Six boys

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Contents

Chapter Pagb

I. The Clan ii

II. The Portrait Party 39

Chapter I. The Clan

** \ 1 7ELL, I never ! What will them impusses be

^^ up to next?"

It was Miss Letitia, the village storekeeper, who spoke, peering from between the gingerbread men who were poised on the sashes of her little shopwindow. The " imps " or ** impusses," as Miss Letitia called them, were five of the six boys who were nearly always together, and whose performances were the amusement and occasionally the dismay of the village.

The " Six Boys '' they were always called, though one of the number was a girl ; and every one knew just who were meant, though there were many other

boys in Little Wisdom. They were, —

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Percy Coffin,

" Bricktop " Heyv^ood,

" Riggers " da Silva,

" HUNX " ^

" Trix " y Huntington.

Little Jack J

This was the roll-call of the clan. All were between the ages of twelve and sixteen. The oldest, and the acknowledged chief, was Percy Coffin, the minister's mischievous son ; next ranked good-natured Ned Heywood, a farmer's boy (called familiarly *' Bricktop " from his bright red hair) ; then came the Brazilian, and last the three Huntingtons.

The democratic character of the clan will be recognized when we explain that Bricktop was second in popularity, though his family were considered decidedly " common ; " while the three Huntingtons were invariably mentioned last, though their father was a city millionaire, and their home the only Queen Anne villa in the town.

Miss Letitia's shop was directly opposite the minister's house ; and on the day on which our story opens the troop (with the exception of Trix Huntington) were visiting Percy and Riggers, who boarded at the parsonage.

As Dr. Coffin was writing his sermon, Mrs. Coffin had asked the boys to amuse themselves out of doors. Percy, always fertile in expedients, suggested that they were chipmunks or monkeys, and lived in trees.

"Miss Letitia cannot reproach at me if I so do," said Riggers. " She have often called me a monk. If I am so, I must have the habit of zose beast, ze which I have often seen to jump and to chatter in ze tree of my fazer's plantation on ze Amazons."

Rigger's true name was Rodrigues Joaquim Nepomucene Maria da Silva ; but this was too much for the other boys.

At first they murdered his leading Christian name by calling him ** Rod-riggers ; " but even that soon degenerated into simply *' Riggers." He was little and wizened and yellow, but he was gentle and polite, and his five friends liked him; and when the unmannerly factory-boys over at Toughend shouted derisively, — ,

♦* Riggers, Riggers, Lives among the niggers,"

Hunks — as Humphrey Huntington, the heavy-weight of the coterie, was nicknamed — seized the offending rhymester and administered condign punishment.

The tree which had been selected for their base of operations this afternoon was Y-shaped. Riggers and Percy had climbed into its main branches, Riggers carrying Mrs. Coffin's clothes-line coiled about his waist. He now proceeded to unwind it, and letting down one end, the other boys attached various articles, which were drawn into the tree. The first article to be hoisted was a long plank, which was supported by the two branches, and formed a sort of bridge or platform, on which the two boys danced, sat, and gambolled. Other articles were drawn up and placed on the platform by means of a basket fastened to the end of the rope. Riggers suggested that monkeys lived upon nuts, and that as the tree was an elm he could not discover any. Hunks took

14 SIX EOYS.

the hint, and running over to Miss Letitia's, bought a paper bag of chestnuts, which was immediately elevated to the monkeys. Percy complained that the chestnuts were not roasted, and it was determined to build a fire on the platform and roast them. This was accomplished just as Miss Letitia looked from between her gingerbread men and women. The ** impusses '* had drawn up an old tomato can, in which the chestnuts were placed, and the basket had been filled with kindling-wood, which was piled around * the can. Riggers had matches in his pocket, the paper bag ignited the kindling-wood, and a miniature bonfire was soon blazing around the chestnuts. But the fire was too near to be comfortable, and Riggers and Percy each mounted a different limb of the tree. The fire crackled and leaped still uncomfortably near Percy's legs. He essayed to mount higher; but the branch was too slender, and bent beneath his weight. The fire was snapping at his trousers; in another moment they would be ablaze.

