“Well, pretty near,” replied his friend. “Old Chris Boltenhouse helped me with the frame, and set me right whenever I got in a muddle. It was hard work, but I tell you, Will, it was so interesting I could hardly take time to eat. I’ve thought of nothing else for months, except when I was worrying over mother’s eyes, and now—”
“I heard about your mother’s trouble with her eyes,” interrupted Will, sympathetically. “I do hope it’s not going to be serious.”
“Worries me a lot,” said Reube, gloomily. And then, his face brightening again, he went on, “But now I’ve got her done, and rigged and tarred and afloat at Wood Creek landing.”
“Reube,” interrupted Will again, and this time in a tone of severe surprise, “what a singular way to treat your mother! I cannot imagine that dignified lady in any such absurd situation as you speak of.”
“Come off!” retorted Reuben, very literally, as he caught at Will’s ankle and, with a quick twist, jerked him from his perch. “I’m not talking of mother, but of the Dido, and I say there’s not a trimmer craft will go shad fishing from Westcock this season. I tell you, Will, I’ve just put my heart into that boat. If it were not for that grove of Barnes’s we could see her now, lying with the others, in the mouth of the creek; and even at this distance you could pick her out from the rest.”
“Well,” said Will, “let’s get along and inspect her as soon as possible. I’m as tickled about her as if I’d built her myself; and I’m going to help you with the fishing all I can, as my holiday diversion. Did she cost you much? Is she going to pay, like new marsh?”
“If she has a lucky summer,” answered Reube—“and they do say there’s going to be a great run of shad this season—I’ll have her all paid for and quite a lump of money in the bank this fall.”
“And then!” said Will, in a voice of joyous anticipation. “What then? College with us, for the winter term, anyway! And maybe a scholarship that will still further simplify matters!”
“No!” exclaimed Reube, shaking his head gravely. “No college for me till I have had mother away to Boston or New York, to get her eyes properly seen to.”
Will’s face fell a little. “That’s so, old man. The eyes must be fixed up first of all, of course. But if the boat’s a success, another season will straighten it all out, eh? And when you come to college you’ll be a freshman, while I’m a senior! Won’t I haze you though?”