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Sign Up for Affiliate Networks. download +88k “Well, Moses,” queried his genial host at the supper table, “did the skating go pretty good to-day?”,Mrs. Wopp rose from her chair and seating herself on the sofa beside her husband took his thin hand in her substantial one, squeezing it openly.,“Alone, mamma said,” came the second voice.,They were at the dripping roadside tank and back in a trice. Gently where a moment before he had been ferocious with anger, Billy wiped his play-mate’s face, or rather, changed the mud from one spot to another, got him to his feet again, and finally into the buggy with the little girls by his side.,Yet it was a very quiet little child that crept down to the others a few minutes later; when asked of her fortune she burst into tears.，A certain wide lawn, starred with white clover and daisies came unwelcome to his mind. He ought that moment to be chopping off clover tops.，The little room was rude and bare, but Billy loved it. He thought the massive beams like the ribs of a ship, and planned to hang between them all his ship pictures. Anything relating to the sea fired his imagination. It gave him a sense of manliness to sleep there alone; and when the heavier gusts of night wind rocked the tower, and each revolution of the big wheel splashed the water against the tank, as waves lap a ship’s side, he dreamed himself on the ocean, called himself “Captain.”，Moses’ opinion, repressed, however, in his bursting bosom, was of a like complexion, only much more vivid. He was hesitating between the liquid verge of tears and the lambent verge of profane utterance.CHAPTER IV THE TWO-LIGHT TIME

“You are not a baby, my son; you’ll soon be a man, and it’s time you did your own thinking. Don’t be late for dinner.”,“Two coyotes most hed him,” he explained. “Jist near the big slough, the spunky little critter started chasin’ them. Then they turned on him an’ he done some fine sprintin’. I tried to turn the team to go an’ meet him, but the hosses acted up, an’ as soon as I got them quieter the dog was atween them an’ the coyotes slinkin’ away. It were a close shave fer him.”,He was out early wheeling from house to house, where various parts of the “show” were receiving last touches. One by one he gathered each “attraction,” and herded them all to Jimmy’s big barn, where the procession was to form. Some were late, Bess for one; but Billy was not anxious about her.,“‘Magine huntin’ Joner in Mifsud’s woods.” Betty dimpled at the thought. “He was more like to find a coyote or stir up a bee’s nest. My! St. Elmo must of et a sight o’ berries to git so smeared.”,Some of the voices were cracked and others badly out of tune. Moses Wopp’s voice, loudest of all, sounded like a foghorn and the windows fairly rattled in their frames. Nell motioned him to her desk. She thought by occupying his attention elsewhere the music lesson might proceed with more melody and less noise. Moses had developed his stentorian tones at home, by the lusty singing of Hallelujah hymns under the strict supervision of his mother.,All this time Mrs. Wopp ran breathlessly up and down stairs attending to the feverish child. Even wash-day was postponed, but the terrors of that dread event would never again appal Moses, he felt sure, if only Betty got well. Ebenezer Wopp was distracted and neglected to take his usual number of notes.,Was there to be another murder? Ought he to call? If he did wouldn’t they turn on him—kill him? No matter. Some one might be on the road and hear. And he could run pretty fast. Anyway he must risk it.,Howard rode his chestnut saddle-horse “The Kid,” while Nell had “Ladybird.” Moses was not so pious by nature as his mother, and he had flatly refused to have his pinto’s disposition spoiled by giving her such a name as “Hephzibah” his mother’s choice.,“All over the house does she put them?” the child asked after she had snipped a fragrant heap.,“Please did the lot hurt Joner when it fell?” queried a sober-minded seeker of truth.,Mrs. Crump smiled kindly at the impressionable boy, and lest her son’s evident amusement should wound his feelings, she asked, “Do you like hearing of other countries and of other people?”,“No; I’ll do it first thing to-morrow.” He tried vainly to change the subject. “I—”.