will was now at work on a very learned dissertation on “philosophical ingenuity.” that is the name he gave it,—but the name had nothing in common with the subject, “socialism” would have been quite as appropriate,—and according to his views, he handled it in a graphic, original, and striking manner; and he was firmly convinced that he should make a very good thing of it.

poor boy, it was too bad, after all the pains he took.

what was too bad?

this. the same evening on which he wrote out his composition for the last time, he sat up late and wrote to his cousin henry, inviting him to come and pay them a visit in the holidays.

when this boy (will) gave stephen gunpowder instead of fire crackers, and again when he loaded henry’s pistols with wads, his mistakes were glossed over, and he himself was laughed at, rather than blamed. but now the truth must be made known; he cannot be excused any longer. right over his eyes, where the phrenologists locate order, there was a depression.

there, the secret is out, and the writer’s conscience is easy.

boys, it is hard to have to deal with a hero who is not a paragon; but you must be indulgent, and we will do our best.

after finishing and directing the letter to his cousin, will went to bed and slept peacefully, little dreaming of the thunderbolt which would soon burst over his head, and which he himself had prepared.

next morning he found his writing materials strewn over his table in great confusion, and in a lazy, listless manner he set to work to put them to rights.

[272]

in order to keep his composition, or “essay,” perfectly clean, he intended to put it into an old envelope. alas, poor boy, he made a blunder, as usual; and mistaking the composition for the letter, he thrust it into the envelope directed to henry, which he sealed on the spot, and stowed away in his pocket. then he put the letter into the old envelope and put it carefully away in his satchel.

not one boy in fifty could possibly have made so egregious a blunder, but nothing else could be expected from will.

on this eventful day, the “essays,” as teacher meadows saw fit to call them, were to be read, and the prize was to be delivered over to the “successful competitor.”

full of his expected triumph, will set out for school. he knew that his composition was good, and he could judge what the others’ would be. he was a little uneasy about george and charles, but as for the rest—pshaw! the rest couldn’t write!

he imagined he saw his schoolmates watching him as he went home that evening with about the biggest book ever printed. he even heard their disappointed tones, and saw their sullen and envious looks, as he passed through the streets.

and that old lady who often cast admiring glances towards him—she would call next day and say, “well, mrs. lawrence, your boy is just the smartest boy in the whole village.”

in a day or so stephen would drop in and let him know what was said about it by the villagers in general, the schoolboys in particular.

and when his uncle and aunt heard the news, they would certainly be overjoyed, and send him (just what he wanted, of course) a monkey! as soon as it could be done, his father would buy him a little gun.

full of these dreams, he went on, stopping at the post office to send, as he supposed, his letter to henry.

time wore away, and the hour for the “essays” to be read, came at last. teacher meadows took his seat, and they were laid on the desk before him. good man,[273] he himself would read them all, lest the “composers” should not do themselves justice.

only a dozen or so had competed for the prize, but all these had done their best, and the handwriting was so plain that it was a pleasure to read it.

a few of the competitors’ parents and “well-wishers” were present, “to see justice done to all,” as they pleasantly put it. but they served only to increase the master’s pompousness and self-esteem, and the “essayists’” bashfulness and inquietude; while they themselves were surely neither very much instructed nor very much delighted.

in fact, the truth was probably forced home to the more intelligent of the audience, that schoolboys and schoolgirls who would soar to the pinnacle of fame by attempting to write beyond their capabilities, generally find themselves floundering about in the slough of ignominious failure.

mr. meadows certainly read the different compositions with great care and earnestness, and took as much pains with the worthless ones as with the tolerably good ones.

by some chance, will’s was the last to be read, and dead silence was observed till it was finished.

whenever a new idea had struck the boy, he had set it down without the slightest regard to consecutiveness; and if the same idea was afterwards seen in a different light, he had promptly expressed his views, though in the midst of a paragraph.

a mere handful of words had been sufficient for him on this occasion, and these were repeated with unwearied persistency. a schoolboy writing a letter excels in repetition, at least.

