She stopped and bit her lips and shook her head. “I don’t see why Jack grows up so hard,” she murmured, half in anger and half in sorrow. “Edward and Henry never had such times. Oh, well,” she sighed, “boys will be boys, I suppose; an’ if this all results in the boy’s settlin’ down it’ll be money well spent in the end, after all. Maybe—probably—most likely.” 

 The days that followed were anxious days, but at last the cabman rallied and concluded not to die, and Jack went off yachting with a light heart and a choice collection of good advice from Mr. Stebbins and Aunt Mary. 

 Nothing happened to mar his holiday. He ran a borrowed steam launch on to some rocks with rather heavy consequences to his aunt’s exchequer, and returned from the West Indies so late that she never had a visit from him at all that summer; but, barring these slightly unwelcome incidents, he did remarkably well, and when he returned to college in the fall he was regarded as having become, at last, a stable proposition. 

 “I wonder whether our boy’s comin’ home for Christmas?” Aunt Mary asked her niece, Mary, as that happy period of family reunions drew near. Mary had come up to stay with her aunt while Lucinda went away to bury a second cousin. Mary was very different from Arethusa, having a voice that, when raised, was something between an icicle and a steam whistle, and a temperament so much on the order of her aunt’s that neither could abide the other an hour longer than was absolutely necessary. But Arethusa had a sprained ankle, so there was no help for existing circumstances. 

 “No, he isn’t,” said Mary, who had no patience at all with her brother, and showed it. “He’s going West with the glee club.” 

 “With the she club!” cried poor Aunt Mary, in affright. 

 Mary explained. 

 “I don’t like the idea,” said the old lady, shaking her head. “Somethin’ will be sure to happen. I can feel it runnin’ up and down my bones this minute.” 

 “Oh, if he can get into trouble, of course, Jack will,” said Mary cheerfully. 

 Aunt Mary didn’t hear her, because she didn’t raise her voice particularly. Besides, the old lady was absorbed for the nonce in the most dismal sort of prognostications. 

 And they all came true, too. Something unfortunate beyond all expectations came to pass during the glee club’s visit to Chicago, and the result was 

 Prev. P 10/184 next