"What!" exclaimed Peter, turning on his three sons, who sat trembling before him.

"Yes, she came to see if Henry was any better, and that let the cat out of the bag. They've got to be 'tended to," replied Mrs. Stout. "Tended to" in the Stout family meant something painful. The boys looked at each other in dismay, and then at their parents.

"I ain't got time now," said Peter, "but in the mornin'--" With that terrible, unspoken threat on his lips Peter put on his hat, and went back to the store. Mrs. Stout began clearing the table, and the boys silently filed out of the house and sat down on the front door-steps to talk it over.

"You've got to give me back that five cents I give you for sayin' I was sick, Paul," said Henry, "and you too, Wendell."

"I guess not," replied Paul and Wendell, quickly.

"I got found out, didn't I?"

"We said you was sick, didn't we?"

"I'm goin' to get a lickin', ain't I?"

"We're goin' to get one, too, ain't we?"

"I wouldn't lie for money."

"No; you'd get somebody to lie for you," said Wendell, scornfully.

"Yer little brothers," added Paul.

"I wouldn't steal, anyway," retorted Henry. For a moment they were silent.

"h.e.l.lo, fellers," yelled a boy from the street.

"h.e.l.lo, Tom," replied the trio.

"Don't make any noise," cautioned Henry as Tommy Tweedie came up to the steps.

"Why?" he asked as he sat down.

"I got caught," said Henry.

Tommy whistled his surprise.

"Did the kids (meaning Paul and Wendell) tell?" he asked.

"Nope; Miss Wallace come to see how sick I was."

"What'd your father say?" snickered Tom.

"Said he'd see us in the mornin'. Say, Tom, what's this club for that your ma and mine are gettin' up?"

"I dunno," replied Tommy, "only I heard pop say we was goin' to have a tablet, kind of a tombstone, you know, in the yard that told on it when the club was foundered or somethin' like that; and this mornin' he told Dora that he wished the tablet was goin' to be put up right away with the date the club died on it, too."

"Are they goin' to play ball?" asked Wendell.

"Women don't play ball," said Paul.

"My mother says," replied Tom, "that women do everything nowadays."

"Boys," said Mrs. Stout, sternly, from the doorway.

The three guilty ones filed solemnly into the house, and Tommy Tweedie slipped away into the darkness.

Chapter VI

Barbara and Will

"GOOD luck is with me sometimes, Barbara," said Will, as they turned into the street from Mrs. Stout's yard.

"Is that a new name for me?" asked Barbara.

"No; but it would be a good one. I meant that I was fortunate in meeting you; chance meetings, you know, are often best."

"Yes," replied Barbara, and then added, "if the chance is genuine." He had met her so often of late by chance, that now, as he was bold enough to speak of it, for a moment she doubted his sincerity.

"Really, Barbara," he replied, quickly, "on honour, I was on my way home, and had no idea where you were." (Except, he might have added, that she was first in his thoughts.) Barbara believed him, nevertheless she was annoyed. Whether her feeling of annoyance was caused by what Mrs. Stout had said, by the chance meeting with Will, or by what people were saying about them, Barbara herself was not sure. She was certain, however, that people were talking and linking her name with his in a way that she did not like. That very night at supper Mrs. Tweedie had given her estimate of Will Flint's character. The picture that she painted, though more suggestive than real, was intended to be anything except favourable, and Barbara knew that it was intended especially for her. But despite the talk, she liked Will better than any other of her acquaintances in Manville, because he at least was companionable and honest.

"What's going on at the Stouts'?" asked Will. Barbara related the story, and when she had finished Will expressed his feelings with a long whistle.

"The little rascals!" he exclaimed. "I suppose it's all my fault."

"Your fault?" said Barbara, in surprise.

"Yes. Early this afternoon as I was on my way to the pond for an afternoon's fishing I met the Stout boys. Henry asked me where I was going, and when I told him he expressed a wish that he might go too. I said come along, and he did, after a whispered conference with the other two. We had a bully time."

"You great big boy!" exclaimed Barbara, not knowing whether to laugh or be angry. "And those three boys are going to be punished when you are the one wholly to blame."

"But, Barbara, I never once thought about school, and Henry didn't speak of it."

"Of course he didn't, but now he has got to pay for his fun, and yours, too."

Will stopped and looked back, undecided as to what he ought to do, and very much disturbed to think that he had been the cause of trouble.

"What shall I do, go back and tell Mrs. Stout?" he asked.

"It is all over now, probably."

"That's so," said Will, gloomily, as they resumed their walk. "But I'll go down in the morning and confess everything, and then, some day when there's no school, I'll give those boys a good time to pay for the whipping they've had. The little villains--do you go to see them all when they're sick?"

"Yes, unless some one comes to tell me about them."