There was a sort of council at the breakfast-table of the Foster family that morning; and Ford and Annie found their side of it “voted down.”

That was not at all because they did not debate vigorously, and even “protest;” but the odds were too much against them.

“Annie, my dear,” said Mrs. Foster at last, in a gentle but decided way, “I’m sure your aunt Maria, if not your uncle, must feel hurt at your coming away so suddenly.  If we invite Joe and Foster to visit us, it will make it all right.”

“Yes,” sharply exclaimed Mr. Foster:  “we must have them come.  They’ll behave themselves here.  I’ll write to their father:  you write to Maria.”

“They’re her own boys, you know,” added Mrs. Foster soothingly.

“Well, mother,” said Annie, “if it must be.  But I’m sure they’ll make us all very uncomfortable if they come.”

“I can stand ’em for a week or so,” said Ford, with the air of a man who can do or bear more than most people.  “I’ll get Dab Kinzer to help me entertain them.”

“Excellent,” said Mr. Foster; “and I hope they will be civil to him.”

“To Dabney?” asked Annie.

“Fuz and Joe civil to Dab Kinzer?” exclaimed Ford.

“Certainly:  I hope so.”

“Father,” said Ford, “may I say just what I was thinking?”

“Speak it right out.”

“Well, I was thinking what a good time Fuz and Joe would be likely to have, trying to get ahead of Dab Kinzer.”

Annie looked at her brother, and nodded; and there was a bit of a twinkle in the eyes of the lawyer himself, but he only remarked,

“Well, you must be neighborly.  I don’t believe the Hart boys know much about the seashore.”

“Dab and Frank and I will try and educate them.”

Annie thought of the ink, and her box of spoiled cuffs and collars, while her brother was speaking.  Could it be that Ford meant a good deal more than he was saying?  At all events, she fully agreed with him on the Dab Kinzer question.

That was one “council;” and it was one of peace or war, probably a good deal as the Hart boys themselves might thereafter determine.

At the same hour, however, matters of even greater importance were coming to a decision around the well-filled breakfast-table in the Morris mansion.  Ham had given a pretty full account of his visit to Grantley, including his dinner at Mrs. Myers’s, and all he had learned relating to the academy.

“It seems like spending a great deal of money,” began Mrs. Kinzer, when Ham at last paused for breath; but lid caught her up at once, with

“I know you’ve been paying out a good deal, mother Kinzer, but Dab must go, if I pay”

“You pay, indeed?  For my boy?  I’d like to see myself!  Now I’ve found out what he is, I mean he shall have every advantage.  If this Grantley’s the right place”

“Mother,” exclaimed Samantha, “it’s the very place Mr. Foster is going to send Ford to, and Frank Harley.”

“Exactly,” said Ham; “Mr. Hart spoke of a Mr. Foster, his brother-in-law, a lawyer.”

“Why,” said Keziah, “he’s living in our old house now.  Ford Foster is Dab’s greatest crony.  They’re the very people you met at the landing.”

“Yes, I’ve heard all that,” said Ham, “but somehow I hadn’t put the two things together.  Now, mother Kinzer, do you really mean Dab is to go?”

“Of course I do,” said she.

“Well, if that isn’t doing it easy!  Do you know, it’s about the nicest thing I’ve heard since I got here?”

“Except the barn,” said Dabney, unable to hold in any longer.  “Mother, may I stand on my head a while?”

“You’ll need all the head you’ve got,” said Ham.  “You won’t have much time to get ready.”

“He’ll have books enough after he gets there,” said Mrs. Kinzer decidedly.  “I’ll risk Dabney.”

“And they’ll make him give up all his slang,” added Samantha.

“Yes, Sam; when I come back I’ll talk nothing but Greek and Latin.  I’m getting French now from Ford, and Hindu from Frank Harley.  Then I know English, and slang, and Long-Islandish.  Think of one man with seven first-rate languages!”

But Dabney soon found himself unable to sit still, even at the breakfast-table.  Not that he got up hungry, for he had done his duty by Miranda’s cookery; but the house itself, big as it was, seemed too small to hold him, with all his new prospects swelling within him.  Perhaps, moreover, the rest of the family felt that they would be better able to discuss the important subject before them, after Dab had taken himself out into the open air; for none of them tried to stay his going.

“This beats dreaming, all hollow,” he said to himself, as he stood, with his hands in his pockets, half way down to the gate between the two gardens.  “Now I’ll see what can be done about that other matter.”

Two plans in one head, and so young a head as that?

