uted some one from the road side.

Bobby was provoked; for it is sometimes very uncomfortable to have a
pleasant train of thought interrupted. The imagination is buoyant,
ethereal, and elevates poor mortals up to the stars sometimes. It was
so with Bobby. He was building up some kind of an air castle, and had
got up in the clouds amidst the fog and moonshine, and that aggravating
voice brought him down, _slap_, upon terra firma.

He looked up and saw Tom Spicer seated upon the fence. In his hand he
held a bundle, and had evidently been waiting some time for Bobby's
coming.

He had recovered from the illness caused by his broken arm, and people
said it had been a good lesson for him, as the squire hoped it would
be. Bobby had called upon him two or three times during his
confinement to the house; and Tom, either truly repentant for his past
errors, or lacking the opportunity at that time to manifest his evil
propensities, had stoutly protested that he had "turned over a new
leaf," and meant to keep out of the woods on Sunday, stop lying and
swearing, and become a good boy.

Bobby commended his good resolutions, and told him he would never want
friends while he was true to himself. The right side, he declared, was
always the best side. He quoted several instances of men, whose lives
he had read in his Sunday school books, to show how happy a good man
may be in prison, or when all the world seemed to forsake him.

Tom assured him that he meant to reform and be a good boy; and Bobby
told him that when any one meant to turn over a new leaf, it was "now
or never." If he put it off, he would only grow worse, and the longer
the good work was delayed, the more difficult it would be to do it.
Tom agreed to all this, and was sure he had reformed.

For these reasons Bobby had come to regard Tom with a feeling of deep
interest. He considered him as, in some measure, his disciple, and he
felt a personal responsibility in encouraging him to persevere in his
good work. Nevertheless Bobby was not exactly pleased to have his fine
air castle upset, and to be tipped out of the clouds upon the cold,
uncompromising earth again; so the first greeting he gave Tom was not
as cordial as it might have been.

"Hallo, Tom!" he replied, rather coolly.

"Been waiting for you this half hour."

"Have you?"

"Yes; ain't you rather late?"

"No; I have plenty of time, though none to spare," answered Bobby; and
this was a hint that