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BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME
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FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY

HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE

 

 

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Bp benrp A. Shute

THE YOUTH PLUPY, OR THE LAD
WITH THE DOWNY CHIN.  Iilus-
trated.

THE MISADVENTURES OF THREE
GOOD BOYS. Illustrated.
A COUNTRY LAWYER. Illustrated.
FARMING IT. Illustrated.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
Boston anp New York

 

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FT (Page 176)

PLUPY SHOT ALO

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THE YOUTH PLUPY

OR

The Lad with a Downy Chin

BY

HENRY A. SHUTE

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
REGINALD BIRCH

 

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
Che Miverdide Press Cambridge
1917

Lo

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 C iChy
COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY HENRY a. SHUTE

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Published August 1917

1317¢ 60
7
S

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THE YOUTH PLUPY

OR

The Lad with a Downy Chin

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DEDICATION

This book, which contains a fairly veracious account
of the love affairs of a long-legged, gawky, sensitive,
bashful, absurd, and ridiculous youth, is dedicated,
with a sincere fellow-feeling, to all such youths. I see
them daily passing my office. Their coat-sleeves are
all-too-short, the legs of their trousers all-too-brief,
their wrists and ankles, in startling contrast to their
abnormally thin shanks and arms, seem over-devel-
oped.
They are opulent in white eyelashes, blushes, mobile
Adam’s-apples, affection, and honesty.
Their voices are — well, beyond description.
God bless them all.

Henry A. Saute

Exeter, New Hampshire, April 7, 1917.

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ILLUSTRATIONS

Puupy sHoT ALOFT . . . . . « «~~ « Frontispiece
His MOUTH FELL OPEN, HIS EYES WIDENED . - . . 60
AND THEN FELL ON THE BACK OF THEIR NECKS . . . 122
JHE FIGURE DID NOT MOVE . . . . « « « , 206
SHOT OUT THE REST IN A SHRIEK . . «. « « « 222

THE CROWD WERE FRANTIC, AND ONLY THE PRESENCE OF
THE TALL MAN PREVENTED THEM FROM TAKING PART . 240

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THE YOUTH PLUPY
OR, THE LAD WITH-A DOWNY CHIN

CHAPTER I

Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision.

Lewis Carron.
THE various mishaps which our friend Plupy had
experienced in his boyhood days had been in-
dubitably designed by an All-Wise Power as a
sort of amusing probation or purgatory, from
which Plupy the youth might emerge, purged
as by fire from physical and mental dross or un-
worthiness. He had been, or naturally was sup-
posed to have been, licked into shape by adver-
sity.

And at the beginning of his second year in the
High School a great change in him was noticed.
It was a physical as well as a mental change.
The former was not, perhaps, as gratifying as the
latter, but far, far more noticeable. In his boy-
- hood Plupy had been somewhat remarkable for
nature’s parsimony in the way of fleshy adorn-
ment. Beany, who was protuberant everywhere,
and who filled his clothes with gratifying smooth-
ness, and Pewt, thin-faced and thin-lipped, but
well-knit and muscular, lithe and active, had for

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2 THE YOUTH PLUPY

several years been foils to exhibit, to a callous,
hardened, unsympathetic, and derisive public,
poor Plupy’s physical peculiarities.

And yet, so cheerful was this youth, and so
given to looking on the bright side of things,
that he was occasionally able to surpass his more
gifted friends by making superlative use of his
physical peculiarities, and to bask in the sun-
shine of superior accomplishment. In the sev-
eral-times-a-day swim at the “Oak,” the
“Grove,” the “Eddy,” “Sandy Bottom,” or
the “‘Gravel,” he had been the only boy in the
neighborhood, or for that matter in the town,
who could draw in his stomach until the corru-
gations of the vertebre of his backbone could
be plainly seen from the front, which was indeed
a master accomplishment, and which daily
during the swimming season gained him great
and lasting fame, in spite of the sneers and scoffs
of friends less gifted in this line.

Now, if one adds to Plupy’s usual attenua-
tion an increase of from eight to ten inches in
altitude, and a corresponding development of
Adam’s apple, wrist and ankle bones, one re-
quires but little imagination to realize that
Plupy’s bodily specifications were not precisely
in harmony with the classic lines of a Greek god.

Indeed, the taller the poor lad became, the
worse and the more ridiculous his appearance,

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 3

which mortified him exceedingly, for he was a
sensitive soul; and yet, even in the bitterness of
his daily humiliation, there was a bright spot,
a sort of compensation. He could no longer wear
his father’s cast-off clothes, reincarnated by the
needle-pricked fingers of a snuffy, beeswaxy old
tailoress who for many years had dwelt in a
smelly old apartment down by the river, and had
promoted economy and boyish humiliation by
the manufacture of sartorial atrocities that must
have made angels weep.

Yes, there was happiness in the thought that
old Mrs. Stickney had lost a customer, and that
hereafter his clothes, modest and inexpensive
though they might be, would be purchased at
one of the two ready-made-clothing stores of
that day in the little town of Exeter. Gone were
the days of cotton or linen collars, and in their
place dawned the era of paper collars and cuffs,
reversible at need; and possibly, as one matured,
of the long-pointed and crimson-striped, linen-
covered paper collar, and the polished shirt of
real swelldom.

The columns of the weekly paper, the famous,
half-century-old ‘“‘News Letter,” teemed with
attractive advertisements of the local stores,
and Plupy derived the most intense satisfaction
from reading these advertisements; particularly
one cleverly written in imitation of Longfellow’s

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4 THE YOUTH PLUPY

‘‘Hiawatha,” in which ingenious parody the lit-
erary member of the firm itemized the astonish-
ingly high quality and low prices of his goods-
with equal skill: —

THE SONG OF HIGHER QUALITY AND LOWER PRICES

“Should you ask us why we write this,
Write these simple lines of greeting,
We should answer, we should tell you,
That we have some information,
Some good news of great. importance.
So, if you wil] only listen,

Only stop and hear the story,

We will tell of trade and traffic,

Tell where goods are sold the lowest,
Where to get the nicest clothing,
Where to get the suit that suits you,
Where to get the boot that fits you,
Where to get a shoe that’s stylish.

Listen now the while we tell you,
Tell you what we have to offer:
First we have nice suits of linen,
Suitable for sultry August.

Suits of white and blue and yellow,
Summer suits of varied colors,
Various styles and finest texture,
Suits of cassimere and doeskin,
Pants and vests of choicest tricot,
Pants and vests of lighter fabric.
Collars, too, and ties we’ll show you
Handkerchiefs and gloves and braces,
Hosiery and undergarments.

We will do our best to suit you,

We will do our best to please you.”

And yet, as Plupy, his head resting on his bony
hands, and his long legs wrapped around the legs

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 5

of his chair, marveled over this dazzling array of
fabrics and mentally clothed himself in them, he
was brought to earth with the humiliating rec-
ollection, that while he could not wear his
father’s clothes, —for his father weighed two
hundred pounds and more, — he could, alas, he
could, wear that father’s boots.

It was during the first year in the High School
that he had made this astonishing growth. Beany,
Pewt, and Plupy had taken their entrance ex-
aminations. Plupy had passed without condi-
tions, and it might also be said without brilliant
success, such as had rewarded the efforts of
Nipper Brown and Priscilla Hobbs. But he had
passed, and that was enough for him. Pewt had
failed signally in everything but writing. Indeed,
his handwriting was far better than that of any
pupil in the school. Beany had passed, although
he had insisted in plain black and white that
“Geography was the Science of Numbers, and the
Art of Computing by them,” which merely indi-
cated lack of care and not of knowledge; and to
a question in the paper on English Grammar he
had opined that the proper comparison of the ad-
jective “‘fore” was, “positive fore, comparative
five, superlative six,” which called for heavy de-
merits. He also had been marked down severely
when, in answer to a question as to what was
the leading product of the New England States,

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6 THE YOUTH PLUPY

he had answered, his mind caught by the auric-
ular suggestion, “New England Rum,” which
at that day was not, I maintain, very far from
the truth. But Beany, too, had passed, although
by the smallest margin imaginable, and caring
not a whoop for anything but the result, he was
perfectly satisfied.

Nor was Pewt cast down by his misfortune,
but on the whole rather pleased. He had for
some time felt that he had outgrown his rela-
tions with Beany and Plupy, as he was several
years older than they, and longed to realize the
not unworthy ambition to be a house painter,
paperer, grainer and glazier, and the architect of
lavishly decorated signs; and he now felt, and
with good reason, that his ambition was to be
gratified, as he knew very well that his father
would not insist on his spending another year in
the grammar school.

And thus occurred the first break in the rela-
tions of the three boys, the locally famous, in-
famous, or at least notorious, triumvirate, Plupy,
Beany, and Pewt, who for so many years had
fought, bled, and died for one another, and had
been thorns in the flesh of the reputable citizens
and dwellers of Court, Pine, Elm, Center, Clif-
ford, South, River, and other streets in their
bailiwick.

- Tt had been long coming. Two or three years

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 7

in the age of a boy in his early ’teens becomes a
vast period, an zon almost, of development and
change of view, and for a long time Pewt had
been fretting at the shackles of boyhood and
school. His soul was attuned to the smell of
linseed oil; to red-white-and-blue eagles holding
chrome-yellow arrows of jagged lightning in
their crimson-lake claws, and shrieking gilded
and hectic defiance in classic Latin, such as

“Tn hoc signo vici”

and

“Flamma que correpta ruunt, renovare conamur”

and other precepts of boastful competition; to ex-
ceedingly fat-legged goddesses of liberty wav-
ing flags of parallel folds; to white houses and
green blinds; to red barns; to pea-green fences
with scarlet top rails; and to other creations sig-
nificant of rural taste and prosperity; and he
longed for the pleasures of artistic creation.

To propel a ripe and rosy red-and-yellow to-
mato to an objective between the shoulders of a
fat man in a frock coat, despite the highly spec-
troscopic result, had been merged in worthier
artistic ambition; to impinge the swift and si-
lent buckshot, twenty to the ounce, against the
withered calf of a peaceful octogenarian, tooth-
lessly chewing flagroot, and slowly and canefully
plodding his way along the shaded village street,

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8 THE YOUTH PLUPY

thereby generating in that revered and gentle
citizen the fluent and fearsome language of the
pirate, the ferocity of the ‘“‘mountain cat that
guards her young,” and the grim determination
of the bulldog, and making of the peaceful cane,
the support and trustworthy companion of old
age, a dangerous, deadly, and lethal weapon, was,
in Pewt’s rapidly maturing mind, unworthy of a
man’s consideration. He had passed that period
of trivialities. He, Pewt, had arrived. Let Plupy
and Beany remain stationary, if they would; am-
bition, man’s ambition, beckoned him.

And so Pewt passed on. It was indeed a break,
but neither Plupy nor Beany felt it much. They
saw Pewt nearly every day, clad in white clothes,
plentifully bespattered with parti-colored paint.
He looked stern and preoccupied, and when ac-
costed familiarly and with the genial “‘ Hi, Pewt,”
he replied, with condescending affability, —

**Hello, Shute! Hello, Watson! Still in school,
I suppose. Hanged if I see how you can stand it
to live on the old man. But I suppose it comes
easy to some fellers.”’

““Whatcher doin’ to-day, Pewt; paintin’ a
fence or a hencoop?”’ queried Beany.

“Well, I guess not much,” said Pewt with
marked scorn. “I’m mixin’ colors for a gang of
men that’s workin’ for the old man on Judge
Stickney’s house, *n’ that’s about the most im-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 9

portant thing in paintin’, to get the colors right.
°F I put in a little too much brown, the paint
won’t match, or a dash too much red. Then again
it takes a good eye to know just what color
you’ve got to perduce, and you’ve got to be
almighty careful not to put too much oil in or
*t will be too long in dryin’, ’n’ not to put too
much dryer in for fear the paint will dry before
you can slap it on. I tell ye, there’s a good deal
more in paintin’ than I ever expected, but I’m
doin’ well. Th’ old man told some one yesterday
that I was the best nateral painter he ever had.”

“Gosh!” said Beany.

“By Time!” ejaculated Plupy.

*°°N” when I ain’t mixin’ paint I’m designin’
scrolls for signs. I’ve got some pretty good ideas
for signs ’n’ ornamental scroll work. Not bad,
so very, I guess,” said Pewt with a look that
spoke volumes.

“How much d’ ye get a week, Pewt?”

“Well, as to that, fellers, our firm does n’t
tell just what we pay. ’S enough to say that I get
pretty fair wages; pretty fair, I guess. I don’t
mind tellin’ you, if you’ll keep it dark. It might
make trouble with the other men, but I get two
*n’ a quarter a day, with a raise after the first
three months.”

“Two ’n’ a quarter; that’s twenty-seven cents
a day,” said Plupy, doing « rapid calculation in

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10 THE YOUTH PLUPY

mental arithmetic. ‘‘Well, that ain’t such an
awful lot. We did lots better than that when we
were plummin’.”

“Twenty-seven cents! Whatcher talkin’ about?
What’s eatin’ o’ ye, Plupy?” snarled Pewt, re-
lapsing into the vernacular in his disgust. “I
said two dollars ’n’ twenty-five cents a day.
Twenty-seven cents a day, huh!”

“Gosh! Pewt,” said Plupy; “that’s as much as
a man gets.”

“Well, whatcher think I am, —a boy, like
you fellows?” demanded Pewt.

“You were, Pewt, not so long ago, and ye would
be now if you’d had gumption ’nough to get
into the High School,” sneered Beany.

“High School! To hear you talk one would
think I could n’t have got in if I had wanted to.
Catch me foolin’ away my time in the High
School when I can earn two dollars ’n’ a quarter
a day workin’ with men,” said Pewt, talking out
of the corner of his mouth.

“Well, you did n’t, didje?” persisted Beany,
while Plupy looked thoughtful.

“Yes, I did n’t, didje!” retorted Pewt hotly.
*°N’ I can’t afford to waste my time foolin’ with
a couple of schoolboys. My time is worth some-
thin’ if yours ain’t,” continued that man of af-
fairs as he picked up his pail, looked carefully
into it, then wrinkled his brow, shook his head,

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 11

gave the mass of oil and lead a whirling mo-
tion with a practiced sweep of a flat mixing-
stick, squinted at it from different angles, and
ejaculated “Hum!” doubtfully.

““Whatser matter, Pewt?” demanded Plupy
anxiously; “anything wrong?”

Pewt compressed his lips tightly, whirled his
mixer deftly, squinted again. Then his face
cleared and he nodded in a relieved manner.

“T’s all right. I thought for a minute that
I’d put in just a bit too much vandyke brown,
or a bit too little dichromate of lead. The pig-
ment did n’t seem just right. I’ve always told
the old man that vandyke was better than sepia
or sienna, but it looked for a minute as if I was
mistaken.” And he heaved a sigh of relief. “It
would have meant a big loss, but it’s all right.
Well, I must be goin’, boys.”’ And he went off in
a most businesslike manner, leaving his former
companions much impressed.

“Say, Beany, d’ ye suppose Pewt gets two dol-
lars an’ a quarter a day?” asked Plupy doubt-
fully.

“Huh!” snorted Beany; “don’t believe he gets
fifty cents a year.”

“But Pewt always could paint, an’ shin up a
ladder,” urged Plupy.

‘An’ he could always lie faster than he could
paint or shin up a ladder either,” replied Beany.

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12 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Plupy remained thoughtful, and absent-mind-
edly neglected to throw a stone at an errant cat
that ran peacefully across the street, crouched
and sprang to the top of a board fence, and dis-
appeared.

**Made me sick to hear him talk as if he was a
great man. All that stuff about vandyke green
and conglomerate of lead and senna,” continued
Beany in huge disgust. “That showed he was
lyin’, ’cause enny feller has taken salts and senna
enough to know ’tain’t used none for paintin’
houses.”

‘Well, I dunno, Beany,” said Plupy. ‘“‘Seems
to me that senna could be used for most any-
thing,” he added reminiscently and from bitter
experience.

**P’r’aps youre right, Plupe,”’ conceded Beany;
“they say paint is rank poison, ’n’ I guess senna
ain’t much better.”

And the two boys went slowly and reluctantly
to school, which seemed to them, for the first
time since they had attained the honor of being
“High Schoolers,” rather a tame and uninterest-
ing proposition, and wholly inferior to the joys of
making two dollars and a quarter a day in an oc-
cupation so interesting and absorbing as Pewt’s.

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CHAPTER II

*T was when advancing manhood first had shed
The early pride of summer o’er his head.
Tuxocrirts, translation.

Unconscious.y the boys were growing in mind
as well as body. Time was when they would have
stared with uncomprehending wonder had any
one suggested for a moment that the time would
come when the fizz, sputter, and snap of a fire-
cracker would not delight them beyond measure;
when the sharp pluck of a bluish gray marble
against a gorgeous agate or white alley would
not thrill them; when the spring store in the
soggy woodshed or the nigger minstrel show in
the barn chamber would not absorb their very
souls.

But little by little they had passed these mile-
stones of boyhood, and at fourteen and fifteen
were at the threshold of youth, and they neither
understood it nor quite liked it. As Beany often
said, ““The town is deader ’n Sunday-School.”
He was wrong; there was much to do and to see.
There were furious football games in the lower
yard. There were terrific thumps to be suffered
against the board fence and the stone posts and
the maple trees in the upper end of the grounds;

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14 THE YOUTH PLUPY

and there was glory to be gained as well as hard
knocks, and applause when one sent the ball out
of a desperate rush of frenzied legs, and over the
line for a goal and “change sides.”

And as the fall weather came on with inter-
mittent frosts at nights, and sunny days, there
was wild delight in upsetting an opponent on the
greasy, slippery, muddy surface of the recently
frozen ground, and smearing him from head to
foot, which showed that the boy was still there.

Beany did not care for football. It was a pity,
because he was a sturdy*youth; but it did not
appeal to him. For Plupy it had an immense
fascination, and scarcely a day passed that he
was not knocked down, “put over,” and trodden
on by the mass of players; and yet, when Plupy’s
toe, reinforced by a sturdy Hoppy Gadd boot,
and directed by the pendulum swing of his crane-
like leg, sent the ball away, it would soar to the
almost inevitable goal. And so, as it was the aim
of the opposing players to destroy Plupy before
he got a fair kick, he underwent a variety of con-
tusions that was good for him.

And there were various pleasures in school.
Plupy was introduced to Algebra, and spent much
time, both in school and at home, in that fas-
cinating maid’s society. But the acquaintance
never ripened into intimacy. But he was gen-
uinely interested in Physiology and Hygiene,

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 15

and talked most knowingly at home of radius
and ulna and maximus dorsi, tibia, fibula, and
metacarpals. He also, as did Beany, began the
serious study of Latin, and made some progress,
as also did Beany, especially in his remarkable
translation of
“In antiquissimis temporibus
Saturnus in Italiam venisse discitur,” —

when he gravely proclaimed that, “In very an-
cient time Satan is said to have come to Italy.”

One day Plupy’s voice broke and he found
himself speaking in a bassoonlike croak that
fairly convulsed the members of his family at
breakfast.

Plupy thought at first that he had contracted
a hideous cold that presaged an early but miser-
able death from lung fever; and he considered
as he lay in bed that he would have to submit
to a dose of syrup of squills, the thought of which
caused his diaphragm to contract and his blood
to curdle. He felt of his skinny throat: it was not
sensitive. He swallowed gingerly: there was no
trace of soreness. He tried his voice: it was
cavernously low and croaky; something like the
deep tones of an adult bullfrog in full cry. He
tried to see how low he could go in arpeggios:
Bom! Boom! Booom! Boooom! Booooom! It was
wonderful. It sounded like the sixteen-foot pipe
of the First Church organ. He tried to see how

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16 THE YOUTH PLUPY

high he could go; at about the middle tone of
the second octave his throat contracted.

Huh! Any one could sing high, but few had
the deep bass voices. Boooom, booom, boom, bom
—bom, boom, booom, boooom! up and down his
voice went. He was delighted. It was almost as
good as to play the bass horn in the Silver Cornet
Band. His sisters Cele and Keene thought they
could sing. He would show them what real sing-
ing was. He sprang from his bed, plunged his
face and hands into a bowl of cold water, blew
and sputtered and rubbed himself furiously with
a coarse towel. Then he stood in front of the
glass and squinted carefully for signs of an
embryo mustache or beard. Nothing! — abso-
lutely nothing on his lip! But a slight appear-
ance of fuzz — very soft and silky, but still fuzz
— on his lank jaw and on his throat.

Well, he had got a man’s voice, and ‘he was
taller than most men, and his beard and mus-
tache would come in time. You could n’t have
everything at once, could you? And he looked
at his little brother, who was just opening his
sleepy eyes, with a sense of pity because he, poor
boy, would have to pass through the trying and
arid years of boyhood before he could attain the
joys of manhood.

Plupy descended the stairs caroling the dia-
tonic scale with long-drawn booms to perfectly

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 17

astonishing sub-bass growls. Keene and Cele
were helping their mother get breakfast, and
as he entered the kitchen these two musical
young ladies were singing “I know a bank
whereon the wild thyme grows,” most tune-
fully in thirds, accompanied by the rattle of
dishes, the screeching of hot fat in the flapjack
pan, and the tinkle of the teakettle cover as it
danced on the stove. Plupy at once joined in
the harmony incidental to the piece in a sub-
dominant sol fa style that so astonished these
song-birds that they stopped abruptly and stared
in astonishment and indignation.

“Say, Harry, whatjer do that for? Did n’t
you know we were practicing?” queried Keene.

“Well, whattif you were?” retorted Plupy.
“You and Cele ain’t the only ones that can sing
here.”

“Do you call that noise you are making sing-
ing?” snapped Keene; “I call it croaking.”

“Well, it ain’t screechin’ anyway,” sneered
Plupy. . ;

*“Who’s screeching, I’d like to know?” de-
manded that outraged damsel, glowering bale-
fully.

**Guess if you knew what I heard some one say
about your singin’ ‘Now I lay me down to sleep,’
in the concert in the vestry last week, you would
n’t feel so smart.”

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18 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Well, what did they say?”

“They said any one who could go to sleep
while you was singin’ must be deaf or dead,”
said Plupy, improvising fluently.

“Well,” snapped Keene, her face aflame, “I
don’t believe any one said that; you’re just
making it up. You’re just hateful enough.”

“There, children, that will do,” said Plupy’s
mother firmly. “‘Both of you stop.”

“Well, she begun it, anyway,” said Plupy, “by
findin’ fault with my singin’.”

“Never mind who begun it. I’ll end it,” said
Plupy’s mother with finality. “Now, get me a
pail of fresh water and we will have breakfast.”

So Plupy, casting a glance of dignified defiance
at Keene, who returned it with interest, took up
the pail and went out to the pump, trolling
“Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep”’ with the
falling inflection of a planing-mill at the fag end
of a board, while his mother looked at him aghast.

As soon as he returned she said, “‘Why, Harry,
I really believe your voice has changed over-
night. Sing something.”

So Plupy, delighted with her notice, ee
out a few arpeggios and ended by plumbing ex-
treme depths of the “‘Cradle of the Deep,” very
much to her amusement, although out of con-
sideration for his feelings she controlled her ris-
ibles. Then at her mother’s request Celia sang a

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 19

verse of “Flow Gently, Sweet Afton,” and Plupy
joined in with a sepulchral bass that caused that
worthy lady to bite her lips to keep from laugh-
ing aloud at the uncanny sound.

“How do you like it, mother?” demanded
Plupy proudly. “Lots better than singin’ alto
like a girl, as I used to, ain’t it, mother?”

“Well, I can’t say just that. I used to love
to hear you sing alto. But of course I knew your
voice would change some day, either to bass
or tenor, but I did n’t quite expect so deep a
bass. It is so deep that it sounds funny, but as
soon as it smooths out a bit, it will be fine, I’m
sure.”

“Well, I want a good deep voice like old Long
Metre Dow’s or Egg-Shaped Robinson’s.”

‘Harry,’ said his mother severely, “how many
times have I told you not to call people by such
names! Both Mr. Robinson and Mr. Dow are
excellent men and fine singers, and you have no
right to call them any such names.”

‘Well, mother, I know that, but if I had said
‘Mr. Dow’ and ‘Mr. Robinson,’ you would n’t
have known who I meant,” said Plupy.

“Well, perhaps not; but at any rate I don’t
like it and I hope I shall not have to speak to
you again about it,” said his mother.

“All right, I won’t, but I only hope I shall
have as good a bass voice as old Long — I mean

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20 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Mr. Dow and Mr. Robinson. Old Spectacle
—-I mean Mr. Lang is a good singer too,” he
added.

Mrs. Shute turned away to hide a smile.

“Aunt Sarah,” croaked Plupy, “do you want
to hear a good bass voice?”

“Yes, auntie, come and hear the old bullfrog
hoot,” said Keene, with marked sarcasm.

“Anyway,” bassooned Plupy angrily, ‘“‘ Miss
Gusty Peavey said last week that Keene Shute’s
voice went through her like a knife.”

“IT don’t believe a word of it. Gusty Peavey
don’t say such things about people,”’ said Keene,
her face crimson with anger.

“IT know she don’t very often, but she was
sufferin’. She had to sit ’n’ listen to you, for she
was in church ’n’ did n’t want to disturb the con-
gregation by goin’ out,” explained Plupy kindly.
“She likes Cele’s voice,”’ he added.

“Children!” said Plupy’s mother with a warn-
ing voice, “not another word, unless you both
want to spend the morning in your rooms. Celia,
ring the breakfast bell.”

And the combatants, restraining themselves
with some difficulty, such is the sensitive nature
of musicians, sat down to the table and addressed
themselves to the demolition of countless flap-
jacks and coffee.

Then Plupy, having brought in huge armfuls

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 21

of wood and a pail of fresh water, brushed his
clothes very carefully, parted his hair, adjusted
his necktie, pulled down his cuffs, and started
with his books for the High School, looking with
appraising eye at the young girls he met, and
pleasantly accosting them.

More than one, startled at his deep voice, asked
him how he got such a cold, which rather an-
noyed him, but he comforted himself with the
reflection that girls never did know much, any-
way, although as a matter of fact one could n’t
get along very well without them.

In point of fact, for some time Plupy had felt
that girls, far from being the nuisance that he
had once thought them, were rather an institu-
tion. True enough there had been a few excep-
tions to his sweeping opinion of boyhood; but
now, as he grew older, girls occupied a large share
of his waking and sleeping dreams. He would n’t
for a moment have acknowledged this, but so it
was, and in a way he was proud of the secret
that he hugged so closely in his heart, thinking
that he was the only youth having this feeling.
Bless the long-legged scarecrow, there was n’t
a human, red-blooded boy of his age in the High
School whose mind had not registered the same
feelings, and not one of whom would not have
made vociferous “cross my throat” and “hope
to die” denials of the same.

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22 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Why — when every little crimson-combed
cockerel five months old, a period corresponding
with Plupy’s budding maturity, was crowing
the two-syllabled crow of cockereldom, dropping
its wings and strutting in the sun to show its
newly grown hackle feathers of the latest style?
Why — when the young cock grouse in the woods
was spreading its pin-feather tail and drumming
the rataplan of the woods? Why — when every
diminutive turkey cock that had survived the
myriad dangers that beset it was spreading and
strutting and filling the October air with futile
attempts to gobble? Why should Plupy and his
friends of equal age blushingly deny the yearnings
that did them infinite honor? Who can tell?
Later in life they will laugh and take infinite de-
light in telling what consummate donkeys they
were at this period, and yet no man of them will
tell it all.

And to-day I know that the elderly man that
years, years ago answered to the name of Plupy
would give all that he has, all that he ever ex-
pects to have, all that he ever dreamed of hav-
ing, to be able to go back to those days, the best
days of his life, days of youth and hope, and
faith and disappointment, and delight and mor-
tification, and bliss and ridicule and despair; days
of rising in the morning feeling that it was good
to be alive, with the sun never so bright, and the

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 23

air never so pure, and the future never so rosy,
and of going to bed at night, almost, but not
quite, hoping that he might never again wake
to consciousness of a world out of tune.

.“Quoth the Raven, ‘Nevermore.’”,

Digitized by Microsoft®
CHAPTER III

The warrior bowed his crested head
And tamed his heart of fire
And sued the haughty king to free his long-imprisoned sire.

Onz of the aims in life of the High-School teacher
in those days was the development of oratory.
He held the old-fashioned idea that much
public speaking promoted ease of manner, a
fluent vocabulary, and grace of diction. Regu-
larly once a week, on Fridays, the entire morning
session was taken up with speaking. Plupy par-
ticularly detested the Fridays on which he had
a speaking part. On the off Fridays when he
was spared, he took the keenest delight in the
tortures of the victims, and to this was added
the pleasing assurance that he did not have to
prepare or recite any lessons for that half-day.

Plupy had never been an impressive speaker.
Neither his figure nor his voice commanded
the respect of his hearers. His voice had been a
rather light and pleasing voice, a soft and flexible
alto, ill suited to the lusty themes chosen by
young orators of the day. To declare in an ex-
tremely ladylike voice that

., “Thad a dream, which was not all a dream,
The bright sun was extinguished

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 25

“And the stars did wander darkling in eternal space
Rayless and pathless,”” —
did not produce on the listeners precisely the ef-
fect that its author and his interpreter intended.

To be told in a fluty treble that

‘Right to the heart of Lausulus Horatius sent a blow;

‘Lie there!’ he cried; ‘fell pirate! no more, aghast and pale,

From Ostia’s walls the crowd shall mark

The track of thy destroying bark;

No more Campania’s hinds shall fly

To woods and caverns when they spy

Thy thrice accur-r-sed sail,’”” —
excited the derisive laughter of the boys, and
the amused smiles or subdued merriment of the
visitors. Many a time had Plupy, after unheard-
of pains in committing to memory soul-stirring
selections and in thorough rehearsal of the same,
retired crimson with mortification and alive to
the realization that he had utterly failed to im-
press his audience. And so it was no wonder that
he loathed the Fridays that he was fated to ap-
pear as a long-legged orator. But his perform-
ances were always a joy to the boys, and the
Friday that knew not Plupy was, like the stars
in the masterpiece, “‘rayless and pathless.”’

But the abrupt and astonishing change in his
voice opened up hitherto unexpected opportuni-
ties to astonish his friends, not only in the im-
provement in his singing voice, if indeed it were
an improvement, but in declamatory bursts of

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26 THE YOUTH PLUPY

language. Plupy, who had experienced the art-
ist’s pleasure in his cavernous arpeggios, now
fairly gasped with delight at the brilliant hues of
the practically immediate future, and for the first
time since his admission to the High School re-
gretted poignantly that he was not cast for a
few lines of Jove-like proclamation at the next
Friday’s symposium.

But on the whole this was lucky, because with
one week to prepare he felt sure he could work up
a rather unusual creation in the line of platform
classics. One thing that stimulated Plupy to
unwonted enthusiasm was the Female Seminary,
a very ambitious educational institution that
had been “wished on” the town in the spring of
’65 by one Robinson, a native of Exeter, who had
years before shaken the dust of his native town
from his cowhide “hommels” and departed for
the South to make his fortune. There he had
accumulated much property by deft manipula-
tion of the tar, pitch, turpentine, and negro
slave markets, and dying rich, great, envied,
revered, and lamented, —in his adopted town
at least,— he had left the bulk of his fortune
to his native town for the establishment of a
school to mould girls into abnormally developed
young women, at once artists, authors, linguists,
poets, cooks, gymnasts, pedagogues, scientists,
seamstresses, mathematicians, and milliners, and

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.THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 27

thereby causing those fellow-citizens, who had
loved, revered, and admired him in life, and his
name in death up to the time the contents of
his will were made public, to sit up nights to
invent curses on his memory sufficiently horrid
and comprehensive to suit the theme. |

But the citizens of his native town, few of
whom had ever heard of him, seized upon this
benefaction with wild and long-continued re-
joicings, and lauded his memory to the skies,
while they began to plan for the erection of a
building in some locality that favored specula-
tion in real estate. Every one that had a lot to
sell placed it in the market at a most unchristian
figure, and in hoarse tones allowed that it was
the only suitable lot in town.

Every one that did not own a lot cursed his
luck and railed bitterly against those fortunate
ones who had unencumbered real estate. Owners
of large private houses at once offered them for
the purpose, as affording everything desirable
in the way of heat, light, sanitation, and acous-
tics, and vaunted their unselfishness and public
spirit in being willing to sacrifice their home-
steads at something more than four times their
market value.

The most congested and hotly contested town
meetings in history were held, in which verbal
warfare frequently led to fistic collisions between

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28 THE YOUTH PLUPY

rival parties; the tongue of slander was abroad
and the docket of the local Police Court and of
the Superior Court for the County of Rocking-
ham doubled in size.

It was a year or more before the site for the
building was settled and two years before the
building was completed, in six stories, crowned
by a hideous mansard roof, beneath which the
delicately organized pupils daily sought divine
blessing, and, descending by precipitous stair-
cases to less elevated positions, were served with
a little of all the known courses of study in the
entire world.

Up to the time of the organization of this little
college, the girls and the boys had attended the
town schools together, and the girls had been to
the boys just girls, and only that. But the mo-
ment the girls were drafted into the Seminary,
they became glorified beings, worthy of the ut-
most reverence and adulation. And you may be
very sure that these young ladies knew and ap-
preciated this change of heart in their former
schoolmates, and did their utmost to increase
it by marked reserve, not to say hauteur, mod-
erated and sweetened by a judicious admixture
of maidenly condescension.

Soon after the opening of the school year, a
wealthy and distinguished townsman, with the
praiseworthy intention of promoting competition

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 29

between the High School and the Seminary, set
aside a not inconsiderable sum of money, —nor,
when it comes to that, a very considerable one, —
the interest of which was to be yearly given as
prizes for those excelling in declamation of a
nature so public as to obtain expression only
in the Town Hall and before a highly congested
audience of all classes of citizenry, both of Exe-
ter and the neighboring towns.

The prizes were three in number, first, second,
and third. Indeed, being but three in number,
this arrangement was axiomatic, as by the great-
est stretch of imagination one could scarcely ex-
pect them to be known as fourth, fifth, and sixth;
their financial value was, in their order, $20, $12,
and $8, respectively.

The actual benefit to the schools or to those
taking part in the exhibition was very doubtful.
The strain of competition was great, especially
on the girls, and the disappointment, inevitable
to all but the three successful contestants, was
crushing. Then again the partisans of the con-
testants did their utmost to indicate, to the six
unfortunate gentlemen chosen to act as judges,
the vastly superior excellence of their favorite’s
work, by vociferous and long-continued applause,
and by such heated recriminations after the de-
cision was made and the audience dismissed,
as to render the lives of those unhappy but

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30 THE YOUTH PLUPY

public-spirited gentlemen a burden for many
days.

It had been Plupy’s ambition for some time to
take part in one of these verbal tournaments
and to take one of the dazzling prizes. He had
imagined himself giving Webster’s Reply to
Hayne with a force and intensity that, were
Hayne still living, would absolutely “scrunch”
that gentleman up like a squeezed lemon. In
reverie he tore her tattered ensign down, and
in stentorian tones informed his shivering and
fascinated audience that “Her thunders shook
the mighty deep,” and then, with falling inflec-
tion, and fine pathos, decreed that, “There should
be her grave.” .