** Fire, fire ! " screamed Miss Letitia, pounding on her window frantically, and creating great havoc among her gingerbread men. " Mercy on us, they '11 be burned alive ! " But the boys were equal to the emergency. Bricktop had darted to the back porch, seized a milk-pail, filled it at the well, and fastened it to the end of the rope which still dangled from Rigger's waist. Riggers pulled up the water, ex-

•

tinguished the fire, and presently the boys descended quite unhurt. ** The little rascals ! " gasped

Miss Letitia; ** I wish they had been scotched just a mite, to teach 'em not to frighten folks out of their seven senses."

Riggers came into the store a little later to buy some shoemaker's wax to make a jumping frog from a wish-bone; and Miss Letitia said to him spitefully, " Tears to me you 're a regular little imp o' darkness.".

The boy showed all his white teeth as he replied, *' Pardon, signora, are you not what zcy call a leetle impolite ? "

The pun was widely circulated; and when Mrs. Coffin heard it, she declared that the boy was really making progress in acquiring the language, if he could play with it sufficiently to make a pun. The little foreigner, so far away from his own mother, had won his way into Mrs. Coffin's motherly heart. He had been most persistently silent for nearly a month after his arrival, partly because he was ashamed of his broken English, and partly from homesickness. The rest thought him morose ; but Mrs. Coffin saw through the mask of reserve. She had heard the boy sobbing at night as though his heart would break, and she had slipped into his room in the darkness and had kissed him, without a word. The boy had made no reply ; but he was comforted, and from that time responded eagerly to Percy's overtures of friendship.

Handsome Percy Coffin was the acknowledged leader of the clan; but not because he was the minister's son, and his father one of the old style Doctors of Divinity who *' nded his congregation '* from his ordination to ^his decease. The Rev. Solomon Coffin was descended from a long line of ministers of whom it was written : ** They were all endowed with unnatural abilities ; their presence and conversation did peculiarly command awe. They were painful preachers of the gospel, and descended from one of the. best families that ever came out to this colony.

" Their works of piety and love Remain before the Lord; Honor on earth, and joys above Shall be their sure reward."

Percy would never have gained his leadership on account of the position of his family, for social distinctions were not regarded by the boys of Little Wisdom. He owed it simply to the fact that he was the best fellow in the village, overflowing with good fellowship to all around him, and that he was not in the least *' backward about coming forward." It was a family trait of the Coffins that they loved popularity and in different ways they gained it.

Old Eben Sawyer said that ** you might shake the Coffins up with all creation, and at the end of the shaking they would be found on the top of the heap." Solomon Coffin was secretly as much pleased by the recognition which his own piety and learning had always obtained, as his son Percy by his election as captain of the school foot-ball team. The Coffin family pride was centred and concentrated in the minister's maiden sister, widely known as Lady Caroline Coffin. If her brother ruled his congregation, she ruled him and his gentle wife ; but she could not rule Percy. Strange to say, with all his faults, — for Miss Letitia voiced the general opinion when she said that Percy Coffin abundantly carried out the proverb in regard to the mischief to be found in ministers' sons, — Percy was the idol of her heart. She regretted that her brother had given him his mother's family name instead of weighting him with the ancestral Solomon, which had been borne by five Coffins in succession, and to her mind hardly adequately represented the magnificence and wisdom of the Coffins, who certainly surpassed " great David's greater son."

It was also a grief to Lady Caroline that her brother had received into his family to tutor for college the Brazilian boy, whom she persisted in regarding as the instigator of all Percy's mischief; whereas the facts were exactly opposed to this delusion, as the little foreigner was gentle and naturally well behaved, and whatever pranks he executed were suggested by Percy.

It was well for her own peace of mind that Lady Caroline had not been at home during the episode of the bonfire in the tree.

