces from behind their mother's gown.
+
+To hide his laughter, the young fellow stood patting and stroking his
+horse's neck until Sal returned with her "pap."
+
+"Mr. Wiggett?" inquired the youth, seeing a tall, spare, rough old man
+approach.
+
+"That's my name, stranger. What can I dew for ye to-day?"
+
+"I've come to see what I can do for _you_, Mr. Wiggett. I believe you
+want your section corner looked up."
+
+"That I dew, stranger. But I 'lowed 't would take a land-surveyor for
+that."
+
+"I am a land-surveyor," said the young fellow, with a modest smile.
+
+"A land-surveyor? Why, you're noth'n' but a boy!" And the tall old man,
+bending a little, and knitting his gray eyebrows, looked down upon his
+visitor with a sort of amused curiosity.
+
+"That's so," replied the "boy," with a laugh and a blush. "But I think I
+can find your corner, if the bearings are all right."
+
+"Whur's your instruments?" asked the old man, leaning over the buggy.
+"Them all? What's that gun to do with land-surveyin'?"
+
+"Nothing; I brought that along, thinking I might get a shot at a rabbit
+or a prairie hen. But we shall need an axe and a shovel."
+
+"I 'lowed your boss would come himself, in place of sendin' a boy!"
+muttered the old man, taking up the gun,--a light double-barrelled
+fowling-piece,--sighting across it with an experienced eye, and laying
+it down again. "Sal, bring the axe; it's stickin' in the log thar by the
+wood-pile. Curi's thing, to lose my section corner, hey?"
+
+"It's not a very uncommon thing," replied the young surveyor.
+
+"Fact is," said the old man, "I never found it I bought of Seth
+Parkins's widder arter Seth died, and banged if I've ever been able to
+find the gov'ment stake."
+
+"Maybe somebody pulled it up, or broke it off, to kill a rattlesnake
+with," suggested the young surveyor.
+
+"Like enough," said the old man. "Can't say 't I blame him; though he
+might 'a' got a stick in the timber by walkin' a few rods. He couldn't
+'a' been so bad off as one o' you surveyor chaps was when the gov'ment
+survey went through. He was off on the Big Perairie, footin' it to his
+camp, when he comes to a rattler curled up in the grass, and shakin' his
+tarnal buzz-tail at him. He steps back, and casts about him for some
+sort of we'pon; he hadn't a thing in his fist but a roll of paper, and
+if ever a chap hankered arter a stick or a stun, they say he did. But it
+was all jest perairie grass; nary rock nor a piece of timber within
+three mile. Snake seemed to 'preciate his advantage, and flattened his
+head and whirred his rattle sassier 'n ever. Surveyor chap couldn't
+stan' that. So what does he dew, like a blamed fool, but jest off with
+his boot and hurl it, 'lowin' he could kill a rattler that way? He
+missed shot. Then, to git his boot, he had to pull off t' other, and
+tackle the snake with that. Lost that tew. Then he was in a
+perdickerment; snake got both boots; curled up on tew 'em, ready to
+strike, and seemin' to say, 'If you've any more boots to spar', bring
+'em on.' Surveyor chap hadn't no more boots, to his sorrow; and, arter
+layin' siege to the critter till sundown, hopin' he'd depart in peace
+and leave him his property, he guv it up as a bad job, and footed it to
+the camp in his stockin's, fancyin' he was treadin' among rattlers all
+the way."
+
+The story was finished by the time the axe was brought; the old man
+picked up a rusty shovel lying by the house, and, getting into the buggy
+with his tools, he pointed out to his young companion a rough road
+leading through the timber.
+
+This was a broad belt of woodland, skirting the eastern side of a wide,
+fertile river-bottom, and giving to the settlement the popular name of
+"Long Woods."
+
+On the other side of the timber lay the high prairie region, covered
+with coarse wild grass, and spotted with flowers, without tree or shrub
+visible until another line of timber, miles away, marked the vicinity of
+another stream.
+
+The young surveyor and the old man, in the jolting buggy, followed by
+the dog, left the log-house and the valley behind them; traversed the
+woods, through flickering sun and shade; and drove southward along the
+edge of the rolling prairie, until the old man said they had better stop
+and hitch.
+
+"I don't hitch my horse," said the young surveyor. "The dog looks out
+for him. Here, old fellow, watch!"
+
+"The section corner, I ca'c'late," said the old man, shouldering his
+axe, "is off on the perairie thar, some'er's. Come, and I'll show ye the
+trees."
+
+"Is that big oak with the broken limb one of them?"
+
+"Wal, now, how did ye come to guess that?--one tree out of a hundred ye
+might 'a' picked."
+
+"It is a prominent tree," replied the youth, "and, if I had been the
+surveyor, I think I should have chosen it for one, to put my bearings
+on."
+
+"Boy, you're right! But it took me tew days to decide even that. The
+underbrush has growed up around it, and the old scar has nigh about
+healed over."
+
+The old man led the way through the thickets, and, reaching a small
+clear space at the foot of the great oak, pointed out the scar, where
+the trunk had been blazed by the axemen of the government survey. On a
+surface about six inches broad, hewed for the purpose, the distance and
+direction of the tree from the corner stake had, no doubt, been duly
+marked. But only a curiously shaped wound was left. The growth of the
+wood was rapid in that rich region, and, although the cut had been made
+but a few years before, a broad lip of smooth new bark had rolled up
+about it from the sides, and so nearly closed over it that only a
+narrow, perpendicular, dark slit remained.
+
+"What do you make of that?" said Mr. Wiggett, putting his fingers at the
+opening, and looking down at his companion.
+
+"I don't make much of it as it looks now," the young surveyor replied.
+
+"Didn't I tell you 't would take an old head to find my corner? T' other
+tree is in a wus shape than this yer. Now I reckon you'll be satisfied
+to turn about and whip home, and tell your boss it's a job for him."
+
+"Give me your axe," was the reply.
+
+"Boy, take kere what you're about!"
+
+"O, I will take care; don't be afraid!" And, grasping the axe, the young
+surveyor began to cut away the folds of new wood which had formed over
+the scar.
+
+"I see what you're up tew," said the old man, gaining confidence at
+every stroke. "Give me the axe; you ain't tall enough to work handy."
+And with a few strokes, being a skilful chopper, he cleared the old
+blaze, and exposed the blackened tablet which Nature had so nearly
+enclosed in her casket of living wood.
+
+There, cut into the old hewed surface, were the well-preserved marks of
+the government survey:
+
+    N. 48 deg. 15' W.
+    18 R. 10 L.
+
+"What does that mean?" asked the old man, as the youth made a copy of
+these marks in his notebook.
+
+"It means that this tree is eighteen rods and ten links from your corner
+stake, in a direction forty-eight degrees and fifteen minutes west of
+north."
+
+"I can understand your rods and links," said the old man; "for I know
+your surveyor's chain is four rods long, and has a hundred links. But
+banged if I know anything about your degrees and minutes."
+
+"All that is just as simple," replied the young surveyor. "A circle is
+supposed to be divided into three hundred and sixty degrees. Each degree
+is divided into sixty minutes; and so forth. Now, if you stand looking
+directly north, then turn a quarter of the way round, and look straight
+west, you have turned a quarter of a circle, or ninety degrees; and the
+angle where you stand--where the north line and the west line meet--is
+called an angle of ninety degrees. Half as far is forty-five degrees.
+Seen from the corner stake, wherever it is, this tree bears a little
+more than forty-five degrees west of north; it is forty-eight degrees
+and a quarter. Where's the other tree?"
+
+That was ten or eleven rods away, still in the edge of the timber; and
+it bore on its blazed trunk, facing the open prairie, the
+inscription--laid bare by the old man's ready axe--
+
+    N. 82 deg. 27' w.
+    16 R. 29 L.
+
+"Eighty-two degrees twenty-seven minutes west of north, and sixteen rods
+twenty-nine links, from your corner," the young surveyor read aloud, as
+he copied the marks into his notebook. "The other tree is so surrounded
+by undergrowth, it would take you and your axe an hour to cut a passage
+through so that I could run a line; and I am going to try running a line
+from this tree alone. Be cutting a few good stakes, while I go and bring
+up my horse and set him to eating grass."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+OLD WIGGETT'S SECTION CORNER.
+
+
+The horse was driven to a good shady place on the edge of the woods,
+relieved of his bridle, and left in charge of the dog. In the mean while
+the old man cut a few oak saplings and hewed them into stakes.
+
+"Now, I want ye to give me a notion of how you're gwine to work," he
+said, as the youth brought his compass and set it up on its tripod at
+the foot of the tree. "For, otherwise, how am I to be sure of my corner,
+when you say you've found it?"
+
+"O, I think we shall find something to convince you! However, look here,
+and I'll explain."
+
+While waiting for the wavering needle to settle in its place, the youth
+made a hasty diagram in a page of his notebook.
+
+"Here we are on the edge of the timber. _A_ is your first tree. _B_ is
+the one where we are. Now if the bearings are correct, and I run two
+lines accordingly, the place where they meet will be the place for your
+corner stake; say at _C_."
+
+"That looks cute; I like the shape of that!" said the old man,
+interested.
+
+[Illustration: SETTING THE STAKES.]
+
+"If the distance was short,--feet instead of rods,--all the instruments
+we should want," said the young surveyor, with his peculiarly bright
+smile, "would be a foot measure and two strings."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"How so?" said the old man, who could not believe that science was as
+simple a thing as that.
+
+"Why, for instance, we will say the tree _A_ is eighteen feet from the
+corner you want to find; _B_, sixteen feet. Now take a string eighteen
+feet long, and fasten the end of it by a nail to the centre of the
+blazed trunk, _A_; fasten another sixteen feet long to _B_; then stretch
+out the loose ends of both until they just meet; and there is the place
+for your stake."
+
+"I declar'!" exclaimed the old man. "That's the use of the tew trees.
+Banged if I dew see, though, how you're gwine to git along by runnin' a
+line from jest one."
+
+"If I run two lines, as I have shown you, where they meet will be the
+point. Now if I run one line, and measure it, I shall find the point
+where the other line ought to meet it. We'll see. Here on my compass is
+a circle and a scale of degrees, which shows me how to set it according
+to the bearings. Now look through these sights, and you are looking
+straight in the direction of your section corner."
+
+"Curi's, ain't it?" grinned the old man. "'Cordin' to that, my corner is
+out on the perairie, jest over beyant that ar knoll."
+
+"You're right. Now go forward to the top of it, while I sight you, and
+we'll set a stake there. As I signal with my hands this way, or this,
+move your stake to the right or left, till I make _this_ motion; then
+you are all right."
+
+The young surveyor had got his compass into position, by looking back
+through the sights at the tree. He now placed himself between it and the
+tree, and, sighting forward, directed the old man, who went on over the
+knoll, where to set his stakes.
+
+On the other side of the knoll, it was found that the line crossed a
+slough,--or "slew," as the old man termed it,--which lay in a long,
+winding hollow of the hills. This morass was partly filled with stagnant
+water; and the old man gave it a bad name.
+
+"It's the wust slew in the hull country. I've lost tew cows in 't. I
+wouldn't go through it for the price of my farm. Couldn't git through; a
+man would sink intew it up tew his neck."
+
+"Then we may have to get a boat to find your section corner," laughed
+the young surveyor.
+
+"But it's noth'n' but a bog this time o' year; ye can't navigate a boat
+thar. And it'll take till middle o' next week to build a brush road
+acrost. Guess we're up a stump now, hey?"
+
+"O, no; stumps are not so plenty, where I undertake jobs! Let's have a
+stake down there, pretty near the _slew_; then we will measure our line,
+and see how much farther we have to go."
+
+The old man helped bear the chain; and a careful measurement showed that
+the stake at the edge of the slough was still four rods and thirty links
+from the corner they sought.
+
+"Banged if it don't come jest over on t' other side of the slew!" the
+old man exclaimed, computing the distance with his eye. "But we can't
+measure a rod furder; and yer we be stuck."
+
+"Not yet, old friend!" cried the young surveyor. "Since we can't cross,
+we'll measure the rest of our distance along on this shore."
+
+The old man looked down upon him with indignation and amazement.
+
+"Think I'm a dog-goned fool?" he cried. "The idee of turnin' from our
+course, and measurin' along by the slew! What's the good of that?"
+
+Finding that the old man would not aid or abet what seemed to him such
+complete folly, the young surveyor made another little diagram in his
+notebook, and explained:--
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"Here is the end of our line running from the direction
+_B_,--theoretically a straight, horizontal line, though it curves over
+the knoll. You noticed how, coming down the slope ahead of you, I held
+my end of the chain up from the ground, to make it horizontal, and then
+with my plumb-line found the corresponding point in the ground, to start
+fresh from. That was to get the measurement of a horizontal line; for if
+you measure all the ups and downs of hills and hollows, you'll find your
+surveying will come out in queer shape."
+
+The old man scratched his bushy gray head, and said he hadn't thought of
+that.
+
+"Well," the young surveyor continued, "we are running our line off
+towards _C_, when we come to the slew. Our last stake is at _D_,--say
+this little thing with a flag on it. Now, what is to be done? for we
+must measure four rods and thirty links farther. I measure that distance
+from _D_ to _E_, along this shore, running my new line at an angle of
+sixty degrees from the true course. Then, with my compass at _E_, I
+sight another line at an angle of sixty degrees from my last. I am
+making what is called an equilateral triangle; that is, a triangle with
+equal sides and equal angles. Each angle must measure sixty degrees.
+With two angles and one side, we can always get the other two sides; and
+the other angle will be where those two sides meet. They will meet at
+_C_. Now, since the sides are of equal length, the distance from _D_ to
+_C_ is the same as from _D_ to _E_,--that is, four rods and thirty
+links, just the distance we wish to go; _C_, then, is the place for your
+corner stake."
+
+"It looks very well on paper," said the old man, "but"--casting his eye
+across the bog--"how in the name of seven kingdoms are ye ever gwine to
+fix yer stake thar?"
+
+"That is easy. Go round to the other side of the slew, get yourself in
+range with our line from the tree, by sighting across the stakes, and
+walk down toward the slew,--that is, on this dotted line. Having got my
+angle of sixty degrees at _E_, I will sight across and stop you when I
+see you at _C_. There stick your last stake."
+
+"Banged if that ain't cute! Young man, what mout be your name?"
+
+"I was only boy a few minutes ago," said the young surveyor, slyly.
+"Now, if you are ready, we'll set to work and carry out this plan."
+
+The line from _D_ to _E_ was measured off. Then the youth set his
+compass to obtain the proper angle at _E_; while the old man, with his
+axe and a fresh stake, tramped around to the eastern side of the slough.
+Having got the range of the stakes, he was moving slowly back toward
+them, holding his stake before him, when the youth signalled him to stop
+just in the edge of the quagmire.
+
+The new stake stuck, the young surveyor, taking up his tripod and
+compass, went round to him.
+
+"That stake," said he, "is not far from your corner. Are there any
+signs?"
+
+"I've been thinkin'," said the old man, "the 'arth yer looks like it had
+been disturbed some time; though it's all overgrowed so with these
+clumps of slew-grass, ye can't tell what's a nat'ral hummock and what
+ain't. Don't that look like a kind of a trench?"
+
+"Yes; and here's another at right angles with it. Surveyors cut such
+places on the prairies, pile up the sods inside the angle, and drive
+their corner stakes through them. But there must have been water here
+when this job was done, which accounts for its not being done better.
+We'll improve it. Go for the shovel. I'll get the bearings of those
+trees in the mean while, and see how far wrong they make us out to be."
+
+When the old man returned with the shovel, he found his boy surveyor
+standing by the compass, with folded arms, looking over at the woodland
+with a smile of satisfaction.
+
+Sighting the trees, the tall, straight stems of which were both visible
+over the knoll, he had found that their bearings corresponded with those
+copied in his notebook. This proved his work to his own mind; but the
+old man would not yet confess himself convinced.
+
+"We may be somewhur _nigh_ the spot, but I want to be sure of the
+_exact_ spot," he insisted.
+
+"That you can't be sure of; not even if the best surveyor in the world
+should come and get it from these bearings," replied the youth.
+"Probably the bearings themselves are not exact. The government
+surveyors do their work in a hurry. The common compass they use doesn't
+make as fine angles as the theodolite or transit instrument does; and
+then the chain varies a trifle in length with every variation of
+temperature; the metal contracts and expands, you know. Surveying, where
+the land is worth a dollar and a quarter a foot, instead of a dollar and
+a quarter an acre, is done more carefully. Yet I am positive, from the
+indications here, that we are within a few inches of your corner."
+
+"A few inches, or a few feet, or a few rods!" muttered the old man,
+crossly. "Seems like thar's a good deal of guess-work, arter all."
+
+"I am sorry you think so," replied the young surveyor, quietly removing
+his tripod. "If, however, you are dissatisfied with my work, you can
+employ another surveyor; if he tells you I am far out of the way, why,
+then, you needn't pay me."
+
+The old man made no reply, but, seizing the shovel, began to level the
+hummock a little, in order to prepare it for a pile of fresh sods. He
+was slashing away at it, with the air of a petulant man working off his
+discontent, when he struck something hard.
+
+"What's that ar?" he growled. "Can't be a stone. Ain't a rock as big as
+a hazel-nut this side the timber."
+
+Digging round the obstacle, he soon exposed the splintered end of an
+upright piece of wood. He laid hold of it and tried to pull it up. The
+youth, with lively interest, took the shovel, and dug and pried.
+Suddenly up came the stick, and the old man went over backwards with it
+into the bog.
+
+He scrambled to his feet, dripping with muddy water, and brandished his
+trophy, exclaiming:--
+
+"Dog my cats! if 't ain't the end of the ol' corner stake, left jest
+whur't was broke off, when the rest was wanted to pry a wheel out o' the
+slew, or to kill a rattler with!"
+
+He appeared jubilant over the discovery, while the young surveyor
+regarded it simply as a piece of good luck.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE HOMEWARD TRACK.
+
+
+The new stake having been stuck in the hole left by the point of the old
+one, and plenty of fresh turf piled up about it, the old man wiped his
+fingers on the dry prairie-grass, thrust a hand into his pocket, and
+brought forth an ancient leather wallet.
+
+"My friend," said he, "shall I settle with you or with your boss?"
+
+"You may as well settle with me."
+
+"Nuff said. What's yer tax?"
+
+"Two dollars and a half."
+
+"Tew dollars and a--dog-gone-ation! You've been only tew hours and a
+half about the job. I can hire a man all day for half a dollar."
+
+"It is an afternoon's work for me," argued the young surveyor. "I've had
+a long way to drive. Then, you must understand, we surveyors" (this was
+said with an air of importance) "don't get pay merely for the time we
+are employed, but also for our knowledge of the business, which it has
+taken us time to learn. If I had been obliged to hire the horse I drive,
+you see, I shouldn't have much left out of two dollars and a half."
+
+"Friend, you're right. Tew 'n' a half is reasonable. And if I have
+another job of land-surveyin', you are the man for my money."
+
+"A man, am I, now?" And with a laugh the young surveyor pocketed his
+fee.
+
+"Good as a man, I allow, any time o' day. You've worked at this yer
+thing right smart, and I'll give ye the credit on't. How long have ye
+been larnin the trade?"
+
+"O, two years, more or less, studying at odd spells! But I never made a
+business of it until I came to this new country."
+
+"What State be ye from?"
+
+"New York."
+
+"York State! That's whur I hail from."
+
+"One wouldn't think so; you have a good many Southern and Western words
+in your talk."
+
+"I come by 'em honest," said the old man. "I run away from home when I
+was a boy, like a derned fool; I've lived a'most everywhur; and I've
+married four wives, and raised four craps of children. My fust wife I
+picked up in ol' Kaintuck. My next was an Arkansaw woman. My third was a
+Michigander. My present was born and raised in the South, but I married
+her in Southern Illinois. She's nigh on to forty year younger 'n I be,
+and smart as a steel trap, tell you! So you see we're kind of a mixed-up
+family. My fust and second broods of children's married off, or
+buried,--scattered to the four winds o' heaven! Tew boys o' the third
+brood, and that ar Sal, is with me yit. Some of the present brood you've
+seen. Thar's been twenty-one in all."
+
+"Of the fourth brood?"
+
+"No, of the lot. Whose hoss mout that be?"
+
+"Mine; I brought him from the East with me."
+
+"What do you have to pay for a beast like that, now, in York State?"
+
+"I didn't pay anything for him."
+
+"Somebody gi'n him tew ye?"
+
+"Not exactly."
+
+"Ye gambled for him?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Raised him from a colt, then?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Stole him?"
+
+"Not much."
+
+"Picked him up astray?"
+
+The young surveyor, laughing, shook his head.
+
+"Then how in the name o' seven kingdoms did ye come by him, if ye didn't
+find him, nor steal him, nor raise him from a colt, nor buy him, nor
+have him gi'n tew ye?"
+
+"I borrowed him of a neighbor, and drove him to a show, where the old
+elephant broke loose and had the handling of him for about a second and
+a half. The owners of the elephant paid the damages; and I kept the
+horse. Nobody thought he would get well; but he is now scarcely lame at
+all. I can show you the scars where he was hurt."
+
+The two had approached the wagon during this talk; and now the old man
+examined the horse with a good deal of curiosity.
+
+"That your dog tew?"
+
+"Yes, sir. Here, Lion!"
+
+"Cost ye suth'n, didn't it, to bring yer animals West with ye?"
+
+"Not a great deal. When my friends wrote for me to come, they said good
+horses were scarce and high-priced out here, and advised me to bring
+mine. I couldn't leave my dog behind,--could I, old Lion?"
+
+"Who mout your friends be?"
+
+"Mr. and Mrs. Lanman, at North Mills; and Mrs. Lanman's brother,--my
+boss, as you call him,--Mr. Felton, the surveyor. They came out last
+year; and last winter they wrote to me, offering me a good chance if I
+should come. It was in winter; I drove Snowfoot in a cutter, and crossed
+the Detroit River on the ice just before it broke up. There the
+sleighing left me; so I sold my cutter, bought a saddle, and made the
+rest of the journey on horseback. That was rather hard on the dog, but I
+got the stage-drivers to give him a lift once in a while."
+
+"What did you say your name was?" the old man inquired.
+
+"I don't think I said. But I will say now. My name is Ragdon,--Henry
+Ragdon. My friends call me Jack."
+
+"And it ain't yer name?"
+
+"O, yes, it is, and yet it isn't! I was brought up to it. My friends
+like it, and so I keep it."[1]
+
+[Footnote 1: See "FAST FRIENDS"; also the previous volumes of this
+series,--"JACK HAZARD AND HIS FORTUNES," "A CHANCE FOR HIMSELF," and
+"DOING HIS BEST," in which is given a full account of the young
+surveyor's early life and adventures.]
+
+"Wal, Jack,--if you'll rank me with your friends, and le' me call ye
+so," said the old man, with a cordial grip of his great, flat hand,--"I
+s'pose we part yer, and say good by. I'll shoulder my tools, and take a
+cow-path through the woods; you'll find a better road than the one we
+come by, furder north. Jest keep along the edge of the perairie. I
+sha'n't forgit this job."
+
+"Nor I," said the young surveyor, with a curious smile.
+
+It was the first work of the kind he had undertaken on his own account,
+and without assistance; for which reason he felt not a little proud of
+it. But he did not tell the old man so.
+
+After parting company with him, he drove in the shade of the woods,
+along a track so little travelled that the marks of wheels looked like
+dark ruled lines in the half-trodden grass.
+
+The pleasant summer afternoon was drawing to a close. The peculiar wild
+scent of the prairie, which seems to increase as the cool evening comes
+on, filled all the air. The shadows of the forest were stretching in a
+vast, uneven belt over summit and hollow; while far away beyond, in
+seemingly limitless expanse, swept the golden-green undulations of the
+sunlit hills.
+
+Jack--for I trust we shall also be entitled to call him so--kept his eye
+out for game, as he drove leisurely along; stopped once or twice for a
+rabbit on the edge of the woods; and, finally, pulled up sharply, as a
+prairie-hen shot whirring out, almost from under his wheels.
+
+He sprang to his feet and faced about, raising his gun; but before he
+could take aim, the bird, at the end of a short, straight flight,
+dropped into the prairie-grass a few rods away.
+
+Jack followed on foot, holding his piece ready to fire. Knowing the shy
+habits of the bird, he trampled the grass about the spot where she had
+alighted, hoping to scare her up. He also sent his dog coursing about;
+but Lion, though an intelligent animal, had no scent for birds.
+
+Suddenly, from the very ground between the hunter's feet, with a
+startling rush and thunder of wings, the hen rose. Up went gun to
+shoulder. But instantly the dog gave chase, and kept so exactly in the
+line of flight, that Jack durst not fire.
+
+"You silly boy's dog!" he said; "don't you know better than that? You'll
+get a stray shot some day, if you run before my gun-barrels in that
+fashion. Now go to the horse, and stay."
+
+The dog, who had fancied that he was doing good service, dropped ears
+and tail at this rebuke, and retired from the field.
+
+Jack was continuing the hunt, when all at once a strange spell seemed to
+come over him. It found him on one foot, and he remained on one foot,
+poising the other behind him, for several seconds. Then, softly putting
+down the lifted leg, and lowering his gun, he stole swiftly back, in a
+crouching attitude, to his wagon by the woodside.
+
+Taking his horse by the bridle, he led him down into a little hollow.
+Then, piercing the undergrowth, he hastened to a commanding position,
+where, himself hidden by the bushes, he could look off on the prairie.
+
+His heart beat fast, and his hand shook, as he drew the bird-shot out of
+the two barrels of his fowling-piece, reloading one with buck-shot, the
+other with an ounce ball.
+
+All the while his eye kept glancing from his gun to the shadowy slope of
+a distant hill, where were two objects which looked like a deer and a
+fawn feeding.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+A DEER HUNT, AND HOW IT ENDED.
+
+
+They were a long way off,--more than half a mile, he thought. Evidently
+they had not seen him. Though marvellously quick to catch scent or
+sound, deer have not a fine sense of sight for distant objects.
+
+"They have left the covert early, to go out and feed," thought he. "If
+not frightened, they will browse around in the hollows there until
+dark."
+
+He was wondering how he should manage to creep near, and get a shot at
+the shy creatures, when the dog barked.
+
+"That won't do!" he muttered; and, hurrying to silence Lion, he saw a
+stranger loitering along the prairie road.
+
+Jack stepped out of the bushes into the hollow, and beckoned.
+
+"I've sighted a couple of deer that I'm trying to get a shot at; if you
+go over the hill, you'll scare 'em."
+
+The stranger--a slender youth in soiled shirt-sleeves, carrying a coat
+on his arm--looked at him saucily, with his head on one side and a quid
+turning in the cheek, and said,--
+
+"Well! and why shouldn't I scare 'em?"
+
+"I can't hinder you, of course; but," said Jack, "if _you_ were hunting,
+and _I_ should be passing by, I should think it a matter of honor--"
+
+"Honor is an egg that don't hatch in this country," interrupted the
+stranger; and the quid went into the other cheek, while the head went
+over on the other side, as if to balance it. "But never mind; 'tain't my
+cut to interfere with another feller's luck. Show me your deer."
+
+Jack took him through the thickets to his ambush. There were the deer
+still feeding; the old one lifting her head occasionally as if on the
+lookout for danger. They seemed to be moving slowly along the slope.
+
+The dark eyes of the strange youth kindled; then he said, with a low
+laugh,--
+
+"I'd like a cut-bore rifle for them fellers! You never can get 'em with
+that popgun."
+
+"I believe I can if you'll help me. You notice there's a range of hills
+between us and them; and they are on the north slope of one. I've been
+surveying a little of the country off south, and I think you can get
+around the range that way, and come out beyond the deer, before they see
+you. There's everything in our favor. The wind blows to us from them. At
+the first alarm they'll start for the woods; and they'll be pretty sure
+to keep along in the hollow. I'll watch here, and take them as they come
+in."
+
+Quid and head rolled again; and the strange youth said jeeringly, with
+one eye half closed, looking at Jack,--
+
+"So you expect me to travel a mile or two, and drive the deer in for
+you?" He then pulled down the nether lid of the half-closed eye, and
+inquired, somewhat irrelevantly, whether Jack saw anything green there.
+"Not by this light!" he answered his own question, as he let up his
+eyelid and snapped his thumb and finger. "Ye can't ketch old birds with
+chaff. I've been through the lot. Parley-voo frong-say?"
+
+Jack regarded him with astonishment, declaring that there was no catch
+about it. "Only help me, and we will share the game together."
+
+Still the fellow demurred. "I've walked my legs off to-day already;
+you'll find 'em back in the road here! Had nothing to eat since morning;
+wore myself down lean as a rail; felt for the last two hours as though
+there was nothing but my backbone between me and eternity! No, sir-ree!
+I wouldn't walk that fur out of my way for a herd of deer. If I had a
+horse to ride I wouldn't mind."
+
+Jack was greatly excited. He had never yet had a good shot at a deer;
+and if, at the end of his day's work, he could carry home a good fat
+doe, and perhaps a fawn, of his own shooting, it would be a triumph. So,
+without a moment's reflection, he said,--
+
+"You may ride mine. Then, if you don't want a share of the game, I'll
+pay you for your trouble."
+
+The strange youth took time to shift his quid and balance it; then
+replied in a manner which appeared provokingly cool to the fiery Jack,--
+
+"I'll look at him. Does he ride easy?"
+
+"Yes. Hurry!"
+
+Jack ran down to the horse, led him into the bushes, where the wagon
+could be left concealed, and had already taken him out of the shafts,
+before the stranger came lounging to the spot.
+
+"Pull off the harness," said the latter, with the easy air of ordering a
+nag at a stable. "And give me that blanket out of the buggy. I don't
+ride bareback for nobody." And he spat reckless tobacco-juice.
+
+Jack complied, though angry at the fellow for being so dilatory and
+fastidious at such a time. The strange youth then spread his coat over
+the blanket, laid his right hand on it, and his left on bridle and mane,
+and with a leap from the ground threw himself astride the horse,--a
+display of agility which took Jack by surprise.
+
+"I see you have been on horseback before!"
+
+"Never in my life," said the stranger, with a gleam in his dark eyes
+which belied his words. And now Jack noticed that he had a little switch
+in his hand.
+
+"He won't need urging. Be sure and ride well beyond that highest hill
+before you turn; and then come quietly around, so as not to frighten the
+deer too much."
+
+The fellow laughed. "I've seen a deer before to-day!" And, clapping
+heels to the horse's sides, he dashed through the bushes.
+
+Jack followed a little way, and from his ambush saw him come out of the
+undergrowth, strike across the prairie, and disappear around the range
+of hills.
+
+[Illustration: JACK AND THE STRANGE YOUTH.]
+
+The deer were still in sight, stopping occasionally to feed, and then,
+with heads in air, moving a few paces along the slope. Jack waited with
+breathless anxiety to see his horseman emerge from among the hills
+beyond. Several minutes elapsed; then, though no horseman appeared, the
+old deer, startled by sound or scent of the enemy, threw high her head,
+and began to leap, with graceful, undulating movements, along the
+hillside.
+
+The fawn darted after her, and for a minute they were hidden from view
+in a hollow. The stratagem had so far succeeded. They had started toward
+the woods.
+
+Jack, in an ague of agitation, waited for the game to show itself again,
+and, by its movements, guide his own. At length the fawn appeared on the
+summit of a low hill, and stopped. The doe came up and stopped too, with
+elevated nostrils, snuffing. For a rifle, in approved hands, there would
+have been a chance for a shot. But the game was far beyond the range of
+Jack's gun.
+
+To try his nerve, however, he took aim, or, rather, attempted to take
+aim. His hands--if the truth must be confessed--shook so that he could
+not keep his piece steady for an instant. Cool fellow enough on ordinary
+occasions, he now had a violent attack of what is called the "buck
+fever."
+
+Fortunately, the deer had not seen the horseman; and, while they were
+recovering from their first alarm, they gave the young hunter time to
+subdue, with resolute good sense, his terrible nervous agitation.
+
+They did not stop to feed any more, but moved on, with occasional
+pauses, toward the woods; following the line of the hollows, as Jack had
+foreseen.
+
+All this time the dog lay whining at his young master's heels. He knew
+instinctively that there was sport on foot, and could hardly be kept
+quiet.
+
+The deer took another and final start, and came bounding along toward
+the spot where the wagon had stood. But for the excitement of the
+moment, Jack must have felt a touch of pity at sight of those two
+slender, beautiful creatures, so full of life, making for their covert
+in the cool woods. But the hunter's spirit was uppermost. He took aim at
+the doe, followed her movements a moment with the moving gun, then
+fired. She plunged forward, and dropped dead.
+
+The fawn, confused by the report and by the doe's sudden fall, stood for
+an instant quite still, then made a few bounds up toward the very spot
+where the young hunter was concealed. It stopped again, within twenty
+paces of the levelled gun. There it stood, its pretty spotted side
+turned toward him, so fair a mark, and so charming a picture, that for a
+moment, excited though he was, he could not have the heart to shoot. Ah!
+what is this spirit of destruction, which has come down to us from our
+barbarous forefathers, and which gives even good-hearted boys like Jack
+a wild joy in taking life?
+
+The dog, rendered ungovernable by the firing of the gun, made a noise in
+the thicket. The fawn heard, and started to run away. The provocation
+was too great for our young hunter, and he sent a charge of buck-shot
+after it. The fawn did not fall.
+
+"Take 'em, Lion!" shouted Jack; and out rushed the dog.
+
+The poor thing had been wounded, and the dog soon brought it down. Jack
+ran after, to prevent a tearing of the hide and flesh. Then he set up a
+wild yell, which might have been heard a mile away on the prairie,--a
+call for his horseman, who had not yet reappeared.
+
+Jack dragged the fawn and placed it beside its dam. There lay the two
+pretty creatures, slaughtered by his hand.
+
+"It can't be helped," thought he. "If it is right to hunt game, it is
+right to kill it. If we eat flesh, we must take life."
+
+So he tried to feel nothing but pure triumph at the sight. Yet I have
+heard him say, in relating the adventure, that he could never afterwards
+think of the dead doe and pretty fawn, lying there side by side, without
+a pang.
+
+He now backed his buggy out of the woods, set the seat forward in order
+to make room for the deer behind, and waited for his horse.
+
+"Where can that fellow have gone?" he muttered, with growing anxiety.
+
+He went to a hill-top, to get a good view, and strained his vision,
+gazing over the prairie. The sun was almost set, and all the hills were
+darkening, save now and then one of the highest summits.
+
+Over one of these Jack suddenly descried a distant object moving. It was
+no deer this time, but a horse and rider far away, and going at a
+gallop--in the wrong direction.
+
+He gazed until they disappeared over the crest, and the faint sundown
+glory faded from it, and he felt the lonesome night shutting down over
+the limitless expanse. Then he smote his hands together with fury and
+despair.
+
+He knew that the horse was his own, and the rider the strange youth in
+whose hands he had so rashly intrusted him. And here he was, five miles
+from home, with the darkening forest on one side, and the vast prairie
+on the other; the dead doe and fawn lying down there on the dewy grass,
+the empty buggy and harness beside them; and only his dog to keep him
+company.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE BOY WITH ONE SUSPENDER.
+
+
+Jack's first thought, after assuring himself that his horse was
+irrevocably gone, was to run for help to the line of settlements on the
+other side of the grove, where some means of pursuit might be obtained.
+
+He knew that the road which Mr. Wiggett had described could not be much
+beyond the hollow where his wagon was; and, dashing forward, he soon
+found it. Then, stopping to give a last despairing look at the billowy
+line of prairie over which his horse had disappeared, he started to run
+through the woods.
+
+He had not gone far when he heard a cowbell rattle, and the voice of a
+boy shouting. He paused to take breath and listen; and presently with a
+crashing of bushes three or four horned cattle came pushing their way
+through the undergrowth, into the open road, followed by a lad without a
+jacket, with one suspender and a long switch.
+
+"Boy," Jack cried, "how far is it to the nearest house?"
+
+"Our house is jest down through the woods here," replied the boy,
+stopping to stare.
+
+"How far is that?"
+
+"Not quite so far as it is to Peakslow's house."
+
+"Where is Peakslow's house?"
+
+"Next house to ours, down the river."
+
+Seeing that this line of questions was not likely to lead to anything
+very satisfactory, Jack asked,--
+
+"Can I get a horse of anybody in your neighborhood,--a good fast horse
+to ride?"
+
+The boy whipped a bush with his switch, and replied,--
+
+"There ain't any good horses around here, 'thout 'tis Peakslow's; but
+one of his has got the spring halt, and t' other's got the blind
+staggers; and he's too mean to lend his horses; and, besides, he went to
+Chicago with 'em both this morning."
+
+Jack did not stop to question the probability of a span thus afflicted
+being driven on so long a journey; but asked if Mr. Wiggett had horses.
+
+"No--yes. I believe his horses are all oxen," replied the boy; "not very
+fast or good to ride either."
+
+Thereupon Jack, losing all patience, cried out,--
+
+"Isn't there a decent nag to be had in this region?"
+
+"Who said there wasn't?" retorted the boy.
+
+"Where is there one?"
+
+"We've got one."
+
+"A horse?"
+
+"No; a mare."
+
+"Why didn't you tell me before?"
+
+"'Cause you asked for horses; you didn't say anything about mares."
+
+"Is she good to ride?"
+
+"Pretty good,--though if you make her go much faster 'n she takes a
+notion to, she's got the heaves so folks'll think there's a small
+volcano coming!"
+
+"How fast will she go?"
+
+"As fast as a good slow walk; that's her style," said the boy, and
+whipped the bushes. "But, come to think, father's away from home, and
+you'll have to wait till to-morrow night before you can see him, and get
+him to let you take her."
+
+"Boy," said Jack, tired of the lad's tone of levity, and thinking to
+interest him by a statement of the facts in the case, "I've been
+hunting, and a rascal I trusted with my horse has run off with him, and
+I have a harness and a buggy and a couple of dead deer out there on the
+prairie."
+
+"Deer?" echoed the lad, pricking up his ears at once. "Did you shoot
+'em? Where? Can I go and see 'em?"
+
+Jack was beginning to see the hopelessness of pursuing the horse-thief
+that night, or with any help to to be had in that region; and he now
+turned his thoughts to getting the buggy home.
+
+"Yes, boy; come with me," he said.
+
+The boy shouted and switched his stick at the cattle browsing by the
+wayside, and started them on a smart trot down the road, then hastened
+with Jack to the spot where the wagon and game had been left, guarded by
+Lion.
+
+But Jack had another object in view than simply to gratify the lad's
+curiosity.
+
+"If you will hold up the shafts and pull a little, I'll push behind, and
+we can take the buggy through the woods. After we get it up out of this
+hollow, and well into the road, it will be down-hill the rest of the
+way."
+
+"You want to make a horse of me, do ye?" cried the boy. "I wasn't born
+in a stable!"
+
+"Neither was I," said Jack. "But I don't object to doing a horse's work.
+I'll pull in the shafts."
+
+"O good!" screamed the boy, making his switch whistle about his head.
+"And I'll get on the seat and drive!" And he made a spring at the wagon.
+
+But Lion had something to say about that. Having been placed on guard,
+and not yet relieved, he would permit no hand but his master's to touch
+anything in his charge. A frightful growl made the boy recoil and go
+backwards over the dead deer.
+
+"Here, Lion! down with you!" cried Jack, as the excited dog was pouncing
+on the supposed intruder.
+
+The boy scrambled to his feet, and was starting to run away, in great
+terror, when Jack, fearing to lose him, called out,--
+
+"Don't run! He may chase you if you do. Now he knows you are my friend,
+you are safe, only stay where you are."