But he had never dared to try his fortune
because his soft alto voice was, he knew, and
grieved to know, far better suited to such mellow
themes as

“You will wake and call me early,
Call me early, mother dear,
To-morrow’!l be the happiest day
Of all the glad new year.”

And he had despaired of ever winning either cash
prizes or encomiums in competitive vocal calis-
thenics. But now, thanks to the wonderful works
and bountiful provision of nature, all these things
were his for the asking. Money, glory, fame, the
adulation of friends, the astonishment of his

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 31

father and mother, the delight of his sisters, and
best of all, the opportunity of telling a certain
bright-eyed, brown-haired young lady that he
did it all for her.

For, truth to tell, Plupy was vehemently in
love with a certain young lady, who, while
perfectly aware of his infatuation and rather
pleased at it, — as all clean-hearted girls should
be with an affection so pure as that of Plupy’s,
and, it might be said, as calf-like, — nevertheless
took the greatest pleasure in tormenting poor
Plupy half out of his wits.

She was a born coquette, a most ingenious and
practiced flirt, and in reality liked Plupy not a
little. But his awkwardness, his sensitive bash-
fulness, his willingness to come to heel, to lie
down and roll over, to give his paw, and play
dead, amused her beyond measure, and she led
him a dog’s life, I assure you, particularly as
Plupy was by no means the only victim dancing
to her piping.

So Plupy felt that Providence had given him
a blessed opportunity to redeem himself in her
eyes, and as he was still a bit sore from some of
her exactions, he felt that he might show a judi-
cious reserve toward her, and he created as ase-
dative for his own tortured feelings a very pretty
little mental fable in which he took not only the
first, but, as there was no one within sight of

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32 THE YOUTH PLUPY

his superb oratory, the second and third prizes,
while strong men rose in their seats and cheered
hoarsely, and women waved their handkerchiefs
and threw bouquets of hothouse roses at his feet.
And then, while they crowded round to congratu-
late him, one young lady, to whom he had never
even dared to raise his eyes, pressed him to ac-
company her home that evening and be intro-
duced to her father and mother, who she knew
would be honored to meet him; and when, with
this beautiful aristocrat on his arm, he left the
hall, he met his erstwhile tormentor, looking at
him appealingly, and turning away with big tears
dimming her eyes as she marked his careless nod.
Now, although Plupy knew that this was a
most asinine use of imagination, he greatly en-
joyed it and fairly hugged it to his heart, im-
proving it with the addition of many details of
pleasing variety. After all, with his change of
voice, it wasn’t absolutely impossible. There
had been King Cophetua and the beggar maid,
and this was merely a reversion of the facts.
True to his promise to “show them,” at the
next speaking day Plupy was cast for the not
wholly unknown gem, the “Burial of Moses.”

“By Nebo’s lonely mountain,
On this side Jordan’s wave,
In a vale in the land of Moab
There lies a lonely grave.”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 33

And he spoke his lines with such sepulchral sad-
ness and impressive force that he quite aston-
ished Principal Gibson, and earned the most
respectful hearing that had ever been accorded
him.

“Gosh!” said Beany, his eyes big with won-
der; ‘‘what in time has come over old Plupe?”

“Really, Shute, I am astonished, and very
much pleased. You certainly have a good chance
to get one of the Tyrrell prizes, if not the first,”
said Principal Gibson to the tall lad, who blushed
with delight like “‘Alice, Ben Bolt,” who unlike
Plupy, “trembled with fear at a frown.”

Plupy took his seat in a glow of delight. Well,
he guessed he had shown them. And this was
only the beginning, and he had a useless sort of
piece, that old Moses piece. Huh! let him have
a good one like “Bernardo del Carpio,” or “Ho-
ratius at the Bridge,” or —or, say! “Regulus
to the Carthaginians,” he would do something
worth while! If he could only get Gibby to let
him speak that in the competition, he would give
them something to think about.

So at the first opportunity he proffered this
modest request to Principal Gibson, and very
much to his delight, found that wide-awake
gentleman in a very complaisant and even enthu-
siastic mood, and the three pieces were considered
with much care, each offering unusual opportuni-

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34 THE YOUTH PLUPY

ties for fine linguistic and gymnastic effects.
But finally, to Plupy’s great delight, it was de-
cided that he should make a bid for fame and
lucre through the medium of the Regulus of
dear old Elijah Kellogg, well beloved of a sister
State.

“You see, Shute,” said Principal Gibson af-
fably, and as man to man, “what we want to
do is to beat the Seminary. The Seminary has
for the past three or four years been about all
the town has thought about, and the townspeople
have entirely forgotten that there is a High
School in town, and as for boys, they don’t ap-
pear to realize that there are any left. Now, I, as
the principal of a boys’ school, want to show the
people here that the boys amount to something,
and can do things as well as girls, and I rely on
you to do your best. It means a good deal to the
school.” And he clapped Plupy on the shoulder
with a democratic frankness that brought a glow
to the lank Jad’s cheek.

So Plupy, delighted with so congenial a task,
decided to spend the entire evening in commit-
ting his piece to memory, knowing that the sooner
he got the words fixed in his mind, the sooner
would he be able to clothe these burning words
with appropriate gestures and pregnant inflec-
tions. But as soon as he opened the book contain-
ing this gem, he ran across another selection, so

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 35

fine that he was put in the condition, and perhaps
appropriately, of the ass that starved to death
between two haystacks while trying to make up
his mind which of the two to eat.

As the new selection was “Spartacus to the
Gladiators,” one may readily see that it re-
quired a strong man to decide between that and
Regulus. Plupy read them both. They were
superb. They called to brave deeds. He pon-
dered and scratched his head in perplexity. He
must decide or lose a whole evening. If he de-
cided in favor of Reg, all would be well, for he
had secured permission to speak that. If, on the
other hand, he chose Spart, and spent the evening
mumblingly, as is the wont of youth when com-
mitting to memory selections, and the next day
Gibby held out for Reg, he would have to unlearn
all he had learned of Spart.

To be sure that would n’t take long, not half
so long as to learn it. But the more he sought to
put Spart, like Satan, behind him, the more he
fancied him. He remembered to have heard Ned
Walker, a Southerner with a fine bass voice,
speak Spartacus at a High-School exhibition a
few years before, and he well remembered how
the people applauded him, and what the “News
Letter’? said about him. Perhaps — well, he
did n’t want to brag, — but it might happen
that some one else could speak it as well if not

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36 THE YOUTH PLUPY

better than Ned Walker. People talked about
Southern orators, but how about Webster and
Hayne, and Lincoln and Douglas, and — and —
and a few others? On the whole, he guessed that
he would try Spartacus.

So the next day before school commenced he
sought Principal Gibson at his desk. ‘‘Well,
Shute,” he said with a pleasant smile, “how far
did you get with Regulus?”

“Not very far, sir,” answered Plupy with some
difidence. “I started to learn it and opened the
book at ‘Spartacus to the Gladiators,’ and I
changed my mind and thought I would like to
speak that. I think I can do better with that
piece.”

“Perhaps you can, Shute, but we can’t allow
any shilly-shallying or halfway measures. I
thought you had made up your mind last night,”
replied that pedagogue with a slight trace of
tartness in his voice.

“Yes, I know, sir; I thought I had; but
when I remembered how well Walker spoke it
a few years ago, I wanted to try it,” explained
Plupy.

Tt strikes me, Shute, that may be a good rea-
son why you should stick to Regulus,” said the
master dryly.

““Why?” asked Plupy densely.

‘“Why?” echoed the master; “because I am

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 37

afraid the contrast between Walker’s speaking
and yours may cause people to make unfavorable
comments.”

Plupy colored and dropped his eyes upon the
toe of his boot, with which he was making shiny
crosses on the hardwood floor. Finally he said
rather faintly, “Well, anyway, Mr. Gibson, I
would like to try.”

The master laughed rather shortly. ‘Well,
Shute, try it if you wish, but Iam afraid you are
going to be disappointed if you expect to come up
to Walker’s standard.”

“Thank you, sir; I’ll do my best,” said Plupy,
and turned away with a light heart.

The master smiled a smile of amusement as he
watched Plupy’s angular figure disappear down
the stairway. “Well, fools rush in where angels
fear to tread,” he quoted. “But perhaps he
may do it,” he soliloquized. “He certainly has
a remarkable voice.” And he rang the bell for
the boys to come in.

Every night for the next two weeks Plupy
paced the floor of his room, muttering, mumbling,
and mowing, sawing the air with wild and fren-
zied gestures. Anon he would burst forth in fierce
damnatory tones as he hurled words of scorching,
withering scorn at the supine slaves —

“Standing, like fat oxen, waiting for the butcher’s knife.”

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38 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Again with voice stifled with sobs, he wailed —
“He knew me, smiled faintly, gasped, and died”’;

or hissed words that presaged awful things, —

“That very night the Romans landed on our shore, and
the clash of arms was heard within our peaceful vale.”

Now, of course it cquid not be reasonably ex-
pected that Plupy could carry on in this way
without attracting the attention of some of his
numerous brothers and sisters, and the very first
night that he really broke loose and burst into
frenzied periods he heard a subdued giggling in
the entry leading from his room, and seeing that
the door was ajar, made a swift straddle, threw
the portal wide, and disclosed two of his younger
sisters, Georgie and Annie, and his small brother
Frank, with their hands over their mouths, almost
giggling their heads off in delight at his mouth-
ings and contortions.

““What are you children doing here?” he de-
manded in high dudgeon.

‘ “Tistenin’ to you hollerin’,” the delighted chil-
dren said in unison like the chorus in a comic
opera.

“Now, you get out of here right off, and don’t
you let me see you here again,” said Plupy an-
grily. ‘y

*Shan’t!” said Georgie defiantly.

“Shan’t!” shrilled the two tots in imitation.’

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN: 39:

Plupy advanced threateningly.

“You lemme be,” vociferated Georgie. “Ill
tell father.”

“You lemme be too,” piped the other chil-
dren, puffing out their small bodies.

Plupy paused. Experience had taught that
whenever he laid violent hands on his younger
brothers and sisters, they yelled so loudly and
made so outrageous a fuss that they attracted
the sympathy of the older members of the family
and got him into more trouble than they were
worth, and he did n’t want to lose an evening in
a row with the rest of the family.

“Mother!” he yelled down the stairway, “I
wish you would make these children come down-
stairs. How do you expect me to study if they
keep botherin’ round?”

“Georgie! Annie! Frank!” called Plupy’s mo-
ther, ‘‘come right down into the sitting-room.”

The three children poutingly descended and
Plupy was closing his door when his mother called
up the stairway, “Harry, how much longer are
you going to speak?”

“Oh, a long time. Why?” he asked.

‘Because the girls want to practice awhile too.”

“What for? They ain’t goin’ to speak.”

“No, but they are going to sing.”

“Huh!” grunted Plupy in disgust. “Can’t I
ever do anything without their stickin’ in?”

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40 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Well, I guess we can sing better than you can
speak, if it sounds like you do to-night,” piped
up his sister Keene, eager to resent the imputa-
tion. :

“I s’pose you and Cele are goin’ to sing ‘Now
I lay me down to sleep.” You have n’t sung it
more ’n forty-’leven times,” retorted Plupy with
delicate sarcasm. .

“H’m, I guess that’s all you know about it,
smarty,” trilled Keene.

“That will do, children. Keene, hush!” said
Plupy’s mother.

“Anyway, he need n’t feel so big now his voice
has changed into a cow’s,” persisted Keene.

“Cornelia!” said her mother in a voice like ice.

“Ma’am?” said the rebellious young lady
meekly, for she knew when her mother called
her “Cornelia” that it behooved her to look to
her behavior.

“You heard me tell you to hush?”

“Yes, ma’am!’’ stammered the young lady,
her eyes falling before the steely gray ones.

There was a pause while Keene visibly shrunk
into herself, and then Plupy’s mother spoke
again.

“You may have just one-half hour longer to
practice. It is now half-past seven. No longer
than eight. Then the girls may practice. Do you
understand?”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 41

>»

“Yes, ma’am,” said Plupy despondently, as
he went into his room, closed the door, and com-
muned with himself bitterly.

“Tt’s always just that way. Just as soon as I try
to do something, Keene and Cele have to stick
in some of their old songs, ‘Now I lay me,’ or
‘I know a bank,’ or ‘ Cheerfulness,’ or some old
song that they have sung more ’n two hundred
times. It makes me sick. I wish there would
come one time when I could do something with-
out them.” And he addressed himself to his
task, and soon lost himself in hoarse invective
over the Roman Legions. Indeed, so intent was
he that his mother’s warning knock came at the
time that he was cheering his co-gladiators on to

‘*Gain the mountain passes and there do bloody work, as
did our sires at old Thermopyle”’;

and brought him to earth with a shock, thus
closing his practice for that evening.

A moment later, and from the old yellow-
keyed Emerson piano came a rippling prelude
expressive of Venetian waters, and two girlish
voices, pure, limpid, and absolutely true to
pitch, floated out in the delicious harmony of

“Voga, Voga, O Marinero,
Voga, Vo-o-ga.”

Plupy listened resentfully. “Gosh! they can

sing, and no mistake”; only he wished they would

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42 THE YOUTH PLUPY

sing some other time. Anyway, one thing was
sure, there was no prize for singing, so they
would n’t amount to much. People came there
to listen to the speaking and not singing, and
meditating thus Plupy undressed and crawled
into bed, not even tempted to read “Nat Todd”
or “Bill Biddon the Trapper,” as upon any
other occasion we fear he would have been.

For the evenings of the next week or two this
state of things continued. Plupy practiced speak-
ing and his sisters practiced singing with the
greatest enthusiasm, and each party thought but
little of the other’s performance. As a matter of
fact, both Plupy and his tuneful sisters were
doing really good work, but the singing of these
young ladies was refreshing, and they by no
means confined their practicing to the new piece,
but ranged through a varied repertoire of clas-.
sics and popular ballads of the day. “Drink to
Me only with Thine Eyes” alternated with
“Mollie, Darling.” “Sally in Our Alley’? and
“Cujus Animam”’ rubbed elbows with “ Katie’s
Letter,” “The Low-backed Car,” and “The
Sweet By and By.”

But the unusual devotion of Plupy to his work
was contagious, and the cheerful prattle of his
sisters to the effect that Minnie this, and Alice
that, and Imogene the other were all working
hard at perfectly splendid pieces, three times as

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 43

good as old Spartacus, alternately excited that
harassed youth to recrimination or stimulated
him to fresh exertions.

Little by little his father, mother, and aunt
began to catch the infection and to plan to attend
the competition. Plupy’s father was the last to
come into line, as he had never forgotten the
time he had attended the closing-day exercises
in the grammar school when he had been in-
formed by Plupy that he, Plupy, was to be
crowned with a laurel wreath, or, in other words,
to receive either the first or second prize for ex-
cellence in everything, only to learn, after he had
headed a procession of Shutes to the platform,
and had sat out the long exercises, the horrid
truth, that his son, so far from receiving a prize,
had not even received mention as one of the first
twenty in a class of twenty-one pupils.

So the elder Shute was a bit wary, but after
listening to Plupy’s raving and ranting, and hav-
ing marked the boy’s enthusiasm, he had finally
come to the conclusion that the “cussed boy,”
as he affectionately termed him, was “going to
do something for once in his life.” And so, to
Plupy’s great delight, he had agreed to go, and
his delight was not lessened by the fact that this
astute lad knew that it meant a new suit of
clothes for him.

Plupy had also taken pains to assure himself

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that the brown-haired girl knew all about it, and
in spite of her good-natured raillery he felt very
sure that she was genuinely interested in his suc-
cess, although as a Robinson Seminary girl her
sympathies should have been with her school.

This gave Plupy a great happiness. He felt
that he had something tangible to work for, a re-
ward measured by which the expected cash prize
was as mere dross, negligible, worthless; “Away
with it!”

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CHAPTER IV

Palmam qui meruit ferat.

Two nights before the eventful night of the com-
petition, Plupy, accompanied by his father, went
into that delightful emporium, presided over
by the literary gentleman who parodied the
immortal Longfellow, and there was allowed to
choose certain garments of maturity and not of re-
pentance, which included a bright blue, diagonal,
cutaway coat, a white vest, and a pair of doeskin
pants, as they were then known in the language
of common use, which pants were of an exceed-
ingly neat, not to say penurious, fit, and of the
color of a new marble. He also was allowed to
choose a pair of long, narrow-toed, shiny shoes,
the soles of which projected on all sides beyond
the uppers, and were sewed to the latter by bright
yellow thread, as was de rigeur in polite and
dressy circles of the day.

Arrayed in these modest habiliments, one
may readily conclude that Plupy presented a
most beauteous and tasteful appearance. In-
deed, when he got home, he at once surrounded
himself with these garments and descended to
the sitting-room, where he turned alternately
back and front to display himself and was pro-

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46 THE YOUTH PLUPY

digiously admired for his quiet and unobtrusive
tastes, at least, by his brothers and sisters; al-
though his father, his mother, and Aunt Sarah
smiled quietly to each other, and said, “Let the
boy enjoy himself for once; he certainly has
worked hard enough.”

I leave the reader to imagine the intense and
not entirely subdued excitement in the household
on the day of the competition. In other house-
holds that furnished competitors and rivals of
Plupy, it may have been as great, but it certainly
could not well have been greater.

Plupy’s excitement and interest were further
increased by the welcome news that the Ex-
eter Silver Cornet Band, twenty-two pieces,
J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, had been engaged
to play the opening march, and to spatter a few
fortissimo madrigals along the programme. This,
with the assistance of the Shute sisters in a few
musical dialogues, assured the public that the
musical part of the programme was of a very
unusual order of excellence, indeed.

Plupy’s mother and aunt had worked for days
upon new dresses for the song-birds, which were
of a much less lurid nature than Plupy’s clothes,
and naturally in much better taste, somewhat
to Keene’s disappointment, as she had long
coveted a Scotch plaid dress that contained all
the then known and recognized colors.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 47

During tea Plupy’s father told most ridiculous
stories of his own prowess as a public speaker
when a youth, a sure sign that he was in high
spirits. In reality he was as nervous as the rest,
and he took this method of diverting their minds
and enabling them to fortify themselves by a
hearty meal,

As Plupy stepped into the street that evening,
arrayed in his new suit and accompanied by an
agreeable creaking of his new yellow-sewed
shoes, his heart leaped as in the distance he
heard the crash and blare of military music. It
was the Exeter Silver Cornet Band, twenty-two
pieces, J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, blowing the
“Skidmore Guards March” with all the breath
of its lungs, aided by a brawny, relentless man
who beat the bass drum cruelly.

Why they should have chosen the “Skidmore
Guards March” was a mystery, but they had
been engaged to make a joyful noise in front of
the Town Hall and they were doing their utmost
to justify the faith that the public had in them.

Plupy strode along as if on air. He was at last
of some importance in the world. He was to have
the center of the stage to-night and, well, per-
haps in the paper the next Friday. He looked
sharply about for the brown-haired girl, but he
could not see her. People were hurrying in for
the best seats, and she was probably already

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48 THE YOUTH PLUPY

there in one of the front rows, where she had
promised to be.

The carriages of such of the wealthy people as
maintained carriages were drawing up at thecurb-
ing and discharging loads of ladies in shawls and
fur tippets and knitted hoods and clouds, for it
was a nipping and a bitter air. Farm wagons
loaded with plump and rosy girls, with their
equally rosy and somewhat plumper mammas,
drove up and unloaded their charming freight.
The air was vocal with cheery salutations, and in-
vitations to “‘set in with us.” The Exeter Silver
Cornet Band finished the “Skidmore Guards”
and turned to number 14 in the spotted book
and burst into full cry.

Plupy had the envied privilege of going in at
the side entrance through which John B. Gough,
and Barnabee, and Myron B. Whitney, and
the “Morris Brothers’ Minstrels,” and ‘‘Wash-
burn’s Great Sensation,” and Comical Brown, and
Ossian E. Dodge, and other great men had passed.
He was told to go into the room on the right and
remove his hat and coat. There he found Princi-
pal Gibson, Tommy Thompson, and Jack Mel-
ville awaiting the arrival of the other aspirants,
and they welcomed Plupy with well-dissembled
delight.

From the other room they could hear the
lively chatter of the girls, and through a crack

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 49

in the door leading to the hall they could see the
people pouring in, nodding, laughing, removing
coats and wraps, and arranging themselves com-
fortably while they chatted about various small
matters. ;

The stage had been enlarged and decorated
with flags and bunting, and a silver-lettered,
blue-ground scroll proclaimed

“Tn hoc signo vinces”

—to give quite the correct educational flavor to
the occasion.

Then the Exeter Silver Cornet Band, twenty-
two pieces, J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, having
fired a last charge of brazen music into the
quivering atmosphere, came into the hall and
began, with much bustle, to set up their music-
racks and arrange their chairs in a circle on the
floor at the left of the stage, where, in their epau-
letted, befrogged, belaced, and bedizened uni-
forms and with their brightly polished instru-
ments, they gave a military air to the occasion.
At last, in obedience to a signal from within,
J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, arose, and rapping
on his music-rack brought his men to attention
and waited, his eye on the rear door and his hand,
holding his silver E cornet, raised gracefully.

The doors burst open on each side of the stage,
and the hand of J. Eastman Lovett, Leader,

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50 THE YOUTH PLUPY

swept in a half-circle of command and the band
burst into a crashing march. From the left-hand
door came a procession headed by the Principal
Reuben X. Burns, a man with cavernous eyes,
long hair and beard and frock coat, and followed
by the seven trustees, prominent men with long
beards, shaved upper lips, and wearing. gray
woolen trousers, frock coats, and brightly pol-
ished calfskin boots, who in turn were followed by
a bevy of charming, bright-eyed girls in white,
with brightly colored sashes. In this order they
mounted the steps to the platform where chairs
were arranged for them.

From the room on the right came a smaller pro-
cession headed by Principal Gibson, his athletic
figure neatly set off by a well-fitting, youthful
suit, and his strong face, with its close-cut beard,
wearing a pleasant smile. And here one thing
happened, a slight thing, but one which marked
the gentleman. As the small procession came to
the steps, he stepped aside, and motioned the
boys to mount the platform before him, and as
they arranged themselves before their seats, he
quietly followed them to his place.

Then, while all stood, the audience rose and
the Reverend Thankful Whittaker, of the First
Congregational Church, lifted his voice in
prayer. He prayed long and fervently, so long,
indeed, that Plupy’s father, catching his son’s

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 51

eye, considered it a mark of good-fellowship and
paternal encouragement to wink broadly at him,
which nearly set that youth into a fit of giggling.
Finally the Reverend Thankful, having asked
for a large variety of blessings that would suit
every occasion imaginable, ceased, and the au-
dience, somewhat relieved, if the truth be told,
sat down.

Then the band, upon the signal of J. Eastman
Lovett, Leader, burst into a thunderous crash
of music that caused every eardrum in the au-
dience to contract with pain. They were in great
form. J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, lifted his eyes,
his crimson, contorted countenance, and his silver
E cornet to Heaven and blared the theme of the
selection like a very mortal Gabriel. The tuba-
player fairly crawled into his instrument and
wrenched forth corrugated slabs of hoarse har-
mony. The piccolo-player shrilled until his pre-
hensile upper lip was lost in a pale blur of vibra-
tions and his profile resembled a strongly blown
soapbubble. At last they ceased.

Then Principal Burns rose and extolled the
Seminary, the trustees, the generosity of the
donor of the fund from which the prizes were
given, the beauties of the town, and the intellect-
uality of its citizens. He was followed by Prin-
cipal Gibson, who spoke briefly and pleasantly.

The judges took their seats amid a hush, and

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52 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Miss Claribel Evans tripped forward, curtsied to
the platform notables, to the audience, and then
in a clear, sweet voice said —

“Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean.”

Poor child, she found out before the evening
ended, although she did well and received great
applause. As she sat down, happy and confident,
Jack Melville came forward and spoke “Old
Tronsides”’ in hoarse tones, but with so marked
a sing-song as to put his chance for a prize
entirely out of question. The adherents of the
Seminary were jubilant and the trustees smiled
grimly.

Following Jack came little Miss Rhoda Emery,
who told how

“They made her a grave too cold and damp

For a soul so warm and true,

And she’s gone to the lake of the dismal swamp

Where all night long, to her firefly lamp,

She paddles her light canoe.”
Again the applause burst forth, and Rhoda re-
ttirrned to her seat, flushed with pleasure, while
poor Claribel began to look somewhat doubtful.

At this point in the programme the two Shute

girls came forward and, with the practiced ease
of veteran (they were about sixteen years of age)
vocalists, sang their Italian duet with perfect
intonation and great sweetness, while the audi-

ence nodded wisely as if they understood per-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 53

fectly the Italian words, and at the close awarded
‘them a double encore.

Things were looking well for the Seminary,
but Principal Gibson still smiled pleasantly and
applauded impartially.

As the Shute girls, much gratified at their re-
ception, retired to their seats, Tommy Thompson
bowed and began in a deep, rich voice that beau-
tiful poem beginning —

‘Over the river they beckon to me,
Loved ones who’ve gone to the other side.”

Now, while this was a beautiful selection, it was
a most unfortunate one for Tommy, for it hap-
pened that he had for a long time been a passion-
ate admirer of Miss Minnie Wyman, who was one
of the contestants, and when Tommy reached the
line —

“Darling Minnie, I see her yet” —

a ripple of amusement went through the audi-
ence, and all eyes turned to that young lady, who
bit her lip, squirmed in her seat, and turned the
color of a crimson peony, while Tommy, sud-
denly realizing his mistake, turned liver color,
stammered, repeated two lines, and nearly broke
down, but managed to keep going and finished
in good form.

At his retirement, which he accomplished amid.
prolonged applause, Principal Gibson, perceiv-

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54 THE YOUTH. PLUPY

ing that the audience were getting dangerously
near an outbreak of laughter which might seri-
ously handicap the young girl who was to fol-
low Tommy, suggested a selection by the band.
J. Eastman Lovett, Leader, gave the signal with
marked grace, and his co-workers plunged into
the stately measures of an andante and waltz,
which would have been most creditably played
but for the fact that the tuba-player had un-
fortunately chosen a galop instead of the andante
and waltz, and being of a somewhat opinionated
nature, and convinced that he was the only man
of the twenty-two that was right, he proceeded
on that somewhat one-sided theory to play his
part con molto spiritu, which imparted a most
jerky rhythm and quite uncanny harmony to
the selection, and resulted, at the close of the
piece, in a profane colloquy between J. East-
man Lovett, Leader, and that obstinate and
enthusiastic basso profundo, in sibilant and per-
fectly distinct whispers.

Next, Miss Minnie Wyman, having recovered
her presence of mind and dissipated a consider-
able percentage of her compiexion, rose and gave
the dialogue between Lady Teazle and Sir Peter,
in Sheridan’s “School for Scandal,” alternately
impersonating the dignified but exasperated old
man and the charming and impudent young wife,
in such admirable style that the audience went

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 55

wild with delight and applauded until the chande-
liers jingled in sympathy.

Following her, a sturdy lad from a neighboring
town rejoicing in the name of Hobbs, and like-
wise endowed with good looks and fine presence,
came forward and urged the audience in solemn
tones to

“Toll for the brave,
The brave that are no more,

All sunk beneath the wave,
Hard by their native shore.”

The audience, sobered, sat spellbound, not one of
them acting in accordance with his suggestion.
But the massive Paul Revere bell in the white
church but fifty yards away at once responded
with the brazen jangle of the nine o’clock curfew
and for a moment drowned the words of the
speaker. But he was a youth of parts, and at once
entered the contest like a politician beset by
hecklers. It was nip and tuck between them—

“Fight hundred of the brave
Jangle clang dong
Whose courage well was tried
whang dang Rang whangle
Had made the vessel heel
Jang ding dong whang dong
And laid her on her side.”
bang jingle zang dongle dang

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56 THE YOUTH PLUPY

For the first three verses it was an even thing;
they roared and jangled in unison, but the
speaker won, and the bell, little by little, trailed
away to a faint jangle. But the speaker, evi-
dently distrustful of the ultimate surrender of
his opponent, roared the remaining verses at the
top of his voice and with the rapidity of an
express train, which rather detracted from the
grandly solemn nature of the selection.

The next young lady informed the audience,
with delicious frankness and charming naiveté,

that
“News of battle! News of battle!

Hark! ’t is ringing down the street”’;
and having enlarged on the theme to the extent
of fourteen verses, gave place to a peewee of a
youth who, in a voice like the reedy pipe of a
mellow whistle, led the audience to believe that

“He sat in silence on the ground,

The old and haughty Czar,

Lonely, though princes girt him round

And leaders of the war”’;
and added eleven verses of particulars.

He was followed by a most considerate maiden,

who, with the admirable brevity of but two verses,
desired explanation as to

“How sleep the brave, who sink to rest,
By all their country’s wishes blest?”

All this time Plupy had sat in a position of

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 57

elegant leisure, well designed to show his new
clothes, and had followed the selections with
rather condescending tolerance, as much as to
say, ‘Really very good, very good indeed”’; but
the vastly superior performance of Miss Wyman
reduced his mercury to a very low ebb, and he
felt that every inch of his personality must be
thrown into the contest in order to stave off
defeat.

Plupy sat up with a jerk and began mentally to
review his inflections and his gestures. As his
turn came nearer and nearer, his throat began to
dry and he swallowed convulsively. Suddenly
his name was called, as was the famous name of
Spartacus and the Gladiators. Plupy rose, cast
a hurried glance at his family, an appealing one
at the brown-haired girl. She looked him fairly
in the eye. Plupy’s fear fell from him like a gar-
ment. This indeed was a worthy mate. He
stepped out, bowed, and paused. Then, when
all was quiet, he leaned forward and said in
low, deep, contemptuous tones: —

“Ye call me chief. And ye do well to call him chief,
who for twelve long years has met upon the arena every
shape of man or beast that the broad empire of Rome
could furnish, and yet has never lowered his arm.”

Then Plupy straightened up, threw his head
back and glared around.

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58 THE YOUTH PLUPY

There was a pause and a deep silence. Then,
leaning forward with his right hand clenched and
slowly emphasizing each word, he continued: —

“And if there be one among you who can say that, ever,

in public fight or private brawl, my actions did belie my
tongue, let him step forth and say it.”

Then, raising his voice to thunderous threat-
ening: —

“Tf there be three in all your throng that dare face me
on the bloody sand, let them come on!”

And Plupy with glaring eyes threw up his
head, squared-his shoulders, and folded his arms.
Really he was doing the thing astonishingly well,
and the audience stared at him in genuine sur-
prise.

Then, suddenly dropping his threatening air,
he said: — :

“Yet I was not always thus, a hired butcher, a savage
chief of savage men —”

The trustees of the Seminary began to look
doubtful and worried. Up to this time they felt
sure that Miss Wyman would take first prize
and Miss Rhoda Emery second, conceding third
prize to the High School. But they had not
reckoned on this gawky lad with the deep voice
and the fiery gestures. If he finished as well as he
had begun, then Miss Minnie Wyman was by no
means a sure winner. Clever indeed she was, but

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 59

this lad was Spartacus himself, a reincarnated
Spartacus in a cutaway coat, lavender trousers,
and yellow-sewed shoes, but Spartacus Re-
divivus. :

Principal Reuben X. Burns cast an uneasy
glance at the intent faces of the judges, an appeal-
ing one at the trustees, and changed legs twice.
Principal Gibson leaned forward and watched
Plupy with a hypnotic stare of encouragement.

“That very night the Romans landed on our
shore,”’ thundered Plupy, and a paper cuff, torn
from its moorings by the vehement gesture,
landed halfway down the center aisle. There was
a lightening of the tension. Many smiled, but no
one laughed. They were too much interested.
In the description of his friend’s death, Plupy’s
voice was almost a whisper, and yet so distinct
that every word was heard.

And then suddenly the thing happened that
Principal Gibson had feared, and looked for, and
had dreaded. Plupy’s voice broke: broke with a
high falsetto squeal, and alternated, from tones a
full octave above any hitherto recognized tone,
to the lowest bass of the contra-bassoon.

Ro Ro me
“oO | thou hast been a tender nurse to

oom oom ugh!”

The audience started convulsively. For a mo-

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60 THE YOUTH PLUPY

ment they did not know what had happened. It
is said that persons whose voices break are not
conscious of it. It may be so; I do not know; but
at any rate, Plupy went on as if nothing had
happened. The audience by a violent effort
restrained their almost overpowering desire to
laugh. Could Plupy have controlled his errant
voice, all would have been well, but as he deeply
swore vengeance on Rome, again his voice es-
caped in a hideous, quavering screech —

| dled.”

*And in its deepest ooze thy lifeblood lies cur

It was too much. From the mouth of the
brown-haired girl came a squeal of merriment
which was instantly answered by a high-pitched,
quavering tee-hee of a fat old lady who had tried
vainly to hold in. A hoarse booming Ha! — Ha! —
Ho! — Ho! — Ho! came from the rear seats, and
in an instant the storm was on. People roared,
shrieked, cackled, held their sides, rocked to and
fro, and pounded each other on the back in con-
vulsions. Principal Gibson sprang to his feet, his
face dark with wrath, and raised his hand, but he
might as well have tried to stop the tide. ::.,

At the uproar Plupy stopped. His mouth fell
open, his eyes widened. What had happened?
Then it dawned on him. They were laughing,

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A 23S
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Ne

Ai

 

HIS MOUTH FELL OPEN, HIS EYES WIDENED

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 61

laughing, and at him. What had he done? He
turned to the trustees. They were doubling up
with mirth. The girls were in convulsions. He
stared at his sisters. They were white as ghosts.
He turned to Principal Gibson, who made fran-
tic gestures to him to go on. He shot a glance of
appeal at the brown-haired girl. She was cackling
like a hen.

Suddenly it came to him. He had failed; the
only one who had broken down. He was a fool.
Every one was laughing at him. His face turned
as white as chalk, then he crimsoned with shame,
and turning he rushed wildly from the stage, down
the steps, and slammed the door of the dressing-
room behind him. There he seized his hat and
coat and ran out into the night.

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CHAPTER V

Blood is thicker than water.

From his seat in the hall Plupy’s father sprang
to his feet with a growl of anger. His eyes blazed
and two crimson spots on his cheekbones con-
trasted with the livid white of his face. “The
damned idiots!’’ he hissed, as he strode down the
aisle, followed by his family tingling with anger.
It would have been a bold man who might say a
word to him at that minute. The sight of that
pitifully gawky, helpless, confused, ashamed lad
as he left the platform had stirred him to the
depths of his soul.

No less prompt than their father, Keene and
Cele sprang to their feet and marched stiffly from
the stage, Cele cold as ice and as erect and slim
as a lath, Keene with her eyes snapping and her
cheeks crimson. Truly the Shutes might quarrel
and spat among themselves, but they were loyal
one to another and made common cause at
the world if need be.