She was making a call upon Mrs. Huntington. Lady Caroline had wrestled long with her ideas of dignity before she had brought herself to this determination. The Huntingtons were " new people " in Little Wisdom, inasmuch as it was only five years since they had bought the " Pride estate " and erected their wonderful villa thereon. The old Pride mansion had been destroyed by fire many years before this, and the shrubbery had grown into trees, while the small statues, which had once gleamed white on the well-clipped lawns, were clothed with green mould and wrapped with tangling vines. Only the great central chimney stood solitary in the centre of a little depression, which had once been the cellar, a monument to the departed Prides.

The Huntingtons had been in the habit of spending their summers at the neighboring watering-place of Great Folly, where Mr. Huntington sent his horses, and amused himself by exploring the beautiful drives which covered the county as with a network. In one of these he had discovered the Pride estate. His imagination told him how easily it could be restored, and he recognized in this neglected piece of property a valuable investment. It appealed to Mrs. Huntington's imagination in another way. She was weary of the fashion and the publicity of Great Folly, and she was delighted when her husband proposed to buy the Pride property and build a summer home. She had enjoyed her first tour of inspection about the place.

" The terrace and the balustrade Were broken, weedy, and decayed ; The garden walks were overgrown ; The flowers were low, the weeds were high;

The fountain stream was choked and dry; The dial stone with moss was green : , But still the rose of May was seen/'

She loved the place because it seemed to bring to her a breath from the olden time. The shady walks were grateful to her ; the seclusion delightful. She was so tired of noise and glare. She regretted that the old mansion itself was no longer in existence, with its pillared portico, its uneven floors, and legends of romance and gloom. She poked about among the ruins with her parasol, and was much interested in the great chimney which had defied the assaults of flame without and within like the donjon keep of a castle.

She asked her husband to incorporate it in the new home ; and as it was found to be entirely uninjured, he was very willing to do so. Mrs. Huntington taught her children Longfellow's poem, " The Golden Milestone," and succeeded in winning their respect for the old chimney, and their pity for the family history which it represented, though all they knew of it was that it had been one of dire misfortune. In the rough plaster over the jamb she traced the lines, —

** We may build more splendid habitations, Fill our rooms with paintings and with sculptures,

But we cannot Buy with gold the old associations."

Lady Caroline had known the dead-and-gone Prides ; and she resented the fact that another familv should build a flaunting villa on the site of their old mansion, and should be happy where they had been miserable. Lady Caroline insisted on believing that the Huntingtons were vulgar upstarts. It was a fiction in her mind that Mr. Huntington had made his money in the manufacture of guano. It would have been hard to explain why she should look down upon him on this account, had it been the fact, any more than upon the worthy farmers of Little Wisdom who made their money by spreading guano on their productive meadows.

Mrs. Huntington attended the Orthodox church; and it was all very well, Lady Caroline argued, for her brother's wife to call upon her. As the minister's wife it was her duty to do a great many disagreeable things. Lady Caroline only wished that this might be understood as an official call, and not as a social recognition. She had often asserted that she would never demean herself by such associations. But Mrs. Huntington, entirely unconscious of the light in which she was regarded, went on her gentle way, doing unobtrusive kindnesses, and winning Mrs. Coffin's affection. Mrs. Huntington called one day to take the minister's wife to drive, and finding her too busy to accept, offered to take Lady Caroline instead. In spite of herself the aristocratic old lady was flattered; and she accepted the attention, though she felt that it was a great condescension on her own part, and that possibly Mrs. Huntington wished thereby to announce to the parish the fact of their acquaintanceship. This view of her motives was rather shaken by the route which Mrs. Huntington chose, — a lonely one, following up a picturesque gorge, and skirting a range of wind-swept hills commanding a grand view. She returned by an unfrequented road, and entering the village just as every one was at supper, deposited Miss Coffin at her brother's door, without having met one of his parishioners, or having attracted the attention of anyone except the all-observant Miss Letitia

To tell the truth. Lady Caroline was a little disappointed ; for she had not ridden in a carriage since the funeral of the last family friend, and she would have been pleased to have the unaccustomed grandeur observed and commented upon.

