Lucky Wood

Lucky Wood Electronics online - V1.4.7 “Can you drive?” he asked, anxiously, as he unhitched the horse. He noticed with a second sinking feeling that Jimmy’s face twitched with pain, that his right arm hung limp.,Hot water, lotions, a mother’s tender hands, best of all, a mother’s comprehending heart,—it is wonderful what cures these can make. In an hour Billy was comparatively at ease. His sore body still ached, and his eyes “felt like red fire on the Fourth,” he said; but the world seemed less dark, and he was glad his mother had not taken him at his word and left him to bear his trouble alone.,To stay the cloud that began to gather over Moses’ brow, Howard suggested going to see a vaudeville show.,Jimmy was taken by surprise. Billy was his favorite play-mate, and the whip had disappeared before he realized the import of the attack, and he thus lost any advantage he might have gained while Billy’s hands were busy. But the words roused Jimmy’s anger. No boy had a right to interfere between him and his sisters; and he struggled to his feet and launched some telling blows.,“My boy, you have done a wonderful thing!” he said when Billy had finished. “You must come with me and tell your story again. If it comes out as I think, you’ll earn at least a thousand dollars.”，“You have, you have, dear baby! I’ll be your mother, and you can call me ‘mamma’ as Billy does.”，“Golly! Wish’t I had time to stay an’ watch. But I won’t, Betsey; I’ll go right now.”，It took some time to focus her intellect on the proper placing of mirthful youngsters, but at last, after singing “Like a little candle burning in the night,” all were in readiness to imbibe biblical learning.“Ebenezer, you might bring in my slumber robe, bein’s I’m so busy an’ Mose an’ Betty’s gone to bed.”

“Hurry Betty and set opposite me so’s we kin play together,” said Moses, unwittingly giving Cupid his innings.,“This isn’t so bad,” he continued, as he led her into a sunny upper chamber that looked on the mountain in the rear. “And it’ll be all over in a day or so; you’ll see your father,—on the square you will, little kid. Do you think you’ll scream? You’d better not.” He put his hand under her chin to lift her face, and she was glad he wore gloves.,“You hitch Jethro to yer ole ’xpress waggon, ’n I’ll hitch Job to a prune-box with spool-wheels,” suggested Betty.,Billy was suddenly overcome with bashfulness when the child, quite composed, came forward to meet him. A bath, a shampoo, and new clothes had transformed her from a tangled, smudged little girl to a lovely miss with a high-bred air foreign to the childish manners Billy understood. He recognized Edith’s gown in the pretty frock mother and daughter had sat late to make over; but the neat ties and hose, all the little things it takes to make a girl look pretty, where had they come from?,The water would soon be low enough, he decided, though the end of the suspension foot-bridge hung very near surface. The rains had come in a sudden flood that year, delaying sport he had planned, in which the island was to play an important part.,Job’s feathers that to Betty’s eyes had taken on the glory of ostrich plumes, drooped disconsolately, while Moses denounced in fluent language the stupidity of the fowl that had caused the unfortunate episode. He declared loudly that he would like to wring the aggressive portions of those feathered culprits. The group stood for a moment, a miniature Vesuvius erupting lava and ashes, while Moses wrung the offending liquid from Betty’s yellow drape and the magenta antimacassar. His sense of the ludicrous however overcame his wrath, “My Eye Betty!” he cried, “I near kerlapse every time I draw up my curtings on Job.”,The basket piled high with snowy linen and cotton seemed almost to overflow the brim. Betty pressed the clothes down with her brown hands, while the complaining boy enlarged on the sordid details of that trying wash-day and on the manner in which his mother had teased him. The child’s sense of humor outbalanced even her sympathy and a peal of laughter rang out. Her laugh was a long delicious trill, as though a bird had dropped from the clouds singing still with the sunrise tangled in its notes. Moses paused long enough for a procession of commas and semicolons to pass by. Then seeing his disappointment in her apparent lack of sympathy, Betty hastened to console him.,For a minute Billy stood, dazed, his heart thumping hard. Then he threw his cap in the air, sang out, “Bully for the Gang! This time it’s Billy To-day!” and raced down the hill to join them.,“Surely Billy has earned it, Mrs. Bennett,” Mr. Smith urged.,“Don’t stan’ there fillin’ the doorway like a bung in a barrel, Moses,” reprimanded Mrs. Wopp. “That boy’s gone clean petrified. Go an’ fetch the lamp, it air giftin’ so dark I can’t tell which is Glory an’ which is Miss Gordon.”,As many of the hens and chickens as could be persuaded were ushered into the yard to add to the numerical strength of the menagerie.,“I think the linin’ of Miss Gordon’s cloud needs polishin’ these days,” ventured Betty, shyly..