BY EMMA J. GRAY.
March had come in like a lion, but, contrary to the old prediction, was going out in the same fashion. At least, so thought Dick Atwater as he violently pulled his friend Joe Jacobs's door bell. Only a second or two, and the door opened, when, rapidly passing through, he bounded up two staircases, and in response to a hasty knock, was joyfully welcomed in Joe's den, room, sanctum, or whatever the third-floor front might be denominated.
"Hello, old chap!" was the cheery, familiar greeting. "What's up now? for that some scheme's afloat I know"; and immediately Joe commenced to laugh, though, had any one inquired what at, he could not have told, unless it was the merry twinkle in Dick's eyes—enough to make a judge laugh, much less a rollicking, good-natured boy—the hale-fellow sort—and Dick's boon companion and greatest friend.
So, without further parley, the two boys sat down opposite to each other, one face all expectancy, knowing he was to hear something awfully jolly; the other all animation, for so sure he was that he was about to unfold a really taking scheme.
And this is what Joe heard: "You know April-fool's day will soon be here, and as it's blowing great guns now, I don't imagine that all the wind will die down by that time. So my plan is to give a kite masquerade on the afternoon of that day."
"Fine!" and Joe Jacobs immediately jumped up to get out his new "sky-scraper," as he called it, though it was altogether perfect; kite, tail, string, everything was there, and his friend Dick had seen it possibly fifty times before. But the simple thought of anything novel in the kite line seemed too much for Joe's excitable temperament; besides, he was very proud of this kite; it was brand-new, and none of the fellows, if we will except Dick, knew that he had it.
So Joe, having gotten out his kite, again sat down, and with his treasure in hand, holding it scrutinizingly up, looking at it most attentively—indeed, surveying it backwards, forwards, every sort of a way, even to an occasional unwinding and winding again of the string, and unfastening of the tail—he yet was full of inquiry to discover more. And as for Dick, he talked as excitedly, rapidly, and earnestly as if Joe was as still as the Sphinx. He was not in the very least nervous or ruffled, so entirely does one boy understand another. The scheme was to give the exhibition in the lot in which they played baseball, and, as Dick said, "Wear costumes, with masks, and we'll have lots of fun fooling one another—just the sport for the 1st of April." And then he added, "We'll tell the fellows to-morrow; I'm not afraid but what they'll join us, and they can do as they like about their clothes, but we'll dress each other up, Joe. What do you say to that for a fool trick?" and a quick slap on the shoulder added emphasis to the boy's enthusiasm.
"It's immense, that's what I think, and our kites are boss too. I wonder if they'll suspect who we are?"
"Not if I can help it."