Not only were Mrs. Huntington and Mrs. Coffin sympathetic, but Percy Coffin was on the best of terms with the three Huntington children, — Humphrey, Trix, and little Jack. Humphrey, it will be remembered, was the heavy boy who was nicknamed Hunx. Lady Caroline persisted that he was stupid as well as fat, and always spoke of him as " the lummux." Trix, or Beatrix Huntington, she called "the tomboy," — with some show of reason; for Trix liked boys, boys' sports, and boys' companionship, and was always mentioned as one of the six boys. Little Jack was a large-eyed, imaginative boy of seven, who simply worshipped Percy Coffin ; and it was he who had won Lady Caroline's heart so far that she had decided to call upon his mother. It happened in

*this wise. Jack called one afternoon upon Percy, and, not finding him, stood for a moment greatly interested in an embroidered picture, executed in Lady Caroline's youth, representing Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.

** Is that a picture of Percy ?'* he asked of Lady Caroline, who was watching him with her piercing •black eyes.

** No, my dear," she replied ; " that is Solomon."

" I might have known," Jack replied ; " he is n't nearly as good-looking as Percy. Was he as smart ? "

** I s'pose so," Lady Caroline admitted grudgingly. ** He was the wisest man that ever lived."

** I bet you, Percy '11 beat him when he is a man."

Lady Caroline hemmed ; she sympathized with the sentiment, but deprecated the manner in which it was expressed. " So you like Percy ? " she asked.

** Just don't I, though. Percy 's just splendid. I think he 's the elegantest boy that ever lived. Don't you ? "

"Yes," replied Lady Caroline, quite truthfully; ** I do. You seem to be a very nice boy yourself; would you like a cooky? ".

" Yes, ma'am, if you please, ma'am." Lady Caroline hastened down cellar to search for something with which to regale her little friend. She plunged her mittened fingers into a tall stone jar only to find that it contained salt pork, and reaching for a pan on a high swing-shelf, which she imagined might contain glngersnaps, overturned a quantity of cream on her black lace cap. She found some doughnuts at last» and hurrying upstairs found to her astonishment that her little guest was gone. Looking down the street, she saw him running after a load of hay which was crossing the meadow, and on which Jack's sharp eyes had discovered Percy's bright "blazer. " Bless his heart ! " said Lady Caroline ; " he 'd rather run after Percy than eat doughnuts. Well, that beats David and Jonathan."

Lady Caroline never did anything by halves. Convinced that little Jack Huntington was made of better stuff than she had imagined, and that his mother had not endeavored to parade her acquaintanceship with the Coffins, Lady Caroline determined to make the amende honorable by calling formally at the house.

She had not entered the grounds since the home of the Prides had been destroyed, and she half expected to see the old mansion, with its white pillars built in imitation of Mount Vernon, appear before her between the trees ; and as this mirage of her memory melted, and the pinnacled and balconied structure thrust itself upon her vision, she felt anew her first throb of indignation and resentment against the aggressive interlopers who had forcibly taken away her awn past, which had been very intimately connected with that of the Prides. She felt like turning away and shaking the dust from her feet ; but she had put her hand to the plough and would not turn back, and she tripped nimbly up the broad flight of steps which led to the veranda. The idea of shaking the dust from her shoes was still uppermost in her mind, which was somewhat perturbed by her memories, and she proceeded nervously but vigorously to wipe her feet on a black fur door-mat which lay on the upper step. What was her amazement when the door-mat uncoiled itself, showed a remarkably white set of teeth and fiery eyes, and began snapping viciously at her prunella gaiters. Lady Caroline retreated backward down the staircase with great alacrity, and found herself in the basin of the fountain. The dog dashed after her, but stopped on the margin of the pool, not being of the water-spaniel variety. Lady Caroline waded to the centre of the basin, and climbed on the pedestal of the marble nymph, clinging to her for support; while the dog made the circuit of the fountain, barking and snapping, but not daring to cross to the frightened little old lady, though he was encouraged to do so by a sound of clapping from within a hammock at the end of the piazza, and cries of " Scat ! Sick ! At her, Billy, good dog ! "

