"I don't know, Nan. Maybe I was just dreaming."
"Then dream some more," she murmured.
The morning had worn on without a bell for recess. The room had become restive, and now Jane realized that the youngest of the Owsleys was lustily bawling. She glanced at the little watch in her belt, crying: "Heavens!" Then dashed toward the door to rescue her neglected charges; leaving Nancy under the trees to patch up the interrupted dream.
CHAPTER XVII
AT TOP SPEED
Brent had at one time promised Dale to take him out on the survey. This promise had been made in an unguarded moment—or, at least, without a suspicion that the mountaineer would keep so tenaciously after him until it was fulfilled. Now, with school closed the day before, he felt that the evil hour could no longer be postponed. He had no objection to Dale, or having him along on the work, if he would only take some recesses in his interminable string of questions. But this impetuous student, whose soul craved the heights of Lincoln and Clay, took no recesses.
Petulantly Brent had carried his woe to the Colonel, but, instead of sympathy, he found the old gentleman radiant;—declaring Dale would become so utterly absorbed in learning the secrets of this science, that the engineer would find himself being led out by the ears each morning at sunrise.
"The road is just as good as built," he had cried, "if you have along Dale's example of application!" Which comforted Brent not at all.
So this very morning the Colonel was astir long before breakfast, sharing in a measure the mountaineer's excitement. Anything, he had jovially averred, which inspired Brent to work, was worth getting up early to see.