+
+"Blast his pictur'!" exclaimed the boy. "He's a perfect cannibal! What
+does anybody want to keep such a savage critter as that for?"
+
+"I had told him to watch. Now he is all right. Come!"
+
+"Me? Travel with that dog? I wouldn't go with him," the boy declared,
+meaning to make the strongest possible statement, "if 't was a million
+miles, and the road was full of sugar-candy!" And he backed off warily.
+
+[Illustration: UP-HILL WORK.]
+
+Jack got over the difficulty by sending the dog on before; and finally,
+by an offer of money which would purchase a reasonable amount of
+sugar-candy,--enough to pave the short road to happiness, for a boy of
+thirteen,--induced him to help lift the deer into the buggy, and then to
+go behind and push.
+
+They had hard work at first, getting the wagon up out of the hollow; and
+the boy, when they reached at last the top of the hill, and stopped to
+rest, declared that there wasn't half the fun in it there was in going a
+fishing; the justice of which remark Jack did not question. But after
+that the way was comparatively easy; and with Jack pulling in the
+shafts, his new acquaintance pushing in the rear, and Lion trotting on
+before, the buggy went rattling down the woodland road in lively
+fashion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+"LORD BETTERSON'S."
+
+
+On a sort of headland jutting out from the high timber region into the
+low prairie of the river bottom, stood a house, known far and near as
+"Lord Betterson's," or, as it was sometimes derisively called, "Lord
+Betterson's Castle," the house being about as much a castle as the owner
+was a lord.
+
+The main road of the settlement ran between it and the woods; while on
+the side of the river the land swept down in a lovely slope to the
+valley, which flowed away in a wider and more magnificent stream of
+living green. It was really a fine site, shaded by five or six young
+oaks left standing in the spacious door-yard.
+
+The trouble was, that the house had been projected on somewhat too grand
+a scale for the time and country and, what was worse, for the owner's
+resources. He had never been able to finish it; and now its
+weather-browned clapboards, unpainted front pillars, and general shabby,
+ill-kept appearance, set off the style of architecture in a way to make
+beholders smile.
+
+"Lord Betterson took a bigger mouthful than he could swaller, when he
+sot out to build his castle here," said his neighbor, Peakslow.
+
+The proprietor's name--it may as well be explained--was Elisha Lord
+Betterson. It was thus he always wrote it, in a large round hand, with a
+bold flourish. Now the common people never will submit to call a man
+_Elisha_. The furthest they can possibly go will be _'Lisha_, or
+_'Lishy_; and, ten to one, the tendency to monosyllables will result in
+_'Lishe_. There had been a feeble attempt among the vulgar to
+familiarize the public mind with _'Lishe Betterson_; but the name would
+not stick to a person of so much dignity of character. It was useless to
+argue that his dignity was mere pomposity; or that a man who, in
+building a fine house, broke down before he got the priming on, was
+unworthy of respect; still no one could look at him, or call up his
+image, and say, conscientiously, "'Lishe Betterson." He who, in this
+unsettled state of things, taking a hint from the middle name,
+pronounced boldly aloud, "LORD BETTERSON," was a public benefactor.
+"Lord Betterson" and "Lord Betterson's Castle" had been popular ever
+since.
+
+The house, with its door-posts of unpainted pine darkly soiled by the
+contact of unwashed childish hands, and its unfinished rooms, some of
+them lathed, but unplastered (showing just the point at which the
+owner's resources failed), looked even more shabby within than without.
+
+This may have been partly because the house-keeper was sick. She must
+have been sick, if that was she, the pale, drooping figure, sitting
+wrapped in an old red shawl, that summer afternoon. She looked not only
+sick, but exceedingly discouraged. And no wonder.
+
+[Illustration: "LORD BETTERSON."]
+
+At her right hand was an empty cradle; and she held a puny infant in her
+arms, trying to still its cries. At her left was a lounge, on which lay
+the helpless form of an invalid child, a girl about eleven years old.
+The room was comfortless. An old, high-colored piece of carpeting half
+covered the rough floor; its originally gaudy pattern, out of which all
+but the red had faded, bearing witness to some past stage of family
+gentility, and serving to set off the surrounding wretchedness.
+
+Tipped back in a chair against the rough and broken laths, his knees as
+high as his chin, was a big slovenly boy of about seventeen, looking
+lazily out from under an old ragged hat-rim, pushed over his eyes.
+Another big, slovenly boy, a year or two younger, sat on the doorstep,
+whittling quite as much for his own amusement as for that of a little
+five-year-old ragamuffin outside.
+
+Not much comfort for the poor woman and the sick girl shone from these
+two indifferent faces. Indeed, the only ray of good cheer visible in
+that disorderly room gleamed from the bright eyes of a little girl not
+more than nine or ten years old,--so small, in truth, that she had to
+stand on a stool by the table, where she was washing a pan of dishes.
+
+"O boys!" said the woman in a feeble, complaining tone, "do, one of you,
+go to the spring and bring some fresh water for your poor, sick sister."
+
+"It's Rufe's turn to go for water," said the boy on the doorstep.
+
+"'T ain't my turn, either," muttered the boy tipped back against the
+laths. "Besides, I've got to milk the cow soon as Link brings the cattle
+home. Hear the bell yet, Wad?"
+
+"Never mind, Cecie!" cried the little dish-washer, cheerily. "I'll bring
+you some water as soon as I have done these dishes." And, holding her
+wet hands behind her, she ran to give the young invalid a kiss in the
+mean while.
+
+Cecie returned a warm smile of love and thanks, and said she was in no
+hurry. Then the child, stopping only to give a bright look and a
+pleasant word to the baby, ran back to her dishes.
+
+"I should think you would be ashamed, you two great boys!" said the
+woman, "to sit round the house and let that child Lilian wait upon you,
+get your suppers, wash your dishes, and then go to the spring for water
+for your poor suffering sister!"
+
+"I'm going to petition the Legislature," said Wad, "to have that spring
+moved up into our back yard; it's too far to go for water. There come
+the cattle, Rufe."
+
+"Tell Chokie to go and head 'em into the barnyard," yawned Rufe, from
+his chair. "I wonder nobody ever invented a milking-machine. Wish I had
+one. Just turn a crank, you know."
+
+"You'll be wanting a machine to breathe with, next," said the little
+dish-washer.
+
+"Y-a-as," drawled Rufe. "I think a breathing machine would be popular in
+this family. Children cry for it. Get me the milk-pail, Lill; that's a
+nice girl!"
+
+"Do get it yourself, Rufus," said the mother. "You'll want your little
+sister to milk for you, soon."
+
+"I think it belongs to girls to milk," said Rufe. "There's Sal
+Wiggett,--ain't she smart at it, though? She can milk your head off! Is
+that a wagon coming, Wad?"
+
+"Yes!" cried Wad, jumping to his feet with unusual alacrity. "A wagon
+without a horse, a fellow pulling in the shafts, and Link pushing
+behind; coming right into the front yard!"
+
+Rufe also started up at this announcement, and went to the door.
+
+"Hallo!" he said, "had a break-down? What's that in the hind part of
+your wagon? Deer! a deer and a fawn! Where did you shoot 'em? Where's
+your horse?"
+
+"Look out, Rufe!" screamed the small boy from behind, rushing forward.
+"Touch one of these deer, and the dog'll have ye! We've got two deer,
+but we've lost our horse,--scamp rode him away,--and we want--"
+
+"We do, do we?" interrupted Wad, mockingly. "How many deer did _you_
+shoot, Link?"
+
+"Well, I helped get the buggy over, anyway! And that's the savagest dog
+ever was! And--say! will mother let us take the old mare to drive over
+to North Mills this evening?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+JACK AT THE "CASTLE."
+
+
+For an answer to this question, the person most interested in it, who
+had as yet said least, was shown into the house. Rufe and Wad and Link
+and little Chokie came crowding in after him, all eager to hear him talk
+of the adventure.
+
+"And, O ma!" cried Link, after Jack had briefly told his story, "he says
+he will give us the fawn, and pay me besides, if I will go with him
+to-night, and bring back the old mare in the morning."
+
+"I don't know," said the woman, wrapping her red shawl more closely
+about her, to conceal from the stranger her untidy attire. "I suppose,
+if Mr. Betterson was at home, he would let you take the mare. But you
+know, Lincoln,"--turning with a reproachful look to the small boy,--"you
+have never been brought up to take money for little services. Such
+things are not becoming in a family like ours."
+
+And in the midst of her distress she put on a complacent smirk,
+straightened her emaciated form, and sat there, looking like the very
+ghost of pride, wrapped in an old red shawl.
+
+"Did you speak of Mr. Betterson?" Jack inquired, interested.
+
+"That is my husband's name."
+
+"Elisha L. Betterson?"
+
+"Certainly. You know my husband? He belongs to the Philadelphia
+Bettersons,--a very wealthy and influential family," said the woman with
+a simper. "Very wealthy and influential."
+
+"I have heard of your husband," said Jack. "If I am not mistaken, you
+are Mrs. Caroline Betterson,--a sister of Vinnie Dalton, sometimes
+called Vinnie Presbit."
+
+"You know my sister Lavinia!" exclaimed Mrs. Betterson, surprised, but
+not overjoyed. "And you know Mr. Presbit's people?"
+
+"I have never seen them," replied Jack, "but I almost feel as if I had,
+I have heard so much about them. I was with Vinnie's foster-brother,
+George Greenwood, in New York, last summer, when he was sick, and she
+went down to take care of him."
+
+"And I presume," returned Mrs. Betterson, taking another reef in her
+shawl, "that you heard her tell a good deal about us; things that would
+no doubt tend to prejudice a stranger; though if all the truth was known
+she wouldn't feel so hard towards us as I have reason to think she
+does."
+
+Jack hastened to say that he had never heard Vinnie speak unkindly of
+her sister.
+
+"You are very polite to say so," said Mrs. Betterson, rocking the
+cradle, in which the baby had been placed. "But I know just what she
+has said. She has told you that after I married Mr. Betterson I felt
+above my family; and that when her mother died (she was not _my_ mother,
+you know,--we are only half-sisters), I suffered her to be taken and
+brought up by the Presbits, when I ought to have taken her and been as a
+mother to her,--she was so much younger than I. She is even younger by a
+month or two than my oldest son; and we have joked a good deal about his
+having an aunt younger than he is."
+
+"Yes," spoke up Rufe, standing in the door; "and I've asked a hundred
+times why we don't ever hear from her, or write to her, or have her
+visit us. Other folks have their aunts come and see 'em. But all the
+answer I could ever get was, 'family reasons, Rufus!'"
+
+"That is it, in a word," said Mrs. Betterson; "family reasons. I never
+could explain them; so I have never written to poor, dear
+Lavinia--though, Heaven knows, I should be glad enough to see her; and I
+hope she has forgiven what seemed my hardness; and--do tell me" (Mrs.
+Betterson wiped her eyes) "what sort of a girl is she? how has she come
+up?"
+
+"She is one of the kindest-hearted, most unselfish, beautiful girls in
+the world!" Jack exclaimed. "I mean, beautiful in her spirit," he added,
+blushing at his own enthusiasm.
+
+"The Presbits are rather coarse people to bring up such a girl," said
+Mrs. Betterson, with a sigh--of self-reproach, Jack thought.
+
+"But she has a natural refinement which nothing could make her lose," he
+replied. "Then, it was a good thing for her to be brought up with George
+Greenwood. She owes a great deal to the love of books he inspired in
+her. You ought to know your sister, Mrs. Betterson."
+
+The lady gave way to a flood of tears.
+
+"It is too bad! such separations are unnatural. Certainly," she went on,
+"I can't be accused of feeling above my family now. Mr. Betterson has
+had three legacies left him, two since our marriage; but he has been
+exceedingly unfortunate."
+
+"Two such able-bodied boys must be a help and comfort to you," said
+Jack.
+
+"Rufus and Wadleigh," said Mrs. Betterson, "are good boys, but they have
+been brought up to dreams of wealth, and they have not learned to take
+hold of life with rough hands."
+
+Jack suggested that it might have been better for them not to have such
+dreams.
+
+"Yes--if our family is to be brought down to the common level. But I
+can't forget, I can't wish them ever to forget, that they have Betterson
+blood in their veins."
+
+Jack could hardly repress a smile as he glanced from those stout heirs
+of the Betterson blood to the evidences of shiftlessness and
+wretchedness around them, which two such sturdy lads, with a little
+less of the precious article in their veins, might have done something
+to remedy.
+
+But his own unlucky adventure absorbed his thoughts, and he was glad
+when Link vociferously demanded if he was to go and catch the mare.
+
+"Yes! yes! do anything but kill me with that dreadful voice!" replied
+the mother, waving him off with her trembling hand. "Don't infer from
+what I have said," she resumed, gathering herself up again with feeble
+pride, "that we are poor. Mr. Betterson will come into a large fortune
+when an uncle of his dies; and he gets help from him occasionally now.
+Not enough, however, to enable him to carry on a farm; and it requires
+capital, you are aware, to make agriculture a respectable profession."
+
+Jack could not forbear another hit at the big boys.
+
+"It requires land," he said; "and that you have. It also requires bone
+and muscle; and I see some here."
+
+"True," simpered Mrs. Betterson. "But their father hasn't encouraged
+them very much in doing the needful labors of the farm."
+
+"He hasn't set us the example," broke in Rufe, piqued by Jack's remark.
+"If he had taken hold of work, I suppose we should. But while he sits
+down and waits for something or somebody to come along and help him,
+what can you expect of us?"
+
+"Our Betterson blood shows itself in more ways than one!" said Wad with
+a grin, illustrating his remark by lazily seating himself once more on
+the doorstep.
+
+Evidently the boys were sick of hearing their mother boast of the
+aristocratic family connection. She made haste to change the subject.
+
+"Sickness has been our great scourge. The climate has never agreed with
+either me or my husband. Then our poor Cecilia met with an accident a
+year ago, which injured her so that she has scarcely taken a step
+since."
+
+"An accident done a-purpose!" spoke up Rufe, angrily. "Zeph Peakslow
+threw her out of a swing,--the meanest trick! They're the meanest family
+in the world, and there's a war between us. I'm only waiting my chance
+to pay off that Zeph."
+
+"Rufus!" pleaded the little invalid from the lounge, "you know he could
+never have meant to hurt me so much. Don't talk of paying him off,
+Rufus!"
+
+"Cecie is so patient under it all!" said Mrs. Betterson. "She never
+utters a word of complaint. Yet she doesn't have the care she ought to
+have. With my sick baby, and my own aches and pains, what can I do?
+There are no decent house-servants to be had, for love or money. O, what
+wouldn't I give for a good, neat, intelligent, sympathizing girl! Our
+little Lilian, here,--poor child!--is all the help I have."
+
+At that moment the bright little dish-washer, having put away the
+supper things, and gone to the spring for water, came lugging in a small
+but brimming pail.
+
+"It is too bad!" replied Jack. "You should have help about the hard
+work," with another meaning glance at the boys.
+
+"Yes," said Rufe, "we ought to; and we did have Sal Wiggett a little
+while this summer. But she had never seen the inside of a decent house
+before. About all she was good for was to split wood and milk the cow."
+
+"O, how good this is!" said the invalid, drinking. "I was so thirsty!
+Bless you, dear Lill! What should we do without you?"
+
+Jack rose to his feet, hardly repressing his indignation.
+
+"Would you like a drink, sir?" said Lill, taking a fresh cupful from her
+pail, and looking up at him with a bright smile.
+
+"Thank you, I should very much! But I can't bear the thought of your
+lugging water from the spring for me."
+
+"Why, Lilie!" said Cecie, softly, "you should have offered it to him
+first."
+
+"I thought I did right to offer it to my sick sister first," replied
+Lill, with a tender glance at the lounge.
+
+"You did right, my good little girl!" exclaimed Jack, giving back the
+cup. He looked from one to the other of the big boys, and wondered how
+they could witness this scene and not be touched by it. But he only
+said, "Have these young men too much Betterson blood in them to dress
+the fawn, if I leave it with you?"
+
+"We'll fall back on our Dalton blood long enough for that," said Wad,
+taking the sarcasm in good part.
+
+"A little young venison will do Cecie so much good!" said Mrs.
+Betterson. "You are very kind. But don't infer that we consider the
+Dalton blood inferior. I was pleased with what you said of Lavinia's
+native refinement. I feel as if, after all, she was a sister to be proud
+of."
+
+At this last display of pitiful vanity Jack turned away.
+
+"The idea of such a woman concluding that she may be proud of a sister
+like Vinnie!" thought he.
+
+But he spoke only to say good by; for just then Link came riding the
+mare to the door.
+
+She was quickly harnessed to the buggy, while Link, at his mother's
+entreaty, put on a coat, and made himself look as decent as possible.
+Then Jack drove away, promising that Link, who accompanied him, should
+bring the mare back in the morning.
+
+"Mother," said the thoughtful Lill, "we ought to have got him some
+supper."
+
+"I thought of it," said the sick woman, "but you know we have nothing
+fit to set before him."
+
+"He won't famish," said Rufe, "with the large supply of sauce which he
+keeps on hand! Mother, I wish you wouldn't ever speak of our Betterson
+blood again; it only makes us ridiculous."
+
+Thereupon Mrs. Betterson burst into tears, complaining that her own
+children turned against her.
+
+"O, bah!" exclaimed Rufe, with disgust, stalking out of the room,
+banging a milk-pail, and waking the baby. "Be sharpening the knives,
+Wad, while I milk; then we'll dress that fawn in a hurry. Wish the
+fellow had left us the doe instead."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+HOW VINNIE MADE A JOURNEY.
+
+
+Leaving Jack to drive home the borrowed mare in the harness of the
+stolen horse, and to take such measures as he can for the pursuit of the
+thief and the recovery of his property, we have now to say a few words
+of Mrs. Betterson's younger sister.
+
+Vinnie had perhaps thriven quite as well in the plain Presbit household
+as she would have done in the home of the ambitious Caroline. The tasks
+early put upon her, instead of hardening and imbittering her, had made
+her self-reliant, helpful, and strong, with a grace like that acquired
+by girls who carry burdens on their heads. For it is thus that labors
+cheerfully performed, and trials borne with good-will and lightness of
+heart, give a power and a charm to body and mind.
+
+It was now more than a year since George Greenwood, who had been brought
+up with her in his uncle's family, had left the farm, and gone to seek
+his fortune in the city. A great change in the house, and a very unhappy
+change for Vinnie, had been the result. It was not that she missed her
+foster-brother so much; but his going out had occasioned the coming in
+of another nephew, who brought a young wife with him. The nephew filled
+George's place on the farm, and the young wife showed a strong
+determination to take Vinnie's place in the household.
+
+As long as she was conscious of being useful, in however humble a
+sphere, Vinnie was contented. She did her daily outward duty, and fed
+her heart with secret aspirations, and kept a brave, bright spirit
+through all. But now nothing was left to her but to contend for her
+rights with the new-comer, or to act the submissive part of drudge where
+she had almost ruled before. Strife was hateful to her; and why should
+she remain where her services were now scarcely needed?
+
+So Vinnie lapsed into an unsettled state of mind, common enough to a
+certain class of girls of her age, as well as to a larger class of boys,
+when the great questions of practical life confront them: "What am I to
+be? What shall I do for a living?"
+
+How ardently she wished she had money, so that she could spend two or
+three entire years at school! How eagerly she would have used those
+advantages for obtaining an education which so many, who have them,
+carelessly throw away! But Vinnie had nothing--could expect
+nothing--which she did not earn.
+
+At one time she resolved to go to work in a factory; at another, to try
+teaching a district school; and again, to learn some trade, like that of
+dress-maker or milliner. Often she wished for the freedom to go out into
+the world and gain her livelihood like a boy.
+
+In this mood of mind she received two letters. One was from Jack,
+describing his accidental visit to her sister's family. The other was
+from Caroline herself, who made that visit the occasion of writing a
+plaintive letter to her "dear, neglected Lavinia."
+
+Many tears she shed over these letters. The touching picture Jack drew
+of the invalid Cecie, and the brave little Lilian, and of the sick
+mother and baby, with Caroline's sad confession of distress, and of her
+need of sympathy and help, wakened springs of love and pity in the young
+girl's heart. She forgot that she had anything to forgive. All her
+half-formed schemes for self-help and self-culture were at once
+discarded, and she formed a courageous resolution.
+
+"I will go to Illinois," she said, "and take care of my poor sister and
+her sick children."
+
+Such a journey, from Western New York, was no small undertaking in those
+days. But she did not shrink from it.
+
+"What!" said Mrs. Presbit, when Vinnie's determination was announced to
+her, "you will go and work for a sister who has treated you so
+shamefully all these years? Only a half-sister, at that! I'm astonished
+at you! I thought you had more sperit."
+
+"For anything she may have done wrong, I am sure she is sorry enough
+now," Vinnie replied.
+
+"Yes, now she has need of you!" sneered Mrs. Presbit.
+
+"Besides," Vinnie continued, "I ought to go, for the children's sake, if
+not for hers. Think of Cecie and the poor baby; and Lilian not ten years
+old, trying to do the housework! I can do so much for them!"
+
+"No doubt of that; for I must say you are as handy and willing a girl as
+ever I see. But there's the Betterson side to the family,--two great,
+lubberly boys, according to your friend's account; a proud, domineering
+set, I warrant ye! The idee of making a slave of yourself for them!
+You'll find it a mighty uncomf'table place, mark my word!"
+
+"I hope no more so than the place I am in now,--excuse me for saying it,
+Aunt Presbit," added Vinnie, in a trembling voice. "It isn't your fault.
+But you know how things are."
+
+"O, la, yes! _she_ wants to go ahead, and order everything; and I think
+it's as well to let her,--though she'll find she can't run over _me_!
+But I don't blame you the least mite, Vinnie, for feeling sensitive; and
+if you've made up your mind to go, I sha'n't hender ye,--I'll help ye
+all I can."
+
+So it happened that, only four days after the receipt of her sister's
+letter, Vinnie, with all her worldly possessions contained in one not
+very large trunk, bid her friends good by, and, not without misgivings,
+set out alone on her long journey.
+
+She took a packet-boat on the canal for Buffalo. At Buffalo, with the
+assistance of friends she had made on board the boat, she found the
+captain of a schooner, who agreed to give her a passage around the lakes
+to Chicago, for four dollars. There were no railroads through Northern
+Ohio and across Michigan and Indiana in those days; and although there
+were steamboats on the lakes, Vinnie found that a passage on one of them
+would cost more money than she could afford. So she was glad to go in
+the schooner.
+
+The weather was fine, the winds favored, and the Heron made a quick
+trip. Vinnie, after two or three days of sea-sickness, enjoyed the
+voyage, which was made all the more pleasant to her by the friendship of
+the captain and his wife.
+
+She was interested in all she saw,--in watching the waves, the sailors
+hauling the ropes, the swelling of the great sails,--in the vessels they
+met or passed, the ports at which they touched,--the fort, the Indians,
+and the wonderfully clear depth of the water at Mackinaw. But the voyage
+grew tiresome toward the close, and her heart bounded with joy when the
+captain came into the cabin early one morning and announced that they
+had reached Chicago.
+
+The great Western metropolis was then a town of no more than eight or
+ten thousand inhabitants, hastily and shabbily built on the low level of
+the plain stretching for miles back from the lake shore. In a short walk
+with the captain's wife, Vinnie saw about all of the place she cared
+to; noting particularly a load of hay "slewed," or mired, in the
+mud-holes of one of the principal streets; the sight of which made her
+wonder if a great and flourishing city could ever be built there!
+
+Meanwhile the captain, by inquiry in the resorts of market-men, found a
+farmer who was going to drive out to the Long Woods settlement that
+afternoon, and who engaged to come with his wagon to the wharf where the
+Heron lay, and take off Vinnie and her trunk.
+
+"O, how fortunate!" she exclaimed. "How good everybody is to me! Only
+think, I shall reach my sister's house to-night!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+VINNIE'S ADVENTURE.
+
+
+In due time a rough farm-wagon was backed down upon the wharf, and a
+swarthy man, with a high, hooked nose, like the inverted prow of a ship,
+boarded the schooner, and scratched his head, through its shock of
+stiff, coarse hair, by way of salutation to Vinnie, who came on deck to
+meet him.
+
+"Do' no's you'll like ridin' with me, in a lumber-wagon, on a stiff
+board seat."
+
+"O, I sha'n't mind!" said Vinnie, who was only too glad to go.
+
+"What part of the settlement ye goin' to?" he asked, as he lifted one
+end of the trunk, while the captain took up the other.
+
+"To Mr. Betterson's house; Mrs. Betterson is my sister," said Vinnie.
+
+The man dropped his end of the trunk, and turned and glared at her.
+
+"You've got holt o' the wrong man this time!" he said. "I don't take
+nobody in my wagon to the house of no sich a man as Lord Betterson. Ye
+may tell him as much."
+
+"Will you take me to any house near by?" said the astonished Vinnie.
+
+"Not if you're a connection of the Bettersons, I won't for no money!
+I've nothin' to do with that family, but to hate and despise 'em. Tell
+'em that too. But they know it a'ready. My name's Dudley Peakslow."
+
+And, in spite of the captain's remonstrance, the angry man turned his
+back upon the schooner, and drove off in his wagon.
+
+It took Vinnie a minute to recover from the shock his rude conduct gave
+her. Then she smiled faintly, and said,--
+
+"It's too bad I couldn't have a ride in his old wagon! But he wouldn't
+be very agreeable company, would he?" So she tried to console herself
+for the disappointment. She had thought all along: "If I can do no
+better, I will take the stage to North Mills; Jack will help me get over
+to my sister's from there." And it now seemed as if she might have to
+take that route.
+
+The schooner was discharging her miscellaneous freight of Eastern
+merchandise,--dry goods, groceries, hardware, boots and shoes,--and the
+captain was too much occupied to do anything more for her that
+afternoon.
+
+She grew restless under the delay; and feeling that she ought to make
+one more effort to find a conveyance direct to Long Woods, she set off
+alone to make inquiries for herself.
+
+The first place she visited was a hotel she had noticed in her morning's
+walk,--the Farmers' Home; and she was just going away from the door,
+having met with no success, when a slim youth, carrying his head
+jauntily on one side, came tripping after her, and accosted her with an
+apologetic smile and lifted hat.
+
+"Excuse me,--I was told you wanted to find somebody going out to Mr.
+Betterson's at Long Woods."
+
+"O yes! do you know of anybody I can ride with?"
+
+"I am in a way of knowing,--why, yes,--I think there is a gentleman
+going out early to-morrow morning. A gentleman and his daughter. Wife
+and daughter, in fact. A two-seated wagon; you might ride on the
+hind-seat with the daughter. Stopping at the Prairie Flower."
+
+"O, thank you! And can I go there and find them?"
+
+"I am going that way, and, if you please, I will introduce you," said
+the youth.
+
+Vinnie replied that, if he would give her their names, she would save
+him the trouble. For, despite his affability, there was something about
+him she distrusted and disliked,--an indefinable air of insincerity, and
+a look out of his eyes of gay vagabondism and dissipation.
+
+He declared that it would be no trouble; moreover, he could not at that
+moment recall the names; so, as there was no help for it, she let him
+walk by her side.
+
+At the Prairie Flower,--which was not quite so lovely or fragrant a
+public-house as the name had led her to expect,--he showed her into a
+small, dingy sitting-room, up one flight of stairs, and went to speak
+with the clerk.
+
+"The ladies will be here presently," he said, returning to her in a few
+minutes. "Meanwhile I thought I would order some refreshments." And he
+was followed into the room by a waiter bringing a basket of cake and two
+glasses of wine.
+
+[Illustration: TOO OBLIGING BY HALF.]
+
+"No refreshments for me!" cried Vinnie, quickly.
+
+"The other ladies will like some," said the youth, carelessly. "Intimate
+friends of mine. Just a little cake and sweet wine."
+
+"But you have ordered only two glasses! And a few minutes ago you
+couldn't think of their names,--those intimate friends of yours!"
+returned Vinnie, with sparkling eyes.
+
+The youth took up a glass, threw himself back in a chair, and laughed.
+
+"It's a very uncommon name,--Jenkins; no, Judkins; something like that.
+Neighbors of the Bettersons; intimate friends of _theirs_, I mean. You
+think I'm not acquainted out there? Ask Carrie! ask the boys, hi,
+hi!"--with a giggle and a grimace, as he sipped the wine.
+
+"You do really know my sister Caroline?" said Vinnie.
+
+The youth set down his glass and stared.
+
+"Your sister! I wondered who in thunder you could be, inquiring your way
+to Betterson's; but I never dreamed--Excuse me, I wouldn't have played
+such a joke, if I had known!"
+
+"What joke?" Vinnie demanded.
+
+"Why, there's no Jenkins,--Judkins,--what did I call their names? I just
+wanted to have a little fun, and find you out."
+
+Vinnie trembled with indignation. She started to go.
+
+"But you haven't found _me_ out," he said, with an impudent chuckle.
+
+"I've found out all I wish to know of you," said Vinnie, ready to cry
+with vexation. "I've come alone all the way from my home in Western New
+York, and met nobody who wasn't kind and respectful to me, till I
+reached Chicago to-day."
+
+The wretch seemed slightly touched by this rebuke; but he laughed again
+as he finished his glass.
+
+"Well, it was a low trick. But't was all in fun, I tell ye. Come, drink
+your wine, and make up; we'll be friends yet. Won't drink? Here goes,
+then!" And he tossed off the contents of the second glass. "Now we'll
+take a little walk, and talk over our Betterson friends by the way."
+
+She was already out of the room. He hastened to her side; she walked
+faster still, and he came tripping lightly after her down the stairs.
+
+Betwixt anger and alarm, she was wondering whether she should try to run
+away from him, or ask the protection of the first person she met, when,
+looking eagerly from the doorway as she hurried out, she saw, across the
+street, a face she knew, and uttered a cry of joy.
+
+"Jack! O Jack!"
+
+It seemed almost like a dream, that it should indeed be Jack, then and
+there. He paused, glanced up and down, then across at the girlish figure
+starting toward him, and rushed over to her, reaching out both hands,
+and exclaiming,--
+
+"Vinnie Dalton! is it you?"
+
+In the surprise and pleasure of this unexpected meeting, she forgot all
+about the slim youth she was so eager to avoid a moment before. When she
+thought of him again, and looked about her, he had disappeared, having
+slipped behind her, and skipped back up the stairs with amazing agility
+at sight of Jack.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+JACK AND VINNIE IN CHICAGO.
+
+
+Vinnie poured out her story to her friend as they walked along the
+street.
+
+Jack was so incensed, when she came to the upshot of the adventure, that
+he wished to go back at once and make the slim youth's acquaintance. But
+she would not permit so foolish a thing.
+
+"It is all over now. What good would it do for you to see him?"
+
+"I don't know; I'd like to tell the scamp what I think of him, if
+nothing more. He wanted a little fun, did he?" And Jack stood, pale with
+wrath, looking back at the hotel.
+
+"If it hadn't been for him, I might not have seen you," said Vinnie.
+"Maybe you can't forgive him that!"
+
+Jack looked into her eyes, full of a sweet, mirthful light, and forgot
+his anger.
+
+"I'll forgive him the rest, _because_ of that. Besides, I've no time to
+waste on him. I'm hunting for my horse."
+
+He had written to Vinnie of his loss; and she was now eager to know if
+Snowfoot had been heard from.
+
+"Not a hair of him!" said Jack. "I got an old hunter and trapper to go
+with me the next day; we struck his trail on the prairie, and after a
+deal of trouble tracked him to a settler's cabin. There the rogue had
+stopped, and asked for supper and lodgings, which he promised to pay for
+in the morning. The man and his wife had gone to bed, but they got up,
+fed him and the horse, and then made him up a bed on the cabin floor. He
+pretended to be very careful of his horse, and he had to go out and make
+sure that he was all right before he went to bed; and that was the last
+they saw of him. He bridled Snowfoot, and rode off so slyly that they
+never knew which way he went. He had struck the travelled road, and
+there we lost all trace of him. I went on to Joliet, and looked along
+the canal, and set stablemen to watch for him, while my friend took the
+road to Chicago; but neither of us had any luck. I've hunted all about
+the country for him; and now, for a last chance, I've come to Chicago
+myself."
+
+"How long have you been here?" Vinnie asked.
+
+"Only about two hours; and I must go back to-morrow. I've not much hope
+of finding Snowfoot here; but as I had a chance to ride in with a
+neighbor, I thought best to take advantage of it. Lucky I did! Why
+didn't you write and let somebody know you were coming?"
+
+"I did write to my sister; but I didn't expect anybody to meet me here
+in Chicago, since I couldn't tell just when I should arrive."
+
+"Where are you stopping?"
+
+"On board the schooner that brought me. She is lying quite near here, at
+a wharf in the river."
+
+"Can you stay on board till to-morrow?"
+
+Vinnie thought the captain and his wife would be glad to keep her.
+
+"Though it isn't very nice," she added, "now that they are discharging
+the cargo."
+
+"Perhaps you had better go to the Farmers' Home, where my friend and I
+have put up," said Jack.
+
+"You at the Farmers' Home! Why couldn't I have known it?" said Vinnie.
+"It was there I went to inquire for Long Woods people, and met that
+scape-grace. When do you go home?"
+
+"We start early to-morrow morning. You can go with us as well as not,--a
+good deal better than not!" said the overjoyed Jack. "Nothing but a
+little load of groceries. You shall go home with me to North Mills; Mrs.
+Lanman will be glad to see you. Then I'll drive you over to Long Woods
+in three or four days."
+
+"Three or four days!" exclaimed Vinnie, not daring to be as happy as
+these welcome words might have made her. "I should like much to visit
+your friends; but I must get to my sister's as soon as possible."
+
+Jack's face clouded.
+
+"Vinnie, I'm afraid you don't know what you have undertaken. I can't
+bear the thought of your going into that family. Why do you? The Lanmans
+will be delighted to have you stay with them."
+
+"O, but I must go where I am needed," Vinnie answered. "And you mustn't
+say a word against it. You must help me, Jack!"
+
+"They need you enough, Heaven knows, Vinnie!" Jack felt that he ought
+not to say another word to discourage her, so he changed the subject.
+"Which way now is your schooner?"
+
+Vinnie said she would show him; but she wished to buy a little present
+for the captain's wife on the way. As they passed along the street, she
+made him tell all he knew of her sister's family; and then asked if he
+had heard from George Greenwood lately.
+
+"Only a few days ago he sent me a magazine with a long story of his in
+it, founded on our adventure with the pickpockets," replied Jack. "He
+writes me a letter about once a month. You hear from him, of course?"
+
+"O yes. And he sends me magazines. He has wonderful talent, don't you
+think so?"
+
+And the two friends fell to praising the absent George.
+
+"I wonder if you have noticed one thing?" said Vinnie.
+
+"What, in particular?"
+
+"That Grace Manton has been the heroine of all his last stories."
+
+"I fancied I could see you in one or two of them," replied Jack.
+
+"Perhaps. But I am not the heroine; I am only the goody-goody girl,"
+laughed Vinnie. "When you see beauty, talent, accomplishments,--that's
+Grace. I am glad they are getting on so well together."
+
+"So am I!" said Jack, with an indescribable look at the girl beside him.
+
+"Mr. Manton is dead,--I suppose you know it," said Vinnie.
+
+Jack knew it, and was not sorry; though he had much to say in praise of
+the man's natural talents, which dissipation had ruined.
+
+The purchase made, they visited the schooner, where it was decided that
+Vinnie should remain on board. Jack then left her, in order to make the
+most of his time looking about the city for his horse.
+
+He continued his search, visiting every public stable, making inquiries
+of the hostlers, and nailing up or distributing a small handbill he had
+had printed, offering a reward of twenty dollars for "a light, reddish
+roan horse, with white forefeet, a conspicuous scar low down on the near
+side, just behind the shoulder, and a smaller scar on the off hip."
+
+In the mean time he kept a sharp lookout for roan horses in the streets.
+But all to no purpose. There were roan horses enough, but he could see
+and hear nothing of the particular roan he wanted.
+
+In the evening he went to see Vinnie on board the schooner, and talked
+of his ill success.
+
+"A light roan? that's a kind of gray, ain't it?" said the captain of the
+Heron. "That bearish fellow from Long Woods, who wouldn't take into his
+wagon anybody connected with the Bettersons--"
+
+"Dudley Peakslow,--I sha'n't soon forget his name!" said Vinnie.
+
+"He drove such a horse," said the captain; "though I didn't notice the
+forefeet or any scars."
+
+Jack laughed, and shook his head.
+
+"That's what everybody says. But the scars and forefeet are the main
+points in my case. I wouldn't give a cent for a roan horse without 'em!"
+Then he changed the subject. "It's a beautiful night, Vinnie; let's go
+for a little stroll on the lake shore, and forget all about
+roans,--light roans, dark roans, white feet, black, blue, green, yellow
+feet! Perhaps your friends will go with us."
+
+Jack hoped they wouldn't, I regret to say. But the night was so
+pleasant, and the captain's wife had become so attached to Vinnie, that
+she persuaded her husband to go.
+
+The lake shore was charming; for in those early days it had not been
+marred by breakwaters and docks. The little party strolled along the
+beach, with the sparkling waves dashing at their feet, and the lake
+spread out before them, vast, fluctuating, misty-gray, with here and
+there a white crest tossing in the moon.
+
+Singing snatches of songs with Vinnie, telling stories with the captain,
+skipping pebbles on the lake,--ah, how happy Jack was! He was glad,
+after all, that they had all come together, since there was now no
+necessity of Vinnie's hastening back to the schooner, to prevent her
+friends from sitting up for her.
+
+"I've been in this port fifty times," said the captain, "but I've never
+been down here before, neither has my wife; and I'm much obliged to you
+for bringing us."
+
+"I like the lake," said his wife, "but I like it best from shore."
+
+"O, so do I!" said Vinnie, filled with the peace and beauty of the
+night.
+
+It was late when they returned to the schooner. There Jack took his
+leave, bidding Vinnie hold herself in readiness to be taken off, with
+her trunk, in a grocer's wagon early the next morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+JACK'S NEW HOME.
+
+
+In due time the wagon was driven to the wharf; and Vinnie, parting from
+the captain and his wife with affectionate good-byes, rode out in the
+freshness of the morning across the great plain stretching back from the
+city.
+
+The plain left behind, groves and streams and high prairies were passed;
+all wearing a veil of romance to the eye of the young girl, which saw
+everything by its own light of youth and hope.
+
+But the roads were in places rough and full of ruts; the wagon was
+pretty well loaded; and Vinnie was weary enough, when, late in the
+afternoon, they approached the thriving new village of North Mills.
+
+"Here we come to Lanman's nurseries," said Jack, as they passed a field
+of rich dark soil, ruled with neat rows of very young shrubs and trees.
+"Felton is interested in the business with him; and I work for them a
+good deal when we've no surveying to do. They're hardly established yet;
+but they're sure of a great success within a few years, for all this
+immense country must have orchards and garden fruits, you know. Ah,
+there's Lion!"
+
+The dog came bounding to the front wheels, whining, barking, leaping
+up, wagging his tail, and finally rolling over in the dirt, to show his
+joy at seeing again his young master.
+
+The Lanman cottage was close by; and there in the door was its young
+mistress, who, warned by the dog of the wagon's approach, had come out
+to see if Jack's horse was with him.
+
+"No news of Snowfoot?" she said, walking to the gate as the wagon
+stopped.
+
+"Not a bit. But I've had good luck, after all. For here is--who do you
+suppose? Vinnie Dalton! Vinnie, this is the friend you have heard me
+speak of, Mrs. Annie Felton Lanman."
