"If we were to run all the way? I should not get to school till after copy time. I expect every minute to hear the school bell ring," said Andrew.
"But what can I do, then?" said poor little Jenny. "I can't wait here till school's out, and I don't want to go up to the schoolhouse, for all the boys to laugh at me."
"No," said Andrew, reflecting very seriously, "I must take you home some way or other. It won't do to leave you here, and, no matter where you might stay, your mother would be very much troubled about you."
"Yes," said Jenny, "she would think I was drowned."
Time pressed, and Jenny's countenance became more and more overcast, but Andrew could think of no way in which he could take the little girl home without being late and losing his standing in the school.
It was impossible to get her across the stream at any place nearer than the "big bridge"; he would not take her that way, and make up a false story to account for his lateness at school, and he could not leave her alone or take her with him.
What was to be done? While several absurd and impracticable plans were passing through his brain, the school bell began to ring, and he must start immediately to reach the schoolhouse in time.
And now his anxiety and perplexity became more intense than ever; and Jenny, looking up into his troubled countenance, began to cry.
Andrew, who had never before failed to be at the school door before the first tap of the bell, began to despair. Was there nothing to be done?
Yes! a happy thought passed through his mind. How strange that he should not have thought of it before! He would ask Dominie Black to let him take Jennie home. What could be more sensible and straightforward than such a plan?