Sid made one more effort to cope with Miss Martin's suddenly aggressive fiancÉ. John came upon the couple one late, crisp January afternoon, as he was leaving for the paper route. Louise did her best to appear nonchalant as he picked his way carefully across the slippery, wagon-rutted road, and Sid, after a longing glance toward the iron fence which surrounded the home lot, decided to brazen matters out.

"'Nother chop-suey sundae?" John sneered as he eyed his rival scornfully.

"'Tain't fair, always talking about that," blurted Sid. "How'd I know the money I'd need when I left home?"

John deemed the excuse unworthy of notice, and turned to Louise.

"What's he want this time?"

"Go skating with him," she replied after a moment's hesitation.

"Then ask you to have a treat in the warming house, and let you pay for it 'cause he didn't bring enough money. I'll teach you to skate—tonight if your mother'll let you. Silvey said the ice was fine yesterday, and everything'll be peachy. Want to come?"

What maiden wouldn't? John glanced at his watch. The paper wagon was due in five minutes.

"I've got to run," he said hastily. "See you tonight!" He left on the dogtrot for the corner.

His school books eyed him reproachfully as he hunted for his skate straps after supper. An arithmetic test impended, and he had a composition to write. Nevertheless, he disregarded both tasks serenely and called for his lady. With her skates swinging with his over one shoulder, they started for the park.

"Ever been skating before?" he asked casually as he took hold of her arm that she might pass a slippery bit of walk in safety.

Louise shook her head. "Once a mud puddle froze in front of the house where I used to live, and I got a broom and tried. That's all."

Then, for an instant, John regretted the invitation. To teach an absolute novice, no matter what the age, to skate with a passable degree of security is no light task. But his hesitation vanished, ten minutes later, when he fastened her skates on and helped her through the doorway of the warming house. It is no unpleasant thing for a small boy's best girl to cling to his arm as did his when they walked, oh so cautiously, down the skate-chopped steps from the boat landing.

As they stepped out on the slippery ice, Louise made a last, despairing grab for the step rail.

"You go on and skate, Johnny," she pleaded. "I'll just stay here for a while."

"Shooting the duck."

Nothing loath, he sped off in and out among the swiftly moving, ever changing throng of people. In a moment he shot back to a less crowded space near her, where he "shot the duck," balanced himself first on one foot and then on the other, and finally came to an abrupt halt, leaving a trail of ice shavings in his wake.

"My!" said Louise as he stood beside her, panting a little. "I wish I could do those things."

He beamed. "They're easy. Hang on to my arm and I'll show you. Now, step out with me. One-two, one-two, one-two."

Her ankles bent over until they touched the ice, and her breath came in quick, nervous gasps. Nevertheless, she followed bravely over a scant ten feet of the rink.

"Isn't that easy?"

She nodded with an assurance which she was far from feeling. "My skate strap hurts. The right one. Loosen it, John."

He knelt to make the necessary alteration. As he stood up, one of his lady's feet started off on an unauthorized expedition, and she grabbed him by the arm with a fervency which nearly proved disastrous.

"Don't start again just yet," she begged. "I'm tired."

As they stood there, a pounding, scurrying figure in black, Red Brown, sped past at top speed. Silvey followed closely, noted the situation, and slowed up.

"Leave her in the skating house and come on," he called. "Red's got it and we're having heaps of fun."

Skinny Mosher and Perry Alford came, both in pursuit of the fleet-footed Brown. Sid DuPree, puffing audibly, stopped just out of reach, glad of any pretext to halt long enough to catch his breath.

"Let's see her skate," he sneered, knowing that Louise dared not release her escort for pursuit. "You're a fine teacher, you are. Don't you wish you were with us?"

John's eyes followed him longingly as he skated off. The temptation of Silvey's invitation was great, and with any other maiden, would have proved fatal. But the lure of the rosy dream for the future was still strong. He freed himself gently from her grasp, and was two yards away before she realized what he had done.

"There," he said with satisfaction. "I knew you could stand up. Now, skate to me."

"Aw-w-w, Johnny, come on back. I'm going to fall!"

