“Oh, right off. We’ll get the boys
together and have the initiation to-night, maybe.”
“Have the which?”
“Have the initiation.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s to swear to stand by one another,
and never tell the gang’s secrets, even if you’re
chopped all to flinders, and kill anybody and all
his family that hurts one of the gang.”
“That’s gay—that’s mighty
gay, Tom, I tell you.”
“Well, I bet it is. And all that swearing’s
got to be done at midnight, in the lonesomest, awfulest
place you can find—a ha’nted house
is the best, but they’re all ripped up now.”
“Well, midnight’s good, anyway, Tom.”
“Yes, so it is. And you’ve got to
swear on a coffin, and sign it with blood.”
“Now, that’s something like!
Why, it’s a million times bullier than pirating.
I’ll stick to the widder till I rot, Tom; and
if I git to be a reg’lar ripper of a robber,
and everybody talking ’bout it, I reckon she’ll
be proud she snaked me in out of the wet.”
So endeth this chronicle. It being strictly
a history of a boy, it must stop here; the story
could not go much further without becoming the history
of a man. When one writes a novel about grown
people, he knows exactly where to stop—that
is, with a marriage; but when he writes of juveniles,
he must stop where he best can.
Most of the characters that perform in this book still
live, and are prosperous and happy. Some day
it may seem worth while to take up the story of the
younger ones again and see what sort of men and women
they turned out to be; therefore it will be wisest
not to reveal any of that part of their lives at present.
