"What's the use of telling you?" returned Osric. "You won't dare to go with me, and you will run and tell of me directly, I know you will. If you would help me, I would manage it nicely, and if I thought you would," continued Osric, "I would try it."
"You can tell me how you mean to manage, anyway," said Christopher. "I promise you, as true as I live and breathe, I won't tell, even if I don't go myself."
"Well, I'll tell you. You know it is our week to go after water, and Miss Hilliard always sends us for a fresh pailful a little before the girls' recess. Well, we can take the pail and go to the well and leave it. Then we can go up to the vault, and if nobody is there, and the door is open, we can slip inside and wait till the people come. If the door isn't open, or if somebody is watching, we can hide among the trees till the funeral comes, and then we can see all the people and get back before the end of the boys' recess."
"But what will Miss Hilliard say, if we stay so long?" asked Christopher.
"We will tell her that the pump was out of order, and old Peter wouldn't let us have any water at his well—you know he never will let anybody come to his well—and that we had to go up to the tavern for water."
"But that will be a lie," said Christopher, rather startled.
"Fiddlestick's-end!" retorted Osric. "If you are such a spooney as that, Chris, I don't want anything to do with you. Suppose it is a little stretch, what then? All the boys tell them, and the girls too, worse than the boys."
"Oh, Ozzy, not all! I don't believe your sister would tell a lie for the world!"
"Won't she, then? If you had heard her this morning! If she didn't tell a fib, she acted it, and that is worse. Besides, this can't be a lie. You will see the pump will be out of order when the time comes."
"But, Ozzy—" said Christopher, still hesitating. He did not know exactly what he meant to say. The more he thought about it, the more he wanted to go, and the more he listened to the temptation; the fainter became the whispers of his conscience. Osric saw his advantage, and pursued it.