"No you're not," said John decisively. "Try and you'll see."

Louise essayed one ineffectual stroke and stood helpless. "I t-think you're just horrid," she whimpered.

He grew a trifle impatient. "You'll never learn that way." Why were girls always so afraid to try things, anyway?

She made another halting attempt, reached forward to catch him, and felt herself slipping, then straightened up, leaned too far backwards, and her feet shot suddenly out from under her. Pupil and teacher crashed to the ice. John was the first to recover himself, although the unexpected fall had been a severe one. He stooped over his lady in spite of strangely shaky knees, and found her sobbing, partly from nervous shock and partly from mortification.

"Hurt, Louise?" She sat up angrily and dug her mittened hands into her eyes. He caught a murmur of "Horrid old thing!" and she began to sob. The boy knelt and removed her skates gently.

"Come," he suggested wisely. "We'll go into the warming house and have something to eat. Then you'll feel better. Catch hold of my hand. One, two, three! Up you come."

They sat down on one of the gray, wooden benches which lined the big room. Louise studied the dingy sign on the post by the counter.

"Aren't mad, are you?" he asked anxiously. "I didn't do it on purpose."

The easy tears had dried and she shook her head cheerfully.

"Give me some apple pie," she began. Thus peace was concluded.

When she had drained the last drop of cider from the glass and dropped the pasteboard pie plate on the floor, John kicked it under the seat with his heel and leaned over to her.

"Take some more," he urged. "I'm not Sid DuPree."

Since the disastrous one in late December, there had been two exceedingly prosperous snowfalls to supplement the newspaper revenue, and he had plundered the pig bank for funds for the evening with a clear conscience.

Again Louise eyed the placard. Coffee was for grown-ups, and strictly forbidden at home; therefore she would sample a cup of it. "And a red-hot sandwich and some more apple pie, Johnny."

When she had finished, they started for home. Their feet were still unaccustomed to the difference between walking and skating and they stumbled now and then along the path. As they came to the road, John looked down at her anxiously.

"Have a good time?"

"It was peachy."

"Aren't you glad you didn't go with Sid?"

She nodded.

"Have enough to eat?"

She assented heavily. Strange how the taste of that forbidden coffee lingered in her mouth.

In the morning as Miss Brown called the roll, John gave a quick glance backward along the aisle. His lady was absent. The strangely assorted meal had been too much for her.

But attacks of indigestion rarely last more than a day, and this one proved no hindrance to the series of tri-weekly skating parties, minus refreshments, in which the pair participated. After two weeks of laborious lessons, Louise found that she was able to take a few sure strokes without gulping and calling for masculine aid. The first trip around the rough ice about the island followed, sure test of a beginner's prowess, and, behold! the youthful mentor found the lessons no longer irksome.

As they sauntered home, skates clashing merrily at every step over the arc-lit snow of the park driveway, one starlit February night, Louise broke into a sudden delighted giggle.

"Day after tomorrow's Lincoln's birthday. Aren't you glad?"

Glad? Was ever a schoolboy sorry for an added day of freedom?

"Two days after that's St. Valentine's day. We'll have a box up at school then. What kind of valentines do you like best?" he quizzed in return. "Paper hearts and things with lots of lace on them, or celluloid ones in boxes?"

Louise hesitated for a moment.

"I like," she said finally, "any kind of valentines, but best I like lots and lots of them—more'n anyone else in the room gets. Last year I was third, and in second grade a girl got one more valentine than I did. It was only a comic, but that gave her nine, and I had eight. This year I want to be first!"

It was no small honor which the girl craved. To lead in the valentine distribution is to be acknowledged the belle of the room until the June examinations break up the little, pupil cliques and send their members to the different higher-grade rooms. John resolved that her wish should be fulfilled, but that achievement lay at the end of a path beset with pitfalls. Let rumor make the rounds that he purposed stuffing the box, and others would play at the same game. Witness a girl in an early grade, the homeliest of the room, who begged a dollar from her father and filled the box to overflowing with a hundred penny valentines addressed to herself.