+
+Vinnie went out of the wagon almost into the arms of Annie; so well had
+both been prepared by Jack to know and to love each other.
+
+Of course the young girl received a cordial welcome; and to her the
+little cottage seemed the most charming in the world. It contained few
+luxuries, but everything in it was arranged with neatness and taste, and
+exhaled an atmosphere of sweetness and comfort which mere luxury can
+never give.
+
+"Lion has been watching for you with the anxiety of a lover all the
+afternoon," Mrs. Lanman said to Jack, as, side by side, with Vinnie
+between them, they walked up the path to the door. "And he is jealous
+because you don't give him more attention."
+
+"Not jealous; but he wants to be introduced to Vinnie. Here, old
+fellow!"
+
+Vinnie was delighted to make acquaintance with the faithful dog, and
+listened eagerly to Annie's praise of him as they entered the house.
+
+"He is useful in doing our errands," said Mrs. Lanman. "If I wish to
+send him to the grocery for anything, I write my order on a piece of
+paper, put it into a basket, and give the basket to him, just lifting my
+finger, and saying, 'Go to the grocery, go to the grocery,' twice; and
+he never makes a mistake. To-day, Jack, for the first time, he came home
+without doing his errand."
+
+"Why, Lion! I'm surprised at you!" said Jack; while Lion lay down on the
+floor, looking very much abashed.
+
+"I sent him for butter, which we wanted to use at dinner. As I knew,
+when he came back, that the order, which I placed in a dish in the
+basket, had not been touched, I sent him again. 'Don't come home,' I
+said, 'till somebody gives you the butter.' He then went, and didn't
+return at all. So, as dinner-time came, I sent my brother to look after
+him. He found the grocery closed, and Lion waiting with his basket on
+the steps."
+
+"The grocer is sick," Jack explained; "his son had gone to town with me;
+and so the clerk was obliged to shut up the store when he went to
+dinner." And he praised and patted Lion, to let him know that they were
+not blaming him for his failure to bring the butter.
+
+"One day," said Annie, "he had been sent to the butcher's for a piece of
+meat. On his way home he saw a small dog of his acquaintance engaged in
+a desperate fight with a big dog,--as big as Lion himself. At first he
+ran up to them much excited; then he seemed to remember his basket of
+meat. He couldn't go into the fight with that, and he was too prudent to
+set it down in the street. For a moment he looked puzzled; then he ran
+to the grocery, which was close by,--the same place where we send him
+for things; but instead of holding up his basket before one of the men,
+as he does when his errand is with them, he went and set it carefully
+down behind a barrel in a corner. Then he rushed out and gave the big
+dog a severe punishing. The men in the grocery watched him; and, knowing
+that he would return for the basket, they hid it in another place, to
+see what he would do. He went back into the store, to the corner behind
+the barrel, and appeared to be in great distress. He snuffed and
+whimpered about the store for a while, then ran up to the youngest of
+the men--"
+
+"Horace,--the young fellow who came out with us to-day," commented Jack.
+"He is full of his fun; and Lion knew that it would be just like him to
+play such a trick."
+
+--"He ran up to Horace," Annie continued, "and barked furiously; and
+became at last so fiercely threatening, that it was thought high time to
+give him the basket. Lion took it and ran home in extraordinary haste;
+but it was several days before he would have anything more to do with
+Horace."
+
+"Who can say, after this, that dogs do not think?" said the admiring
+Vinnie.
+
+"Mr. Lanman thinks he has some St. Bernard blood," said Jack, "and that
+is what gives him his intelligence. He knows just what we are talking
+about now; and see! he hardly knows whether to be proud or ashamed. I
+don't approve of his fighting, on ordinary occasions; and I've had to
+punish him for it once or twice. The other evening, as I was coming home
+from a hunt after my horse, I saw two dogs fighting near the saw-mill."
+
+Jack had got so far when Lion, who had seemed to take pleasure in being
+in the room till that moment, got up very quietly and went out with
+drooping ears and tail.
+
+"He knows what is coming, and doesn't care to hear it. There's a little
+humbug about Lion, as there is about the most of us. It was growing
+dark, and the dogs were a little way off, and I wasn't quite sure of
+Lion; but some boys who saw the fight told me it was he, and I called to
+him. But what do you think he did? Instead of running to greet me, as he
+always does when he sees me return after an absence, he fought a little
+longer, then pretended to be whipped, and ran around the saw-mill,
+followed by the other dog. The other dog came back, but Lion didn't. I
+was quite surprised, when I got home, to see him rush out to meet me in
+an ecstasy of delight, as if he then saw me for the first time. His
+whole manner seemed to say, 'I am tickled to see you, Jack! and if you
+think you saw me fighting the sawyer's dog just now, you're much
+mistaken.' I don't know but I might have been deceived, in spite of the
+boys; but one thing betrayed him,--he was wet. In order to get home
+before me, without passing me on the road, he had swum the river."
+
+"Now you must tell the story of the chickens," said Annie.
+
+"Another bit of humbug," laughed Jack. "Our neighbors' chickens trouble
+us by scratching in our yard, and I have told Lion he must keep them
+out. But I noticed that sometimes, even when he had been on guard, there
+were signs that the chickens had been there and scratched. So I got Mrs.
+Lanman to watch him for two or three days, while he watched the
+chickens. Now Lion is very fond of company; so, as soon as I was out of
+sight, he would let the chickens come in, and scratch and play all about
+him, while he would lie with his nose on his paws and blink at them as
+good-naturedly as possible. But he kept an eye out for me all the while,
+and the moment I came in sight he would jump up, and go to frightening
+away the chickens with a great display of vigor and fidelity. So you
+see, Lion isn't a perfect character, by any means. I could tell you a
+good deal more about his peculiarities; but I think you are too tired
+now to listen to any more dog stories."
+
+Jack carried Vinnie's trunk to a cosey little room; and there she had
+time to rest and make herself presentable, before Mrs. Lanman came to
+tell her that tea was ready.
+
+"See here, Vinnie, a minute!" said Jack, peeping from a half-opened
+door. "Don't make a noise!" he whispered, as if there were a great
+mystery within. "I'll show you something very precious."
+
+Mrs. Lanman followed, smiling, as Jack led Vinnie to a crib, lifted a
+light veil, and discovered a lovely little cherub of a child, just
+opening its soft blue eyes, and stretching out its little rosy hands,
+still dewy with sleep.
+
+"O how sweet!" said Vinnie, thrilled with love and tenderness at the
+sight.
+
+"She has a smile for you, see!" said the pleased young mother.
+
+Of course Vinnie had never seen so pretty a baby, such heavenly eyes, or
+such cunning little hands.
+
+"The hands are little," said Jack, in a voice which had an unaccustomed
+tremor in it; "but they are stronger than a giant's; they have hold of
+all our heart-strings."
+
+"I never knew a boy so fond of a baby as Jack is," said Annie.
+
+"O, but I shouldn't be so fond of any other baby!" Jack replied, bending
+down to give the little thing a fond caress.
+
+As they went out to tea, there was a happy light on all their faces, as
+if some new, deep note of harmony had just been struck in their hearts.
+
+At tea Vinnie made the acquaintance of Annie's brother and husband, and
+Jack's friends, Mr. Forrest Felton and Mr. Percy Lanman, and--so
+pleasant and genial were their ways--felt at home in their presence at
+once. This was a great relief to her; for she felt very diffident at
+meeting men whom she had heard Jack praise so highly.
+
+Any one could see that Vinnie was not accustomed to what is called
+society; but her native manners were so simple and sincere, and there
+was such an air of fresh, young, joyous, healthy life about her, that
+she produced an effect upon beholders which the most artificially
+refined young lady might have envied.
+
+Jack watched her and Annie a good deal slyly; and there was in his
+expression a curious mixture of pride and anxiety, as if he were trying
+to look at each with the other's eyes, and thinking how they must like
+each other, yet having some fears lest they might not see all he saw to
+admire.
+
+Vinnie was made to talk a good deal of her journey; and she told the
+story with so much simplicity, speaking with unfeigned gratitude and
+affection of the friendships she had made, and touching with quiet
+mirthfulness upon the droll events, as if she hardly knew herself that
+they were droll, that all--and especially Jack--were charmed.
+
+But she had not the least idea of "showing off." Indeed, she thought
+scarcely at all of what others thought of her; but said often to
+herself, "What a beautiful home Jack has, and what pleasant
+companions!"
+
+After tea she must see more of the baby; then Jack wanted to show her
+the greenhouses and the nurseries; and then all settled down to a social
+evening.
+
+"Vinnie is pretty tired," said Jack, "and I think a little music will
+please her better than anything else."
+
+And so a little concert was got up for her entertainment.
+
+Forrest Felton was a fine performer on the flute; Mr. Lanman played the
+violin, and his wife the piano; and they discoursed some excellent
+music. Then, still better, there was singing. The deep-chested Forrest
+had a superb bass voice; Lanman a fine tenor; Annie's voice was light,
+but exceedingly sweet and expressive; and they sang several pieces
+together, to her own accompaniment on the piano. Then Lanman said,--
+
+"Now it is your turn, Jack."
+
+"But you know," replied Jack, "I never play or sing for anybody, when
+your wife or Forrest is present."
+
+"True; but you can dance."
+
+"O yes! a dance, Jack!" cried Annie.
+
+Vinnie clapped her hands. "Has Jack told you," she said, "how, on the
+steamboat going from Albany to New York, after they had had their
+pockets picked, he and George Greenwood collected a little
+money,--George playing the flute and Jack dancing, for the amusement of
+the passengers?"
+
+Jack laughed, and looked at his shoes.
+
+"Well, come to the kitchen, where there's no carpet on the floor, and
+I'll give you what I call the 'Canal Driver's Hornpipe.' Bring your
+flute, Forrest."
+
+So they went to the kitchen; and all stood, while Jack, with wild grace
+of attitude and wonderful ease and precision of movement, performed one
+of his most difficult and spirited dances.
+
+When it was ended, in the midst of the laughter and applause, he caught
+up a hat, and gayly passed it around for pennies. But while the men were
+feeling in their pockets, he appeared suddenly to remember where he was.
+
+"Beg pardon," he cried, sailing his hat into a corner, and whirling on
+his heel,--"I forgot myself; I thought I was on the deck of the
+steamboat!"
+
+This closed the evening's entertainment.
+
+When Vinnie, retiring to her room, laid her head on the pillow, she
+thought of the night before and of this night, and asked her heart if it
+could ever again know two evenings so purely happy.
+
+Then a great wave of anxiety swept over her mind, as she thought of the
+other home, to which she must hasten on the morrow.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+VINNIE'S FUTURE HOME.
+
+
+A lively sensation was produced, the next forenoon, when a youth and a
+girl, in a one-horse wagon, with a big dog and a small trunk, arrived at
+Lord Betterson's "castle."
+
+Link dashed into the house, screaming, "They've come! they've come!"
+
+"Who has come?" gasped poor Mrs. Betterson, with a start of alarm,
+glancing her eye about the disordered room.
+
+"Jack What's-his-name! the fellow that shot the deer and lost his horse.
+It's Aunt Lavinny with him, I bet!"
+
+And out the boy rushed again, to greet the new-comers.
+
+Lill, who was once more washing dishes at the table, stepped down from
+her stool, and ran out too, drying her fingers on her apron by the way.
+Five-year-old Chokie got up from his holes in the earth by the doorstep,
+and stood with dangling hands and sprawling fingers, grinning,
+dirty-faced.
+
+Vinnie, springing to the ground with Jack's help, at the side door
+caught Lill in her arms, and gave her an ardent kiss.
+
+"I have heard of you!" she said; for she had recognized the bright,
+wistful face.
+
+"Dear auntie!" said the child, with tears and smiles of joy, "I'm so
+glad you've come!"
+
+"Here is Link--my friend Link," said Jack. "Don't overlook him."
+
+"I've heard a good deal about you too, Link!" said Vinnie, embracing him
+also, but not quite so impulsively.
+
+"Ye needn't mind kissing me!" said Link, bashfully turning his face.
+"And as for him,"--as she passed on to the five-year-old,--"that's
+Chokie; he's a reg'lar prairie gopher for digging holes; you won't find
+a spot on him big as a sixpence clean enough to kiss, I bet ye two
+million dollars!"
+
+[Illustration: LINK DOESN'T CARE TO BE KISSED.]
+
+Vinnie did not accept the wager, convinced, probably, that she would
+lose it if she did. As she bent over the child, however, the report of a
+kiss was heard,--a sort of shot in the air, not designed to come very
+near the mark.
+
+"I'm didding a well," said Chokie, in a solemn voice, "so the boys won't
+have to go to the spring for water."
+
+Mrs. Betterson tottered to the door, convulsively wrapping her red shawl
+about her.
+
+"Lavinia! Is it sister Lavinia?"
+
+At sight of her, so pale and feeble, Vinnie was much affected. She could
+hardly speak; but, supporting the emaciated form in her strong,
+embracing arms, she led her back into the house.
+
+"You are so good to come!" said Mrs. Betterson, weeping, as she sank in
+her chair. "I am worse than when I wrote to you; and the baby is no
+better; and Cecie--poor Cecie! though she can sit up but little, she
+does more than any of us for the sick little thing."
+
+Vinnie turned to the lounge, where Cecie, with the baby in her arms, lay
+smiling with bright, moist eyes upon the new-comer. She bent over and
+kissed them both; and, at sight of the puny infant,--so pitiful a
+contrast to Mrs. Lanman's fair and healthy child,--she felt her heart
+contract with grief and her eyes fill.
+
+Then, as she turned away with an effort at self-control, and looked
+about the room, she must have noticed, too, the painful contrast between
+Jack's home and this, which was to be hers; and have felt a sinking of
+the heart, which it required all her strength and courage to overcome.
+
+"We are not looking fit to be seen; I know it, Lavinia!" sighed Mrs.
+Betterson. "But you'll excuse it--you've already excused so many things
+in the past! It seems a dreadful, unnatural thing for _our_ family to be
+so--so very--yet don't think we are absolutely reduced, Lavinia. Mr.
+Betterson's connections, as everybody knows, are very wealthy and
+aristocratic, and they are sure to do something for him soon. This is my
+husband, sister Lavinia." And, with a faint simper of satisfaction, she
+looked up at a person who just then entered from an adjoining room.
+
+He was a tall, well-made man, who looked (Vinnie could not help
+thinking) quite capable of doing something for himself. He might have
+been called fine-looking, but that his fine looks, like his gentility,
+of which he made a faded show in his dress and manners, appeared to have
+gone somewhat to seed. He greeted Vinnie with polite condescension, said
+a few commonplace words, settled his dignified chin in his limp dicky,
+which was supported by a high, tight stock (much frayed about the
+edges), and went on out of the house.
+
+"Now you have seen him!" whispered Mrs. Betterson, as if it had been a
+great event in Vinnie's life. "Very handsome, and perfectly well-bred,
+as you observe. Not at all the kind of man to be neglected by his
+family, aristocratic as they are; do you think he is? Yes, my dear
+Lavinia," she added, with a sickly smile, "you have seen a real, live
+Betterson!"
+
+These evidences of a foolish pride surviving affliction made poor Vinnie
+more heartsick than anything else; and for a moment the brave girl was
+almost overcome with discouragement.
+
+In the meanwhile the real, live Betterson walked out into the yard,
+where Jack--who had not cared to follow Vinnie into the house--was
+talking with Link.
+
+"Will you walk in, sir?" And the stately Betterson neck bent slightly in
+its stiff stock.
+
+"No, I thank you," replied Jack. "But I suppose this trunk goes in."
+
+"Ah! to be sure. Lincoln,"--with a wave of the aristocratic Betterson
+hand,--"show the young man where to put the trunk. He can take it to
+Cecie's room."
+
+"I can, can I? That's a privilege!" thought Jack. He was perfectly
+willing to be a porter, or anything else, in a good cause; and it was a
+delight for him to do Vinnie a service; but why did the noble Betterson
+stand there and give directions about the trunk, in that pompous way,
+instead of taking hold of one end of it? Jack, who had a lively spirit,
+and a tongue of his own, was prompted to say something sarcastic, but he
+wisely forbore.
+
+"I'll place it here for the present," he said, and set the trunk down by
+the doorstep. He thought it would be better for him to see Vinnie and
+bid her good-by a little later, after the meeting between the sisters
+should be well over; so he turned to Link, and asked where his big
+brothers were.
+
+"I d'n' know," said Link; "guess they're down in the lot hunting prairie
+hens."
+
+"Let's go and find 'em," said Jack.
+
+Both Link and Lion were delighted with this proposal, and they set off
+in high glee, boy and dog capering at each side of the more steady-going
+Jack.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+WHY JACK DID NOT FIRE AT THE PRAIRIE CHICKEN.
+
+
+"A well?" said Jack, as they passed a curb behind the house. "I thought
+you had to go to the spring for water."
+
+"So we do," said Link.
+
+"Why don't you use the well?"
+
+"I d'n' know; 't ain't good for anything. 'T ain't deep enough."
+
+"Why wasn't it dug deeper?"
+
+"I d'n' know; father got out of patience, I guess, or out of money. 'T
+was a wet time, and the water came into it, so they stunned it up; and
+now it's dry all summer."
+
+They passed a field on the sunny slope, and Jack said, "What's here?"
+
+"I d'n' know; _'t was_ potatoes, but it's run all to weeds."
+
+"Why didn't you hoe them?"
+
+"I d'n' know; folks kind o' neglected 'em, till 't was too late."
+
+Beyond the potatoes was another crop, which the weeds, tall as they
+were, could not hide.
+
+"Corn?" said Jack.
+
+"Meant for corn," replied Link. "But the cattle and hogs have been in
+it, and trampled down the rows."
+
+"I should think so! They look like the last rows of summer!" Jack said.
+"Why don't you keep the cattle and hogs out?"
+
+"I d'n' know; 't ain't much of a fence; hogs run under and cattle jump
+over."
+
+"Plenty of timber close by,--why don't your folks make a better fence?"
+
+"I d'n' know; they don't seem to take a notion."
+
+Jack noticed that the river was quite near, and asked if there was good
+boating.
+
+"I d'n' know,--pretty good, only when the water's too low."
+
+"Do you keep a boat?"
+
+"Not exactly,--we never had one of our own," said Link. "But one came
+floating down the river, and the boys nabbed that. A fust-rate boat,
+only it leaked like a sieve."
+
+"Leaked? Doesn't it leak now?"
+
+"No?" said Link, stoutly. "They hauled it up, and last winter they
+worked on it, odd spells, and now it don't leak a drop."
+
+Jack was surprised to hear of so much enterprise in the Betterson
+family, and asked,--
+
+"Stopped all the leaks in the old boat! They puttied and painted it, I
+suppose?"
+
+"No, they didn't."
+
+"Calked and pitched it, then?"
+
+"No, they didn't."
+
+"What did they do to it?"
+
+"Made kindling-wood of it," said Link, laughing, and hitching up his one
+suspender.
+
+Jack laughed too, and changed the subject.
+
+"Is that one of your brothers with a gun?"
+
+"That's Wad; Rufe is down on the grass."
+
+"What sort of a crop is that,--buckwheat?"
+
+Link grinned. "There's something funny about that! Ye see, a
+buckwheat-lot is a great place for prairie hens. So one day I took the
+old gun, and the powder and shot you gave me for carrying you home that
+night, and went in, and scared up five or six, and fired at 'em, but I
+didn't hit any. Wad came along and yelled at me. 'Don't you know any
+better 'n to be trampling down the buckwheat?' says he. 'Out of there,
+quicker!' And he took the gun away from me. But he'd seen one of the
+hens I started light again on the edge of the buckwheat; so he went in
+to find her. 'You're trampling the buckwheat yourself!' says I. 'No, I
+ain't,' says he,--'I step between the spears; and I'm coming out in a
+minute.' He stayed in, though, about an hour, and went all over the
+patch, and shot two prairie chickens. Then Rufe came along, and he was
+mad enough, 'cause Wad was treading down the buckwheat. 'Come out of
+that!' says he, 'or I'll go in after ye, and put that gun where you
+won't see it again.' So Wad came out; and the sight of his chickens made
+Rufe's eyes shine. 'Did ye shoot _them_ in the buckwheat?' says he.
+'Yes,' says Wad; 'and I could shoot plenty more; the patch is full of
+'em.' Rufe said he wanted the gun to go and shoot ducks with, on the
+river; but he didn't find any ducks, and coming along back he thought he
+would try _his_ luck in the buckwheat,--treading between the spears! He
+had shot three prairie chickens, when father came along, and scolded
+him, and made him come out. 'I've heard you fire twenty times,' says
+father; 'you're wasting powder and ruining the crop. Let _me_ take the
+gun.' 'But _you_ mustn't ruin the crop,' says Rufe. Father's a splendid
+shot,--can drop a bird every time,--only he don't like to go hunting
+very often. He thought 't would pay for _him_ to go through the patch
+_once_; besides, he said, if the birds were getting the buckwheat, we
+might as well get the birds. He thought _he_ could tread between the
+spears! Well, since then," said Link, "we've just made a hunting-ground
+of that patch, always treading between the spears till lately; now it's
+got so trampled it never'll pay to cut it; so we just put it through.
+See that hen!"
+
+There was a sound of whirring wings,--a flash, a loud report, a curl of
+smoke,--a broken-winged grouse shooting down aslant into the buckwheat,
+and a young hunter running to the spot.
+
+"That's the way he does it," said Rufe, getting up from the grass.
+
+He greeted Jack good-naturedly, inquired about Snowfoot, heard with
+surprise of Vinnie's arrival, and finally asked if Jack would like to
+try his hand at a shot.
+
+"I should," replied Jack, "if it wasn't for treading down your
+buckwheat."
+
+"That's past caring for," said Rufe, with a laugh. "Here, Wad, bring us
+the gun."
+
+"Is that your land the other side of the fence?" Jack asked.
+
+"That lot belongs to old Peakslow," said Rufe, speaking the name with
+great contempt. "And he pretends to claim a big strip this side too.
+That's what caused the feud between our families."
+
+"He hates you pretty well, I should judge," replied Jack; and he told
+the story, as Vinnie had told it to him, of her encounter with Peakslow
+on the deck of the schooner.
+
+"He's the ugliest man!" Rufe declared, reddening angrily. "You may thank
+your stars you've nothing to do with him. Now take the gun,"--Wad had by
+this time brought it,--"go through to the fence and back, and be ready
+to fire the moment a bird rises. Keep your dog back, and look out and
+not hit one of Peakslow's horses, the other side of the fence."
+
+"He brought home a new horse from Chicago a day or two ago," said Wad;
+"and he's just been out there looking at him and feeling for ringbones.
+If he's with him now, and if you _should_ happen to shoot _one_ of 'em,
+I hope it won't be the horse!"
+
+Jack laughed, and started to go through the buckwheat. He had got about
+half-way, when a hen rose a few feet from him, at his right. He was not
+much accustomed to shooting on the wing; and it is much harder to hit
+birds rising suddenly, at random, in that way, than when they are
+started by a trained dog. But good luck made up for what he lacked in
+skill; and at his fire the hen dropped fluttering in the grass that
+bordered the buckwheat.
+
+[Illustration: SHOT ON THE WING.]
+
+"I'll pick her up!" cried Link; and he ran to do so; while Wad carried
+Jack the powder and shot for another load.
+
+"But I ought not to use up your ammunition in this way!" Jack protested.
+
+"I guess you can afford to," replied Wad. "It was mostly bought with
+money we sold that fawn-skin for."
+
+Jack was willing enough to try another shot; and, the piece reloaded, he
+resumed his tramp.
+
+He had nearly reached the fence, when a bird rose between it and him,
+and flew over Peakslow's pasture. Jack had brought the gun to his
+shoulder, and was about to pull the trigger, when he remembered
+Peakslow's horses, and stopped to give a hasty glance over the fence.
+
+Down went the gun, and Jack stood astonished, the bird forgotten, and
+his eyes fixed on an object beyond.
+
+What Wad said of their neighbor having brought out a new horse from
+Chicago, together with what the captain of the Heron said of one of
+Peakslow's span being a light roan, rushed through his thoughts. He ran
+up to the fence, and looked eagerly over; then gave a shout of joy.
+
+After all his futile efforts to find him,--chasing about the country,
+offering rewards, scattering hand-bills,--there was the lost horse, the
+veritable Snowfoot, grazing quietly in the amiable Mr. Peakslow's
+pasture!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+SNOWFOOT'S NEW OWNER.
+
+
+Jack left the gun standing by the fence, leaped over, gave a familiar
+whistle, and called, "Come, Snowfoot! Co' jock! co' jock!"
+
+There were two horses feeding in the pasture, not far apart. But only
+one heeded the call, lifted head, pricked up ears, and answered with a
+whinny. It was the lost Snowfoot, giving unmistakable signs of pleasure
+and recognition, as he advanced to meet his young master.
+
+Jack threw his arms about the neck of his favorite, and hugged and
+patted and I don't know but kissed him; while the Betterson boys went up
+to the fence and looked wonderingly over.
+
+In a little while, as they did not venture to go to him, Jack led
+Snowfoot by the forelock up to the rails, which they had climbed for a
+better view.
+
+"Is he your horse?" they kept calling to him.
+
+"Don't you see?" replied Jack, when he had come near enough to show the
+white feet and the scars; and his face gleamed with glad excitement.
+"Look! he and the dog know each other!"
+
+It was not a Betterson, but a Peakslow style of fence, and Lion could
+not leap it; but the two animals touched noses, with tokens of friendly
+recognition, between the rails.
+
+"I never expected such luck!" said Jack. "I've not only found my horse,
+but I've saved the reward offered."
+
+"You haven't got him yet," said Rufe. "I guess Peakslow will have
+something to say about that."
+
+"What he says won't make much difference. I've only to prove property,
+and take possession. A stolen horse is the owner's, wherever he finds
+him. But of course I'll act in a fair and open way in the matter; I'll
+go and talk with Peakslow, and if he's a reasonable man--"
+
+"Reasonable!" interrupted Wad. "He holds a sixpence so near to his eye,
+that it looks bigger to him than all the rest of the world; he can't see
+reason, nor anything else."
+
+"I'll make him see it. Will you go and introduce me?"
+
+"You'd better not have one of our family introduce you, if you want to
+get anything out of Dud Peakslow!" said Rufe. "We'll wait here."
+
+Jack got over the fence, and walked quickly along on the Betterson side
+of it, followed by Lion, until he reached the road. A little farther
+down was a house; behind the house was a yard; and in the yard was a
+swarthy man with a high, hooked nose, pulling a wheel off a wagon, the
+axletree of which, on that side, was supported by a propped rail. Close
+by was a boy stirring some grease in a pot, with a long stick.
+
+Jack waited until the man had got the wheel off and rested it against
+the wagon; then said,--
+
+"Is this Mr. Peakslow?"
+
+"That happens to be my name," replied the man, scarcely giving his
+visitor a glance, as he turned to take the stick out of the grease, and
+to rub it on the axletree.
+
+The boy, on one knee in the dirt, holding the grease-pot to catch the
+drippings, looked up and grinned at Jack.
+
+"I should like a few minutes' talk with you, Mr. Peakslow, when you are
+at leisure," said Jack, hardly knowing how to introduce his business.
+
+"I'm at leisure now, much as I shall be to-day," said Mr. Peakslow with
+the air of a man who did not let words interfere with work. "I've got to
+grease this wagon, and then harness up and go to haulin'. I haven't had
+a hoss that would pull his share of a decent load till now. Tend to what
+you're about, Zeph!"
+
+"I have called to say," remarked Jack as calmly as he could, though his
+heart was beating fast, "that there is a horse in your pasture which
+belongs to me."
+
+The man straightened his bent back, and looked blackly at the speaker,
+while the grease dripped from the end of the stick.
+
+"A hoss in my pastur' that belongs to you! What do ye mean by that?"
+
+"Perhaps you haven't seen this handbill?" And Jack took the printed
+description of Snowfoot from his pocket, unfolded it, and handed it to
+the astonished Peakslow.
+
+[Illustration: THE AMIABLE MR. PEAKSLOW.]
+
+"'Twenty dollars reward,'" he read. "'Stolen from the owner--a light,
+reddish roan hoss--white forefeet--scar low down on the near side, jest
+behind the shoulder--smaller scar on the off hip.' What's the meanin' of
+all this?" he said, glancing at Jack.
+
+"Isn't it plain enough?" replied Jack, quietly standing his ground.
+"That is the description of the stolen horse; the horse is down in your
+pasture."
+
+"Do you mean to say _I_'ve stole your hoss?" demanded Peakslow, his
+voice trembling with passion.
+
+"Not by any means. He may have passed through a dozen hands since the
+thief had him. All I know is, he is in your possession now."
+
+"And what if he is?"
+
+"Why, naturally a man likes to have what is his own, doesn't he? Suppose
+a man steals your horse; you find him after a while in my stable; is he
+your horse, or mine?"
+
+"But how do I know but this is a conspyracy to cheat me out of a hoss?"
+retorted Peakslow, looking again at the handbill, with a terrible frown.
+"It may have all been cut and dried aforehand. You've your trap sot,
+and, soon as ever the animal is in my hands, ye spring it. How do I know
+the hoss is yourn, even if ye have got a description of him? Anybody can
+make a description of anybody's hoss, and then go and claim him.
+Besides, how happens it a boy like you owns a hoss, anyway?"
+
+In a few words Jack told his story, accounting at once for his
+ownership, and for the scars on the horse's side and hip.
+
+"There are two other scars I can show you, under his belly. I didn't
+mention them in the handbill, because they are not noticeable, unless
+one is looking for them."
+
+"Ye may show me scars all over him, fur's I know," was Peakslow's reply
+to this argument. "That may prove that he's been hurt by suth'n or
+other,--elephant, or not; but it don't prove you ever owned him."
+
+"I can satisfy you with regard to that," said Jack, confidently. "Do you
+object to going down with me and looking at him?"
+
+"Not in the least, only wait till I git this wheel on. Ye may go and
+_see_ the hoss in my presence, but ye can't _take_ the hoss, without I'm
+satisfied you've the best right to him."
+
+"That's all I ask, Mr. Peakslow; I want only what belongs to me. If you
+are a loser, you must look for redress to the man who sold you my
+property; and he must go back on the next man."
+
+"How's that?" put in Zeph, grinning over his grease-pot. "Pa thinks he's
+got a good deal better hoss than he put away; and you ain't agoin' to
+crowd him out of a good bargain, I bet!"
+
+"Hold your tongue!" growled Peakslow. "I can fight my own battles,
+without any of your tongue. I put away a pooty good hoss, and I gin
+fifteen dollars to boot."
+
+"What man did you trade with?" Jack inquired.
+
+"A truckman in Chicago. He liked my hoss, and I liked hisn, and we
+swapped. He wanted twenty dollars, I offered him ten, and we split the
+difference. He won't want to give me back my hoss and my money, now; and
+ye can't blame him. And the next man won't want to satisfy _him_. Grant
+the hoss is stole, for the sake of the argyment," said Peakslow. "I
+maintain that when an animal that's been stole, and sold, and traded,
+finally gits into an honest man's hands, it's right he should stay
+there."
+
+"Even if it's your horse, and the honest man who gets him is your
+neighbor?" queried Jack.
+
+"I do'no'--wal--yes!" said Peakslow. "It's a hard case, but no harder
+one way than t' other."
+
+"But the law looks at it in only one way," replied Jack. "And with
+reason. Men must be careful how they deal with thieves or get hold of
+stolen property. How happens it that you, Mr. Peakslow, didn't know that
+such a horse had been stolen? Some of your neighbors knew it very well."
+
+"Some of my neighbors I don't have nothin' to say to," answered
+Peakslow, gruffly. "If you mean the Bettersons, they're a pack of
+thieves and robbers themselves, and I don't swap words with none of 'em,
+without 't is to tell 'em my mind; that I do, when I have a chance."
+
+"You use pretty strong language when you call them thieves and robbers,
+Mr. Peakslow."
+
+"Strong or not, it's the truth. Hain't they cheated me out o' the best
+part of my farm?"
+
+"The Bettersons--cheated you!" exclaimed Jack.
+
+They were now on the way to the pasture; and Peakslow, in a sort of
+lurid excitement, pointed to the boundary fence.
+
+"My line, by right, runs five or six rod t' other side. I took up my
+claim here, and Betterson bought hisn, 'fore ever the guv'ment survey
+run through. That survey fixed my line 'way over yender in their
+cornfield. And there I claim it belongs, to this day."
+
+"But, Mr. Peakslow, how does it happen that a man like Mr. Betterson has
+been able to rob a man like _you_,--take a part of your farm before your
+very eyes? He is a rather slack, easy man; while you, if I'm not greatly
+mistaken, are in the habit of standing up for your rights."
+
+"I can gin'ly look out for myself," said Peakslow. "And don't suppose
+that Lord Betterson took me down and put his hands in my pockets,
+alone."
+
+"Nine men, with masks on," cried Zeph, "come to our house one night, and
+told pa they'd jest tear his ruf right down over his head, and drive him
+out of the county, if he didn't sign a deed givin' Betterson that land."
+
+"Hold your yawp, Zeph!" muttered Peakslow. "I can tell my own story.
+There was nine of 'em, all armed, and what could I do?"
+
+"This is a most extraordinary story!" exclaimed Jack. "Did you sign the
+deed?"
+
+"I couldn't help myself," said Peakslow.
+
+"It seems to me I _would_ have helped myself, if the land was
+rightfully mine!" cried Jack. "They _might_ tear my house down,--they
+_might_ try to drive me out of the county,--I don't believe I would deed
+away my land, just because they threatened me, and I was afraid."
+
+"It's easy to talk that way," Peakslow replied. "But, come case in
+hand,--the loaded muzzles in your face,--you'd change your mind."
+
+"Didn't they pay for the land they took?"
+
+"Barely nothin'; jest the guv'ment price; dollar 'n' a quarter an acre.
+But jest look at that land to-day,--the best in the State,--wuth twenty
+dollars an acre, if 't is a cent."
+
+"What was Betterson's claim?" Jack asked; "for men don't often do such
+things without some sort of excuse."
+
+"They hild that though the survey gin me the land, it was some Betterson
+had supposed belonged to his purchase. Meanwhile he had j'ined a
+land-claim society, where the members all agreed to stand by one
+another; and that was the reason o' their takin' sich high-handed
+measures with me."
+
+Jack was inclined to cross-question Peakslow, and sift a little this
+astonishing charge against Betterson and the land-claim society. But
+they had now reached the pasture bars, and the question relating to the
+ownership of the horse was to be settled.
+
+The Betterson boys were still sitting on the fence, where Jack had left
+them; but Snowfoot had returned to his grazing.
+
+"Call him," said Jack. "If he doesn't come for you, then see if he will
+come for me."
+
+Peakslow grumblingly declined the test.
+
+"He doesn't always come when I call him," said Jack. "I'll show you what
+I do then. Here, Lion!"
+
+He took from his pocket an ear of corn he had picked by the way, placed
+one end of it between the dog's jaws, saying, "Bring Snowfoot, Lion!
+bring Snowfoot!" and let him through the bars.
+
+Lion trotted into the pasture, trotted straight up to the right horse,
+coaxed and coquetted with him for a minute, and then trotted back.
+Snowfoot followed, leering and nipping, and trying to get the ear of
+corn.
+
+Lion brought the ear to Jack, and Jack gave it to Snowfoot, taking him
+at the same time by the forelock.
+
+"What do you think of that?" he said, looking round in triumph at
+Peakslow.
+
+"I don't see as it's anything to make sich a fuss over," said Peakslow,
+looking angrily across at the spectators on the boundary fence, as they
+cheered the success of the man[oe]uvre. "It shows you've larnt your dog
+tricks,--nothin' more. 'Most any hoss would foller an ear of corn that
+way."
+
+"Why didn't your hoss follow it?"
+
+"The dog didn't go for my hoss."
+
+"Why didn't he go for your horse, as soon as for mine?" urged Jack.
+
+To which Peakslow could only reply,--
+
+"Ye needn't let down the top bar; ye can't take that hoss through! I
+traded for him, and paid boot, and you've got to bring better evidence
+than your say-so, or a dog's trick, 'fore I give up my claim."
+
+"I'll bring you evidence," said Jack, turning away in no little
+impatience and disgust.
+
+He hastened back to Mr. Betterson's house, and was met by the boys as he
+came into the yard.
+
+"What did I tell you?" said Rufe. "Couldn't get him, could you?"
+
+"No, but I will!" replied Jack, untying the horse, which he had left
+hitched to an oak-tree. "I'm going for a witness." He backed the wagon
+around. "Get in, if you like,"--to Rufus.
+
+Rufus did like; and the two rode off together, to the great
+dissatisfaction of Wad and Link, who also wanted to go and see the fun.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+GOING FOR A WITNESS.
+
+
+"Did Peakslow say anything to you about our folks?" Rufe asked.
+
+"I rather think he did!" said Jack; and he repeated the story of the
+land robbery.
+
+Rufe showed his contempt for it by a scornful laugh. "I'll tell you just
+what there is in it; and it will show you the sort of man you have to
+deal with. We haven't an inch of his land. Do you think father is a man
+to crowd a neighbor?"
+
+"And a neighbor like Peakslow! That's just what I told him," said Jack.
+
+"You see," said Rufe, "these claims through here were all taken up
+before the government survey. Most of the settlers were decent men; and
+they knew that when the survey came to be made, there would be trouble
+about the boundaries, if they didn't take measures beforehand to prevent
+it. So they formed a society to protect each other against squatters and
+claim-jumpers, and particularly to settle disputed boundary questions
+between themselves. They all signed a paper, agreeing to 'deed and
+redeed,'--that is, if your land adjoined mine, and the government survey
+didn't correspond with our lines, but gave you, for instance, a part of
+the land I had improved, then you agreed to redeed that part to me, for
+the government price; just as I agreed to redeed to my neighbors what
+the survey might give me of their claims."
+
+"I understand," said Jack.
+
+"Well, father and almost everybody in the county joined the society; but
+there were some who didn't. Peakslow was one."
+
+"What were his objections?"
+
+"He couldn't give any good ones. All he would say was, 'I'll see; I'll
+think about it.' He was just waiting to see if there was any advantage
+to be gained over his neighbors by _not_ joining with them. Finally, the
+survey came through; and the men run what they called a 'random line,'
+which everybody thought, at first, was the true line. According to that,
+the survey would have given us a big strip of Peakslow's farm, including
+his house and barn. That frightened him. He came over, and shook his
+fist in father's face, and threatened I don't know what, if he took the
+land.
+
+"'You really think I ought to redeed to you all your side of our old
+line?' says father.
+
+"'Of course I do!' says Peakslow. 'It's mine; you never claimed it; and
+I'll shoot the fust man who sets foot on 't, to take it away from me.'
+
+"'Then,' says father, 'why don't you join the society, and sign the
+agreement to redeed, with the rest of us? That will save trouble.'
+
+"So Peakslow rushed off in a fearful hurry, and put his name to the
+paper. Then--what do you think? The surveyors, in a few days, run the
+correct line, and that gave Peakslow a strip of _our_ farm."
+
+"Capital!" laughed Jack.
+
+"It wasn't capital for us! He was then, if you will believe it, more
+excited than when the boot seemed to be on the other leg. He vowed that
+the random line was a mere pretence to get him to sign the agreement;
+that it was all a fraud, which he never would submit to; that he
+wouldn't redeed, but that he would have what the survey gave him. That's
+the kind of man he is," added Rufus.
+
+"But he did redeed?"
