OUR YOUNG FOLKS.

An Illustrated Magazine

FOR BOYS AND GIRLS.

VOL. VIII.

NOVEMBER, 1872.

No. XI.

A CHANCE FOR HIMSELF.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

HOW JACK WON A BET, AND RETURNED A FAVOR. HE next morning Sellick sat milking a cow in the yard, when a clear, pleasant voice close beside him said, "Good morning, Mr. Constable !"

He had heard footsteps and the rattling of a milk-pail behind him, but had not looked around, thinking it was Billy the farm-boy coming to help him. Now he looked, however, and there stood his escaped prisoner of yesterday, smiling, with a milk-pail in one hand and a stool in the other.

"Ha! good morning, sonny!" cried Sellick, excitedly. His first impulse was to spring and seize the fugitive; his next, to sit still.

"You helped me milk yesterday morning, now I've come to help you," said Jack. "I like to pay my

debts."

"That's right! that's fair!" said the astonished constable.

"Which is the kicking cow? I don't want to tackle her!" quietly remarked Jack, surveying the little herd. "Try that heifer with the white forefeet," replied Sellick. "You 're an honest boy, as I said yisterday! I've changed works many a time with a neighbor, but I never had one return my little favors quite so prompt! You kind o' took my breath away!

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, by JAMES R. OSGOOD & Co., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

Where have you been since we parted in that rather abrupt fashion yisterday?"

"O, travelling about the country a little," said Jack, seating himself beside the heifer. "I thought I would make the most of my opportunities; I may not have another chance soon."

"What trick is the fellow up to now?" thought the constable. "He must have settled the affair with Peternot!" So he said aloud, “Have you seen the squire ?"

"Not since I left him with you in the court-room. not the best friends in the world, I'm sorry to say. squire!' But I've called on him once too often." "Where was you last night?"

"You kept me last night."

The squire and I are

'Nice old man, the

"I kept you, sonny?" said Sellick, more and more puzzled.

"Yes; I thought it was no more than fair that you should give me a night's lodging. I won't ask you to board me; I pay for my own milk, you know."

"Yes, I know!" you sleep last night? Not under my roof!"

Sellick grimaced at the recollection. "But where did

"Yes, I did, under your roof!" laughed Jack.

"Look here, sonny!" cried the incredulous Sellick, "I'll bet ye a trifle on that! I believe you 're an honest boy, as I've said; but you could n't have slept under my roof without my knowing it, unless Billy smuggled you in, and he would n't have dared to do it! Here, Billy!" An oldlooking, broad-shouldered, hollow-cheeked youth came into the yard. “Did you take this fellow into my house last night?"

"I never saw him on the place before," replied Billy, "though I ruther guess he's the one Mis' Sellick says come to the door last evening and asked for you."

"I came to your door, and afterwards slept under your roof," Jack insisted. "Since you offer to bet, I'll bet ye,—well, I'm no gambler, but I'll say my hat against a bowl of bread and milk.”

"No more milk! no more milk!" said Sellick, good-humoredly. "That cupful of yisterday soured on my stomach, if it did n't on yours. Call it a breakfast; I'm willing."

"All the better," said Jack. "Now just step into your barn, and in the left-hand farther corner you'll find a heap of straw, which you'll agree has been slept on. There's a pitchfork standing behind it; and there's a bound bundle, which I used as a pillow. I walked in last evening and made myself at home, while you were leading your horse to the pasture."

"I can believe all that," said Sellick readily. "But my barn ain't my house."

"I said nothing about your house; I bet that I slept under your roof.” "Sonny, I give it up! Keep on in the way you have begun, and you'll make a joker by the time you 're a hundred year old. But what in sixty have you come here for this morning? If that's a joke too, I can't see it."

"I thought you might like to finish that little ride we began yesterday. Not that I'm at all anxious about it," Jack explained, "but your heart seemed set on it; and, thinking it over, I concluded 't was too bad to disappoint you."

"And you mean

Sellick, sitting by his cow, paused to grin at the

young milker in puzzled astonishment.

"Yes, I do!" said Jack, laughing; "I don't mean to spill any more milk, nor lock up any more court-rooms, nor go through any more culverts, very soon." Then, as Sellick still looked incredulous, he added, more seriously, "I've thought it all over, and made up my mind to just this: if I've done anything to be taken to jail for, why, then, take me to jail, if you want to."