Yes; and it spoke well for Dab’s heart, as well as his brains, that his plan number two was not a selfish one.  The substance of it came out in the first five minutes of the talk he had, a trifle later, with Ford and Frank, on the other side of the gate.

“Ford, you know there’s twenty dollars left of the money the Frenchman paid us for the bluefish.”

“Well, what of it?  Isn’t it yours?”

“One share of it’s mine.  The rest is yours and Dick’s.”

“He needs it more’n I do.”

“Ford, did you know Dick Lee was real bright?”

“’Cute little chap as ever I saw.  Why?”

“Well, he ought to go to school.”

“Why don’t he go?”

“He does, except in summer.  He might go to the academy, if they’d take him, and if he had money enough to go with.”

“Academy?  What academy?”

“Why, Grantley, of course.  I’m going, and so are you and Frank.  Why shouldn’t Dick go?”

“You’re going?  Hurrah for that!  Why didn’t you say so before?”

“Wasn’t sure till this morning.  You fellows ’ll be a long way ahead of me, though.  But I mean to catch up.”

For a few minutes poor Dick was lost sight of in a perfect storm of talk; but Dab came back to him, with,

“Dick’s folks are dreadful poor, but we might raise it.  Twenty dollars to begin with.”

“I’ve ten dollars saved up, and I know mother’ll say ’Pass it right in,’” exclaimed Ford.

It was hardly likely Mrs. Foster would express her assent in precisely that way; but Frank Harley promptly added,

“I think I can promise five.”

“I mean to speak to Ham Morris and mother about it,” said Dab.  “All I wanted was to fix it about the twenty dollars to start on.”

“Frank,” shouted Ford, “let’s go right in, and see our crowd!”

Ford was evidently getting a little excited; and it was hardly five minutes later that he wound up his story, in the house, with,

“Father, may I contribute my ten dollars to the Richard Lee Education Fund?”

“Of course; but he will need a good deal more money than you boys can raise.”

“Why, father, the advertisement says half a year for a hundred and fifty.  He can board for less than we can.  Perhaps Mrs. Myers would let him work out a part of it.”

“I can spare as much as Ford can,” here put in Annie.

“Do you leave me out entirely?” said her mother, with a smile that was even sweeter than usual.

As for sharp-eyed lawyer Foster himself, he had been hemming and coughing in an odd sort of way for a moment, and he had said, “I declare,” several times; but he now remarked, somewhat more to the purpose,

“I don’t believe in giving any man a better education than he will ever know what to do with; but then, this Dick Lee and you boys, well, see what you can do; but no one must be allowed to contribute outside of the Foster and Kinzer families, and Frank.  As for the rest, hem! ah I think I’ll say that there won’t be any difficulty.”

“You, father?”

“Why not, Annie?  Do you s’pose I’m going to let myself be beaten in such a matter by a mere country-boy like Dabney Kinzer?”

“Father,” said Ford, “if you’d seen how Dick behaved, that night, out there on the ocean, in ’The Swallow’!”

“Just as well, just as well, my son.”

“Hurrah!” shouted Ford.  “Then it’s all right, and Dick Lee’ll have a fair shake in the world!”

“A what, my son?” exclaimed his mother.

“I didn’t mean to talk slang, mother:  I only meant well, you know how dreadfully black he is; but then, he can steer a boat tiptop, and he’s splendid for crabs and bluefish; and Dab says he’s a good scholar too.”

“Dab’s a very good boy,” said Mrs. Foster; “but your friend Dick will need an outfit, I imagine, clothing, and almost every thing.  I must see Mrs. Kinzer about it.”

Meantime Dick Lee’s part in the matter, and that of his family, had been taken for granted, all around.  An hour later, however, Mrs. Kinzer’s first reply to her son, after listening to a calculation of his, which almost made it seem as if Dick would make money by going to Grantley, was,

“What if Mrs. Lee should say she can’t spare him?”

Dab’s countenance fell.  He knew Mrs. Lee, but he had not thought so far as that.

He said something not very intelligible, but to that effect.

“Well, Dabney, if we can make the other arrangements, I’ll see her about it.”

Ham Morris had been exchanging remarkable winks with Miranda and Samantha, and now gravely suggested,

“Maybe the academy authorities will refuse to take him.”

“Ford says they had a blacker boy than he is, there, last year.”

“Now, Dab!” exclaimed Ham.

“Well, I know he’s pretty black; but it don’t come off.”

“Mother,” said Samantha, “Mrs. Foster and Annie are coming through the gate.”

Dab waited just long enough after that to learn the news concerning the “Richard Lee Education Fund” and Mr. Foster’s offer, and then he was off towards the shore.

