“Nickey, I thought you were goin’ to be a gentleman.” 183
“That’s straight, all right, what I’ve told you,” he murmured abashed.
There was another silent pause—presently broken by Nickey.
“I guess I hadn’t thought about it, just that way. I guess I’ll give the kids their money back,” he volunteered despondently—“only I’ll have to make it up, some way, in the treasury.” He felt in his pockets, and jingled the coins.
Another pause—with only the ticking of his mother’s knitting needles to relieve the oppressive silence. Suddenly the worried pucker disappeared from his brow, and his face brightened like a sun-burst.
“I’ve got it, Mrs. Maxwell,” he cried. “I’ve got seventy-five cents comin’ to me down at the Variety Store, for birch-bark frames, and I’ll give that for the blamed old missionaries. That’s square, ’aint it now?”
Mrs. Betty’s commendation and her smile were salve to the wounds of her young guest, and Donald’s hearty laughter soon dispelled the sense of social failure which was beginning to cloud Nickey’s happy spirit.
“Say Nickey,” said Maxwell, throwing down his paper, “Mrs. Betty and I want to start a Boy Scout Corps in the parish, and with your resourceful genius 184 you could get the boys together, and explain it to them, and soon we should have the whole thing in ship-shape order. Will you do it?”
“Will I?” exclaimed the delighted recruit. “I guess so—but some of ’em ’aint ’Piscopals, Mr. Maxwell; there’s Sam Cooley, he’s a Methodist, and––”
“That doesn’t cut any ice, Nickey,—excuse my slang, ladies,” he apologized to his wife and Hepsey, at which the boy grinned with delight. “We’re out to welcome all comers. I’ve got the books that we shall need upstairs. Let’s go up to my den and talk it all over. We shall have to spend evenings getting thoroughly up in it ourselves,—rules and knots and first-aid and the rest. Mrs. Burke will allay parental anxiety as to the bodily welfare of the recruits and the pacific object of the organization, and Mrs. Maxwell will make the colors. Come on!”