As soon as the reunited family, bursting with
rage, started for home, Plupy’s father, after a
few inquiries, found that Plupy had started up
Court Street toward his house, but he soon as-
certained that he was not there. Plupy’s father |

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 63

started at a rapid pace up Court Street. He did
not know what the boy might do. He was haunted
by the wild and desperate look in the boy’s face
as he turned to leave the stage.

‘Perhaps he will—” But he choked the
thought back, and hurried on, past the big field,
down the Kensington road. There on the bridge
he overtook his son, looking into the black water.
Plupy was so absorbed in his thoughts that he
did not look up until his father put his hand on
his shoulder. Then he turned a startled, drawn,
and haggard face to his father, tried to speak,
choked, gurgled, and his head went down on his
arms and his shoulders shook with sobs that
racked his thin body in spasms.

Even his father was affected, and had to swal-
low hard several times and clear his throat
with a portentous au-ragg-gr-hag-g-gum before he
could make any comment that seemed to fit the
occasion. So he decided to say nothing and let
the boy have his cry out.

Finally Plupy stopped, felt in his pockets for
his handkerchief, and after fumbling in several
pockets found it and wiped his eyes. Then, try-
ing hard to smile, he stuttered, “W-well, father,
it ain’t ev-every fellow that can mum-mum-make
a dud-dud-damned fool of himself twice in one
night. I sh-should think you w-w-would be pup-
pup-proud of me,”

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64 THE YOUTH PLUPY

For a moment his father’s face contorted pow-
erfully, he was so tickled with the unexpected
sentiment of his crushed son. But he restrained
himself as his thoughts flew back to the shrieking,
cackling, laughing crowd.

“Fool of yourself! Well, I should say not. If
I had n’t got out of that infernal hall as I did, I
should have made a bigger fool of myself than
you could if you practiced for a year,” he sput-
tered.

“Why, did you leave too?” asked Plupy.

“Of course I left. If I had n’t, I should have
been up on that platform in another minute; and
if I had got up there, I’d have snatched old
goat-whiskered Burns bald-headed, and snaked
him out of that old ministerial long-tailed coat
quicker’n you could have batted an eyelash.
And some of those grinning hyenas of trustees
would have got their empty noggins knocked to-
gether,” he fumed.

‘“W-what were they laughing at, anyway?”
asked Plupy.

Plupy’s father stared at his offspring, wide-
eyed. “Thunder! don’t you know?” he ejacu-
lated.

“No,” said Plupy in a sort of wondering daze.
“Everything seemed to be going all right, when
I heard the noise and found they were laughing.
First I thought that some of my clothes had

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fallen off, but I found everything all right. What
was it? I have n’t the least idea.”

“Well, I swear!” said Plupy’s father. ‘“That’s
the queerest thing I ever heard. Why, son, your
voice broke, and first you were talking ’way up
in your head and then down in your boots, or in
a cellar, or down a well or a coal mine. Come to
think of it, it did sound funny, and I think the
people held in as long as they could, but as soon
as that girl you seem to think so much of laughed
out loud, every one else began.”

‘*Was she the one that started it?” denignded
Plupy, in a hard tone.

‘Yes, she was the one, confound her,” exploded
his father. “But then, if she had n’t, some one
else would have. The way they joined in the
chorus showed that they were all ready. You see,
it did sound funny, so you ought not to blame
her,”’ he added, in fairness to the young lady.

But Plupy remained unconvinced. His face
hardened, and he drew a long breath. “All the
same, I don’t believe I would have laughed if she
had been in the same fix. And it was n’t funny
to me,” he added.

““No, by thunder, it was n’t funny to me, and
if I had managed to get in among those pre-
historic, gibbering baboons on the stage, they
would n’t have been able to crack a smile all
winter,” said Plupy’s father.

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Plupy smiled a wan smile at the elder man’s
description of some of Exeter’s most worthy
citizens. His father, perceiving this to his
great relief, said, ‘Well, let’s be moving toward
home.”

“T’d rather not go home just yet. Let’s walk
down the road a bit,” said Plupy, who was still
somewhat shaky from the violence of his emo-
tions.

‘All right, come on,” said his father cheerfully.

They walked slowly down the quiet country
road, the elder man telling most ridiculous sto-
ries of his experiences when a youth, and adorn-
ing solid facts with such a filigree of whimsical
fancy and imagination, that in a short time Plupy
began to cheer up visibly, which was precisely
what that astute and experienced veteran de-
sired. After a mile or so they turned and walked
toward home at a slower pace, as Plupy dreaded
to meet the family, and indeed to pass any one
on the street. .

“Say, father, don’t you suppose you could
get me a job in the Boston Custom House?” de-
manded that youth suddenly.

“Impossible. Can’t be done, and I would n’t
do it if I could. I’ve got all I can do to keep
my own job,” he replied quickly. “I thought we
had settled the question of your going to school
long ago.”

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“Yes, I know, but it’s pretty hard to think of
going back after what happened to-night,” re-
turned Plupy slowly.

“Go back! Of course you must go back. It
may be hard for a day or two, but you can stand
it. Look here! You have nothing to be ashamed
of. On the contrary, you did almighty well, and
if it had n’t been for something you were not to
blame for and could n’t help, you would have
left them all at the post. Now, what is there to
be ashamed of?” demanded that worthy dip-
lomat.

“T guess you never had to face people after
getting into a scrape, as I have.”

His father grinned a wide and reminiscent
grin. “Sacred flapjacks!” he shouted; “I’ve
gone down the street mornings after a few of
us had been turning things wrong side up the
night before, when I knew that half the people
on the street would have had me arrested if it
had not been for the respect they had for your
grandfather and grandmother. But within a week
they had something else to think of.”

“But I should n’t mind that as much as to be
thought a cussed fool, as I am,” said Plupy de-
spondently.

“Oh, as for that, I’ve been hota both,
more than once,” said Plupy’s father, improvising
shamelessly. ‘There was a big time here once

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68 THE YOUTH PLUPY

in the spring, a May Festival they called it. The
prettiest girl in town and the best was chosen
Queen of the May.”

“Who was she, father?” queried Plupy inno-
cently.

““Who was she! Who do you suppose was the
prettiest and best girl in Exeter twenty years ago,
and is now for that matter?” continued the old
gentleman.

“Why, it must have been mother,” said Plupy
quickly. “I guess I was a fool to ask such a ques-
tion.”

“Of course it was your mother,” continued
Plupy’s father genially. “Well, as I was saying,
she was chosen and was crowned; and then they
offered a prize for the biggest fool, and who do you
think got it?”

“Well,” said Plupy warily, and preparing to
dodge, “I don’t know for sure, but was it you?”

“Go to the head, boy; you hit the bull’s-eye
first time,” said his father. “But your mother
said if they gave me any such prize as that they
could take their old May Queen prize and go to
hell with it. No! She did n’t say that, of course;
that was the way I should have put it,” he added
hastily as Plupy looked at him with a gasp of
horror. ‘‘What she did say was that she would
have nothing to do with the festival if a part
of the order of exercises was the offer of an in-

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THE, LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 69

tentional insult to any one. That was different,
was n’t it?”

“Yes, I should say so,” said Plupy, much re-
lieved.

“Well,” continued the resourceful veteran,
“they thought I deserved some recognition and
so they gave me a saw-horse and saw as the laziest
man in town. I think they were wrong in their
estimate of me. I don’t think I ever was lazy, but
it was a bit difficult to tell just where I was go-
ing to light, and whether or not I would stay put
after I had lighted. Well, I lived that down in a
few days. A very few days, but as I remember
them, full of happenings.”

**What happened, father?” asked Plupy, for-
getting his sorrows in the exciting details of local
history.

‘*Well, for one thing, several young fellows got
licked. One sawed wood in my yard two after-
noons to avoid getting licked, and — well — I
lived it down.” a

Plupy chuckled, much delighted. ‘But how
about the old men, the storekeepers and the like?
Of course you could n’t lick them without get-
ting in jail?” he inquired.

“Well, one man, a very respectable deacon of
a church, had a horse and wagon. He talked a
good deal to me on the street about my trouble,
and before people. He was rather a nuisance.

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70 THE YOUTH PLUPY

One night his horse and wagon were missing and
there was a great time about it. The horse and
wagon were found hitched under the shed of the
most disreputable place in a neighboring town.
Nobody knew how they got there. The deacon
was well known to be an absent-minded man. I
reckon it took him a good deal longer to live that
down than it did me to live down the saw-horse.”

“And was there any other people you had
trouble with?”? demanded Plupy, eager for de-
tails.

“Me! Trouble? No trouble at all — only
things happened. Nobody connected any of the
events of that memorable time with me, except,
of course, the lickings. Careless and irrespon-
sible people made assertions, and it happened
rather unaccountably that they were sorry for
their hasty words. I am reminded of one vinegary
old lady who had a most disgusting, aggravating,
and yapful French poodle, and who was very out-
spoken against me. One night her poodle was
missing. She made a dreadful fuss over it and
nearly had the fire department out on a general
alarm. The next morning the pup turned up with
a clean shave and some very instructive Chinese
proverbs in green paint on his smoothly shaved
white skin. I don’t think she ever succeeded
in having them deciphered, and so, of course,
missed their application. None the less, I think

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 71

the experience had a chastening effect on her and
on the poodle. Incidentally the saw-horse episode
was forgotten long before the poodle’s pin-fea-
thers were sprouted.” &

“Tell me some more,” said Plupy eagerly.

“No more. I think that will do for some time.
You need n’t mention to your mother what I have
told you. I have only told you that things can
be lived down, and that this affair of yours is
only of passing interest. It won’t hurt you a
bit. Now, you and I will go home. I think your
mother will be worried about you, and I know
the girls will, and the sooner we get back the
better.”

“The girls!’ said Plupy bitterly; “what do
they care?”

“Eh?” said his father, — “what do they care?
Well, if you had seen them throw down their
music and march out of that hall, you would have
thought that they cared.”

“Gosh, father! did Cele and Keene do that?”

“Yes, they did, and if Keene did n’t make a
face at the crowd, then it was because she was
too mad. Cele walked so stiff that if she had hit
against anything she would have snapped like a
piece of glass.”

“Well, by Time!” said Plupy, with harmless
profanity, “I did n’t know that. Good for them.”

And, much relieved and cheered, Plupy and his

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72 THE YOUTH PLUPY

father hastened homeward, where Plupy met his
family, and shared the joint comfort and uplift-
ing effect of his mother’s fattest and richest mince
pies, and a short time afterwards was sleeping
profoundly, exhausted by hard work, misfor-
tune, shame, sorrow, and the comfort of sym-
pathy and good food.

It was three days before Plupy met the brown-
haired girl face to face. In the mean time he
had not been allowed by his friends to forget his
misfortune. But it was not as bad as he had
expected. He could take a joke. But he had
been steeling himself to meet the girl. At times
he felt that he could never forgive her. At times
he wondered if it would not be better to forgive
her and pass it over. Then he thought, perhaps
if he ignored the whole thing and met her as if
nothing had happened, that it might shame her
more than if he mentioned it, and might put her
in her place.

Before he had made up his mind what course
to follow, the meeting took place on a side street.
It is but fair to that young lady to state that the
best evidence of her pacific disposition was, that
having seen Plupy going down that particular
street, she had shinned a fence, cut through a
garden, and was very demurely and innocently
coming out of a gate just as he passed.

Plupy, observing her, turned red and very dig-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 73

nified, as became a man whose feelings had been
trampled under foot by fickle woman.

But fickle woman, in the person of this charm-
ing young girl, with her brown eyes and brown
hair, smiled appealingly, and placed herself in such
a position that in order to avoid her Plupy would
be obliged to right-about-face, forward-guide
right-march, or to jump over her, crawl under
her, or go around her. Plupy, being in many re-
spects a gentleman, stopped, somewhat sulkily,
but nevertheless stopped.

She was a bit nervous, and her small hands
nervously clasped and unclasped, and her eyes
were appealing. “‘Harry!”’ she said in a low voice,
**T have been trying to see you to tell you how
sorry I am for what happened the other night. I
am afraid I caused the whole trouble.” She
paused and caught her breath.

“No,” replied Plupy judicially, “I don’t think
that is so. Probably some one would have started
it, if you had n’t.”

“Oh, do you really think so?” she asked with
much relief. “I hope so, anyway; that is, Imean,”
she stammered; “I am glad you did n’t think I
did it on purpose,”’ she explained.

*“What hurt more than anything else was that
you laughed. I don’t believe I should have
laughed if you had been in the same position as
I was,” said Plupy reproachfully.

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74 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Honest, I think you could n’t have helped it
if you had seen me in a standing collar, a new
cutaway coat, and lavender — well, dressed as
you were, and my voice changed,” she said with
a bright blush and a smile.

“TI see you are bound to make a joke of it,”
said Plupy coldly. “It was no joke to me.”

“No, I don’t think it was a joke. It was no
joke to me, when I had time to think it over. I
was dreadfully sorry about it and am now.
Please forgive me, won’t you?” she pleaded so
charmingly that Plupy was melted.

What might have happened then, Plupy never
knew, but as he sought to absolve her in language
suitable to the impressive occasion, alas! his
voice again broke and alternately soared aloft
and dived to the eternal depths.

Into the brown eyes leaped a flash of merri-
ment. Instinctively her hands in a childish ges-
ture flew to her mouth. In vain, for from the
corner of her mouth burst that irrepressible squeal
of laughter.

Plupy went white, and his eyes were cold. He
turned abruptly.

She laid her hand appealingly on his arm.
“Please! please!” she pleaded.

‘Will you please take your hand off my arm?”
demanded Plupy in a voice that surprised him.

She flushed and paled at his cold, contemptu-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 175

ous tone and sprang back. For a moment they
faced each other, pale and angry. Then Plupy,
turning, strode majestically down the street and
turned the corner.

She stood and saw him disappear, and then —
Now, I should like to be able to state that she
covered her pallid face with her hands and wept
convulsively, but in reality she did nothing of the
sort. Instead of that she stamped her small foot
angrily and said, “The fool! The big donkey!”
And with head erect she walked rapidly in
the opposite direction, by no means crushed,
although realizing that she had lost him forever.

Just what the extent of her loss was may be
judged from the fact that, not very long ago,
Plupy, now an elderly country lawyer of very
modest standing, stepped from a trolley car at the
expense of a nickel and saw, passing in front of
him, a superb limousine containing, in the order
of their relative importance, a uniformed, erect,
and stiff-backed chauffeur, a footman of like ap-
pearance, a Pomeranian dog, two beautiful chil-
dren, a courtly, white-haired gentleman, evi-
dently grandpa, and a bright-eyed, sweet-faced
lady, evidently grandma, and as evidently, to
Plupy’s astonished eyes, the brown-haired, win-
some maiden of years before.

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CHAPTER VI

If I were life I’d run away from him

And treat my parents to like calls and runs

I'd pick the nicest girls to suit my whim

And other folk should get the ugly ones.

ANGIOLIERI.

For several weeks after Plupy’s break with the
brown-haired girl he felt as if there were some-
thing lacking in his scheme of happiness. He was
still too indignant at what he considered her
heartless behavior, to forgive her. But he took a
melancholy, but very deep and sincere, pleasure
in imagining that she was broken-hearted in
having lost him, and by her own fault in having
recognized too late his nobility of character.

He pictured himself, quiet, dignified, and un-
smiling, going through his daily tasks, with the
peaceful perseverance and calm regularity of a
man who had lost his confidence in the con-
stancy and unselfishness of woman, and who had,
in consequence, put her, woman, out of his life
for aye. While it hurt him, he felt that his hurt
was already being cured by the healing process
of work and living interests alien to woman.

And he was gratified to imagine that she was
unhappy on account of his estrangement, and
that she concealed this unhappiness under a

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 77

cloak of high spirits and laughter. Did he pass
her on the street, she was laughing and chat-
ting with her gir] friends. This, indeed, was her
habit, as she was by nature bubbling over with
joyous life and happiness, and could no more sulk
or fret or be unhappy for any considerable period
than a healthy kitten.

But Plupy, as ever the victim of this ridicu-
lous play of the imagination, this exaggerated
egoism (the expression was unheard of in those
days), considered her high spirits as the mask of
real unhappiness, even if it did not portend a
badly sprained if not broken heart.

It was at this time that he experienced a great
happiness. He acquired a flute. For years it had
been his ambition to be the proud possessor of
a cornet, and he had made a strong effort for
several years to amass a sufficient fortune to se-
cure one. But the price had always remained far
above his ability to save and he had for a long
time put aside this ambition as a thing unat-
tainable.

Consequently, when the opportunity arrived
of securing — and for the moderate sum of three
dollars — a four-keyed flute in F, he at once
closed the bargain. The distinguished musician
who sold him this flute gave him, as a part of the
consideration of the purchase, a lesson in tone-
production, and in key-padding with chamois

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78 THE YOUTH PLUPY

skin, and crack-stopping or calking with Castile
soap or shoemaker’s wax.

Plupy’s voice being still unreliable, as was his
love affair, it was a great delight, comfort, and
solace to him to pour into the barrel of this mod-
est instrument his joys, his griefs, and his soul’s
thoughts. It was difficult for a while, for he never
was sure that its non-responsiveness was due to

his defective embouchure or to a leaky pad or un-

calked crack. His first idea was to grasp the flute
with rigid fingers and tense muscles, to press it so
firmly against his chin as to push that somewhat
retreating member a considerable distance be-
yond the point intended by a none-too-lavish
nature, which had the effect of increasing Plupy’s
resemblance to the profile of a woodchuck.

Then, having got the instrument in position,
he would blow, at different angles and at differ-
ent rates of speed and pressure, into the blow-hole
of the instrument, to be rewarded by sibilant
hisses and occasionally a muffled toot. But he
was persistent, and after a while his practice
began to be rewarded by dismal pipings.

It was harder than sawing wood, playing foot-
ball, or spading up a garden, because in all these
forms of exercise there was occasional relaxation.
In sawing wood one had to change sticks every
two cuts, and occasionally was privileged to go
into the house for a doughnut or a drink; in spad-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 79

ing, one frequently straightened up to cast as-
persions at the boy across the way who was rak-
ing his yard, or to resent insinuations or outright
slander from passers-by; while in football there
were periods of comparative inaction while some
player was carried off the field for major surgi-
cal operations.

But in Plupy’s method of flute-playing there
was great strain on the lungs, the chin, and the
flexors and extensors, and at the close of a move-
ment Plupy felt like a drowning man with writer’s
cramp, forced to come to the surface to breathe,
and to rub his stiffened hands and arms, half
paralyzed by the fierceness of his clasp.

But in a short time he found that more ingra-
tiating methods and more delicate wooing ac-
complished better results, and before long he
could, very much to his delight, play a consider-
able percentage of the “‘Last Rose of Summer”
and “‘Home, Sweet Home.” True enough he was
obliged to remove the instrument and whistle all
the high tones when they were needed to embel-
lish the theme suitably, and then clap the flute to
his mouth and produce the medium and lower
tones. This method created quite a hiatus in the
proper rhythm of the selection, but was fairly
encouraging to the performer, and he looked
forward to the proud possibility of being able
some day to play “Champagne Charlie,” “‘Mollie,

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80 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Darling,” and the “Skidmore Guards,” which at
that time were the ruling favorites.

Plupy was especially attracted by the words
and melody of “‘Mollie, Darling.” Sweet, girlish
voices trilled it, accompanied by jangling pianos.
Sturdy young machinists, carpenters, and plumb-
ers roared it jovially as they hammered, sawed,
and soldered. Dapper clerks sang it more deli-
cately as they bustled round with sugar-scoops
and cheese-knives. Street urchins whistled it
shrilly and the Exeter Silver Cornet Band,
twenty-two pieces, J. Eastman Lovett, Leader,
played it in six-eight time with particularly ter-
rific effect. Plupy did not like to hear the band
play it. For it was the delicate combination of
the words and music that thrilled him. He lin-
gered thoughtfully over the words in one line —

“Mollie, darling, sweetest, dearest.”

How soft and tender the language of affection!

How far above and apart from the other girls did

the two superlatives place Mollie. Sweet and

dear other girls might be, but sweetest and dear-

est! Ah! There was a vast difference in the terms.
“Look up, Mollie, tell me this;

If you love me, Mollie, darling,
Always answer with a kiss.”

Plupy imagined Mollie looking up, bright, fresh,
innocent, with dewy eyes. It really was easy for

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 81

any one who knew Plupy to imagine that any
young lady, not built like a giraffe, must look up
in conversation with him, but Plupy never viewed
it in just that way.

And what an answer! What a complete and
satisfactory answer! No tiresome explanations,
no whys or wherefores, no uncertainty, no de-
lays — yes, just a bit of maidenly hesitation, to
make the answer more complete, and then —
and then —!!

Away with the Exeter Silver Cornet Band with
its twenty-two pieces, its J. Eastman Lovett,
Leader, and its dreadful

“Ooomp — tidderada, ooompta, ooompta —
Ooomp — tidderada, ooompta, ooompta” —

to express a sentiment so delicate and thrilling
as this!

Plupy smiled with derision when he thought
of his petty ambition to become a bandman,
a professional cornet-player. Somewhere, — it
was in the Bible, he thought, — he had read of
“sounding brass and tinkling cymbals.” That
expressed it perfectly. No language could do it a
fuller measure of justice.

But the viol and the lute — probably meaning
the flute and the guitar, as lute was spelled so
much like flute that it must really mean the
_ same — were the instruments of love and moon-

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82 THE YOUTH PLUPY

light, and sweet sorrows and blissful delights.
And so Plupy daily practiced on his pitiful little
instrument and made such progress that in a
very short time he could play several inoffensive
little tunes without whistling the high tones.

One memorable night, when he brought the
flute out for a little practice with his sister Cele,
who was the recognized harpsichord artiste of the
family, it was found that the instrument was
pitched in a key so far removed from its natural
signature F, that his accompanist was compelled,
from motives of harmony, to play all of his ac-
companiments in six sharps. However, as she
was a natural accompanist, the rehearsal was a
complete success, and Plupy received many en-
comiums on his accomplishment.

It was quite evident that Plupy was gradually
relapsing into another attack of love’s intermit-
tent fever, to which he was particularly subject.
It might have been that the lad was lonesome,
because the defection of Pewt was at about this
time followed by Beany’s promotion from school
life. That plump and persevering youth had
finally prevailed upon his father to allow him to
enter the marts of local trade, and Beany, with
an eye for personal adornment, had chosen for
the theater of his mercantile operations the
ready-made-clothing store of the literary man.

Beany had been so long a part of Plupy’s

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 83

scheme of things that his sudden and quite com-
plete removal left a gap in his affections that
needed filling. The flute did something, but not
all; and Beany’s fun-making, irrésponsible nature
might have served the purpose of tiding Plupy
over another of these attacks, had he continued
to lead ascholastic career for a year or so longer.
But ambition, in the way of striped shirts and
collars, plated jewelry, lurid hosiery, independ-
ence, and four dollars a week, claimed him.

There is a tiny tragedy in the breaking of
school and boyhood friendships, or perhaps it
would be better to say, intimacies. Friends,
Plupy, Beany, and Pewt always remained, and
friends they are to-day, but from that day so
long ago when their trails separated, their in-
timate friendships ceased. Up to that time
they had fraternized, quarreled, and fought, like
real intimates, — the fights that, once over, ce-
mented their friendship still firmer. But from
that day they ceased to quarrel, they never
again fought, and that was a death-blow to
intimacy.

Plupy felt it. He experienced a vague, inter-
mittent unrest. He attributed it to other causes
than the defection of his former cronies, in fact
to the more serious events of the past few months.
And yet at times, when, with his hands clutch-
ing his throbbing temples, his legs wrapped in

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84 THE YOUTH PLUPY

pliant convolutions around the legs of his chair,
and his eyes riveted upon the pages of Allen and
Greenough’s Latin Grammar, he tried to pene-
trate the occult mysteries of an irregular verb,
he found himself many times harking back to the
days when he and his cronies were a tripartite
pest in the neighborhood, and when life was
glorious.

And then, to clear his brain and refresh his
mind, befogged by the intricacies and “no
thoroughfares” of the subjective preterit, he
would lay aside his book by the simple process of
hurling it violently across the room, and take from
his drawer his precious flute in F and painstak-
ingly tootle “Thou art gone from my gaze,” or
some simple ballad of the time, and his soul be-
came attuned to softer thoughts and sweet mel-
ancholy and — “Mollie, Darling.”

As I have remarked, Plupy was due for another
attack. Football was a thing of the past. Just
enough drizzly snow had fallen to spoil the skat-
ing and not enough to furnish sleighing or coast-
ing. In consequence ordinary preventives of the
fever and antidotes after the attack were lacking.

At this time Professor Lamprini, from a neigh-
boring city, came to Exeter in the interests of a
weekly clinic for the teaching of dancing and
deportment. There was need of it, a crying need.
Each knight who bought a season ticket for

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twelve lessons was entitled to invite a “‘fayer
ladye”’ without any expense to her.

Naturally Plupy aspired to be an attendant,
and was at once granted permission and the neces-
sary three dollars by his father. And naturally
he selected in anticipation the particular “‘fayer
ladye”’ he desired to take. Unhappily he at once
ran against a snag. For both of his older sisters
wanted to go and insisted that Harry should
take one of them each time, so, there —!

Plupy insisted that “no feller’’ wanted to take
his sister, and he was n’t intending to have them
hanging on to him, that he guessed he could see
them taking him anywhere if they had tickets.
Yes, he guessed he knew whom they would take.
Not him, anyway. He guessed he knew a thing
or two. He was n’t quite a fool, oh, no!

Whereupon the two young ladies laid the case
before their mother, who for her part did not
quite see why Plupy should object to taking his
sisters. Johnny Brown always took his.

‘Aw, Johnny Brown has to, that’s why,”
snarled Plupy.

“Well, other boys do,” insisted his mother
mildly.

“No feller ever wants to go anywhere with his
sister if he can help it, and can take any other
girl, and no girl ever will go with her brother if
she can get any other feller to go with her,” said

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86 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Plupy, with axiomatic exactness and the wis-
dom of experience.

“But the girls do want to go with you,” said
his mother.

“No, they don’t, neither,” insisted Plupy.

“We do, too,” said Keene emphatically. “If
any other fellows should invite us to-day, we
would n’t go with them, would we, Cele?”

Just what the result might. have been is not
known, for while the argument was on a ring of
the bell was heard and a small squabble arose
between the two younger children as to their
individual right of precedence in answering it,
and comparative harmony was restored by al-
lowing them both to go. Harmony I say, but
not quiet, as both children raced shrieking to the
door and nearly pulled the doorknob off in their
zeal of hospitality.

Somewhat to their surprise, but by no means to
their embarrassment, they confronted gigglingly
two very dapper and immature students of the
Academy, clad in lovely garments, and carrying,
as was the fashion of the day, wisplike canes of
natural wood highly shellacked and varnished.

Without an instant’s delay the two children
shrieked in unison, “Hooyerwantersee?”’

“What!” gasped the astonished students.

““Hooyerwantersee?”’ again shrieked the chil-
dren.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 87

**Oh, I understand, whom do we want to see,”
said one, staring at them as an entomologist
might stare at a rare bug. “We would like to see
Miss Celia and Miss Cornelia Shute. von you
see if they are at home?”

“We don’t havter see. We’ve just seen ’em.
They ’re down in the kitchen washin’ dishes,” said
Annie in a voice so shrill that it penetrated that
room and several hundred yards in each direction.

“Keene was n't,” shouted Frankie; “she was
sweepin’ down th’ cellar stairs.”

“She was n’t!” squealed Annie.

*“She was!” piped Frankie.

“No, sir!”

Yes, sir!”

“No, sir! !”

“Yes, sir!!!”

“No, siree! ! ! !’? yelled the children.

“Well, never mind what they are doing,” said
one of the students with a grin of appreciation.
“Tell them that Mr. McKee and Mr. Vance
wish to see them.”

With delightful emulation the two children
raced to the stairway, and leaning over the rail,
yelled, “Keene! Cele! hi! hi! Two students is
up here. Wantyer to c’mup!”

“Mctee has got some dwedful tight bwitches
on, tighter ’n Harry’s best ones!” shouted Frankie
in a voice that would have pierced a tomb.

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“Vance has got on a vest with cunnin’ little
dog’s heads on it, — a new one!” squealed An-
nie, thereby covering Mr. Vance with a mantle
of shame over this wide advertising of his sport-
ing vest. Mr. McKee, likewise red to the roots
of his light-colored hair, nervously tried to shrink
a bit so that his trousers might not look so ab-
normally tight.

Below in the kitchen and dining-room the two
girls were crimson with mortification and wrath.
“Mother!” gasped Keene, “can’t you make those
brats keep still? What will they think of us?”

‘And they have not invited them in,” wailed
Cele in a hoarse whisper, as she hurriedly re-
moved her apron and dried her hands on the
roller towel behind the door.

“Mother, you must go up, you must!” said
Keene, hastily smoothing her hair before the
small square glass, where her father habitually
shaved twice a week.

Mrs. Shute, who always looked trim and neat,
despite her never-ending household duties, oblig-
ingly went upstairs and appeared at the door
with the small gossips accompanying her, but
speechless at her stern command. At her appear-
ance, Mr. McKee and Mr. Vance, who were
young gentlemen, stood uncovered and _ prof-
fered their modest request to see the young
ladies.

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“Yes, surely, gentlemen, if you will come in
and wait a few minutes. My daughters have
not quite finished their work, but are nearly
through. Please excuse the children for not in-
viting you in. I think they were too anxious to
announce your presence, and — and” — here
she smiled delightfully — “to describe you so
that there might be no mistake. I hope that you
have small brothers and sisters. If so, you will
understand.”

“We both have, Mrs. Shute,” said the young
gentlemen, laughing in their turn and com-
pletely put at their ease by her tact and good
nature, as they followed her into the parlor and
sat down to wait.

In a short time the two young ladies appeared
with the air of having been reading Shakespeare
or doing tambour work or tatting, and the won-
dering little ones were compelled, much to their
dissatisfaction, to accompany their mother down-
stairs.

In a short time Keene reappeared in some
excitement and announced that the two young
gentlemen had invited them both to the danc-
ing-school and awaited with great anxiety her
mother’s verdict, whereupon that busy lady again
left her work and accompanied her daughter to
the parlor, where, after thoroughly going into
the matter, she consented upon certain reason-

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able provisions as to the time of departure and
particularly as to the time of arrival home.

Great was Plupy’s relief, when, at the close
of the call, the young men having taken their
departure with much courtesy, his mother and
sisters returned and Keene announced, with some
degree of sarcasm, that she and Cele had been
invited to the dancing-school and that they
didn’t need to go on his old ticket anyway, so,
there! — which pleased Plupy greatly, ordi-
narily so sensitive to her sharp sarcasms.

That evening, as soon as he had split his kin-
dling and brought in his wood and water, he some-
what timidly betook himself to Mollie’s house,
and after walking by her modest gate, which
seemed to him the grimmest portal that ever
was guarded by a hydra-headed monster, finally
mustered up courage to knock, and upon her
pleasant invitation entered, and in words that
came straight from his heart, but which seemed
to come alternately from the roof and the sub-
cellar, extended his invitation, which, after a
very short interview with “mother,” was gra-
ciously accepted, much to his delight.

Plupy marched home with all his troubles be-
hind him. True, his unruly voice was with him
still, but he had become accustomed to it, as one
becomes accustomed to a harelip or a goitre.
Besides, he knew it was but a temporary afflic-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 91

tion, whereas he knew that his feelings for Mollie
would last forever. All other loves had been foot-
less, rootless, and without substance. Mere will-
o’-the-wisps, flashing for a moment over the
muddy, boggy stretches of thanklessness and
inconstancy and going out forever. Yes, forever!
But this, ah! this was different. And he hastened
home to his chamber and taking up his flute, his
faithful confidant, blew into it the mellow, lilting
strains of “Mollie, Darling,” until his mother
warned him that it was time to go to bed.

And when he had fallen asleep thinking of
Mollie, Darling,” and suiting her many charms
to the words of the song, he dreamed, not of
Mollie, but of the brown-haired girl who had
passed forever out of his life. So perverse and
inexplicable are dreams.

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CHAPTER VII

Hark! how the minstrels ’gin to shrill aloud
The pipe, the taber, and the trembling crowd [fiddle]
But most of all the damsels do delight
And thereunto do dance and carol sweet.
SPENSER.

In looking back to that winter of his life Plupy is
inclined to believe that for a period of three
months he never enjoyed himself better. He
was, so to speak, launched into society. He was
in some small measure interested in his school
studies. He could hic — hec — hoc with the
best of them. He knew that

A — ab or abs — absque — de
Coram — palam — cum — ex — E
Sine — tenus — pro and pre
governed the ablative. At times he himself
found some difficulty in determining what the
ablative was in a given substantive, but having
finally determined it, he knew what governed it.
He also felt that he could quite appreciate
Ceesar’s feelings, so much did they resemble his,
when after many trials and battles he went into
winter quarters for rest and recreation —
“His rebus gestis, omni Gallia pacata — ‘
Dies quindecim supplicatio decreta est.”
Plupy felt that he had earned a good time, and,
indeed, to use a modern expression that would

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 93

not have been understood in those days, “Things
were breaking right for Plupy.”

When Thursday evening arrived, Plupy,
dressed in his blue cutaway coat, his pearl-gray
trousers, and his yellow-sewed shoes, strode with
much dignity to the residence of Mollie, and in
a very short time the street-lamps blinked haz-
ily upon a young couple, with linked arms, who
walked in a silence too deep for words, Plupy
thinking great thoughts, and instinctively trying
to suit his rangy gait to the short steps of his
diminutive partner, for, like the brown-haired
girl, Mollie was short and slight. ’I was ever
thus; sharp contrast lent fascination.

Arrived at the hall and divested, Plupy of his
coat and Mollie of her quilted jacket and hood,
they were separated, alas, by the width of the
hall, which seemed to Plupy a distance of about
eight miles or more, and, boys on one side and
girls on the other, were taught the steps, singly
and in unison. Plupy, who previously had ex-
perienced no especial difficulty in managing his
limbs, now appeared to have a much larger num-
ber of arms, legs, and feet than he knew what to
do with, and, when singled out by Professor
Lamprini to illustrate some difficult step, went
through the most grotesque contortions ever
seen, attracting universal attention and gen-
erous applause. During these enforced gymnas-

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tics Plupy decided that the width of the hall had
suddenly shrunk to about ten feet, and he felt the
eyes of every girl fastened on him with a twin-
kle of amusement. He decided that there were
some drawbacks to the pleasures of Terpsichore.

But it was delightful to see the grace with
which Mollie took her steps — that is, it would
have been delightful if some of the Academy
students had not taken so great an interest in
her. Confound them! Why did n’t they look at
the girls they brought, if indeed they were not
too mean to invite any!

