ould disappear for years and turn up again at
home, whitened by confinement; and, during his absence, when anyone
asked about him, the answer was penitentiary. He wondered what those
boxes on the walls were for, and he was about to ask, when a guard
stepped from one of them with a musket and started to patrol the wall,
and he had no need to ask. Tom wanted to go up on the hill and look at
the Armory and the graveyard, but the school-master said they did not
have time, and, on the moment, the air was startled with whistles far
and near--six o'clock! At once Caleb Hazel led the way to supper in the
boarding-house, where a kind-faced old lady spoke to Chad in a motherly
way, and where the boy saw his first hot biscuit and was almost afraid
to eat anything at the table for fear he might do something wrong. For
the first time in his life, too, he slept on a mattress without any
feather-bed, and Chad lay wondering, but unsatisfied still. Not yet had
he been out of sight of the hills, but the master had told him that
they would see the Bluegrass next day, when they were to start back to
the mountains by train as far as Lexington. And Chad went to sleep,
dreaming his old dream.

CHAPTER 6

LOST AT THE CAPITAL

It had been arranged by the school-master that they should all meet at
the railway station to go home, next day at noon, and, as the Turner
boys had to help the Squire with the logs at the river, and the
school-master had to attend to some business of his own, Chad roamed
all morning around the town. So engrossed was he with the people and
the sights and sounds of the little village that he came to himself
with a start and trotted back to the boarding-house for fear that he
might not be able to find the station alone. The old lady was standing
in the sunshine at the gate.

Chad panted--"Where's--?"

"They're gone."

"Gone!" echoed Chad, with a sinking heart.

"Yes, they've been gone--" But Chad did not wait to listen; he whirled
into the hall-way, caught up his rifle, and, forgetting his injured
foot, fled at full speed down the street. He turned the corner, but
could not see the station, and he ran on about another corner and still
another, and, just when he was about to burst into tears, he saw the
low roof that he was looking for, and hot, panting, and tired, he
rushed to it, hardly able to speak.

"Has that enJINE gone?" he asked breathlessly. The man who was whirling
trunks on their corners into the ba