+
+"Yes, in some such way as he told you. The dispute came before the
+society for arbitration, and of course the decision was in father's
+favor. But Peakslow still held out, and talked of shooting and all that
+sort of thing, till the society got tired of his nonsense. So, one
+night, nine men did give him a call; they had called on a claim-jumper
+down the river a few nights before, and made kindling-wood of his
+shanty; Peakslow knew it, and knew they were not men to be trifled with.
+They told him that if he expected to live in the county, he must sign
+the deed. And he signed it. My father wasn't one of the men, but
+Peakslow turned all his spite against him."
+
+"He imagines he has been wronged," said Jack.
+
+"I suppose so, for he is one of that kind who never can see any side to
+a quarrel but their own. The land is growing more valuable every year;
+he covets it accordingly, and so the ferment in his mind is kept up. Of
+course," Rufe confessed, "we have done, or neglected to do, a good many
+things which have kept adding fuel to the fire; for it's impossible to
+live peaceably alongside of such a selfish, passionate, unreasonable
+neighbor. We boys have taken up the quarrel, and now I owe that Zeph a
+cudgelling, for hurting Cecie."
+
+"How did he hurt her?"
+
+"We had a swing up in the woods. The Peakslows are always interfering in
+our affairs, and, one day, when Link and the girls went to swing, they
+found a couple of little Peakslows there. Link drove 'em away, and they
+went off bellowing to their big brothers. In a little while Zeph came
+along, when Cecie happened to be in the swing; and he pushed her so hard
+that she fell out."
+
+"I shouldn't think cudgelling him would give you much satisfaction,"
+said Jack. "It was a dreadful thing to happen! But did he intend it?"
+
+"I don't think he is sorry for it. Father went to see Mr. Peakslow about
+it; but he got nothing but abuse from him. What do you think he said?
+'The swing,' says he, 'is on a part of the land you robbed me of; if you
+had gin me what the guv'ment survey did, then your children wouldn't
+have been there, and the thing wouldn't have occurred.' That is the man
+who has got your horse."
+
+Meanwhile, they had driven past Peakslow's house, proceeding down the
+river road; and now once more Jack reined up before old Wiggett's cabin.
+
+At the sight of the wagon approaching three or four half-naked little
+barbarians ran into the house, like wild creatures into their hole,
+giving an alarm which brought out old Wiggett himself, stooping through
+the low doorway.
+
+"Mr. Wiggett, do you remember me?" said Jack.
+
+"Wal, I reckon!" said the old man, advancing to the wagon, reaching up,
+and giving Jack's hand a hearty shake. "You're the young chap that found
+my section corner."
+
+"And do you remember my horse?"
+
+"I 'low I oughter; for your elephant story, and the scars you showed me,
+was drea'ful curi's. I heard the hoss was stole."
+
+"He _was_ stolen. But I have found him; and I want you to go with me and
+identify him, if you will be so good. Mr. Peakslow has him."
+
+"Peakslow?" said the old man, with a dubious shake of the head. "It's
+nigh about the easiest thing in the world to git into trouble with Dud
+Peakslow. I gener'ly go my way, and let Peakslow go hisn, and waste few
+words on him. But I don't mind gwine with ye, if ye say so. How did
+Peakslow come by him?"
+
+Jack told the story, whilst driving back to Peakslow's house. There he
+left Rufus in the wagon, and walked on with Mr. Wiggett into the
+barnyard.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+PEAKSLOW GETS A QUIRK IN HIS HEAD.
+
+
+Peakslow had finished greasing his wheels, and was about harnessing a
+pair of horses which Zeph held by their halters at the door of a
+log-stable. One of the horses was Snowfoot.
+
+"Please wait a minute, Mr. Peakslow," said Jack, turning pale at the
+sight. "I've brought a witness to prove my property."
+
+Peakslow looked at his neighbor Wiggett, and gave a grunt.
+
+"So you've come to interfere in this business, hey?"
+
+Mr. Wiggett made no reply, but walked up to Snowfoot, stroked his sides,
+examined the scars, looked at him before and behind, and nodded slowly
+several times. Then he spoke.
+
+"I hain't come over to interfere in nobody's business, Mr. Peakslow. But
+I happen to know this yer young man; and I know this yer hoss. At his
+request, I've come over to say so. I could pick out that animal, and
+sw'ar to him, among ten thousan'."
+
+"What can you swear to?" Peakslow demanded, poising a harness.
+
+"I can sw'ar this is the hoss the young man druv the day he come over to
+find my section corner."
+
+"That all?"
+
+"Isn't that enough?" said Jack.
+
+"No!" said Peakslow, and threw the rattling harness upon Snowfoot's
+back. "It don't prove the hoss belonged to you, if ye did drive him.
+And, even though he did belong to you, it don't prove but what ye sold
+him arterward, and then pretended he was stole, to cheat some honest man
+out of his prop'ty. Hurry up, boy! buckle them hames." And he went to
+throw on the other harness.
+
+Jack stepped in Zeph's way. "This is my horse, and I've a word to say
+about buckling those hames."
+
+"Ye mean to hender my work?" roared Peakslow, turning upon him. "Ye mean
+to git me mad?"
+
+Jack had before been hardly able to speak, for his rising wrath and
+beating heart; but he was now getting control of himself.
+
+"I don't see the need of anybody's getting mad, Mr. Peakslow. There's a
+right and a wrong in this case; and if we both want the right, we shall
+agree."
+
+"Every man has his own way o' lookin' at the right," said Peakslow,
+slightly mollified. "The right, to your notion, is that I shall give ye
+up the hoss. I've got possession of the hoss, and I mean to keep
+possession; and that's what's about right, to my notion."
+
+"I want only what is lawfully my own," Jack answered, firmly. "If you
+want what isn't yours, that's _not_ right, but wrong. There's such a
+thing as justice, aside from our personal interest in a matter."
+
+Probably Peakslow had never thought of that.
+
+"Wal, what ye goin' to do about it?" he asked.
+
+"I am going to have my horse," replied Jack. "If you let me take him
+peaceably, very well. If you compel me to go to law, I shall have him
+all the same, and you will have the costs to pay."
+
+Peakslow winced. The threat of costs touched him in his tenderest spot.
+
+"How's that?" he anxiously asked.
+
+"I haven't been about the country looking for my horse, without knowing
+something of the law for the recovery of stolen property," replied Jack.
+"If I find him in your hands, and you give him up, I've no action
+against you. If you hold on to him, I can do one of two things. I can go
+to a magistrate, and by giving bonds to an amount that will cover all
+damages to you or anybody else if I fail to make good my claim, get out
+a _writ of replevin_, and send a sheriff with it to take the horse. Or I
+can let you keep him, and sue you for damages. In either case, the one
+who is beaten will have the costs to pay," Jack insisted, turning the
+screw again where he saw it pinch.
+
+The swarthy brow was covered with perspiration, as Peakslow answered,
+making a show of bluster,--
+
+"I can fight ye with the law, or any other way, 's long's you want to
+fight. I've got money. Ye can't scare me with your sheriffs and writs.
+But jest look at it. I'm to be throwed out of a hoss at a busy time o'
+year. _You_ wouldn't like that, Mr. Wiggett--you nor nobody else."
+
+"No," said Mr. Wiggett, who stood looking on in an impartial way, "it
+moutn't feel good, I allow. And it don't seem like it would feel much
+better, to have to stan' by and see a hoss that was stole from me, bein'
+worked by a neighbor. This yer young man tells a straightfor'ard story,
+and there's no doubt of its bein' his hoss. You've no doubt on't in your
+own mind, Dudley Peakslow. If he goes to law, he'll bring his
+proofs,--he's got friends to back him,--and you'll lose. Then why not
+come to a right understanding and save right smart o' trouble and cost.
+I 'low that'll be best for both."
+
+"Wal, what's your idee of a right understandin'?" said Peakslow, flushed
+and troubled, turning to Jack. "_My_ hoss is in Chicago--that is, if
+_this_ hoss ain't mine. I might go in and see about gittin' on him back,
+but I don't want to spend the time, 'thout I can take in a little jag o'
+stuff; and how can I do that, if you break up my team?"
+
+"Mr. Peakslow," replied Jack, quickly making up his mind what he would
+do, "while I ask for my rights, I don't wish to put you or any man to an
+inconvenience." He took Snowfoot by the bridle. "Here is my horse; and,
+with Mr. Wiggett for a witness, I make you this offer: you may keep him
+one week, and do any light work with him you please. You may drive him
+to Chicago, and use him in recovering your horse from the truckman. But
+mind, you are to be responsible for him, and bring him back with you. Is
+that a fair proposal?"
+
+"Wal, I do'no' but what 't is; I'll think on 't."
+
+"I want you to say now, in Mr. Wiggett's presence, whether you accept
+it."
+
+"I'll agree to bring him back; but I do'no' 'bout deliverin' on him up
+to you," said Peakslow.
+
+"Leave it so, then," replied Jack, with a confident smile. "I call you
+to witness, Mr. Wiggett, that the horse is in my possession now" (he
+still held Snowfoot by the bridle), "and that I lend him to Mr.
+Peakslow. Now you can buckle the hames, Zeph," letting go the bridle,
+and stepping back.
+
+"Gi' me a copy o' that handbill," said Peakslow. "I shall want that, and
+I ought to have a witness besides, to make the truckman hear to reason."
+
+"If he happens to be an unreasonable man," said Jack, with a smile, "you
+have the same remedy which I have,--a suit for damages. I don't believe
+he will wait for that. I'll see you in one week. Good-day, Mr.
+Peakslow."
+
+"Looks like you was takin' a big resk, to let him drive the hoss to
+Chicago," Mr. Wiggett remarked confidentially, following Jack out of the
+yard.
+
+"I don't see that it is," Jack replied, wiping the sweat from his
+forehead. "I didn't wish to be hard on him. It does men good, sometimes,
+to trust them."
+
+"Mabbe. But Dud Peakslow ain't like no other man ye ever see. He's got
+some quirk in his head, or he never'd have agreed to be responsible for
+the hoss and bring him back; ye may bet on that. He means to take some
+advantage. Now I'm interested in the case, and I shall hate to see you
+swindled."
+
+Jack thanked the old man warmly; but he failed to see what advantage
+Peakslow could hope to gain.
+
+"I know him a heap better 'n you dew," said Mr. Wiggett. "Now, it struck
+me, when he said he might need a witness, I'd offer to go with him to
+Chicago. I could help him with the truckman, and mabbe find out what new
+trick he's up tew. Anyhow, I could look arter your hoss a little."
+
+"That would oblige me ever so much!" exclaimed Jack. "But I see no
+reason why you should take that trouble for me."
+
+"I take a notion tew ye, in the fust place. Next place, I've been gwine
+to Chicago for the past tew weeks, but couldn't somehow git started.
+Now, banged if I won't go in with Peakslow!"
+
+Having parted with Jack, the old man returned to propose the arrangement
+to his neighbor. He was just in time to hear Peakslow say to his son,--
+
+"I see a twist in this matter 't he don't, shrewd as he thinks he is. If
+I lose a good bargain, I'm bound to make it up 'fore ever this hoss goes
+out of my hands. You ag'in, Wiggett?"
+
+It was Mr. Wiggett, who concluded that he was quite right in saying that
+Peakslow had a quirk in his head.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+VINNIE MAKES A BEGINNING.
+
+
+Vinnie learned only too soon why Jack had dreaded so much to have her
+enter the Betterson household; and, in a momentary depression of
+spirits, she asked herself whether, if she had known all she was
+undertaking, she would not have shrunk from it.
+
+The sight of the sick ones, the mother enfeebled in mind as well as in
+body, Lord Betterson pompous and complacent in the midst of so much
+misery, little Lill alone making headway against a deluge of
+disorder,--all this filled her with distress and dismay.
+
+She could think of no relief but in action.
+
+"I shall stifle," thought she, "unless I go to work at once, setting
+things to rights."
+
+And the thought of helping others cheered herself.
+
+She needed something from her trunk. That was at the door, just where
+Jack had left it. She went out, and found that Chokie had changed his
+mind with regard to digging a well, and was building a pyramid, using
+the door-yard sand for his material, a shingle for a shovel, and the
+trunk for a foundation.
+
+"Why, Chokie!" she said; "what are you doing?"
+
+"I makin' a Fourth-of-Duly," replied Chokie, flourishing his shingle.
+"After I dit it about twice as bid as the house, I doin' to put some
+powder in it, and tout'th it off."
+
+"O dear!" said Vinnie; "I'm afraid you'll blow my trunk to pieces; and I
+must have my trunk now!"
+
+"I doin' to blow it to pieces, and you tan't have it," cried Chokie,
+stoutly.
+
+"But I've something for you in it," said Vinnie, "and we never can get
+it for you, if you touch off your Fourth-of-July on it."
+
+"O, wal, you may dit it." And he began to shovel the sand off, throwing
+it into his clothing, into the house, and some into Vinnie's eyes.
+
+Lord Betterson, who was walking leisurely about his castle, now came
+forward, and, seeing Vinnie in some distress, inquired, in his lofty
+way, if he could do anything for her.
+
+"If you please," she replied, laughing, as she brushed the sand away
+from her eyes, "I should like to have this trunk carried in."
+
+Betterson drew himself up with dignified surprise; for he had not meant
+to proffer any such menial service. Vinnie perceived the little mistake
+she had made; but she was not so overpoweringly impressed by his
+nobility as to think that an apology was due. She even permitted herself
+to be amused; and, retiring behind the sand in her eyes, which she made
+a great show of winking and laughing away, she waited to see what he
+would do.
+
+He looked around, and coughed uncomfortably.
+
+"Where are the boys?" he asked. "This--hem--is very awkward. I don't
+know why the trunk was left here; I directed that it should be taken to
+Cecie's room."--
+
+Vinnie mischievously resolved that the noble Betterson back should bend
+beneath that burden.
+
+"It is quite light," she said. "If you want help, I can lift one end of
+it."
+
+The implication that it was not greatness of character, but weakness of
+body, which kept him above such service, touched my lord. As she, at the
+same time, actually laid hold of one handle, he waived her off, with
+ostentatious gallantry.
+
+"Permit me!" And, with a smile of condescension, which seemed to say,
+"The Bettersons are not used to this sort of thing; but they can always
+be polite to the ladies," he took up the trunk by both handles, and went
+politely _backward_ with it into the house, a performance at which Jack
+would have smiled. I say _performance_ advisedly, for Betterson showed
+by his bearing, lofty and magnificent even under the burden, that this
+was not an ordinary act of an ordinary man.
+
+Having set down the trunk in its place, he brushed his fingers with a
+soiled handkerchief, and retired, exceedingly flushed and puffy in his
+tight stock.
+
+Vinnie thanked him with charming simplicity; while Cecie, on her lounge,
+laughed slyly, and Mrs. Betterson looked amazed.
+
+"Why, Lavinia! how did you ever dare?"
+
+"Dare what?"
+
+"To ask Mr. Betterson to carry your trunk?"
+
+[Illustration: VINNIE'S STRATAGEM.]
+
+"Why not?" said Vinnie, with round eyes.
+
+"A gentleman like him! and a Betterson!" replied Caroline, in a whisper
+of astonishment and awe.
+
+"Who should have done it?" said Vinnie, trying hard to see the enormity
+of her offence. "I couldn't very well do it alone; I am sure you
+couldn't have helped me; and my friend who brought me over, he has done
+so much for me already that I should have been ashamed to ask him.
+Besides, he is not here, and I wanted the trunk. Mr. Betterson seems
+very strong. Has he the rheumatism?"
+
+"O Lavinia! Lavinia!"--and Caroline wrapped her red shawl despairingly
+about her. "But you will understand Mr. Betterson better by and by. You
+are quite excusable now. Arthur, dear! what do you want?"
+
+"In her trunt, what she's doin' to dive me, I want it," said the boy,
+invading the house for that purpose.
+
+"Yes, you shall have it," cried Vinnie, skilfully giving his nose a wipe
+behind the mother's back (it needed it sadly). "But is your name Arthur?
+I thought they called you Chokie."
+
+"Chokie is the nickname for Arthur," Lill explained.
+
+Vinnie did not understand how that could be.
+
+"It is the boys' invention; they are full of their nonsense," said
+Caroline, with a sorrowful head-shake. "It was first Arthur, then Artie,
+then Artichoke, then Chokie,--you see?"
+
+Vinnie laughed, while her sister went on, in complaining accents,--
+
+"I tell them such things are beneath the dignity of our family; but they
+will have their fun."
+
+Vinnie took from her trunk a barking dog and a candy meeting-house,
+which made Chokie forget all about his threatened Fourth-of-July. She
+also had a pretty worsted scarf of many colors for Lill, and a copy of
+Mrs. Hemans's Poems--popular in those days--for Cecie.
+
+"For you, sister Caroline," she added, laughing, "I have
+brought--myself."
+
+"This book is beautiful, and I love poetry so much!" said Cecie, with
+eyes full of love and gratitude. "But you have brought mother the best
+present."
+
+"O, you don't know about that!" replied Vinnie.
+
+"Yes, I do," said Cecie, with a smile which seemed to tremble on the
+verge of tears. And she whispered, as Vinnie bent down and kissed her,
+"I love you already; we shall all love you so much!"
+
+"Dear Cecie!" murmured Vinnie in the little invalid's ear, "that pays me
+for coming. I am glad I am here, if only for your sake."
+
+"I dot the bestest pwesents," cried Chokie, sitting on the floor with
+his treasures. "Don't tome here, Lill; my dod will bite!" He made the
+little toy squeak violently. "He barks at folks doin' to meetin'. Dim me
+some pins."
+
+"What do you want of pins?" Vinnie asked, taking some from her dress.
+
+"To make mans and womans doin' to meetin'. One dood bid black pin for
+the minister," said Chokie.
+
+Vinnie helped him stick up the pins in the floor, and even found the
+required big black one to head the procession. Then she pointed out the
+extraordinary fact of the dog being so much larger than the entire
+congregation; at which even the sad Caroline smiled, over her sick babe.
+Chokie, however, gloried in the superior size and prowess of the
+formidable monster.
+
+Lill was delighted with her scarf,--all the more so when she learned
+that it had been wrought by Vinnie's own hand.
+
+"O Aunt Vinnie!" said Cecie; "will you teach me to do such work? I
+should enjoy it so much--lying here!"
+
+"With the greatest pleasure, my dear!" exclaimed Vinnie, her heart
+brimming with hope and joy at sight of the simple happiness her coming
+had brought.
+
+She then hastened to put on a household dress; while Cecie looked at her
+book, and Lill sported her scarf, and Chokie earned himself a new
+nickname,--that of Big-Bellied Ben,--by making a feast of his
+meeting-house, beginning with the steeple.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+VINNIE'S NEW BROOM.
+
+
+Returning from his interview with Mr. Peakslow, Jack drove up on the
+roadside before the "castle," asked Rufe to hold the horse a minute, and
+ran to the door to bid Vinnie good by.
+
+"Here, Link!" Rufe called, "stand by this horse!"
+
+"I can't," answered Link from the wood-pile, "I've got to get some wood,
+to make a fire, to heat some water, to dip the chickens, to loosen their
+feathers, and then to cook 'em for dinner."
+
+"Never mind the wood and the chickens and feathers! Come along!"
+
+"I guess I _will_ mind, and I guess I _won't_ come along, for you, or
+anybody, for _she_ asked me to."
+
+"She? Who?"
+
+"Aunt Vinnie; and, I tell you, she's real slick." And Link slashed away
+at the wood with an axe; for that was the Betterson style,--to saw and
+split the sticks only as the immediate necessities of the house
+required.
+
+Rufe might have hitched the horse, but he was not a fellow to give
+himself any trouble that could well be avoided; and just then he saw Wad
+coming out of the yard with two pails.
+
+Wad, being cordially invited to stay and hold the horse, also declined,
+except on condition that Rufe should himself go at once to the spring
+for water.
+
+"Seems to me you're in a terrible pucker for water!" said Rufe. "Two
+pails? what's the row, Wad?" For it was the time-honored custom of the
+boys to put off going for water as long as human patience could endure
+without it, and never, except in great emergencies, to take two pails.
+
+"_She_ asked me to, and of course I'd go for _her_," said Wad. "She has
+gone into that old kitchen, and, I tell you, she'll make things buzz!"
+
+Meanwhile Jack had gone straight to the said kitchen,--much to Mrs.
+Betterson's dismay,--and found Vinnie in a neat brown dress, with apron
+on and sleeves pinned up. He thought he had never seen her look so
+bright and beautiful.
+
+"At work so soon!" he exclaimed.
+
+"The sooner the better," she replied. "Don't look around you; my sister
+is sick, you know."
+
+"I won't hinder you a minute," Jack said. "I just ran in to tell you the
+good news about my horse,--though I suppose you've heard that from the
+boys,--and to say good by,--and one word more!" lowering his voice. "If
+anything happens,--if it isn't pleasant for you to be here, you
+know,--there is a home at Mrs. Lanman's; it will be always waiting for
+you."
+
+"I thank you and Mrs. Lanman very much!" said Vinnie, with a trembling
+lip. "But I mean to _make_ things pleasant here," a smile breaking
+through the momentary trouble of her face.
+
+Jack declined an urgent invitation to stay and see what sort of a dinner
+she could get.
+
+"By the way," he whispered, as she followed him to the door, "who
+carried in that trunk?" When she told him, he was hugely delighted. "You
+will get along! Here comes Rufe. Rufus, this is your Aunt Vinnie."
+
+Rufus (who had finally got Chokie to hold the horse's halter) blushed to
+the roots of his hair at meeting his relative, and finding her so very
+youthful (I think it has already been said that the aunt was younger
+than the nephew), and altogether so fresh and charming in her apron and
+pinned-up sleeves.
+
+She smilingly gave him her hand, which he took rather awkwardly, and
+said,--
+
+"How d' 'e do, Aunt Lavinia. I suppose I must call you _aunt_."
+
+"Call me just Vinnie; the idea of my being _aunt_ to young men like
+you!"
+
+There was a little constraint on both sides, which Link relieved by
+pushing between them with a big armful of wood.
+
+"Well, good by," said Jack. "She will need a little looking after,
+Rufus; see that she doesn't work too hard."
+
+"_You_ are not going to work hard for _us_!" said Rufus, with some
+feeling, after Jack was gone.
+
+"That depends," Vinnie replied. "_You_ can make things easy for me, as I
+am sure you will."
+
+"Of course; just let me know if they don't go right. Call on Link or Wad
+for anything; make 'em stand round."
+
+Vinnie smiled at Rufe's willingness to have his brothers brought into
+the line of discipline.
+
+"They are both helping me now. But I find there are no potatoes in the
+house, and I've been wondering who would get them. Lill says they are to
+be dug in the field, and that she digs them sometimes; but that seems
+too bad!"
+
+"That's when Wad and Link--there's no need of _her_--I don't believe in
+girls digging potatoes!" Rufe stammered.
+
+"O, but you know," cried Lill, "sometimes we shouldn't have any potatoes
+for dinner if I didn't go and dig them! I don't care, only it's such
+hard work!"
+
+Vinnie looked admiringly at the bright, brave little girl. Rufe colored
+redder than ever, and said,--
+
+"Don't _you_, now, do such a thing! Only let me know in season what's
+wanted; I'll be after those boys with a sharp stick!"
+
+Vinnie couldn't help laughing.
+
+"So, when we're going to want a handful of wood, a pail of water, or a
+basket of potatoes, I am to go for you, and you will go for the boys,
+and drive them up with your sharp stick! I don't think I shall like
+that. Wouldn't it be better for you to see that there are always
+potatoes in the bin, and wood in the box, and other things on hand that
+you know will be needed?"
+
+It was perhaps quite as much her winning way as the good sense of this
+appeal which made it irresistible.
+
+"Of course it would be better! I'll get you a basket of potatoes now,
+and some green corn, and I'll look out for the water and wood."
+
+"O, thank you!" said Vinnie. "That will make things so much easier and
+pleasanter for all of us!"
+
+The potatoes and corn were got with a cheerful alacrity which quite
+astonished Rufe's mother and sisters.
+
+The inertia of a large body being thus overcome, that well-known
+property of matter tended to keep Rufus still in motion; and while
+Vinnie, with Lill's help, was getting the dinner ready, he might have
+been seen approaching the wood-pile with an eye to business.
+
+"See here, Wad! This wood is pretty dry now; don't you think it had
+better be cut up and got in before there comes a rain?"
+
+"Yes, s'pose 't would be a good idea."
+
+"We ought to be ashamed," Rufe went on, "to have _her_ calling for a
+handful of wood every time it's wanted, or going out to hack a little
+for herself, if we're not around; for she'll do it."
+
+"I s'pose so," Wad assented. "Why don't you go to work and cut it up?
+I'll sit down on a log and whittle, and keep you company."
+
+"Pshaw! don't talk that way. I'll go to work at it if you will. Come!
+Will you saw, or split?"
+
+Wad laughed, and said he would split,--perhaps because the sawing must
+be done first.
+
+"This saw is in a frightful condition!" Rufe said, stopping to breathe
+after sawing a few sticks.
+
+"So is this axe; look at the edge! It's too dull even to split with,"
+said Wad. "A small boy might ride to mill on it without suffering any
+very great inconvenience."
+
+"If father would only file and set this saw, I'd help you grind the
+axe," said Rufe.
+
+The paternal Betterson was just then returning from a little walk about
+his estate. As he approached, hat in hand, wiping his noble forehead,
+under the shade of the oaks, Rufe addressed him.
+
+"We've got to have wood in the house; now _she_'s come, it won't do to
+get it by little driblets, and have her waiting for it and worrying
+about it. I'll saw it, if you'll only set the saw; you know how, and I
+don't; we'll do the hard work if you'll furnish a little of your skill."
+
+Rufe knew how to appeal to the paternal vanity. The idea of furnishing,
+not labor, but skill, flattered my lord.
+
+"Ah! let me look at the saw. And bring me the file. And set out the
+shave-horse. I'll show you how the thing is done."
+
+When Link, who in the mean while had been dressing the prairie chickens
+behind the house, came round and saw his pompous papa sitting under an
+oak-tree, astride the "shave-horse," filing away at the saw held in its
+clumsy jaws, and Wad turning the grindstone close by, while Rufe held on
+the axe, he ran into the house laughing.
+
+"Mother! just look out there! Father and Rufe and Wad all at work at
+once! Guess the world's coming to an end!"
+
+"I hope some of our troubles are coming to an end," sighed poor Mrs.
+Betterson, who sat nursing her babe with a bottle. "It's all owing to
+_her_. A new broom sweeps clean. She brings a very good influence; but I
+can't hope it will last."
+
+"O mother!" said Cecie, from her lounge, "don't say that. I am sure it
+will last; she is so good! You'll do all you can for her, won't you,
+Link?"
+
+"I bet!" was Link's laconic response. "If _they_ only will, too, for
+there ain't much fun in doing chores while father and Rufe and Wad are
+just loafing round."
+
+He hastened to Vinnie with his chickens.
+
+"Just look out there once! All at it! Ain't it fun?"
+
+It was fun to Vinnie, indeed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+LINK'S WOOD-PILE.
+
+
+The dinner, though late that day, was unusually sumptuous, and Betterson
+and his boys brought to it keen appetites from their work. Vinnie's
+cooking received merited praise, and the most cordial good-will
+prevailed. Even little Chokie, soiling face and fingers with a
+"drum-stick" he was gnawing, lisped out his commendation of the repast.
+
+"I wish Aunt Vinnie would be here forever, and div us dood victuals."
+
+"I second the motion!" cried Link, sucking a "wish-bone," and then
+setting it astride his nose,--"to dry," as he said.
+
+"One would think we never had anything fit to eat before," said Mrs.
+Betterson; while my lord looked flushed and frowning over his frayed
+stock.
+
+"You know, mother," said Lill, "I never could cook prairie chickens. And
+you haven't been well enough to, since the boys began to shoot them."
+
+"Lincoln," said Mrs. Betterson, "remove that unsightly object from your
+nose! Have you forgotten your manners?"
+
+"He never had any!" exclaimed Rufe, snatching the wish-bone from its
+perch.
+
+"Here! give that back! I'm going to keep it, and wish with Cecie bimeby,
+and we're both going to wish that Aunt Vinnie had come here a year
+ago--that is--I mean--pshaw!" said Link, whose ideas were getting rather
+mixed.
+
+Poor Mrs. Betterson complained a great deal to her sister that afternoon
+of the impossibility of keeping up the style and manners of the family
+in that new country.
+
+Vinnie--who sat holding the baby by Cecie's lounge--asked why the family
+had chosen that new country.
+
+"Mr. Betterson had been unfortunate in business at the East, and it was
+thought best that he should try Illinois," was Caroline's way of stating
+that after her husband had run through two small fortunes which had
+fallen to him, and exhausted the patience of relatives upon whom he was
+constantly calling for help, a wealthy uncle had purchased this farm for
+him, and placed him on it to be rid of him.
+
+"I should think you might sell the farm and move away," said Vinnie.
+
+"There are certain obstacles," replied Caroline; the said uncle, knowing
+that Lord could not keep property from flying away, having shrewdly tied
+this down by means of a mortgage.
+
+"One thing," Caroline continued, "I have always regretted. A
+considerable sum of money fell to Mr. Betterson after we came here; and
+he--wisely, we thought at the time, but unfortunately, as it
+proved--put it into this house. We expected to have a large part of it
+left; but the cost of building was such that all was absorbed before the
+house was finished."
+
+Such was Caroline's account of the manner in which the "castle" came to
+be built. Vinnie was amazed at the foolish vanity and improvidence of
+the lord of it; but she only said,--
+
+"There seems to be a great deal of unused room in the house; I should
+think you might let that, and a part of the farm, to another family."
+
+Caroline smiled pityingly.
+
+"Lavinia dear, you don't understand. _We_ could never think of taking
+another family into _our_ house, for the sake of _money_! though it
+might be well to let the farm. Besides, there is really one more in the
+family than you see. I think I haven't yet spoken to you of
+Radcliff,--my husband's nephew."
+
+"You mentioned such a person in your letter to me," replied Vinnie.
+
+"Ah, yes; when I was giving some of the reasons why we had never had you
+come and live with us. Well off as we were at one time,--and are now in
+prospect, if not in actual appearance,--we could not very well take you
+as a child into our family, if we took Radcliff. He was early left an
+orphan, and it was thought best by the connections that he should be
+brought up by my husband. I assure you, Lavinia, that nobody but a
+Betterson should ever have been allowed to take your place in _our_
+family."
+
+Vinnie pictured to herself a youth of precious qualities and great
+promise, and asked,--
+
+"Where is Radcliff now?"
+
+"He is not with us just at present. He is of age, and his own master;
+and though we make a home for him, he's away a good deal."
+
+"What is his business?"
+
+"He has no fixed pursuit. He is, in short, a gentleman at large."
+
+"What supports him?"
+
+"He receives a limited allowance from our relatives on the Betterson
+side," said Caroline, pleased with the interest her sister seemed to
+take in the illustrious youth. "He is not so stylish a man as my
+husband, by any means; my husband is a Betterson of the Bettersons. But
+Radcliff has _the blood_, and is _very_ aristocratic in his tastes."
+
+Caroline enlarged upon this delightful theme, until Cecie (who seemed to
+weary of it) exclaimed,--
+
+"O mother, do see how Aunt Vinnie soothes the baby!"
+
+Indeed, it seemed as if the puny thing must have felt the flood of
+warmth and love from Vinnie's heart bathing its little life.
+
+That afternoon Rufe and Wad sawed and split the wood, and Link (with
+Chokie's powerful assistance) carried it into an unfinished room behind
+the kitchen,--sometimes called the "back-room," and sometimes the
+"lumber-room,"--and corded it up against the wall. An imposing pile it
+was, of which the young architect was justly proud, no such sight ever
+having been seen in that house before.
+
+[Illustration: LINK'S WOOD-PILE.]
+
+Every ten or fifteen minutes he called Vinnie or Lill to see how the
+pile grew; and at last he insisted on bringing Cecie, and letting her be
+astonished.
+
+Cecie was only too glad of any little diversion. She could walk with a
+good deal of assistance; Vinnie almost lifted the poor girl in her
+loving arms; Link supported her on the other side; and so they bore her
+to the back-room, where she leaned affectionately on Vinnie, while Link
+stood aside and pointed proudly at his wood-pile.
+
+"We never could get him to bring in a stick of wood before, without
+teasing or scolding him," said Lill.
+
+"This is different; there's some fun in this," said Link. "Rufe and Wad
+have been at work like sixty; and we wanted to see how big a pile we
+could make."
+
+All praised the performance; and Mrs. Betterson so far forgot herself as
+to say she felt rich now, with so much nice, dry, split wood in the
+house.
+
+"But what a remark," she added immediately, turning to Vinnie, "for one
+of _our_ family to make!"
+
+"I was never so proud of my brothers!" said Cecie. "If I was only well
+enough, how I should like to help pile up that wood!"
+
+"Dear Cecie!" cried Vinnie, embracing her, "I wish you _were_ well
+enough! And I hope you will be some time."
+
+The wood was all disposed of that afternoon, and the boys concluded that
+they had had a pretty good time over it.
+
+"Now we can loaf for a whole week, and make a business of it," said Wad.
+
+"There's one more job that ought to be done," said Rufe. "That
+potato-patch. We can't keep the pigs out of it, and it's time the
+potatoes were dug."
+
+"I s'pose so," said Wad. "Wish we had a hired man."
+
+"It isn't much of a job," said Rufe. "And we don't want to be seen
+loafing round, now _she's_ here."
+
+"We can go up in the woods and loaf," said Wad.
+
+"Don't talk silly," said Rufe. "Come, I'll go at the potatoes to-morrow,
+if you will. We'll dig, and make Link pick 'em up."
+
+"I was going to shoot some more prairie chickens to-morrow. We've no
+other meat for dinner."
+
+"We'll get father to shoot them. Come, Wad, what do you say?"
+
+Wad declined to commit himself to an enterprise requiring so large an
+outlay of bone and muscle. All Rufe could get from him was a promise to
+"sleep on the potatoes" and say what he thought of them in morning.
+
+The next morning accordingly, before the cattle were turned out of the
+yard, Rufe said,--
+
+"Shall we yoke up the steers and take the wagon down into the
+potato-patch? We can be as long as we please filling it."
+
+"Yes, we may as well take it down there and leave it," Wad assented; and
+the steers were yoked accordingly.
+
+Lord Betterson was not surprised to see the wagon go to the
+potato-patch, where he thought it might as well stay during the rest of
+the season, as anywhere else. But he _was_ surprised afterward to see
+the three boys--or perhaps we should say four, for Chokie was of the
+party--start off with their hoes and baskets.
+
+"We are going to let _you_ shoot the prairie chickens this forenoon,"
+said Rufe. "You'll find the gun and ammunition all ready, in the
+back-room. We are going at the potatoes."
+
+Link went ahead and pulled the tops, and afterward picked up the
+potatoes, filling the baskets, which his brothers helped him carry off
+and empty into the wagon-box; while Chokie dug holes in the black loam
+to his heart's content.
+
+"We might have had a noble crop here," said Rufe, "if it hadn't been for
+the weeds and pigs. Wad, we mustn't let the weeds get the start of us so
+another year. And we'll do some repairs on the fences this fall. I'm
+ashamed of 'em!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+MORE WATER THAN THEY WANTED.
+
+
+A doctor from North Mills came once a week to visit Cecie and the sick
+mother and baby. One afternoon he brought in his chaise a saddle and
+bridle, which he said a young fellow would call for in a day or two. The
+boys laughed as they put the saddle away; they knew who the young fellow
+was, and they hoped he would have a chance to use it.
+
+Snowfoot's week was up the next forenoon; and at about ten o'clock Jack,
+accompanied by Lion, and carrying a double-barrelled fowling-piece, with
+which he had shot a brace of prairie hens by the way, walked into the
+Betterson door-yard.
+
+He found the boys at the lower end of the house, with the steers and
+wagon.
+
+"What's the news?" he asked.
+
+"The news with us is, that we're out of rainwater," Rufe replied.
+
+"I should think so," said Jack, looking into a dry hogshead which stood
+under the eaves-spout.
+
+"It's too much of a bother to bring all our water by the pailful. So we
+are going to fill these things at the river and make the steers haul
+'em."
+
+There were three wash-tubs and a barrel, which the boys were putting up
+on the bottom boards of the wagon-box, from which the sides had been
+removed.
+
+Jack was pleased with this appearance of enterprise; he also noticed
+with satisfaction that the yard had been cleared up since he last saw
+it.
+
+He asked about Vinnie, and learned from the looks and answers the boys
+gave him that she was popular.
+
+"Your saddle came yesterday," said Wad; "so I s'pose you expect to ride
+home."
+
+"I feel rather inclined that way. How is our friend Peakslow?"
+
+"Don't know; he went to Chicago, and he hasn't got back."
+
+"Hasn't got back!" said Jack, astonished. "That's mean business!"
+
+He smothered his vexation, however, and told the boys that he would go
+with them to the river, after he had spoken with Vinnie.
+
+Entering the house, he was still more surprised at the changes which had
+taken place since his last visit.
+
+"Her coming has been the greatest blessing!" said Caroline, detaining
+him in the sitting-room. "We are all better,--the doctor noticed it
+yesterday; Cecie and baby and I are all better. Lavinia dear will see
+you presently; I think she is just taking some bread out of the oven."
+
+"Let me go into the kitchen--she won't mind me," said Jack.
+
+Vinnie, rosy-red from her baking, met him at the door. He had been very
+anxious about her since he left her there; but a glance showed him that
+all had gone well.
+
+"You have survived!" he said.
+
+"Yes, indeed!" she replied. "I told you I would make things pleasant
+here."
+
+"The boys like you, I see."
+
+"And I like them. They do all they can for me. Rufus even helped me
+about the washing,--pounded and wrung out the clothes. You must stay to
+dinner to-day."
+
+"I think I may have to," said Jack; "for my horse hasn't come back from
+Chicago yet, and I don't mean to go home without him."
+
+When he went out he found the boys waiting, and accepted a seat with
+Wad and Link on a board placed across two of the tubs. Rufe walked by
+the cattle's horns; while in the third tub sat Chokie.
+
+"You can't sit in that tub going back, you know," said Link.
+
+"Yes, I can! I will!" And Chokie clung fast to the handles.
+
+"O, well, you can if you want to, I suppose!" said Link; "but it will be
+full of water."
+
+They passed the potato-patch (Jack smiled to see that the potatoes had
+been dug), crossed a strip of meadow-land below, and then rounded a bend
+in the river, in the direction of a deep place the boys knew.
+
+"I always hate to ride after oxen,--they go so tormented slow!" said
+Link. "Why don't somebody invent a wagon to go by steam?"
+
+"Did you ever see a wagon go by water?" Jack asked.
+
+"No, nor anybody else!"
+
+"I have," said Jack. "I know a man in this county who has one."
+
+"What man? I'd go five miles to see one!"
+
+"You can see one without going so far. The man is your father, and this
+is the wagon. It is going by water now."
+
+"By water--yes! By the river!" said Link, amused and vexed.
+
+"Link," said Jack, "do you remember that little joke of yours about the
+boys stopping the leak in the boat? Well, we are even now."
+
+Rufe backed the hind-wheels of the wagon into the river, over the deep
+place, and asked Wad which he would do,--dip the water and pass it up by
+the pailful, or stay in the wagon and receive it.
+
+"Whoever dips it up has to stand in the river above his knees," said
+Wad; "and I don't mean to get wet to-day."
+
+"Very well; stay in the wagon, then. You'll get as wet as I shall; for
+I'm going to pull off my shoes and roll up my trousers. Chokie, you keep
+in that tub, just where you are, till the tub is wanted. Link, you'd
+better go into the river with me, and dip the pails, while I pass 'em up
+to Wad."
