A BOY'S TOWN ADVENTURES: The Flight of Pony Baker, Boy Life, A Boy's Town & Years of My Youth. William Dean Howells
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started away on the run again. He wanted to get rid of that money so badly, for it was all he had to worry about, after he had got rid of his brother, that he was out of breath, almost, by the time he reached Mr. Bushell’s store. But even then he could not get rid of the money. Mr. Bushell had told him to give it to his partner, but his partner had gone out into the country, and was not to be back till after supper.
Frank did not know what to do. He did not dare to give it to any one else in the store, and it seemed to him that the danger of having it got worse every minute. He hung about a good while, and kept going in and out of the store, but at last he thought the best thing would be to go home and ask his father; and that was what he did.
By this time his father had gone home to supper, and he found him there with his two younger brothers, feeling rather lonesome, with Frank’s mother and his sisters all away. But they cheered up together, and his father said he had done right not to leave the money, and he would just step over, after supper, and give it himself to Mr. Bushell’s partner. He took the roll of bills from Frank and put it into his own pocket, and went on eating his supper, but when they were done he gave the bills back to the boy.
“After all, Frank, I believe I’ll let you take that money to Mr. Bushell’s partner. He trusted it to you, and you ought to have the glory; you’ve had the care. Do you think you’ll be afraid to come home through the bridge after sunset?”
The bridge was one of those old-fashioned, wooden ones, roofed in and sided up, and it stretched from shore to shore, like a tunnel, on its piers. It was rather dim, even in the middle of the brightest day, and none of the boys liked to be caught in it after sunset.
Frank said he did not believe he should be afraid, for it seemed to him that if he had got through a runaway, and such a thunder-storm as that was the night before, without harm, he could surely get through the bridge safely. There was not likely to be anybody in it, at the worst, but Indian Jim, or Solomon Whistler, the crazy man, and he believed he could run by them if they offered to do anything to him. He meant to walk as slowly as he could, until he reached the bridge, and then just streak through it.
That was what he did, and it was still quite light when he reached Mr. Bushell’s store. His partner was there, sure enough, this time, and Frank gave him the money, and told him how he had been so long bringing it. The merchant thanked him, and said he was rather young to be trusted with so much money, but he reckoned Mr. Bushell knew what he was about.
“Did he count it when he gave it to you?” he asked.
“No, he didn’t,” said Frank.
“Did you?”
“I didn’t have a chance. He put it right into my pocket, and I was afraid to take it out.”
Mr. Bushell’s partner laughed, and Frank was going away, so as to get through the bridge before it was any darker, but Mr. Bushell’s partner said, “Just hold on a minute, won’t you, Frank, till I count this,” and he felt as if his heart had jumped into his throat.
What if he had lost some of the money? What if somebody had got it out of his pocket, while he was so dead asleep, and taken part of it? What if Mr. Bushell had made a mistake, and not given him as much as he thought he had? He hardly breathed while Mr. Bushell’s partner slowly counted the bank-notes. It took him a long time, and he had to wet his finger a good many times, and push the notes to keep them from sticking together. At last he finished, and he looked at Frank over the top of his spectacles. “Two thousand?” he asked.
“That’s what Mr. Bushell said,” answered the boy, and he could hardly get the words out.
“Well, it’s all here,” said Mr. Bushell’s partner, and he put the money in his pocket, and Frank turned and went out of the store.
He felt light, light as cotton, and gladder than he almost ever was in his life before. He was so glad that he forgot to be afraid in the bridge. The fellows who were the most afraid always ran through the bridge, and those who tried not to be afraid walked fast and whistled. Frank did not even think to whistle.
His father was sitting out on the front porch when he reached home, and he asked Frank if he had got rid of his money, and what Mr. Bushell’s partner had said. Frank told him all about it, and after a while his father asked, “Well, Frank, do you like to have the care of money?”
“I don’t believe I do, father.”
“Which was the greater anxiety to you last night, Mr. Bushell’s money, or your brother?”
Frank had to think awhile. “Well, I suppose it was the money, father. You see, it wasn’t my own money.”
“And if it had been your own money, you wouldn’t have been anxious about it? You wouldn’t have cared if you had lost it, or somebody had stolen it from you?”
Frank thought again, and then he said he did not believe he had thought about that.
“Well, think about it now.”
Frank tried to think, and at last he said. “I reckon I should have cared.”
“And if it had been your own money, would you have been more anxious about it than about your brother?”
This time Frank was more puzzled than ever; he really did not know what to say.
His father said: “The trouble with money is, that people who have a great deal of it seem to be more anxious about it than they are about their brothers, and they think that the things it can buy are more precious than the things which all the money in the world cannot buy.” His father stood up. “Better go to bed, Frank. You must be tired. There won’t be any thunder-storm to-night, and you haven’t got a pocketful of money to keep you awake.”
XI. How Jim Leonard Planned For Pony Baker to Run Off On A Raft
Now we have got to go back to Pony Baker again. The summer went along till it got to be September, and the fellows were beginning to talk about when school would take up. It was almost too cold to go in swimming; that is, the air made you shiver when you came out, and before you got your clothes on; but if you stood in the water up to your chin, it seemed warmer than it did on the hottest days of summer. Only now you did not want to go in more than once a day, instead of four or five times. The fellows were gathering chinquapin acorns most of the time, and some of them were getting ready to make wagons to gather walnuts in. Once they went out to the woods for pawpaws, and found about a bushel; they put them in cornmeal to grow, but they were so green that they only got rotten. The boys found an old shanty in the woods where the farmer made sugar in the spring, and some of the big fellows said they were coming out to sleep in it, the first night they got.
It was this that put Jim Leonard in mind of Pony’s running off again. All the way home he kept talking to Pony about it, and Pony said he was going to do it yet, some time, but when Jim Leonard wanted him to tell the time, he would only say, “You’ll see,” and wag his head.
Then Jim Leonard mocked him and dared him to tell, and asked him if he would take a dare. After that he made up with him, and said if Pony would run off he would run off, too; and that the way for them to do would be to take the boards of that shanty in the woods and build a raft. They could do it easily, because the boards were just leaned up against the ridge-pole, and they could tie them together with pawpaw switches, they were so tough, and then some night carry the raft to the river, after the water got high in the fall, and float down on it to the city.
“Why, does the river go past the city?” Pony asked.
“Of course it does,” said Jim Leonard, and he laughed at Pony. “It runs into the Ohio there. Where’s your geography?”
Pony was ashamed to say that he did not suppose that geography had anything to do with the river at the Boy’s Town, for it was