CONCLUSION
Five rather contemptuous pairs of youthful eyes surveyed Dick
& Co. as their outfit plodded on its way.
"Aren't they a mucker looking outfit?" demanded one voice from
the car.
Then the automobile shot ahead again.
"Phin Drayne! Humph!" said Darry rather scornfully.
Phin Drayne is no stranger to the readers of the "_High School
Boys Series_," who will recall Phin as the "kicker" who, at the
game on the Thanksgiving before, had sulked and refused to go
on the field, hoping to induce the other members of the Gridley
High School gridiron team to coax him to play. Thus Dick, though
suffering at that time from injuries, and forbidden to play, had
been forced out onto the field to help win the great game of the
season. Of course a kicker like Drayne did not like Prescott.
Dick worried but little on that account.
"There! they are coming back," Greg announced. "They are grinning
at us again."
"If they keep on grinning," threatened Darry, "we'll sic Danny
Grin onto them. When it comes to grinning our own Danny boy can
grin down anything on earth."
As if to verify that claim, Dalzell began to grin broadly. Besides
this, he turned his face toward the occupants of the automobile
as it once more passed Dick & Co.
Just at this point the car slowed down. Phin Drayne looked as
though he were exhibiting his fellow students of Gridley High
School as so many laughable freaks.
"That's what I call a vacation on the cheap," Drayne remarked
to his friends, in a tone wholly audible to Dick & Co.
"It is 'on the cheap,'" Dick called out pleasantly. "And yet,
our trip hasn't been such a very cheap one, either, and we've
earned all the money ourselves. I don't suppose, Drayne, you
ever earned as much money in your life."
"I don't have to," scoffed Phin Drayne. "My father is able to
supply me with whatever money I need."
"Why!" uttered Dan Dalzell. "Our old Drayne is just another Timmy
Hinman of the regular kind, isn't he?"
Dan looked so comical when he made this observation that his five
chums burst into a shout of gleeful laughter.
Phin Drayne didn't relish that very sincere laughter. Though
he didn't understand the allusion, he suspected that he was being
made the butt of a joke by Dick & Co.
"Drive on, George," he requested his friend at the wheel. "One
hates to be seen in the company of such fellows."
The car's speed was let out several notches, and shot down the
road ahead of Dick & Co.'s plain little caravan.
"Now that I think of it," Dick declared, "Phin is just another
edition of Timmy Hinman, isn't he? And so are quite a good many
of the fellows we know. The world must be nearly as full of Timmy
Hinmans as it is of fathers either wealthy or well-to-do. I'd
hate to belong to the Timmy Hinman crowd!"
"As for me," sighed Tom comically, "I don't see any chance of
my becoming a Timmy until I'm able to do it on money accumulated
for myself."
As Phin Drayne was still in Gridley High School, and had an overweening
idea of himself as a football player, it is extremely likely that
we shall hear of him again, for which reason, if for no other,
we may as well dismiss him from these present pages.
A few more days of earnest hiking, followed by restful sleep in
camp at night, brought Dick & Co., one fine afternoon toward the
end of August, in sight of the spires of Gridley.
"There's the good old town!" called Dick, first to reach the rise
of ground from which the view of Gridley was to be had.
"Good old town, indeed!" glowed Dave Darrin.
"Whoop!" shouted Tom Reade irrepressibly. "Whoop! And then---whoop!"
Dalzell, as he stood still for a few moments, gazing ahead, grinned
broadly.
"He thinks his native town is a joke!" called Greg Holmes reproachfully.
"No," replied Dalzell, with a solemn shake of his head. "I am
the joke, and it's on Gridley for being my native town."
"I'm glad to be back---when I get there," announced Hazy. "I
shall be glad, even if for nothing more than the chance to rest
my feet."
"Nonsense!" Dick retorted. "You'll be out on Main Street, to-night,
ready to tramp miles and miles, if anything amusing turns up."
At the first shade by the roadside Dick &. Co. halted for fifteen
minutes to rest.
"Now, each one of you do a little silent thinking," Prescott urged.
"Give us the topic, then," proposed Reade.
"Fellows," Dick went on, mounting a stump and thrusting one hand
inside his flannel shirt, in imitation of the pose of an orator,
"the next year will be an eventful one for all of us. In that
time we shall wind up our courses at the Gridley High School.
From the day that we set forth from Gridley High School we shall
be actively at work creating our careers. We are destined to
become great men, everyone of us!"
"Tell that to the Senate!" mocked Tom Reade.
"Well, then," Dick went on, accepting the doubt of their future
greatness, "we shall, at least, if we are worth our salt, become
useful men in the world, and I don't know but that is very close
to being great. For the man who isn't useful in the world has
no excuse for living. Now, in a little more than another hour,
we shall be treading the pavements of good old Gridley. Let us
do it with a sense of triumph."
