"Stop! where's Joel?" asked Percy. "Thomas, we've forgotten Joe," rapping on the glass to the coachman.
"No, we haven't; he isn't going to drive," said Polly.
"Oh!" and Percy, thinking that Joel had stolen a march on them on his good strong legs, now cried lustily, "Go on, Thomas; get ahead as fast as you can," and presently he was lost in the babel of laughter and chatter going on in the coach.
"I've a piece of news," presently cried Van in a lull. "Davie's bringing home a prize; first in classics, you know."
"Oh, Davie!" screamed Polly, and she leaned over to throw her arms around him; "Mamsie will be so glad. Davie, you can't think how glad she'll be!"
Davie's brown cheek glowed. "It isn't much," he said simply, "there were so many prizes given out."
"Well, you've taken one," cried Polly, saying the blissful over and over. "How perfectly elegant!"
Van drummed on the carriage window discontentedly. "I could have taken one if I'd had the mind to."
"Hoh-oh!" shouted Percy over in his corner. "Well, you didn't have the mind; that's what was wanting."
"You keep still," cried Van, flaming up, and whirling away from his window. "You didn't take any, either. Polly, his head was under water all the time, unless some of the boys tugged him along every day. We hardly got him home at all."