The spoons were found the very next day. Jake Nesmith, the blacksmith, saw the corner of the napkin in which they were wrapped sticking out of a mud-puddle. Ruby had pulled them out of the basket with the chickens, and dropped them in the snow.
Wheels had gone over them, and they had to be sent down to Burton's to be bent into shape--that was all.
Alf Coombs is still in his cousin's store, where he does well, but Dave has come home to Butternut Hill. He says he isn't sure that he shall ever be a minister or a farmer, but he is sure he shall never be wild again. The awful suspicion that fell upon him cured him of that. Miser Jensen was found and arrested, and confessed the theft; he escaped from prison, but there is no fear that he will ever return to Butternut Corner. Dr. Nutting wished to send Tilly to the Academy with Ruby--the whole story of the ravelled mitten was told after the spoons were found; no one could expect a human girl like Patty to keep it--but Tilly thought she had a knack for millinery, and she liked to be independent, and Miss Farnham wanted her; she says she is a good business woman, although she is only fifteen.
The doctor always takes off his hat to Tilly Coombs, while he gives only a careless nod to the other fifteen-year-old girls. The minister, who is his great friend, and hears a good deal about Butternut Corner people through him, does so too, and just now the young people of the Corner are making preparations for another birthday surprise party. They have hired the new Town-hall, because the little house at the foot of the hill wouldn't begin to hold Tilly's troops of friends, and everything is to be in the very best style that is known to Butternut Corner, because they want Tilly to feel that she is "just like other folks."
The All-Boston interscholastic football eleven for 1895 is as follows:
JACK HALLOWELL, _Hopkinson_ end. J. J. PURTELL, _English High-School_ tackle. L. WARREN, _Cambridge High-School_ guard. G. CALAHAN, _English High-School_ centre. W. D. EATON, _English High-School_ guard. R. C. SEAVER, _Brookline High-School_ tackle. LEE BEARDSELL, _Cambridge High-School_ end. A. D. SAUL, _Cam. High-School_ quarter-back. T. H. MAGUIRE, _Boston Lat. School_ half-back. A. C. WHITTEMORE, _Eng. H.-S._ half-back. C. WATSON, _Cam. High-School_ full-back.