He left for his paper route half an hour earlier, that Lincoln's birthday afternoon, and turned abruptly westward as he reached the corner where the wagon drove up with his nightly bundle. He halted a moment in front of the school store. In the window was the usual display of rubber balls, penny trinkets, and magazines, and beyond them, he could see the deserted interior. As he had foreseen, the holiday had brought the usual lack of juvenile trade, and investment in the valentine market could be made without fear.

He swung the door back. The trip bell rang noisily, and tall, angular Miss Thomas came out from the suite of little rooms in the rear.

"Valentines," said he briefly. She reached a shallow box containing a dozen or so of the little printed love missives to the glassy-topped counter, where he pawed them over with one half-washed hand.

"I want more than these!"

The look of boredom, bred by long months of finicky penny purchasers, vanished. She stooped for one of the packets of fresh stock on the lower shelf. As he broke it open, she readjusted her heavy-rimmed spectacles, and watched his actions with amusement.

Hearts of cardboard with crudely pierced edges of blue forget-me-nots, little square folders bearing pictures of doves, a cottage, an old mill, or a bit of idealistic scenery—he sorted them all. Each appropriate sentiment on the inner leaf, "To one I love," "To my true love," and the like, was read and approved before he shoved the packet away from him.

"Let's see your two-penny ones."

Gorgeously laced, these, with cut-outs in the center to reveal butterflies, arrow-pierced hearts, or Dresden Shepherdesses. He selected three of the gaudy creations.

"The nickel ones—in boxes."

Thus did he aspire to brilliantly-colored celluloid for the crowning jewel of the St. Valentine's sacrifice. He handed the assortment to Miss Thomas with a sheepish grin.

"Envelopes for them, too. How much?"

She counted them with gaunt, practiced fingers.

"Sixteen penny ones, three two-centers, and one at five. Do you want one or two-cent envelopes?"

He gazed at the assortment of paper containers. Monstrosities of hearts, cupids, and entwining fretwork were embossed on each, but save for the intricacy of design, there was little difference between them. He indicated his choice.

"Forty-three cents," said Miss Thomas.

John paid the sum without a tremor and dashed for the door. The selection had taken longer than he had planned and he was afraid he would miss the paper wagon.

That evening was passed in addressing the envelopes at his father's library desk. Five of them were scrawled in a heavy backhand, with the aid of his mother's broad, stub pen, and five more in his normal handwriting. He finished the others in a variety of huge pothooks with blackly crossed "T's" and dotted "I's," and viewed the result of his labors with great satisfaction. Louise would never guess that they had come from the same donor.

Their despatch to the valentine box was the next thing to trouble him. If he deposited so large a number of love tokens in one, or even two installments, it would certainly attract attention. He took Silvey into his confidence.

"Why don't you want Louise to know where they came from?" asked his chum thoughtfully.

"'Cause getting the most valentines in the room won't be half the fun if she knows I sent 'em all."

"Give 'em to me," said Silvey. "I'll put half in, myself, and Red can take the rest."

Promptly at two-thirty, that Fourteenth of February, Miss Brown brought the recitations to a close and laid her little, black record book in the desk drawer, then drew the big, slotted cardboard box toward her and smiled down at the expectant pupils.

"I'll ask you to keep as quiet as possible," she requested. "Otherwise, we may disturb some of the grown-up, eighth-grade classes who are too old for these things."

No need of any such caution. The children were quiet as the proverbial mice as they waited for the first name to be called.

"John Fletcher."

He stumbled to his feet in amazement. Had Louise sent him a valentine? As he opened the envelope, a gaudy caricature of a gentleman with reddened nose, paste-diamond pin, and flowered vest met his eyes. Underneath was a bit of doggerel elaborating certain traits ascribed to "The Rounder." He twisted suddenly in his seat and surprised a smile of exultation on Sid's face.

Just wait until school was over. He'd fix him for that.

"Olga," called Miss Brown with a smile, some moments later.

Flaxen-haired Olga simpered up to receive her missive. The excited buzz of conversation which arose claimed John's attention.

"That makes eight for her."

"But Louise has nine!"