+
+"I never can keep my trousers-legs rolled up, and I ain't going to get
+wet," said Link. Then, whispering to Jack: "There's leeches in this
+river; they get right into a fellow's flesh and suck his blood like
+sixty."
+
+Wad proposed to begin with the barrel, and to have Link stand at the end
+of the wagon, receive the pails, pass them to him, and pass them back to
+Rufe empty.
+
+"Why not move the barrel to the end of the wagon, and fill it about two
+thirds full, and then move it back again? I'll help you do that," said
+Link.
+
+"All right; I'll fill the barrel and one of the tubs; then you shall
+fill the other two tubs."
+
+Link agreed to this; while Jack smiled to hear so much talk about doing
+so small a thing.
+
+Rufe went in bare-legged, and stood on the edge of the deep hole, where
+the water was hardly up to his knees. Much as he disliked, ordinarily,
+to set about any work, he was strong and active when once roused; and
+the pails of water went up on the wagon about as fast as Wad cared to
+take them.
+
+"Hullo! Don't slop so! You're wetting my feet!" cried Wad.
+
+"I can't keep from spilling a drop once in a while. You might have taken
+off your shoes and rolled up your trousers as I did."
+
+The barrel was soon two thirds full, and Wad called upon Link to help
+him move it forward. Link left his seat by Jack's side, and walked back
+to the rear of the wagon. Wad, as we know, was already there. So was the
+barrel of water, standing just back of the rear axletree. So also was a
+fresh pail of water, which Rufe had placed at the extreme end, because
+Wad was not ready to take it.
+
+At that moment the oxen, hungry for fresh grass, and having nipped all
+within reach of their noses, started up a little. Jack, thinking to
+prevent mischief by running to their heads, leaped from the front of the
+wagon.
+
+This abrupt removal of weight from one end, and large increase of
+avoirdupois at the other, produced a natural but very surprising result.
+Chokie in his tub, though at the long end of the beam, so to speak (the
+rear axletree being the fulcrum), was not heavy enough to counterbalance
+two brothers and a barrel of water at the short end.
+
+He suddenly felt himself rising in the air, and sliding with the empty
+tubs. His brothers at the same moment felt themselves sinking and
+pitching. There was a chorus of shrieks, as they made a desperate effort
+to save themselves. Too late; the wagon-bottom reared, and away went
+barrel, boys, tubs, everything.
+
+The oxen, starting at the alarm, helped to precipitate the catastrophe.
+Fortunately, Jack was at hand to stop them, or the dismantled wagon
+might have gone flying across the lot, even fast enough to suit Link's
+notion of speed.
+
+Rufe made one quick effort to prevent the boards from tipping up, then
+leaped aside, while the discharged load shot past him.
+
+Chokie, screaming, held fast to the sides of his tub with both hands.
+Wad, intending to jump, plunged into the deepest part of the river. Link
+made a snatch at the barrel, and, playing at leap-frog over it (very
+unwillingly), went headlong into the deep hole.
+
+Chokie met with a wonderfully good fortune; his tub was launched so
+neatly, and ballasted so nicely by him sitting in the bottom, that it
+shipped but a splash of water, and he floated away, unhurt and scarcely
+wet at all, amidst the general ruin.
+
+The wagon-boards, relieved of their load, tumbled back upon the wheels.
+To add to the confusion, Lion barked furiously.
+
+Jack, frightened at first, finally began to laugh, when he saw Chokie
+sailing away, under full scream, and Wad and Link scrambling out of the
+water.
+
+"So you were the fellows that were not going to get wet!" cried Rufe.
+"Pick out your barrel and empty tubs, while I catch Chokie!"
+
+The river, even in the deepest place, was not very deep; and Wad and
+Link came wading out, blowing water from their mouths, flirting water
+from their hair, and shaking water from their rescued hats, in a way
+that made Rufe (after he had stranded Chokie in his tub) roll upon the
+grass in convulsions.
+
+"Laugh, then!" cried Wad in a rage; "I'll give you something to laugh
+at!" And, catching up a tub partly filled with water, he rushed with it
+to take wet vengeance on his dry brother.
+
+Before Rufe, helpless with laughter, could move to defend himself, tub,
+water, and Wad, all together, were upon him,--the tub capsizing over his
+head and shoulders, Wad tumbling upon the tub, and the water running out
+in little rivulets below.
+
+Rufe was pretty wet, but still laughing, when he crawled out, like a
+snail from under his shell, and got upon his feet, clutching the tub to
+hurl it at Wad, who fled.
+
+"You are the only one who has got any dry fun out of this scrape!" Rufe
+said, trying to brush the water out of his neck and breast.
+
+His words were addressed to Jack, and they proved more strictly true
+than he intended; for just then Chokie, trying to get out of his
+stranded tub, tipped it over, and went out of it, upon his hands and
+knees, into the river. By the time he was pulled out and set upon dry
+ground, the boys were all pretty good-natured.
+
+"How about those leeches, Link? Did you find any?" said Jack.
+
+"I'm too dizzy yet, to think about leeches," replied Link. "I turned a
+somerset out of that wagon so quick, I could see the patch on the seat
+of my trousers!"
+
+"I thought I was going through to China," said Wad, "and expected, when
+I came up, to see men with pigtails."
+
+He stood on the edge of the water, holding another tub for Rufe, if he
+should come too near.
+
+"Quit your nonsense now!" cried Rufe, "and hand up that barrel."
+
+"I'll quit if you will,--as the poultry-thief said when the old gobbler
+chased him. 'Quit, quit!' says the turkey. 'Quit your ownself!' says the
+thief. And I'm just of his way of thinking," said Wad.
+
+"Well! help me put this wagon into shape," said Rufe. "Then we'll fill
+our tubs and barrel without any more fooling."
+
+The wagon-boards were replaced and loaded without any further accident.
+The well-filled tubs were set one upon another, and Wad stood holding
+them; while Link, having placed the board seat over the barrel of water,
+sat upon it. They found it a pretty sloppy ride; but they could laugh
+defiance at a little water now. Chokie, it need hardly be said, did not
+ride in a tub of water, but walked between Jack and Rufe beside the
+oxen.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+PEAKSLOW SHOWS HIS HAND.
+
+
+"Hullo!" cried Link from his perch, as the wagon passed the
+potato-patch, "there comes Peakslow down the road through the
+woods,--just turning the corner for home!"
+
+Jack started with sudden excitement.
+
+"Can you see his team?"
+
+"Yes; one of the horses looks like yours; and he has an extra horse led
+behind."
+
+Jack ran up to the road to get a look, and came laughing back to the
+house, where the boys and their load of water had by that time arrived.
+
+"He is driving my horse, and leading one of his own. I am going to get
+my bridle, and call on him."
+
+"You'll come back to dinner?" said Rufe.
+
+"Yes, if you'll have my prairie chickens cooked."
+
+And, leaving the boys to astonish the family with their wet clothes,
+Jack, with the bridle on his arm, walked down the road.
+
+Just as he was entering Peakslow's yard, he met Mr. Wiggett coming out
+with his arms full of brown-paper parcels.
+
+"Mr. Wiggett! glad to see you!"
+
+"Same to yourself," replied the old man. "Got my arms full o' this yer
+stuff, or I'd shake hands. I've a lot more o' comforts for wife and
+young uns in the wagon; but I thought I'd lug along suthin, or they
+wouldn't be glad to see me."
+
+"Is it all right about the horse?"
+
+"I 'low it's all right."
+
+"Is Peakslow up to any trick?"
+
+"Nary, as I kin diskiver; and I pumped him, tew, right smart, a-comin'
+over the perairie."
+
+"Did he have much trouble getting back his horse?"
+
+"Not sich a dog-goned sight. Truckman's a straightfor'ard, honest chap.
+Says he guv eighty dollars for your hoss; thinks he had him of the thief
+himself; and 'lows he knows the rascal. He stuck out a little at fust,
+and you should 'a' heard Peakslow talk tew him! 'Twas ekal to gwine to
+preachin'."
+
+"What did he say?"
+
+"Said none but a fool or a scoundrel would ca'c'late he could hang ontew
+a piece o' prop'ty that had been stole, or traded for what had been
+stole. Talked, of course, just t' other way from what he did when he
+talked to you. Truckman didn't mind his gab, but when he was satisfied
+the hoss he put away had been stole, he guv up Peakslow's, and the
+fifteen dollars to boot. Now, how in the name of seven kingdoms
+Peakslow's gwine to turn it about to make anything more, beats all my
+understandin'!"
+
+Jack thanked the old man warmly for the interest he had taken in the
+affair, and asked how he could pay him for his trouble.
+
+"I haven't looked for no pay," replied the old man. "But one thing I
+should like to have ye dew for me, if ever ye come my way agin with yer
+compass. My woman guv me right smart of her jaw for forgittin' it when
+ye was thar before. She wants a noon-mark on our kitchen floor."
+
+"All right," said Jack. "She shall have it."
+
+The old man went on with his bundles, while Jack entered Peakslow's
+yard.
+
+Peakslow, who was unharnessing his team, with the help of two stout
+boys, looked up and said, in a tone which he meant should be
+friendly,----
+
+"How are ye? On hand, I see," with a grim smile at the bridle.
+
+"I was on hand a little before you were," replied Jack. "Your week was
+up an hour ago. Though I don't care about that. You've got your horse, I
+see."
+
+"That's the main thing I went for; course I've got him. Here's a paper,
+with the truckman's name wrote on 't; he wants you to come and see him
+when you go to town, pervided he don't come to see you fust."
+
+"Did he say anything about a bridle and a blanket that were on the horse
+when he was stolen?"
+
+"He's got 'em," Peakslow coolly replied; "but as no reward was offered
+for anything but the hoss, I didn't take 'em."
+
+Jack didn't quite see the logic of this remark.
+
+"Never mind; they are trifles," he said. "It's glory enough for one
+while, to get my horse again. I've a bridle here for him; I'll slip it
+on, Zeph, if you'll slip yours off."
+
+"You can slip your bridle on that hoss, and take him away, when you've
+fulfilled the conditions; not before," said Peakslow.
+
+"What conditions? You don't pretend to claim my horse now you've got
+your own back?"
+
+"I've got a claim on him," Peakslow replied. "Here's your own handbill
+for it. Twenty Dollars Reward! I've got back your hoss for ye, and I
+demand the reward."
+
+This, then, after all, was the quirk in Peakslow's head. The boys
+grinned. Jack was astounded.
+
+"Peakslow," he exclaimed indignantly, "you know that's an absurd claim!
+You didn't find my horse and deliver him to me; I found him in your
+hands, and you even refused to give him up! The truckman has a better
+claim for the reward than you have, for he had him first; and then I
+don't see but the thief himself has a prior claim to either."
+
+"You talk like a fool!" said Peakslow.
+
+"You _act_ like a fool and a knave!" Jack retorted, in a sudden blaze.
+"I won't have any more words with you. Sue for the reward, if you think
+you can get it. I'm just going to take my horse!"
+
+"Not till the reward is paid, if I live!" said Peakslow, his black eyes
+sparkling. "Zeph, step and hand out the old gun!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+THE WOODLAND SPRING.
+
+
+Very pale, with the bridle dangling from his arm, and Lion walking
+dejectedly by his side (the sympathetic dog always knew when his master
+was in trouble), Jack returned to the "castle."
+
+Lord Betterson, meeting him in the door-yard, touched his hat and bowed.
+
+"Where--is--your--quadruped?" he asked, with a cool, deliberate
+politeness, which fell upon Jack's mood like drops of water on red-hot
+steel.
+
+"That villain! he claims the reward for him! But I never'll pay it in
+the world!"
+
+Betterson smiled and said, "Ah! Peakslow! Highly characteristic!"
+
+"He threatened to shoot me!"
+
+"Very likely. He has threatened to shoot _me_, on one or two occasions.
+I said, 'Shoot!'" (Jack wondered whether he said it with that
+condescending smile and gracious gesture.) "It isn't agreeable to have
+dealings with a person who talks of shooting his fellow-men; but I
+imagine there's no danger, if you keep cool."
+
+"I couldn't keep cool," said Jack. "I got as mad as he was. I could have
+shot _him_."
+
+"That, my friend," Lord Betterson replied, with a wave of the hand, "was
+an error,--quite natural, but still an error. You stay to dinner?"
+
+"Thank you, I have promised myself that pleasure."
+
+Jack was ashamed of having given way to his anger; and he determined
+from that moment, whatever happened, to keep calm.
+
+As he threw his useless bridle down, and left Lion to guard it, he saw
+Wad starting off with a pail, and asked where he was going.
+
+"For water," said Wad.
+
+"More water? I should think you all had enough for one day!"
+
+"Yes, for the outer man," drawled Wad. "Where's your horse?"
+
+"I concluded to let Peakslow keep him a little longer. He seemed willing
+to; and I am not ready to ride home. May I go with you?"
+
+"Glad to have ye," said Wad.
+
+They walked a little way along the road toward Peakslow's house, then
+entered the woodland, descended into a little ravine, and, on the slope
+beyond, found a spring of running water in the shade of an oak grove.
+
+Jack was not inclined to talk of Snowfoot, but he had a good deal to say
+about the spring.
+
+"Why, this is charming! What a clear basin of water! Is it always
+running over?"
+
+"Always, even in the driest season. We first noticed that little stream
+trickling down into the ravine; and that's about all there was to be
+seen, till Rufe and I hollowed out this basin."
+
+"Why don't you come here with your wagon and tubs, instead of going to
+the river?"
+
+"There's no good way to get in here with a wagon; and, besides, we can't
+dip up more than two or three pailfuls at a time,--then we must wait for
+the spring to fill."
+
+"You could sink a barrel," said Jack, "and always have that full, to
+start upon. Now dip your pail, and let's see how long it takes for the
+basin to fill."
+
+The experiment was tried, and Jack grew quite enthusiastic over the
+result.
+
+"See! how fast the water comes in! I say, Wad, you've got something
+valuable here."
+
+"Yes," said Wad. "I only wish the house had been built somewhere near.
+This is part of the land Peakslow pretended to claim. The swing, where
+Cecie got hurt, is in the grove, just up here."
+
+The place was so cool and pleasant that Jack let Wad return alone with
+the water, and walked about the spring and the swing, and up into the
+woods beyond, calming his inward excitement, until dinner-time.
+
+At table he gave a humorous account of his late interview with Peakslow.
+
+"He was so very cordial in his request that I should leave Snowfoot,
+that I couldn't well refuse,--though I _did_ decline to trouble him,
+till he brought out a double-barrelled argument,--stub twist, percussion
+lock,--which finally persuaded me. He is one of the most urgent men I
+ever saw," added Jack, mashing his potato.
+
+Vinnie smiled, while the others laughed; but her eyes were full of
+anxiety, as they beamed on Jack.
+
+"Isn't it possible," she said, "to meet such arguments with kindness? I
+didn't think there was a man so bad that he couldn't be influenced by
+reason and good-will."
+
+"It might rain reasons on Peakslow, forty days and forty nights,--he
+would shed 'em, as a duck does water," Jack replied. "Isn't it so, Mr.
+Betterson?"
+
+"I have certainly found him impervious," said my lord.
+
+"I might have stopped to argue with him, and threaten him with the law
+and costs of court, and perhaps have settled the matter for five or ten
+dollars. But the truth is," Jack confessed, "I lost patience and temper.
+I am not going to have any more words with him. Now let's drop Peakslow,
+and speak of something more important. That spring over in your woods,
+Mr. Betterson,--I've been looking at it. Is it soft water?" (Jack lifted
+a glass and sipped it;) "as good for washing as it is for the table?"
+
+"It is excellent water for any purpose," said Mr. Betterson. "There is
+only one fault in that spring,--it is too far off."
+
+"We are going to move the house up there, so as to have it handy," said
+Link.
+
+"That is one of my young friend's jokes," said Jack. "But, seriously,
+Mr. Betterson, instead of moving the house to the spring, why don't you
+bring the spring to the house?"
+
+"How do you mean? It doesn't seem quite--ah--practicable, to move a
+spring that way."
+
+"I don't mean the spring itself, of course, but the water. You might
+have that running, a constant stream, in your kitchen or back-room."
+
+"I apprehend your drift," said Betterson, helping Jack to a piece of
+prairie chicken. "You mean, bring it in pipes."
+
+"Thank you. Precisely."
+
+"But I apprehend a difficulty; it is not easy to make water run up
+hill."
+
+Jack smiled, and blushed a little, at Betterson's polite condescension
+in making this mild objection.
+
+"Water running down hill may force itself up another hill, if confined
+in pipes, I think you will concede."
+
+"Most assuredly. But it will not rise again higher than its source. And
+the spring is lower than we are,--lower than our kitchen sink."
+
+"I don't quite see that," replied Jack, with the air of a candid
+inquirer. "I have been over the ground, and it didn't strike _me_ so."
+
+"It certainly looks to be several feet lower," said Betterson; and the
+boys agreed with him.
+
+"We generally speak of going _down_ to the spring," said Rufe. "We go
+down the road, then down the bank of the ravine, and then a little way
+up the other bank. I don't know how we can tell just how much lower it
+is. We can't see the spring from the house."
+
+"If I had my instruments here, I could tell you which is lower, and how
+much lower, pretty soon. While I am waiting for Snowfoot, (I can't go
+home, you know, without Snowfoot!) I may, perhaps, do a bit of
+engineering, as it is."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+JACK'S "BIT OF ENGINEERING."
+
+
+The boys got around Jack after dinner, and asked him about that bit of
+engineering.
+
+"In the first place," said Jack, standing outside the door, and looking
+over toward the spring, hidden by intervening bushes on a ridge, "we
+must have a water-level, and I think I can make one. Get me a piece of
+shingle, or any thin strip of wood. And I shall want a pail of water."
+
+A shingle brought, Jack cut it so that it would float freely in the
+pail; and, having taken two thin strips of equal length from the sides,
+he set them up near each end, like the masts of a boy's boat.
+
+"Now, this is our level," he said; "and these masts are the sights. To
+see that they are exact, we will look across them at some object, then
+turn the level end for end, and look across them again; if the range is
+the same both ways, then our sights are right, are they not? But I see
+we must lay a couple of sticks across the pail, to hold our level still
+while we are using it."
+
+The boys were much interested; and Link said he didn't see what anybody
+wanted of a better level than that.
+
+[Illustration: TESTING THE LEVEL.]
+
+"It will do for the use we are going to make of it," said Jack; "but it
+might not be quite convenient for field service; you couldn't carry a
+pail of water, and a floating shingle with two masts, in your
+overcoat-pocket, you know. We'll aim at a leg of that grindstone. Go and
+stick your knife where I tell you, Link."
+
+Jack soon got his level so that it would stand the test, and called the
+boys to look.
+
+"Here! you stand back, Chokie!" cried Link; while Rufe and Wad, one
+after the other, got down on the ground and sighted across the level at
+the knife-blade.
+
+"Now," Jack explained, "I am going to set this pail of water in your
+kitchen window, by the sink. That will be our starting-point. Then I
+want one of you boys to go, with a long-handled pitchfork, in the
+direction of the spring, as far as you can and keep the pail in sight;
+then set up your fork, and pin a piece of white paper on it just where I
+tell you. As I raise my hand, you will slide the paper up; and, as I
+lower my hand, you will slip it down."
+
+Wad and Link both went with the fork, which they set up on the borders
+of the woodland, back from the road. Then Wad, wrapping a piece of
+newspaper about the handle, held it there as high as his head, with a
+good strip of it visible above his hand.
+
+Jack, standing in the kitchen, looked across the sights of his level
+placed in the open window, and laughed.
+
+"What do you think, Rufe? Is the paper high enough?"
+
+"It ought to be a foot or two higher," was Rufe's judgment.
+
+"_I_ say _a foot_ higher," remarked Lord Betterson, coming up behind.
+
+"What do you say, Vinnie?"
+
+"I think the paper is too high."
+
+"Now look across the level," said Jack.
+
+All were astonished; and Lord Betterson could hardly be convinced that
+the level was constructed on sound principles. It showed that the top of
+the paper should be just below Wad's knee.
+
+"Now we will take our level," said Jack, after the paper was pinned in
+its proper place, "and go forward and make another observation."
+
+He chose a place at the top of the ridge beyond Wad, where, after
+cutting a few bushes, he was able to look back and see the fork-handle,
+and also to look forward and see the spring. There he set his pail on
+the ground, waited for the water to become still, adjusted his level,
+and caused a second strip of paper to be pinned to the fork-handle, in
+range with the sights.
+
+The boys then gathered around the fork, while Jack, taking a pocket-rule
+from his coat, ascertained that the second paper was six feet and an
+inch above the first.
+
+"Which shows that our level is now six feet and an inch higher than it
+stood on the kitchen window," said he. "Now let's see how much higher it
+is than the spring."
+
+Link was already on his hands and knees by the pail, turning the sights
+in range with the spring on the farther side of the little ravine. He
+suddenly flapped his arms and crowed.
+
+"No need of setting the fork over there," he said. "The spring is
+_almost_ as high as the pail!"
+
+"Let's be exact," said Jack; and he went himself and thrust the fork,
+handle downward, into the basin of the spring. "Now, Link, you be the
+engineer; show your skill; tell me where to fix this paper."
+
+Link was delighted with the important part assigned him.
+
+"Higher!" he commanded, from behind the pail. "Not quite so high. Not
+quite so low. Now just a millionth part of an inch higher--there!"
+
+"A millionth part of an inch is drawing it rather fine," said Jack, as
+he pinned the paper.
+
+Afterward, going and looking across the level, he decided that Link had
+taken a very accurate aim. Then, his pocket-measure being once more
+applied, the paper was found to be only seven inches higher than the
+water in the basin.
+
+"Seven inches from six feet one inch, leaves five feet six inches as the
+height of the spring water above the level of our sights at the kitchen
+window. Now, I measured, and found they were there thirteen inches
+higher than the bottom of the sink; which shows that if you carry this
+water in pipes, you can have your spout, or faucet, thirteen inches
+higher than the bottom of your sink, and still have a head of water of
+five feet and six inches, to give you a running stream."
+
+The boys were much astonished, and asked how it happened that they had
+been so deceived.
+
+"You have unconsciously based all your calculations on the fact that you
+go _down_ to Peakslow's. The road falls a little all the way. But it
+doesn't fall much between your house and the place where you turn into
+the woodland. There you take a path among the bushes, which really rises
+all the way, though quite gradually, until you pass the ridge and go
+down into the ravine. Vinnie hasn't been accustomed to talk of going
+down to the spring, as you have; and so, you see, she was the only one
+who thought Wad at first placed his paper too high. Perhaps this doesn't
+account for your mistake; but it is the best reason I can give."
+
+"How about the pipes?" Rufe asked.
+
+"You can use pump-logs for pipes."
+
+"But we have no pump-logs!"
+
+"You have enough to reach from here to North Mills and return. They are
+growing all about you."
+
+"Trees!" said Wad. "They are not pump-logs."
+
+"Pump-logs in the rough," replied Jack. "They only need cutting, boring,
+and jointing. All pump-logs were once trees. These small-sized oaks are
+just the thing for the purpose; you have acres of them, and in places
+the timber needs thinning out. You can use the straight stems for your
+aqueduct, and the limbs and branches for firewood."
+
+"That's an idea!" said Rufe, rubbing his forehead and walking quickly
+about. "But how are we going to turn our tree-trunks into pump-logs? We
+have no tools for boring and jointing."
+
+"No, and it would cost a good deal to get them. You want an iron rod, or
+auger-shaft, long enough to bore half-way through your longest log; then
+a bit,--an inch bore would be large enough, but I suppose it would be
+just as easy, perhaps easier, to make a two-inch bore,--the auger would
+be more apt to get clogged and cramped in a smaller hole; then a reamer
+and a circular joint-plane, to make your joints,--the taper end of one
+log is to be fitted into the bore of the next, you know. You will also
+need some apparatus for holding your log and directing the rod, so that
+you sha'n't bore out, but make your holes meet in the middle, when you
+bore from both ends; and I don't know what else. I've watched men boring
+logs, but I don't remember all the particulars about it."
+
+"You seem to remember a good deal," said Wad. "And I like the idea of a
+stream from this spring running in our back-room,--think of it, Rufe!
+But it _can't be did_,--as the elephant said when he tried to climb a
+tree. No tools, no money to buy or hire 'em, or to hire the work done."
+
+"You boys can do a good deal of the work yourselves," said Jack. "You
+can cut the logs, and get them all ready for boring. Then you can get
+the pump-maker at the Mills to come over with his tools and help you
+bore them by hand; or you can haul your logs to him, and have them bored
+by machinery,--he has a tread-mill, and a horse to turn it. In either
+case, I've no doubt you could pay for his labor by furnishing logs for
+his pumps."
+
+"I believe we can!" said Rufe, by this time quite warmed up to the
+subject. "But how about laying the logs? They have to be put pretty deep
+into the ground, don't they?"
+
+"Deep enough so that the water in them won't freeze. A trench four feet
+deep will answer."
+
+"How wide?"
+
+"Just wide enough for a man to get into it and lay the logs and drive
+the joints together. And, by the way, you'd better be sure that there
+are no leaks, and that the water comes through all right, before you
+cover your logs."
+
+"But there's work in digging such a trench as that!" said Wad, shaking
+his head.
+
+"So there is work in everything useful that is ever accomplished. Often
+the more work, the greater the satisfaction in the end. But you boys
+have got it in you,--I see that; and, let me tell you," said Jack, "if I
+were you, I would take hold of things on this place in downright
+earnest, and make a farm and a home to be proud of."
+
+"I never could get in love with work," replied Wad. "I'm
+_constitutionally tired_, as the lazy man said. The thought of that
+trench makes my back ache."
+
+"It won't be such a back-aching job as you suppose. You've only to take
+one stroke with a pick or shovel at a time. And as for that
+constitutional weariness you complain of, now is the time in your lives
+to get rid of it,--to work it out of your blood,--and lay the
+foundations of your manhood."
+
+"I must say, you preach pretty well!" observed Wad.
+
+"I'm not much of a preacher," replied Jack; "but I can't help feeling a
+good deal, and saying just a word, when I see young fellows like you
+neglecting your opportunities."
+
+"If father and Rad would take hold with us, we would just straighten
+things," said Rufe.
+
+"Don't wait for your father to set you an example," replied Jack. "I
+don't know about Rad, though I've heard you speak of him."
+
+"Our cousin, Radcliff," said Rufe. "He's a smart fellow, in his way, but
+he don't like work any better than we do, and he's off playing the
+gentleman most of the time."
+
+"Or playing the loafer," said Wad.
+
+"Let him stay away," said Jack. "You'll do better without any gentlemen
+loafers around."
+
+"Did _you_ ever do much hard work?" Wad asked.
+
+"What do you think?" replied Jack, with a smile.
+
+"I think you've seen something of the world."
+
+"Yes, and I've had my way to make in it. I was brought up on the Erie
+Canal,--a driver, ignorant, ragged, saucy; you wouldn't believe me if I
+should tell you what a little wretch I was. All the education I have, I
+have gained by hard study, mostly at odd spells, in the last three
+years. I had got a chance to work on a farm, and go to school in winter;
+then I took to surveying, and came out here to be with Mr. Felton. So,
+you see, I must have done something besides loafing; and if I talk work
+to you I have earned the right to."
+
+"I say, boys!" cried Link, "le's put this thing through, and have the
+water running in the house."
+
+"It will do for you to talk," said Wad; "mighty little of the work
+you'll do."
+
+"You'll see, Wad Betterson! Hain't I worked the past week as hard as
+either of you?"
+
+"This thing isn't to be pitched into in a hurry," said Rufe, more
+excited than he wished to appear. "We shall have to look it all over,
+and talk with the pump-maker, and do up some of the farm-work that is
+behindhand."
+
+"Why don't you take the farm of your father," said Jack, "and see what
+you can make out of it? I never knew what it was to be really interested
+in work till I took some land with another boy, and we raised a crop on
+our own account."
+
+Rufe brightened at the idea; but Wad said he wasn't going to be a
+farmer, anyway.
+
+"What are you going to be?"
+
+"I haven't made up my mind yet."
+
+"Till you do make up your mind, my advice is for you to take hold of
+what first comes to your hand, do that well, and prepare yourself for
+something more to your liking."
+
+"I believe that's good advice," said Rufe. "But it is going to be hard
+for us to get out of the old ruts."
+
+"I know it; and so much the more credit you will have when you succeed."
+
+Jack moved away.
+
+"Where are you going now?" Rufe asked.
+
+"To reconnoitre a little, and see what Peakslow has done with my horse.
+I ride that horse home, you understand!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+PREPARING FOR THE ATTACK.
+
+
+The boys showed Jack a way through the timber to a wooded hill opposite
+Peakslow's house. There Link climbed a tree to take an observation.
+
+[Illustration: OLD WIGGETT.]
+
+"I can look right over into his barnyard," he reported to his companions
+below. "There's old Wiggett with his ox-cart, unloading something out
+of Peakslow's wagon; and there's Peakslow with him. Hark!" After a
+pause, Link laughed and said: "Peakslow's talking loud; I could hear him
+say, 'That air hoss,' and 'Not if I live!' Now old Wiggett's hawing his
+oxen around out of the yard."
+
+"I must head him off and have a word with him," said Jack. And away he
+dashed through the undergrowth.
+
+Reaching a clump of hazels by the roadside, he waited till the old man
+and his slow ox-team came along.
+
+"What's the news, Mr. Wiggett?" Jack said, coming out and accosting him.
+
+"Whoa! hush! back!" the old man commanded, beating his cattle across the
+face with a short ox-goad. He shook with laughter as he turned to Jack.
+"It's dog-gone-ation funny! He had a quirk in his head, arter all.
+Hankers arter that reward of twenty dollars!"
+
+"What did you say to him?"
+
+"Told him he had no shadder of a claim,--he might sue ye through all the
+courts in seven kingdoms, he couldn't find a jury to give him the reward
+for stolen prop'ty found in his hands. He said for that reason he meant
+to hold ontew the hoss till you'd agree to suthin."
+
+"Where is the horse now?"
+
+"In Peakslow's stable. He wants to turn him out to pastur', but he's
+afraid you're hangin' round. He has set his boys to diggin' taters over
+ag'in Betterson's lot, where they can watch for ye. What he re'ly wants
+is, for you to come back and make him an offer, to settle the hash; for
+he's a little skittish of your clappin' the law ontew him."
+
+"I wonder he didn't think of that before."
+
+"He did, but he says you'd showed yerself a kind of easy, accomodatin'
+chap, and he'd no notion o' your gettin' so blamed riled all of a
+suddint."
+
+"That shows how much good it does to be easy with a man like him!" And
+Jack, thanking old Wiggett for his information, disappeared in the
+woods.
+
+He found the boys waiting for him, and told them what he had learned.
+"Now my cue is," said he, "to make Peakslow think I've gone home. So I
+may as well leave you for the present. Please take care of my saddle and
+bridle and gun till I call for them. Good by. If you _should_ happen to
+come across the Peakslow boys--you understand!"
+
+Rufe carelessly returned Jack's good-by. Then, leaving Wad and Link to
+go by the way of the spring and take care of the pail and fork, he
+walked down through the woods to the road, where he found Zeph and his
+older brother Dud digging potatoes in Peakslow's corner patch.
+
+"Hullo!" Dud called out, so civilly that Rufe knew that something was
+wanted of him.
+
+"Hullo yourself and see how you like it," Rufe retorted.
+
+"Where's that fellow that owns the hoss?"
+
+"How should I know?"
+
+"He stopped to your house."
+
+"That's so. But he's gone now."
+
+"Where?"
+
+"I don't know. He told us to keep his saddle and bridle and gun till he
+called for 'em, and went off. You'll hear from him before many days."
+
+Rufe's tone was defiant; and the young potato-diggers, having, as they
+supposed, got the information they wanted, suffered their insolence to
+crop out.
+
+"We ain't afraid of him nor you either," said Zeph, leaning on his hoe.
+
+"Yes, you are afraid of me, too, you young blackguard! I'll tie you into
+a bow-knot and hang you on a tree, if I get hold of you."
+
+"Le's see ye do it!"
+
+Rufe answered haughtily: "You wouldn't stand there and sass me, if you
+didn't have Dud to back you. Just come over the fence once, and leave
+Dud on the other side; I'll pitch you into the middle of next week so
+quick you'll be dizzy the rest of your natural life." And he walked on
+up the road.
+
+"Here! come back! I'll fight you! You're afraid!" Zeph yelled after him.
+
+"I'll come round and 'tend to your case pretty soon," Rufe replied.
+"I've something of more importance to look after just now; I've a pig to
+poke."
+
+Dud went on digging potatoes; but Zeph presently threw down his hoe and
+ran to the house. Shortly after, he returned; and then Jack, who had sat
+down to rest in a commanding position, on the borders of the woodland,
+was pleased to see Peakslow lead Snowfoot down the slope from the barn,
+and turn him into the pasture.
+
+Rufe got home some time before his brothers, who seemed to linger at the
+spring.
+
+"There they are!" said Lill; "Link with the fork on his shoulder, and
+Wad bringing the pail."
+
+Rufe was sitting on the grindstone frame, as they came into the yard.
+
+"Did you hear me blackguard the Peakslow boys? They think Jack--Hullo!"
+Rufe suddenly exclaimed. "I thought you was Wad!"
+
+"I am, for the present," said Jack, laughing under Wad's hat. "Do you
+think Peakslow will know me ten rods off?"
+
+"Not in that hat and coat! Lill and I both took you for Wad."
+
+"I am all right, then! Where's your father? I wonder if he wouldn't like
+to try my gun."
+
+Lord Betterson now came out of the house, fresh from his after-dinner
+nap, and looked a good deal of polite surprise at seeing Jack in Wad's
+hat and coat.
+
+"Mr. Betterson," said Jack, "Peakslow thinks I have gone home, and he
+has turned Snowfoot out to grass. Now, if I _should_ wish to throw down
+a corner of the fence between his pasture and your buckwheat, have you
+any objection?"
+
+"None whatever," replied my lord, with a flourish, as if giving Jack the
+freedom of his acres.
+
+"And perhaps," said Jack, "you would like to go down to the
+buckwheat-lot with me and try my gun. I hear you are a crack shot."
+
+"I can't boast much of my marksmanship nowadays; I could fetch down a
+bird once. Thank you,--I'll go with pleasure."
+
+"You are not going to get into trouble, Jack?" said Vinnie, with lively
+concern, seeing him tie the halter to his back.
+
+"O no! Mr. Betterson is going to give me a lesson in shooting on the
+wing. I'll take the bridle, so that if Snowfoot should happen to jump
+the fence when he sees me, I shall be ready for him, you know. Now I
+wonder if we can take Lion along without his being seen. He is tired of
+sitting still."
+
+"We can take him to the farther side of the cornfield, easily enough."
+
+"That will answer. Come, Lion!" The dog bounded with joy. "Keep right by
+my heels now, old fellow, and mind every word I say. Don't be anxious
+about us, Vinnie. And, Rufe, if you could manage to engage the Peakslow
+boys in conversation, about the time we are shooting hens pretty near
+the fence, you might help the sport."
+
+"I'll follow you along, and branch off toward the potato-patch, and ask
+Zeph what he meant by offering to fight me," said Rufe.
+
+"I'm going to get up on the cow-shed, and see the battle," said Link.
+"On Linden when the sun was low, and the buckwheat-patch was all in
+blow,--I'm a poet, you know!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THE BATTLE OF THE BOUNDARY FENCE.
+
+
+The little party set off, watched by Vinnie with a good deal of anxiety.
+The dog was left in the edge of the corn; and Jack, with a good milky
+ear in his pocket, followed Mr. Betterson into the buckwheat-field.
+
+"There's Wad and his dad after prairie chickens," said Zeph.
+
+"Yes," said Dud, "and here comes Rufe after you. He'll give you _Hail
+Columby_ one of these days, when I ain't round."
+
+"I'll resk him," muttered Zeph.
+
+"Look here, you young scape-grace!" Rufe called from over the fence,
+"I've come to take you at your word. Want to fight me, do ye? I'm ready,
+if you're particular about it."
+
+"Come near me, and I'll sink a stun in your head!" said Zeph,
+frightened.
+
+"You've got that phrase from the Wiggett boys," said Rufe. "I'd fight
+with something besides borrowed slang, if I was you."
+
+Betterson meanwhile brought down a prairie chicken with a grace of
+gesture and suddenness of aim which Jack would have greatly admired if
+he had not had other business on his mind.
+
+The bird fell in the direction of the boundary fence. Jack ran as if to
+pick it up, at the same time giving a low whistle for his dog. He
+stooped, and was for a minute hidden by the fence from the Peakslow
+boys,--if, indeed, Rufe gave them leisure just then to look in that
+direction.
+
+Darting forward to the fence, Jack took down the top rails of a corner,
+and made a motion to Lion, who leaped over.
+
+"Catch Snowfoot! catch Snowfoot!" said Jack, quickly placing the ear of
+corn in the dog's mouth.
+
+The horse was feeding some six rods off, near Peakslow's pair, when the
+dog, singling him out, ran up and began to coquet with him, flourishing
+the ear of corn.
+
+The boys were talking so loud, and Jack had let down the rails so
+gently, and Lion had sped away so silently, that the movement was not
+observed by the enemy until Snowfoot started for the fence. Even then
+the excited boys did not see what was going on. But Peakslow did.
+
+If Snowfoot had been in his usual spirits he would have soon been off
+the Peakslow premises. But his long pull from Chicago had tamed him; and
+though hunger induced him to follow the ear of corn, it was at a pace
+which Jack found exasperatingly slow,--especially when he saw Peakslow
+running to the pasture, gun in hand, and heard him shout,--
+
+"Let that hoss alone! I'll shoot you, and your dog and hoss too!"
+
+Jack answered by calling, "Co' jock! co' jock! Come, lion! Come,
+Snowfoot! Co' jock!"
+
+At the same time Zeph and Dud took the alarm, and ran toward the gap
+Jack had made,--they on one side of the fence, while Rufe raced with
+them on the other. Meanwhile Betterson, having coolly reloaded his
+discharged barrel, walked with his usual quiet, dignified step to the
+broken fence.
+
+"Better keep this side," he said with deliberate politeness to Jack.
+"You are on my land; you've a right here."
+
+"Oh! but that horse never will come!" said Jack. "Co' jock! co' jock!"
+
+"He is all right; keep cool, keep cool!" said Betterson.
+
+On came Peakslow, the inverted prow of his hooked nose cutting the
+air,--both hands grasping the gun, ready for a shot.
+
+Jack did not heed him. Snatching the corn from Lion's mouth, he held it
+out to Snowfoot: in a moment Snowfoot was crunching corn and bits, and
+the bridle was slipping over his ears.
+
+"Head him off, boys!" shouted Peakslow. Then to Jack, "Stop, or I'll
+shoot!"
+
+"If there's any shooting to be done," said Betterson, without for a
+moment losing his politeness of tone and manner, "I can shoot as quick
+as anybody; and, by the powers above, I will, if you draw trigger on
+that boy!"
+
+"Take care of him,--go!" cried Jack, giving Lion the bridle-rein and
+Snowfoot a slap. Then confronting Peakslow, "I've got my horse; I'm on
+Mr. Betterson's land; what have you to say about it?"
+
+[Illustration: "STOP, OR I'LL SHOOT!"]
+
+"I'll shoot your dog!"
+
+"No, you won't!" And Jack sprang between the infuriated man and Lion
+leading off the horse.
+
+Dud and Zeph were by this time on Betterson's side of the fence,
+hurrying to head off Snowfoot.
