Part 28 (1/2)

”Get my gun back!” exclaimed Harry. ”How am I to do that?”

”Why, there's money enough,” answered Kate. ”You only lent your gun-money to Aunt Matilda's fund. Take out enough, and get your gun back.”

”That sounds very well,” said Harry; ”but we haven't so much money, after all. The interest on what we have won't begin to support Aunt Matilda, and we really ought not to break in on the princ.i.p.al.”

Kate did not immediately answer. She thought for a while and then she said:

”Well, that's what I call talking nonsense. You must have heard some one say something like that. You never got it out of your own head.”

”It may not have come out of my own head,” said Harry, who had not told Kate of his meeting with George Purvis, ”but it is true, for all that.

It seems to me that whatever we do seems all right at first, and then fizzles out. This telegraph business has done that, straight along.”

”No, it hasn't,” said Kate, with some warmth. ”It's turned out first-rate. I think that interest idea is all stuff. As if we wanted to set up Aunt Matilda with an income that would last forever! Here comes father. I'm going to ask him about the gun.”

When Mr. Loudon had had the matter laid before him, he expressed his opinion without any hesitation.

”I think, Harry,” said he, ”that you certainly ought to go and get your gun.”

And Harry went and got it.

The rest of that day, which was Sat.u.r.day, was delightful, both to Harry and Kate. Harry cleaned and polished up his gun, and Kate sat and watched him. It seemed like old times. During those telegraphic days, when they were all thinking of business and making money, they seemed to have grown old.

But all that was over now, and they were a girl and a boy again. Late in the afternoon, Harry went out and shot half-a-dozen partridges, which were cooked for supper, and Mrs. Loudon said that that seemed like the good old style of things. She had feared that they were never going to have any more game on their table.

On the following Wednesday there was a half-holiday, and Harry was about to start off with his gun, when he proposed that Kate should go with him.

”But you're going after birds,” said Kate, ”and I can't go where you'll want to go--among the stubble and bushes.”

”Oh! I sha'n't go much after birds,” said Harry. ”I wanted to borrow Captain Caseby's dog, but he's going to use him himself to-day, and so I don't expect to get much game. But we can have a good walk in the woods.”

”All right,” said Kate. ”I'll go along.” And away she went for her hat.

The walk was charming. It was now September, and the fields were full of bright-colored fall flowers, while here and there a sweet-gum tree began to put on autumn tints. The sun was bright, and there was a strong breeze full of piney odors from the forests to the west.

They saw no game; and when they had rambled about for an hour or so, they sat down under an oak-tree on the edge of the woods, and while they were talking, an idea came into Harry's head. He picked a great big fat toadstool that was growing near the roots of the tree, and carrying it about sixty feet from the tree, he stuck it up on a bush.

”Now then,” said he, taking up his gun, c.o.c.king it, and handing it to Kate, ”you take a shot at that mark.”

”Do you mean that I shall shoot at it?” exclaimed Kate.

”Certainly,” said Harry. ”You ought to know how to shoot. And it won't be the first time you have fired a gun. Take a shot.”

”All right,” said Kate. And she took off her hat and threw it on the gra.s.s. Then she took the gun and raised it to a level with her eye.

”Be easy now,” said Harry. ”Hold the b.u.t.t close against your shoulder.

Take your time, and aim right at the middle of the mark.”

”I'm afraid I'm shutting the wrong eye,” said Kate. ”I always do.”