CHAPTER XXXV.

AT THE COUNTRY DANCE.

For the balance of the day nothing was talked of but the party they were going to attend. Pickles had not been forgotten, and he was to join in a hoe-down in the barn, where the farm hands were going to have their jollification.

Boxy and Andy spent a good bit of the time over their toilet, and it must be confessed that Jack and Harry did the same.

“We are not fit for a city party, but I guess we look well enough for this country affair,” remarked Jack. “Our clothing is clean, and when we wash and comb up we’ll pass in a crowd.”

It was decided not to move camp until the following day, and a rude shelter was constructed under the trees, where the traps were hidden. It was not likely that they would return to the spot until nearly sunrise.

The party was expected to arrive at the farmhouse up the lake at about eight o’clock, and at half-past seven the boys set out for the place, without taking the trouble to replenish the campfire.

They had been given minute directions concerning the road, and had no difficulty in reaching their destination.

As they came in sight of the farmhouse, which was lit up from cellar to garret, they saw that the sleigh loads of relatives and neighbors had just arrived. They hurried in, and a few minutes later were introduced all around.

“Make yourselves at home,” said Henry Akers, Sarah’s husband. “I’ve heard o’ the service you did my father-in-law, and I am as thankful as he is that his barn wasn’t burnt down.”

The fiddler and the harpist were stationed in a corner of the broad hallway, and the sitting-room and the kitchen had been cleared for dancing. Soon the lively strains of a Virginia reel broke the ice all around and set everybody to talking and laughing.

“Choose partners fer the reel!” shouted the master of ceremonies, a village dandy, who had a chrysanthemum as large as a saucer stuck in his buttonhole.

“Good gracious, I can’t dance!” whispered Andy, and off he ran to a corner and was soon talking and laughing with a crowd of boys and girls. Boxy joined him, and they managed to have a real good time until supper.

Harry and Jack found two pretty country girls of about their own age willing to dance, and joined the two lines that were forming at the head of the sitting-room. Soon nearly everybody in the house was in line, old Job Brodhead and his wife leading off.

Once again the fiddler and the harp player tuned up and started the reel, and away the dancers went, one couple after the other, forward and back, forward and around, forward and join hands, and all the rest of it. Some mistakes were made, and it grew mighty warm toward the end. But nobody minded this, and all laughed and cracked jokes, and when, nearly an hour later, the reel was ended, every one was on the best possible terms with every one else.

“I’ll slip down to the barn and see how Pickles is making out,” whispered Harry, and off he went, leaving Jack to entertain the girls they had danced with.

Harry found the colored youth in his glory. Pickles had brought his banjo along, and was entertaining the other colored people and the farm hands with plantation songs and tunes. It was not long before word was sent from the farmhouse to come up and entertain the others. And Pickles had to go.

In the meantime cider was flowing, and apples and nuts were passed around on all sides. About eleven o’clock the kitchen was cleared, and the older women went to work to set the tables for supper.

After the reel came other dances in the sitting-room and hall--waltzes, quadrilles and the like, and Harry and Jack and two of the young ladies who had been to dancing school danced the latest two-step, while the older folks looked on.

At last supper was announced, and such a feast as that was! There was enough three times over, and everything of the best. All of the boys were urged to eat, until Boxy whispered to Andy that every button was ready to burst off. It was a country supper never to be forgotten! They finished off with mince pie, and nuts, and raisins, and it was after one o’clock when the feast was declared at an end.

Then came several toasts. First old Job Brodhead made a little speech, and then his son-in-law, and after this half-a-dozen neighbors.

“Maybe our young friends from Rudskill kin speak pieces,” said Mother Brodhead, and then half a dozen clustered around Harry and Jack and the others, demanding something from them.

Luckily, Andy and Boxy knew a funny dialogue which they got off amid much laughter. Then Jack recited “The Sword of Bunker Hill.”

“Now it’s your turn, Harry,” they said, after he had finished.

Harry had been thinking of what to recite, and a few scraps of an original song floated into his mind. He gave it in his own sweet tenor voice, and it fairly took the country folk by storm. He was _encored_ so much that he had to follow with several others.

“You’re the hero of the evening,” whispered Jack, and Harry flushed furiously when the pretty girl beside him said the same thing.

Then Pickles was called in, and soon the colored boy had every one joining in the chorus of “Sweet Times Comin’ By and By,” and “Who’s Dat A-nockin’ at De Doah?” Then Pickles gave a breakdown, and got several of the old countrymen so warmed up that they took off their coats and joined in.

Following the singing came half-a-dozen games, hunt the slipper, pillows and keys, fortune-telling, forfeits and the like. Perhaps some kissing was done, too, but in telling the story to me the boys whose fortunes I am relating did not mention this, for reasons purely their own.

“It’s the best party I ever attended in my life!” cried Boxy to Harry, as they passed each other in the hall. “Beats a stiff town party all to bits!” And Harry agreed with him.

It was after five o’clock when some one suggested that they break up. Then clock and watches were consulted, and a raid was made on the closets where hats, bonnets, overcoats and tippets were stored. Fifteen minutes later the sleighs were brought around, good-bys were said, and off went the merry revelers, leaving the five boys to return to their camp in the early dawn, completely tired out, but happier than they had been for many a day.

“I never expect to attend another party like it,” said Jack. “It is one of the brightest spots in the tour of the Zero Club, to my way of thinking.”

“You are right, Jack. They treated us as if we were their warmest friends. It’s a pity city folks cannot do as well by their country cousins when they come to town.”

After all that dancing and romping around, it was a weary walk back to the temporary camp, but finally it was finished, and, lighting a big fire of brushwood, they sat around it to rest. Andy and Boxy fell asleep, and the others dozed until nearly noon.

“Now we will continue on our way up the lake front until we get away from the neighborhood of these farmhouses,” said Harry. “I don’t believe any one wants dinner.”

“Not just yet for me!” groaned Boxy. “Last night filled me up as full as a tick.”

“Ditto,” put in Andy. “Let us walk ourselves hungry first.”

And so they set off on their skates up the lake, keeping as closely to the shore as the snowdrifts would permit.

By sundown they calculated that they had covered six miles. They were now in a very wild neighborhood, full of rocks and cliffs and a heavy growth of timber.

“This ought to be just the thing,” said Harry, as they turned in to shore and came to a halt. “There ought to be plenty of game back of that rocky ground.”

“That is true,” said Jack. “What do you think, fellows, shall we look for a camping spot here?”

They agreed that no better place could be found. Ten minutes later they were behind the shelter of a clump of bushes, and then Jack and Boxy went off to find a suitable location for a permanent camp for the balance of the outing.