"And you didn't doubt I'd do it, Jack?"
"Not for a moment," Jack said. "I would have trusted thee as much as Harry."
"Well then, I forgive you, Jack, but if ever you get in danger again, and doant let me know, I'll never speak a word to you again."
In the years which had passed since this friendship began Nelly Hardy had greatly changed. The companionship of two quiet lads like Jack and Harry had tamed her down, and her love of reading and her study of all the books on history and travel on Jack's book-shelves had softened her speech. When alone the three spoke with but little of the dialect of the place, Jack having insisted on improvement in this respect. With Nelly his task had been easy, for she was an apt pupil, but Harry still retained some of his roughness of speech.
Nelly was fifteen now, and was nearly as tall as Jack, who was square and somewhat stout for his age. With these two friends Jack would talk sometimes of his hopes of rising and making a way for himself. Harry, who believed devoutly in his friend, entered most warmly into his hopes, but Nelly on this subject alone was not sympathetic.
"You don't say anything," Jack remarked one day; "do you think my castles in the air will never come true?"
"I know they will come true, Jack," she said earnestly; "but don't ask me to be glad. I can't; I try to but I can't. It's selfish, but, but—" and her voice quivered. "Every step thou takest will carry you farther up from me, and I can't be glad on it, Jack!"
"Nonsense, Nelly," Jack said angrily, "dos't think so little of me as to think that I shall not be as true to my two friends, Harry and you, as I am now?"
The girl shook her head.