18 
THE LADIES’ FLORAL CABINET. 
substitute with thirty cents for every pound of its lean, 
scrawny carcass; and now, as Tom looked at the mud 
and slush through which he was expected to crawl, his 
heart sank within him. But, feeling that it was cowardly 
to shirk any punishment which fate—or Kitty—should 
offer, he commenced his penitential pilgrimage on his 
hands and knees, but was soon obliged to drop flat on 
his stomach and wriggle slowly in. 
“Truly, the way of transgressors is hard,” muttered 
Tom, as he cut his wrist on a broken lamp-chimney, tore 
his coat on an empty tomato-can, and found his shoulders 
wedged tightly between some timbers. But he was now 
in reach of the turkey, and, in spite of Tiger’s threatening 
growl, seized a claw and held on, while Professor Ryder 
called off his dog. But the remains of the ill-fated turkey 
seemed no more likely to be restored to Kitty than before, 
for Tom was so tightly wedged in as to be unable to stir. 
“ I am caught, I can’t move; you’ll have to pull me out 
of this,” groaned the turkey hunter. 
“Can't you wriggle out some way?” asked the Pro¬ 
fessor. 
“ No, I tell you I can’t stir,” replied the unhappy Tom. 
“ Well, lend a hand here, Roberts, and you too, Miller,” 
added the Professor, as Miller attempted to retreat; 
“ each of you take one foot and then both pull together.” 
The two students obeyed, but just as they were pulling 
with all their strength, something seemed to give way, 
and over they went backward into the mud, each holding 
up at arm’s length a large and muddy boot. Mrs. Ryder 
and Kitty laughed until their faces turned purple; the 
servant and the children fairly yelled with delight; groans 
of despair issued from beneath the barn, and expletives, 
not of the mildest character, fell from the lips of the 
wretched students. 
“ Do look at Miller’s stovepipe hat! ” cried Kitty; “ it 
has turned into a Tam o’ Shanter.” 
But Professor Ryder rallied his forces to combat again. 
“Try once more, gentlemen,” he urged; “take firm 
hold of the ankles this time, and bring the whole of him.” 
This effort was more successful and brought Tom so 
nearly out that he soon scrambled to his feet, scratched, 
bleeding, ragged and muddy, but triumphant, for he held 
in his hand the woful remains of the turkey which had 
caused such a commotion—a dark, lank claw with a leg 
attached, and a rag of skin and a portion of mangled back¬ 
bone hanging to it. 
“Have a boot, Tom?” asked Roberts, reaching him 
one to which a generous portion of mother earth adhered. 
“ Boot, indeed ! ” ejaculated Miller, “ I should call it a 
whole farm ; if I owned as much landed property I should 
be a rich fellow.” 
“Oh, Tom!” cried Mrs. Ryder, “your own mother 
would not know you.” 
“ I congratulate your tailor, Tom, but I shouldn’t won¬ 
der if your father would feel more like confounding him 
by the time you are thoroughly repaired,” added Miller. 
Kitty had heard her hero abused long enough and 
came to the rescue. 
“Tom, you’re a splendid fellow!” she cried; “I will 
keep that turkey’s claw as long as I live; and nobody 
needn’t go to judging you by themselves and think your 
merits depend on the tailor; some folks may not have 
anything but clothes to recommend them, but you’re not 
that kind,” and Kitty gave Miller a look of contempt. 
“ f think they’re pretty well matched; I never saw a 
couple more unmistakably intended for each other,” 
dryly observed Roberts, looking from Kitty with her 
muddy face and dress and dishevelled hair to the still 
more muddy and forlorn figure of Tom. 
Kitty blushed even under the mud, but looked bravely 
up at Tom, meeting a look in his honest eyes that made 
the blood tingle in her veins, but she said quietly, “ Come 
home with me, Tom; mamma will set your clothes to 
rights,” and the two turned away. 
“Has she taken you for better or worse, Tom? ” called 
out Roberts. 
“ I hope so,” answered Tom, boldly. 
“ There can’t be any better about it, it is all worse,” 
cried Miller. 
“ You are mistaken; it is better than you will ever do,” 
retorted Kitty, casting a defiant look behind as they 
passed into the street. 
“ They haven’t been making a match of it here in my 
yard and before my very eyes, have they ? ” gasped Pro¬ 
fessor Ryder. 
“It looks very much like it,” remarked Roberts. 
Breakfast was over at Mrs. Deming’s when Kitty and 
Tom entered the dining-room where only her mother and 
the oldest boarder still lingered over their coffee. 
“ Mercy on us ! Kitty Deming, where have you been ? ” 
exclaimed her mother. 
“ I’ve been on a wild-goose chase, mamma,” calmly 
announced Kitty, as she sank into a chair, letting her 
long hair trail on the floor, while a delicate pink flush still 
lingered in her cheeks. 
“You seem to have caught the goose,” remarked the 
boarder, giving a significant look at Tom, while rising from 
the table to leave the room. “ I caught so much of it,” 
declared Kitty, holding out for her mother’s inspection 
the long dark claw. 
“ Why, that is a turkey’s leg,” said the good woman. 
“ It was another lark; I left it at your door, and Pro¬ 
fessor Ryder’s dog carried it off,” explained Tom. 
“ And I promised that you would fix Tom up, mamma.” 
“ He does need it,” admitted Mrs. Deming. 
“ And while you are about it” added Kitty, “you may 
as well give us your blessing.” 
“ Do tell! ” ejaculated Kitty’s astonished parent. 
But they wouldn’t. 
Over three hundred people gathered in the chapel that 
evening at the levee—for St. Botolph’s was a large school. 
The tableaux went off with entire success until the cur¬ 
tain rose to reveal Joan of Arc, bound to a stake with 
fagots piled about her feet. Laura did, indeed, make a 
fine picture, with her slender, girlish figure robed in 
white ; her long black hair contrasting with the paleness 
of her face and the purity of her dress. There were mur¬ 
murs of admiration as the curtain fell, then all was silence 
as it rose again revealing a soldier with a lighted torch in 
the act of setting fire to the fagots. The glare of the 
torch lent an unearthly pallor to the face of the martyr. 
But Tom’s exploit of the morning had rendered his 