Suddenly Beatrix Huntington — for it was she — sprang from the hammock, bounded off the piazza into a bed of hyacinths, and caught the dog by the collar. ** Oh ! excuse me, excuse me ! " she cried, laughing so heartily that she could scarcely speak. ** I beg your pardon, I did not recognize you. I thought you were a silver-polish woman who came this morning, and while she got Tibbens to try her stuff, made off with Jack's christening-mug, and an old silver porringer that mamma likes to serve bonbons in. Dear me, how funny you look out there ! How can I get you across? "

** You might lend me an umbrella," Lady Caroline replied with dignity. ** I did n't surmise I should get caught in a shower, and I came unprotected."

" But you are not going to stay there, you know. I *11 set this chair in the basin, and you can step on it and then jump across. Down, Billy, down, I say! Wait a minute and I will chain the dog if you are afraid of him ; " and she dragged her pet away, laughing all the time in a frenzy of merriment. Then she returned and helped Lady Caroline, very limp as to her bombazine gown, and very stiff as to her deportment, into the great hall and up to the PridQ chimney, where a low fire was burning on the great forged-iron andirons. Lady Caroline had resisted at first, but Trix had insisted on settling her in a wicker armchair to dry. She had brought a towel, and had carefully wiped down the bombazine gown, had taken off the prunella gaiters, and set them to dry on the andirons. She had changed Lady Caroline's openwork white stockings for a pair of her own black silk ones, and she had finally brought her a cup of hot tea. Mrs. Huntington was not at home ; but Trix had waited upon Lady Caroline so deftly and withal so unassumingly, that that lady became every moment more and more mollified. She sipped her tea with much enjoyment, though she had never before seen it served with lemon; and she was much interested when Trix informed her that it was called Orange Pekoe, on her inquiry as to whether it was Gunpowder or old Hyson.

" There are orange-buds in it," Trix explained, ** and they give it the pleasant perfume as well as the name."

*' Dear me ! " ejaculated Lady Caroline ; " what will they adulterate with next ? I Ve heard that they even make strawberry jam by stirring up a mess of tomato, sugar, glue, and grass seed. That's the finishing touch, — grass seed, to imitate the little gritty seeds that grow on real strawberries.. I should think your pa would be willing to pay a little more, and get real tea, now that he knows that this kind is counterfeit

** I think he gets it because mother likes it best, Trix replied, repressing the scornful retort which started to her lips.

" You don't say ! " Lady Caroline exclaimed, and then her attention was attracted by the great rough fireplace. " You have n't finished off your mantelpiece yet, have you ? If it 's going to be white marble, there 's a tombstone-cutter over at Great Folly who carves real nice. He made the mantelpiece for Squire Billings's best room. It was very handsome, and it cost as much as fifty dollars. Mrs. Billings wanted to have a gas-log, such as she tells me they have in the city; but as there were no gas-works nearer than Great Folly, she gave up the idee. Now I see your pa has gas made on the place, and he could have one of those gas-logs as easy as anything."

" Papa would think the gas-log more of a counterfeit than the mixed tea," Trix replied, "especially here in the country, where it is so easy to have the real thing. He was reading one of Aldrich's poems from a magazine last night, and he came across something about a wood-fire that pleased him very much. Here is the magazine now, with a paper-cutter between the leaves marking the lines ; let me read

them to you, —

* Silent was the room, Save when along the still damp apple-wood A little flame ran that chirped like a bird, — Some wren^s ghost haunting the familiar bough.'

Papa does n*t look like a man who is fond of poetry, but he appreciated that. It is something like the idea in mamma's favorite * Golden Milestone,' which she had us all learn by heart, —

* On the hearth the lighted logs are glowing. And, like Ariel in the cloven pine-tree.

