ked.

"Because it makes a boy mean to tell, and all the boys would have
thought me a sneak."

"It is a little hard to face a general opinion like that," she said.

"But," said Jack, "if I had told, the master would have whipped Columbus
all the same, and the boys would probably have pounded him, too. I ought
to have told beforehand," said Jack, after a pause. "But I thought it
was only some coffee-nuts that they had put in. The mean fellows, to let
Columbus take a whipping for them! But the way Mr. Ball beats us is
enough to make a boy mean and cowardly."

After a long silence, the mother said: "I think we shall have to give it
up, Jack."

"What, mother?"

"The schooling for this winter. I don't want you to go where boys are
beaten in that way. In the morning, go and get your books and see what
you can do at home."

Then, after a long pause, in which neither liked to speak, Mrs. Dudley
said:

"I want you to be an educated man. You learn quickly; you have a taste
for books, and you will be happier if you get knowledge. If I could
collect the money that Gray owes your father's estate, or even a part of
it, I should be able to keep you in school one winter after this. But
there seems to be no hope for that."

"But Gray is a rich man, isn't he?"

"Yes, he has a good deal of property, but not in his own name. He
persuaded your father, who was a kind-hearted and easy-natured man, to
release a mortgage, promising to give him some other security the next
week. But, meantime, he put his property in such a shape as to cheat all
his creditors. I don't think we shall ever get anything."

"I am going to be an educated man, anyhow."

"But you will have to go to work at something next fall," said the
mother.

"That will make it harder, but I mean to study a little every day. I
wish I could get a chance to spend next winter in school."

"We'll see what can be done."

And long after Jack went to bed that night the mother sat still by the
candle with her sewing, trying to think what she could do to help her
boy to get on with his studies.

Jack woke up after eleven o'clock, and saw her light still burning in
the sitting-room.

"I say, mother," he called out, "don't you sit there worrying about me.
We shall come through this all right."

Some of Jack's hopefulness got into the mother's heart, and she took her
light and went to bed.

Weary, and sore, and disappointed, Jack did not easily get to sleep
himself afte