After a half-hour’s practice in the steps, the
girls were told to sit down on the benches, and
the boys were taught to request the pleasure of a
dance after the gracefully polite method of Pro-
fessor Lamprini. Most of the boys made a very
faithful imitation, but Plupy, in spite of his zeal,
was so intensely and grotesquely awkward that
the professor spent a long time in drilling him.
Plupy’s improvement was not so marked as I
am sure it would have been had not Beany, who
was present in all the glories of a ready-made-
clothing-store outfit, secured something in the
nature of a watchman’s rattle, which, being oper-
ated coincidentally with Plupy’s low bow, made
a grisly creaking that led every one to believe
that Plupy’s spinal column needed oiling, and
caused prolonged laughter, which Professor

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 95

Lamprini vainly endeavored to still, and which
caused Plupy intense annoyance and mortifica-
tion.

They were then taught to take three steps to
the right and rise on their toes, three to the left,
ditto. Again Plupy gained unenviable distinc-
tion, for when he rose on his toes, his yellow-
sewed shoes resented the sudden strain on them
by prolonged and strident squeaks. Indeed, he
decided that dancing-school was not what it had
been represented, and he rather regretted his
three dollars. But the pleasure and pride of
walking home with Mollie, having waited to see
two or three fellows offer to escort her home
and get left at the post, more than made up
for the petty annoyances he had suffered at
the hands of students “and — and — er — shop-
boys.”

So Plupy, after leaving Mollie at her gate,
started for home in high spirits, where, mount-
ing to his chamber, forgetful of the hour, he took
his beloved flute from his drawer and blew a few
tentative tootles in preparation for more serious
work, when his father’s voice, in a tone of indig-
nant remonstrance, intimated that his continued
possession of that “‘cussed”’ flute depended on
the celerity with which Plupy “shut up”; where-
upon the music ceased abruptly and peace and
quietness stole over the neighborhood.

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During the week that ensued before the next
dancing-lesson, Plupy practiced his steps faith-
fully, and, mindful of his squeaky shoes, intro-
duced a little oil into their joints which rendered
them much less assertive, but unfortunately
dimmed the luster of the yellow threads — in
Plupy’s eyes their chief attraction. However, he
wisely concluded that one could not well have
everything in this world, and as he was learning
the steps, and a new tune on the flute, the future
seemed reasonably bright.

In spite of the manifold attractions of social
life he did not allow his school work to fall off,
and was keenly interested in Cesar’s campaign
against the Germans, whom he in sight trans-
lation aptly described (bellicosissimi Germant)
as “Germans with the largest and coarsest
stomachs possible,” amid the delighted laughter
of his classmates.

Ambition was beckoning Plupy: multiple,
hydra-headed, centipede-legged ambition. He
decided first to be a very distinguished musical
amateur on several instruments. Not a profes-
sional musician, but one who played for the
amusement of himself and his friends, and one
who could, when some professional was unable
to play a difficult selection in a manner to sat-
isfy a critical audience, take his instrument from
him and put him right. He imagined himself

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doing this before “Mollie, darling,” and a criti-
cal audience.

Then, while Pewt was slaking his artistic
thirst in a pail of fence paint or priming for
wagon wheels, and securing his material welfare
at two dollars and a quarter a day, — which he
believed was about three times as much as Pewt
received for skilled labor, — and while Beany
was cloying his modest ambition by selling col-
lars, neckties, underwear, brazen jewelry, and
other articles pertaining to a haberdashery shop,
he, Plupy, was advancing along educational
lines.

Why, Beany, if asked what a metacarpal was,
would think it was a sort of gold-fish; that is, if
he had any kind of idea about it. And Pewt —
well, Pewt was impossible. A good fellow enough,
but —

It was a curious state of affairs, for if Plupy
had known it, Beany and Pewt had precisely
the same idea of Plupy and of each other that
Plupy had of them: a good enough fellow, but —
well — ha!

Then he intended to develop his physical
strength to a hitherto unheard-of extent. And he
wished to do this quietly, unobtrusively, and
without the knowledge of any one. Then, when
an opportunity came, he might astonish people
by the quiet, modest performance of some tre-

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mendous task. He could see himself walking
down the main street some day, pleasantly ac-
costing his acquaintances. Suddenly a half-
dozen sailors from Portsmouth, drunk and dis-
orderly, pour out of a saloon, and come down
the street arm in arm, yelling, shouting, curs-
ing, and shouldering the peasantry off the side-
walk. The police are powerless. Already Bill
Thomas, one of the town roughs and bullies, has
been knocked down and thrown into the road
senseless.

The storekeepers and others rush into the
stores and lock their doors. It is as if a mad dog
were abroad. Plupy, alone, erect, unafraid,
comes up the sidewalk. “Hold! my good fellows,
what is this? You are annoying and terrorizing
our citizens!”

The sailors stop and gather round him. The
leader, a huge, brutal man, thrusts out his jaw.
“Shiver my tarry toplights. This dandy needs
a bath in the horse-trough.”’ \

Plupy smiles. “Gentlemen,” he says pleas-
antly, “I want no trouble with you. Only you
must behave while you are here.”

“Who will make us, you ——————?”
His words are unthinkable.

“T will if I must,” says Plupy, a steely glint
shining in his eyes.

The huge, brutal sailor flings himself forward.

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Thud! —he is down with the blood gushing
\~ from his nostrils. Another lunges for Plupy’s jaw.
Smack! — and he goes heels-over-head into the
gutter, where he lies quivering like a stricken ox.
The four others fling themselves on this youth.
Whack! Slam! Biff! Bang! Plop! It is over in
a moment. Ha! the officers, assured of no dan-
ger, are there. “Take them away, officers, and
see that they have proper care. I warned them.
If I am wanted you know where to find me.”

He walks quietly away, blowing on his knuckles
(every one in books blows on his knuckles after
a fight, but seldom does out of a book). While
walking quietly away,and blowing on hisknuckles,
Plupy meets Mollie, pale, wide-eyed, and fright-
ened.

‘Harry! Harry! I was so frightened! I thought
you would be killed! How could you do it?” she
pants.

Plupy smiles reassuringly, still blowing on his
knuckles, which are still red-hot, while he is
as cool as the proverbial cucumber. “A mere
nothing, Mollie. I am a little worried about the
big sailor. I am afraid I struck him a bit too
hard. You see, one cannot always measure his
blows when the circumstances require quick ac-
tion. I hope he is not seriously hurt.”

As they talk, Pewt and Beany timidly tiptoe
from a store and look up and down the street.

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Out of an alleyway several students steal, one
of them being the student who wanted to go
home from the dance with Mollie. She sees
him and a look of contempt comes over her
charming face.

Across the street stands the brown-haired girl.
She looks with an expression of haunting regret
on her face. Plupy sees her. “Ha! It is too late,
and it was her fault. At all events, there is noth-
ing to laugh at now.”

In this way does Plupy enjoy himself and flat-
ter his egoism. Asinine? Perhaps. Childish?
To be sure. Idiotic? By no means. At least I
hope not, for who of us at some time has not done
the same?

Plupy goes with Mollie to the dancing-school
the next week. This night they are again drilled
in steps, and Plupy acquits himself in a con-
scientious if not graceful manner. They are ini-
tiated into the mysteries of Lady Washington’s
reel. At the end of the evening Plupy again
lingers in the dressing-room, and peeps through
the crack in the door, where he delightedly wit-
nesses the confusion of three students who in suc-
cession offer their services to escort Mollie home.

As he and the young lady walk away from
the hall Mollie takes occasion mildly to object
to this method as discourteous to these young
men.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 101

“What of it?” asks Plupy. “They are only
“stewdcats.’”

“* But they are pleasant and gentlemanly, and
after I have refused to go home with them a few
more times I can’t blame them if they do not ask
me to dance any more.”

“What if they don’t? You can dance with me,
can’t you?” said Plupy reassuringly.

“Why, yes, of course. But then I don’t want
to dance always with you,” she replied.

“Why not? I always want to dance with you,
don’t I?” protested Plupy.

“You are certainly very silly, if you always
wish to dance with me, or always expect me to
dance with you. Why, of course we must n’t
do that. People will surely think we are geese,”
she said with a laugh.

“T don’t care what people think,” said Plupy
grimly.

“Well, I do,” she answered rather emphati-
cally for a girl who in the song was “dearest”
and “sweetest.”

“Perhaps you think they will talk if I see you
home so often,” grumbled Plupy with marked
pessimism.

‘There is no sense in being silly about it,”’ she
said tartly.

Plupy suddenly became very dignified, and a
silence of unplumbable depth enfolded them.

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“Good-night!” gloomed Plupy in a cavernous
bass. Luckily his voice held true. i

“‘Good-night,” she responded in a voice that
implied mental reservations as to Plupy’s desir-
ability as a social equal.

The door slammed, and Plupy, with a resent-
ful glare, strode moodily home.

“Gosh darn it!!”? What had he done to be
treated that way?

That night Plupy did not play his flute. He
did not even take it from its drawer and hold it
in position and twiddle his fingers. He forgot
all about it. He was thinking of more serious,
more important things. He began to realize that
he could n’t tyrannize over this girl any more
than he had been able to tame the brown-haired
girl.

Girls were queer anyway. A fellow never could
tell just what they would do or say under any
given circumstances. They were selfish. There
could be no reasonable doubt of that; while as
a general proposition boys were generous and
unselfish. His own case was a good illustration.
He was willing, yes, anxious to give every dance
to her, and not to dance with any other girl. In
fact, he was so willing that he really did not
want to dance with any other girl. If that was n’t
a case of unselfishness, he would like to see one,
that was all.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 103_

On the other hand, Mollie not only did not
want to dance all the dances with him, but
wanted to dance some of them with other fel-
lows. If that did not look like selfishness, he for
his part did not know what it did look like.

That was the difference between girls and
boys, and always had been. A difference not
very complimentary to girls, to say the least.
But Plupy was learning something through ad-
versity. He had received a few sharp raps on his
mental shins, so to speak, and was beginning to
derive some benefit from the process. So he de-
cided that he would overlook Mollie’s lack of
gratitude and act the gentleman, and meeting
her on the street the next morning he spoke
pleasantly and referred most courteously to the
good time they had at the dancing-class the
night before.

Mollie was a little surprised at this, considering
his colossal dignity of the night before when he left
her at her gate, but as she was an extremely good-
natured, affable girl, she met him halfway, and
when Plupy left her at the corner on his way to
school, all unpleasant memories were, at least tem-
porarily, effaced.

That night he triumphantly proved that

“The square of the hypothenuse of a right-angled
triangle is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two
sides.”

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and learned to play that delightful and very ap-
propriate ballad, “If ever I cease to love,”’ before
his father’s voice cut short his practice. The old
gentleman had the bad taste to prefer his daugh-
ters’ voices in duets to his son’s solo performance
on the flute. However, Plupy was in so good a
humor with the world that he cheerfully laid
down his flute and commenced serious consid-
eration of Cesar’s disputes with the Germans,
which occupied him until bedtime, undisturbed .
by the sound of girlish voices in thirds from the
parlor below.

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CHAPTER VIII

The way was long, the wind was cold
The minstrel was infirm and old.
Scorr.

On Tuesday of the next week the Mendelssohn
Quintette Club was to give a concert in the
Town Hall. Plupy was to attend, as were his
sisters and aunt. He had half intended to invite
Mollie, but he was afraid she might talk rather
than listen, and possibly spoil his enjoyment of
the concert. And so he decided to go alone, gener-
ous and self-sacrificing youth that he was. He
had read the advertisement in the local paper and
burned to hear Rietzel play the flute.

Those of us who remember the concerts of
this Club, at that time with Schultz and Meisel,
violins; Rietzel or Beyer, flute; Tom Ryan,
clarinet; and Fries, cello, can imagine the pleas-
ure such a concert would give to a youth with
a passion for music. And you may be sure that
Plupy was early in the front seat with his eyes
devouring the five chairs in place by the five
japanned music-racks.

It was the first time Suppé’s “‘ Poet and Peasant
Overture” had been played in Exeter, and Plupy
was in a state of trance. It seemed to him that
he had never listened to such divine strains.

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And when the flute-player stood out to play his
solo, using a silver Boehm flute, the first that
Plupy had ever seen, Plupy’s eyes nearly dropped
out with admiration, reverence, and wonder. He
thought if he ever could hope to play such music,
he would be perfectly happy, perfectly satisfied.
He had forgotten all about Mollie, he had for-
gotten Cesar, everything.

The first part of the programme ended with a
Strauss waltz, but even then he did not think of
Mollie, but only of the silver flute and the clari-
net, the tone of which, to his unbounded amaze-
ment, was as rich and smooth as the high tones
of the ’cello, and did not quack or squeal. Then
there was the intermission of fifteen minutes
during which the musicians, godlike, gifted
creatures, strolled into the anterooms, and the
people turned in their seats and chatted and
gossiped about the music and a few other topics.

By degrees, Plupy came out of his daze and
began to look about him. Suddenly he saw some-
thing that brought him up with a start, and he
promptly forgot the musicians and the music.
Even the silver flute disappeared from his
thoughts as if it had never been. Three rows to
the rear, on the opposite side of the aisle in which
his seat was located, sat Mollie with one of those
infernal Academy students, Thomaston, an ex-
tremely handsome, well-dressed Middler.

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Plupy felt for a moment as if his vitals had
suddenly left him. He stared at the pair stupidly.
Mollie caught his eye, bowed and smiled. Plupy,
pulling himself together desperately, gave a nod
and a most ghastly smile. Thomaston smiled
and nodded. Plupy felt sure he could see a mock-
ing twinkle in his eyes. He clinched his hands,
swallowed once or twice, then turned and some-
what ostentatiously ran over his programme.
Two seats to his left was a girl he thought he
knew. She was squint-eyed and pimply. He
leaned forward and called attention to one of
the numbers. She answered him pleasantly, and
in a moment they were talking animatedly.

Mollie saw him, and smiled to herself. Plupy
redoubled his attentions to the girl at his left.
At his request she changed seats with the man at
her right. Plupy put his arm protectingly over
the back of the settee and talked with great ear-
nestness, and laughed fatuously. Poor girl, it
was a new experience for her. She responded al-
most too warmly. Plupy leaned over her with
ostentatious gallantry. He hoped Mollie would
see and be impressed. Mollie did see and was
impressed, but not in the way Plupy wished or
expected. In fact she was so much impressed that
she had to stuff her handkerchief into her mouth
to keep from giggling aloud. Mollie was a very
bright girl and had a strong sense of humor. In

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those traits she resembled the brown-haired girl.
But unlike the brown-haired girl she could con-
trol her laughter, even if she had to use a tightly
stuffed handkerchief as an extinguisher. The
brown-haired girl could not, which was unfortu-
nate, at least for Plupy.

And Mollie did not care a hoot for Plupy, —
not one single, unostentatious hoot; not the
mildest, most superlatively pianissimo hoot im-
aginable, — while the brown-haired girl had really
liked him. How she could have liked him is
one of those inexplicable. mysteries that baffle
science.

The intermission was over; the musicians
strolled back to their seats. The clarinet sounded
A and the chirping and twittering of the instru-
ments began, as strings were tightened and
tubes warmed to pitch. A moment’s pause, with
instruments in position, a nod from the concert
master and they were off. Plupy’s attitude re-
laxed. He felt better; he had shown his inde-
pendence; he could still enjoy music. He felt a
warm feeling of gratitude toward the girl at his
left. She had helped him, had helped him much.
His amour propre had been smoothed down.

The music was delightful. Not quite so absorb-
ing as it had been before the intermission. Per-
haps its charm of novelty had waned. Perhaps
the thought that Mollie, back there with that con-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 109

founded student, was listening to the music may
have cribbed and confined Plupy’s boundless en-
joyment. Perhaps — and Plupy glowed at the
thought — Mollie might not be so thoroughly
wrapped up in the music since she had seen
Plupy with the new girl. Plupy would show her.
And straightway Plupy began again thoroughly
to enjoy the music, and imagined himself sitting
in the chair of the flutist, playing roulades of
melody upon his little, wooden, four-keyed flute
in F better even than the gifted Rietzel or Beyer
or whatever might be the name of the man with
the silver Boehm.

The last sustained chord had ceased with the
even, accurate snap of the professional. The au-
dience was rising, stretching, chatting, and put-
ting on its wraps, when Plupy came out of
the daze into which the “‘Siege of Corinth,” by
Rossini, had plunged him. Already the young
lady had risen and with her father and mother
was making ready to leave the hall. She turned
to Plupy and said, “I’m afraid I must say good-
night.”

Out of the corner of his eye Plupy could see
Mollie looking at him quizzically. He averted
his eyes. A brilliant idea struck him, as he leaned
toward his neighbor.

“Don’t you think it much too early to say
good-night?” he asked, with quitea killing glance.

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“Why, I don’t know,” she replied dubiously;

“‘the concert is over and there does n’t seem to
“be anything more to do but to go home.”

“That is the next thing to do, I have no
doubt,” said Plupy; “but if I might have the
pleasure of seeing you home, we would not have
to say good-night quite so early.”

“Why, I was intending to ride home with
father and mother. It is rather far to walk,
isn’t it, father?”’ she asked, turning to her father,
a large, jolly-looking man in the middle thirties.

‘““ Whassat, m’ dear?” he asked.

“Why, Mr. Shute here was kind enough to ask
to see me home. This is Mr. Shute,” she said
simply; and Plupy put out his hand.

““H’m, yes, George Shute’s boy? Well, I’m
glad to know you,” said her father, pumping
Plupy’s arm up and down, and squeezing the
blood, not merely out of that youth’s crushed
fingers, but out of his entire forearm. ‘‘Don’t
favor your father overmuch; he was about as
lively and husky a lad when he was your age as
one could find in a day’s trip. So you want to see
my gal home, hey?” he continued.

“Why, yes, I thought it was a little early to
say good-night,” said Plupy, thinking his phrase
good enough to repeat.

“Wal, young man, if you walk home with my
gal, it will be either pretty late to-night, or pretty

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 111

airly to-morrer when you say good-night, unless
you are a good walker. S’pose you know we live
a pretty tidy distance down th’ rud?”’

“*T’m sure itwon’t be at all too far,” said Plupy,
very elegantly.

‘Wal, ma and me can stan’ it, if you can. But
we shan’t set up fer ye none to speak,” he said
breezily, with a loud laugh. “C’m on, ma, we’ll
be sensible ’n’ ride. We'll say good-night now,
even if it is a leetle airly.”” And he laughed and
moved off with ma, while Plupy, after gallantly
helping the young lady on with her scarf, offered
his arm and strode out of the hall briskly.

The moon was high and the snow lay white in
its silvery radiance. Plupy, who knew nothing
about the location of her home, found to his de-
light that in order to reach it he had to pass
Mollie’s house. He looked about for her and saw
her with Thomaston just crossing the road at
the north of the Hall. Quickly taking the front
crossing, he turned down by the Lawrence house
and got ahead of them.

Then he walked rather slowly, so that Mollie
and her escort might have no difficulty in keeping
within sight and hearing, and began to talk and
laugh with the utmost enjoyment. Never had
he been so witty, or such a dashing, dangerous,
devil-may-care fellow.

The young lady was delighted, and her keen

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112 THE YOUTH PLUPY

appreciation of his witty sallies stimulated him
to fresh efforts. Their laughter rang out clearly
in the crisp air. It was just as well that Mollie
should understand that Plupy could have a de-
lightful time in the society of another girl. The
sooner that idea was firmly fixed in her mind, the
better. Plupy guessed that she would be a little
more circumspect in the future.

They passed Mollie’s house and strolled along
amid laugh, quip, and jest. For a half mile
farther they walked, and Plupy began to wonder
in what town she lived, and sought tactfully to
satisfy his curiosity without seeming unduly
anxious. He still felt very kindly toward the
girl.

“This is the house, is it not?” he said, stop-
ping in front of a farmhouse.

“Oh, no, it is lots farther than this. Don’t you
wish you had n’t come?” she giggled archly.

“Well, I should say not,” said Plupy with
well-simulated enthusiasm; “I hope it is miles.”

The girl giggled again delightedly. “Do you
know,” she continued timidly, “I always wanted
to know you.”

“Well, I’m sure I’ve always felt that way about
you,” said Plupy, lying fearsomely, and thinking
that here was a mighty sensible girl who knew
a thing or two. “If it wasn’t for that squint,
I don’t know — after all — but —” he thought.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 113

Another half-mile was passed. Plupy shivered.
It was really pretty sharp and they had come
at a very slow pace, suitable to summer breezes
and roses and moonlight and the scent of new-
mown hay. “Are you cold?”’ he queried.

“Not at all. As warm as toast,” she replied.

Plupy spoke of the music and began to whistle
a lively march. “Hi there!” he cried, “‘keep
step.” And with rare presence of mind he swung
her into marching step. She laughed and en-
tered into the idea with abandon. Plupy was de-
lighted; they were now making good progress.
“But for thunder’s sake, where does this girl
live?” he thought to himself.

They had completed another mile, and in the
distance the ten o’clock bell struck faint but
clear. “‘Gosh!” thought Plupy, “what will they
think?”

“Now let’s try a quickstep,” said Plupy, and
he whistled the “Skidmore Guards” in double
time until they nearly had to run to keep step.
Another half-mile and Plupy was beginning to
get bored. It was difficult to maintain his as-
sumed cheerfulness and his pucker. His lips were
beginning to tire, and for the first time in his
life whistling became a task.

Horrid thought! Her father said it would be
early in the morning before they would say good-
night. Where in thunder did this girl live? Would

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114 THE YOUTH PLUPY

they have to walk all night, and talk like darned
fools and — and — er — whistle?

Fortunately at this point they arrived at a neat
white house, with huge barns and outhouses, and
she said, “Here we are,” regretfully, so Plupy
thought.

“Oh, this is your house,” said Plupy in feigned
regret. “Why, it has n’t seemed a bit long!”

Reckless Plupy, but lightning seldom strikes
one dead in midwinter.

““Won’t you come in?” she said politely.

“No, thank you, I’ve got some Latin and
geometry to learn to-night, and it is late,” said
Plupy grandly.

“Good-night; I’ve had a very pleasant eve-
ning,” she murmured.

“‘Good-night,” said Plupy, standing at atten-
tion while she entered the house and closed the
door. Then he drew a long breath, turned, and
with rapid and far-reaching strides he commenced
to retrace the three miles that separated him
from his indignant and fuming father, sitting in
his easy-chair by the glowing coal stove, wonder-
ing where in thunder that “cussed” boy was at
that time of night?

Plupy was a great traveler and he made rapid
progress, but it seemed to him that never were
miles longer or cold more piercing or moon-
light more glaring than on this return trip. It

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 115

was striking twelve when he came in sight of
Mollie’s house, and as he passed it without a
glance, a chamber window opened and a clear,
sweet voice rang out —

“Good-night, Harry; did you have a nice
walk?”? —a peal of girlish laughter and then the
groan of the closing sash.

Plupy flushed. Confound her! She had sat up
for two hours just to say this to him. Well, for
his part he hoped she had got a good cold out of
it. At five minutes after twelve Plupy hurried
up the steps of his home, and entered the sitting-
room, where, as he feared, sat his father, a
frowning Jove, ready to mete out judgment, but
whether justice or not Plupy was uncertain.

The old gentleman had evidently been sound
asleep, but had awakened in time to assume a
fierce judicial, or rather prosecuting-attorney,
glance at his shrinking son.

“Well, where in thunder have you been at this
time of night, sir?” he demanded.

“I —I could n’t help it, father. I asked a girl
to let me go home with her, and s’posed she lived
in Exeter, but she did n’t,”’ he explained.

‘Did n’t live in Exeter! Where in blazes did
she live?” gasped his astonished father.

‘Halfway to Hampton Village,” replied his son.

‘Well, did n’t you know any more than to ask
a girl like that?” he asked impatiently.

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116 THE YOUTH PLUPY

““Well, father, I sat next to her and her father,
and he said he knew you, and that you were the
liveliest boy and the huskiest one could find in a
day’s trip —” began Plupy when his father in-
terrupted him.

“Who was he? What was his name?”

“Mr. Harriman. He said he knew you.”

“Oh, yes; Bill Harriman; I know him,” replied
the old gentleman, much gratified.

Then Plupy, much relieved by his father’s
change of base, told his experience to that sym-
pathetic veteran, who roared with laughter as
his son explained the ingenious duplicity with
which he beguiled her into rapid pedestrianism.

Then, having seen that his son was thor-
oughly warmed, he brought out a quarter of a
mince pie, which Plupy’s mother had left for him,
and which Plupy ate with vast content and en-
joyment. He then climbed to his chamber and,
pulling off his clothes, crawled into his bed and
fell at once into a deep and dreamless sleep.

The next morning he overslept, and the family
were at breakfast when he came downstairs. As
he entered the dining-room, Keene, assuming a
horrible squint by looking with both eyes at the
tip of her nose, said in a nasal, high-pitched
voice, —

“Wal, yeou, I callate yeou hed a tolerble right
smart of a time, hey?”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 117

Plupy flushed angrily. ‘Well,’ he snapped,
“she got some one to go home with her, and
that’s more’n you did.”

“Huh! I guess she did n’t get much anyway,
even —”

““Cornelia,” said her mother quietly, “you
may do the dishes alone this morning. Celia may
be excused.”

And “Cornelia” sunk her teeth viciously into
her muffin as if it were alive and suffering, while
Plupy smiled and began his breakfast with an
appetite undisturbed by midnight mince pie.

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CHAPTER IX

One inch of joy surmounts of grief a span
Because to laugh is proper to the man.
RaBE.als.

THE next two days passed in comparative peace
and quietness for the long-legged youth. He
developed his muscle by sawing wood, a form of
exercise particularly repugnant to him, as he
never became sufficiently expert to saw a straight
cut. In consequence the saw would bind and
stick fast at unexpected times which resulted
either in a severe bump on his breast-bone with
the frame of the saw when it stuck in the down
stroke, or a jerk that nearly tore his arms out of
their sockets when it balked on the reverse.

He also split and piled the wood, which was a
far pleasanter task, as was shoveling snow-paths.
Cesar he found almost as difficult a job as wood-
sawing; he was racking his brain to understand
the wonderful mechanism of the famous bridge
built over the Rhine with its “tigna bina ses-
quipedalia,” its “trabes bipedalia,” and other
dreadful things that poor Plupy could not make
head or tail of. When he came to the word
**fistucis,”’ he brightened up a bit, as he naturally
thought it meant “fisticuffs,” and supposed it

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 119

heralded a fight of some sort, to read of which
gave him genuine pleasure.

By the side of this dreadful bridge, geometry
seemed a pastime, and in odd moments at home
he exchanged mutual aspersions and recrimina-
tions with his lively sister Keene, who professed
to consider him very raw and ill-bred, which
cheered him up amazingly.

When Thursday came he was rather uncertain
as to the manner in which Mollie would receive
him. But feeling it his duty, as it was his pleas-
ure, to escort the young lady to the dancing-
school, he decided to go to her house as usual,
only a trifle late in order that she might become
uneasy at his tardiness and begin to appreciate
him the more.

In some way it did not turn out just as he ex-
pected, for when he called for her a full quarter
of an hour later than his usual time, he found her
not only dressed and waiting for him, but some-
what tart in her greeting. Taking this as evi-
dence that she really would have been heart-
broken had he not arrived, Plupy assumed the
lazily affable blasé air of the superior man of the
world, as one who viewed her impatience with
the good-natured tolerance of one to whom
dancing-school was “‘rawther a demned bore,
doncherknow.”

Mollie bit her lip with vexation, but managed

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to keep him at a sort of hand-gallop on their way
to the hall, on entering which her good nature
‘at once returned, although there was a light in
her eyes that boded no good to our man of the
world.

That evening they were taught the sensuous
measures of ‘‘La Varsouvienne,” a most fasci-
nating round dance, a real exotic of that time.
Plupy was charmed by the characteristic music
that illustrated this dance, which was as follows:
Te — doodle — iddle — oodle — iddle — oodle — iddle — oo
Tu — de — doodedoo

Te — doodle — iddle — oodle — iddle — oodle — iddle — oo
Tu — de — doodedoo.

Now, any one with the slightest appreciation of
really good music can see at once that this par-
ticular selection was indeed a dance classic and
clearly in the same class as Boccherini’s and
Beethoven’s minuets.

Each male grasped his partner firmly about
the waist, whirled for two measures, then dropped
her hand, pointed his toe gracefully, re-clasped
and whirled, and so on to the end of the dance.
Plupy, having a nature attuned to rhythm, had
no difficulty in learning the step, and perhaps for
the first time was an endurable partner.

As soon as this dance was over, Professor
Lamprini announced a lesson in “‘Lady Wash-
ington’s Reel,” a kind of dance that seemed to

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 121

Plupy analogous to a difficult problem in geom-
etry. Consequently he was annoyed to see a
cheeky, immature Junior select Mollie, on whom
Plupy had relied as a sort of crib, tutor, or guide
to pilot him through the intricacies and mazes of
this difficult dance.

Plupy tried for another partner, but was too
late, and found himself alone on the side of the
hall, where he assumed an easy posture as of
one who was vastly relieved of the trouble of
dancing. But his heart burned within him, and
so to even matters with this young lady he took
the next dance with her, excused himself for a
moment, went to the dressing-room, to loiter there
until the dance commenced, when he intended
to dash out with a look of annoyance, and feign
great regret at depriving her of a dance.

Plupy considered this a very Mephistophelian
touch of left-handed diplomacy, and while wait-
ing in the dressing-room exulted in his smart
trick. But when, hearing the music commence,
he assumed his look of annoyance and bounded
forth, he was amazed and chagrined to find
Mollie dancing in a set with Thomaston, who had
immediately seized upon the opportunity of se-
curing an attractive partner.

Plupy retired to the dressing-room in a state
of sulks and communed with himself bitterly.
Gosh hang it! What was the matter with things

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anyway? Why did all these things happen to him?
What had he done? Was that the way a fellow
got treated after all he had done for that girl?
He had stood enough of it. Some one was going
to get punched, that was all.

The evening wore on. Plupy returned to the
floor and danced, painstakingly and as a con-
scientious pupil. They had returned to the
Varsouvienne, and Plupy, dancing rhythmically
with Mollie, began to feel a glow at his heart.
After all what was the use of fretting! A fellow
might as well be good-natured. Things would
turn out all right.

Professor Lamprini played faster and encour-
aged the dancers with stimulating words. The
dancers fairly flew. Plupy and Mollie were alone
in the middle of the hall, the other couples cir-
cling on the sides and ends as if centrifugal force
had flung them there. Plupy and Mollie pointed

“Tu — de — doodedoo” —

Alas! Plupy’s foot slipped and for a moment he
balanced on one heel with the other leg elevated
at a dizzy height. With the instinct of the drown-
ing man who clutches at a straw, Plupy gave a
wild and frenzied claw for the nearest support,
and found it — not a straw but Mollie. For a
moment they clung to each other like wrestlers,
and then fell on the back of their necks with heels

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| an HT

iI

AND THEN FELL ON THE BACK OF THEIR NECKS

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 123

aloft, a grotesque mélange of silken ankles, yellow
sewed shoes, dainty slippers, pearl-gray trousers,
and white petticoats.

The dance stopped; a dozen hands assisted
Mollie to rise, while Plupy heaved himself to his
feet. Mollie was very angry, and perhaps with-
out much reason. Others had fallen, had laughed,
and had been laughed at. To Plupy’s abashed
apologies she returned no answer beyond a glare
that had a tendency to curdle the blood in his
veins, and thanking her rescuers, she hastened
to the dressing-room. The evening was over.

Plupy retired to his dressing-room. He did not
know just what to do. He slowly put on his over-
coat and slowly went out into the hall. He waited
a long time. Young girls, hooded and warmly
wrapped, tripped gayly out of the dressing-room,
deftly slipped their red-mittened hands under the
arms of their respective escorts, and walked
away. Two by two they filtered out, leaving
Plupy alone with the janitor.

“Wal, young feller, I gotter shet up. That
’ere gal o’ yourn went off with a student chap
more’n twenty minutes ago.”

Plupy seethed with anger. This was the end
of Mollie, but not of the student. Plupy had said
some one would get punched. Some one would.
That was all. Let’s see; if Plupy hurried he would
meet Thomaston about opposite Ike Shute’s.

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Plupy hurried across the bridge and up the hill.
The moon had arisen and it was light enough for
his fell purpose. He knew he was in for a tough
tussle, but he felt that the right was on his side,
and he felt that if might makes right, the con-
verse should be equally true. He was cool, but
tense, and grimly considered his plan of attack.
It would be open and aboveboard. Nothing un-
derhanded about it. ‘He would give the student
a chance to shed his overcoat, and his jacket, if he
wished. For his part he would merely remove his
overcoat, tuck up his sleeves at the wrists, and as
sang the worthies of old —

“Again to the battle, Achaians,
Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance.”

He decided to feint and draw his opponent’s left
if possible, and then to cross-counter heavily.
That would do for a beginning. Then to get into
close quarters and fib him heavily on the “conk”
and tap his claret. Then, when he came up
groggy, to get in a solid left on the “beezer,” and
that would probably end the thing. If not, he
would get his head in chancery and give him
pepper until he hollered “enough.” It was per-
fectly simple.

Thus mused Plupy as he drew near the battle-
field. The street was very quiet. Scarcely a light
showed. Where was Thomaston? Ha! —he

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 125

knew. She had invited him in. Well, so much
the better. He would pretend not to hear him
when he hollered “‘enough,” and give him four or
five more good ones for that. Oh, he could wait.
He was in no hurry.

Suddenly a door opened, the sound of voices,
good-nights, laughter. The door slammed, and
down the steps came Plupy’s victim. He drew
near. Plupy gasped. Instead of Thomaston it
was the little Junior, Willoughby. Suddenly a
wave of fury rushed over Plupy. What of it?
Even if he could n’t fight him, he could roll him
in a snowdrift, fill his neck with snow, wash his
face.

The little chap came up briskly. “Hello,” he
said pleasantly, “going my way?”

“No, you little runt of a ‘stewdcat,’ I’m not.
But you are just the fellow I want to see, all the
same,” snarled Plupy.

The little student opened his eyes wide. “Are
you joking?” he inquired.

“You'll find it no joke,” said Plupy, ad-
vancing.

“TI say now, keep off; what have I done?”
shouted the boy, seeing that his long-legged an-
tagonist meant mischief.

“Never mind what you’ve done; just see what
I’m going to do to you,” hissed Plupy, seizing
the little fellow roughly.

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The boy struggled and twisted, but Plupy
swung him round and dashed him head first into
a drift. The victim struggled to his feet to be
seized again and dashed down a second time into
a drift. Again he struggled to his feet without a
whimper, and faced his angry assailant. The
moonlight fell on his face. It was pale and quiver-
ing, and tears were in his eyes, but he did not
utter a sound. It was pitiful. Plupy stopped;
his arms fell at his sides; his rage cooled, and in
its place came a spasm of pity that wrenched his
heart.

“Say, I don’t know what got into me; I ought
to be shot,” he said. “I —I beg your pardon.
Let me brush you off.”

The little chap forced back his tears. “‘ What
did you do it for? What have I done?” he asked.

“Nothing; only I made a laughin’-stock of
myself at the dance, and every one laughed, and
you did, and — and — er —”’ stammered Plupy,
brushing frantically, — “‘and I’d give a million
dollars if I had n’t hit you.”

The little chap started to laugh. “‘ Well, I fell
down twice and every one laughed at me, but I
did n’t want to punch any one,” he said naively.

