scinating Crusoe. Up to this time Johnnie had never
taken much interest in school-books beyond scribbling on their blank
margins. Was it really worth while, he wondered, "to buckle down" and learn
to read? He knew just enough about the famous Crusoe to make him wish to
learn more, so he finally decided that it was worth while, if only to
impress Chips Wood, his next-door neighbor and playmate, a boy a year
younger than himself, whom Johnnie patronized out of school hours. So he
worked away until at last there came a proud day when he carried the blue
and gold wonder book into Chips' yard, and, seated beside his friend on the
piazza step, began to read aloud the story of Robinson Crusoe. It would be
hard to tell which pair of eyes grew widest and roundest as the tale
unfolded, and when Johnnie, one day, laid the book down, finished, two
sighs of admiration floated away over Mrs. Wood's crocus bed.

"Chips, I'd rather be Robinson Crusoe than a king!" exclaimed Johnnie.

"So would I," responded Chips. "Let's play it."

"But we can't both be Crusoes. Wouldn't you like to be Friday?" asked
Johnnie insinuatingly, "he was so nice and black."

"Ye-yes," hesitated Chips, who had great confidence in Johnnie's judgment,
but whose fancy had been taken by the high cap and leggings in the golden
picture.

"Then I've got a plan," and Johnnie leaned toward his friend's ear and
whispered something under cover of his hand, that opened the younger boy's
eyes wider than ever.

"Now you mustn't tell," added Johnnie aloud, "'cause that wouldn't he like
men a hit. Promise not to, deed and double!"

"Deed and double!" echoed Chips solemnly, for that was a very binding
expression between him and Johnnie.

For several days following this, Mrs. Wood and Mrs. Ford were besieged by
the boys to permit them to earn money; and Mrs. Ford, especially, was
astonished at the way Johnnie worked at clearing up the yard, and such
other jobs as were not beyond his strength; but, inquire as she might into
the motive of all this labor, she could only discover that Chips and
Johnnie wished to buy a hen.

"Have you asked father if you might keep hens?" she inquired of Johnnie,
but he only shook his head mysteriously.

Chips' mother found him equally uncommunicative. She would stand at her
window which overlooked the Fords' back yard, and watch the boys throw
kindling into the shed, or sweep the paths, and wonder greatly in her own
mind. "Bless their li