"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 little hearts, what can it all be about?" she questioned, but she could not get at the truth.
Suddenly the children ceased asking for jobs, and announced that they had all the money they cared for. The day after this announcement was the first of April. When Mr. Ford came home to dinner that day, he missed Johnnie.