'Should you like to have me go with you?' said Frank.
'Will you? that's a good fellow.'
After they had walked a little way in silence, Gardiner said, 'I am glad Frank, that I know you have got something to help you to do right; for now there don't seem to be such a difference between us. Albert said, he believed you had a good genius always at your elbow, when you declined going into swimming with us, the day after the guards were broken by the high wind; and Mrs. Reed said your good genius was your virtuous thoughts; but she did not know the whole. If I had not gone at that time, Greenville would have been drowned; for there was not a fellow among them all, who had the courage to jump in after him when he floated outside the bars; so I can't reproach myself for that.'
'You said,' replied Frank, 'Mr. Reed commended your courage very much: but he told you you were as wrong as the others in going; and that we must not do evil that good may come of it.'
'Well, Frank,' said William, 'what would you do in my place about the chaise? suppose I go and tell parson Allen the whole truth; where is the use of it? It would only disgrace the school, to have it talked about all over the neighborhood; and injure the other boys as well as myself.'
'I agree with you,' said Frank; 'but can't you tell Mr. Reed?'
'How could that make the matter any better?'
'You would be relieved from the dread you now feel, of being found out.'
'That is something, I acknowledge; for I never did feel so badly about being found out before.'