"Sure to be, Master Dick. If you're up early, I'll show you the best field in the place for them. Come out to the stable-yard as soon as you're dressed, and I'll show you the way." "Thank you, Nicholls," said Dick. "Yes, I'll come. Don't tell anybody else, Nicholls."[Pg 78] [Pg 78] "No, no, sir, we'll keep it a secret." Lancey and Dick went to church together and were together as usual all day. But strange to tell, not one word was said by either boy to the other about their plans for the next morning. Some mischievous sprite had put it into their heads, for almost the first time in their lives, to have a secret, and not a kind secret either, each from the other. "I'm the eldest," thought Lancey. "I think it's only fair I should get the mushrooms for Mamma's birthday."[Pg 79] [Pg 79] "Lancey's bigger and stronger than I am," thought Dick. "If he went with me, he'd gather ever so many more, and Mamma wouldn't think it was me at all that had got them." Monday morning came. The boys slept in separate rooms at Auntie's. Each had a tiny dressing-room with a sofa-bed, so it was easy to get up and dress without "brother" knowing. Lancey was first, but it took him some little time to find Griffith, and to ask him again where to go, which he had partly forgotten. Dick was luckier, for Nicholls was waiting for him, and took him by what he called a short cut, to the field he had described, and helped him over the hedge, telling him the mushrooms grew thickest "a bit up the field." Up the field trotted Dick, but he had not gone far before he stopped short in surprise. Who was that coming towards him from the other end? And "who can that be?" thought the new-comer, as a small, stout figure caught his eye—a round, brown-holland little person, not unlike a mushroom button on two legs. "I do believe," he said aloud, "I do believe it's Dick." "I do believe," said Dick. "I do believe it's Lancey." They stared at each other for a few minutes, not quite sure what to say or do. Then they thought better of it and burst out laughing. "It's no good doing without each other," said both together.
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