This was all that Billy knew of him until he had been in Mr. Selden’s employment nearly three weeks; then, as he was one day poring over a volume of Horace which he had brought with him, George, who chanced to pass by, looked over his shoulder, exclaiming, “Why, Bender, can you read Latin?  Really this is a novelty.  Are you fond of books?”

“Yes, very,” said Billy, “though I have but a few of my own.”

“Fortunately then I can accommodate you,” returned George, “for I have a tolerably good library, to which you can at any time have access.  Suppose you come round to my uncle’s to-night.  Never mind about thanking me,” he added, as he saw Billy about to speak; “I hate to be thanked, so to-night at eight o’clock I shall expect you.”

Accordingly that evening Billy started for Mr. Selden’s.  George, who wished to save him from any embarrassment, answered his ring himself, and immediately conducted him to his room, where for an hour or so they discussed their favorite books and authors.  At, last, George, astonished at Billy’s general knowledge of men and things, exclaimed, “Why, Bender.  I do believe you are almost as good a scholar as I, who have been through college.  Pray how does it happen?”

In a few words Billy explained that he had been in the habit of working summers, and going to school at Wilbraham winters; and then, as it was nearly ten, he hastily gathered up the books which George had kindly loaned him, and took his leave.  As he was descending the broad stairway he met a young girl fashionably dressed, who stared at him in some surprise and then passed on, wondering no doubt how one of his evident caste came to be in the front part of the house.  In the upper hall she encountered George, and asked of him who the stranger was.

“His name is Bender, and he came from Chicopee,” answered George.

“Bender from Chicopee,” repeated Ida.  “Why I wonder if it isn’t the Billy Bender about whom Jenny Lincoln has gone almost mad.”

“I think not,” returned her cousin, “for Mrs. Lincoln would hardly suffer her daughter to mention a poor boy’s name, much less to go mad about him.”

“But,” answered Ida, “he worked on Mr. Lincoln’s farm when Jenny was a little girl; and now that she is older she talks of him nearly all the time, and Rose says it would not surprise her if she should some day run off with him.”

“Possibly it is the same,” returned George.  “Any way, he is very fine-looking, and a fine fellow too, besides being an excellent scholar.”

The next day, when Billy chanced to be alone, George approached him, and after making some casual remarks about the books he had borrowed, &c., he said, “Did you ever see Jenny Lincoln in Chicopee?”

“Oh, yes,” answered Billy, brightening up, for Jenny had always been and still was a great favorite with him; “Oh, yes, I know Jenny very well.  I worked for her father some years ago, and became greatly interested in her.”