Names of several girls who were popular only in the eyes of their youthful swains followed. The teacher shuffled the remaining valentines hastily.

"Four more for Olga, and three for Louise."

John turned anxiously and encountered a look of placid satisfaction on Olaf's stolid face; that same Olaf who had offered to sell his symptom list for a fifth of the market price.

"Louise Martin, two more."

"Six for Olga!"

John leaned tensely forward. He had sent but an even twenty of the gaudy trinkets, and this sudden influx of rival valentines threatened dangerously to pass that number. More envelopes were passed out. From behind him, he caught the excited whisperings of two girls.

"Louise has twenty!"

"And Olga, twenty-one!"

Miss Brown stooped to turn a broad box right side up on her desk.

"The last valentine," she concluded. "Here you are, Louise."

Had Sid sent that? He'd smash his face in if he had. The unexpected addition had saved the day for his sweetheart, but that kid had no business butting in, anyway! Miss Brown watched the buzzing groups of pupils.

"There's just fifteen minutes left before dismissal," she said considerately. "You may spend it in looking at each other's valentines if you wish."

The pupils crowded back to his lady's seat, while he stood on a chair near the wall and craned his neck to see the vision of celluloid and pink and blue ribbon which had come in that last box. She examined the wrappings again, but no identifying mark could be found. As John stepped down, Sid DuPree tried to edge past him, and found his way blocked immediately. Louise looked up at her youthful fiancÉ.

"Oh, Johnny, Johnny," she smiled delightedly.

"I sent—" began Sid from behind his shoulder. Then was John filled with sudden wrath. He would squelch this persistent rival once and for all.

"You sent it?" he sneered.

"I did," DuPree replied. Louise watched the two eagerly.

"Why that cost all of a quarter. And kids who asks folks to have sundaes and then can't pay for them, don't spend that much for valentines. Cheapskates never do!"

Sid scowled. Before he could make suitable reply, Miss Brown rapped for order and he had to go back to his seat. There, as he squirmed in his seat while waiting for the dismissal bell, he caught John looking at him and stuck out his tongue as a manifestation of his scorn. But that gentleman only grinned. Wrongfully or no, he knew that the credit for the twenty-five cent valentine had been given to him, and he was content to let matters rest as they were.

Valentine's day past, Washington's birthday was the one festive oasis left for the children in the desert of school days. Though the cold weather held marvelously well, little by little the thermometer beside the drug store's door showed rising-temperature levels as John stopped to look at it on the way to school. The long, northern shadows which the houses and apartments cast against the soot-grayed snow were shortening rapidly, and his paper route, so long patrolled in entire or semi-darkness, was now completed just as dusk set in.

Then Miss Brown reached back in her desk drawer for a certain packet of narrow manila envelopes, that last February afternoon, and brought to a certain small boy who occupied the seat just in front of her desk, sudden realization that March was upon the class.

"Please have them signed and returned by Monday," she told the pupils as she distributed them.

John drew the white, finger-marked card from the ragged envelope, and his face went first white and then scarlet as his eye followed the long column of marks. Accusing memories of lessons half done or postponed with a hope that teacher wouldn't call on him, of a skating party with Louise when a geography map should have been outlined, and of arithmetic papers hurriedly done in the half-hour "B" class recitation period, to be returned with a heavily penciled "20" or "30" across their surfaces, arose to annoy him. His teacher spoke again.

"There are one or two boys and girls in the 'A' class who will have to do better next month," John fancied that she was looking squarely at him, "or they'll be sent down into the 'B' division."

That wasn't the worst of the matter. He had to take that testimonial of disgrace home to be signed, and duly commented upon, by his mother.

The card reposed safely in his pocket over Saturday, while he pondered now and then upon the least painful method of breaking the news to her. Sunday passed. On Monday morning, as he stood up from the breakfast table, he broke out,

"Mother!"

"Yes, son?"

His courage vanished, and he was unable to go any further.

"What is it?" she asked.

"N-nothing. It was a peachy breakfast." He kissed her nervously and went into the hall for his coat.

"I forgot to bring it," he told Miss Brown that morning school session. At noon, he had the same excuse.

