The Quilt that Jack Built; How He Won the Bicycle | Page 6

lying on the hearth-rug, the night the boys were waiting for him around the corner, and he was crying out, "But you _promised me! You promised me!_" and there was his mother with the bit of a gold piece in her hand,--the precious little keepsake that she had treasured for thirty years, saying, in answer to her husband's remonstrance: "No, Robert, that would make Johnny break his promise, too, and we couldn't afford that, could we, son? We must keep our word at any cost!"
It stood out fair and fine now, the memory of her unswerving truthfulness, her fidelity to duty. If the commonplace deeds of those early days had seemed of little moment to his childish eyes in passing, he saw them at their full value now. He recognized the high purpose with which she had pieced her little days together, now that he could look at the whole beautiful pattern of her finished life. How sacredly she had always kept her word to him, the slightest promise always inviolate! Ah, the little gold coin was the very least of all her sacrifices.
He was about to say, "No, they shall not all be in vain," when he heard the fellows on the walk outside. A cold perspiration broke out on his forehead, as he considered the consequences should he refuse to go with them. Strong as he was, he had a fear of ridicule. To be laughed at, to be ostracized by the set he admired, was more than he could endure. Like many another brave fellow, fearless in every respect but one, he was an arrant coward before that one overpowering fear of being laughed at.
He gathered the quilt in his arms, debating whether he should hide it hastily in the closet, or come out boldly before them all with its whole homely little story. The fellows were tramping down the hall now. Oh, what should he do? Go or not? It meant to break with them for all time if he refused now.
There was an instant more of indecision, as the footsteps halted at the threshold, but, when the door burst open, he had squared his shoulders to meet whatever might come, and was whispering between his set teeth: "At any cost, mother! I'll keep my promise _at any cost!_"
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HOW HE WON THE BICYCLE

_This story first appeared in the Central Christian Advocate. The author wishes to acknowledge the courtesy of the editor in permitting her to republish it in the present volume_.

HOW HE WON THE BICYCLE
"Looks like everybody in Bardstown has a wheel but us," said Todd Walters, wistfully pressing his little freckled nose against the show-window of the bicycle shop, where a fine wheel was on exhibition.
It was the third time that day that Todd had walked five blocks out of his way to look in at that window, and each time Abbot Morgan and Chicky Wiggins were with him. In the two weeks that the new store had been open, the boys never failed to stop by on their way from school, and the more they looked at the wheel displayed so temptingly in the window, the more each boy longed to own it.
None of them had any spending money. Todd might have by and by when school was out, and he began selling fly-paper again, as he had done the summer before; but it was understood in the tumble-down little cottage that Todd called home that every penny thus earned was to be saved toward the purchase of a much needed new suit.
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Chicky Wiggins never could hope to buy the wheel, for he was a district messenger boy, and it took all his weekly earnings to pay for his board and lodging and washing and shoe-leather. Chicky had no family to look after him, or help him make one nickel do the work of three.
Abbot Morgan was such a well-dressed boy that one might have supposed that his pockets were always supplied with spending money, but those who knew Abbot's uncle, the hard, grasping man with whom he lived, knew better. Peter had worked hard for his little fortune, and, while he was willing to provide a comfortable home for his sister's orphan son, he did not propose that one penny should be spent in foolishness, as he called it. So there was little hope of Abbot ever owning the wheel.
"But I'll have something to spend as I please this summer," he said, as they stood looking in through the window. "Uncle said that after I have done Aunt Jane's chores every morning, I shall have my time to myself this summer. He let me have the two acres back of the house for a garden, and I've got it planted with all sorts of vegetables. They are coming on