if either mr. or mrs. lawrence had reviewed it for him it would not have been so incomprehensible.

the letter ran as follows:

dear henry,—i am going to write to you all about us boys and our doings, and tell you all about a great plot that all of us are going to have. i received your letter of last month safe and sound, and i expect you expected to hear from me right off. but, henry, i’ve[274] had all sorts of things to do, and just now we boys are trying for a prize. i expect it will be a beauty. i would not write till it’s all over, but we boys want me to write to you right off to come down and help us in a plot we’ve got made up to impose on one of our number. i’ve been puzzling over my essay for the prize for nearly three weeks or more (the boys here don’t know that) or i should have written before; and so, just to please them, i’m sitting up late and writing to-night instead of day after to-morrow.

they expect it will be the most tremendous fun that ever was, and of course it will. i’m rather tired of playing tricks, but they say this isn’t playing tricks at all. in your last letter you asked me if the boys were the same rum old poligars that they used to be. i don’t know what that means, henry, but i guess the boys are just the same—only worse. well, henry, i guess i’ll try and give you a better idea of them than i did when i was with you. you know all their names; so first there is charley. he is a capital good sort of a fellow, and he often helps me. but he is a very queer sort of a fellow, and he thinks it’s tremendous big fun to use big words when he talks with us—well, so do the others. it seems natural for george to use them, but i don’t know why steve does. i expect he thinks it’s tremendous big fun too.

stephen is a great fellow to play tricks. my father says if he lives, and keeps on at this rate, he and the law will meet with violence some of these days.

but i hope stephen will never get into such trouble. he makes us laugh more than all the other boys put together, and i expect when you come down and we get fairly started rescuing the captive, we’ll laugh ourselves sick in bed. marmaduke, he’s the one, is not to see you till in the haunted house.

charley likes to have me tell him stories about the demon. marmaduke—he’s the next one to tell about. we boys are not very well satisfied with the way we get on in french. we haven’t a genuine frenchman for a master, as you have. we all like mr. meadows, but he[275] has not the knack of making us understand french, though he is a splendid teacher in other things. but the boys all say that marmaduke is satisfied.

because he can write “a red-haired sailor dressed in blue says the physician’s house is burnt,” “the king’s palace is built on the river,” “the neighbor’s wicked little boy has stolen the carpenter’s hammer,” and so on, he thinks he and the french language understand each other. mr. meadows himself isn’t satisfied with the method he uses. one boy here says the reason he doesn’t get a better one is because he studied it when he was a boy, and, etc., etc. but that is a very mean thing to say, eh, henry? and i don’t believe it a bit. that’s the reason we want you to come, to write us a good letter in french. george is a nice boy. he always says, look here, boys, when he has something on his mind. he reads a great deal, but it doesn’t spoil him from being a boy a bit. ask him what he reads, and he’ll say, oh, anything from an almanac to an unabridged dictionary, and i expect that is so. marmaduke is just the wildest boy in his notions that i ever saw. the boys mean to take advantage of this, and delude him. but i have explained all that. jim always, generally, goes with us, and he is the most first-rate coward that i ever saw. we’ve shut him out this time. but he is a nice fine boy in lots of things.

in reading over what i’ve written i’m afraid i haven’t explained our plot at all, henry; but it’s too long to explain now, because i’m tired, henry, and i expect to see you soon, henry, and then i can explain it better than i could in writing. perhaps i’ve written too much about the boys, but you know just how much i think of them. they are all good fellows and we would do almost anything for each other. we don’t care much for the other boys here, only ourselves. i can tell you this much about our plot, we pretend to rescue a prisoner out of an old house. george calls it the necropolis, and charley the scare-crow’s factory; but stephen has a better name—at least, it sounds better. he calls it the wigwam of the seven sleepers. last time i forgot to ask you to excuse[276] my writing, so i might as well now, this time. i’m too tired to write any more this time, and my letter is pretty long, anyway. don’t wait to write again, but come as soon as possible next week, for our plot will come off as soon as possible.

i am, i was, and i always mean to be,

your sleepy cousin will.