"So he is to all of us," said the doctor.
The next week saw Eben established in the Cure, liking his place and doing well in it, the happiest boy in all Lake county. He had the pleasure of seeing Flora and his mother very often, for as the Cure and the hotels filled up for summer, Flora's work became more and more celebrated, till she had more than she could do. Mrs. Fairchild, too, was not unfrequently sent for to supply some one who needed the exclusive attention of a nurse, and at last, by the advice of all her friends, Mrs. Fairchild rented her house at Boonville and established herself permanently at the Springs, where her nursing and Flora's machine afforded a handsome maintenance without any help from Eben's earnings. Eben is now attending lectures at Hobartown, and has every prospect of making a good physician.
In the course of one of his yearly wanderings into all sorts of wild places in search of the rest from professional labours he so much needed, Dr. Henry stumbled over poor Tom Wilbur, sick, alone, and dying, in a forlorn little settlement at the West. He had been in several good situations, but never stayed in any of them, because there was always something he did not like—"something that wasn't very pleasant," as he said—but he had come to the end of all his wanderings at last. The poor fellow was very penitent, and sent a great many messages to Mr. Antis and his father, as well as to Eben.
"Eben was always in luck," said he. "He wasn't a bit smart in school; the boys always used to call him the slow coach. But somehow, he has always got on. I'm glad of it, too, for it isn't very pleasant to be lying here as I am."
"How did you get into such a scrape as that about robbing the mill?" asked the doctor.
"Well, you see Smith lent me money and gave me credit. I began by taking things out of the store for him—sugar, and so on—and so he got me in his power, so I couldn't help myself, or thought I couldn't. I happened to let out one day that I had seen Mr. Antis draw some money from the bank, and said, joking, that I could get it if I was a mind to, because I had the key of the mill. You see, I'd carried it off with me without meaning to. So, then, Smith and the other man got up this scheme, and they made me go along. But I never knew they meant to burn the mill."
"How did they make you?"
"Well, they told me that they would certainly kill me if I didn't, and they would make me," continued Tom, feebly. "But, doctor, you tell them I never meant to hurt Eben nor to burn the mill."
These were the poor fellow's last words.
Dr. Henry saw him decently buried, and carried home his messages to his friends. Such was the end of Tom Wilbur, a boy endowed with abundant talents and favoured with every chance for making a man of himself, but throwing them all away because he could never make up his mind to do anything which he did not like to do.