+
+"Keep out of our buckwheat!" cried Rufe. "By George, Zeph, now I've got
+you where I want you."
+
+"Help! Dud, Dud--help!" screamed Zeph.
+
+But Dud had something else to do. He sprang to seize Snowfoot's bridle;
+when Lion, without loosing his hold of it, turned with such fury upon
+the intruder, that he recoiled, and, tripping his heels in the trodden
+buckwheat, keeled over backward.
+
+Meanwhile Rufe had Zeph down, and was rubbing the soft black loam of the
+tilled field very thoroughly into his features, giving especial
+attention to his neck and ears. Zeph was spitting the soil of the
+country, and screaming; and Rufe was saying,--
+
+"Lie still! I'll give your face such a scouring as it hasn't had since
+you was a baby and fell into the soft-soap barrel!"
+
+Jack backed quietly off, as Peakslow, cocking his gun, pressed upon him
+with loud threats and blazing eyes. The angry man was striding through
+the gap, when Betterson stepped before him, courteous, stately, with a
+polite but dangerous smile.
+
+"Have a care, friend Peakslow!" he said. "If you come upon my premises
+with a gun, threatening to shoot folks, I'll riddle you with small shot;
+I'll fill you as full of holes as a pepper-box!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+VICTORY.
+
+
+Peakslow halted in the gap of the fence, his fury cooling before Lord
+Betterson's steady eyes and quiet threat.
+
+Betterson went on, speaking deliberately, while his poised and ready
+barrels gave emphasis to his remarks,--
+
+"You've talked a good deal of shooting, one time and another, friend
+Peakslow. I think it is about time to have done with that foolishness.
+Excuse my frankness."
+
+"I've a right to defend my property and my premises!" said Peakslow,
+glowing and fuming, but never stepping beyond the gap.
+
+"What property or premises, good neighbor? The horse is this young
+man's; and nobody has set foot on your land."
+
+"That dog was on my land."
+
+"And so was the horse," put in Jack.
+
+"Take him off, pa! he's smotherin' on me!" shouted Zeph.
+
+"Your boy is abusin' mine. I'll take care o' _him_!" And Peakslow set a
+foot over the two lower rails left in the gap.
+
+"You'd better stay where you are,--accept a friend's disinterested
+advice," remarked Betterson. "If your boy had been on the right side of
+the fence, minding his own business,--you will bear with me if I am
+quite plain in my speech,--my boy would have had no occasion to soil his
+hands with him."
+
+Peakslow appeared quite cowed by this unexpected show of determination
+in his easy-going neighbor. He stood astride the rails, just where
+Betterson had arrested his advance, and contented himself with urging
+Dud to the rescue of his brother.
+
+"Why do ye stan' there and see Zeph treated that way? Why don't ye pitch
+in?"
+
+"That's a game two can play at," said Jack. "Hands off, Dud, my boy."
+And he stood by to see fair play.
+
+"My boy had a right on that land; it's by good rights mine to-day!"
+exclaimed Peakslow.
+
+"We won't discuss that question; it has been settled once, neighbor,"
+replied Betterson. "Rufus, I think you've done enough for that boy; his
+face is blacker than I ever saw it, which is saying a good deal. Let him
+go. Mr. Peakslow,"--with a bow of gracious condescension over the frayed
+stock,--"you are welcome to as much of this disputed territory as you
+can shake out of that youngster's clothes,--not any more."
+
+"That seems to be a good deal," said Jack, laughing to see Zeph scramble
+up, gasping, blubbering, flirting soil from his clothes and hair, and
+clawing it desperately from his besmeared face.
+
+"That's for daring me to fight you," said Rufe, as he let him go. "I'll
+pay you some other time for what you did to Cecie"; while Zeph went off
+howling.
+
+"No more, Rufus," said Betterson. "Come and put up this fence."
+
+"I'll do that," said Jack. "I'm bound to leave it as I found it; if Mr.
+Peakslow will please step either forward or back."
+
+Peakslow concluded to step back; and Jack and Rufe laid up the corner,
+rail by rail.
+
+"Don't you think you've played me a perty shabby trick?" said Peakslow,
+glaring at Jack.
+
+"You are hardly the man to speak with a very good grace of _anybody's_
+shabby tricks," Jack replied, putting up the top rail before the hooked
+nose.
+
+"I didn't think it of you!" And Peakslow cast longing eyes after the
+horse.
+
+"You must have forgotten what you thought," said Jack. "You didn't dare
+turn the horse out till Zeph told you I'd gone home; and it seems you
+kept pretty close watch of him then."
+
+Peakslow choked back his wrath, and muttered,--
+
+"Ye might 'a' gi'n me suthin for my trouble."
+
+"So I would, willingly, if you had acted decently."
+
+"Gi' me suthin now, and settle it."
+
+"I consider it already settled,--like your land-claim dispute," said
+Jack. "But no matter; how much do you want? Don't bid too high, you
+know."
+
+"Gi' me a dollar, anyhow!"
+
+Jack laughed.
+
+"If I should give you enough to pay for the charge in your gun, wouldn't
+that satisfy you? Though, as you didn't fire it at me, I don't quite see
+that I ought to defray the expense of it. Good day, Mr. Peakslow."
+
+Jack went to find the chicken that had been shot; and Peakslow vented
+his rage upon his neighbor across the fence.
+
+"What a pattern of a man you be! stuck-up, struttin',--a turkey-gobbler
+kind of man, I call ye. Think I'm afraid o' yer gun?"
+
+"I have no answer to make to remarks of that nature," said Lord
+Betterson, retiring from the fence.
+
+"Hain't, hey?" Peakslow roared after him. "Feel above a common man like
+me, do ye? Guess I pay _my_ debts. If I set out to build, guess I look
+out and not bu'st up 'fore I get my paintin' and plasterin' done.
+Nothin' to say to me, hey?"
+
+Betterson coolly resumed his slow and stately march across the
+buckwheat, looking for prairie chickens.
+
+"You puffed-up, pompous, would-be 'ristocrat!" said Peakslow, more and
+more furious, "where'd you be if your relations didn't furnish ye money?
+Poorer 'n ye be now, I guess. What if I should tell ye what yer
+neighbors say of ye? Guess ye wouldn't carry yer head so plaguy high!"
+
+Two chickens rose from before Betterson's feet, and flew to right and
+left. With perfect coolness and precision of aim he fired and brought
+down one, then turned and dropped the other, with scarce an interval of
+three seconds between the reports.
+
+"This is a very pretty piece of yours," he observed smilingly, with a
+stately wave of the hand toward Jack.
+
+"I never saw anything so handsomely done!" exclaimed Jack, bringing the
+chicken previously shot.
+
+At the same time he could not help glancing with some apprehension at
+Peakslow, not knowing what that excitable neighbor might do, now that
+Betterson's two barrels were empty.
+
+"I think I will stay and have one or two more shots," said Betterson. "A
+very pretty piece indeed!"
+
+The muttering thunder of Peakslow's wrath died away in the distance, as
+he retired with his forces. Rufe picked up the last two prairie chickens
+and followed Jack, who ran to overtake the dog and horse.
+
+Lion still held the bridle-rein, letting Snowfoot nip the grass that
+grew along the borders of the corn, but keeping him from the corn
+itself. Jack patted and praised the dog, and stroked and caressed the
+horse, looking him all over to see if he had received any fresh injury.
+
+Then Rufe joined him; and presently Wad came bounding down the slope
+from the barn, laughing, carrying Jack's coat; and Link appeared,
+running and limping, having hurt his ankle in jumping down from the
+cow-shed. Behind came Chokie, trudging on his short legs, and tumbling
+and sprawling at every few steps.
+
+The boys were jubilant over the victory, and Jack was the object of loud
+congratulations; while Lion and Snowfoot formed the centre of the little
+group.
+
+"Much obliged to you, Wad," said Jack, as they re-exchanged coats and
+hats. "Thanks to you, I've got my horse again. Thanks to all of you.
+Boys, I was perfectly astonished at your father's pluck!" And he could
+not help thinking what a really noble specimen of a man Betterson might
+have made, if he had not been standing on his dignity and waiting for
+legacies all his life.
+
+"Not many folks know what sort of a man father is," replied Rufe.
+"Peakslow would have found out, if he had drawn a bead on you. How quick
+he stopped, and changed countenance! He can govern his temper when he
+finds he must; and he can cringe and crawl when he sees it's for his
+interest. Think of his asking you at last,--after you had got your horse
+in spite of him, and at the risk of your life,--think of his begging you
+to give him a dollar!"
+
+Jack said, "Look at that galled spot on Snowfoot's neck! Peakslow has
+got all he could out of him the past week,--kept him low and worked him
+hard in a cruel collar. Never mind, old Snowfoot! better times have come
+now, for both of us. Here, Link, you are lame; want a ride?"
+
+Link did want a ride, of course,--who ever saw a boy that didn't? Jack
+took hold of his foot and helped him mount upon Snowfoot's back; then
+called to Chokie, who was getting up from his last tumble (with loud
+lamentations), a few yards off.
+
+"Here, Chokie; don't cry; fun isn't all over yet; you can ride too."
+Tossing the urchin up, Jack set him behind Link. "Hold on now, Chokie;
+hug brother tight!"
+
+[Illustration: RETURNING IN TRIUMPH.]
+
+Both chubby arms reaching half around Link's waist, one chubby cheek
+pressed close to Link's suspender, and two chubby legs sticking out on
+Snowfoot's back, Chokie forgot his griefs, and, with the tear-streaks
+still wet on his cheeks, enjoyed the fearful pleasure of the ride.
+
+Vinnie's bright face watched from the door, the delighted Lill clapped
+her hands, and Mrs. Betterson and Cecie looked eagerly from the window,
+as the little procession approached the house,--Lion walking sedately
+before, then Link and Chokie riding the lost horse, and Jack and Rufe
+and Wad following with the prairie chickens.
+
+More congratulations. Then Lord Betterson came from the field with
+another bird. Then Snowfoot was saddled, and Jack, with dog and gun, and
+two of the prairie chickens, took leave of his friends, and rode home in
+triumph.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+VINNIE IN THE LION'S DEN.
+
+
+When Link the next morning went to the spring for water he found that
+the Peakslow boys (it could have been nobody else) had, by a dastardly
+trick, taken revenge for the defeat of the day before.
+
+Link came limping back (his ankle was still sore) with an empty pail,
+and loud complaints of the enemy.
+
+"They've been and gone and filled the spring with earth and leaves and
+sticks, and all sorts of rubbish! It will take an hour to dig it out,
+and then all day for the water to settle and be fit to drink."
+
+"Those dreadful Peakslow boys! what _shall_ we do?" Caroline said
+despairingly. "No water for breakfast, and no near neighbors but the
+Peakslows; but their well is the last place where we should think of
+going for water."
+
+"I'll tell you what _I_'ll do!" said Link. "I'll go to-night and give
+'em such a dose in their well, that they won't want any water from it
+for the next two months! I know where there's a dead rabbit. The
+Peakslows don't get the start of us!"
+
+"I don't see but that one of the boys will have to go to Mr. Wiggett's
+for water," said poor Caroline, bemoaning her troubles.
+
+"Rufe and Wad are doing the chores," said Link, "and I'm lame. Besides,
+you don't catch one of us going to old Wiggett's for water, for we
+should have to pass Peakslow's house, and it would please 'em too well."
+
+"Let me take the pail; I will get some water," said Vinnie.
+
+"Why, Lavinia dear!" Caroline exclaimed, "what are you thinking of?
+Where are you going?"
+
+"To Mr. Peakslow's," Vinnie answered with a smile.
+
+"Going into the lion's den! Don't think of such a thing, Lavinia dear!"
+
+"No, by sixty!" cried Link. "I don't want them boys to sass you! I'd
+rather go a mile in the other direction for water,--bother the lame
+foot!"
+
+But Vinnie quietly persisted, saying it would do no harm for her to try;
+and putting on her bonnet, she started off with the empty pail.
+
+I cannot say that she felt no misgivings; but the consciousness of doing
+a simple and blameless act helped to quiet the beating of her heart as
+she approached the Peakslow door.
+
+It was open, and she could see the family at breakfast within, while the
+loud talking prevented her footsteps from being heard.
+
+Besides Dud and Zeph, there were three or four younger children, girls
+and boys, the youngest of whom--a child with bandaged hands and
+arms--sat in its father's lap.
+
+Vinnie remembered the swarthy face, bushy beard, and hooked nose; and
+yet she could hardly believe that this was the same man who once showed
+her such ruffianly manners on the wharf in Chicago. He was fondling and
+feeding the child, and talking to it, and drumming on the table with his
+knife to amuse it and still its complaining cries.
+
+"Surely," thought Vinnie, "there must be some good in a man who shows so
+much affection even toward his own child." And with growing courage she
+advanced to the threshold.
+
+Mrs. Peakslow--a much-bent, over-worked woman, with a pinched and
+peevish face--looked up quickly across the table and stared at the
+strange visitor. In a moment all eyes were turned upon Vinnie.
+
+"I beg your pardon," she said, pausing at the door. "I wish to get a
+pail of water. Can I go to your well and help myself?"
+
+The children--and especially Dud and Zeph--looked in astonishment at the
+bright face and girlish form in the doorway. As Mr. Peakslow turned his
+face toward her, all the tenderness went out of it.
+
+"What do Betterson's folks send here for water for? And what makes 'em
+send a gal? Why don't they come themselves?"
+
+"They did not send me," Vinnie answered as pleasantly as she could. "I
+came of my own accord."
+
+Peakslow wheeled round on his chair.
+
+"Queer sort of folks, they be! An' seems to me you must be queer, to be
+stoppin' with 'em."
+
+"Mrs. Betterson is my sister," replied Vinnie in a trembling voice. "I
+came to her because she is sick, and Cecie--because I was needed," she
+said, avoiding the dangerous ground of Zeph's offence.
+
+"I've nothin' pa'tic'lar ag'in Mis' Betterson as I know on," said
+Peakslow, "though of course she sides with him ag'in me, an' of course
+_you_ side with _her_."
+
+"I've nothing to do with Mr. Betterson's quarrels," Vinnie answered,
+drawing back from the door. "Will you kindly permit me to get a pail of
+water? I am sorry if I give you any trouble."
+
+"No trouble; water's cheap," said Peakslow. "But why don't they have a
+well o' their own, 'ste'd o' dependin' on their neighbors? What makes
+'em so plaguy shif'less?"
+
+"They have a well, but it is dry this summer, and--"
+
+"Dry every summer, ain't it? What a way to dig a well that was!"
+
+"They have a very good spring," Vinnie said, "but something happened to
+it last night." At which Dud and Zeph giggled and looked sheepish.
+
+"What happened to the spring?"
+
+"Somebody put rubbish into it."
+
+"Who done it, did you hear 'em say?"
+
+"I don't know who did it; and I should be sorry to accuse any person of
+such an act," Vinnie answered with firm but serene dignity.
+
+The boys looked more sheepish and giggled less.
+
+"I know who put stuff in the spring," spoke up a little one, proud of
+being able to convey useful information; "Dud and Zeph--"
+
+But at that moment Dud's hand stopped the prattler's mouth.
+
+"I don't believe my boys have done anything of the kind," said Peakslow;
+"though 't wouldn't be strange if they did. See how that great lubberly
+Rufe treated our Zeph yist'day! rubbed the dirt into his skin so 't he
+hain't got it washed out yit."
+
+"I am sorry for these misunderstandings," said Vinnie, turning to Mrs.
+Peakslow with an appealing look. "I wish you and my sister knew each
+other better. You have a sick child, too, I see."
+
+"'T ain't sick, 'xac'ly," replied the mother in a peevish, snarling
+tone. "Pulled over the teapot, and got hands and arms scalt."
+
+"O, poor little thing!" Vinnie exclaimed. "What have you done for it?"
+
+"Hain't done nothin' much, only wrapped up the blistered places in Injin
+meal; that's coolin'."
+
+"No doubt; but I've some salve, the best thing in the world for burns. I
+wish you would let me bring you some."
+
+"I guess Bubby'll git along 'thout no help from outside," said Peakslow,
+his ill-natured growl softened by a feeling of tenderness for the child
+which just then came over him. "He's weathered the wust on 't."
+
+But Bubby's fretful cries told that what was left was bad enough.
+
+"I will bring you the salve," said Vinnie, "and I hope you will try it;
+it is so hard to see these little ones suffer."
+
+She was retiring, when Peakslow called after her,--
+
+"Goin' 'ithout the water?"
+
+"I--thought--you had not told me I could have it."
+
+"Have it! of course you can have it; I wouldn't refuse nobody a pail o'
+water. Ye see where the well is?"
+
+"O yes; thank you." And Vinnie hastened to the curb.
+
+"She can't draw it," snickered Zeph. "Handle's broke; and the crank'll
+slip out of her hands and knock her to Jericho, if she don't look out."
+
+"Seems to be a perty spoken gal," said Peakslow, turning to finish his
+breakfast. "I've nothin' ag'in _her_. You've finished your breakfast;
+better go out, Dudley, and tell her to look out about the crank."
+
+With mixed emotions in his soul, Dud went; his countenance enlivened at
+one and the same time with a blush of boyish bashfulness and a malicious
+grin. As he drew near, and saw Vinnie embarrassed with the windlass,
+which seemed determined to let the bucket down too fast (as if animated
+with a genuine Peakslow spite toward her), the grin predominated; but
+when she turned upon him a troubled, smiling face, the grin subsided,
+and the blush became a general conflagration, extending to the tips of
+his ears.
+
+"How does 't go?"
+
+"It's inclined to go altogether too fast," said Vinnie, stopping the
+windlass; "and it hurts my hands."
+
+"Le' me show ye."
+
+And Dud, taking her place by the curb, let the windlass revolve with
+moderated velocity under the pressure of his rough palms, until the
+bucket struck the water. Then, drawing it up, he filled her pail.
+
+The grin had by this time faded quite out of his countenance; and when
+she thanked him sweetly and sincerely for helping her, the blush became
+a blush of pleasure.
+
+"It is more than I can carry," she said. "I shall have to pour out
+some."
+
+Thereupon Dud Peakslow astonished himself by an extraordinary act of
+gallantry.
+
+"I'll carry it for ye as fur as the road; I'd carry it all the way, if
+'t was anywhere else." And he actually took up the pail.
+
+"You seem to have a very bad opinion of my relations," Vinnie said.
+
+"Good reason! They hate us, too!"
+
+"And think _they_ have good reason. But I'm sure you are not so bad as
+they believe; and _you_ may possibly be mistaken about _them_. Let me
+take the pail now. You are very kind."
+
+Dud gave up the pail with reluctance, and gazed after her up the road,
+his stupid mouth ajar with an expression of wistful wonder and pleasure.
+
+"Hurry now and git up the team, Dud!" his father called from the door.
+"What ye stan'in' there for? Didn't ye never see a gal afore?"
+
+When Vinnie reached home with her pail of water, all gathered around,
+eager to hear her adventure.
+
+"The lions were not very savage, after all," she said, laughing.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+AN "EXTRAORDINARY" GIRL.
+
+
+After breakfast Vinnie left Lill to "do the dishes," and went with her
+box of salve to fulfil her promise to Mrs. Peakslow. Dud and Zeph were
+off at work with their father; and she was glad to find the mother alone
+with the younger children.
+
+"Oh! you ag'in?" said Mrs. Peakslow, by the chimney, looking up from a
+skillet she was stooping over and scraping. "Ye need n't 'a' took the
+trouble. Guess Bubby's burns 'll git along."
+
+But Vinnie was not to be rebuffed.
+
+"I have brought some linen rags to spread the salve on. Will you let me
+do it myself? I wish you would; the poor thing is suffering so."
+
+And Vinnie knelt down beside the girl who was holding Bubby in her arms.
+
+"Is 't any o' the Betterson folks's sa'v'?" Mrs. Peakslow inquired,
+scraping away at her skillet.
+
+"No; it is some I brought from the East with me, thinking I should find
+a use for it in my sister's family; it is good for various things."
+
+"Better keep it for her family!" snarled Mrs. Peakslow. Scrape, scrape.
+
+"There's plenty and to spare," said Vinnie, unrolling her rags. "And my
+sister will be only too glad if it can be of any service to you."
+
+"Think so?" Mrs. Peakslow stopped her scraping and scowled at Vinnie.
+"Her folks hain't never showed us none too much good-will."
+
+"They have never known you,--you have never understood each other," said
+Vinnie. "It is too bad that the troubles between the men should prevent
+you and her from being on neighborly terms. Can I use a corner of this
+table to spread the salve? And can I see the little thing's burns, so as
+to shape the plasters to cover them?"
+
+"He tol' me not to use the sa'v', if ye brought it," said Mrs. Peakslow
+doubtfully, laying down the skillet.
+
+"When he sees the good effect of it I am sure he won't complain; he is
+too fond of his little boy," said Vinnie, placing rags and salve on the
+table. "Will you let me take a case-knife and a pair of scissors?"
+
+"Got rags enough of my own. Needn't trouble yourself to cut and spread
+plasters. _Try_ the sa'v', 'f ye say so."
+
+Vinnie did say so, and dressed Bubby's burns with her own hands, doing
+the work so deftly and tenderly, talking now to the child, now to the
+mother, who had taken him into her lap, and showing in every look and
+tone so cheerful and sweet a spirit that poor Mrs. Peakslow's peevish
+heart warmed and softened toward her.
+
+"I do declare," she said, as the outer bandages were going on, "Bubby
+feels comforted a'ready. Must be dreffle good sa'v'! _Much_ obleeged to
+ye, I'm sure. How _is_ yer sister?"
+
+"Much better than she was; and the baby is better too. Indeed," said
+Vinnie, "I think the baby will get well as soon as the mother does."
+
+"And Cecie--how's Cecie?" Mrs. Peakslow timidly asked.
+
+"O, Cecie is in very good spirits! She is the most gentle, patient,
+beautiful girl you ever saw! She never complains; and she is always so
+grateful for any little thing that is done for her!"
+
+"S'pose the folks feel hard to our Zeph; don't they?"
+
+"I believe the boys do, and you can hardly wonder at it, Mrs. Peakslow,"
+said Vinnie; "their own dear sister! crippled for life, perhaps. But
+Cecie won't allow that your son _meant_ to hurt her; she always takes
+his part when the subject is brought up."
+
+"Does she?" exclaimed Mrs. Peakslow, surprised into sudden tears. "I
+wouldn't 'a' believed that! Must _be_ she's a good gal. Truth is, Zeph
+hadn't no notion o' hurtin' on her. It's re'ly troubled me,--it's
+troubled all on us, though I don't s'pose her folks'll believe it."
+
+And Mrs. Peakslow, not finding it convenient to get at her apron, with
+Bubby in her lap, wiped her eyes with a remnant of Vinnie's rags.
+
+"Isn't it too sad that this quarrel is kept up?" said Vinnie.
+
+"O dear me! nobody knows," said Mrs. Peakslow, in a quavering voice,
+"what a life it is! Our folks is _some_ to blame, I s'pose. But the
+Bettersons have been _so_ aggravatin'! Though I've nothin' ag'in the
+gals. They're as perty gals as I'd ask to have play with my children. My
+children is sufferin' for mates. I want society, too, for it's a dreffle
+life,--a dreffle life!" And the quavering voice broke into sobs.
+
+Vinnie was surprised and pained at this outburst, and hardly knew what
+reply to make.
+
+"Lyddy, wipe them dishes!" Mrs. Peakslow went on again, sopping her eyes
+with the remnant of rags. "Lecty Ann! here, take Bubby. Scuse me, miss;
+I d'n' know what sot me goin' this way; but my heart's been shet up so
+long; I've _so_ wanted sympathy!" And now the apron did service in place
+of the rags.
+
+"Yes, I know," said Vinnie. "This is a lonesome country, unless you have
+friends around you. There seem to be a few nice people here,--people
+from the East; you are from the East, I suppose?"
+
+"O yes; but _he_ ain't a very social man, an' he's dreffle sot in his
+way. He don't go out nowheres, 'thout he has business, an' he don't
+think there's any need of a woman's goin' out. So there it is. The
+Wiggetts, our neighbors on one side, ain't our kind o' people; then
+there's the Bettersons on t'other side. An' there's allus so many things
+a wife has to put up with, an' hold her tongue. O dear! O dear! Keep to
+your work, gals! hear?"
+
+There was something almost comical in this sharp and shrill winding-up
+of the good woman's pathetic discourse; but Vinnie never felt less like
+laughing.
+
+"I am glad you can speak freely to me," she said. "I'll come and see you
+again, if you will let me; and I want you some time to come and see my
+sister."
+
+"I d'n' know! I d'n' know!" said Mrs. Peakslow, still weeping. "_You_
+may come _here_,--like to have ye,--only it'll be jest as well if you
+time your visits when me an' the gals is alone; you know what men-folks
+be."
+
+"You are really an extraordinary girl, Lavinia dear!" Caroline said,
+when Vinnie went home and told her story. "Did you know it?"
+
+Vinnie laughed.
+
+"Why, no; I never thought of such a thing; what I do comes so very
+natural."
+
+"Extraordinary!" Caroline repeated, regarding her admiringly. "I'm proud
+of such a sister. I always told Mr. Betterson there was good blood on
+our side too. I wonder what Radcliff would think of you."
+
+Vinnie sincerely believed that so fine a young gentleman would not think
+anything of her at all, but feared it might seem like affectation in him
+to say so.
+
+"And I wonder," Caroline continued, with the usual simper which her
+favorite theme inspired, "what you would think of Radcliff. Ah, Lavinia
+dear! it is a comfort for me to reflect that it was a Betterson--nobody
+less than a thoroughbred Betterson--who took the place in our family
+which you would otherwise have filled."
+
+Evidently Caroline's conscience was not quite easy on the subject of her
+early neglect of so "extraordinary" a sister; for she often alluded to
+it in this way. Vinnie now begged her not to mention it again.
+
+"And you really cherish no hard feelings?"
+
+"None whatever."
+
+"You are _very_ good. And pretty; did you know it? Quite pretty."
+
+Vinnie laughed again.
+
+"Mrs. Presbit brought me up to the wholesome belief that I was quite
+plain."
+
+"That was to prevent you from becoming vain. Vanity, you know," said
+Caroline, with her most exquisite simper, "spoils so many girls! I'm
+thankful it doesn't run in _our_ family! But didn't your glass undeceive
+you?"
+
+"On the contrary, I used to look in it and say to myself, 'It is a very
+_common_ face; I _wish_ it was pretty, but Aunt Presbit is right; I'm a
+homely little thing!'"
+
+"And you felt bad?"
+
+"I never mourned over it; though, of course, I should have much
+preferred to be handsome."
+
+"And hasn't anybody ever told you you _were_ handsome?"
+
+Vinnie blushed.
+
+"Of course I've heard a good deal of nonsense talked now and then."
+
+"Lavinia dear, you _are_ extraordinary. And handsome, though not in the
+usual sense of the word. Your face _is_ rather common, in repose, but it
+lights up wonderfully. And, after all, I don't know that it is so much
+your face, as the expression you throw into it, that is so enchanting.
+What _would_ Radcliff Betterson say to you, I wonder?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+ANOTHER HUNT, AND HOW IT ENDED.
+
+
+Jack had one day been surveying a piece of land a few miles east of Long
+Woods. It was not very late in the afternoon when he finished his work;
+and he found that, by going a little out of his way and driving rather
+fast, he could, before night, make Vinnie and her friends a call, and
+perhaps give Mrs. Wiggett the promised noon-mark on her kitchen floor.
+
+Leaving in due time the more travelled thoroughfare, he turned off upon
+the neighborhood road, which he knew passed through the woods and struck
+the river road near Betterson's house. Away on his left lay the rolling
+prairie, over a crest of which he, on a memorable occasion, saw Snowfoot
+disappear with his strange rider; and he was fast approaching the scene
+of his famous deer-hunt.
+
+Jack had his gun with him; and, though he did not stop to give much
+attention to the prairie hens which now and then ran skulkingly across
+the track, or flew up from beside his buggy-wheels, he could not help
+looking for larger game.
+
+"I'd like to see another doe and fawn feeding off on the prairie there,"
+thought he. "Wonder if I could find some obliging young man to drive
+them in!"
+
+He whipped up Snowfoot, and presently, riding over a swell of land,
+discovered a stranger walking on before him in the road.
+
+"No deer or fawn," thought he; "but there's possibly an obliging young
+man."
+
+As he drove on, fast overtaking the pedestrian, Jack was very much
+struck by his appearance. He was a slender person; he walked at a
+loitering pace; and he carried his coat on his arm. There was something
+also in the jaunty carriage of the head, and in the easy slouch of the
+hat-brim, which startled Jack.
+
+"I vow, it's my obliging young man himself!" he muttered through his
+teeth,--"or a vision of him!"
+
+Just then the stranger, hearing the sound of wheels, cast a quick glance
+over his shoulder. It was the same face, and Jack could almost have
+taken his oath to the quid in the cheek.
+
+He was greatly astonished and excited. It seemed more like a dream than
+anything else, that he should again meet with the person who had given
+him so much trouble, so near the place where he had seen him first, in
+precisely similar hat and soiled shirt-sleeves, and carrying (to all
+appearances) the same coat on his arm!
+
+The stranger gave no sign of the recognition being mutual, but stepped
+off upon the roadside to let the buggy pass.
+
+"How are you?" said Jack, coming up to him, and drawing rein; while Lion
+snuffed suspiciously at the rogue's heels.
+
+"All right, stranger; how are you yourself?" And a pair of reckless dark
+eyes flashed saucily up at Jack.
+
+"Better than I was that night after you ran off with my horse!" Jack
+replied.
+
+"Glad you're improving. Wife on the mending hand? And how are the little
+daisies? Which is the road to Halleluia Corners? I branch off here; good
+day, fair stranger."
+
+These words were rattled off with great volubility, which seemed all the
+greater because of their surprising irrelevancy; while the head, thrown
+gayly to one side, balanced the quid in the bulged cheek.
+
+Before Jack could answer, the youth with a wild laugh struck off from
+the road, and began to walk fast toward the woodland. Jack called after
+him,--
+
+"Hold on! I want to speak with you!"
+
+"Speak quick, then; I'm bound for the Kingdom,--will you go to glory
+with me?" the rogue shouted back over his shoulder, with a defiant grin,
+never slacking his pace.
+
+Jack gave Snowfoot a touch of the whip, reined out of the track, and
+drove after him.
+
+The fellow at the same time quickened his step to a run, and before he
+could be overtaken he had come to rough ground, where fast driving was
+dangerous.
+
+Jack pulled up unwillingly, revolving rapidly in his mind what he
+should do. Though he had recovered his horse, he felt the strongest
+desire to have the thief taken and punished. Moreover, he had lately
+seen the truckman to whom the stolen animal was sold, and had promised
+to do what he could to help him obtain justice.
+
+He might have levelled his gun and threatened to shoot the fugitive; but
+he would not have felt justified in carrying out such a threat, and
+recent experience had disgusted him with the shooting business.
+
+He would have jumped from the wagon, and followed on foot; but, though a
+good runner, he was convinced that his heels were no match for the
+stranger's. There was then but one thing to do.
+
+"Stop, or I'll let the dog take you!" Jack yelled.
+
+For reply, the fugitive threw up his hand over his shoulder, with
+fingers spread and thumb pointing toward the mid-region of countenance
+occupied by the nose; which did not, however, take the trouble to turn
+and make itself visible.
+
+Lion was already eager for the chase; and Jack had only to give him a
+signal.
+
+"Take care of him, Lion!" And away sped the dog.
+
+Fleet of foot as the fellow was, and though he now strained every nerve
+to get away, the distance between him and the dog rapidly diminished;
+and a hurried glance behind showed him the swift, black, powerful
+animal, coming with terrible bounds, and never a bark, hard at his
+heels.
+
+The thickets were near,--could he reach them before the dog reached him?
+Would they afford him a refuge or a cudgel? He threw out his quid, and
+_leaned_.
+
+Jack drove after as fast as he could, in order to prevent mortal
+mischief when Lion should bring down his game; for the dog, when too
+much in earnest with a foe, had an overmastering instinct for searching
+out the windpipe and jugular vein.
+
+The rogue had reached the edge of the woods, when he found himself so
+closely pursued that he seemed to have no resource but to turn and dash
+his coat into the dog's face. That gave him an instant's reprieve; then
+Lion was upon him again; and he had just time to leap to the low limb of
+a scraggy oak-tree, and swing his lower limbs free from the ground, when
+the fierce eyes and red tongue were upon the spot.
+
+Lion gave one leap, but missed his mark; the trap-like jaws snapping
+together with a sound which could not have been very agreeable to the
+youth whose dangling legs had been actually grazed by the passing
+muzzle.
+
+With a wistful, whining yelp, Lion gave another upward spring; and this
+time his fangs closed upon something--only cloth, fortunately; but as
+the thief clambered up out of their range, it was with a very good
+chance for a future patch upon the leg of his trousers.
+
+Leaping from his wagon, Jack rushed to the tree, and found his obliging
+young man perched comfortably in it, with one leg over a limb; while
+Lion, below, made up for his long silence by uttering frantic barks.
+
+[Illustration: THE END OF THE CHASE.]
+
+"What are you up there for?" said Jack.
+
+"To take an observation," the fellow replied, out of breath, but still
+cheerful. "First-rate view of the country up here. I fancy I see a doe
+and a fawn off on the prairie; wouldn't you like a shot at 'em?"
+
+"I've other game to look after just now!" Jack replied.
+
+"Better look out for your horse; he's running away!"
+
+"My horse isn't in the habit of running away without help. Will you come
+down?"
+
+"I was just going to invite you to come up. I'll share my lodgings with
+you,--give you an upper berth. A very good tavern; rooms airy, fine
+prospect; though the table don't seem to be very well supplied, and I
+can't say I fancy the entrance. 'Sich gittin' up stairs I never did
+see!'"
+
+Jack checked this flow of nonsense by shouting, "Will you come down, or
+not?"
+
+"Suppose not?" said the fellow.
+
+"Then I leave the dog to guard the door of your tavern, and go for a
+warrant and a constable, to bring you down."
+
+"What would you have me come down for? You seem to be very pressing in
+your attentions to a stranger!"
+
+"Don't say stranger,--you who drove the deer in for me! I am anxious to
+pay you for that kindness. I want you to ride with me."
+
+"Why didn't you say so before?" cried the rogue, rolling a fresh quid
+in his cheek. "I always ride when you ask me to, don't I? Say, did you
+ever know me to refuse when you offered me a ride? Which way are you
+going?"
+
+"Down through the woods," said Jack, amused, in spite of himself, at the
+scamp's reckless gayety.
+
+"Why, that's just the way I am going! Why didn't you mention it? I never
+should have put up at this tavern if I had thought a friend would come
+along and give me a lift in his carriage. Please relieve the guard, and
+I'll descend."
+
+The dog was driven off, and the youth dropped from the branches to the
+ground.
+
+"Pick up your coat," said Jack, "and do pretty much as I tell you now,
+or there'll be trouble. None of your tricks this time!"
+
+He held the reins and the gun while he made the fellow get into the
+buggy; then took his seat, with the prisoner on his left and the gun on
+his right, drove on to the travelled track, and turned into the woods;
+the vigilant Lion walking close by the wheel.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+JACK'S PRISONER.
+
+
+For a second time Jack now travelled that woodland road under odd
+circumstances; the first occasion being that on which he himself had
+pulled in the shafts, while Link pushed behind. He laughed as he thought
+of that adventure, of which the present seemed a fitting sequel. Before,
+he had been obliged to go home without his horse; what a triumph it
+would now be to carry home the thief! But to do this, great care and
+vigilance would be necessary; and he calculated all the chances, and
+resolved just what he would do, should his captive attempt to escape.
+The rogue, on the contrary, appeared contented with his lot.
+
+"Young man," said he, "I can't call your name, but let me say you
+improve upon acquaintance. This is galorious! better by a long chalk
+than a horseback gallop without a saddle. I suppose you will call for me
+with a barouche next time!"
+
+"At all events, I may help you to free lodgings,--not up in a tree,
+either!" Jack said, as he touched up Snowfoot.
+
+He had, of course, abandoned the idea of giving Mrs. Wiggett her
+noon-mark that day. But he could not think of passing the "castle"
+without stopping at the door.
+
+"What will Vinnie say?" thought he, with a thrill of anticipation. And
+it must be confessed that he felt no little pride at the prospect of
+showing his prisoner to Lord Betterson and the boys.
+
+Descending the long declivity, the fellow was strangely silent, for one
+so rattle-brained, until the "castle" appeared in sight through an
+opening of the woods. "He's plotting mischief," Jack thought. And when
+suddenly the rogue made a movement with his arms, Jack started, ready
+for a grapple.
+
+"Don't be excited; I'm only putting on my coat."
+
+"All right," said Jack; and the garment was put on. "Anything else I can
+do for you?"
+
+"I'm dying with thirst; they had nothing to drink at that tavern where
+you found me."
+
+"May be we can get some water at this house," Jack said.
+
+"Are you acquainted here?" the prisoner inquired, with a curious, sober
+face.
+
+"Yes, well enough to ask for a glass of water." And Jack drove into the
+yard.
+
+The rogue kept on his sober face, but seemed to be laughing prodigiously
+inside.
+
+As Jack reined up to the door, Lill came out, clapped her hands with
+sudden surprise, and screamed, "O mother!" Then Vinnie appeared, her
+face radiant on seeing Jack, but changing suddenly at sight of his
+companion. Mrs. Betterson followed, and, perceiving the faces in the
+buggy, uttered a cry, tottered, and clung to Vinnie's shoulder.
+
+Link at the same time ran out from behind the house, dropped a dirty
+stick, wiped his hands on his trousers, and shouted, "Hullo! by sixty!
+ye don't say so!" while Rufe and Wad came rushing up from the barn. Jack
+had rather expected to produce a sensation,--not, however, until he
+should fairly have shown his prisoner; and this premature commotion
+puzzled him.
+
+The rogue's suppressed laughter was now bubbling freely; a frothy and
+reckless sort of mirth, without much body of joy to it.
+
+"How are ye all?" he cried. "Don't faint at sight of me, Aunt Carrie.
+This is an unexpected pleasure!" and he bowed gayly to Vinnie.
+
+"O Radcliff! you again? and in _this_ style!" said poor Caroline. "Where
+_did_ you come from?"
+
+"From up a tree, at last accounts. Hullo, boys! I'd come down on my
+trotters, and hug you all round, but my friend here would be jealous."
+
+Jack was confounded.
+
+"Is _this_ your Cousin Rad?" he cried, as the boys crowded near. "I'm
+sorry to know it, for he's the fellow who ran off with my horse. Where
+did _you_ ever see him before, Vinnie?"
+
+"He is the one I told you about,--in Chicago," said Vinnie, astonished
+to find her waggish acquaintance, the elegant Radcliff Betterson, and
+this captive vagabond, the same person.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+RADCLIFF.
+
+
+Lord Betterson now came out of the house, calm and stately, but with
+something of the look in his eye, as he turned it upon his nephew, which
+Jack had observed when it menaced Peakslow at the gap of the fence.
+
+"Ah, Radcliff! you have returned? Why don't you alight?" And he touched
+his hat to Jack.
+
+"Your nephew may tell you the reason, if he will," Jack replied.
+
+"The long and the short of it is this," said Radcliff, betraying a good
+deal of trouble, under all his assumed carelessness: "When I was on my
+way home, a few weeks ago, this young man asked me to drive in some deer
+for him. He gave me his horse to ride. I made a mistake, and rode him
+too far."
+
+"You, Radcliff!" said Lord Betterson, sternly; while Mrs. Betterson went
+into hysterics on Vinnie's shoulder, and was taken into the house.
