That was a bad thing for Dabney to say just then, for it was vigorously resented by the remaining three. As soon as quiet was restored, however, Mrs. Kinzer remarked,--
"I think Hamilton should have consulted me about it, but it"s too late now. Anyhow, you may go and put on your other clothes."
"My wedding suit?" asked Dab.
"No, indeed! I mean your old ones,--those you took off night before last."
"Dunno where they are," slowly responded Dab.
"Don"t know where they are?" responded a chorus of four voices.
"No," said Dab. "Bill Lee"s black boy had em on all yesterday afternoon, and I reckon he"s gone a-fishing again to-day. They fit him a good sight better "n they ever did me."
If Dabney had expected a storm to come from his mother"s end of the table, he was pleasantly mistaken; and his sisters had it all to themselves for a moment. Then, with an admiring glance at her son, the thoughtful matron remarked,--
"Just like his father, for all the world! It"s no use, girls: Dabney"s a growing boy in more ways than one. Dabney, I shall want you to go over to the Morris house with me after breakfast. Then you may hitch up the ponies, and we"ll do some errands around the village."
Dab Kinzer"s sisters looked at one another in blank astonishment, and Samantha would have left the table if she had only finished her breakfast.
Pamela, as being nearest to Dab in age and sympathy, gave a very admiring look at her brother"s second "good fit," and said nothing.
Even Keziah finally admitted, in her own mind, that such a change in Dabney"s appearance might have its advantages. But Samantha inwardly declared war.
The young hero himself was hardly used to that second suit, as yet, and felt any thing but easy in it.
"I wonder," he said to himself, "what Jenny Walters would say to me now.
Wonder if she"d know me."
Not a doubt of it. But after he had finished his breakfast, and gone out, his mother remarked,--
"It"s really all right, girls. I almost fear I have been neglecting Dabney. He isn"t a little boy any more."
"He isn"t a man yet," exclaimed Samantha. "And he talks slang dreadfully."
"But then, he does grow so!" remarked Keziah.
"Mother," said Pamela, "couldn"t you get Dab to give d.i.c.k Lee the slang, along with the old clothes?"
"We"ll see about it," replied Mrs. Kinzer.
It was very clear that Dabney"s mother had begun to take in a new idea about her son.
It was not the least bit in the world unpleasant to find out that he was "growing in more ways than one," and it was quite likely that she had indeed kept him too long in roundabouts.
At all events, his great idea had been worked out into a triumphant success; and, before the evening was over, Pamela replied to a remark of Samantha"s,--
"I don"t care. He"s taller than I am, and I"d ever so much rather have a frock-coat walk beside me to meeting."
CHAPTER III.
A MEMBER OF ONE OF THE OLDEST FAMILIES MEETS A YOUNG GENTLEMAN FROM THE CITY.
d.i.c.k Lee had been more than half right about the village being a dangerous place for him, with such an unusual amount of clothing over his ordinary uniform.
The very dogs, every one of whom was an old acquaintance, barked at him on his way home that night; and, proud as were his ebony father and mother of the improvement in their son"s appearance, they yielded to his earnest entreaties, first, that he might wear his present all the next day, and, second, that he might betake himself to the "bay" early in the morning, and so keep out of sight "till he got used to it."
"On"y, you jist mind wot yer about!" said his mother, "and see"t you keep dem clo"es from gettin" wet. I jist can"t "foard to hab dem spiled right away."
The fault with Dab Kinzer"s old suit, after all, had lain mainly in its size rather than its materials; for Mrs. Kinzer was too good a manager to be really stingy.
d.i.c.k succeeded in reaching the boat-landing without falling in with any one who seemed disposed to laugh at him; but there, right on the wharf, was a white boy of about his own age, and he felt a good deal like backing out.
"Nebber seen him afore, either," said d.i.c.k to himself. "Den I guess I ain"t afeard ob him."
The stranger was a somewhat short and thick-set, but bright and active-looking boy, with a pair of very keen, greenish-gray eyes. But, after all, the first word he spoke to poor d.i.c.k was,--
"Hullo, clothes! Where are you going with all that boy?"
"I knowed it, I knowed it!" groaned d.i.c.k. But he answered as sharply as he knew how,--
"I"s goin" a-fishin". Any ob youah business?"--
"Where"d you learn how to fish?" the stranger asked, "Down South? Didn"t know they had any there."
"Nebbah was down Souf," was the somewhat surly reply.
"Father run away, did he?"
"He nebber was down dar, nudder."
"Nor his father?"
""Tain"t no business ob yourn," said d.i.c.k, "but we"s allers lived right heah, on dis bay."
"Guess not," said the white boy knowingly. d.i.c.k was right, nevertheless; for his people had been slaves among the very earliest Dutch settlers, and had never "lived South" at all. He was now busily getting one of the boats ready to shove off; but his white tormentor went at him again, with,--
"Well, then, if you"ve lived round here as long as that, you must know everybody."
"Reckon I do."
"Are there any nice fellows around here? Any like me?"
"De nicest young gen"lman round dis bay," replied d.i.c.k, "is Mr. Dab Kinzer. But he ain"t like you. Not nuff to hurt him."