John was now, this July, allowed to ride with Leila when his uncle was otherwise occupied.  He had been mounted on a safe old horse and was not spared advice from Leila, who enjoyed a little the position of mistress of equestrianism.  She was slyly conscious of her comrade’s mildly resentful state of mind.

“Don’t pull on him so hard, John.  The great thing is to get intimate with a horse’s mouth.  He’s pretty rough, but if you wouldn’t keep so stiff, you wouldn’t feel it.”

John began to be a little impatient.  “Let us talk of something else than horses.  I got a good dose of advice yesterday from Uncle Jim.  I am afraid that you will be sent to school in the fall.  I hate schools.  You’ll have no riding and snowballing, and I shall miss you.  You see, I was never friends with a girl before.”

“Uncle Jim would never let me go.”

“But Aunt Ann?” he queried.  “I heard her tell Mr. Rivers that you must go.  She said that you were too old, or would be, for snowballing and rough games and needed the society of young ladies.”

“Young ladies!” said Leila scornfully.  “We had two from Baltimore year before last.  I happened to hit one of them in the eye with a snowball, and she howled worse than Billy when he plays bear.”

“Oh, you’ll like it after a while,” he said, with anticipative wisdom, “but I shall be left to play with Tom.  I want you to miss me.  It is too horrid.”

“I shall miss you; indeed, I shall.  I suppose I am only a girl, but I won’t forget what you did when that boy was rude.  I used to think once you were like a girl and just afraid.  I never yet thanked you,” and she leaned over and laid a hand for a moment on his.  “I believe you wouldn’t be afraid now to do what I dared you to do.”

He laughed.  There had been many such dares.  “Which dare was it, Leila?”

“Oh, to go at night—­at night to the Indian graves.  I tried it once and got half way—­”

“And was scalped all the way back, I suppose.”

“I was, John.  Try it yourself.”

“I did, a month after I came.”

“Oh! and you never told me.”

“No, why should I?”

It had not had for him the quality of bodily peril.  It was somehow far less alarming.  He had started with fear, but was of no mind to confess.  They rode on in silence, until at last she said.  “I hope you won’t fight that boy again.”

“Oh,” he said, “I didn’t mind it so very much.”

She was hinting that he would again be beaten.  “But I minded, John.  I hated it.”

He would say no more.  He had now had, as concerned Tom, three advisers.  He kept his own counsel, with the not unusual reticence of a boy.  He did not wish to be pitied on account of what he did not consider defeat, and wanted no one to discuss it.  He was better pleased when a week later the English groom talked to him after the boxing-lesson.  “That fellow, Tom, told me about your slapping him.  He said that he didn’t want to lick you if you hadn’t hit him.”