He was thinking how he should manage to conceal his truancy, but he could not hit upon any satisfactory plan.

The more he reflected upon the matter, the more he was troubled and perplexed about it.

He might possibly hide his mis-spent forenoon from his parents, but how should he explain his absence to his teachers?
He could not tell.

He decided, however, to see his brothers before they should get home from school, and, if they had noticed his absence, to prevail upon them to say nothing about it.
"You 'll be back again after dinner, Oscar ?" said Alfred, as his friend started for home.
"Yes," replied Oscar, with some hesitation; "I 'll see you before school-time." "School-time?
You don't intend to go to school this afternoon, do you ?" inquired Alfred.
Oscar did not reply, but hastened homeward.

He soon found Ralph and George, but as neither of them spoke of his absence from school, he concluded that they were ignorant of it, and he therefore made no allusion to the subject.
After dinner, Oscar had about half an hour to spend with Alfred; for he felt so uneasy in his mind, that he had decided not to absent himself from school in the afternoon.