"That? Oh! that's quite another thing. I'm keeping tally of Joe and Fuz.

Every time one of 'em asks a question about our boarding-house, or Mrs.

Myers, or Almira, or' little Dr. Brandegee, I nick it down. Got to quit pretty soon, or buy another slate."

"They've kind o' kept away from us," said Dab. "They're in only one of my cla.s.ses, but they're in three of yours."

"Ain't in any ob mine," said d.i.c.k; "but Dr. Brandegee says he'll promote me soon."

d.i.c.k's tongue always began to work better, the moment he mentioned the academy-princ.i.p.al.

"I don't mind their keeping away from us," said Frank.

"Nor I," said Ford.

At that moment they reached their own gate, and d.i.c.k darted forward in response to an imaginary call from Mrs. Myers.

Ford went on,--

"They can keep away all they please, but they won't do it long. They're bound on mischief of some kind."

"To us?" asked Frank.

"Well, yes; but it'll light on Richard Lee first. He won't say a word to us about it, but they've bothered him."

"I'll ask him," said Dab, in whose face a flush was rising. "They must let d.i.c.k alone."

"They won't, then. And there's plenty of others just like 'em. They're getting together in a kind of a flock these last two or three days. Some of 'em are pretty big ones."

"Boys," exclaimed Frank, "how about our boxing lessons?"

"Guess we haven't forgotten 'em all in one week," said Ford. "I was thinking about to-morrow."

So were they all; and they held a council-of-war about it, in their own room, before supper. The result was, that, by a unanimous vote, that Sat.u.r.day was to be devoted to the catching of fish, rather than to playing ball, or any thing else that would bring them into immediate contact with Joe and Fuz.

They had all brought their fishing-tackle with them, as a matter of course; plenty of worms for bait were to be dug in the garden; and Dab Kinzer had learned, by careful inquiry, that both bait and tackle could be used to good purpose in the waters of "Green Pond," and sundry other small bits of lakes, miles and miles away among the hills to the north of Grantley.

"We'll have a grand time," he said, "and it'll do us all good. No crabs, though. Wonder if those fresh-water fish bite like ours down in the bay."

"Some do, and some don't," said Ford. "I've caught 'em."

It did not occur to him now, however, that he could probably teach Dab; and they all obeyed the supper-bell.

There were three kinds of corn-cake on the table, but the boys were thinking of something more important; and Dab hardly received his first cup of tea before he remarked,--

"We're all going a-fishing to-morrow, Mrs. Myers; but we may get home in time for supper. Can you spare d.i.c.k?"

"What, on Sat.u.r.day? The very day I need him most? Three loads of wood'll be over from the farm to-night."

d.i.c.k had been in the kitchen, and had advanced as far as the door while Dab was speaking.

"Wood?" he muttered to himself. "Guess I know wot dat means. T'ree load ob wood, an' no fishin'! It's jes' awful!"

"Now, Mrs. Myers," said Ford, "if you knew what a fisherman d.i.c.k is! He might bring you home a load of them."

"I am sorry," said Mrs. Myers, with more of firmness and less of smile than they had ever seen on her face before. "I have no objection to the rest of you going. You may do as you please about that, but I must keep Richard at his work."

"I am particularly well pleased to learn that you have no objection to our going," remarked Ford, with extreme politeness, and Dabney added,--

"It does me good too. We'll take d.i.c.k with us some other time. Mrs.

Myers, if you will have breakfast pretty early I'll be much obliged to you."

Even Almira had never seen Dabney look quite so tall as he did at that moment.

CHAPTER x.x.x.

DABNEY KINZER TRIES FRESH-WATER FISHING FOR THE FIRST TIME.

Conversation did not flourish at the supper-table that Friday evening.

There was a puzzled look on the faces of Mrs. Myers and her daughter, and their three boarders seemed to be running a kind of race with each other as to which of them should make out to be the most carefully polite. As for poor d.i.c.k Lee, out there in the kitchen, the nearest he came to breaking the silence was in a sort of smothered groan, and a half-uttered determination to "git up good and early, an' dig dem fellers de bes' worms dey is in de gardin."

There was talk enough in the room up stairs in the course of the evening; but the door was closed, and there was no chance for any one in the pa.s.sage outside, no matter how silently he or she might go by, to hear a distinct word of it.

"You see, boys," said Ford Foster, at the end of some extended remarks, "I'm not at all mean or exacting. My father only pays Mrs. Myers three dollars a week, and all she agreed to give was board. I can't expect her to be any kind of an aunt, too, and let me go a-fishing. I'll take it all off her hands, and let myself go."

"It's hard on d.i.c.k, though," said Dab, "and she's kind o' got the right of it."

"I s'pose she has. But if he isn't earning all he gets, I'm mistaken.

Boys, if she puts any more work on him, what'll we do?"

"Eat," said Dab: "that's the only way we can make it up."

"We can't do it, Dab. Not unless the price of corn-meal goes up. Think of eating another three dollars' worth of hasty-pudding every week!"

Their landlady came out in all her smiles at breakfast, and hoped they would have good success with their fishing.

"Only," she added, "I'm not very fond of fish, and I never take the trouble to clean them."

"We will try and catch ours ready cleaned, Mrs. Myers," said Ford. "Now, boys, if you're ready, I am."

They were ready, bait and all, thanks to d.i.c.k; and the breakfast had been an early one. Dab thanked Mrs. Myers for that, even while he wished he had Ford Foster's tongue to do it with.

In fact, he had been noticing of late that his ideas came to him a little slowly. Not but what he had plenty of them, but they seemed disposed to crowd one another; so that whenever there was any thing to be said in a hurry, Ford was sure to get ahead of him, and sometimes even quiet Frank Harley.

"Must be I'm growing, somehow," he said to himself, "or I wouldn't be so awkward."