For its freedom Groans and sighs the air imprisoned in them.' "

" Apple-tree wood is very poor for an open fire," Lady Caroline remarked practically. " It spits and splutters too much. Never reminds me of the singing of birds ; but then a wren is n t much of a singer, either, only yawps a little like, a half-grown chicken. Hemlock's wuss ; it snaps like a s^^n^j&f'fire-cra'ckers. Pine is n't good to burn, either ; makes too hot a flame, and too soon over. Tell your father to stick to hickory. You seem very fond of poetry here ; what are those lines upon the chimney?"

Trix read them to her: ** You see, this is the original old chimney that was in the Pride Mansion," she explained. " It has been through fire and water, and mother thought the sentiment appropriate."

"You wouldn't want to buy with gold the Pride associations, if you knew them," Lady Caroline remarked gloomily. " There 's more than that -chimney has been through fire and flood on account of the Prides."

" Oh 1 do you know about the Prides? " Trix asked eagerly. ** Are there any legends, tragedies, or romances connected with the family? We want to have a ghost-story party some time. Won't you come over and tell us all about them? I am sure there must have been a ghost in the family, some white lady gliding along the old pillared portico, or some mysterious chamber with blood-stains on the floor — "

Lady Caroline had turned very pale ; but as she was extremely sallow, her paleness only turned her from dark orange to a Mongolian yellow, and Trix did not notice it, but rattled on : ** We will have the lights all turned out, the fire low, and we will all sit on the floor around it, and it will be delightfully gooey. Do promise that you will come ! "

** No," replied Lady Caroline, abruptly, " I want to forget everything connected with this place; my experience has not been an interesting one."

" You mean your experience with Billy, — please excuse him. You know Dr. Watts says * it is their nature to.' "

Trix had had many trials with Billy, but she loved him dearly. In the first place he was such a handsome dog: a black Spitz, with a pelt as glossy and fine, as curly and as beautiful a black as the costliest furs of a Russian princess. And Billy was intelligent as well as handsome. From his sharp, nervous nose, his trembling, sensitive ears, his affectionate eyes, to the tip of his plumy tail, he was the liveliest, the most intense piece of emotional and expressional mechanism ever fashioned. Billy was passionately affectionate, and would nearly leap out of his skin on the return of any member of the family after even a short absence, and would caper himself into utter exhaustion in vain attempts to pour forth all his ecstasy of love and joy. He was loving, intelligent, and a thing of beauty, but alas ! he was not good. Billy was utterly lacking in self-control. He could not be trusted to guard the market-basket, and he could not refrain from fighting with other dogs. He would drop the choicest piece of meat -to cavort down the road after a bull-dog, who would invariably give him a good drubbing.

A good missionary once told her . experience with a converted Indian. On seeing hioj smoking she took him to task, and told him tllat cigarettes were inconsistent with his new professions.

" Miss Mather," said the Indian convert, " me love you some."

"I hope so," replied Miss Mather; "I have certainly labored for your good, and I am glad if you appreciate it."

** Me love you some," repeated the Indian, checking the statement off on one of his fingers, ** but love Jesus more ' some."

" Qirtte right," said Miss Mather, approvingly.

" You some," reiterated the convert, ** Jesus more some, me love smoke heap more some."

If Billy could have voiced his feelings, he would have said that he loved Trix some, a juicy beefsteak more some, but a good fight heap more some.

The Huntingtons would go out for a drive with Billy lying across their feet like a handsome lap-robe. He would peer from sleepily blinking eyes dreamily off at the landscape, apparently meditating on the good, the true, and the beautiful, and just about to sink into peaceful slumber, when a speck in a distant field would suddenly arouse his attention. Alas! it was a collie dog faithfully guarding some cattle ; and Billy would shoot from the carriage like a black comet, dash across the field, and engage that inoffensive collie in deadly combat; and before the boys could reach the scene of conflict and drag the contestants apart by their tails^ one or both of the dogs would be severely injured.