He knew very well in which direction it was best to go; and, half way to the landing, he met Dick coming up the road with a basket of eels on his arm.

“Dick,” shouted Dabney, “I’m going away to boarding-school, at an academy.”

“’Cad’my?  Whar?”

“Up in New England.  They call it Grantley Academy, where Frank and Ford are going.”

“Dat spiles it all,” said Dick ruefully.  “Now I’s got to fish wid fellers ’at don’t know nuffin.”

“No, you won’t.  You’re going with us.  It’s all fixed, money and all.”

Dick would never have thought, ordinarily, of questioning a statement made by “Captain Kinzer;” but the rueful expression deepened on his face, the basket of eels dropped heavily on the grass, the tough black fingers of his hands twisted nervously together for a moment, and then he sat mournfully down beside the basket.

“It ain’t no use, Dab.”

“No use?  Why not?”

“I ain’t a w’ite boy.”

“What of it?  Don’t you learn well enough, over at the school?”

“More dar like me.  Wot’d I do in a place whar all de res’ was w’ite?”

“Well as anybody.”

“Wot’ll my mudder say, w’en she gits de news?  You isn’t a-jokin’, is you, Dab Kinzer?”

“Joking?  I guess not.”

“You’s lit onto me powerful sudden ‘bout dis.  Yonder’s Ford an’ Frank a-comin’.  Don’t tell ’em.  Not jes’ yit.”

“They know all about it.  They helped raise the money.”

“Did dey?  I’s obleeged to ’em.  Well, ’tain’t no use.  All I’s good for is eels and crabs and clams and sech.  Har dey come.  Oh, my!”

Ford and Frank brought a fresh gust of enthusiasm with them, and they had Dick and his eels up from the grass in short order.

“We must see Mrs. Lee right away,” said Ford.  “It would never do to let Dick tell her.”

“Guess dat’s so,” said Dick.

Quite an embassy they made, those four boys, with Dab Kinzer for spokesman, and Dick Lee almost crouching behind them.  Mrs. Lee listened with open mouth while Dab unfolded his plan, but when he had finished she shut her lips firmly together.  They were not very thin, and not at all used to being shut, and in another instant they opened again.

“Sho!  De boy!  Is dat you, Dick?  Dat’s wot comes ob dressin’ on ’im up.  How’s he goin’ to git clo’es?  Wot’s he got to do wid de ’Cad’my, anyhow?  Wot am I to do, yer all alone, arter he’s gone?  Who’s goin’ to run err’nds an’ do de choahs?  Wot’s de use ob bringin’ up a boy an’ den hab him go trapesin’ off to de ’Cad’my?  Wot good’ll it do ’im?”

“I tole yer so, Dab,” groaned poor Dick.  “It ain’t no use.  I ’most wish I was a eel!”

Dabney was on the point of opening a whole broadside of eloquence, when Ford Foster pinched his arm, and whispered,

“Your mother’s coming, and our Annie’s with her.”

“Then let’s clear out.  She’s worth a ten-acre lot full of us.  Come on, boys!”

If Mrs. Lee was surprised by their very sudden and somewhat unceremonious retreat, she need not have been, after she learned the cause of it.  She stood in wholesome awe of Mrs. Kinzer; and a “brush” with the portly widow, re-enforced by the sweet face of Annie Foster, was a pretty serious matter.

She did not hesitate about beginning the skirmish, however; for her tongue was already a bit loosened, and in fine working-order.

“Wot’s dis yer, Mrs. Kinzer, ‘bout sendin’ away my Dick to a furrin ’Cad’my?  Isn’t he ’most nigh nuff spiled a’ready?”

“Oh! it’s all arranged nicely.  Miss Foster and I only came over to see what we could do about getting his clothes ready.  He must have things warm and nice, for the winters are cold up there.”

“I hasn’t said he might go Dick, put down dem eels; an’ he hasn’t said he’d go Dick, take off yer hat; an’ his father”

“Now, Glorianna,” interrupted Mrs. Kinzer, calling Dick’s mother by her first name, “I’ve known you these forty years, and do you suppose I’m going to argue about it?  Just tell us what Dick’ll need, and don’t let’s have any nonsense.  The money’s all provided.  How do you know what’ll become of him?  He may be governor yet.”

“He mought preach!”

That idea had suddenly dawned upon the perplexed mind of Mrs. Lee, and Dick’s fate was settled.  She was prouder than ever of her boy; and, truth to tell, her opposition was only what Mrs. Kinzer had considered it, a piece of unaccountable “nonsense,” to be brushed away by just such a hand as the widow’s own.