"Triumph?" quizzed Tom soberly. "What about?"
"The sense of triumph," Dick retorted, "will arise from the fact
that this is to be the last and biggest year in which we are to
give ourselves the final preparation for becoming either great
or useful men. I'm not going to say any more on this subject.
Perhaps you fellows think I've been talking nonsense on purpose.
I haven't. Neither have I tried to preach to you, for preaching
is out of my line. But, fellows, I hope you all feel, as solemnly
as I do myself, just what this next year must mean to us in work,
in study---in a word, in achievement. It won't do any of us any
harm, once in a while to feel solemn, for five seconds at a time,
over what we are going to do this year to assure our futures."
For once Tom Reade didn't have a jest ready. For once Dalzell
forgot to grin.
The march was taken up again. The next halt was made in Gridley,
thus ending their long training hike, the boys going to their
respective homes.
"Just give three silent cheers, and we won't startle anyone,"
Tom proposed.
"We went out on the trip to harden ourselves," murmured Dave,
"and I must admit that we have all done it."
That evening Dick and Harry Hazelton drove the horse and wagon
over to Tottenville, where the camp wagon was returned to its
owner, Mr. Newbegin Titmouse.
"You young men have worn this wagon quite: a bit," whined Mr.
Titmouse, after he had painstakingly inspected the wagon by the
light of a lantern.
"I think we've brought it back in fine condition, sir," replied
Dick, and he spoke the truth. "The wagon looks better, Mr. Titmouse,
than you had expected to see it."
"You owe me about five dollars for extra wear and tear," insisted
the money-loving Mr. Titmouse.
But he didn't get the money. Again Dick Prescott turned out to
be an excellent business man. Dick was most courteous, but he
refuted all of Mr. Titmouse's claims for extra payment, in the
end even such a money-grubber as Mr. Newbegin Titmouse gave up
the effort to extort more money for the use of his wagon than
was his due. He even used his lantern to light the boys through
the dark side alley to the street where the trolley car ran.
Two or three times after this Dick and his friends heard from
Tom Drake. That young workman never repeated his earlier error.
In time he paid for his home, then began the saving of money
for other purposes. To-day Drake owns his own machine shop and
is highly prosperous.
Old Reuben Hinman lingered many days between life and death.
At last he recovered, and in time was discharged from the hospital.
However, his first attempts to run the peddler's wagon again revealed
the fact that the peddler's days on the road were over. He was
no longer strong enough for the hard outdoor life.
Timothy Hinman and his sisters came forward when the Overseers
of the Poor began to look into the peddler's affairs. These dutiful
children wanted to be sure to obtain whatever might be their share
of their father's belongings.
Timothy and his sisters obtained their full shares---nothing.
The Overseers of the Poor found that they could effect an arrangement
by which the peddler's home, his horse and wagon, stock and good
will could be sold for four thousand dollars.
This was done. With half the money Reuben Hinman was able to
purchase his way into a home for old men. Here he will be maintained,
without further expense, as long as he lives, and he will live
in a degree of comfort amounting, with this simple-minded ex-peddler,
to positive luxury.
The other two thousand dollars, at the suggestion of the Overseers
of the Poor, was spent in buying an annuity from a life insurance
company. This annuity provides ample spending money for Reuben
Hinman whenever, in fine weather, he wishes to go forth from the
home and enjoy himself in the world at large.
Timothy has been forced to go to work as a valet. The daughters
tearfully support themselves as milliners. Reuben Hinman long
ago spent the ten dollars received from Lawyer Stark.
The tramp who accepted work from Dr. Hewitt made good in every
sense of the word. In fact he did so well that, in time, he took
unto himself a wife and is now the head of a family, which lives
in a little cottage built on Dr. Hewitt's estate. The name of
"Jim Joggers" has given way to the real name of that former knight
of the road. However, as the man is sensitive about his idle
past, we prefer to remember him as "Joggers."
And now we come to the end of the "_High School Boys Vacation
Series_."
It is to be hoped that these four little volumes have not dwelt
so much upon fun as to make it appear that pleasure is all there
is in the world that is worth while.
Dick Prescott and his friends were destined to discover that
all the pleasure in the world that is worth anything at all comes
only as the reward of continuous, hard and useful endeavor.
The further adventures that befell Dick Prescott and his chums
while they were still Gridley High School boys will be found in
the fourth volume of the "_High School Boys Series_," which is published
under the title, "_The High School Captain of the Team; Or, Dick
& Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard_."
In that volume, the last dealing with Dick Prescott's high school
days, the value of sports and the worth of honor and faithful
work will be set forth as strongly as lies within the power of
the narrator of these events.