That was good news. At least Spot so thought it.
"This lamb won't get much notice from Johnnie Green after to-day," Spot told Henrietta Hen. "He'll be left here in the yard. And it won't be long now before Mrs. Green tells Farmer Green to put him in the pasture with the flock. She won't have him in everybody's way. She'll get rid of him quickly. You know that when Mrs. Green makes up her mind, things generally happen to suit her."
Henrietta nodded her handsome head.
"Just what I've often told the Rooster!" she exclaimed.
Well, the following morning, as much as an hour after breakfast, Johnnie Green started up the road with some books under his arm and a lunch basket in his hand. It was the first day of school. And somehow Johnnie wasn't feeling very happy. He had dawdled about the house—so his mother said. It appeared that he was in no hurry to leave home.
Before Johnnie had reached the barn, which stood beside the road, Mrs. Green stepped out of the house and looked at him.
"You'd better get along!" she called after him. "You don't want to be late the first day of school!"
So Johnnie Green fell into a jog trot, which he kept up all the way to the red schoolhouse.
As he came in sight of the little box-like building he saw other youngsters hurrying through the doorway. And then Johnnie ran as fast as he could.
He burst inside the schoolroom just as the school mistress tapped the little bell on her desk, which meant that everybody must stop talking, because school had begun. Johnnie Green hurried to a seat. But before he reached it all the other pupils burst into a shout.