Plupy had finished brushing him, had picked
up his cap, carefully shaken out the snow, and
had given it to him. But still the momentary
glance of the frightened, twisted little face bored

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 127

into his heart like an auger. He was in a mood for
any expiation.

‘All right, now, are you, Willoughby?” he said
gruffly, to hide his emotion.

“Yes, I’m all right now, thank you,” said the
little chap cheerfully.

“Well, there’s just one thing I want you to
do to make me feel right,” said Plupy.

“What is that?” asked the boy.

“T am goin’ to put my hands behind me and I
want you to give mea punch for all you are worth,
straight in the mouth.”

“Gosh, no! I ain’t going to punch you. It’s
all right now,”’ protested the boy.

“No, it is n’t all right, and it won’t be all right.
I shan’t sleep a wink to-night if you don’t,” said
Plupy earnestly. “Right spang on the mouth now,
as hard as you can let drive.”

‘But I won’t do it,” insisted the boy.

“Look here, Willoughby, first I want to tell
you this. I thought I was goin’ to meet Thomas-
ton. That’s what I came here for, and when I
found it was you I lost my temper.”

“Golly!” said the little chap; “you would n’t
have slammed him round as you did me. I’m
glad it was me.”

“Why should you wish that? It would have
served me right to have got a thunderin’ good

999

lickin’,” said Plupy.

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“Because,” said the little Junior, “I think you
are a pretty good feller and I kinder like you.”

“Well, I’m glad of that. Now, come on, paste
me a good one on the mouth,” insisted Plupy.

“No, I can’t do it,” said the boy.

“Tf you don’t I’ll surely lick you. I can do that,
you know,” threatened Plupy.

“Do you mean it?” asked the little Junior.

“T do,” affirmed Plupy stoutly.

“Can’t I hit you somewhere else?”

“No! Right on the mouth, and as hard as you
can lam it.”

*“Are you ready?”

“Yes, let her go.”

Smack!

Plupy blinked. His mouth seemed like a puff-
ball.

“Gosh!” he said; “that was a ring-tailed
peeler.””

“It’s bleedin’.”

“Let her bleed,” said Plupy, gingerly feeling it.

Digitized by Microsoft®
CHAPTER XI

For ye have seen on many a toilsome day,

How sad the ruthless work of war appears;

Seen anger furious in the battle’s bray

And Mars exulting in abundant tears.

TyYRT2Uvs.

““Wauat didjer want me to hit you on the mouth
for? If I had hit you on the forehead, it would n’t
have hurt you much or swelled it up,” said the
little Junior.

“Well, I’ll tell you,” said Plupy judicially.
“TI did a pretty mean thing, hittin’ a fellow as
small as you, and for nothin’, and I wanted the
meanest thing that could happen to me to hap-
pen. I’m crazy about playin’ the flute and to
play a flute you’ve got to have a good lip. You
can’t make a single toot with a cut or a swelled
lip. Now I’ve got both and it will be a month,
p’r’aps, before I can play a note. See, I can’t
even whistle.” And Plupy, to prove his state-
ment, puckered up his swollen mouth and failed
to make a single pipe.

“By Time!” said the little chap,“ that’s pretty
tough. I wish I hadn’t hit you. D’ye s’pose
’t will last as long as that?”

“Dunno,” said Plupy blithely. “‘Hope so; it
will serve me right.”

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“But can’t you do anything on the flute for a
month?”

“Oh, yes; I can take it up and hold it in posi-
tion and blow into it and work my fingers, and
I can tell whether the tune is right. There’s
some fun in that,” said Plupy cheerfully. “Well,
let’s go home. Sure you ain’t mad?”

“Gosh! no; not with you. I’m mad at myself
at hitting you such a crack,” said the boy.

“Tt was an old lambinger, for sure,” replied
Plupy genially.

And the two lads, now firm friends, started
down the street side by side, each with a warm
glow in his heart.

When Plupy went to his room that night he
took up his flute and tried it. Nothing but a hiss-
ing breath. He played, in dumb show, one of his
repertoire. Not quite in dumb show, for he
could tell the difference of the tones in the hollow,
muffled breath. He could at least have some fun,
as soon as the cut healed. Just now it stung out-
rageously and made the water come to his eyes.
Slowly he undressed and crawled into bed. As
he lay there the events of the evening went troop-
ing through his mind. His fall, Mollie’s anger,
the laughter of the dancers, the — the — he was
almost off when the memory of the frightened,
tearful little face came to him. He turned un-
easily, and a wave of pity wrenched his heart

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 131

again. Then he thought of the blow, the cut lip,
and the loss of his pleasant flute-playing for so
long, and his heart grew light. He had again
made himself ridiculous, he had a second time lost
his girl, but there was a glow at his heart, for he
had gained a friend, and he drifted away happily.

The next morning at breakfast his swollen lip
was at once the topic of family conversation.

*‘Bet you’ve been fighting again,” said Keene.

‘Have n’t neither,” said Plupy grumpily.

‘How did you get it?” inquired his mother —
“splitting kindling?”

“No; a feller hit me.”

“There! I knew you had been fighting,” in-
sisted his sister triumphantly.

“T wasn’t fighting, I told you once,” said
Plupy hotly.

“Who did it?” inquired his aunt solicitously.

“Oh, nobody you know. Just a feller,” said
Plupy, bolting a muffin.

“Was it an accident?” inquired his mother.

“No; feller did it a-purpose,”’ said Plupy, with
an air as if a cut lip were a daily occurrence.

“There! I told you,” cut in Keene.

“Cornelia, attend to your breakfast,” said his
mother curtly.

“Yes, ma’am,” replied that young lady, drink-
ing her coffee elegantly, with her little finger
gracefully extended beyond the others.

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132 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Did n’t you get angry? It was a pretty hard
blow, was n’t it?”

““Gosh! yes; it was an old lambinger, but the
feller did n’t mean to hit me so hard, and was
sorry, and said so, and I did n’t get mad,” replied
Plupy, heartily wishing he had accepted the sug-
gestion of the split kindling, and had lied plaus-
ibly. ‘Gosh! Why did n’t I?” he said under his
breath.

Within twelve hours he was bitterly to regret
his truthfulness, for when his father came home
from Boston that night he at once noticed the
bruise and a gleam of interest came to his eyes.
One of his reasons for disappointment in his
oldest son was his peaceful disposition. He him-
self had been a great fighter, both in his boy-
hood, youth, and young manhood. Not a brawler,
but a determined, two-fisted, alert fighter, one
who could take and give punishment with good
feeling, and then, when the fight was over, shake
hands in renewed respect and friendship.

Those were the days when there was no or-
ganized baseball or football, no track athletics,
boat-racing, golf, tennis, in fact, few diversions,
and fighting filled in the chinks between supper
time and bed. And while he did not aspire to
raise a pugilist, his son’s freedom from fights
seriously annoyed and worried him. He began to
fear that his son was something of a poltroon.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 133

And so when Plupy turned up with a cut and
swollen lip, he sincerely hoped he had reformed
and “‘licked”’ somebody, or had taken defeat like
a man.

But when in answer to his questions Plupy
gave the same explanation as before (indeed he
could not do otherwise), the old gentleman re-
warded him with a glare of disbelief.

“What! You mean to tell me that you let a
fellow give you a crack like that in the mouth and
not so much as knock his snout off?” roared the
old man in disgust.

‘**Honest, father, he did hit me, but he did n’t
mean to hit so hard,” asseverated Plupy.

“I’m ashamed of you; absolutely ashamed. If
I did n’t have more spunk than that I’d wear
petticoats and be done with it. Why, if a fellow
twice my size hit me like that, he’d get licked if
it was in me,” snorted the old gentleman.

“But he was littler than me, and of course I
could n’t hit him,” said Plupy, trying to rise to
higher grounds.

‘Littler than you! Littler than you!”’ fairly
foamed the old gentleman. ‘Then there was ab-
solutely no excuse for you. To stand like a great
gawk and let a boy half your size come up and
slap your face, and spread your mouth all over
it, is too much. You ought to wear a pinafore.”

In vain Plupy tried to explain; his father was

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134 THE YOUTH PLUPY

hurt and disgusted with his son’s pusillanimity
and would listen to no explanations.

““Not another word!” he commanded; “I
ought to give you a good hiding, but you are too
big to lick. I’ll tell you what I’m going to do.
Go up to your room, and bring down that infernal
flute of yours.”

“What for?” asked Plupy, in alarm.

**Never mind what for, bring it!” roared his
father.

So Plupy in a horrible anxiety went up to his
room, and taking his beloved flute, came down
to his fuming father.

‘Give it here!” he snapped.

-Plupy handed it to him with an appealing
glance.

The old gentleman took it. “Now, go to your
room and study. I’ll see that you don’t do any
more playing on this cussed thing, or on any other,
for one while.”

Plupy, with head held erect, marched indig-
nantly from the room and up the bleak and cheer-
less stairs into his equally bleak and cheerless
room and sat down to think it over. Why had n’t
he lied about it? That was what a fellow got for
telling the truth. After this he would lie like a
pirate every chance he got. Catch him ever telling
the truth again as long as he lived.

Below in the sitting-room Plupy’s mother sat

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 135

and darned stockings and said nothing. His
father started to read the paper, frowned, and
threw it down. His mother did not look up. His
aunt, who had left the room at the first clash of
arms, now returned and sat down rather hard.

Plupy’s father felt that his campaign methods
for the reformation of his son were not winning
the cordial sympathy of his wife and sister. A
very loud, impressive, and explosive silence
reigned. Plupy’s mother slipped a little round
wooden ball into the heel of a stocking, threaded
a needle with white yarn, and commenced span-
ning a huge opening with a pattern of criss-cross
strands. Plupy’s aunt fastened the end of a strip
of cloth into the beak of a little silver bird fastened
to the edge of the table by a thumbscrew, and
began to stitch quickly.

Plupy’s father put some more wood in the stove
and slammed the door viciously. Neither Plupy’s
mother nor aunt stirred or spoke.

“Well, why don’t somebody say something?”
inquired Plupy’s father, somewhat sarcastically.

Plupy’s mother deftly overstitched and fas-
tened a thread, broke it, and slipped the wooden
ball out of the stocking.

“It seems to me that you’ve said all that was
necessary on the subject,” she replied calmly.

“Well, I have n’t said half what I might have
said. I despise a coward. A boy that won’t fight

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136 THE YOUTH PLUPY

is a mighty poor tool. And he tried to lie out of it
too,” he added, glowering.

“You were never more mistaken in your life,
George,” said Plupy’s mother. “I know when he
lies to me as well as any one, — better probably,
—for I see more of him than you do, and this
time he told the truth.”

“What makes you think so, Joee? It sounded
like a pretty poor lie to me. If he was going to
lie about it he might as well have told a plausible
lie,” replied Plupy’s father.

“He might have said he got it splitting kin-
dlings. He had the chance, but he told this story
and I believe him, and you will find out some day
that you have been unjust to him,” said Plupy’s
mother gently, but with decision.

“But he let a boy hit him and did n’t hit back
— would n’t fight. What do you think of that for
a boy? I don’t want to raise a Methodist par-
son,” said the old gentleman disgustedly.

“*T guess you need n’t be afraid,” cut in Plupy’s
aunt; “‘none of your children will be saints. For
my part I’m glad Harry is n’t a fighter. You were
always fighting and being brought home with
black eyes and bloody noses and teeth knocked
out, and scaring us to death.”

‘* Well, the way Ifeel about it is that if he ever
does come home with any teeth missing and eyes
black and nose bloody, it will be because he has

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 137

been run over by a dingle cart,” concluded
Plupy’s father as he strode off to bed, leaving the
unsympathetic women patiently stitching, darn-
ing, and piling up the finished product.

It was a week later, —a week of gloom to
Plupy, a week of vague dissatisfaction to his
father. Plupy knew that his father had been un-
just. Plupy’s father, who had watched his son
carefully, felt that he had been hasty. But when-
ever his conscience urged him to make further
investigation, his good sense prevented him. It
was a fool lie, and the boy would n’t fight; that
was enough.

As Plupy’s father took a seat in the morning
train for Boston, a bright-faced little chap ac-
costed him, and, asking his permission, took a
seat beside him and entered into conversation
with him. Plupy’s father, a most entertaining
story-teller, also had the faculty of drawing out
a stranger, and, being really interested in young
people, proceeded by encouragement to induce
the young chap to talk about himself, and as he
was no other person than little Willoughby, in
a very short time the true story of Plupy’s cut
lip was laid before his astonished father to its
last detail by the boy, who professed the utmost
regard for Plupy.

Plupy’s father at once became very thoughtful,
and soon excused himself. He went to another

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138 THE YOUTH PLUPY

car and took a seat by himself and thought over
this astounding news. Well, he would be damned!
he would be double-damned! he would be most
eternally and unequivocally damned! His boy,
whom he had begun to regard as a hopeless jack-
rabbit, afraid of his shadow, had deliberately laid
in wait for a student, of prodigious fighting ability
(such was the description given of Thomaston by
the little Junior), had missed him, had maltreated
a boy much smaller than himself, and had allowed
him to square matters by smashing his mouth.

Plupy’s father drew a long breath. He was an
ass; a double distilled, dyed-in-the-wool, infer-
nal donkey! He was a most abandoned, hopeless,
everlasting, brainless idiot! He was — but the
English language was inadequate fully to express
just what he was.

Plupy’s father was quick-tempered, outspoken,
explosive, but he was always ready to acknowl-
edge a mistake when convinced of it. It was not
always easy to convince him. This time he was
thoroughly convinced, most thoroughly.

That night at supper, Plupy’s father was calm
and judicial. Plupy slid into his seat quietly and
said little. He had n’t said much during the week.
The rest of the family gossiped and chatted. It
was all very pleasant, but Plupy was rather in the
dumps. He knew his father despised him, and
that was a keen sorrow. He missed his flute.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 139

As the family rose from the table, Plupy
started for the door, but his father stopped him.
Plupy’s mother and aunt cast anxious glances at
each other. Plupy’s father was stern and judicial.
They were apprehensive.

“TI met a friend of yours to-day, a great friend,”
said Plupy’s father.

‘“Who was it, father? I didn’t know I had
any,’ said Plupy despondently.

“A student, —a little chap named Willoughby,
—a very interesting little chap. He told me a
few things, not knowing who I was.”

Plupy became red to the ears and showed signs
of guilt. Plupy’s mother and aunt looked very
serious and unhappy. What was coming?

“Yes, sir,” said Plupy.

“He told me all about your cut lip,” said his
father sternly.

‘Yes, sir,” stammered Plupy.

“And I want to tell you, boy, that I was wrong
to say what I did, and to do what I did, and I
beg your pardon. I’m almighty sorry and I
made a fool of myself.”

“Yes, sir,” said Plupy,— “I mean,” he
added hastily, ‘‘it is all right. I don’t blame you
for thinkin’ I was lyin’. The story sounded
kinder fishy.”

“Well, I blame myself and I want to make it
right,” said Plupy’s father.

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140 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Gosh, father, it’s all right now,” said Plupy,
with a sheepish grin that hid a lump in his throat.

“Now, boy, I did the best I could on short
notice to square things. I might have done as
you did, let you take a crack at me, but I’m
afraid the moment the blow landed, I should
have countered, and where would you have
been?” demanded that repentant gentleman.

‘Gosh, father, I don’t know. I’d have gone
some distance before I lit,”’ he answered.

With that Plupy’s father took a package from
his inner pocket, opened it, and displayed to the
enraptured eyes of his son a polished, six-keyed
flute in D, with swab, grease box, and small case
of loose pads.

Plupy stared at it wide-eyed, then took it in
his hand. “Gorramity, father, that is a ling-
paister; why, I never expected to have a flute
like this.” He choked a bit, and rather unstead-
ily walked toward the door, turned, and said,
“Thank you, father, it’s all right,”’ and went up
to his room, unable to trust himself to speak, but
the happiest boy in America.

Digitized by Microsoft®
CHAPTER XI

Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring
Your Winter garment of Repentance fling.
Omar KuaryAm.

Tue next day Plupy awoke with the delicious
feeling of youth and happiness in his heart. It
was cold and crisp in his room. The frost lay
thick on the window panes and his breath was
white as steam. His duty was to leave his warm
and comfortable bed, to go downstairs, out by
the back door to the shed, and to bring in armful
after armful of wood until the cavernous depth
of the woodbox was filled, and then to bring in
countless pails of water from the well.

But far from being a task on this morning and
for many successive mornings, it was a pleasure.
He was alive to the pleasures of life. He had made
up with his father; he had been reéstablished in
that gentleman’s good books. He was no longer
the liar and coward, but stood high in the opinion
of his parents and brothers, sisters and aunt.
Even his sister Keene, so prone to criticize his
actions, viewed him with respect.

And he had a flute, a real flute, a flute with
six keys; nota little, undersized, four-keyed flute
in F, but a six-keyed flute in D. Perhaps not so

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142 THE YOUTH PLUPY

magnificent a flute as the silver flute of Rietzel,
but nearly so. Many musicians preferred the
wooden flute to the flute of silver. Plupy did.
He was quite sure of it. He had tried it, and had
almost been able to make a tone on it. His lip
was healing, and in a short time he felt sure he
could play brilliantly. His fingers, which had at
first contact seemed unsuited to the larger flute
and to the greater distances between the holes,
had now become accustomed to it. He felt sure
that he could become a musician. All doubt of
this had been put behind him.

True, he had lost another girl, but he did not
care. How silly his infatuation for Mollie seemed
now. He wondered how he could have been such
a fool. And the tune of “Mollie, Darling,”
seemed trite, uninteresting, and unmelodious.
The rhythm and the harmony seemed extremely
crude, especially when measured by the high
standard set by the Mendelssohn Quintette
Club, whose members played such music as the
“Poet and Peasant Overture,” and the “Siege
of Corinth,” and Strauss waltzes. And then the

words: —

“Mollie, darling, sweetest, dearest,
Look up, darling, tell me this.”

Faugh! he could n’t go on; it made him sick.
What a pitiful jackass he had been. Well, enough
of that. He would send Mollie his ticket to the

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 143

dancing-school. As a gentleman he owed her that.
She was welcome to that and to Thomaston. He
smiled to himself as he penned the address on an
envelope and enclosed the ticket. Enough of the
fair sex. He would close the door, draw the cur-
tain, and wipe the slate clean of such follies from
that time on and forever.

The brisk, bright days of winter alternated
with stormy days when the snow drove in blind-
ing clouds and piled huge drifts before the doors
and in the paths for Plupy to clear away with
enormous labor. He sawed and split cords of wood
and drew endless pails of water. He rubbed down
and fed the little bay mare with which he had
won the race years before at the old county fair,
and, hooking her to a light sleigh, he drove about
the town Wednesday and Saturday afternoons.
Nellie was not the horse she once was, and Plupy
seldom rode her, but she was still a good driver,
and still pulled, but Plupy found no difficulty in
holding her, even when she came charging into
the home yard, as was her custom.

But the most delightful part of the day for him
was when, Ceesar having been defeated and the
problem in geometry having been collared and
thrown, he took out his new flute and played
selections from the “ Poet and Peasant Overture,”
or a movement or two from a Strauss or Gungle
waltz, or a new song.

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144 THE YOUTH PLUPY

The winter passed all too quickly. There had
been much snow and practically no skating.
But as the sun’s rays became more direct with
the changing season, its heat began to make deep
inroads on the huge piles and drifts. The river
rose and poured through the wide, deep cracks
in the ice, warped by the swelling torrent.

A few wheeled carriages made their appear-
ance and sleighs began to be hoisted aloft to scaf-
foldings in the barns and stables. The roads
became seas of mud in which wheels went to the
hubs. People began to ride horseback, the horses
picking their way carefully through the muddier
streets, and trotting or cantering briskly on the
dryer ones.

Plupy felt the infection, and occasionally
mounted Nellie and rode about town; but his legs
were now so long that he made rather a ridiculous
appearance, which provoked coarse platitudes.
Occasionally he got a chance to exercise one
of Levi Towle’s stable horses and in that way
managed to keep in trim and to secure some good
rides. And then one day a bluebird sang, and
Plupy was thrilled with a sweet sadness, and his
imagination began to work.

Beany, who was receiving the comfortable
salary that suited his immense business ability
and experience, patronized the livery stables ex-
tensively. It was no uncommon thing to see this

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 145°

gilded youth driving a spanking trotter hitched
to a hectic sleigh, or mounted on a prancing
steed. There was keen rivalry between Beany
and Plupy in the grand pastime of riding and driv-
ing. Both were reasonably expert. Beany, with
his shorter legs and longer body, made a better
appearance on horseback than Plupy. But the
latter could stick to an unruly animal better than
Beany, owing to his abnormal length of leg. And
as he had an extremely light hand, horses were
quieter and better behaved with him than with
Beany. Hence, when it came to exercising his
horses, Levi the Publican chose Plupy. But
Beany as a financial magnate (I believe he re-
ceived a weekly stipendium of seven dollars) had
the right of way when it came to pay excursions.

One Wednesday afternoon Plupy, school free,
was sauntering through the square. It was still
early in spring and the roads and streets were
muddy, and the chill of winter was in the air after
four or five o’clock. But this was just after din-
ner, the sun was high, and a purple finch was
singing, and Plupy’s heart was light. The tram-
pling of horses’ hoofs attracted his attention.
He turned and stared with wonder that changed
to envy. Down the street came Beany, mounted
on a gray saddler, and by his side rode a beau-
teous maiden, a divinity who lived with her
parents in the Squamscott House.

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146 THE YOUTH PLUPY

How had Beany become acquainted with her?
A sudden envy of Beany swept over Plupy. He
watched them as they trotted by. The girl had
on a flowing riding-skirt, and a broad hat with
drooping feather. Beany had on his lavender
trousers and his father’s cavalry boots with their
flaring tops far above his knees. He sat his horse
well, and used just enough curb to make that
animal arch its neck.

Plupy watched them with envious eyes until
they turned the corner, and then walked on
thoughtfully. Well, if Beany had got acquainted
with her, there was no reason why he could not.
Beany did n’t board at the hotel. Probably he
had sold her a pair of balmoral boots or croquet
slippers. Beany’s business gave him many op-
portunities for acquaintance that the prosaic,
matter-of-fact, schoolboy existence of Plupy did
not afford. But why a high-class girl of any dis-
cernment should wish to go round with a boot-
and-shoe and clothing-store clerk was more than
Plupy could understand.

This thought was really foreign to Plupy. I
have had a fairly intimate acquaintance with
Plupy for many, many years, and I am sure he
was as far from a snob as possible. But the sud-
den appearance of Beany with a new and beau-
tiful girl, his glance of triumph from the corner
of his eye as he saw his friend Plupy peacefully

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 147

pacing downtown, had shot a dash of wormwood
into Plupy’s disposition which bred the unkind
and disloyal thought.

As Plupy proceeded down the street he was
pondering deeply. A thought struck him. Why
not return home, saddle Nellie, and chance ‘to
meet the riders. No, that would not do; he did not
look well on Nellie. His legs were too long, and
the girl would probably laugh at him. Beany
would anyway. Beany was a good deal changed
now that he worked in a store and got so much
money.

““Let’s see. They were riding Charles Towle’s
horses. Perhaps Levi might have a horse he
wanted exercised. Plupy became animated once
more, and he started hot foot for the American
House Stables. Arrived there he sought out the
proprietor, good-natured, shrewd-faced Levi,
and asked him if he wanted any horses exer-
cised.

“Well, I dunno. Perhaps so. Is Dick in?” he
asked of one of the stable men.

“No; he’s on Crockett and Downing’s grocery
wagon. Most every horse is out this afternoon,”
replied the man.

Plupy looked disappointed.

“Lessee, boy, the ‘Chase’ mare has n’t been
out for two days. Do you think you can manage
her?” asked Levi.

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148 THE YOUTH PLUPY

The “Chase” mare was the private driving-
horse of the proprietor and a very fine animal,
and Plupy’s eyes lighted up as he said, “I think
so, Mr. Towle.”

“All right. Mike, put the saddle on the mare,
and bring her out.”

Mike brought out the mare and Plupy held
her while he put on saddle and bridle. Then
he mounted and reined the impatient animal in
while Levi charged him not to warm her up too
much and not to allow her to get chilled by walk-
ing. Then, with a light pressure on the bit, he
trotted out of the yard and down the street.
The mare was keen and fresh, and her small ears
were pricked up and she pranced a bit and arched
her neck. She had long pasterns which gave a
delightfully elastic spring to her gait.

Plupy reasoned very logically that Beany and
his companion, having gone down Water Street,
would probably go up Town Hill, Main and
Middle Streets, then either down Lincoln to
Front, or across the track and to Front Street by
way of Winter, as these were fairly dry streets.
So with the idea of meeting them and dazzling
the girl with his horsemanship, he rode at a quick
trot up Front Street. He reasoned that a fellow
dressed in lavender trousers tucked into polished
cavalry boots, and riding a fine horse and with
an exceedingly pretty girl, would stick to the

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traveled streets to bask in the admiring and en-
vious glances of the Haut Ton, the Bourgeoisie,
and the Proletariat.

To Beany, cantering down Front Street with
his girl, the appearance of Plupy, mounted on the
“Chase” mare and sitting his horse like a cen-
taur, was in the nature of a shock. Plupy, as
he passed, bent to his saddle-bow and raised his
hat. Beany nodded somewhat sulkily. The
young lady looked admiringly at the handsome
mare and the polite youth, and turning to her
escort asked who that gentleman might be.

“Oh,” said Beany, “that fellow? Why, he is
a young fellow I know. He works when out of
school at the livery stables of the American
House, exercising horses,” he added with a short,
contemptuous laugh.

Oh, Beany! Beany! Oh, Love! Love! Like
the accursed thirst for gold, to what dost thou
compel the human mind! I would not have be-
lieved it, Beany, I surely would not have be-
lieved it! But Beany had made a false step, he
had awakened in the girl’s mind an interest in
Plupy.

“Why!” she exclaimed, “how delightful! —
paying his way through school by working in a
stable. I think that is really a brave thing to do,
don’t you?”

*T don’t see where the bravery comes in.

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Most of the American House horses are just old
plugs, as safe as sheep. Any one can ride them,”
answered Beany, missing her point.

“Certainly that horse he is riding is not a
plug, and he certainly rides well. But I think he
is brave to work his way through school in that
way. Not many would do it, I’m sure,” she
said with decision.

“Huh!” grunted Beany; ‘he don’t work his
way through school. His father supports him.
Always has and always will, I guess.’

“Why, he is n’t so very, very old, is her” she
asked with a smile.

“Old enough to go to work, I guess, if he
was n’t too lazy,” said Beany unkindly.

They rode on and talked of other subjects, but
they had not done with Plupy, for a half-hour
later as they were making their fifth trip down
Court Street, from behind came the sound of a
horse at a rapid gallop and Plupy passed them
like the wind. Their horses, startled, jumped and
pranced. At once Plupy pulled up, turned his
mare, and approached them hat in hand, pro-
fusely apologizing for having frightened the
young lady’s horse.

“You ought to know better than to do a thing
like that, Shute,” said Beany, taking a high
hand with his old friend.

“You are right, Watson; I’m very sorry, in-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 151

deed,”’ said Plupy, talking to Beany, but looking
at the young lady.

“Really there was no harm done, Mr. —
Mr. — er —”

“Shute,” said Plupy, perceiving that Beany
did not take her cue and introduce him.

“Mr. Shute,” she repeated with a smile that
went to Plupy’s head like old wine, or hard cider,
or other alcoholic stimulant; ‘I don’t mind hav-
ing my horse prance a little.”

“I’m sure that you could manage him all right.
I was n’t a bit afraid of that, but I did n’t want
you to think I was rude,” explained Plupy with
deft flattery.

“It was very good of you to stop and explain,”
she said brightly, as she bowed and smiled at
Plupy, who raised his hat, whirled his horse,
and in a moment disappeared, while she turned
to Beany with a malicious twinkle in her eye, and
proceeded, for that grumpy gentleman’s especial
penance, to laud Plupy’s horsemanship, his po-
liteness, and good temper to the skies.

As for Plupy he rode to the stable in a very
maze of delight. He had accomplished the im-
possible. She had smiled on him with distinct
favor. They were acquainted, although Beany
had n’t been polite enough to introduce him.
Well, it would serve Beany right. Beany had
changed for the worse. A few years ago he

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would n’t have acted in that way. Perhaps his
store associations had affected him. Well, what-
ever it was, Beany had not appeared to advan-
tage, in spite of his lavender trousers and his
father’s polished cavalry boots.

When Plupy took up his flute in D that eve-
ning he began to play that classic of the times, —
“I’m Captain Jinks, of the Horse Marines;

I give my horse good corn and beans;

Of course it’s quite beyond my means,
Tho’ I’m Captain in the Army.”

Without making any sort of painstaking research
for the purpose of determining what a “Horse
Marine” might be, and whether or not a captain-
ship in the Horse Marines might be a desirable
post, Plupy decided at once that he would prefer
above all other ambitions to become a Horse
Marine. He imagined himself a Captain, clad in
the gaudy uniform naturally adopted by a Captain
in this brilliant cavalry organization, and mounted
on a suitable charger, notably the “Chase”’ mare.
By his side rode the beautiful girl of the Squam-
scott House, upon his little bay mare Nellie.
Had the ingenious and ridiculous parody on
this popular jingle been current at that time,
Plupy would have been enlightened as to the
nature of the selection and of Captain Jinks,
but it was several weeks later, and after this
budding love had gone the way of others, that

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Plupy, a seared and love-scarred veteran, seek-
ing distraction in Morris Brothers’ Minstrels,
heard for the first time a dusky, extravagantly
padded, coiffured, and dressed belle kick up her
heels and sing in a flinty-hard voice —
“I’m Mistress Jinks, of Madison Square;
I wear tight boots and I puff my hair;

Of course the gentlemen at me stare,
While the Captain’s in the Army.”

And he laughed bitterly, thinking of his asinine
infatuation for the Squamscott House girl, and his
nightly performance on the flute in her honor.

The next day after his meeting with her he
chanced to meet her again, on the street, and he
was in a high fever of dread and hope; dreading
lest she might cut him dead, not having been
properly presented, hoping that she might burst
asunder the shackles of convention and greet
him as an acquaintance, if not afriend. As the
young lady was the most sensible and delightful
person imaginable, this last was just what she
did, and the enraptured, fatuous youth found
himself walking by her side and chatting with
all the freedom of an old and dear friend.

Naturally their talk was of horses and of rid-
ing, and did n’t Mr. Shute wish that the age of
chivalry, when knights with their ladies’ ker-
chiefs wrapped around their spears, spurred forth
to do or die in their name, had never ceased?

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154 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Mr. Shute naturally did wish so, and told her
so very fervently.

And Mr. Shute played? She was certain of it;
she never made a mistake; she could always
recognize an artistic temperament.

Mr. Shute did play a bit. He modestly
acknowledged it.

And she would so like to hear him play. What
did he play? Was it a — flute?

Plupy admitted some slight virtuosity on that
instrument.

Oh! how delightful it was. Indeed, she clapped
her hands with delight and surprise. She knew
he played, but she did n’t quite dare hope that
he played the flute. It was her favorite instru-
ment. She liked them all, but really the flute was
her favorite. But was n’t it quite — atrociously
— difficult?

Mr. Shute admitted the difficulty, but thought
the popular idea of the difficulty somewhat ex-
aggerated.

And was Mr. Shute the owner of that dear,
delightful, beautiful little bay mare she was sure
she had seen him driving?

Mr. Shute was.

And was n’t that little mare perfectly wild and
untamable and deliciously dangerous? She was
sure she could n’t ride her.

Mr. Shute assured her that she was very tract-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 155

able and perfectly safe. To be sure, there had
been times when it required a firm hand and a
strong arm to hold her, but now she was per-
fectly reliable. Not, to be sure, a beginner’s horse,
but one that she could ride and manage with the
greatest ease.

Really it was so good of him to say so. Some
day she would so like to try the little mare, but
she would not dare to try her alone, she just
would n’t; for if Mr. Shute could manage to
come with her, she was sure it would be just too
delightful for anything.

Mr. Shute was equally sure, and before he
fairly knew how it happened he had promised to
ride with her on the coming Saturday afternoon.

And it was so thoughtful of him and so kind.
Really she had met the kindest people in Exeter.
There seemed to be a conspiracy among them to
make her feel at home.

And did she like Mr. Watson?

Very, very much, he was so bright and funny.
Plupy’s face fell at this announcement. He was
not funny in the way Beany was, but he was at
times ridiculous, which was different.

Her quick eye saw his discomfiture.

She laughed. Yes, really, Mr. Watson was very
funny, very funny, indeed, but he was not quite
— well, she did n’t quite know how to express it,
but Mr. Shute would understand, she felt sure.

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156 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Mr. Shute did understand her, and felt very
much better. Beany was not quite — and he
began all at once to feel very charitably toward
Beany. Poor fellow, Beany, he was not to blame
for being not quite — Plupy quite understood
and so did she. In fact they both understood.
Plupy quite warmed toward Beany. Considering
Beany’s limitations, for which he was really not
to blame, Beany was quite a good fellow, but not
quite — Plupy quite understood, and held his
head a little higher.

They had an extremely pleasant walk, but all
too short, as Plupy had to tear himself away to
school, where he vainly endeavored to study, but
found her face dancing between his eyes and the
pages of his textbooks.

On Saturday the little mare received a rub-
down such as she had not experienced for weeks,
so thorough it was, and she shone like satin,
although her winter coat was getting a bit rusty.
With rare luck Plupy had succeeded in getting
the “Chase”? mare, and he and the Squamscott
House girl rode all the afternoon with the utmost
enjoyment, and especially to Plupy when they
rode by the clothing store, behind the counter
of which he beheld the luckless Beany busily
selling collars, neckties, flannel shirts, rubber
boots, and other necessities of life to the Satur-
day shoppers, and glaring discontentedly and

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 157

despairingly at Plupy and his companion as
they cantered happily and chattily by. Really,
Beany was not to blame for being not quite —
and Plupy felt quite sorry for him.

But Beany, to use a bit of modern slang, ‘came
back with a wallop” on thenext Wednesday, when
he not only secured the young lady for the after-
noon, but the “Chase” mare as well, and by
paying for the latter effectually shut off Plupy’s
chance for further gratuitous use of this mare.
Levi, good-hearted man though he was, and
liking Plupy, was not in business for his health
and seldom declined a business proposition that
promised profit.

This was a grievous blow to Plupy, and al-
though perfectly legitimate, none the less was
regarded by him as the basest of treachery on the
part of his rival. Plupy saw them ride by and
raised his hat and bravely smiled in answer to her
pleasant nod and the friendly wave of her little
gloved hand. Just what to do he did not know,
for he was not drawing a princely salary as Beany
was. Confound it! What was the sense of going
to school and reading Cesar and studying algebra
and geometry? Both Beany and Pewt were hav-
ing all the fun and money they wanted. If they
wanted to go anywhere out of work hours they
could. If they wanted to make a girl a present
they could, and if they wanted to take a girl

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158 THE YOUTH PLUPY

riding, all they had to do was to go to a livery
stable and order “Anything from a trotting gig
to a six-horse hitch,” as Levi’s terse but compre-
hensive sign informed the public.

