"Oh, it's the jolliest thing I ever heard of," said Jack, clapping Tom on the shoulder. "Why, my boy, if you only stick to your books, and let 'em see what you can do, it's as easy as pie to get a scholarship out of that measly old school."
Tom's eyes opened very wide. "How do you make that out?" he asked.
"Well, you know, I've thought of you, and what you might have done if you had only got a scholarship like your sister did, ever since I knew what we were building, and one day I said to my foreman, I know a bloke that would make a first-rate gardener if he could only come here and work in these gardens. The gardens are there already, you see, and they're just finishing the college, where there is to be lessons and lectures."
"Well, what did he say?" asked Tom, eagerly.
"'Why,' he said, 'your friend can come here, I expect, if he happens to go to one of the right schools. There's a list of 'em given, and I'll find out if you like the names of those who have a right to send a scholar here for a year or two. Somebody left a pot of money to this place on purpose.' Well, old fellow, you might have knocked me down with a feather when he read out the name of Fairfield.
"'That's it,' I said to him; 'and if Tom only goes to school again, we've done the trick.' I wasn't long paying for the rest of my 'bike;' and here I am, and there you are, a scholar of one of the schools who can send a boy to this college."
And Jack indulged in such a string of his old grimaces that Tom laughed as heartily as he had ever done in his life.
"Come in to tea," called Elsie at this point.
But instead of going in at once, Tom called her to come and hear the news.
"I say, Elsie, Jack tells me there is a chance for me to get a scholarship at this school, if I only like to try."