+
+"We thought of Rad when you described him," Rufe said to Jack. "But we
+couldn't believe he would do such a thing."
+
+[Illustration: JACK AND HIS JOLLY PRISONER.]
+
+"'Twas the most natural thing in the world," Rad explained. "I was
+coming home because I was hard up. I didn't steal the horse,--he was put
+into my hands; it was a breach of trust, that's all you can make of it.
+Necessity compelled me to dispose of him. With money in my pocket, what
+was the use of my coming home? I took my clothes out of pawn, and was
+once more a gentleman. Money all gone, I spouted my clothes again,--fell
+back upon this inexpensive rig,--took to the country, remembered I had a
+home, and was making for it, when this young man overtook me just now,
+and gave me a seat in his buggy."
+
+"The matter appears serious," said Lord Betterson. "Am I to understand
+that you have taken my nephew prisoner?"
+
+"He can answer that question," said Jack.
+
+"Well, I suppose that is the plain English of it," replied Radcliff.
+"Come, now, Uncle Lord! this ain't the first scrape you've got me out
+of; fix it up with him, can't you?"
+
+"It is my duty to save the honor of the name; but you are bent on
+destroying it. Will you please to come into the house with my nephew,
+and oblige me?" Betterson said to Jack.
+
+"Certainly, if you wish it," Jack replied. "Get down, Radcliff. Be
+quiet, Lion! I was never in so hard a place in my life," he said to the
+boys, as they followed Rad and his uncle into the house. "I never
+dreamed of his being your cousin!"
+
+"He's a wild fellow,--nothing very bad about him, only he's just full
+of the Old Harry," said Rufe. "I guess father'll settle it, somehow."
+
+Meanwhile, Mrs. Betterson had retired to her room, where Vinnie was
+engaged, with fan and hartshorn, in restoring--not her consciousness,
+for that she had not lost, but her equanimity.
+
+"Lavinia!" she said brokenly, at intervals, "Lavinia dear! don't think I
+intended to deceive you. It was, perhaps, too much the ideal Radcliff I
+described to you,--the Betterson Radcliff, the better Betterson
+Radcliff, if I may so speak; for he is, after all, you know, a--but that
+is the agony of it! The name is disgraced forever! Fan me, Lavinia
+dear!"
+
+"I don't see how the act of one person should disgrace anybody else,
+even of the same name," Vinnie replied.
+
+"But--a Betterson!" groaned Caroline. "My husband's nephew! Brought back
+here like a reprobate! The hartshorn, Lavinia dear!"
+
+Hard as it was freely to forgive her sister for holding up to her so
+exclusively the "ideal Radcliff" in her conversations, Vinnie continued
+to apply the fan and hartshorn, with comforting words, until Link came
+in and said that Jack wished her to be present in the other room.
+
+"Don't leave me, Lavinia dear!" said Caroline, feeling herself utterly
+helpless without Vinnie's support.
+
+"If we open this door between the rooms, and you sit near it, while I
+remain by you,--perhaps that will be the best way," said Vinnie.
+
+The door was opened, showing Jack and Rad and Mr. Betterson seated, and
+the boys standing by the outer door. Rad was trying hard to keep up his
+appearance of gay spirits, chucking Chokie under the chin, and winking
+playfully at Rufe and Wad. But Jack and Lord were serious.
+
+"I have reasons for wanting you to hear this talk, Vinnie," said Jack.
+"I was just telling Mr. Betterson that you had met his nephew before,
+and he was quite surprised. It seems to me singular that you never told
+your friends here of that adventure."
+
+"I suppose I know what you mean," spoke up Caroline. "And I confess that
+_I_ am at fault. Lavinia dear did tell me and the girls of a young man
+beguiling her to a public-house in Chicago, and offering her wine; and
+Cecie whispered to me that she was sure it must have been Radcliff; but
+I couldn't, I wouldn't believe a Betterson could be guilty of--Fan me,
+Lavinia dear!"
+
+Vinnie fanned, and Caroline went on,--
+
+"'T was I who cautioned the children against saying anything disparaging
+of Radcliff's character in Lavinia dear's presence. I had such faith in
+the stock! and now to think how I have been deluded! The hartshorn,
+Lavinia dear!"
+
+"Seems to me you make a pile of talk about trifles!" Radcliff said with
+a sneer. "I owe an apology to this young lady. But she knows I meant no
+harm,--only my foolish fun. As for the horse, the owner has got him
+again; and so I don't see but it's all right."
+
+"It's all right enough, as far as I am concerned," said Jack. "I won't
+say a word about the trouble and expense you put me to. But, whether
+taking my horse as you did was stealing or not, you sold him, you
+obtained money under false pretences, you swindled an honest man."
+
+"Well, that can't be helped now," said Radcliff, with a scoffing laugh.
+"A feller is obliged sometimes to do things that may not be exactly on
+the square."
+
+"I don't know about anybody's being obliged to go off and play the
+gentleman (if that's what you call it), and have a good time (if there's
+any good in such a time), at somebody else's expense. I call such
+conduct simply scoundrelism," said Jack, his strong feeling on the
+subject breaking forth in plain speech and ringing tones. "And I
+determined, if I ever caught you, to have you punished."
+
+"O, well! go ahead! put it through! indulge!" said Radcliff, folding his
+arms, and stretching out his legs with an air of easy and reckless
+insolence, but suddenly drawing up one of them, as he noticed the tear
+Lion's teeth had made. "Guess I can stand it if the others can. What do
+you say, Uncle Lord? Give me up as a bad job, eh?"
+
+"Hem!" Lord coughed, and rubbed his chin with his palm. "If this sort of
+conduct is to continue, the crisis may as well come now, I suppose, as
+later; and, unless you give a solemn pledge to alter your course, I
+shall let it come."
+
+"O, I'll give the solem'est sort of a pledge!" Radcliff replied.
+
+"You will notice--ahem!--a change in our family," Lord went on. "The
+boys have applied themselves to business,--in plain terms, gone to work.
+Although I have said little on the subject, I have silently observed,
+and I am free to confess that I have been gratified. Since our
+circumstances are what they are, they have done well,--I may add, they
+have done nobly."
+
+"Fan me, Lavinia dear!" whispered Caroline.
+
+"Hey, boys? what's got into you?" said Radcliff, really astonished.
+
+Lord put up his hand, to prevent the boys from answering, and
+continued,--
+
+"Your unusually long absence, I am persuaded, has had a wholesome
+effect. But to the presence of new elements in the family I attribute
+the better state of things, in a large measure." Lord indicated Lavinia,
+by a gracious wave of the hand, adding, "Though a man of few words, I am
+not blind, and I am not ungrateful."
+
+This recognition of her influence, before Jack and the whole family,
+brought the quick color to Vinnie's cheeks and tears to her eyes. She
+was surprised by what Lord said, and still more surprised that any words
+of his could touch her so. He had hitherto treated her with civil,
+quiet reserve, and she had never been able to divine his secret thought
+of her. Nor had she cared much, at first, what that might be; but day by
+day she had learned to know that under all his weaknesses there was
+something in his character worthy of her esteem.
+
+"If you choose to fall into the new course of things, Radcliff, you will
+be welcome here, as you always have been. Not otherwise."
+
+And again Jack was reminded of the look and tone with which he had seen
+Lord Betterson confront Peakslow at the gap of the fence.
+
+"Of course I'll fall in, head over heels," said Radcliff, with a laugh,
+and a look at Vinnie, which Jack did not like. "I think I shall fancy
+the new elements, as you call 'em."
+
+Jack started up, with sparkling eyes; but, on an instant's reflection,
+bridled his tongue, and settled down again, merely giving Vinnie a swift
+glance, which seemed to say, "If he has any more of his _fun_ with you,
+I'll--"
+
+"No more trifling," said Betterson. "If you stay, you will come under
+the new _regime_. That means, in plain speech--work; we all work."
+
+"Oh!" gasped poor Caroline, and reached out helplessly to her sister.
+"The hartshorn, Lavinia dear!"
+
+"I'll stay, and I'll work,--I'll do as the rest do," said Radcliff. "But
+when the Philadelphia partners pony up, of course I have my dividend."
+
+"A word here," said Lord, "is due to our friends. By the Philadelphia
+partners, my nephew means the relatives who occasionally send us money.
+Now, as to his dividend: when he came into our family, it was with the
+understanding that he would be clothed and educated at the expense of
+those connections. Accordingly, when money has been sent to me, a
+portion has always gone to him. As soon as he gets money, it burns him
+till he goes off and squanders it. When it is gone, he comes home here,
+and waits for another supply."
+
+Then Jack spoke up.
+
+"I say, when the next supply comes, eighty dollars of it--if there's as
+much--should be paid over to that truckman he swindled. I insist upon
+that."
+
+Radcliff snapped his fingers. "That's a foolish way of doing business!"
+
+"Foolish or not," cried Jack, "you shall agree to it."
+
+"You have anticipated me," remarked Betterson, with a high courtesy
+contrasting with Jack's haste and heat. "I was about to propose a
+similar arrangement. Radcliff's money passes through my hands. I will
+see to it,--the truckman shall be paid. Do you agree, Radcliff? If not,
+I have nothing more to urge."
+
+"Of course I agree, since I can't help myself. But next time I have a
+horse to dispose of," Radcliff added with a derisive smile at Jack, "I
+shall go farther. So take care!"
+
+"No need of giving me that warning," Jack made answer, rising to his
+feet. He went over and stood by Vinnie, and looked back with strong
+distrust upon the jeering Radcliff. "I don't know that I do right, Mr.
+Betterson; but I'll leave him here, if you say so."
+
+"I think it best, on the whole," Mr. Betterson replied.
+
+"O, bosh!" cried Radcliff, giving Jack a sinister look. "You and I'll be
+better acquainted, some day! Come, boys, show me what you've been about
+lately. And, see here, Rufe,--haven't I got a pair of pants about the
+house somewhere? See how that dog tore my trousers-leg! I'll pay _him_
+my compliments, too, some time!"
+
+As he was walking out of the house, Lion at the door gave a growl. Jack
+silenced the dog, and then took leave. Vinnie urged him to stay to
+supper.
+
+"It will be ready in five minutes," she said; "I was just going to set
+the table when you came."
+
+But Jack replied, with a bitter smile, that he believed his appetite
+would be better after a ride of a few miles in the open air.
+
+"Look out for the scamp!" he whispered in her ear; and then, with brief
+good-byes to the rest, he sprang into the buggy, called Lion to a seat
+by his side, and drove away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+
+AN IMPORTANT EVENT.
+
+
+Radcliff resumed his place in the family. But he soon found that his
+relations to it were no longer what they had been before the days of
+Vinnie and Jack.
+
+The "new elements" had produced a greater change than he supposed. He no
+longer possessed the boundless influence over the boys which his wild
+spirits formerly gave him. They saw him in the light of this last
+revelation of his character, and contrasted his coarse foolery, once so
+attractive, with the gentle manners and cheerful earnestness of Vinnie
+and Jack; in which comparison this flower of the Betterson stock
+suffered blight.
+
+The boys did not take a holiday in honor of Rad's return, but went
+steadily on with their tasks. Lord Betterson himself seemed suddenly to
+have changed his views of things, for he now offered to assist the boys
+in repairing the fences, for which they had been cutting poles in the
+woods.
+
+Rad worked a little, but, seeing how things were going, sulked a good
+deal more. He tried to be very gallant toward Vinnie, but her quiet
+dignity of manner was proof against all his pleasantries. Even Cecie
+and Lill could not somehow enjoy his jests as they used to; and
+Caroline--there was no disguising the fact--had ceased to view his
+faults through the golden haze of a sentimental fancy.
+
+So Radcliff found himself out of place, unappreciated; and discontent
+filled his soul. At length an event occurred which blew his smouldering
+restlessness into a flame.
+
+The "Philadelphia partners" were heard from.
+
+Rufe and Wad, who had been over to the Mills one day, completing their
+arrangements with the pump-maker for boring the logs of their aqueduct,
+brought home from the mail one of those envelopes whose post-mark and
+superscription always gladdened the eyes of the Bettersons.
+
+It was from Philadelphia, and it contained a draft for two hundred and
+fifty dollars.
+
+One third of this sum was for Radcliff's "benefit."
+
+It would have been wise, perhaps, to keep from him the knowledge of this
+fact; but it would have been impossible.
+
+"A pittance, a mere pittance," said Lord, holding the precious bit of
+paper up to the light. "Uncle George could just as well have made it a
+thousand, without feeling it. However, small favors gratefully
+received." And he placed the draft in his pocket-book with calm
+satisfaction.
+
+Joy overflowed the family; Caroline began to build fresh castles in the
+air; and Vinnie heard Radcliff say to the boys,--
+
+"You can afford to lay by now, and have a good time, with that money."
+
+"Radcliff Betterson!" cried Vinnie, "you provoke me!"
+
+"How so, my charmer?" said Rad, bowing and smiling saucily.
+
+"With your foolish talk. But I hope--yes, I know--the boys will pay no
+attention to it. To stop work now, and go and play, just because a
+little money has come into the house,--I should lose all my respect for
+them, if they were to do so silly a thing."
+
+"Well, I was only joking," said Rad.
+
+"We could very well spare some of your jokes," Vinnie replied.
+
+"And me too, I suppose you think?"
+
+"You might be more useful to yourself and others than you are; it is
+easy to see that."
+
+"Well, give me a smile now and then; don't be so cross with a feller,"
+said Rad. "You don't show me very much respect."
+
+"It isn't my fault; I should be glad to show you more."
+
+Such was about the usual amount of satisfaction Radcliff got from his
+talk with Vinnie. She was always "up to him," as the boys said.
+
+When he walked off, and found them laughing at his discomfiture, he
+laughed too, with a fresh quid in his cheek, and his head on one-side,
+but with something not altogether happy in his mirth.
+
+"Uncle Lord," said he in the evening, "if you'll put your name to that
+draft, I'll go over to the Mills in the morning and cash it for you."
+
+"Thank you, Radcliff," said his uncle. "I've some bills to pay, and I
+may as well go myself."
+
+"Let the bills slide, why don't you, and get some good out of the
+money?" said Radcliff. "And see here, uncle,--what's the use of paying
+off that truckman in such a hurry? I want some of that money; it was
+intended for me, and I ain't going to be cheated out of it."
+
+"As to that," replied Lord, "you entered into a certain agreement, which
+seemed to me just; and I do not like now to hear you speak of being
+cheated,--you, of all persons, Radcliff."
+
+"O, well, I suppose you'll do as you like, since you've got the thing
+into your hands!" And Radcliff walked sulkily out of the house.
+
+The next day Mr. Betterson drove over to the Mills, cashed the draft,
+made some necessary purchases, paid some bills which had been long
+outstanding, and called to hand Jack eighty dollars, on Radcliff's
+account, for the swindled truckman.
+
+Jack was off surveying with Forrest Felton, and was not expected home
+for a day or two. Mr. Betterson hardly knew what to do in that case, but
+finally concluded to keep the money, and leave Jack word that he had it
+for him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+MRS. WIGGETT'S "NOON-MARK."
+
+
+Jack returned home, unexpectedly, that night. He jumped for joy when
+told of Mr. Betterson's call and the message he had left. The promise of
+money due himself could not have pleased him so much as the prospect now
+presented of justice being done to the truckman.
+
+He felt some concern, it must be owned, lest the money should, after
+all, be diverted from its course; he determined, therefore, to act
+promptly in the matter, and go to Long Woods the next day.
+
+He and Forrest were laying out town lots somewhere up the river; and he
+was closely occupied all the next forenoon and a part of the afternoon
+with his calculations and drawings.
+
+At last he leaped up gayly, with that sense of satisfaction and relief
+which comes from the consciousness of work well done.
+
+He harnessed Snowfoot, put his compass into the buggy, thinking he would
+give Mrs. Wiggett her noon-mark this time without fail, winked assent at
+Lion, eager to accompany him, and drove off with a feeling of enjoyment,
+to which the thought of some one he was going to meet gave a wonderful
+zest.
+
+As it was getting late in the day when he reached the settlement, he
+stopped only a moment at the "castle," to speak with Vinnie, and leave
+word that he would call and see Mr. Betterson on his way back; then
+drove on to Mr. Wiggett's log-cabin.
+
+His reception there was most cordial, especially when it was found that
+he had come with his compass, prepared to make the noon-mark.
+
+"House don't front no sort of a way," said the old man; "and I reckon
+you'll have to give us a kin' of a slantin'diclar line from 'bout this
+yer direction," indicating a wood-pile by the road.
+
+The little Wiggetts meanwhile thronged the doorway, staring at Jack and
+his strange machine, and their old acquaintance, the dog.
+
+"Cl'ar the kitchen, you young uns!" the mother stormed after them,
+cuffing right and left. "Noon-mark'll cut ye plumb in tew, 'f ye don't
+scatter! It's comin' into this yer door, like it was a bullet from pap's
+rifle!"
+
+The grimy faces and bare legs "scattered"; while Mrs. Wiggett called to
+Jack,--
+
+"How long 'fore ye gwine to shute that ar thing off? 'Low I oughter
+scoop up a little fust."
+
+"Scoop up?" Jack repeated, not quite taking her meaning.
+
+"Right smart o' dirt on the floor yer; it'll be in your way, I reckon."
+
+"Not at all," said Jack. "My line will cut through; and you can _scoop_
+down to it, at your leisure. I must get you to remove these iron
+wedges, Mr. Wiggett; the needle won't work with so much iron near."
+
+The wedges removed, the needle settled; and Jack, adjusting the sights
+of his compass to a north-and-south line, got Mr. Wiggett to mark its
+bearings for him, with a chalk pencil, on the floor of the open doorway.
+
+"All creation!" shrieked the woman, suddenly making a pounce at the
+kneeling old man; "we don't want a noon-mark thar, cl'ar away from the
+jamb, ye fool! We want it whur the shadder o' the jamb 'll hit it plumb
+at noon."
+
+The old man looked up from his position on "all-fours," and parried her
+attack with his lifted hand.
+
+"Ye mout wait a minute!" he said; "then you'll see if me an' this yer
+youngster's both fools. I had a lesson that larnt me onct that he knows
+better 'n I dew what he's about; an' I 'lowed, this time, I'd go by
+faith, an' make the marks 'thout no _re_marks o' my own."
+
+"The line will come just where you want it, Mrs. Wiggett," Jack assured
+her, hiding a laugh behind his compass.
+
+Having got the old man to mark two points on his north-and-south line,
+one at the threshold and the other a little beyond, Jack put his rule to
+them and drew a pencil-line; Mrs. Wiggett watching with a jealous scowl,
+not seeing that her mark was coming where she wanted it,--"right ag'in
+the jamb,"--after all.
+
+Then, by a simple operation, which even she understood, Jack surprised
+her.
+
+He first measured the distance of his line from the jamb. Then he set
+off two points, on the same side, at the same distance from the line,
+farther along on the floor. Then through these points he drew a second
+line, parallel to the first, and touching the corner of the jamb, by
+which the noon shadow was to be cast. Into this new line Jack sank his
+noon-mark with a knife.
+
+"There," said he, "is a true noon-mark, which will last as long as your
+house does,"--a prediction which, by a very astonishing occurrence, was
+to be proved false that very afternoon.
+
+"I reckon the woman is satisfied," said the old man; "anyhow, I be; an'
+now what's the tax for this yer little scratch on the floor?"
+
+"Not anything, Mr. Wiggett."
+
+"Hey? ye make noon-marks for folks 'thout pay?"
+
+"That depends. Sometimes, when off surveying, I'm hailed at the door of
+a house, and asked for a noon-mark. I never refuse it. Then, if
+convenient, I take my pay by stopping to dinner or supper. But I never
+accept money."
+
+"Sartin!" cried the old man. "Yer, ol' woman!" (it must be remembered
+that Mrs. Wiggett was forty years younger than her husband), "fly
+round,--make things hum,--git up a supper as suddent as ye kin, an' ax
+our friend yer. Whur's that Sal?"
+
+Mrs. Wiggett, who had appeared all pride and sunny smiles regarding her
+noon-mark (particularly after hearing it was not to be paid for), fell
+suddenly into a stormy mood, and once more began to cuff the children
+right and left.
+
+Jack hastened to relieve her mind by saying that Mr. Wiggett had quite
+mistaken his meaning; that he had an engagement which must deprive him
+of the pleasure of taking supper with her and her interesting family.
+Thereupon she brightened again. The old man shook him warmly by the
+hand; and Jack, putting his compass into the buggy, drove back up the
+valley road.
+
+Vinnie had told him that the Betterson boys were cutting logs for their
+aqueduct; and hearing the sound of an axe on his way back, Jack tied
+Snowfoot to a sapling by the road, and went up into the woods to find
+them.
+
+"What! you coming too, Lion?" he said, after he had gone several rods.
+"Didn't I tell you to watch? Well, I believe I didn't. Never mind;
+Snowfoot is hitched."
+
+He found Rufe and Wad cutting trees with great industry, having
+determined to have the logs laid from the spring to the house without
+delay.
+
+"We've taken the farm of father, as you suggested," said Wad. "He is
+helping us do the fall ploughing while we get out our logs. He and Link
+are at it with the oxen, over beyond the house, now."
+
+"And where's that precious cousin of yours?"
+
+"I believe he has gone to the house to see if supper is about ready,"
+said Rufe. "He's smart to work, when he does take hold, but his interest
+doesn't hold out, and the first we know, he is off."
+
+Jack stopped and talked with the boys about their water-works for about
+half an hour. Then Rad came up through the woods, by way of the spring,
+and announced that supper was ready, greeting Jack with a jeering laugh.
+
+"You'll take tea with us, of course," Rufe said to Jack.
+
+"I suppose your father will be at the house by this time; I'll stop and
+see him, at any rate," was Jack's reply.
+
+Rufe went with him down through the woods to where Snowfoot was left
+hitched. As they were getting into the buggy, Rufe noticed Zeph Peakslow
+coming out of some bushes farther down the road, and going towards home.
+
+"See him slink off?" said Rufe. "He's afraid of me yet; but he needn't
+be,--I've promised Vinnie not to meddle with him."
+
+Then, on the way home, Rufe surprised Jack by telling him how Vinnie had
+made acquaintance with the Peakslow family, and how Mrs. Peakslow,
+taking advantage of her husband's absence from home, had called on the
+Bettersons, under pretence of returning Vinnie's box of salve.
+
+Mr. Betterson had not yet come to the house; and Jack, having hitched
+Snowfoot to an oak-tree, and told of his business with the Wiggetts,
+asked Vinnie and her sister if they would not like a noon-mark on their
+floor. "It will be a good thing to set your clock by when it goes
+wrong," he explained.
+
+Vinnie gladly accepted the offer.
+
+"And, O Jack!" she said, "I wish you would give Mrs. Peakslow one too."
+
+"I would, certainly," said Jack; "but" (his pride coming up) "wouldn't
+it look as if I was anxious to make my peace with Peakslow?"
+
+"Never mind that; I think even he will appreciate the kindness. I wish
+you would!"
+
+"I will--to please you," said Jack. "This afternoon, if I have time."
+And he went to the buggy for his compass.
+
+He fumbled in the blanket under the seat, looked before and behind, and
+uttered an exclamation.
+
+"What's the trouble, Jack?" Rufe asked.
+
+"It is gone! my compass is gone!" said Jack. "Somebody has taken it."
+
+"That Zeph--we saw him, you know!" said Rufe. "It's one of his tricks."
+
+"I'll overhaul that Zeph!" said Jack; "I'll teach him to play his tricks
+on me!"
+
+Vinnie ran after him as he was starting off.
+
+"Jack! don't be hasty or unkind!"
+
+"O no! I won't be unkind," said Jack, with something bitter in his
+laugh. "I just want my compass, that's all." And he hurried down the
+road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+THE STRANGE CLOUD.
+
+
+Jack's call on the Peakslows was brief and unsatisfactory. He returned
+to the "castle" without his compass, and looking flushed and disturbed.
+
+"I didn't accuse Zeph of stealing," said Jack, fearful of being blamed
+by Vinnie. "They were at supper; and I just said, 'Zeph, my boy, what
+did you do with my compass?' He denied having touched it. I explained.
+Great commotion. Mamma Peakslow looked frightened out of her wits, and
+papa blazed away at me like a seventy-four-gun ship. In short, you will
+have to wait for your noon-mark, Mrs. Betterson. So will Mrs. Peakslow.
+I didn't tell her I was going to make her one, if Zeph hadn't stolen my
+compass."
+
+"But you don't know he stole it," said Vinnie.
+
+"We don't know that he and Dud put rubbish in our spring," Rufe made
+answer for Jack, "and yet we know it as well as we know anything we
+don't know."
+
+"I can't tell what I was thinking of," said Jack, "to leave any property
+of mine unguarded, within reach of the Peakslows. Lion was up in the
+woods with me before I knew it."
+
+"Where are you going now?" Vinnie asked.
+
+"To look for my compass in the bushes. Zeph must have hid it somewhere,
+for he didn't have it when we saw him."
+
+"Wait till after supper, and I will go with you," said Rufe. "Father is
+here now."
+
+Mr. Betterson was coming up from the stable, accompanied by Radcliff.
+Rad had hastened to waylay him, and make a last appeal for the money
+which he knew Jack was waiting to receive. He talked and gesticulated
+earnestly; but Lord shook his head and compressed his lips with great
+firmness, whereupon Rad, instead of coming to supper with the rest,
+wandered sulkily away.
+
+When Mr. Betterson had washed his hands and face, and brushed his hair,
+and put on his threadbare black coat and frayed stock, the family sat
+down at the table. Jack waited unwillingly, and soon excused himself,
+saying he must look for his compass before dark.
+
+"I'll attend to our truckman's little matter when I come back," he said,
+and hurried away.
+
+Link jumped up from the table and went with him; Rufe and Wad promising
+to follow as soon as they were through with their supper.
+
+Careful search was made all about the roadside bushes where the wagon
+had been partially concealed when the compass was taken. Lion was also
+set to hunt. But all in vain. Some faint footprints were found, but Jack
+could not be sure that they were not either his own or Rufe's.
+
+"Lion don't know what we are looking for; he's after rabbits," said
+Link. "Was this all the compass you had?"
+
+"The only surveyor's compass; and the worst of it is, 't was a borrowed
+one. It belongs to Forrest Felton. He has a theodolite which we use for
+fine work; and I've a little pocket-compass, given me by an old lady a
+few years ago. I wouldn't have lost this for twice its value,--it's a
+most exasperating trick!" Jack muttered. "And now it is suddenly growing
+dark."
+
+It was very suddenly growing very dark. A strange cloud was blackening
+the sunset sky. "Did you ever see anything so funny?" said Link.
+
+"It is like the lower half of an immense balloon, the top spreading
+out," said Jack. "See that long, hanging, pear-shaped end!"
+
+"I wonder if the folks at the house see it!" Link exclaimed, growing
+excited. "It looks like an elephant's trunk! By sixty, it's growing!"
+
+"It's moving this way," said Jack. "Fast, too! and roaring,--hear it?
+There's an awful storm coming!"
+
+"Oh!" cried Link, "see the lightning-forks! It will be here in a jiffy."
+
+The "elephant's trunk," which had seemed to be feeling its way up the
+valley, now swung toward the line of timber; the roar which accompanied
+it became deafening; and suddenly the cloud, and all the air about it,
+seemed filled with whirling and flying objects, like the broken boughs
+and limbs of trees. It was like some living monster, vast, supernatural,
+rushing through the sky, and tearing and trampling the earth with fury.
+The mysterious swinging movement, the uproar, the gloom, the lightnings,
+were appalling. And now Lion set up a fearful, ominous howl.
+
+"A whirlwind!" Jack exclaimed, shrieking to make himself heard. "I must
+go to my horse."
+
+"Let's put for the house!" Link yelled.
+
+But hardly had they reached the road when the storm was upon them.
+
+Shortly after Jack and Link had left the table, Lord Betterson gave
+Rufus a small key, and told him to bring a certain pocket-book from the
+till of the family chest in the next room.
+
+"We will have our friend's eighty dollars ready for him, against his
+return," Lord said; and, counting out the money, he placed it under the
+pocket-book, beside his plate.
+
+Rufe and Wad were now ready to go and help Jack search for his compass;
+but a discussion which had been going on at intervals, ever since the
+draft came, was now renewed, and they stopped to take part in it.
+
+"If I am going to get out to Divine service again, I _must_ have a silk
+dress," said Caroline. "And, Mr. Betterson, _you_ need a new suit; and
+you know--we all know--nothing becomes you but broadcloth, and the
+finest broadcloth. What do you think, Lavinia dear?"
+
+"I am sure broadcloth is becoming to him," Vinnie replied quietly. "And
+I should like to see you come out in silk. And Cecie and Lilian need new
+things. But--how much of the two hundred and fifty dollars is left, Mr.
+Betterson?"
+
+"Deducting Radcliff's share, one hundred and twenty odd dollars," said
+Lord, touching the pocket-book by his plate.
+
+"One hundred and twenty dollars will go but a little way, in a family
+where so many things are absolutely needed!" said Vinnie. "It seems to
+me I should want to get this room and your room plastered, the first
+thing,--merely for comfort, in the cold weather that is coming."
+
+"And carpeted, Lavinia dear," simpered Caroline.
+
+"And if the house is ever to be painted," spoke up Rufe, "it must be
+done soon. It won't be worth painting if it is neglected much longer."
+
+"And we need so many things in the kitchen!" said Lill. "Vinnie knows
+it, but she won't say anything."
+
+"And lots of things on the farm," said Wad. "If Rufe and I are going to
+do anything, we must have conveniences. The idea of having such a house
+as this, and nothing but a miserable log-barn and stable!"
+
+"We can't build a new barn for a hundred and twenty dollars," said Mr.
+Betterson. "And we can't buy farming tools, and kitchen utensils, and
+carpets, and silk, and broadcloth, and tea and sugar, and clothing for
+the children, and paint and plaster the house, all with so limited a
+sum. The question then arises, just _what_ shall we do with the money?"
+
+"O dear! just a little money like that is only an aggravation!" Caroline
+sighed, discouraged. "And I had hoped some of it would be left for
+Lavinia dear; she deserves it if anybody does."
+
+"O, never mind me," Vinnie replied. "However, if I might suggest--"
+
+But the family had been so long deciding this question, that Fortune
+seemed now to take it out of their hands, and decide it for them.
+
+It suddenly grew dark, and an outcry from the boys interrupted Vinnie.
+The tornado was coming.
+
+All rose, save Cecie,--who remained seated where she had been placed at
+the table,--and pressed to the door and windows.
+
+The baby wakened in the next room, and began to cry, and Caroline went
+to take it up. The boys rushed out of the house. Vinnie turned pale and
+asked, "Where are they? Jack and Link!"
+
+"As well off as they would be here probably," replied Lord Betterson.
+"Shut doors and windows fast. That horse should have been taken care
+of."
+
+"Jack wouldn't let us put him up. I'll do it now," cried Rufe.
+
+But he had hardly begun to undo the halter, when he saw the utter
+impossibility of getting the horse to the stable before the storm would
+be upon them. So, to prevent Snowfoot from breaking away and dashing the
+buggy to pieces, he determined to leave him tied to the tree, and stand
+by his head, until the first whirl or rush should have passed. This he
+attempted to do; and patted and encouraged the snorting, terrified
+animal, till he was himself flung by the first buffet of the hurricane
+back against the pillar of the porch, where he clung.
+
+"Oh! what is that?" screamed Lill, watching with Vinnie from the window.
+
+[Illustration: THE TORNADO COMING.]
+
+Some huge, unwieldy object had risen and rolled for an instant in the
+dim air, over Peakslow's house, then disappeared as suddenly.
+
+At the same time Jack and Link appeared, half running, half blown by the
+tempest up the road. Vinnie watched them from the window, and saw the
+enormous sloping pillar of dust and leaves, and torn boughs, whirling
+above their heads, and overwhelming everything in its roaring cloud.
+
+The last she remembered was Jack and Link darting by the corner of the
+house, and Snowfoot tugging at his halter. Then a strange electric
+thrill shot through her, the house shook with a great crash, and all was
+dark.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+PEAKSLOW IN A TIGHT PLACE.--CECIE.
+
+
+The storm could not have been two minutes in passing. Then it suddenly
+grew light, the tempest lulled, the heavens cleared, and in not more
+than ten minutes the sunset sky was smiling again, a sea of tranquil
+gold, over the western woods.
+
+Fortunately, only the skirt of the storm had swept over Betterson's
+house, doing no very serious damage.
+
+When Vinnie looked again from the window, she saw Snowfoot, still tied
+by the halter, standing with drooping head and tail, wet with rain.
+Jack, hat in hand, his hair wildly tumbled, was already at the horse's
+head, laughing excitedly, and looking back at Rufe and Link, who were
+coming to his side. The buggy, he noticed, had been whirled half-way
+round by the wind, so that the rear end was turned toward the porch.
+
+Through it all, Lill had clung in terror to Vinnie, whose arms were
+still about her. Cecie sat in her chair by the supper-table, white and
+speechless from the electric shock which all had felt, and she more
+sensibly than the rest. Caroline was in the next room with the child,
+whose cries, for a while drowned in the terrible uproar, now broke
+forth again, strenuous and shrill. Mr. Betterson, holding the frightened
+Chokie, opened the door, and calmly asked the boys if they were hurt.
+
+"We are all right, I guess," cried Rufe. "Wad put for the barn, to make
+room for the horse and buggy, which I didn't have time to get there. I
+don't know where Rad is."
+
+Wad now appeared; and at the same time the cattle, started homeward by
+the storm, came cantering down the woodland road, with the rattling
+cowbell, and ran for refuge to the barnyard.
+
+"The big oak behind the house, there,--have you seen it?" cried Wad.
+"It's twisted off. And where's the well-curb?"
+
+"That flew to pieces, and the boards went up into the air like kites,--I
+saw them," said Link. "Where's the dog?"
+
+"He's in the bushes, or under a log somewhere," Jack replied. "He was
+shot at once, with a gun held close to his head,--luckily, there was no
+lead in it. For a long time he was afraid of a gun; and thunder, or any
+big noise, frightens him even now."
+
+"Some of our fences look pretty flat,--rails tumbled every which way!"
+said Rufe. "A good deal of damage must have been done south of us."
+
+"Something looks odd over there toward Peakslow's,--what is it?" cried
+Link.
+
+"Some of the tree-tops by the road have been lopped off," replied Jack.
+
+"That isn't all," said Lord Betterson. "Sure as fate, something has
+happened to Peakslow's buildings."
+
+"That is what I saw!" Vinnie exclaimed. "Something turned over in the
+air like the roof of a house."
+
+"I thought just now I heard cries in that direction," said Jack. "Hark a
+moment!"
+
+"There comes somebody," said Rufe, as a girl of twelve years, barefoot,
+bonnetless, wild with fright, came running up the road. "It's 'Lecty
+Ann!"
+
+Out of breath, almost out of her wits, the girl ran as far as the
+door-yard fence, then stopped, as if unable or afraid to go farther,
+caught hold of the pickets, and, putting her pale face between them,
+gasped out something which nobody could understand.
+
+"What is it?--what's the matter?" cried Jack, advancing toward her.
+
+"House--blowed down--covered up!" was all she could articulate.
+
+"Who is covered up?"
+
+"Don't know--some of the folks--pa, I guess."
+
+Jack did not stop to hear more; but, fired with a generous impulse to
+aid the unfortunate, whoever they might be, gave one backward look,
+threw up his hand as a signal, shouted "Help, boys!" ran to a length of
+fence which the wind had thrown down, bounded over like a deer, and was
+off.
+
+Vinnie followed; but was soon overtaken by Mr. Betterson and the boys,
+who passed her, as if running a race. Then she heard screams behind;
+and there was Chokie, sprawling over the prostrate fence, which he had
+rashly taken, in his eagerness to keep up with Lill.
+
+By the time Chokie was extricated Mrs. Betterson appeared, babe in arms,
+tottering out of the door, and hastening, in the excitement of the
+moment, to learn what dreadful catastrophe had overtaken their
+neighbors.
+
+"Stay with Arthur and your mother," Vinnie said to Lill; "_I_ may do
+something to help." And away she sped.
+
+'Lecty Ann, met by Mrs. Betterson at the gate, was now able to tell more
+of her story; and so strange, so tragical it seemed, that Caroline
+forgot all about her ill health, the baby in her arms, and Cecie left
+alone in the house, and brought up the rear of the little
+procession,--Lill and 'Lecty Ann and Chokie preceding her down the road.
+
+They had not gone far, when Lion came out of the woods, with downcast
+ears and tail, ashamed of his recent cowardly conduct. And so,
+accompanied by the dog and the children,--Lill lugging the baby at
+last,--Caroline approached the scene of the disaster.
+
+The whole force of the tornado seemed to have fallen upon Peakslow's
+buildings. The stable was unroofed, and the barn had lost a door.
+
+The house had fared still worse: it was--even as 'Lecty Ann had
+said--almost literally "blowed down."
+
+It had consisted of two parts,--a pretty substantial log-cabin, which
+dated back to the earliest days of the settlement, and a framed
+addition, called a lean-to, or "linter." The roof of the old part had
+been lifted, and tumbled, with some of the upper logs, a mass of ruins,
+over upon the linter, which had been crushed to the ground by the
+weight.
+
+Mrs. Peakslow and the girls and younger children were in the log-house
+at the time; and, marvellous as it seemed, all had escaped serious
+injury.
+
+The boys were in the field with their father, and had run a race with
+the tornado. The tornado beat. Dud was knocked down within a few rods of
+the house. Zeph was blown up on a stack of hay, and lodged there; the
+stack itself--and this was one of the curious freaks of the
+whirlwind--being uninjured, except that it was canted over a little, and
+ruffled a good deal, as if its feathers had been stroked the wrong way.
+
+Mr. Peakslow was ahead of the boys; and they thought he must have
+reached the linter.
+
+Zeph, slipping down from his perch in the haystack, as soon as the storm
+had passed, and seeing the house in ruins, and his mother and sisters
+struggling to get out, had run screaming for help down the road toward
+Mr. Wiggett's. Dud remained; and by pushing from without, while the
+imprisoned family lifted and pulled from within, helped to move a log
+which had fallen down against the closed door, and so aided the escape
+from the house.
+
+'Lecty Ann ran to the nearest neighbor's up the river. The rest stayed
+by the ruins; and there Lord Betterson and Jack--the earliest on the
+spot--found them, a terrified group, bewildered, bewailing, gazing
+hopelessly and helplessly at the unroofed cabin and crushed linter, and
+calling for "Pa."
+
+"Where is your husband, Mrs. Peakslow?" cried Jack.
+
+"O, I don't know where he is, 'thout he's there!" said the poor woman,
+with a gesture of despair toward the ruined linter.
+
+"This rubbish must be removed," said Lord Betterson. "If friend Peakslow
+is under it, he can't be taken out too soon."
+
+And with his own hands he set to work, displaying an energy of will and
+coolness of judgment which would have astonished Jack, if he had not
+once before seen something of what was in the man.
+
+Jack and the boys seconded their father; and now Dud came and worked
+side by side with Wad and Rufe.
+
+A broken part of the roof was knocked to pieces, and the rafters were
+used for levers and props. The main portion of the roof was next turned
+over, and got out of the way. Then one by one the logs were removed; all
+hands, from Lord Betterson down to Link, working like heroes.
+
+Meanwhile, Vinnie did what she could to aid and comfort Mrs. Peakslow;
+and Caroline and her little company came and looked on.
+
+Mr. Wiggett also arrived, with Zeph, and helped get away the last of the
+logs.