Then again they were men, doing men’s work
in the world, while he — huh! — he was only a
schoolboy, good for nothing but translating a
little Latin and working out a few problems that
were no good to any one in the world. Plupy, with
his hands in his pockets, his shoulders humped,
and his eyes on the ground, trailed home in the
deepest despondency, hating himself, his luck,
and Beany, but Beany most of all.

That night he played the most dismal melo-
dies from the school song-book, the “ Nightin-
gale,” such as “Annie Lyle” —

‘Wave willows, murmur waters,
Golden sunbeams smile,
Earthly music shall not waken
Lovely Annie Lyle”’;

or, — :
, “Lady, in that green grave yonder

Lies the Gypsy’s only child”;
and several other lachrymose selections occa-
sionally warbled by his sisters.

After exhausting his repertoire of funereal
music, which was not, thank Heaven and a natu-
rally cheerful disposition, very extensive, he gave
himself up to his powerful imagination and speed-
ily felt very much better.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 159

He had invited her to ride with him. She had
refused to go, although he had brought the horses
round to the Squamscott, but had gone with
Beany, riding a rather vicious horse from Charles
Towle’s stable.

Plupy had bowed in silence, turned his horses
and ridden back to his stable, where he left the
little mare, and then, to cool the fever in his
blood, had ridden the “Chase” mare far down
Newmarket Road. Turning he rode back. Sud-
denly he hears the clatter of horses’ hoofs, a con-
fused shouting. He gathers up his reins, picks
up his mare, leaning forward in his saddle. At
the end of the street he catches a glimpse of
the vicious horse, ears back, neck outstretched,
thundering along, a wild runaway. On its back
is the young girl, face blanched with fear, hat
gone, hair flying, hands pulling desperately on
the reins. People are running, and shouting, but
no one is brave enough to try to stop the foaming
beast. The bridge is down and the river swollen
with the spring rains.

Plupy sinks his spurs into his horse’s flanks
(Plupy has never used spurs except in imagina-
tion, and these imaginary spurs invariably have
long cruel rowels), and in a moment is thundering
in pursuit. Women scream and faint and men
shout warnings, “Look out for the river! — the
bridge is down!” He is gaining! He is gaining!

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But can he do it? The bridge is but a few hun-
dred yards away, and the runaway has a long
lead. Plupy leans over the neck of his mare, en-
couraging her, lifting her with spur and rein. She
fairly flies. Nearer and nearer he comes to the
flying runaway; nearer and nearer they come to
the bridgeless river; the roar of the water can be
heard; and now Plupy drives both spurs fiercely
into the game mare, and she responds with a
tremendous burst of speed. Fifty yards from the
torrent he overtakes the runaway and leaning
from his saddle seizes the girl by the waist,
pulling at his mare desperately. He is almost
torn from the saddle with the weight of the girl.
Her arms are round his neck, her cheek is on his
shoulder, his mare, on her haunches with fore-
feet braced, is sliding with the momentum of her
tremendous pace.

Three feet from the chasm the mare stops
quivering and shaking. Kind hands seize them
and drag them out of danger. A deadly giddiness
comes over Plupy. Some one says, “Take him
in here —” When he comes to himself, the girl,
pale and trembling, is leaning over him. Some
one is putting a glass to his lips, but he puts it
one side and with an effort sits up. Some one
says, “You saved her life, young fellow, but it
was a mighty close shave.”

Plupy looks about him. Beany stands in

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_THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 161

riding-boots, bespattered with mud and looking
uncomfortable. Plupy staggers to his feet, bows
to the girl, and despite her appealing looks walks
slowly and painfully away, a hero, but a cynic.

Indeed, Plupy is so comforted by this rather
extraordinary feat of imagination that he falls
asleep quite refreshed and sleeps the dreamless
sleep of perfect health and good digestion.

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CHAPTER XII

Blister we not for bursatz? So when the heart is vext,
The pain of one maiden’s refusal is drowned in the pain of the next.
Kiruna, “Certain Maxims of Hafiz.”

WaeEn he awoke the next morning the sun was
bright and from somewhere outside in the sun-
shine he heard the call of the first robin. He
jumped from his bed, rushed to the window, and
throwing it wide, looked and listened. There!
he heard it again. Clearly a robin, and following
a current superstition that a wish made upon the
actual view of the first robin in spring stood an
almost certain chance of literal fulfillment, he
strained his eyes to see the little musician. There!
on the tip of a bending elm, the buds of which
were beginning to swell, he made out the red-
waistcoated pilgrim, and with the view came an
earnest, almost prayerful wish that he might be
able to cut out his rival Beany in the affections
of the young girl of the Squamscott House.
This was a ridiculous thing for him to do, but
then it was just possible that there was some-
thing in it, and it certainly would do no harm
anyway.

So Plupy, having breathed this fervent wish
into the spring air, and having watched the

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 163

robin take bounding flight to another locality,
which was in itself a good omen, blithely dressed
and ran down to his morning task of hewing
wood and drawing water, much cheered in mind.
At breakfast he good-naturedly parried a few
sarcasms on the part of his sister Keene as to
his infatuation for a certain young lady, about
whom “nobody knew a thing, good or bad, so
there!” and having finished, took his books and
walked to school by a circuitous path which led
past the Squamscott House, where he had the
great pleasure of seeing the young lady, “about
whom nobody knew a thing, good or bad,” and
of receiving a most delightful smile and wave of
a small white hand.

It was unnecessary to know her birth and an-
tecedents. Plupy’s heart knew that she was phys-
ical and moral perfection, and that was enough.
The very fact that she was a stranger to the town
and the townspeople gave an added charm to her
many attractions. In his experience with girls,
which as we must all acknowledge was very con-
siderable, if unfortunate, he had never met one
who could make a fellow feel perfectly at home
as she could. Even with a fellow like Beany —
who was “not quite’ — she was consideration
and kindness itself, which must have been rather
a trial for her, especially when Beany’s “not
quiteness” was most in evidence. She was a

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164, THE YOUTH PLUPY

real lady, the soul of honor, the princess of kind-
heartedness and good nature.

Really she reminded him very much of some
of the beautiful ladies he had read of in the “‘ New
York Ledger,” the “Fireside Companion,” and
*““Godey’s Lady’s Book,” which formed the read-
ing matter of many New England households
at that time. The two latter periodicals were
taken by the Shute household, but the “New
York Ledger’’ was, for some occult and, to Plupy,
perfectly inexplicable reason, tabooed by his mo-
ther, and Plupy read it surreptitiously at the
house of a friend.

Plupy worked away at his school tasks with
great assiduity, coming home to his noon din-
ner in high spirits, and after that meal, blew a
few popular classics through the responsive and
seemingly sympathetic barrel of his flute in D.
Things were looking bright again for Plupy.

And yet so thorny is the path of the true lover,
and so rapid the atmospheric changes, that he
was now up, now down, now hot with delight,
now shivering with the sudden chill of despair,
none the less dreadful for being short-lived. And
that evening, after supper and a day of cheering
anticipation, Plupy was cast into the deepest
cavern of black gloom by seeing her standing in
front of Beany’s store, chatting and laughing
with that dapper and debonair merchant in

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 165

what Plupy termed a most heartless fashion, at
least from his point of view.

Plupy, to avoid being seen by them, turned
into a store, and having stared very hard into
a showcase where pitiless gimlets, relentless
screw-drivers, bloodthirsty Jonathan Crook jack-
knives, and other desperate and dangerous wea-
pons were exhibited, regained control of himself,
and in a hard tone of voice priced a few articles
to explain satisfactorily his presence to the pro-
prietor, who had hastened to ascertain his wishes.
When he left the store with a pound of tenpenny
nails for which he had no possible use, he glanced
down the street. She was not in sight. Perhaps
she had gone in. Perhaps — hateful thought —
she was inside the store trying on a pair of shoes,
and Beany, with that beautiful foot and slim
ankle in his hand, was — Hang it all! some
fellows had all the luck.

Plupy turned irresolutely, then started for
Beany’s store. He was mistaken. She was not
in sight, and Beany, on his knees, was trying to
force a number five, A width, shoe on a number
seven, C width, foot belonging to an exceed-
ingly scrawny old maid, who was laying into that
youth for his awkwardness, and with an exceed-
ingly vitriolic tongue.

Plupy smiled to himself and cheered up won-
derfully. After all, Beany did n’t have every-

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166 THE YOUTH PLUPY

thing his way, and as for the girl, probably
Beany had stopped her when she was going by and
she was too good-natured to put him in his place.
It would be just like Beany to stop her. Some-
how Beany appeared to lack the finer feelings.
He was, as she had said, not quite — But then
she understood it. He wondered what they had
been talking about. It was well for Plupy that
he did not know until long afterwards. He would
not have slept much that night. His haughty
spirit would have had a most prodigious fall.

At the exact moment when Plupy had seen
them laughing and talking together, she was
saying to Beany, “ Yes, I certainly do like Mr.
Shute very much, although he is quite the most
transparent simpleton I ever met.” No wonder
Beany laughed. He could forgive many things
in Plupy, because in the eyes of the young girl
they both loved, Plupy was “quite the most
transparent simpleton” she had ever met, and
whatever a “‘simpleton”’ may have meant in her
language, in the language of New England was
known by a very different name.

Beany went back to his collars, neckties, and
rubber boots in high good humor. Plupy went
back to his room much relieved in mind and took
down his flute and played con amore —

“The heart that once truly loves, never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the end.”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 167

He was making great progress on his flute, and
the nature of the music played was a sure index
of his state of mind.

Saturday Plupy could not get a horse to ride,
but let the girl have Nellie for the afternoon and
told her he had some work that had to be done,
which was true. But as it was his regular wood-
splitting and water-drawing he might have done
it mornings and evenings as usual. However, it
was a pleasure to saddle the little mare, to take
her over to the Squamscott, and to help the girl to
mount, and then to return home warmed to his
heart by her smiles and thanks for his disin-
terested kindness.

He felt considerably less complacent about it
when his father returned from Boston on the
2 p.M. train, intending to take a short airing be-
hind the little mare, and was very much disgusted
to find “that infernal wall-eyed girl cavorting all
over creation on his horse,” as he expressed it ina
heated interview with his son, whom, to his sur-

prise, he found splitting wood in the shed like a .

good one. It was perhaps this circumstance that
prevented the old gentleman from laying an
embargo upon his son’s further use of the little
mare, as in the first flush of irritation he had
contemplated doing.

However, so great an admiration had that old
gentleman for any pretty girl with pleasant

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168 THE YOUTH PLUPY

manners, that when at the close of the afternoon
she rode up to Plupy’s stable to return the mare,
and apologized so sweetly for having kept the
mare so long and having ridden her so hard, the
justly irritated old gentleman, who had spent
the entire afternoon in fuming over that “‘cussed
boy’s fool generosity with other people’s horses,”
changed front with most astonishing abruptness,
and assured the young lady that she was so wel-
come to the use of his mare that he wished she
would use her any time she desired.

Plupy, who was peeping out at the scene from
a secure hiding-place, afraid to present himself
for fear of being humiliated before her, opened
his eyes with astonishment at the old gentle-
man’s courtesy, and nearly betrayed himself by
slapping his leg with astonishment, while his
father, with old-fashioned politeness, was escort-
ing the young lady to the gate.

The next day was Sunday and a long, cold
rainstorm set in which lasted until Monday when
it changed to snow. All day Monday and until
Tuesday morning it snowed and rained alter-
nately, and when the sun rose warm and bright
on Tuesday there were about six inches of damp
snow on the ground. By Tuesday night it was
gone, but the river had risen about a foot and
the roads were again deep in mud, except the
most traveled roads and the ones best drained.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 169

Plupy had conceived the somewhat nefarious
design of cutting out Beany by asking her to
ride with him on Wednesday, the day that had
been in a measure sacred to Beany’s semi-weekly
recess from mercantile pursuits.

This was not quite fair to Beany, but Plupy
acted on the well-known principle that all was
fair in love, and felt that undoubtedly Beany
would have done the same to him had their posi-
tions been reversed. Besides this, a piece of good
fortune had occurred to Plupy, an opportunity
that must be seized at once and before Beany
heard of it. Levi had bought a new saddler, a
Western horse. Plupy had ridden him once and
he had never sat so easy an animal. He was very
tractable, but a slight touch of the heel and pres-
sure of the curb would cause him to prance and
passage like a trained cavalry charger, and Plupy
had engaged him for Wednesday.

Small wonder, then, that Plupy watched the
storm with the greatest anxiety, and he was
thoroughly relieved when, on Wednesday morn-
ing, a short trip through the main street of the
town on the back of Nellie showed him that
several of the streets were sufficiently settled for
riding. This decided, he called on the young
lady and besought her to ride with him at two
o’clock. She demurred, saying that it had been
in a measure understood between her and Beany

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that they should ride Wednesdays at three
o'clock.

Plupy felt somewhat chagrined at this, as he
was unaware that things had progressed so far
between her and Beany as to amount to an under-
standing of any kind. But an idea struck him. If
he could persuade her to ride with him at two
o’clock, he would certainly be so far away from
Exeter at three o’clock as to compel her to break
her engagement with Beany. This would prob-
ably make Beany angry with her and would re-
sult in a quarrel that might effectually end
matters between him and her. This was the very
best thing that could happen to Beany, as it
would eventually save him from suffering when
the final separation came. For certainly a girl
of her education and refinement would be obliged
to discourage, perhaps unkindly, the growing
intimacy that Beany was forcing upon her, being
not quite —

Thus Plupy quieted his conscience that gave
him some uncomfortable twinges when he thought
over his treacherous but justifiable conduct
toward his former chum. Much to Plupy’s grat-
ification she agreed to his proposal, provided
she might be brought back in time to keep her
engagement with Beany. With this Plupy had
to be content.

At two o'clock Plupy cantered up to the

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Squamscott on the new Western horse, leading
the little mare, and in a short time he and the
girl were riding toward the Hampton road, pick-
ing their way carefully along the boggy stretches
and trotting or cantering briskly on the dryer
parts. The sun shone, the birds sang. In the.
puddles and pools in the marshes the frogs
piped and whistled. Overhead a triangle of wild
geese flew northward with weird cries. Love-
songs were in the warm west wind, love-songs
were in the heart of Plupy, sitting his mettlesome
horse and casting fond glances at the girl.

They had traveled several miles in this direc-
tion when through the clear spring air the dis-
tant sound of the bell on the town clock striking
the hour of three was heard. Instantly she pulled
up her mare.

“Mercy, Mr. Shute, it’s three o’clock. I ought
to be back. I promised.”

“Gracious!” said Plupy, in well-feigned amaze-
ment; “‘I never dreamed it was so late.”

“We must hurry back,” she said, turning her
horse.

Away they went, the little mare trotting
swiftly, the Western horse loping easily. Then
at a muddy stretch they had to pull up to a slow
trot, at which she fretted. Then Plupy’s horse
got a stone in its frog. Plupy was behind her
when he found this out. Perhaps, if she had

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172 THE YOUTH PLUPY

turned more quickly, she would have been sur-
prised at the entire absence of effect on the
horse’s gait.

But the stone was there. Plupy got it out
after a while. It was an enormous stone. It did
not seem possible that so large a stone could
have been forced between the frog and the rim
of the horse’s shoe. But there it was. Plupy
held it up and showed it to the girl. Plupy told
her that was the reason it was so hard to get
out. But she only said, ‘Thank fortune, you
have got it out. Now we can make a little prog-
ress. I surely don’t know what Mr. Watson
will think of me.”

Plupy had a very well-defined idea what Mr.
Watson would think, and could even hazard a
shrewd guess as to what Mr. Watson would say,
but he did not say so. Instead, he showed com-
mendable zeal in mounting his horse, and was
grieved and surprised when that animal backed
away, dragging him some distance. This may
have been due to a sudden yank of the bridle.
If so, it must have been entirely unintentional
on his part.

But again on his horse, Plupy pressed the pace
on the dryer spaces and did his best to hurry
through the mud as far as consistent with her
safety. Plupy saw to that. He did not want
anything to happen to her, and he expressed some

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anxiety about the little mare’s knees. It would
not do to risk a fall. Any one can see that. Plupy
was careful. Indeed, he was so careful that at
the next breathing-place, where the mud was
deep and the road rough, he insisted that the
girths of the little mare were loose. The girl
said they were not, and if they were she would
keep on the mare, but Plupy, careful youth,
would not have it, and again dismounted. She
absolutely refused to get down, but sat sidewise
while Plupy cinched up. It took him a long
time to do this, because with his head under the
flap of the saddle he could not see very well. In-
deed, any one who has tried to do this with his
head under a saddle flap knows how difficult
it is.

Then the little mare stepped on his foot and
hurt him so that he had to carry one foot in his
hands while he hopped round on the other and
groaned dolefully. But instead of the sympathy
he may have expected to get, the girl had a look
on her face that said as plainly as expression
could say, “‘ You insufferable booby, I wish it had
been your head.”

And so, although when they came to the
settled traveling of the main avenue they made
rapid progress, it was four o’clock when they
clattered into the square. The sun was still bright
and warm and the sidewalks were lined with

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people. Students from the Academy, young
ladies from the Seminary, country people on
shopping bent, with their mud-spattered wagons
and blanketed horses hitched to the posts and
railings, townspeople, visitors, strangers, were
coming and going on the brick walks. In the
square the mud was deep and splashy from the
hoofs of horses and cattle, but Plupy and the
girl splashed and cantered on, Plupy sitting erect
and proud as with arching neck and lifted tail
the Western horse loped swiftly beside the
smoothly moving little mare.

Plupy chuckled to himself with delight. No
Beany was in sight. He had got angry and had
left, either for his store or home. The girl looked
anxiously about, but did not see him. But she was
riding beautifully and scores of people were look-
ing on and admiring. So she sat up and smiled,
and Plupy sat up and smiled and exulted. He
had shown Beany a trick or two, even if he did n’t
work in a store for an enormous salary.

But Beany had not left. He was there on the
square, right by the big Lawrence house where
Washington had stopped once. Not only had
Washington stopped there, but local tradition
had it that Washington had kissed the proprie-
tor’s daughter to show his appreciation of the
entertainment. But Beany was there now, in a
humor to bite some one, not to kiss any one. To

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him, as he glared balefully at Plupy, unconscious
of his glance, but not of the glances of the popu-
lace, there came a street urchin with a sling
shot. At once a fiendish thought seized upon
Beany. “Say, Mikey, if you can hit that horse
that the long-legged feller is on I’ll give you a
quarter,” he whispered to the boy.

The boy grinned a wide and front-toothless
smile. “Ping!” hummed the deadly elastic as
the buckshot sped like lightning.

Plupy was on the top wave of self-congratu-
lation, popularity, and happiness. He had dis-
posed of a rival. Had he? All of a sudden his
horse gave a wrathful snort and a galvanic leap
into the air. Plupy shot up until his knees
cleared the saddle, and his hat went ten feet
farther on, but he recovered his seat by wild
clawings with hands and knees. The horse was
a Western horse and had been trifled with and
its temper was up. Kicking, jumping, and squeal-
ing it shot across the square toward the open
portico of the Town Hall. Every jump caused
Plupy to go through the most complicated evo-
lutions ever conceived and executed by a trained
contortionist. His coat was literally thrown over
his head, his straps burst, and his trousers came
nearly to his knees, exposing an astonishing
thinness of shank to the enraptured citizens.
In front of the hall the horse sprang high in the

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176 THE YOUTH PLUPY

air and came down with stiffened legs, arching
his back like a bent bow.

Plupy shot aloft like a scarecrow tossed by a
bull. The old Greeks and Romans employed cata-
pults to hurl huge stones over the battlements
of beleaguered cities. The Gauls, the Britons,
and the Saxons devised great slings, worked by
machinery, that pitched deadly missiles into cas-
tles and walled towns. Thus was Plupy thrown
by the resistless, catapultic force of this bucking
Western horse.

How high he might have gone but for his death
grip on the reins never was known. Various es-
timates were made. Some put it to the railed
balcony; others, more modest in judgment, opined
that he would have gone no farther than to the
top of the lofty front door. Those there were who
profanely insisted that he would have cleared
the massive building and the goddess of liberty
surmounting it; but theirs was the hazard of
unreason. However, Plupy went high. That is
beyond peradventure.

Thirty or more years afterwards Kipling speaks
of a certain guardsman who

“Used to quit his charger in a parabolic way.”
No better description of Plupy’s misfortune
could be given. It is, I believe, a scientific truth,
that whatever be the momentum of a free body
at its start when thrown heavenward, in re-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 177

turning to the earth its momentum is the same.
But Plupy was going faster when he struck the
ground than when he left the horse’s back, for
shooting like an arrow to the length of the reins,
he turned in the air and was violently snatched
back and slapped on his back into six inches of
the softest, spatteryest, juiciest mud ever seen,
and a cascade of slush went ten feet into the air,
as when one tries to lambaste with a cane pole a
bullfrog in the mud.

Had it not been for the mud he would have
been killed or injured for life, but he was not in-
jured in the least. For a moment he lay still;
then, stung by the roars of laughter that greeted
his plight, he rose to his feet, an unrecognizable,
bifurcated statue of mud. Across the square he
saw through a muddy haze, Beany, mounting the
Western horse, now a lamb, and riding off with
the girl, both bending to their pommels with
laughter.

Plupy slushed drippingly home. This was in-
deed the end. He never spoke to her again.

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CHAPTER XIII

This I do declare —
Happy is the laddy
Who the heart can share
Of Peg of Limavaddy.

Married if she were,
Blest would be the daddy
Of the children fair

Of Peg of Limavaddy.

Beauty is not rare

In the land of Paddy —
Fair beyond compare

Is Peg of Limavaddy.

‘THACKERAY.

Ir was the summer time of the next year. Plupy
was nearly eighteen. He had grown both in
length and breadth, but not in thickness. He was
still painfully thin, not to say scrawny, but on
the whole he had improved. He was in his second
year in Phillips Exeter and had made some prog-
ress in Greek. Truly it was not yet a living lan-
guage to him, and he seldom thought in it and
rarely used it as a medium of conversation. But
he knew a little Greek and occasionally referred
to that fact.

He knew, or thought he knew, a deal of Latin.
He had long since finished Ceesar and Sallust, had
read enough of Virgil rather to enjoy its ringing
measures. Horace was hard, but full of nuggets

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 179

of wisdom. Plupy could quote a few of them.
Indeed, with his love of nature and the flute, it
seemed as if the lines were made for him —

“Tityre tu patule, recubans sub tegmine fagi
Silvestrem tenui musam meditaris avena.”
What could better express his nature?

His early career in the big school had not been
all he could have wished. He had entered pre-
pared in advance of his classmates, particularly
in Latin, owing to the excellent drill of his old
teacher Mr. Gibson, and had loafed deliciously.
But the machine drill of the famous quartette of
instructors had overtaken him before the end of
the first term, had rolled over him, and he had
found himself dropped. Indeed, a new class had
been formed of the driftwood, and to his aston-
ishment and mortification he had realized that
he was a failure.

But it had done him good, for he began to
work and to work hard. He fairly dug into his
studies, early and late, and in a few short weeks
was reinstated. He remained in his old class and
never again fell behind, nor did he ever get in
the first quarter of the class. But his standing
was respectable, if not brilliant.

Many things had happened in this year and a
half. Pewt had grown a mustache that was a
delight to the eye, while Plupy shaved at least
once a month and bore the marks of it for days.

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His voice had long since ceased to bother him by
its erratic nature, and he had become proficient
on the flute. Indeed, he could play readily any-
thing that he could whistle. He had also given
serious study to the proper subjugation of the
tenor horn, which he considered the medium for
the interpretation of military music, best ex-
pressed by the words —

“Umpah — Umpah — Umpah — pah — pah” —

semper crescendo ad libitum, which added much
to the harmony and tone color of any selection.

He had sat with the twenty-two members of
the Exeter Silver Cornet Band under the leader-
ship and instruction of J. Eastman Lovett, and
had learned much. Indeed, on one occasion, clad
in a much-padded and belaced and epauletted
uniform, a leather helmet surmounted by a yellow
horsetail plume, and trousers much too short
and baggy for his long and skinny legs, he had
taken part in a parade which lasted for hours and
ate up miles of dusty road and leagues of hard
pavements. He had blown joyously all day into
his antiquated and rickety instrument with the
greatest pride and enjoyment, only to find, when
he returned home at night, with his lips pro-
truding like ripe tomatoes, that he had left the
tuning-slide of his instrument in his room. He
had then awakened to the mortifying realization

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that he had not made a sound on his instrument
all day, and had been so drowned in a whirl-
pool of brazen harmony that he had not known
it, nor had any of his co-workers in the glorious
cause.

Oh, yes, Plupy had progressed, and the town
had. No longer were the false bosom and the
bow tie with the elastic loop the latest things in
dressy circles. The double-breasted, blue, diag-
onal, cutaway coat had given place to the frock
made of basket cloth. The lavender pants had
retired in favor of the looser trousers. Plupy had
a frock coat for great occasions. He was very
proud of it. He ought not to have been: in it he
was a sight. He was also proud of his small-check
black-and-white trousers and of his low-cut cloth
shoes with toe cap and strips of patent leather.
The tout ensemble was quite unusual. But luckily
he seldom wore them.

Nellie, his little mare, had developed a spavin.
His father always insisted that it was the result
of the hard riding the girl of the Squamscott
House had given her. Perhaps it may have been,
but Plupy did n’t like to think so. Whatever the
cause poor Nellie had become dead lame and
had been put away. Plupy really grieved for her.
She was the only horse he ever loved, although he
owned many different horses in later life. And to
this day when Plupy dreams of a horse it is fre-

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182 THE YOUTH PLUPY

quently the little bay mare he drove and rode so
many years ago. In these dreams he never goes
back to his boyhood and youth that the little
mare comes out of the past, out of those days to
him as he is, to his wonder even in his dreams.

He had long ceased to care for his humiliation
in his Humpty Dumpty fall from the Western
horse and from the favor of the girl. Indeed, he
had practically recovered within ten days, for
various things had happened to cheer him up.
Only one week subsequent to his fall, Beany, in
a reckless endeavor to display his superior horse-
manship, had hired the Western horse to ride
with the girl, had been thrown twice, and had
been compelled to lead the horse back to the
stables.

Then Beany’s father, known to be a mighty
horseman, had announced a willingness, nay,
had recognized his duty, to show the young chaps
a few things about the management of an un-
ruly horse, had mounted the outlaw in the pres-
ence of an admiring crowd, and had been thrown
twice as quickly and nearly as far as Plupy had
been.

The girl of the Squamscott House had long
since departed, whither Plupy knew not, nor
cared he a “darn,” whatever measure of solici-
tude that may have been. Beany, however, as
Plupy had predicted, had taken her departure

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THE LAD ,WITH A DOWNY CHIN 183

very much to heart and had waited long and
vainly for the letter that had not come. But he
had cheered up, and,had confided to Plupy that
she was a stuck-up thing and that he was just
“*a-kiddin’ her along.” Plupy had said little, but
had thought to himself that both he and Beany
were the ones who had been “kidded along” and
not the girl.

At all events, she had long since passed forever
out of their lives, and to this day I do not believe
that either Plupy or Beany can remember her
name, and as the books of the Squamscott House
long since disappeared, her identity, with that
of the ‘‘man who struck Billy Patterson,” is for-
ever lost.

Since that time love had not again entered into
Plupy’s life. Girls there were who had smiled on
him. Perhaps they had smiled at him. Heaven
knows there was reason for it. Plupy distrusted
them. He had been badly seared in the past. And
so, while he had been polite and courteous to
them, he had declined to be limed by their al-
lurements or snared by their wiles. Not he!

He was rowing one day on the river in a little
blue, flat-bottomed skiff, when he heard a clear,
sweet voice from the bank, and looking up saw a
tall, lithe, black-haired, black-eyed girl standing
alone by the stream. She was bareheaded, cal-
ico clad, and her eyes danced with an impish look.

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“Oh, stingy,” she said in a mocking tone, “will
you give me a boat ride?”’

Plupy stared, colored with some embarrass-
ment, for he had not been accustomed to having
a girl make the advances. ‘‘Certainly, Miss —
er — just wait while I back her in.”

Then backing the boat skillfully to the bank he
held it by the oars until she sprang in.

“Sit in the rear seat, please,” said Plupy,
politely and somewhat formally. “Now, where
would you like to go?”

“Oh, anywhere,”’ she said with a smile and a
grimace. “I don’t care much, so long as I get a
ride. It was hot and the mosquitoes were hungry
on the bank, and the water was so still that I
could n’t tell which was upstream and which was
down. I was waiting for the town clock to strike
so as to know which way to go. How do you al-
ways know?” she asked naively.

“Why, I’ve lived here all my life, so I know.
I don’t have to look for the current,” replied
Plupy.

“To be sure. What a ninny I must be! Don’t
you think so, Mr. Shute?”

“By no means. You have n’t lived here long,
have you? I don’t think I have seen you before,”
remarked Plupy as he swung backward and
forward with a long, easy, regular stroke that
sent the boat along swiftly while tiny whirlpools.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 185

and white bubbles sprang up from the blades of
his oars.

“No, I’ve only been here a few weeks. We
came from Lawrence here. I’ve seen you riding
two or three times. You ride fine,” she said.

“Shaw!” said Plupy modestly, “I can’t ride
much. There’s lots of fellows who can ride bet-
ter than I can.”

“And lots that can’t,” she said sententiously.

Plupy gave a half-dozen powerful strokes that
made the water boil, and then rested on his oars.

“Jimmy-O, you can pull a boat too,” she
said with a smile in which one corner of her
mouth drew up more than the other which gave
a strange fascination to her unusual face.

Plupy, in spite of his oft-repeated resolution
to have nothing more to do with girls, was inter-
ested. She was different from other girls he had
met. She seemed — well — more natural than
they. She seemed to appreciate the good points
in a fellow too.

**T’ve rowed a boat ever since I was knee-high
to a toad,” said Plupy in modest explanation of
his prowess.

She laughed outright this time, a silvery peal.
*Jimmy-O,” she said; “‘it seems funny to think
of you as knee-high to anything.”

Plupy laughed. “But my name is not Ji aay
and you have called me it twice.”

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186 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Oh, ‘Jimmy-O’ is what I use for a swear word.
I know what your name is,” she explained.

* But it’s wrong to swear,” said Plupy by
way of light pleasantry.

“But Jimmy-O is better than what you men
say.”

We men! Plupy perked up amazingly and in-
flated his skinny chest.

“And what do we men say?” he inquired.

“Well, — ‘Godfrey!’ and ‘Hang it all!’ and
worse things.”

“What worse things?” asked Plupy with the
wily seductiveness of the serpent.

“Well — er — er —‘Damn it!’ and ‘Hell!’
and —I guess that’s enough,” she said with a
laugh and an impish look in her dark eyes.

Plupy laughed in great enjoyment. This was
certainly going it. He felt a delicious thrill of
wickedness. She was certainly interesting, by
Jove, she was!

“You have n’t told me your name yet,” he
ventured.

“Guess,” she said teasingly.

“Delia,” suggested Plupy wickedly.

“Forever more! Jimmy-O! what a name, —
Delia,” she fairly shouted.

““No, I don’t think you do look as if your name
was Delia. I’ll guess again, what do you say
to — er — Fanny?”

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‘THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 187

“Oh, murder! that’s worse,” she laughed.

‘Well, how about Nellie?”

“Won't do. Jimmy-O! Any name that ends
in ve won’t do for me,” she said with decision.

“I’m sorry for that because I was going to
guess Maggie,” said Plupy.

‘Well, that ain’t so bad, but no ze for me.”

“Well, I’ll give it up,” said Plupy with a
laugh.

“Well, don’t laugh,” she said.

“J won’t,” said Plupy. “What is it?”

“Jean MacEwen,” she said, looking keenly
at him.

“Gosh! That’s a dandy name,” said Plupy
in genuine admiration.

“Glad you like it. I like yours too. It sounds
kind of snap-crackery,” she laughed.

“Shoot if you must this old gray head,” said
Plupy facetiously, as he bent to his oars.

It was late in the afternoon when Plupy drew
his boat up at the wharf at the foot of South
Street and held out his hands to help her out.
Just touching his hand with hers, she sprang out
and up the bank.

‘Good-bye; I’ve had a lovely time,” she said.

Plupy fumbled with the chain of the boat.
‘Hold on, I’ll see you home,” he said.

“No, I’ll go alone. I prefer to. No; I mean
it,” she said as Plupy started to protest.

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“Well, you’ll be sure to come round to-mor-
row night at half-past seven?”’ demanded Plupy
anxiously.

“Yes, I will, if you will be here too,” she said,
smiling.

“You need n’t worry about me. I’ll be here,”
said Plupy fervently.

She laughed, waved her hand and disappeared,
walking rapidly down River Street. Plupy felt a
sense of distinct disappointment at seeing her
going in that direction, as it led toward Franklin
Street, notably the tough street of the town.
However, he fervently hoped that it was merely
a short cut to High Street, one of the best streets.
He would caution her about it some day.

That night Plupy took up his tenor horn and
played the serenade from the “ Haymakers” un-
til a late hour, —

“Mary, love, the world is sleeping,
Only whippoorvwill and T are singing 7

when his father’s voice came booming up the
register wrathfully, “Say, boy, suppose you and
the whippoorwill stop singing and go to bed,” —
which Plupy did with a few carefully muttered
expletives. As nothing further was heard to dis-
turb his father’s slumbers that night, it is fair
to conclude that the whippoorwill was equally
obedient.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN $189

The next night was warm, after a day of torrid
heat. It was band-concert night and Plupy had
been expecting to play in the concert, occupying
the proud position of third B tenor. But all day
he had been thinking about the evening on the
river with Jean. The prospect gave him thrills.
It was deliciously wrong. Of course the girl was
all right and he was a gentleman, but the whole
proceeding was quite delightfully irregular and
fascinating. It must have been to take Plupy
away from a band concert in which he was to
play the afterbeats or “tunkers” to mark the
rhythm, without which waltzes, polkas, quick-
steps, and even plain andantes would be mere
mazes of noise.

Plupy, however, wisely or unwisely decided
that there would be many band concerts, but that
nocturnal boat rides with a mysterious and attrac-
tive girl named Jean were too rare to neglect, and
he acted upon the advice of his friend Horace,
one of whose maxims, — “Carpe diem, quam
minimum credula postero,’’ — came to his mind.

None the less it was a difficult thing to decide.
He was wild over band music, and the pleasure of
sitting in a ring of fellow citizens and two or three
recruits from neighboring villages who came into
town driving carryalls hooked to raw-boned
steeds, with mother and the girls, was great, and
the memory of it lasting.

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But there was something in this sub-rosa affair
of his, this “Stille Liebe,” that held a charm
and an allurement that outweighed the mani-
fold fascinations and delights of playing “‘after-
beats in the band. It was delightfully, deliciously
daring, and Plupy, after looking longingly at his
old tenor horn and trying a few arpeggios on it,
laid it aside with a half sigh of regret. The band
were to play “Departed Days” in that concert,
and he had looked forward to his part, as he was
for the first time to attempt something more
elaborate than “tunkers.”

