ry is odd for a boy," said she. "You should have
read a book of travels or history. Good night, Johnny."

"Good night, mother."

Then Johnny met his father, smelling strongly of medicines, coming up
from his study. But his father did not see him. And Johnny went to bed,
having imbibed from that old tale of Robin Hood more of history and more
knowledge of excursions into realms of old romance than his elders had
ever known during much longer lives than his.

Johnny confided in nobody at first. His feeling nearly led him astray
in the matter of Lily Jennings; he thought of her, for one sentimental
minute, as Robin Hood's Maid Marion. Then he dismissed the idea
peremptorily. Lily Jennings would simply laugh. He knew her. Moreover,
she was a girl, and not to be trusted. Johnny felt the need of another
boy who would be a kindred spirit; he wished for more than one boy.
He wished for a following of heroic and lawless souls, even as Robin
Hood's. But he could think of nobody, after considerable study, except
one boy, younger than himself. He was a beautiful little boy, whose
mother had never allowed him to have his golden curls cut, although
he had been in trousers for quite a while. However, the trousers were
foolish, being knickerbockers, and accompanied by low socks, which
revealed pretty, dimpled, babyish legs. The boy's name was Arnold
Carruth, and that was against him, as being long, and his mother firm
about allowing no nickname. Nicknames in any case were not allowed in
the very exclusive private school which Johnny attended.

Arnold Carruth, in spite of his being such a beautiful little boy,
would have had no standing at all in the school as far as popularity was
concerned had it not been for a strain of mischief which triumphed over
curls, socks, and pink cheeks and a much-kissed rosebud of a mouth.
Arnold Carruth, as one of the teachers permitted herself to state when
relaxed in the bosom of her own family, was "as choke-full of mischief
as a pod of peas. And the worst of it all is," quoth the teacher, Miss
Agnes Rector, who was a pretty young girl, with a hidden sympathy for
mischief herself--"the worst of it is, that child looks so like a cherub
on a rosy cloud that even if he should be caught nobody would believe
it. They would be much more likely to accuse poor little Andrew Jackson
Green, because he has a snub nose and is a bit cross-eyed, and I never
knew that poor child to do anything except obey rules and