"Well, if it isn't here tomorrow morning, I'll send you home after it," that sophisticated supervisor of juveniles replied. And with this uncomfortable fact ever in his mind, he set out on the afternoon journey with the newspapers.

The weather seemed to have shaped itself for his mood. A curious, raw dampness had crept into the still air, and overhead was a level, sullen expanse of gray vapor. Locomotive smoke showed that the light breeze had shifted suddenly to the south, and there was an indefinable attitude of expectancy about, as if the big city with its varied expanse of buildings and vacant lots and snow-filled parks was waiting for something. As he stamped up the front porch steps and kicked the snow from his shoe soles, a fine, almost invisible drizzle began.

Blame that report card, anyway. Perhaps if he presented it with the "hundred" spelling paper that very day, his mother wouldn't be too severe with him. He'd try that experiment in the morning, anyway.

But upon waking, he stared from his window in delight at the spectacle which the capricious weather had formed for him. The rain had increased as the night passed, and had frozen upon the chilled trees and house roofs. The linden on the Fletcher lawn was coated with fairy lace work, and the denuded lilac bush across the way shone black through its glassy covering. The long expanse of dark, cement walk which flanked each side of the snowy road was coated with ice and made walking for pedestrians a matter of some danger. As he jerked his tie into position, Perry Alford shot past on his skates, and he hurried down to breakfast. He'd have a little of that sport before school, himself.

But as he rose joyously from the table, he stopped short. There was that report card; and he knew that his plans were shattered. Mrs. Fletcher's remarks upon his many deficiencies would consume every minute of the time before school.

"My report," he said briefly. She looked at it.

"John!"

He gazed out of the window in a forlorn effort to appear unconcerned.

"Reading, 'F'," quoted Mrs. Fletcher, "and last month it was 'G'."

He drew out his watch and set the big hand forward ten minutes. If he used a little strategy, he could at least shorten the lecture by that amount of time.

"Arithmetic, 'P'," she went on. "And geography, 'P'. And you told me you had all your lessons done when I gave you permission to go skating those evenings. I'm very much displeased with you."

He grew desperate. When Mrs. Fletcher began to talk about being displeased and grieved, there was trouble ahead. He drew a much-chewed pencil from his coat pocket and handed it to her.

"Hurry and sign, Mother," he begged. "It's school time."

She scribbled a reluctant signature at the bottom and looked at it thoughtfully. "I'll keep this to show to your father this evening."

"I've had it three days already," he blurted. "It's got to go back today."

He snatched the card from her hand, showed his watch as she protested, and fled for his coat. Once at the corner, he stopped running and smiled. The escape had been fairly easy and with a minimum of fuss, and he was immeasurably light-hearted, now that the report card bugaboo was off his mind.

At Southern Avenue, he caught up with Sid, Silvey, and Perry Alford. Bits of ice dropped from the trees to the walk as they sauntered along, and water dripped from the icicles on the eaves of the apartments and stores as the morning rise in temperature began to take effect.

"Feel's as if it's going to thaw," said Silvey as they came to a very slippery stretch of walk. So the quartette slid up and down on the ice as long after the second assembly bell as they dared, and with the fear of tardiness upon them, dashed for the school yard.

His pocket was empty, and his conscience clear, and the morning session passed swiftly for John. At noon, as the long lines filed into the school yard to freedom, he looked about him with delight.

The winter's deposit of snow was melting into little rivulets which trickled merrily along wagon ruts until they came to the street drains. First-graders stopped to splash soggy snowballs into a huge puddle which had collected in the street just beyond the alley, and the drip-drip-drip of the water, from the trees and buildings to the wet, glistening sidewalks was as music to his ears. He broke into a run toward home from pure exuberance of feelings, and halted now and then to fill his lungs with the sunlit, pregnant air which the south wind had brought.

The thought of the continuation of the "penny lecture" which was waiting failed to dampen his spirits, even though it threatened curtailment of his evenings with Louise. For if the skating parties were over, spring with its marbles, tops, and kindred delights had arrived and all sorrow fled before it.