“I think we had all better make up friends with Will this minute, and get him to write to his cousin again,” George said, smiling brightly.
Charles and Stephen were of the same opinion, but poor Will was in a bad humour, and he said sullenly, “I won’t write to him any more; so that you needn’t make up with me on that account.”
The boys were appalled. George’s words had revived hope in their breast, but now it seemed that their darling scheme must fail; for, without Henry to write the letter and help them forward, it would be only a humdrum affair; and unless Will would send for him, he perhaps would not come—or, if he should come, he would spend all his time with Will, and have nothing to do with them. Consequently, the three crowded round Will, made him so sensible of his own importance, and played their parts so well, that he finally smiled, relented, and promised to do any thing they wished.
“And you will write soon, won’t you?” Charles asked eagerly.
“Yes; I’ll write as soon as I can;” Will returned. “Say, boys,” anxiously, “do any of you know what Mr. Meadows did with my—my letter?”
“Yes; he kept it for a witness against you;” wickedly and promptly answered quick-witted Stephen.
“Jim is the next one for us to deal with,” said George; “and,” sighing profoundly, “there’s the rub!”
Then Charles, who had been reading a novel of the “intensely interesting” sort, said jocosely, “Perhaps we can buy his silence.”
“As the nervous old gentleman said when he gave a nickel to a little boy to stop his noise,” Steve subjoined.
“He will have to be soothed and let into our councils,” the Sage observed, “and perhaps it will be just as well, because we shall need more than five to manage our plot, and ‘the more, the merrier,’ you know.”