+
+Under the logs was the crushed shell of the linter; and all looked
+anxiously, to see what was under that.
+
+A good many things were under it,--pots and kettles, wash-tubs,
+milk-pans (badly battered), churn and cheese-press, bed and
+trundle-bed,--but no Peakslow.
+
+It was a disappointment, and yet a relief, not to find him there, after
+all. But where was he? Dud ran back to the field, to look for him; while
+the others rested from their labors.
+
+"Did the wind do you much damage, Mr. Wiggett?" Lord inquired.
+
+"Not so much as it mout," replied the old man. "It was mighty suddent.
+Banged if I knowed what in seven kingdoms was a-gwine to happen. It
+roared and bellered that orful, I didn't know but the etarnal smash-up
+had come."
+
+"It must have passed pretty near your house,--I saw it swing that way,"
+said Jack.
+
+"Wal, I reckon you're right thar, young man. It jest took holt o' my
+cabin, an' slewed one corner on't around about five or six inches; an'
+done no more damage, in partic'lar, fur's I can diskiver; only, of
+course, it discomfusticated that ar' noon-mark. I left the ol' woman
+mournin' over that!"
+
+Jack laughed, and promised to replace the noon-mark.
+
+"There's Dud a-yelling!" said Link.
+
+[Illustration: PEAKSLOW REAPPEARS.]
+
+The roof of the shed--which must have been the object Vinnie saw rise
+and turn in the air--had been taken off very neatly, with the two gable
+pieces, whirled over once or more, and then landed gently, right side up
+with care, on the edge of the potato-patch, two or three rods away. Dud,
+hunting for his father, passed near it, and heard stifled cries come
+from under it. He was yelling, indeed, as Link said.
+
+In a moment a dozen feet rushed to the spot, and a dozen hands laid hold
+of one side of the roof, under which Jack thrust a lever. Some lifted on
+the lever, while some lifted on the edge of the roof itself; and out
+crawled--bushy head and hooked nose fore-most--the shaggy shape of the
+elder Peakslow.
+
+The roof was let down again as soon as Peakslow's legs were well
+from under it, and a wondering group--men, boys, women, and
+children--gathered round to see if he was hurt.
+
+"Wal!" said Peakslow, getting upon his feet, giving his clothes a brush
+with his broad hand, and staring about him, "this is a mighty perty
+piece of business! Didn't none on ye hear me call?"
+
+"Did you call?" said Mrs. Peakslow, trembling with joy and fright.
+
+"Call?" echoed Peakslow, feeling his left shoulder with his right hand.
+"I believe I b'en callin' there for the last half-hour. What was ye
+knockin' that ruf to pieces for? I could hear ye, an' see ye, an' I
+wanted to put a stop to 't. Hadn't the wind damaged me enough, but you
+must pitch in?"
+
+"We thought you were under the ruins," Mr. Betterson replied with
+dignity.
+
+"Thought I was under the ruins! What made ye think that?" growled
+Peakslow.
+
+"I thought so--I told them so," Mrs. Peakslow explained; while Lord
+Betterson walked away with calm disgust.
+
+"Ye might 'a' knowed better'n that! Here I was under this ruf all the
+time. It come over on to me like a great bird, knocked me down with a
+flop of its wing,--mos' broke my shoulder, I believe; an' when I come to
+myself, and peeked through a crack, there was a crew knockin' the ruf o'
+the house to flinders. I was too weak to call very loud, but, if you'd
+cared much, I should think ye might 'a' heard me. Look a' that house,
+now! look a' that shed! It's the blastedest luck!"
+
+Jack couldn't help smiling. Peakslow turned upon him furiously.
+
+"You here? So ye think my boy's a thief, do ye?"
+
+"Come, Lion! come, boys!" said Jack, and started to follow Mr.
+Betterson, without more words.
+
+"Come here and 'cuse my boy o' stealin'!" said Peakslow, turning, and
+looking all about him, as if he had hardly yet regained his senses. "I
+had a hat somewheres. Hundred dollars--no, nor two hundred--won't pay
+the damage done to me this day."
+
+"But the children, they are all safe," said Mrs. Peakslow, "and we ought
+to be thankful."
+
+"Thankful! Look a' that linter! _Three_ hundred won't do it!"
+
+"O pa!" cried Zeph, "you've got a great gash on the back o' your head!"
+
+"Never mind the gash," said Peakslow, putting up his hand. "That'll
+heal itself. Holes in the buildin's won't."
+
+Vinnie meanwhile conferred with Jack and Mr. Betterson, as they were
+about going away; and also called her sister, and afterward Mrs.
+Peakslow, to the consultation.
+
+"O, I don't know, Lavinia dear!" said Caroline in great distress of
+mind.
+
+But Lord Betterson spoke out manfully,--
+
+"Lavinia is right. Mrs. Peakslow, we have plenty of spare room in our
+house, which you are welcome to till you can do better."
+
+"O Mr. Betterson!" the poor woman sobbed out, quite overcome by this
+unexpected kindness, "you are too good!"
+
+"I beg your pardon," replied Lord Betterson, in his most gracious
+manner. "We wish simply to do as we might wish neighbors to do by us
+under similar circumstances. Our boys will help yours get your things
+over to my house,--whatever you want, Mrs. Peakslow."
+
+Lord did not much mind the woman's outburst of tears and thanks; but
+when he observed the look of admiration and gratitude in Vinnie's deep
+eyes, fixed upon him, he felt an unaccustomed thrill.
+
+Mrs. Peakslow went weeping back to her husband.
+
+"I am sorry you spoke as you did," she said. "We all thought you was
+under the linter; and they was all workin' so hard--as if they had been
+our best friends--to get you out."
+
+"Best friends!" repeated Peakslow, with a snort of angry contempt.
+
+"Yes, pa; and now,--will you believe it?--now that we haven't a ruf to
+our heads, they offer us shelter in _their_ house!"
+
+"In the castle?--huh!" sneered Peakslow. "I never thought 't would come
+to that!"
+
+"Where else _can_ we go?" said Mrs. Peakslow. "It's 'most night,--nights
+are beginnin' to be cold,--and think o' the children! 'T will be weeks,
+I s'pose, 'fore ye can rebuild."
+
+"If I couldn't rebuild in all etarnity, I wouldn't set foot in Lord
+Betterson's castle!" said Peakslow. He looked again at the ruined house,
+then at the children, and added: "Me an' the boys, we can stop in the
+stable, or dig holes in the stack, to make ourselves comf'table. Do what
+you're a min' ter, for the rest. But don't say _I_ told ye to ask or
+accept a favor of _them_."
+
+The Bettersons, Vinnie, and Jack were waiting between the ruined house
+and the road; and Mrs. Betterson was saying, "Lillie, you and I _must_
+be going back; remember, we left Cecie all alone; and the evening air is
+too chill for the baby," when Link cried,--
+
+"Who's that coming down the road?"
+
+All turned; and Vinnie and Jack and Link ran out to look. They could
+scarcely believe their eyes.
+
+"It can't be!" said Vinnie.
+
+"Yes, it is," exclaimed Link; "it's her--it's her!"
+
+"Who?" Caroline inquired anxiously, dreading some new calamity.
+
+"Cecie! Cecie, sure as the world!" said two or three at once.
+
+It was indeed the little invalid, who, though she had scarcely taken a
+step without help for many months, was actually coming down the road,
+walking, and walking fast, without even the crutch she had sometimes
+tried to use!
+
+She was beckoning and calling. Jack and Vinnie and the boys ran to meet
+her. She was pale and very much excited, and it was some time before she
+could speak coherently.
+
+"Radcliff!" was almost her first word.
+
+"What about Radcliff? where is he?" Vinnie asked.
+
+"Gone!"
+
+"Gone where?"
+
+"I don't know. He came into the house--he saw the pocket-book and money
+on the table--I told him he mustn't take them!"
+
+"And did he?" said Rufe.
+
+"Yes. He only laughed at me. He said his chance had come."
+
+"Which way did he go?"
+
+"He drove up through the woods."
+
+"Drove?" echoed Jack.
+
+"He took the horse and buggy."
+
+"_My_ horse and buggy!" And Jack, followed by Lion and Rufe and Link,
+started up the road.
+
+Though shocked at Radcliff's conduct, Vinnie thought less of the loss of
+the money, and of the horse and buggy, than of the seeming miracle in
+Cecie's case.
+
+"How could you walk so, Cecie?"
+
+"I don't know. I suppose it was the excitement. Strength came to me. I
+called, but could not make anybody hear, and I thought you ought to
+know."
+
+Mr. Betterson would have carried her home in his arms, but she would not
+let him.
+
+"I can walk better and better! That numbness of my limbs is almost gone.
+I believe I am going to be cured, after all!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+"ON THE WAR TRAIL."
+
+
+There could be no mistake about it,--pocket-book and money, and horse
+and buggy, were gone with Radcliff.
+
+"He has taken the road to Chicago," said Jack, easily tracking the
+wheels after the recent rain. "But he'll find it not so easy selling the
+horse there a second time."
+
+"But he'll spend all that money," said Rufe. "He'll find it easy enough
+to do that."
+
+"I wish it wasn't night," said Jack. "I would track him! And I will as
+it is. Have you a lantern?"
+
+"Yes--I'll go with you! Shall we take the mare and one-horse wagon?"
+
+"If you like. But, Rufe, if you go with me, you'll have to travel all
+night. I am on the war trail!"
+
+"I'm with you!" said Rufe; and he gave an Indian war-whoop.
+
+Mr. Betterson, coming up, approved of this resolution. "And, boys," he
+said, "if you _should_ lay hands on Radcliff, you may as well bring him
+back with you. We'll try to have a more satisfactory settlement with him
+this time."
+
+Jack left his friends to harness the mare to the wagon, and went on
+alone, with Lion and the lantern, up through the woods.
+
+For a while he had no trouble in following the fresh marks of hoofs and
+wheels over the wet ground. But when he reached the prairie, an
+unforeseen difficulty appeared. The rain had not extended so far, and
+the tracks were not easily distinguished.
+
+It was nearly dark when Rufe, following in the wagon, emerged from the
+woods. Lonesome and gloomy stretched the great prairie before him, under
+a sky of flying clouds. The insects of the autumn night filled the air
+with their shrill, melancholy notes. An owl hooted in the forest; a pair
+of whippoorwills were vociferating somewhere in the thickets; and far
+off on the prairie the wolves howled. Now and then a rift of dark blue
+sky and a few wildly hurrying stars were visible through the flocking
+clouds. No other light, or sign of life, until Rufe descried far before
+him in the darkness a waving, ruddy gleam, and knew it was the ray from
+the lantern swinging in Jack's hand.
+
+Driving on as fast as the mare's somewhat decrepit paces would allow, he
+found Jack waiting for him at a point where the road divided, one branch
+taking a northerly direction, the other trending easterly, toward the
+great road to Chicago.
+
+"Here's a puzzle," said Jack, as Rufe drove up. "I've tracked the fellow
+as far as here, notwithstanding he has tried the trick of driving off on
+the prairie in two or three places. But here, instead of taking the
+direct road to Chicago, as we supposed, he has taken this by-road, if my
+eyes are good for anything. Lion says I am right; for I believe I've
+made him understand we are hunting Snowfoot."
+
+Rufe jumped down from the wagon, and saw by the light of the lantern the
+imperfect and yet peculiar marks of Snowfoot's rather smooth-worn shoes,
+and of the narrow wheel-tires.
+
+"It is a game of his to mislead us," said Rufe. "I believe if we follow
+him on to where this by-road crosses the main road, we shall find he has
+there turned off toward the city."
+
+"Go ahead, Lion; find Snowfoot!" cried Jack, and jumped into the wagon
+with Rufe.
+
+They got on as fast as they could; but the pursuit was necessarily slow,
+for not only was the mare a creature of very indifferent speed, but the
+boys found it useful to stop every now and then and examine the tracks
+by the light of the lantern.
+
+"The dog is right; and we are right so far, sure!" said Jack, after they
+had proceeded about half a mile in this way. "_Slow and sure_ is our
+policy. We've all the fall before us, Rufe; and we'll overhaul your
+pretty cousin, unless something breaks. Now, drive straight on to the
+main road, and we'll see what we can discover there."
+
+To the surprise of both again, the fugitive, instead of turning
+cityward, kept the northerly road.
+
+"He is cunning," said Rufe. "He knows Chicago is the first place where
+one would be apt to look for him; and, besides, I think he is getting
+too well known in Chicago."
+
+"He is bound for Wisconsin," cried Jack. "Whip along. This road passes
+through the timber, and brings us to the river again; we shall soon find
+settlements, where we can inquire for our game."
+
+"If you can speak Dutch, and if it wasn't too late when Rad passed
+through," Rufe replied. "There is a colony of _meinheers_ up here; they
+go to bed a little after sundown."
+
+As they drove on from the crossing, Jack said, "That left-hand road goes
+to North Mills. But I sha'n't see North Mills to-night, nor for a good
+many nights, I'm afraid."
+
+Jack, however, as we shall see, was mistaken.
+
+The road above the crossing was much more travelled than below; and for
+a while the boys found it very difficult to make out Snowfoot's tracks.
+But soon again fortune favored them.
+
+"Rain--it has been raining here!" said Jack, examining the road where it
+entered the skirts of the timber, "and raining hard! We must be nearing
+the path of the whirlwind again."
+
+They passed through a belt of woods, where the storm had evidently
+passed but without doing much damage; for it was a peculiarity of that
+elephant of a cloud that it appeared to draw up its destroying trunk
+once or twice, and skip over a few miles in its course, only to swing it
+down again with greater fury.
+
+The road was now drenched all the way, and the trail they followed was
+so distinct that the boys did not stop to make inquiries at the log-huts
+which began to appear before they were well through the woods.
+
+They made comparatively rapid progress up the valley, until they came to
+a point where the river, in its winding course, was crossed by the road.
+There, again, the tornado had done a brisk business; the bridge was
+destroyed, the side of the road gullied, and the river swollen.
+
+Both boys alighted and examined the track.
+
+"Here is where he stopped and hesitated, finding the bridge gone," said
+Jack. "And see! here are his own tracks, as if he had got out of the
+buggy and gone ahead to reconnoitre."
+
+"As well he might," Rufe answered. "Look at these tree-tops, and the
+timbers of the bridge lodged in the middle of the river!"
+
+"He seems to have got through, and I guess we can," said Jack. "I've
+forded this stream, below the bridge, before now, when I've wanted to
+water my horse; but it was free from all this sort of rubbish then.
+There must have been a great fall of rain up here!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+
+THE MYSTERY OF A PAIR OF BREECHES.
+
+
+Jack went out with the lantern upon the ruined abutment of the bridge,
+and showed a space beside the drift-wood, in the turbid and whirling
+current, where fording seemed practicable.
+
+Then the boys got into the wagon again, and the mare was driven
+cautiously forward, by the glimmering light which the lantern shed
+faintly before and around them. Lion swam ahead, throwing up his muzzle
+and barking loud, like a faithful pilot showing the safest way. The
+wheels went in over the hubs; the water came into the bottom of the
+wagon-box; the flood boiled and plashed and gurgled, and swept away in
+black, whirling eddies; and Jack said, "This wouldn't be a very nice
+place to break down, eh,--would it?"
+
+But they got safely through; and on the farther bank they were pleased
+to find again the trail of the horse and buggy.
+
+They were now in high spirits. The whirlwind having passed up the river,
+the road lay aside from its direct path, but still within the area of
+rain.
+
+"This is gay!" said Jack. "He thinks he has baffled us; and he will put
+up somewhere for the night; and we won't! We shall circumvent Master
+Radcliff!"
+
+[Illustration: FOLLOWING THE WAR TRAIL UNDER DIFFICULTIES.]
+
+But soon the boys were again puzzled. Reaching another cross-road, and
+bringing the lantern to bear upon the trail, they found that, instead of
+continuing northward, toward Wisconsin, or turning to the right, in the
+direction of Chicago, it turned at a sharp angle to the left, in the
+direction of North Mills.
+
+"This move is a perfect mystery to me!" Jack exclaimed. "It seems as if
+he had thought the thing all over, and finally chosen the very last
+place one would expect him to make for."
+
+"Are you sure this road leads to North Mills?"
+
+"Perfectly sure; I've been this way three or four times. But another
+road branches from it, and passes a mile north of the Mills; he has
+probably taken that."
+
+But no; after a good deal of trouble--the road appearing once more dry
+and much trodden--they discovered that the horse and buggy had not taken
+the branch, but kept the direct route to the Mills!
+
+"It doesn't seem possible! there must be some mistake here," said Jack.
+And every rod of their progress seemed now to increase the boys' doubts.
+
+The road, long before they reached the Mills, became a mere bed of brown
+dust, in which it required a pretty vivid imagination to distinguish one
+track from another. The boys' spirits sank accordingly. Lion still led
+them boldly on; but his guidance could no longer be trusted.
+
+"He's bound for home now," said Jack, "and he'll go straight there."
+
+"If Rad _did_ come this way," said Rufe, "he was shrewd, after all. He
+knew that by passing through a busy place like the Mills, he would hide
+his tracks as he couldn't in any other way."
+
+"To find 'em again," Jack replied, rather gloomily, "we shall have to
+examine every road going out of this place."
+
+It must have been near midnight when they entered the village. The
+houses were all dark and still; not a ray at a window, not even the bark
+of a dog, gave sign of life as they passed.
+
+"This looks discouraging," said Jack.
+
+"A needle in a haystack is no comparison," replied Rufe. "The lantern is
+almost out."
+
+"I can get another at our house," said Jack. "We may as well follow the
+dog now. What did I tell you? He is going straight home!"
+
+The dog trotted up to the gate before Mr. Lanman's cottage, and the
+wagon turned up after him.
+
+"What's that ahead of us?" said Jack, as the mare came to a sudden stop.
+
+"Seems to be a wagon standing," said Rufe, shading his eyes from the
+lantern and peering into the darkness.
+
+Jack jumped out, ran forward, and gave a shout. The wagon was a buggy,
+and the horse was Snowfoot, standing before the gate, waiting patiently
+to be let in.
+
+Quite wild with delight and astonishment, Jack took the lantern and
+examined horse and vehicle.
+
+"Old Lion! you were right," he exclaimed. "The scamp must have let the
+horse go, and taken to his heels. And the horse made for home."
+
+"The most he cared for was to get off with the money," said Rufe, not
+quite so abundantly pleased as his friend. "What's this thing under the
+seat?"
+
+"The compass!" said Jack, if possible, still more surprised and
+overjoyed, "which I accused Zeph of stealing!"
+
+Rufe continued rummaging, and, holding the lantern with one hand, lifted
+up a limp garment with the other.
+
+"What in thunder? A pair of breeches! Rad's breeches! Where can the
+scamp have gone without his breeches? See what's in the pocket there,
+Jack."
+
+Jack thrust in his hand, and brought out some loose bank-notes. He
+thrust in his hand again, and brought out a pocket-book, containing more
+bank-notes. It was Mr. Betterson's pocket-book, and the notes were the
+stolen money.
+
+Jack was hastily turning them over--not counting them, he was too much
+amazed and excited to do that--when the candle in the lantern gave a
+final flicker and went out, leaving the boys and the mystery of the
+compass and the money and Rad's pantaloons enveloped in sudden
+darkness.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+THE MORNING AFTER.
+
+
+Bright rose the sun the next morning over the leafy tops of Long Woods,
+and smiled upon the pleasant valley.
+
+It found many a trace of the previous day's devastation,--trees uprooted
+or twisted off at their trunks, branches and limbs broken and scattered,
+fences blown down, and more than one man's buildings unroofed or
+demolished.
+
+It found Peakslow, accompanied by the two older boys, walking about his
+private and particular pile of ruins, in a gloomy and bewildered state
+of mind, as if utterly at a loss to know where the repair of such
+tremendous damages should begin. And (the sun itself must have been
+somewhat astonished) it found Mrs. Peakslow and the younger children,
+five in number, comfortably quartered in Lord Betterson's "castle."
+
+It also had glimpses of Rufe, with light and jolly face, driving home by
+prairie and grove, alone in the one-horse wagon.
+
+Link ran out to meet him, swinging his cap and shouting for the news.
+
+"Good news!" Rufe shouted back, while still far up the road. "Tell the
+folks!" And he held up the pocket-book.
+
+It was good news indeed which he brought; but the mystery at the bottom
+of it all was a mystery still.
+
+The family gathered around, with intense interest, while he told his
+story and displayed Rad's pantaloons.
+
+"The eighty dollars, which you had counted out,--you remember,
+father,--was loose in the pocket. I left that with Jack; he will send it
+to Chicago to-day. The rest of the money, I believe, is all here in the
+pocket-book."
+
+"And you've heard nothing of Radcliff?" said Mr. Betterson.
+
+"Not a word. Jack made me stop with him over night; and I should have
+come home the way we went, and looked for Rad, if it hadn't been so far;
+we must have driven twelve or fifteen miles in that roundabout chase."
+
+"Some accident must certainly have happened to Radcliff," said Mr.
+Betterson. And much wonder and many conjectures were expressed by the
+missing youth's not very unhappy relatives.
+
+"I bet I know!" said Link. "He drove so fast he overtook the tornado,
+and it twisted him out of his breeches, and hung him up in a tree
+somewhere!"
+
+An ingenious theory, which did not, however, obtain much credence with
+the family.
+
+"One thing seems to be proved, and I am very glad," said Vinnie. "It
+was not Zeph who took Jack's compass."
+
+"Rad must have taken that, to spite Jack, and hid it somewhere near the
+road in the timber, where it would be handy if he ever wanted to make
+off with it; that's what Jack thinks," said Rufe. "Then, as he was
+driving past the spot, he put it into the buggy again."
+
+"Maybe he intended to set up for a surveyor somewhere," Wad remarked.
+"He must have taken another pair of trousers with him."
+
+"I am sure he didn't," said Cecie.
+
+"And even if he did," said Rufe, "that wouldn't account for his leaving
+the money in the pocket."
+
+The family finally settled down upon a theory which had been first
+suggested by Jack,--that in fording the river Rad had caught his wheels
+in the tree-tops or timbers of the ruined bridge, and, to keep his lower
+garments dry, had taken them off and left them in the buggy, while he
+waded in to remove the rubbish, when the horse had somehow got away from
+him, and gone home. It also seemed quite probable that Rad himself had
+become entangled in drift-wood, and been drowned.
+
+"Feed the mare, boys," said Lord Betterson. "As soon as she is well
+rested, I'll drive up to the broken bridge, and see if any discoveries
+can be made."
+
+Meanwhile, whatever Radcliff's fate, it did not prevent the family from
+rejoicing over the recovery of the lost money. And now Rufe's attention
+was called to another happy circumstance, one which promised to be to
+them a source of deeper and more lasting satisfaction.
+
+Cecie could walk!
+
+Yes, the marvellous effects of the previous day's events were still
+manifest in the case of the little invalid. Either the tremendous
+excitement, thrilling and rousing her whole system, or the electric
+shock which accompanied the whirlwind, or the exertions she felt
+compelled to make when Rad ran off with the money,--or all combined (for
+the doctors were divided in opinion on the subject),--had overcome the
+paralysis of her limbs, which a long course of medical treatment had
+failed to remove.
+
+The family physician, who chanced to come over from the Mills that day,
+maintained that what he had been doing for the injured spine, the source
+of Cecie's troubles, had prepared the way for this result; while
+neighbor Peakslow, when he heard the news, grunted, and said he "guessed
+the gal could 'a' walked all the time if she had only thought she could,
+or wanted to very much." All which made Cecie smile. She only knew that
+she was cured, and was too proud and glad to care much what was said of
+her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+
+FOLLOWING UP THE MYSTERY.
+
+
+In the course of the day Mr. Betterson and Rufe visited the supposed
+scene of Rad's disaster, and there met by chance Jack and his friend
+Forrest Felton, who for a similar object had driven up from North Mills.
+
+The river had gone down almost as rapidly as it had risen, and fording
+it now by daylight was no such difficult matter. But there still were
+the timbers and tree-tops amidst which the vehicles had passed the night
+before.
+
+Jack showed marks on one of his wheels where the spokes had been sharply
+raked, and told how, examining Snowfoot by daylight, he had found muddy
+splashes on his flank, as if he had been struck there by a bough or
+branch drenched in turbid water.
+
+"I think," said he, "that as Rad was getting the buggy clear, the limb
+of a tree turned over and hit the horse. That started him, and away he
+went. I don't believe Rad is drowned."
+
+Search was made among the rubbish at the bridge, and for some distance
+down the river; but no traces of Rad were discovered.
+
+"Maybe he has gone home by water," was Rufe's rather too playful way of
+saying that the drowned body might have floated down stream.
+
+"If he got out alive," said Jack's friend Felton, "he must have found
+his way to some house near by, in quest of pantaloons." And the party
+now proceeded to make inquiries at the scattered huts of the Dutch--or
+rather German--settlers along the edge of the timber.
+
+At the first two doors where they stopped they found only women and
+children, who could speak no English. But at the next house they saw a
+girl, who eagerly answered "Yah! yah!" to their questions, and ran and
+called a man working at the back door.
+
+He was a short, thick-set man, with a big russet beard and serious blue
+eyes.
+
+"Goot morgin," he said, coming to the road to greet the strangers. "Der
+been some vind dis vay,--you see some?--vas las' ebening."
+
+The strangers acknowledged that they had experienced some effects of the
+wind the night before, and repeated their questions regarding Radcliff.
+
+"Young man,--no priches,--yah! yah!" replied Meinheer. "He come 'long
+here, vas 'pout nine hours, may pe some more."
+
+"A little after nine o'clock last night?" suggested Jack.
+
+"Yah, yah! I vas bed shleepin', somebody knock so loud, I git some
+candle light, and make de door open, and der vas some young feller, his
+face sick, his clo'es all so vet but his priches,--his priches vas not
+vet, for he has no priches, only some shoes."
+
+"Where did he come from?"
+
+"He say he come from up stream; he pass de pridge over, and der vas no
+pridge; and he dhrive 'cross de vaser, and he cannot dhrive 'cross; so
+he git out, only his priches not git out, for de vaser vas vet, and his
+priches keeps in de vagon, vile he keeps in de vaser; he make some lift
+on some logs, and someding make de hoss fright, and de hoss jump and
+jerk de vagon, and de vagon jerk someding vat jerk him; and de priches
+rides off, and he shtop in de vaser, and dhink some, and git sick, and
+he say de log in his shtomach and so much vaser was pad, and I mus' give
+him some dhink viskey and some dry priches, and I gives 'em."
+
+"A pair of _your_ breeches?" cried Rufe, eying the baggy proportions of
+Meinheer's nether garments.
+
+"I have no oder; I fetch 'em from faderland; and I gives him some. He
+stick his legs in, and some of his legs come too much under; de priches
+vas some too vide, and some not long genoof. He dhink more viskey, and
+feel goot, and say he find his team and bring back my priches to-morrow,
+and it is to-morrow yet, and he not come."
+
+Even the grave uncle of the luckless nephew had to laugh as he thought
+of the slim legs pursuing their travels in the short but enormous
+"priches" fetched from fatherland.
+
+"How much were your breeches worth?" Lord said, taking out some money.
+
+"I don't know--I don't keeps priches to sell; may pe vun tollar."
+
+Betterson gave the German a dollar, saying,--
+
+"Allow me to pay for them; for, if I mistake not, you will never see the
+young man or your breeches again."
+
+He was quite right: the German never did.
+
+Neither--it may as well be said here--did Radcliff's own relatives see
+him again for many years. What various adventures were his can only be
+surmised, until one of the "Philadelphia partners," settling up his
+accounts with the world, left him a legacy of six thousand dollars, when
+he once more bloomed out as a fine gentleman, and favored his Western
+friends with a visit.
+
+He ran through his little fortune in a few months, and once more
+disappeared from view, to turn up again, five or six years later (when
+Jack and Vinnie saw him for the last time), as a runner for one of the
+great Chicago hotels.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL.
+
+PEAKSLOW'S HOUSE-RAISING.
+
+
+"Mercy on me!" said Caroline, hearing an unusual noise in the front part
+of the house; "now we are to have the racket of those Peakslow children!
+What could you have been thinking of, Lavinia dear? I'm sure _I_ didn't
+know what I was saying when I gave _my_ consent to their coming. The
+idea of their turning our library into a kitchen! Not that I blame
+_you_, Lavinia dear. _I_ ought to have considered."
+
+"Surely you wouldn't have denied the houseless family a shelter?" Vinnie
+replied. "That would have seemed too bad, with those great chambers
+unoccupied. As for the _library_,"--Vinnie smiled, for the unfurnished
+room called by that choice name had nothing in it but a fireplace,--"I
+don't think any harm can happen to that."
+
+Vinnie had a plan regarding the Peakslow children, which she laid before
+Mrs. Peakslow as soon as the new inmates were fairly settled in the
+house.
+
+"Since my sister and the baby have been so much better, I have begun a
+little school, with only two scholars,--Cecie and Lilian. Wouldn't your
+children like to join it? I think it would be pleasant."
+
+"Whuther they would or not, I'd like to have 'em," replied Mrs.
+Peakslow, gratefully. "The chances for schoolin' is dreffle slim in this
+country; we've no school-house within nigh two mile. But how shall I pay
+ye?"
+
+"You needn't mind about that."
+
+"Yes, I shall mind too. We must do somethin' for you in return."
+
+"Well, then," said Vinnie, "if you like, you may let one of the girls
+help a little in my sister's kitchen, to make up for the time I spend
+with them."
+
+"I'll do it, sartin! You shall have Lyddy. She's a good smart hand at
+housework, and you may git all out of her you can."
+
+So it was arranged. The little school of two was increased to five; the
+"parlor"--used only to store grain in hitherto--was turned into a
+school-room; and Lyddy worked in Mrs. Betterson's kitchen.
+
+"Lavinia dear, you _are_ an extraordinary girl!" said Caroline. "It
+seems the greatest miracle of all to see one of the Peakslows washing
+_our_ dishes!"
+
+No one was better pleased with this arrangement than Jack, who could
+never be reconciled to seeing Vinnie--with all her health and strength
+and cheery spirits--doing the hardest of the housework.
+
+Jack took early occasion, on visiting Long Woods, to go and see Mr.
+Peakslow, and make him a frank apology for having once suspected Zeph of
+taking his compass. But he got only an ugly scowl and surly grunt for
+his pains.
+
+For a while Peakslow did not go near his family, quartered in his
+enemy's house; but slept in the haystack, with Dud and Zeph, and ate the
+meals his wife cooked and sent to him three times a day.
+
+But soon Dud went to sleep at the "castle," and found he had nothing
+more formidable to meet than Vinnie's bright eyes,--for Dud had suddenly
+developed into a bashful youth.
+
+Zeph in a night or two followed his example, and Peakslow was left alone
+in his haystack.
+
+And the nights were growing chill; and the repair of the buildings went
+on slowly, carpenters being scarce; and Peakslow, who had a heart for
+domestic comforts, began to yearn for the presence of his family at
+mealtime and bedtime.
+
+At length he stole into the house after dark one evening, and stole out
+again before light the next morning. That did not seem to hurt him; on
+the contrary, it suited Peakslow; his neighbor's house was better than a
+haystack. Then he came to supper and stayed to breakfast. Then there was
+no good reason why he should not come to dinner; and he came
+accordingly.
+
+Then he stopped after dinner one day to see how Vinnie conducted her
+little school, and went away looking wonderfully thoughtful. The boys
+remembered that he did not scold them so sharply that afternoon as he
+had been wont to do since the tornado disturbed his temper.
+
+One morning, as he was going out, Peakslow saw Lord Betterson in the
+yard, and advanced awkwardly toward him, holding his hat in one hand and
+scratching his head with the other. There was, after all, a vein of
+diffidence in the rough quartz of the man's character; and somehow, on
+this occasion, he couldn't help showing his neighbor a good deal of
+respect.
+
+"I'm a-gun to have a bee this arternoon,--a raisin',--gun to try to git
+the logs back on to the house, an' the ruf on to the shed,--everything
+ready,--some o' the neighbors comin' to help,--and if you an' your boys
+can lend a hand, I'll do as much for you some time."
+
+"Surely; very glad to serve you, Neighbor Peakslow," Lord Betterson
+replied, in his magnificently polite way, much as if he had been a
+monarch dismissing a foreign ambassador.
+
+Jack came over to Long Woods that afternoon, and, having rectified Mrs.
+Wiggett's noon-mark, stopped at Peakslow's raising on his way back up
+the valley.
+
+He found a group of men and boys before the house, partaking of some
+refreshments,--sweetened whiskey and water, passed round in a pail with
+a tin dipper by Zeph, and "nut-cakes" and "turn-overs," served by Mrs.
+Peakslow and 'Lecty Ann.
+
+The sight of Snowfoot tied to his fence made Peakslow glare; nor was his
+ruffled spirit smoothed when he saw Jack come forward with a cheery face
+and a compass in his hand.
+
+Jack greeted the Bettersons, Mr. Wiggett, and one or two others he
+knew, and was talking pleasantly with them, when Peakslow pushed the
+inverted cut-water of his curved beak through the crowd, and confronted
+him.
+
+"So that air's the compass, is it?"
+
+"This is the compass, Mr. Peakslow."
+
+"Keep it in yer hand, now'days, do ye? Don't trust it in the wagon? Good
+idee! No danger of its bein' stole, an' your comin' agin to 'cuse my
+boys of the theft!"
+
+Peakslow's ancient wrath rekindled as he spoke; his voice trembled and
+his eyes flamed.
+
+Jack kept his temper admirably, and answered with a frank and honest
+face,--
+
+"I have made the best amends I could for that mistake, by apologizing to
+you for it, Mr. Peakslow. I don't keep the compass in my hand because I
+am afraid it may be stolen. I have called--as I promised Mrs. Peakslow
+the other day that I would do--to give her a noon-mark on her kitchen
+floor."
+
+"How's this?--promised her?--I don't understand that!" growled Peakslow.
+
+"Yes, pa!" said Mrs. Peakslow, with a frightened look. "I seen him to
+Mis' Betterson's. He'd made a noon-mark for Mis' Wiggett, and Mis'
+Betterson's sister asked me if I wouldn't like one, as he was comin' to
+make them one some day."
+
+Off went Peakslow's hat, and into his bushy hair went his fingers again,
+while he stammered out,--
+
+"But he can't make no noon-mark this arternoon,--we're all in a mess an'
+litter, so!"
+
+"Just as well now as any time," said Jack. "The doorway is clear. I
+sha'n't interfere with anybody."
+
+"What'll be to pay?" Peakslow asked.
+
+"O, I don't charge anything for a little job like this,--to one of Mr.
+Betterson's neighbors."
+
+"That's jes' so; he didn't charge me nary red," said Mr. Wiggett. "An'
+he's done the job for me now tew times,--fust time, the tornado come and
+put the noon-mark out o' j'int, 'fore ever a noon come round."
+
+Jack adjusted his compass, while the house-raisers looked on, to see how
+the thing was done, Peakslow appearing as much interested as anybody.
+
+Jack got Link to make the first marks for him on the floor, and laughed,
+as he looked through the sights of the compass, to hear Mr. Wiggett
+describe the finding of his section corner,--"runnin' a line plumb to
+the old stake, out on the open perairie,"--and praise the boy-surveyor's
+skill.
+
+The mark was made with quickness and precision; friends and strangers
+crowded around Jack with kind words and questions; and he was surprised
+to find himself all at once a person of importance.
+
+Peakslow puffed hard at his pipe. His face was troubled; and two or
+three times he pulled the pipe out of his mouth, thrust his knuckles
+under his hat, and took a step toward the young surveyor. He also
+cleared his throat. He evidently had a word to say. But the word would
+not come.
+
+When at last he let Jack go off without offering him even a syllable of
+thanks, the bystanders smiled, and somebody might have been heard to
+mutter, "Peakslow all over! Just like his hoggishness!"
+
+Jack smiled too as he went, for he had shrewdly observed his enemy, and
+he knew it was not "hoggishness" which kept Peakslow's lips closed, but
+a feeling which few suspected in that grasping, hard, and
+violent-tempered man.
+
+Peakslow was abashed!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI.
+
+CONCLUSION.
+
+
+The house made once more inhabitable, Peakslow's family moved back into
+it. But this change did not take Lyddy away from the "castle," nor break
+up Vinnie's school.
+
+The "castle" now underwent some renovation. The long-neglected
+plastering was done, and the rooms in daily use were made comfortable.
+
+Meanwhile the boys were full of ambition regarding their water-works.
+The project had cost them a good deal more trouble than they had
+anticipated at first; but they were amply repaid for all on the day when
+the water was finally let on, and they saw it actually run from the
+spout in the back-room! Such a result had seemed to them almost too good
+ever to come true; and their joy over it was increased ten-fold by the
+doubts and difficulties overcome.
+
+Jack had come over to be present when the water was brought in, and he
+was almost as happy over it as they.
+
+"No more trouble with the old well!" said Rufe.
+
+"No more lugging water from the grove!" said Wad.
+
+"Or going into the river head-first after it, as you and I did!" said
+Link.
+
+Vinnie was proud of her nephews, and Caroline and Lord were proud of
+their sons.
+
+[Illustration: THE WATER QUESTION SETTLED.]
+
+"How fine it will be for your dairy, in summer,--this cold, running
+water!" said Vinnie.
+
+But Chokie seemed best pleased, because he would no longer be dependent
+upon precarious rains filling the hogshead, but would have a whole
+tankful of water--an ocean in the back-room--to sail his shingle boats
+on.
+
+The boys had also acted on another suggestion of Jack's, and taken the
+farm to work. This plan also promised to succeed well. The prospect of
+doing something for themselves, roused energies which might have lain
+dormant all their lives, if they had been contented to sit still and
+wait for others to help them.
+
+As Vinnie's school became known, other pupils appeared from up and down
+the river, and by the first snowfall she had more than a dozen scholars.
+Among these were Sal Wiggett and two big boys belonging to the paternal
+Wiggett's "third crap" of children, and Dud and Zeph Peakslow.
+
+The Betterson boys also attended the school, Wad and Link as pupils, and
+Rufe partly as a pupil and partly as an assistant. Vinnie could teach
+him penmanship and grammar, but she was glad to turn over to him the
+classes in arithmetic, for which study he had a natural aptitude.
+
+The Peakslow children, both boys and girls, had a good deal in them that
+was worth cultivating; and amid the genial associations of the little
+school they fast outgrew their rude and uncouth ways. It was interesting
+to see Zeph and Cecie reciting the same lessons side by side, and Rufe
+showing Dud about the sums that bothered him.
+
+Caroline had very much objected to Vinnie's enlarging her school, and
+especially to her receiving the big boys. The success of the experiment
+surprised her. Vinnie had a charming way with the younger children, and
+a peculiarly subduing influence over the big boys.
+
+"Lavinia dear," said Caroline "what have I always said? You are a most
+extraordinary girl!"
+
+And now things came round curiously enough; and an event occurred of
+which nobody could have dreamed when Vinnie set out alone, with a brave
+heart, to do her simple duty to her sister's family.
+
+It was found that she had a happy faculty for interesting and
+instructing the young. So when, in the spring, a girls' school was
+opened at North Mills, she was offered a place in it as assistant
+teacher, which her friends there--Jack's friends--prevailed on her to
+accept.
+
+Leaving Long Woods cost her many regrets. But the better order of things
+was now well established at the "castle" (which was fast ceasing to be a
+castle, in the popular speech); and she felt that its inmates could
+spare her very well,--if they would only think so!
+
+Other considerations also consoled her for the change. She would still
+be where she could see her relatives often; and now Jack's delightful
+home was to be her own.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Young Surveyor;, by J. T. Trowbridge
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