"You 're deep!" said Sellick, still suspicious of some cunning design hidden beneath Jack's candid avowal; "or else you're a bigger fool than I took ye for."

"Have it which way you like,” Jack replied. And, having fairly committed himself to this open and manly course, he felt his bosom swell with honest pride and satisfaction. "Now, whatever happens," thought he, "I've done what is right; I'll be true, I'll be my better self, I won't lie or skulk, for anybody or anything!" Or if he did not think this, he felt it, and it made him brave and strong.

"You're a smart boy to milk," said Sellick, looking at the contents of Jack's pail when it was brought to him. "If you git out of this scrape, I should n't wonder if I would hire you. What do you say ?"

It did not seem to Jack that he could bear to live so near Deacon Chatford's house, and feel that he might never enter it again as he used to do. Yet such an offer was encouraging; and the confidence in him which it implied, on the part of the constable, touched his heart.

"There will be time enough to talk about that after I get out of the scrape," he said. "I can't make any bargain till then.”

"That's right; that's fair and honest. You'll find it a fust-rate place," Sellick went on; "good living, plenty to do, and a jolly man to work for. Do chores this winter to pay for your board, and go to school if you like; and next summer I 'll pay you wages. Think on 't, you'd better. Now for breakfast. You've earnt yours, say nothing about the bet. You can milk a cow twice as quick as Billy. Good boy, but slow, is Billy; drea'ful modrit; stiddy as a yoke of oxen. Fust summer he worked for me Talking about you, Billy," said Sellick, as the old-looking youth overtook them on their way to the house.

Billy, looking as if he was used to being made fun of, said, "Sho!" and grinned, and hung his head.

"Telling how stiddy you be. Fust season he worked for me, I had a good deal of chopping to do over in the South Swamp. So fur off, men used to carry their dinners. Billy went over every day 'cept Sundays, all spring, till along into May, when I noticed something mighty curi's about his face. From a straight line down his forehead and nose, all one side was tanned like an Injin's, while t' other was white as a lady's."

"Sho! 't wa' n't so!" said Billy. "Fact. And this is how it happened. He went over in the morning with the left side of his face turned towards the sun as 't was rising, and come home at night with the same side turned towards the sun as 't was setting; worked in the shade of the woods all day, and never turned his head going and coming, 'cause he's sich a stiddy boy." And Sellick set the example of laughing merrily at his own wit.

"Folks that work for you don't git a chance to come home with the sunlight on their faces," grumbled Billy. "You keep us to work till dark, and sometimes by moonlight. You'll find it so, if you come to work for him," he added, turning to Jack. "T ain't like working for Deacon Chatford."

As Sellick had the reputation of driving his hired men early and late, this hit told; and he made haste to change the conversation.

"Billy's bilious. Billy 'll feel better arter breakfast. Billy's smart at one thing, if nothing else, knife-and-fork practice. If he worked as well as he eats, there'd be no need of his sometimes staying in the field till dark. But come in, come in; breakfast, boys, breakfast." And he led the way into the house.

CHAPTER XXXV.

AT MR. CHATFORD'S GATE.

"How strange it seems," said Mrs. Pipkin that morning, "not to have Jack around! I don't believe I should have missed any one of you so much. Somehow I can't get used to his being away; can you, Mrs. Chatford ?"

A tear quivered in Mrs. Chatford's eye as she replied, "I can't be reconciled to his going in the way he did. I feel that we are responsible for the boy's future; and if he had died I could hardly have mourned for him more than I do!"

This conversation took place at the breakfast-table, and it did not seem to help the appetites of those who heard it. The deacon shoved back his chair with a dissatisfied look; for it was an uncomfortable subject to him, firmly as he believed himself justified in withdrawing from Jack his sympathy and support.

"I'm so glad he got away!" said little Kate; "but I'm afraid they'll catch him again!"

"Not much danger of that," remarked Mr. Pipkin, rising slowly from the table. "A boy smart enough to do what he done yisterday can keep clear of the clutches of the constables if he's a mind to. I'll resk Jack! I'd be willin' to bet- By hokey!" he exclaimed in astonishment, looking from the window.

"What is it, Pip?" cried Moses.

"I've lost my bet 'fore I made it! Jack!"

"Jack!" repeated several voices at once; and there was a general rush to the windows. Annie Felton's face flushed, while Phin's turned suddenly