Well, just for once, it was not a bad guess. He would be working on fertile ground. I didn’t care too much for the Old Girl anyway. She was my senior by four or five years, and naturally she would welcome a good “catch.” It was understood between us that she was only filling a vacancy, and thereby providing a way to keep us in the Silver Stocking circle. The thing I didn’t like was to be “bumped” just for the fun of it, as viewed by the RM’s son. Mike Norton, clerk in the DeForest store, saw the rich man’s son write a letter to the Old Girl, and he thought this would be the time when the RM’s son would try to make good his boast. Three days hence there was to be a picnic in a grove south of Netawaka, and the Silver Stocking boys and girls were lining up to go in a body. Mike and other members of the circle put in two hours looking for me. The boys, and the girls too, were all for me, in this instance — but not even the King’s Horses could have stopped that boy in his purpose. The postmaster showed me the letter with the OG’s name spelled out in bold relief—and I was off at once, thinking I would now show this RM’s son that he could not do this to me. The Old Girl said she was awfully sorry—that she had promised another, naming the rich man’s son. I said, in substance—though really not sore at the OG, I think I was not in a frame of mind to phrase it just so—”Let’s see where we stand. The way things are shaped up now, I’m out—that is, barred from the Silver Stocking crowd by the rules of my own helpful making.” She suggested that I go back to the girl I have designated as My Best Girl—said, “I KNOW you can, if you will just spunk up a little.” I had never “spunked” much with the OG. “But,” I said, “if I should succeed in dating her, someone else would be out, and that someone is your old beau. Likely timber maybe. Then, in case your date does not choose to repeat, you might still have a chance to get back with the old crowd.” She laughed — the OG was feeling pretty good, just then—and said, “I hadn’t thought of it that way.” Now she giggled, “But, you know, I could always be a hanger-on, maybe even go with you and your girl—just in case.” A boy was permitted to take more than one girl—even a flock of them if he were unlucky enough.