Plupy started out soon after supper and went
downtown. He was afraid that were he to sit on
the front steps with the family some visitor might
arrive and he might have difficulty in breaking
away. The plea of an engagement might lead to
questions difficult to answer. So Plupy, wise
in experience, went downtown early, and as soon
as it grew dark went through side streets to the
boat wharf. He had only to wait a few minutes
when she arrived, smiling; cool, fascinating in her
dark beauty. She sprang in, went to the rear
seat, and sat down while Plupy, with the ease of
long practice, pushed the boat from the bank and
sprang in. Then with a deft twist of the oars he
checked its progress, turned the bow upstream,
and with powerful but noiseless strokes drove the
little blue craft into the semi-darkness.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 191

It was a beautiful night. Bats were flitting
about in zigzags. Far overhead a night-hawk filed
its saw or boomed in its headlong sweep toward
the earth. In the trees the treetoads gave the call
that speaks of warm, soft nights. A frog croaked
suddenly and was answered far up the river by
the deep bass of an enormous relative. From the
pastures and woods came the tinkle of a sheep-
bell or the clank clank of a cow-bell.

The air was sweet with the smells of summer.
The mucky smell of the lowlands, the spicy
breath of the pine woods, the tang of the hemlock,
the sweet spice-jar smell of the lilacs that marked
the site of a house fallen to decay years before the
memory of any one then living. An occasional
splash in the water marked a disappearing musk-
rat. A night bird called from the woods.

Neither Plupy nor the girl spoke. To her,
brought up in the hot tenement house of a manu-
facturing city, it was all too soft and sweet and
beautiful. To Plupy, used to it from childhood,
it had never lost its charm. For a mile or more
the boat glided up the stream, leaving a wake
that slowly spread in diverging lines, luminous
in the faint light of the stars. Then Plupy rested
on his oars and they talked in low tones, which,
nevertheless, across the smooth surface of the
water, traveled far. But they said nothing that
could not have been heard by the most critical.

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They were happy, Plupy with the calm happi-
ness of the nature-lover and the blindly respect-
ful worshiper of beauty, Jean with the sweet
sounds and scents, the temporary freedom from
cares and hateful surroundings. She felt de-
liciously peaceful and at rest. She envied Plupy
his easy, care-free life, his chance to associate
with cultivated people, to be educated, to live
his life to the full of educated young manhood.
Finally she began to sing in a rich, throaty con-
tralto with a tinge of melancholy running through
it. She sang a song Plupy had never heard sung
so well, —

“Star of the twilight, beautiful star,
Gladly we hail thee, shining afar.”

Plupy held his breath until she finished, then
broke out enthusiastically : —

“Gosh! you can sing, Jean; I never heard that
song sung so well before.”

She laughed brightly. “I felt it— perhaps that
is why I sang it so well—the smells and the
sounds and the stillness. Why can’t it always
be like this?”

“T wish it might, Jean,” said Plupy softly, and
then caught himself in time as a crimson flush
spread over his face and neck, and he thanked
fortune that the darkness hid it. That would n’t
do; he must get himself in hand.

The girl said nothing, but trailed her hand in

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 193

the cool water. A sleepy wood thrush warbled
a delicious strain. A rapidly swimming muskrat
nearly struck the boat before he found out his
mistake and dived with so near a splash that the
girl was startled and gave acry. In the distance
a dog barked and the town clock struck nine.

Then she spoke. “It is so beautiful that I hate
to leave it, but we must go.”

“Must we go?” asked Plupy.

“Yes,” she said decidedly; “I can’t be out late,
or I can’t come at all.”

Plupy spun the boat round with one alter-
nating sweep of the oars and squared away for
the wharf, his pulses bounding and leaping and
a lump in his throat. Jean sat quietly with her
hands folded in her lap. In all too short a time
they were at the wharf.

‘May I see you home to-night, Jean?” asked
Plupy softly, as he helped her out of the boat.

“No, I must go alone,” she said in a voice that
admitted of no argument, and springing up the
bank she was gone. -

Plupy locked the chain of the boat, and slowly
and thoughtfully strolled home thinking of Jean
and feeling the touch of her hand in his. It was
the merest possible touch, but it had set the
blood racing in his veins. When he went to his
room he took up his flute and in a moment the
high, sweet notes of her song floated softly out

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on the summer air. People outside, hearing it,
hoped for more and some one applauded. Plupy
put away his flute. He could not play her song to
every one. It — it — it seemed like betraying a
secret, like making their friendship a common,
vulgar thing, not a real friendship, not a —
Plupy put away his flute.

For several evenings these excursions contin-
ued. Plupy was falling more deeply in love with
the girl, and she, through some unaccountable law
of affinity or attraction of contrasts, was develop-
ing a strong liking for the gawky, bashful youth.
At times on the point of despising him for his ap-
parent lack of go or get-up-and-get spirit, some
unexpected trait would crop out, some feat of skill
or strength in the management of the boat, some
keen analysis of sound and scents of nature would
cause her to admire him.

Poor child, she had been used to meeting boys
of a very different type. Boys who chewed to-
bacco and spat profusely in public places; boys
who wore their hats rakishly on one side, swore
fluently, and fought savagely among themselves;
boys who spent their evenings in pool-rooms or
in groups under street-lamps, ogling women in
an extremely devil-may-care way. And when she
met this youth, who was so polite and respectful,
she liked him while she laughed at him. She liked
him for his respect, his honesty, and his appalling

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 195

innocence. He was different from any one she
had ever known, and in that perhaps lay the
attraction.

A love affair like this, however discreetly car-
ried on, could not remain long a secret, and one
day Plupy’s horrified sisters came home with a
tale of his enormities that fairly overwhelmed
his ‘patient mother and aunt. Harry was doing
— what did they think! — what did they imag-
ine! Four adult exclamation points, rising inflec-
tion, I-pause-for-a-reply pause, count five.

His patient mother and aunt not being able to
imagine or to suggest what he had been doing,
expressed their burning desire for further in-
formation by the somewhat hackneyed phrases,
““For Heaven’s sake, what is it now?” and,
** Well, let us know the worst!”

Then the two shocked young ladies, having
secured an attentive audience that fairly hung
on their words and that might easily have secured
a perch on their bulging eyeballs, proceeded,
in the high key of horror, mortification, resent-
ment, and with innate gratification, to impart
the gruesome and dreadful news: Harry was pay-
ing attentions to a washerwoman’s daughter, —
think of it! ! Just think of it!! A great, im-
mense, fat, dirty washerwoman’s daughter! ! —
who lived on Franklin Street, — Franklin Street,
of all places in the world! — Franklin Street! !

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In an old tenement house with the windows
broken out! !— and mended with old hats! ! —
and newspapers! !— and drunken men in the
passageways! !— and women too just as bad! !
— swearing and cursing! ! — and being arrested
and put in jail! ! Franklin Street, of all places! !
And going up river with her every night in the

week! ! — a washerwoman’s daughter! ! — every
night! ! And none of us knowing a single thing
about it! ! — not a single idea in the world! !

Plupy’s mother and aunt looked and listened in
stony, petrified, wide-eyed astonishment. Then,
recovering themselves, they began a searching
cross-examination, which, while it disclosed
marked exaggeration, much hearsay evidence,
and many conflicting statements, nevertheless
left them with the feeling that the matter was
at least very unfortunate and disturbing. One
thing was grimly convincing of its seriousness. .
Harry had missed a band concert. Something
must be wrong.

At dinner that day Plupy, sensitive as a ba-
rometer to atmospheric changes, felt a tension
in the air, and with an attempt at lightness in-
quired genially who was dead, and when and
where the funeral was going to be held.

The answer was prompt and extremely discon-
certing, for his sister Keene, tossing her head
with the quintessence of scorn, said: “I know

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where it ought to be. At the washerwoman’s.
on Franklin Street. An old, fat, dirty woman
who has a daughter Jean. I suppose you will
ride in the first coach with the mourners.”

Plupy’s countenance became the color of a
cardinal flower, and he hastily drank a glass of
water to cover his embarrassment.

“T don’t know what you are talking about. I
don’t know any one on Franklin Street who is
a washerwoman’s daughter, or any other street
either.”

“Perhaps you will deny that you know a girl
named Jean MacEwen?” snapped the young
lady.

“What if I do? I have a right to without ask-
ing you,” he growled.

‘*And I suppose you think you have a right to
go up river with her every night. Say, mother,”
she continued, “‘why don’t you let her mother do
our washing, and then Harry can help Jean carry
it down and back?”

Plupy sprang up from the table, furious. ‘‘For
the Lord’s sake,” he sputtered, “I might as well
live in thunder as to hear Keene’s everlasting
clack from morning to night!”” And he rushed
from the room, slamming the door behind him,
leaving his family to discuss the matter, which
we may be sure they did pretty thoroughly, with
the result that, as Plupy had some friends at

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198 THE YOUTH PLUPY

court, his sister was most thoroughly convinced
that she had not improved matters by her rather
injudicious display of partisan spirit.

That night on the return of Plupy’s father, and
after supper, the matter was laid before him by
the two worried ladies. Plupy’s two older sisters,
desiring to be present and add several counts to
the indictment against poor Plupy, were shooed
out by the Court, and upon demurring to this
were promptly ruled out, and told to run away
like good little girls and to pull up their stockings,
whereupon they retired with their heads held
very high, and the devoutly expressed wish that
father would not be so coarse.

Upon the withdrawal of these somewhat prej-
udiced witnesses, the Court went into immediate
session and began to take testimony. Probably
two more sincere witnesses never testified before
any tribunal, and at the same time they tried in
every way to soften the dreadful details of the
transgression and mitigate the severity of the
crushing blow they felt that they were dealing
the Court, his father.

Great was their surprise and indignation when
at the end of their testimony the Honorable
Court burst into a roar of laughter and smote
the table with delight. “‘Good!”’ he shouted; “I
did n’t think the boy had it in him. I swear I
really believe he is waking up and that there is

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 199

some hope for him.”’ And he threw back his head
and laughed again.

Plupy’s mother sat back in amazement at
such sentiments. His aunt compressed her lips
into a fine, straight, crimson line.

“George Shute!”’ gasped Plupy’s mother, “I
am actually ashamed of you for saying such a
thing.”

“T should think you would expect something
dreadful would happen to you. I’m sure it
would serve you right,” chimed in, or rather
snipped in, Plupy’s aunt indignantly.

“Bosh!” said the Court judiciously. “You
never need fear anything will happen to a boy
who won’t fight.”

“You talk as if fighting was everything in this
world,” said Plupy’s mother.

“It certainly is a good deal in these stirring
times,” opined the Court.

“Certainly, George Shute,” said Plupy’s aunt,
displaying a spirit of carping criticism by giving
the Honorable Court his full name; “‘he was al-
ways fighting when he was a boy. You know he
was, and you know it troubled you.”

“The thing that troubled me was not the fight-
ing, but the getting licked,” said the Court.

“At all events, George, if he is as easy-going
and defenseless as you say he is, how do you
expect him to stand out against the fascina-

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tions of this designing girl?” inquired Plupy’s
mother.

““A boy of seventeen who plays the flute never
will have spunk enough to get into ascrape. Tell
me, did you ever know one to?” challenged the
Honorable Court.

“But he also plays the tenor horn, and be-
longs to the band, and certainly you know what
bandmen are. Think of Bill Sedley, and Abe
Sanders, and the Bragdon boys, Scott and Jim.
I never wanted him to play that horn or to get
into the band,” urged Plupy’s mother.

“George, you’ve just got to do something. If
you don’t you may have something to regret as
long as you live,”’ said Plupy’s aunt tearfully.

Plupy’s father was a good-natured man and
saw that they were really very much alarmed,
and he became sober and thoughtful.

“Keep quiet a moment and let me think,” he
said as he drummed on the table with his fingers
and wrinkled his brow.

“You say he has been doing this every night?”
he interrogated.

“Yes, every single, namable night,” asserted
the ladies.

“And you think he will go to-night?”

“Yes; we are sure he will,” they insisted.

“Well,” said Plupy’s father, ‘“‘I don’t like spy-
ing on them, but to convince you that you are

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barking up the wrong tree, I will take a little trip
to-night and find out for myself.”

‘““How are you going to do it without being
seen?”’ asked Plupy’s aunt.

Plupy’s father laughed. “If I remember cor-
rectly, when I was a boy and a young man there
were a number of things laid at my door that
were never proved. To quite a number of these
accusations I could plead guilty, but I don’t think
I will. But at all events, I used to be able to get
round town after dark without unduly advertis-
ing my presence, or knocking over any tables to
tell people just where I was. I don’t believe I
have quite lost the knack,” he said with a twinkle
in his eyes.

“George, you won’t make any scene, will
you?” asked Plupy’s mother appealingly.

“TI don’t believe there will be any reason for
making a scene, or even letting them know I am
there. He will probably play the flute for her,
or repeat some poetry. I would n’t be a bit sur-
prised if he has already written a few sonnets to
the young lady. Let’s see, does she speak Eng-
lish? I imagine his poetry may be something
like this: —

“Calm is the night, and soft the bullfrogs sing,
While bats fly high and damned mosquitoes sting;
Thy wondrous eyes, and blue-black hair —

Ouch! Spat! An old dingbuster got me there,
Give me one moment, dearest, while I swear, —

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“** Around the doodle bug in circles wheels,
At sight of thee, my soaring spirit reels,
While far above the wall-eyed night-hawk squeals
An d oe? 2”

“George Shute!” gurgled Plupy’s mother, in
irrepressible laughter; “‘do be sensible for once.
This is a very serious matter.”

“Yes, it is. I am convinced that the entire so-
cial edifice of this provincial but rapidly growing
town is hanging on the result of my investigation.
Woman! I goto prepare my disguise!”’ he shouted
tragically, and in high good humor, for the pros-
pect pleased him exceedingly.

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CHAPTER XIV

Cry thy trail, Little Brother.

Kipuina, “The King’s Ankus.”
Amonc the few boats on the river in the early
seventies was a dingy, rotten, battered old dory
owned by an ancient, snuffy Englishman who
spent a good part of his time fishing or picking
up wood from the pine forests that grew thickly
along the bank of the river. This dory generally
contained a tin can with a few pale, anemic, and
water-soaked worms, a broad-bladed paddle, a
pair of badly split oars, and two rickety seats,
smeared with the dried slime of countless pout
and eels, the fruit of nocturnal fishing. To the
owner of this dory came Plupy’s father, clad in
nondescript garments, worn rubber boots, and
a shocking hat and carrying a carpet bag. A
moment of keen bargaining, the exchange of an
inconsiderable amount of small specie, and the
dory was the property of Plupy’s father for that
evening.

It was nearly dark when the blue skiff, bearing
Jean, the black-eyed, in the stern seat, and pro-
pelled by the skilled hands of Plupy, quietly slid
into the dusk of the river. As it disappeared, an
old, dingy, leaky dory, propelled by a trampish-

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looking old man, wearing a shocking hat, who
wielded a broad-bladed paddle with skill and
vigor, noiselessly glided in the wake of the skiff.

From the skiff the rhythmic creak of the oars
and the murmur of conversation were faintly
heard, but from the dory, so carefully did the
trampish man dip his paddle, not a sound was
heard. On went both boats for a mile or more,
and then Plupy grounded his skiff at the foot
of a giant pine, the form of which could be dimly
seen against the sky. The trampish-looking man
checked his dory and pushed quietly into a small
cove where a tiny stream entered the main river.
From his sheltered position he was scarcely a
hundred feet from the skiff. It was an excellent
place for overhearing the conversation, pro-
vided the trampish-looking man did not allow his
risibilities to overcome him.

For a half-hour Jean and Plupy talked in low
tones, but quite audibly to the trampish-look-
ing man, and in all that time nothing was said
that could offend any one. Plupy’s father, how-
ever, while nearly bursting with laughter, realized
that his hopeful son was very hard hit indeed,
and he began to cudgel his brains to devise some
means of breaking up the intimacy before his son
made a fool of himself.

While thus engaged a rippling chromatic fluted
out over the water.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 205

“The soft-headed donkey,” he growled to
himself and prepared to listen. It was really
worth it for one who loved music, and Plupy’s
father did. Jean’s voice rang out in the melody of
“Star of the Twilight,” and Plupy’s flute, clear,
pure, and flexible, wove symphonies about it.
Then other songs followed, while the flute rippled
in exact time and harmony. Plupy’s father with
difficulty refrained from applause. Really the
boy played well. If he were only alive! If he
would only fight! If he would occasionally raise
the devil! But to play the flute! Faugh!

The town clock struck nine. Plupy cast off and
turned the boat. As they passed within ten feet
of the trampish-looking man, they made him
out dimly, sitting bent over his line. Plupy
backed vigorously and checked the boat. “‘Hello!
he said. The figure did not move. “Hello!” he
yelled; “chow long have you been here?”

The figure raised its head slightly, put its hand
to its ear, and then said, “Only a couple of horn-
-pout and an eel.”

Plupy drove his oars into the water and the boat
darted away. “‘That’s old Buckley. He’s deafer
than a haddock. He would n’t hear a cannon if
it were fired right under him. Queer old chap,
about a hundred years old, I guess. Some day he
will be found dead in his boat, or a big eel will
get on his hook and pull him overboard.”

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~ At nine-thirty that night a trampish-looking
man wearing a shocking hat pulled up a dingy,
rotten, leaky old dory in front of an old tumble-
down house, which he entered, and a few minutes
later Plupy’s father, tall, strong, well-dressed,
and smiling, emerged from the house and took his
way homeward, where he laughingly described
his trip to two worried but relieved ladies, who
listened eagerly, while from an upper chamber
came the brazen tones of the tenor horn, mel-
lowed by the distance, playing —

“This is thy greeting, signaled afar,

Star of the twilight, beautiful, beautiful star.”

For ten days longer Plupy’s infatuation in-
creased, and his father had not yet devised any
scheme to put an effective end to it. He hoped
for a lovers’ quarrel, but apparently none came.
Although he did not know it, on more than one
occasion Jean had shown indubitable signs of a
violent temper which had caused Plupy much
temporary unhappiness.

He had told her all about his life, his ambitions,
his aims, and she had sympathized with them as
young women do, and her sympathy had fanned
his ambition to dare much. But he had never
dared to propose marriage to her, although a
proposal was on his lips many times. But he did
not dare to venture, for fear, not only of her re-
fusal, but of breaking off forever these delight-

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THE FIGURE DID NOT MOVE

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 207

ful meetings. If only some change in his circum-
stances might make him wealthy. He had read
of such cases. Or if, like Beany, he had made the
most of his opportunities. Beany might risk a
proposal. He need have no fears. Confound it!
He himself had dawdled away precious time in
school when he might have been established in
business like Beany and Pewt, whom he had af-
fected to despise not so long ago.

Well, he would go to work and win independ-
ence and a competence. He might have to give
up his flute and his tenor horn, but what of that,
if he had Jean? Oh, how many opportunities he
had lost!

One afternoon he was sent to a downtown
store for a bushel of potatoes. The clerk was just
starting with a load and obligingly asked Plupy
to ride up with him. Plupy climbed aboard and
they started. The clerk had an order to deliver
on South Street and he took the shortest way,
through Franklin Street. Since his acquaintance
with Jean, Plupy had not been on Franklin Street
once. He could not bear to think that Jean lived
there, and he knew she would feel mortified and
embarrassed to meet him there. He was to meet
her that evening and was looking forward to the
meeting with increasing pleasure.

But he did not like to be rude to his friend the
delivery clerk, who had so obligingly given him

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a lift, so he sat tight and hoped his friend would
drive quickly. He did not know just where she
lived, and he looked keenly about dreading to
see her and yet hoping that he might see her
without her knowledge. He did not care where
she lived except for her own comfort. She was
so far and away above any surroundings that
she might have graced the finest colonial mansion
on Front Street, and would some day if he had
anything to say about it. She was just the
cleanest, sweetest, gentlest, in every way the
most desirable, girl he had ever met. How she
could see anything in him, he for his part could
not understand. Perhaps she really did n’t, but
was only allowing him to pay her attentions be-
cause she had not lived in Exeter long enough
to make any other acquaintances.

Plupy’s mercury fell to the bulb. But then she
must have had to go to stores in town where
such attractive, dangerous, and devil-may-care
young blades as Beany and Tommy Thompson
and George Hilliard and others worked, and she
must have seen and talked with these envied
beings. And she had lent a deaf ear to their flat-
teries. Plupy’s mercury promptly rose to summer
heat.

Jean was absolutely clean-minded. The coarse-
ness, the immorality, the billingsgate of the slums
had not touched her. It had rolled off her soul

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like — like — well, like snow-water off a well-
greased boot; no, that was too coarse a simile —
like — er — like — oh! yes, he had it, — like
““water from a duck’s back.” That was better,
but a bit vulgar. Still in some ways she was like
a duck, a white duck, a very white duck, but he
liked best to think of her as a white dove.

The horse stopped so suddenly that Plupy
nearly went heels over head. There were sounds
of harsh voices in raucous dispute. The grocer
laughed gleefully. “Gosh! a row between women.”
Plupy stared in awakened interest. Facing each
other in the yard of a tenement house were two
fat viragos. Their arms were akimbo, their heads
were thrust forward, and wagged from side to
side as they lashed each other with a stream of
oaths and invectives. A crowd was beginning to
gather. The grocer’s boy laughed at each new
invective. The crowd cheered them as they grew
more violent and abandoned in their language.

Plupy was horrified. He had never heard
women use such language. A feeling of nausea
came over him as he thought of his white dove
exposed to contact with such dreadful people
who said such awful things. Suddenly from a
door of the tenement a lithe, trim figure of a
young girl appeared. She had blue-black hair,
heavy eyebrows that met above the straight
nose, deep black eyes that flashed with fury.

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210 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Leaping down the steps like a panther she rushed
between the viragos and thrusting her fist under
the nose of one, she poured out such a torrent of
billingsgate as Plupy had never dreamed of.

It was Jean, his white dove, his gentle, pure-
minded maid. The grocer’s boy laughed aloud.
“Criminy! She is a humdinger. Did you ever
hear such talk?” And he turned to Plupy for
confirmation, while the white dove poured out
inconceivable blasphemy and filth. Plupy was
leaning forward, his jaw dropped, his eyes wide,
his hands clinched on the wagon seat until the
knuckles were white.

“On his brow the sweat of anguish
Started, but it froze and fell not.”

The grocer’s boy slapped Plupy jovially on the
back, but Plupy stared fixedly at the girl and
made no sign. The viragos were separating; the
one Jean had lashed so mercilessly was backing
away, shaking her head defiantly, but having no
words to match the girl’s. Jean shot a few final
invectives by way of good measure, turned to
reénter the house, and her black eyes flashed
contemptuously over the crowd and caught
Plupy’s horrified glance. A flash of fear and
shame shot over her handsome face, and turning
she dashed up the steps and into the house.

The crowd went its way laughing. The gro-
cer’s boy took down his reins from the hook over-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 211

head in the umbrella, and clucked to his horse.
They went through South Street, stopped at a
house and left an order. Plupy had not moved
or spoken. When the grocer’s boy came back to
the team, Plupy was gone. ‘“‘He’s a queer chap,”
he soliloquized.

Plupy walked slowly up Court Street. Several
persons accosted him, but he paid no attention,
made no reply, but hurried on, by the big field,
past the bridge, and into the pine woods. There
he sat down and tried to arrange his thoughts.
For a long time he could not think in a connected
fashion. His castles-in-the-air had tumbled in
ruins, his card-house had collapsed. She must
be a bad girl. There could be no doubt of it. No
girl who could use that kind of language could be
otherwise than bad. And she had completely
fooled him. Plupy gave a short, mirthless laugh
that sounded like a croak of a night heron.

It was late when he returned. The family had
finished supper and the girls were washing up
the supper dishes. His father was leaning over
a neighbor’s fence chatting and smoking. His
mother met him at the door, and a glance showed
her that something had happened.

“T have kept your supper hot for you,” she
said cheerfully; and Plupy to save questions sat
down and forced himself to eat something. A
cup of strong tea, scalding hot, toned him up a bit.

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He listened to his sisters singing duets and rat-
tling the dishes. The children were laughing and
shrieking with delight over some foolish game.
Plupy smiled bitterly. They were happy, and
the world was bright for them. For him every-
thing was ashes. Suddenly he thought of his
engagement with Jean for that evening. He could
not keep it. He went to the woodshed, picked
up his axe, and began to split wood doggedly and
viciously.

Slowly it grew dusk. The bats came out and
flew in zigzags. A peewee, perched in a tall elm,
sang its sweet but monotonous song. Robins
sang their vespers. Nature was going to sleep
with sleepy noises: It grew dark, and from the
band-room a short distance down the street
came the sound of tuning instruments. There
were the sharp, shrill tones of the piccolo, the
liquid chromatic runs of the clarinets, the blare
of cornets, and the deeper tones of the tuba, the
baritone, and the trombones.

Plupy lighted a lantern and in its dim light
split steadily. He picked out all the knotty sticks
and worked fiercely in an attempt to tire himself
and to divert his thoughts. It was nearly ten
o’clock when he went to his room. His father
was already in bed; his sisters were sitting on the
steps listening to the band. Under a red-shaded
lamp his mother sat sewing.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 213

“You have been working late,” said his
mother, smiling and pausing to bite off a thread.

“Yes, I have n’t done much lately,” he said.

“Why didn’t you go to rehearsal?” she in-
quired.

“T didn’t feel like playing to-night. I guess I’ll
go to bed,” he replied, feigning a prodigious yawn.

“T would if I were you,” she said.

““Good-night, mother,” said Plupy, taking up
his light.

““Good-night,” she said.

Plupy went to his room and from habit took
out his flute, but put it away. He could not play.
He blew out his light and sat in the open window.
Down in the band-room the band was playing,
and, softened and mellowed by the distance, came
the beautiful melody of that fine old band classic,
“Departed Days.” “Departed Days’ — never
had it seemed so sad, so hopeless, so irrevocable
to Plupy. The music ceased. Plupy slowly un-
dressed, went to bed, and worn out by his grief
and hard work slept.

During the next week Plupy worked feverishly.
He split wood, hoed his small garden, pumped
water, ran errands, and extended his activities
to neighbors’ gardens and woodpiles. But he
never went near his boat, the river, or Franklin
Street. He could not do that. He was trying to
forget, if not to forgive.

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214 THE YOUTH PLUPY

On the other hand, Jean, having gone several
evenings to the boat wharf and having waited
vainly for Plupy, had gone home more furious
each time. She neither tried to forgive nor forget.
He had sought and won her young affections and
then had flung her aside. And he and his proud-
stomached, stuck-up sisters were laughing at her.
Well, they should see what a proud girl would
do ——! ——! ! them.

Toward the end of the week Plupy was feeling
so much better that he practiced a short time
of an evening on his flute and tenor horn, and
contemplated attending rehearsals of the Silver
Cornet Band. One day in the forenoon he was
walking toward the post-office in a fairly cheer-
ful state of mind. There was but one letter in the
family box, a long, yellow, official-looking let-
ter. Plupy took it out, looked at it. It was ad-
dressed to him as “‘Esq.,” and in the upper left-
hand corner it bore the name of “J. W. O’Capias,”
a local attorney.

A spasm of dread assailed Plupy. A lawyer’s
letter, and to him! He convulsively concealed
it in his breast-pocket, buttoned his coat over
it, although it was a burning day, looked guil-
tily around to see if he was observed, and hur-
ried away. Straight to the High-School yard he
went, and there on the back steps he opened
the letter, read it, and found his worst fears mild

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 215

in comparison with the dreadful nature of the
communication. Plupy shuddered, swallowed,
and re-read it, hoping that he was the victim of
some hideous nightmare.

Dear Sir : —

I have been retained by Miss Jean MacEwen to demand
immediate compliance with your promise of marriage,
repeatedly given her, and in the event of your refusal, to
‘proceed against you with all the rigor of the law. This
matter must be settled within five days.

Very truly yours,
J. W. O’Cartas.

It was true! His eyes did not deceive him!
‘Promise of marriage”! Plupy’s eyes protruded
until they looked like a lobster’s. ‘Rigor of the
law”! Plupy’s eyes retired so far into his head
that they were completely lost to sight, while
his prominent Adam’s apple flew up and down
his throat like a monkey on a stick. “Five
days”! Plupy’s eyes slowly came forth from the
jungle of eyebrows and wrinkles of pain, and faced
the situation. He read the letter a third time. He
could see no way out -unless he left the country
or committed suicide. He could n’t do the latter
without killing himself and that was awkward.
There was no chance, then, but flight. He had
five days to make his plans.

He folded up the letter mechanically and put
it in the inner pocket of his vest.’ A sort of reck-

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216 THE YOUTH PLUPY

less bravado came to his aid. He had come to
the end. Everything before this was of no im-
portance, — mere trifles, ripples on the smooth
current of his life. But this — this was the end.
He would smile and be like himself. No one would
dream that the vultures were tearing at his liver.
He would drop out of their lives within five days
and they would never know where he went.

Plupy arose, squared his angular shoulders,
and went home, where, to carry out his resolve
to conceal all signs of worry, he smiled in such
a ghastly and wolf-like fashion that his mother
asked him, in sudden alarm, what he had eaten
that so disagreed with him. Plupy assured her
that he never had felt better in his life, and mount-
ing blithely to his room, played astonishing rou-
lades on his flute, and finished by playing on the
tenor horn the “Romance” from “L’Eclair”
without missing a note.

That night at supper he was in great form and
indulged in so hectic a gayety that his parents
were very much astonished, and tried hard to
believe it was genuine.

For several days Plupy alternately worked
feverishly and sat with his head in his hands
thinking, thinking, and trying to think a way
out of the difficulty. At times he thought he
would flee. Then he half determined to confide
in his father. If he had done this he would have

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 217

been relieved of all personal liability, as that
two-fisted gentleman would at once have pro-
ceeded to Mr. O’Capias’s office and inextricably
have mixed that legal gentleman up with the
furniture.

But he could not tell his father. He feared
that gentleman’s sarcasms more than he did
arrest, — that is, almost as much; and he hoped
against hope that Squire O’Capias might die or
forget all about it. But light came to Plupy in
an unexpected way, for chancing to pass two
men who were talking over some engrossing sub-
ject he overheard one say, with marked emphasis,
“Whenever I get a letter from a lawyer I go
straight to my lawyer and let him advise me
what to do and to say. You can’t go very far
wrong if you do that.”

““So you advise me to do that, do you?”’ asked
the other man.

“Yes, I do. Go to General Marston right
away. He can get you out of a scrape if any one
can,” said the other as they passed on.

Plupy’s eyes widened. Why had n’t he thought
of that before? That’s what lawyers were for.
To get people out of scrapes — that is, some
lawyers were. Plupy had saved up nearly five
dollars. Perhaps for that General Marston might
help him. At all events, he must do something
pretty soon. General Marston’s office was up on

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218 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Front Street near the Probate Office and right
in front of the Grammar-School yard.

I do not dare to say how many times Plupy
walked by the office trying to muster sufficient
courage to enter. General Marston was a very
gruff, quick-tempered man and very abrupt in
his actions. It was no uncommon thing for him
to kick a man downstairs, and on one occasion he
had chased a fugitive client clear to the town line.
So Plupy had terrifying doubts of the nature of
his reception. Then, when he had so far made up
his mind as to climb the stairs, he heard voices
and knew that the gruff old lawyer was engaged
with a client. ‘

So he tiptoed downstairs and hung round until
the client came down and walked away. As he
did this, another man joined him and asked how
the old bear was that afternoon, and was an-
swered to the effect that the old bear was as
Savage as a crosscut saw and nearly bit his head
off, “Damn him!” — which we may be sure did
not tend to encourage Plupy.

However, the boy was about ready to do any-
thing, and although he turned pale with nervous
dread, he walked softly upstairs and timidly
knocked. No answer. He knocked again.

““Come in!” said a voice snappishly.

Plupy half opened the door and paused irreso-
lutely.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 219

* Come in!” roared the voice. “Why the devil
don’t you come in, — you ain’t deaf, are you?”

Plupy came in with a convulsive start and held
the door open ready for instant flight if the Gen-
eral reached for a cavalry carbine hanging over
his head.

‘“Whatcher want? Shut the door and sit
down,” snapped the General.

“IT want to know what to do about this letter,”
said Plupy, handing the old lawyer the letter
from Mr. O’Capias.

The General took the letter and read it care-
fully, frowning and humming a tuneless, word-
less song. Then his eyes narrowed, and he
looked keenly at Plupy, who returned his gaze
steadily.

“Is what this cuss says in his letter true?” he
asked.

“No, General, it is not true. I did know the
girl and liked her a good deal, but I never asked
her to marry me, and — and — er — I would n’t
want to now,” Plupy said.

‘“‘Why not now?” snapped the old man.

““Why — er — because — er —”’ stammered
Plupy.

“Tell me the whole story, making it as short
as possible; my time is too valuable to waste in
breach-of-promise cases. Go ahead,” he growled.

Thus ordered, Plupy told the story, being oc-

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220 THE YOUTH PLUPY

casionally told by the old man to “skip that,”
and being occasionally questioned keenly about
some point. Finally, when he had finished, the
General grunted and sat looking at him with
keen eyes.

At last, when Plupy could bear it no longer, he
said, ‘‘ Well, General, what shall I do?”

“Do?” snapped the old bear; “do nothing.”

“But — er — what shall I tell Mr. O’Capias?”

“Tell him to go to hell!” snapped the old
bear.

Plupy colored, hesitated, and half rose. ‘‘Shall,
shall — I — er — shall I tell him now?” he
asked timidly.

“Lord, no! I’ll tell him,” said the old man,
leaning forward on his desk. He seized a sheet of
paper and began to drive a scratching pen over
it at a rapid rate. “Here! Read that,” he said,
handing the sheet to Plupy after having carefully
sanded it.

Plupy scanned the letter. It appeared to be
written in a sort of Runic or Chinese script, and
Plupy could make nothing of it. “I —I— can’t ©
read it very well,” he said.

“Can’t read it! Whatcher mean? Did n’t you
have any schooling at all?’ roared the old Gen-
eral. “Here! Gimme it! I’ll read it to you.”
And he snatched the letter out of Plupy’s hands
and began to read: —

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 221

J.W. O’Capias, —
Dear Sir: Have been consulted by the boy you have—

“What in the devil is that word? Can’t read
my own writing. Throttled, —no, that can’t be
it, — damn it! I’m getting worse every day —
oh, yes —”
threatened — with a suit for breach of promise. Under-

stand it is a blackmail scheme and won’t work. The boy
is a slabsided darkey, —

“Thunder! no, that can’t be right. I’ve got to

have a clerk to write my letters. What in thunder
did I, oh, yes —”

a soft-headed donkey [Plupy colored hotly], but nothing
more. So drop it, Capias; drop it at once or you’ll hear
something drop.

Gitman Marston.

“There!” said the old General, with profound
satisfaction at having been able to read his own
writing; “now you take that down to O’Capias,
read it to him, and then give it to him. Then
come back here and tell me what he said.”

Plupy took the letter, read it, then started
down the stairs, and hurried to the office of Mr.
O’Capias. Armed with this letter he felt equal
to anything. He opened the door without knock-
ing and entered. The lawyer sat with his feet in
the window, and in his shirt-sleeves, smoking.

“Hello, whatcher want?” he said shortly.

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222 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“T’ve got a letter from General Marston to
you,” said Plupy.

“All right; gimme it,”’ said the lawyer.

“He told me to read it to you,” said Plupy.

“Oh, he did. That’s a good thing, if you can
read it. It would take me a week,” returned
O’Capias with a laugh, as he spat out of the win-
dow without regard to the passers-by.

Plupy read the letter. When he had finished,
O’Capias was sitting up, his face red and angry,
his hands gripped on the sides of his chair.

“Who in the devil are you — his clerk?”

““No, I’m the Shute boy, and he told me to tell
you one thing more,” said Plupy.

“And what’s that?” growled O’Capias with a.
threatening look.

“He — told — me — to — tell — you,” said
Plupy slowly, and then shot out the rest in a
shriek, — “‘to go to hell!” And at the savage rush
of the lawyer he slammed the door and was down
the stairs and out on the street in two jumps.
Plupy waited for him to appear, intending to re-
peat his defiance and escape by flight. He could
hear him muttering and cursing, but he did not
come out, and Plupy hurried up the street and was
soon in the General’s office once more.

The General, who was busy at his table, looked
up sharply. ‘‘Hullo! Back so soon? Well, what
did he say?” he asked with a smile.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 223

“Chased me out of the office and swore,” replied
Plupy; “‘but I told him what you told me to.”

“What was that?” inquired the General.

“Told him to go to hell,” said Plupy.

“Good! That’s just what I said. Well, that’s
the last you’ll hear of him or her. So don’t get
into any more scrapes,” said the General, going
back to his work.

Plupy took out his four dollars and seventy-
five cents, all he had, and laid it on the table.
““T’ll pay that to-day, General, and as soon as I
get the rest I will pay it. Will that do?”

The General looked up at Plupy, then at the
money. “Huh,” he growled. “Take your money.
Do you suppose I charge for getting numbskulls
like you out of scrapes?”

Plupy colored deeply. “But, General, I want
to show you I am thankful for what you have
done for me, and I want to pay, too,” he said.

“What’s your name?” he asked abruptly.

Plupy told him.

*“Whose son are you?”

Plupy gave the required information.

“What! George Shute’s son! Why in the
devil did-n’t you say so first?” he snapped.

Plupy could not state just why.

“Your father is a good friend of mine. Your
mother and Aunt Sarah are the finest women in
the world. Who in thunder do you take after?”

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224 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Plupy could not say just what ancestor he
resembled.

“Now, I want you to keep away from women.
They raise the devil with a young fellow. A bad
woman is the worst thing in the world, unless
perhaps it is a fool woman. A good woman is the
best. Some day, if you have good luck, you will
marry a good woman. I wish every young fellow
might. But wait until you are old enough. Now,
promise me that.”

Plupy promised fervently.

“Now,” continued the old bear, “I want you
to promise me that you will tell the whole story
to your father and mother before you go to bed
to-night.”

“Gosh! General, have I got to do that?” de-
murred Plupy.

“Ever read Dickens?” asked the General
abruptly.

‘*Have read ‘Pickwick Papers,’”’ said Plupy.

***Bleak House’?”

“No, sir,” said Plupy.

The old lawyer turned to his capacious and
well-filled bookcases, and took down a book.
‘‘Here,” he said, “read this, the finest thing he
ever wrote. Plupy read: —

“See there, my boy,” said George, very gently smooth-
ing the mother’s hair with his hand, “‘there’s a good, loving
forehead for you! All bright with love of you, my boy. A

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 225

little touched by the sun and the weather, through follow-
ing your father about and taking care of you, but as fresh
and wholesome as an apple on a tree.

“The time will come, my boy,” pursued the trooper,
“when this hair of your mother’s will be gray, and this
forehead be all crossed and recrossed with wrinkles — and
a fine old lady she’ll be then. Take care, while you are
young that you can think in those days, ‘I never whitened
a hair of her dear head — I never marked a sorrowful line
in her face.’ For of all the many things that you can think
of when you are a man, you had better have that by you.”

Plupy read it, as the General said, “‘The finest
thing Dickens ever wrote.”

‘I promise, General,” he said.

‘All right. Now, I’m busy and have wasted
too much time on you. Get out!” said the
General testily, to cut short Plupy’s thanks.

‘Good-bye, General,” said Plupy.

‘*Oh, for the Lord’s sake, go. Good riddance!”
snorted the General.

Plupy ran downstairs with the lightest heart
he had had for weeks. That night he made a clean
breast of his troubles to his father, his mother,
and his aunt.

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CHAPTER XV

Very softly down the glade runs a waiting, watching shade,

And the whisper spreads and widens far and near;

And the sweat is on thy brow, for he passes even now —

He is Fear, O Little Hunter, he is Fear!

Kupuina, “Jungle-Book.”
Tue next morning Plupy awoke with a feeling
of relief and freedom from care that he had not
felt for weeks. He propped himself up with his
arms behind his head and thought over his un-
exampled good luck in getting out of so serious
a scrape. He would n’t have to run away, or go
to jail, but could stay at home and continue his
course in the Academy. His father had long ago
promised him that, and how little gratitude he
had shown him. He had nearly thrown his op-
portunity away by being made a fool of by a girl,
and a girl who swore and used dreadful language,
and his father and mother had forgiven him.
True, his father had not been quite satisfied

with his behavior in not standing up to old
O’Capias in his office, and had found fault with
him because he had not “knocked his infernal
snout off,” to quote the exact language of that
plain-spoken but humorous gentleman. But
what could a fellow do? He wished his father
was not so set on his fighting some one. What was

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 227

the use of fighting anyway? If a fellow got into
a fight he was sure to get a sprained thumb, and
if it were a fight worth mentioning he usually
got a black eye or a bloody nose. And it would
be just his luck to get a crack on the mouth that
would prevent him from playing the flute or the
tenor horn for weeks.

No! In spite of what his father said and felt,
he, Plupy, would not get into a fight if he could
help it. True, he might have to fight some time,
but not if he could help it. He had a nervous
dread of any trouble with any one; he hated to
be hurt, but no more than he hated to hurt an-
other person. He had got out of this scrape pretty
well, and it would be a long time before he would
get into another. Not he!

But Plupy was not yet out of the woods. It
was true he was no longer in danger of legal com-
plications, but he had incurred the enmity, not
only of Jean, but of Franklin Street. Franklin
Street’s code of morals was low. Its residents
fought among themselves. Its consumption of
spirituous liquors was a much larger percentage
per head than in any other community. Its lan-
guage was vitriolic on occasions. But it had its
virtues and its local pride. Its main virtue was
its loyalty to its members. The local police knew
this from bitter experience, for when in response
to a riot call the four guardians of the public,

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228 THE YOUTH PLUPY

“Old Swain,” “Old Brown,” “Old Durgin,” and
“Old Kize”’ would charge into a crowd of em-
battled Franklin Streeters, they had to fight
the whole crowd in order to make a single ar-
rest, and were exceedingly lucky if they got away
with their victim, and any clothes to speak of.

And Franklin Street was proud of Jean. She
was beautiful. She was bright and funny. She
was good-natured. She could outswear and out-
billingsgate any man, woman, or child on the
street. She was a very remarkable girl, and she
had been slighted by Plupy, and in humiliating
her he had struck a blow at the cherished insti-
tutions of Franklin Street. I do not dare to think
what would have happened to Plupy had he ven-
tured to go through Franklin Street. But Plupy
was wise, and, when there was danger in the air,
discreet. Some might have called him timid. His
father used a different word.

No; Plupy was not quite out of the woods.
Not quite. Dennis Cassidy and Micky Costello
were boys of about Plupy’s age. Denny lived
on the Hemlock side, Micky on Franklin Street.
But in heart and soul Denny was a Franklin
Streeter. Denny and Micky were like David and
Jonathan. They were inseparable. They had
fought but once, a long, obstinate, even battle,
and at the end, exhausted, battle-scarred, and
breathless, they had agreed to call it quits, had

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shaken hands, and had become friends. As such
they made common cause against hen-roosts,
apple orchards, and common enemies. They were
skilled in warfare of all kinds and together were
practically invincible.

They prided themselves upon their friendship,
and had a curious way of writing their names in
chalk, charcoal, or pencil, or carving it with jack-
knives on fences, trees, buildings, posts, cupolas
of buildings, and belfries of churches. “Denny
and Micky” stared at you from every place of
vantage and advertised their friendship and
their pugilistic ability.

Denny and Micky espoused the cause of Jean,
and like true knights pledged themselves to
Plupy’s destruction. To some who knew Plupy’s
peculiar architecture, his awkwardness, and his
peaceful disposition, their ambition might have
savored of tilting at windmills; yet to Plupy it
was a terrifying menace.

He first found it out when he went down to his
boat. He found the boat sunk to the gunwale and
with a gaping hole in the bottom. On inquiring he
learned enough to conclude that the damage had
been done by the redoubtable Denny and Micky.
It was told him in strict but oppressive confi-
dence that they had said they had smashed his
boat and would smash him, Plupy, some day.
Plupy was boiling with anger, and yet very

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230 THE YOUTH PLUPY

rouch disturbed at the threat. He procured a new
bottom board, pulled up the boat, turned it over,
and by hard work repaired it, calked the seams,
and made it water-tight. Then he launched it,
took a short spin, then locked the boat, and
borrowing a set of stencil plates stenciled a warn-
ing sign threatening with prosecution any one
injuring his property, and offering a reward of
five dollars (which he had not been obliged to
pay General Marston) for the detection of the
miscreants who smashed his boat.

Two days later he found the boat again
smashed. This time there was no clue to the
criminals. Plupy began to feel very serious, in-
deed. The same day he met Jean on Water Street.
She was accompanied by Denny and Micky,
and the three were laughing and chatting. Plupy
began to feel a bit wabbly. He had been dread-
ing to meet Jean. He did not know whether he
ought to bow to her or not, and whether or not
she would recognize him.

He need not have speculated about that, for
Jean looked at him as if he were a wooden In-
dian at the tobacco store. Plupy, with his hand
halfway to his hat, looked like a petrified idiot,
and while in this condition received a shove from
Denny’s shoulder that sent him reeling off the
sidewalk. This was so glaringly an intentional
affront that Plupy’s face was ablaze.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 231

“Say! what are you trying to do? Have n’t I
got as good a right on the sidewalk as you?” he
demanded indignantly.

“Then keep out of my way, you long-legged,
knock-kneed Shanghai, unless you are trying to
pick up a fight,” said Denny out of the corner of
his mouth. -

“Who said anything about fighting?” said
Plupy in tones of indignant remonstrance.

Jean, with a mocking laugh, began to sing —

“Mamma says I must n’t, mamma says I must n’t,
Oh, George, dear George, not just yet awhile.”

Plupy’s face became congested with blood, and
he looked painfully embarrassed, while the by-
standers laughed.

Micky then walked up to Plupy with head
thrust forward and jaw out. Plupy’s face, now
pale, had a tight, drawn look about the bridge
of the nose, and his eyes had the cold, steely look
of flint. He felt a sensation as if the hair was
rising on end at the back of his neck and spine,
and every muscle was tingling as if he had the
handles of an electric machine in his grip. Micky
made a quick, threatening gesture but Plupy
did not start or flinch. .

For a moment they glared at each other, and
then a storekeeper spoke up sharply, “Here,
there, boys! None of that round here!” And he

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232 THE YOUTH PLUPY

stepped briskly out of his store and approached
the angry boys.

““Come on, boys, don’t muss his hair. Mamma
will have to curl it again.” And Jean laughed her
mocking, musical laugh, as she and her two
knights moved off.

Plupy without a word walked in the other di-
rection, paying no attention to the bystanders’
inquiries as to why he didn’t give Micky a“‘bang
in the snoot.”

““Not much like his old man,” chuckled a
veteran with whiskers. ‘‘When George was his
age he would have gone round them rowdies like
a cooper round a barrel. I reckon this boy kinder
takes arter his grandfather. He wuz a sorter,
kinder mild, gentlemanly sort of man.”

“Dunno ’bout that, Elias,’ said another.
“Henry Shute, this ’ere boy’s grandfather, was
an abolishionist, an’ not afraid to say so when he
was in danger of bein’ rid out of town on a rail,
an’ when they broke up Dan Meader’s saloon,
he wuz the fust man to go in, though Dan he up
and said he’d kill the fust one what come in.
Henry Shute wuz a gentleman, but he wuz pure
grit all through. I sartin dunno where this ’ere
boy gits his disposition. Guess there must ha’
been a rabbit somewhere back.”

“Yer both wrong, I tell ye, th’ young feller
was ready to fight ’em to-day. Did ye see his

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 233

eyes? They wuz jist like ice. Jever git a rat in
acorner? Ye’ll never want to do it twicet. The
devilishest fighter in the world is a rat in a corner,
and when it gits started ye can’t stop ’im unless
ye kill ’im. To my thinkin’ this ’ere boy was in
a corner this time and ye’d ha’ seen some lam-
basting thet wud ha’ s’prised ye some. Ter my
way of thinkin’ if they git this ’ere long-legged,
gander-gutted feller into a fight, itll take suthin’
more’n a lickin’ to stop ’im, you.”

And thrusting a large plug of “nigger-head”’
into his mouth and up under one ear, with hide-
ous and whiskery distortion of his shrewd,
wrinkled New England face, by vigorous up-
and-down movements he wrenched off a segment,
replaced the plug in the hip pocket of his trou-
sers, and stumped off down the street, his iron-
shod cane ringing on the brick sidewalk.

As for Plupy he returned home with very
mixed feelings. He still felt a tingling in his el-
bows and a sort of exhilaration. Yet he could
not help realizing that sooner or later he was
in for a tremendous thrashing. Too well he knew
the prowess of Denny and Micky. If he only
could try it out with one of them singly, he might
possibly give him so much trouble that the other
one might leave him alone. He did not believe
he could even lick one of the two alone, but he
would have at least a fighting chance.

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234 THE YOUTH PLUPY

But with two of them! Plupy shivered at the
thought and glanced over his shoulder. His
exhilaration was rapidly passing away, and in
its place he felt a very reasonable apprehension
that he would have been better off if he had
taken flight before he saw General Marston.
Perhaps General Marston might help him out
again, but — no! he would be ashamed to run
to him for help again. He had helped him against
a girl, whom he could n’t fight, and against a
lawyer. But he could fight Denny and Micky if
he was n’t so “white-livered,” as he had heard
his father say about some fellow. So Plupy, very
much disturbed in his mind, set to work on his
woodpile. He reasoned that while he was at work
in his own shed he was not in danger of any
attack, and should he be so unfortunate as to
meet the enemy on a side street, he would be
somewhat prepared from having sawed and split
a few more cords of wood.

None the less, however, did the future appear
dark with menace to poor Plupy.

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‘CHAPTER XVI

As eagles o’er the ocean, as bears on bergs of snow,

They sprang with measured motion, they rocked them to and fro:

Deep-rooted rocks had quivered to such unearthly blows

And iron oaks been shivered by lighter strokes than those.

Frithiof and Angantyr.

Ir was over a week later when Plupy, having
taken his small brother Ned to Hemlock Square to
get a pair of shoes at the old-fashioned shoe-store
and cobbler’s shop kept by “Brother” Stacey, a
most devout and upright deacon of the Advent
Church, and who had in his time been a fervent
Millerite, even to the extent of giving away most
of his personal property, was returning through
Clifford Street which led to Bridge Square at an
angle to Franklin Street.

Under ordinary circumstances he would have
avoided going to Hemlock Square by this route,
but he never dreamed of being annoyed or held
up when he had his little brother with him. On
Clifford Street stood at that time the Advent
Church, which had been recently moved to the
east side of the street. Behind it was a square or
grassy plot about thirty feet across, which was
used in a most irreverent and sacrilegious manner,
as a place to settle all local disputes by wager of
battle; that is to say, fist fights to a finish.

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236 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Time without number had these sacred pre-
cincts echoed to the hoarse and profane yells of
encouragement of the partisans of the embattled,
to the grunts and muttered curses of the warriors,
to the “thud” of rib-roasters, the “smack” of
claret-tappers, or the “plop” of cracks on the
“bugle” or the “beezer.” And times without
number had the battle-bunged pugilists, having
settled the burning question of supremacy or
local pride, shaken hands and as friends retired
with their partisans, all friends, to a near-by
pump for repairs.

On the whole, it was an institution not wholly
bad. Its location was unfortunate; that was all.
And so Plupy, happily strolling up the street
with his little brother, who was as proud as a
peacock of his new shoes, felt his heart come to
his mouth as he beheld Denny and Micky with
several other desperate characters, emerge from
behind the little chapel and bar his way.

“T guess we’ve got you this time,” said Micky
truculently.

Plupy glanced round; nobody in sight. Plupy’s
little brother, looking at their forbidding faces,
began to cry. In an instant fear fell from Plupy.
“Say, let me take my little brother home and I’ll
be back,” he said.

“The hell you will,”’ said Denny; “I guess you
don’t play that on us.”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 237

Plupy laughed shortly. ‘All right,” he said,
“‘only there is no need of scaring him. Ned,” he
said laughingly to the little chap, “‘you run home
and show your new shoes. The boys want me to
help them do something. Now, run along.”

“But the boys will hurt you,” said the little
chap.

“No, they won’t hurt me, will you, fellers?’’
said Plupy.

“No,” they chorused. “‘We won’t hurt him,
we like him ever so much.” And they roared
with laughter.

The little man, reassured, ran off up the street,
turned, waved his hand, and trotted round the
corner. Then Plupy turned to the crowd with set
jaw and eyes narrowed to slits. The rat was in a
corner.

“How many of you have I got to fight?” he
asked in an even, expressionless voice.

“Me and Micky,” said Denny. “You’ll get
all you want, before you get through with us.”

“T ought to,” said Plupy; “two to one.”

**Come on,” shouted Bill Donelly, — “back of
the church.”

“You'll give me a fair show?” asked Plupy.

“Oh, you’ll get a show all right. Much good
it’ll do you,” returned Bill with an ugly leer.

“Yes, you’ll get a show, and a fair show, too,”
said a voice.

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238 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Plupy turned and saw a tall man with side
whiskers, carrying a heavy whip and wearing
high boots. .

“What you got to do with it?” impudently
asked Bill.

“*T’ll show you,” promptly answered the man.
“This is a fight, two against one. If this young
feller agrees to it, all right; but it’s going to be
square if it ain’t fair. If any one tries to trip this
young chap or to cut in, [’ll cut his hide to ribbons
with this whip. Is that plain enough?” And
he cracked the whip so sharply that every one
started.

The crowd sulkily assented. It wasn’t quite
their idea of a fair fight, but it was apparently the
best they could do. So they at once adjourned
to the lot, and Plupy, Denny, and Micky stripped
for the fight. The tall man displayed a surprising
knowledge of the rules of the ring, and as he
placed himself in Plupy’s corner he gave that
pallid youth hasty instructions.

““Now, understand,” he said when they were
ready, “‘this fight is on the level. No gouging,
or hair-pulling, or kicking or choking. Now, if
you are ready, — time!” he shouted.

Plupy, his face white, but with two red spots
on his cheek-bones, leaned slightly forward, and
backed slowly while his two opponents came up
on both sides. Then, obeying the whispered in-

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 239

structions of the tall man, he made a sudden
feint as if to attack Denny, turned suddenly and
met Micky rushing in. Smack! smack! went the
blows as he rained them in with a force and sav-
age exhilaration he had never dreamed himself
capable of. Thud! Thud! Thud! he received sav-
age blows from behind and his ears rang, as he
ducked, turned, and drove both fists in savage
hooks into Denny’s ribs, bringing grunts of pain
from that doughty warrior.

They clinched, strained, twisted, and fell with
Plupy underneath. “‘Now ye got him! Hammer
him, Denny! Punch his face in, Micky,” yelled
the unfriendly crowd, pressing closer in their
excitement.

“Stand back there!” yelled the tall man, rais-
ing his whip.

Plupy twisted like an eel, got on his face, and
by a violent bow of his back bucked them off like
a vicious broncho, threw himself on Denny, and
drove his bony fists into the broad, freckled face
like the strokes of a piston-rod, holding him with
a vicelike grip of his knees. Micky hammered him
viciously on his head, but finding his blows had
no effect, seized him by the neck and pulled him
off the struggling Denny. The three rolled and
twisted to the fence, battering each other like
furies.

By a violent twist they got Plupy down again,

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 241

pulp. “’Nuff! "Nuff!” yelled Denny, but Plupy
was likea wild man. It cost the tall man a struggle
to drag him away.

Plupy was a sight. His face was cut and bleed-
ing in a dozen places. One eye was closed, his lip
split, his ears swollen like beets, his shirt com-
pletely torn off leaving the neck-band, and his
body streaked with blood and scratches where
the combatants had rolled on the ground. He
was panting like a dog, and his remaining eye had
the glare of the eye of a wolf. Micky, his features
a mass of blood, was still bellowing, while Denny
was dazed by the ferocity of Plupy’s last attack.

There had been many a fight in the little
square, but never one so bloody, so pitiless, and
so savage as this. True, they had got the rat in
the corner, but it had done them little good.

A few minutes later Plupy, still reluctant, was
led by the tall man into his house, where his
horrified aunt and sisters went into hysterics
over his condition. But his mother, aided by the
tall man, who explained matters as well as he
could for the tumult of cries and exclamations,
worked with cold and hot water, soap, towels,
beefsteak, brown paper, and other emergency ar-
ticles, and in about a half-hour had Plupy band-
aged, splinted, and done up like a mummy, and
as comfortable as a boy could be who was a mass
of bruises, abrasions, and purple lumps.

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242 THE YOUTH PLUPY

One may well imagine the feelings of his father
when he arrived home that night. He could
not believe his eyes. The boy had been terribly
beaten. That was evident. But Plupy himself
could give him but little account of the fight, any
more than a man could give a connected account
of a fall down a flight of a thousand steps after
bumping every step.

He would find out for himself. He would see
the other boys, and if, as he fully believed, they
were unhurt, some one would pay for it. He
could not eat his supper. He was mad clear
through. No one dared to say, “‘I told you so.”
Every one wanted to. As soon as supper was over,
he went upstairs to where Plupy lay in state.

“He lay like a warrior taking his rest

With his martial cloak around him”; —
that is to say, he was swathed in bandages and
smelled of witch hazel and bay rum. Plupy was
asleep, but roused up and grinned in a very one-
sided manner, but could not give any lucid ac-
count of the affair, and talked strangely. His
father tiptoed out of the room and down the
stairs. Putting on his hat he started for the
door.

“‘Where are you going,George”’ asked Plupy’s
mother.

“To get Dr. Perry. I don’t like the way he
acts.”

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 243

“Why, what is the matter? Is he worse?”
she said, hastily putting down her tray of
dishes.

“T don’t know, but you had better go up,” he
replied, and strode rapidly toward the doctor’s
house, a short distance away.

Hastily the two women ran upstairs to Plupy’s
room. He was apparently asleep. His mother
bent over him. He was breathing all right, and
his head seemed cool. They sat down and waited.
In a few moments they heard the short, patter-
ing footsteps of the good family doctor and the
heavy tread of Plupy’s father mounting the stairs.
They entered the room.

The doctor sniffed. ‘‘ Witch hazel! Dr. Dear-
born’s Family Salve! I can tell it by its spear-
mint.” He drew near the bed and leaned over the
battered sleeper.

‘Well, well, I should say he had been fighting,”
he said in a surprised tone. “Breathes all right;
head cool.”

Plupy opened his eyes at his touch, stared at
him a moment, and then grinned. “Hullo, doc-
tor,” he said cheerfully.

““What you been up to, Harry?” asked the
doctor.

Fightin’, doctor,” he answered with a grin
and a twinkle in his one unbunged eye.

““Who you been fighting with?”

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244 THE YOUTH PLUPY

Plupy paused, thought a moment, and then
said, in a tone of relief, ‘General Marston.”

“General Marston! Hum, — well, did you lick |
him?” asked the doctor.

Plupy reflected a moment. “I dunno,” he re-
plied and closed his one eye.

“What do you think, doctor,” asked Plupy’s
father; “is he badly hurt?” .

The doctor roused him again. “Here, hold this
in your mouth a minute,” he said as he slipped a
thermometer between his battered lips.

Plupy roused with a start. “Gosh! doctor,
that hurt,” he ejaculated.

“There, that sounds better.”’ Then he listened
at his chest, tapped his back between his shoul-
ders, felt of his head behind his ears, removed the
thermometer, and glanced at it.

“Temperature normal; heart and lungs good;
pulse normal. He is sound. Could n’t kill him
with an axe,” was his verdict. ‘‘Let him sleep.
That is all he wants. In a day or two he will be as
good as ever.”

“Don’t you think, doctor, that something
ought to be done to those rowdies for beating him
so?” asked Plupy’s aunt indignantly.

“Well, Sarah,”’ said the doctor, with a whim-
sical light in his eyes, “that depends on circum-
stances. The report is that Harry here licked
them. If that is so, I guess he is not going to lose

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 245

anything by it, and I guess they are. I guess
George will come to the conclusion that he is a
chip of the old block.”

“T can’t believe it yet, doctor,” said Plupy’s
father doubtfully; ‘but I’m going to find out
to-night.”

“You won’t get into any trouble, George, will
you? I think we’ve had enough lately,” said
Plupy’s mother.

The doctor laughed. “‘I guess, Joanna,” he said
in his kindly, drawling voice, ‘‘George’s fighting
days were over long ago.”

Plupy’s father laughed regretfully. “Yes,
doctor, I’m afraid you are right. Well, I’m off,”
he said, and he ran down the stairs like a boy.

Out of doors he went straight to Franklin Street
to Micky’s house. Several people were sitting
on the steps. “It is Mr. Shute,” and they made
way for him respectfully, for, apart from the
fact that he was the father of Plupy, he was well
liked.

He knocked and Widow Costello came to the
door. “I came to see you about your boy, Mrs.
Costello. I found my boy badly hurt to-night
and I understand your boy had something to do
with it.”

“Oh, yez dud, dud yez? An’ yer booy wuz
hurted, yez say. Och, wirra! wirra! Coom in, sorr,
coom in an’ see fwat yer booy dud to moine.”

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246 THE YOUTH PLUPY

And she ushered Plupy’s father into a bedroom
where lay Micky with his face looking like a
puffball made of autumn leaves, so bruised, cut,
and scarred it was.

Plupy’s father looked, and a light of the ut-
most satisfaction lit his face. Suddenly he per-
ceived that Micky’s mother was berating him. He
turned and made for the door with her voice ring-
ing in his ears. Had it been a man he would have
stopped and argued the matter to a finish, but he
had no words to bandy with a woman. He knew
better than that, and he beat an ignominious re-
treat with joy in his heart, while the virago stood
with her arms akimbo and pursued him with
opprobrium of the lowest description until he
passed from sight.

Plupy’s father crossed the bridge to the Hem-
lock side, turned into the Gilman Farm lane and
followed it to the old farmhouse, opposite the
river end of Franklin Street, where dwelt Den-
ny’s father, a sturdy, fiery-haired man from whom
Denny had inherited his pugilistic disposition and
ability. When he came to the house, Pat and his
helper, a wiry, rat-eyed, smallish man with long
arms, came out.

Plupy’s father stated his errand.

Pat measured him up and down with marked
impudence.

“May I see the boy?”’ asked Plupy’s father.

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 247

““Fwat th’ divil do yez want to see him for?”
asked Pat.

“I heard he was smashed up, and I thought I
would like to find out the truth.”

“Coom in, if ut’s th’ troth yez wants,” said
Pat grimly.

Plupy’s father entered. Within, on the sofa,
lay Denny, his face looking like a worsted tidy,
or a Scotch plaid ottoman. Plupy’s father felt a
wave of pleasure sweep over him. It was true,
his boy could fight. He had seen two specimens of
evidence that were conclusive. He thanked Pat
and left the room.

Pat followed and so did the rat-eyed man.

“Wull, fwat be yez goin’ to do about it?” he
asked.

“Do about it? Nothing. They only got what
they deserved,” said Plupy’s father warmly.

““Fwat d’ yez mane?” said Pat angrily.

‘Mean? I mean just what I say. Your boy
and Micky Costello laid for my boy, the two of
them, and he licked them. I wish he had killed
them,” said Plupy’s father angrily, as he thought
of Plupy’s injuries.

“Who in th’ divil do yez think you’s talkin’ to?”
asked Pat, lashing himself into a passion and
gradually advancing on one side, while the rat-
eyed man sneaked up on the other side. Plupy’s
father’s eyes were keen, and he lost no movement

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248 THE YOUTH PLUPY

of either man. Beyond, in the field, some hay-
makers working overtime, hearing the loud voices,
stopped work and stared. Plupy’s father felt the
tingling sensation in his elbows. His muscles
were rigid and tense.

*T’m talking to Pat Cassidy, who has got the
meanest pup of a boy that ever cheated the gal-
lows,” said Plupy’s father, his temper apparently
flaring, while within he was as cold as ice.

“You are a dommed liar,” said Pat, and he
drew back his arm.

Now, one thing Plupy’s father had always
practiced in his unregenerate days: he always
tried to get in the first blow, and tried to make it
a solid one. And so, when Pat drew back his arm,
Plupy’s father uncoiled and there was a thud,
and Pat lit on his back as if struck by an axe.
But the rat-eyed man was as quick as a cat, and
before he could turn Plupy’s father received a
lightning-like smash on the eye that cut to the |
bone, and staggered him a bit, but he recovered
like a flash and met the rat-eyed man who again
rushed. A left to the wind and a terrific right to
the jaw, and the rat-eyed man was out of the
fight for good. But again Plupy’s father caught
it heavily right and left from Pat, who had re-
gained his feet and rushed in, furious at his knock-
down.

For a moment Plupy’s father gave ground,

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 249

guarding his head from Pat’s sledge-hammer
blows, and then was at him like a whirlwind. Pat
was down a couple of times, picked himself up in
time to receive so lashing a blow in the ribs that
he went completely over a bench, bringing down
a torrent of clashing milk-cans and pails.

Pat slowly rolled over and came to a sitting
position. His eye was puffed up and his face wore
a bewildered look. ‘‘Be Jabers, Misther Shute,
’t is th’ kick av a carr-t horse yez have in yous
rhoite phist. Oi’m thinkin’ ’t is me ribs ye’ve
been afther bra-a-kin, ochone!”’

Plupy’s father turned. The rat-eyed man was
sitting up trying his jaw to see if it was broken.
Plupy’s father beckoned to the haymakers, who
cautiously climbed the fence as if they were ven-
turing into an enclosure where there was a vi-
cious bull. “Look after these men,” he said.

“Yes, sir, we will,” they said respectfully.

Plupy’s father sopped his handkerchief in the
river and washed the blood from his face. Then
he went home with a glow in his heart.

What had come over him? Here he was, a re-
spectable citizen, the father of a family, a man
looked up to and respected generally, and he had
engaged in a knockdown fight with two working-
men. He admitted to himself that he ought to be
ashamed of himself. But try as he might, he was
not ashamed. He was delighted. It was years

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250 THE YOUTH PLUPY

since he had fought, and he had thought his fight-
ing days were over, and so had the doctor.

An hour later, as he sat rehearsing the matter
to his perturbed, dismayed, but admiring wife
and sister, Dr. Perry came padding in. Taking
a seat, he said with a whimsical twist of his lips
and a twinkle of his eye, ‘George, I came in to
take back what I said about your fighting days
being over. I have just put two of Pat Cassidy’s
ribs in splints. He said he was kicked by a horse.
The horse also blacked his eye. I’m thinking
it was a big donkey. Joanna and Sarah, are n’t
you ashamed of him?” And he left doubling up
with laughter.

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CHAPTER XVII

It had been a day of triumph at Capua.
: Katxoae.
SEVERAL days later a little blue boat came slowly
down the river toward the wharf. In it sat a broad-
shouldered, athletic man of forty, his handsome
face bearing the fading remembrance of a black
eye, slightly concealed by a strip of court-plaster.
He wore an old slouch hat on the back of his head,
a pair of rubber boots, and faded clothes. By his
side, and projecting many feet beyond the stern
of the boat, were two cane poles with lines tightly
wound into balls at their tips. Between his feet
was a fine string of pickerel. He held the tiller
lines in his hands, and he was talking animatedly
to a tall, angular, gawky youth at the oars, a
youth with a downy chin, and a face crisscrossed
with healing scars, and blotched with green and
yellow bruises. The youth was barely making
headway with deft turns of his bony wrists,
while he occasionally threw back his head and
laughed until the echoes rang. Together the two
had fished all day on the beautiful stream. They
had eaten their bountiful lunch at the “Eddy”
woods, and had bathed and swum in the cool
water, and had drunk at the icy spring at the

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252 THE YOUTH PLUPY

foot of the giant beech tree. The youth with the
downy chin had laughed the entire day at the
humorous stories and funny quips of the elderly
man, had exulted when a big fish came in, and
had deplored the loss of the bigger ones that al-
ways got away.

It had been a day of triumph at Capua, and it
had signalized the retirement from the local ring
of the unbeaten heavyweight champion, and the
passing from his shoulders, to the shoulders of
the youth, of his mantle. Each thought he had
never spent a more delightful day. The son, be-
cause, in the eyes of the man he most admired,
loved, and revered, he read respect; the father,
because the son had come into his inheritance of
courage and vigor.

Plupy rested on his oars. The sun had set, and
in the west the clouds were rosy with the promise
of another day. But never such a day as this.
That comes but once in a lifetime, when between
two men there comes the perfect confidence and
respect of friendship.

The light slowly faded. The treetoads wailed,
a few fireflies twinkled, bats flitted here and there
along the silvery surface of the stream; from the
depths of the green woods a wood thrush sang.
They drew near the wharf, and the boat, obeying
a skillful twist of the tiller, shaved the edge of
the wharf, and stopped. Plupy and his father got

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THE LAD WITH A DOWNY CHIN 253

out stretchingly, picked up their poles and their
string of fish, turned and looked along the faint
stretch of translucent water, with the blackness
of the fringing pines. The night breeze came to
their cheeks softly.

“It has been a splendid day, son,” said Plupy’s
father.

“T never had so good a time in my life,” said
Plupy, drawing a long breath.

Then they turned and walked up the avenue
under the dim street-lamps where white moths
fluttered against the glass. They were silent, but
it was the silence that obtains between firm
friends, a silence that is the best test of close
friendship.

Plupy was thinking. He had been sore afflicted,
but he had emerged from the slough of despond
a stronger youth. In his room his flute lay on his
table, and his tenor horn stood on its flaring bell
under a japanned music-rack, holding the spotted
book open at number fourteen. He looked for-
ward to days, weeks, months, yes, years of hard
work, of good times with his father, his mother,
his family, and these inanimate but by no means
silent friends, a future unspoiled by the allure-
ments of fickle woman, and in that future he was
filled with an unutterable content.

THE END

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