Jungle Delight

Jungle Delight Register +128K Half paralyzed with astonishment Billy went with the Doctor to the Sheriff’s office; but he was out and the deputy didn’t know when he would return; thought it might be within an hour or so. There was nothing to do but wait. Billy’s perplexed, baffled face touched the Doctor. His temples were already gray, but he had not forgotten how a boy feels.,Billy read the note several times. He knew that Jimmy meant much more than the words said; it was his offer of the “olive branch.” And Billy, thinking over that miserable afternoon, wondered again how it had been possible for him to feel such murderous hate for anything living. And for Jimmy! His mate at school, in play! The picture came to him of Jackson crying, of Vilette,—yes, it was not strange he had been angry. But it was not his duty to punish; even if it had been, he knew he had forgotten Jackson and Vilette, forgotten everything except the rage of the fight. Why was it? Older heads than Billy’s have asked in sorrow that same question after the madness of some angry deed has passed to leave in its wake sleepless remorse.,The little stranger girl smiled winningly. Her childish companions had not been numerous enough to justify her in drawing such close lines; and she liked the sweet, half timid faces that always looked so earnestly into her own. “Surely, I’ll play with you. I’ll come to see you some time when Mrs. Bennett says I may.”,May Nell had been “through the measles,” yet she shared the quarantine. Billy resented this at first. It was “no fair.” Afterward he was grateful; for aside from the cheer of her presence she did him a fine service. It was her clever brain that proposed to read his lessons aloud to him; and though he didn’t think much of it at first, he soon saw that this would make a chance for the prize which in his heart he had resigned.,“No, it can’t wait one minute longer’n it’ll take me to get to town. Maybe I can come back though.”，Diligently as Betty had tended this little garden, it was considered to be a family possession, the child’s own particular treasures lying beyond its fragrant border. Her cherished morning-glories and climbing nasturtiums found a welcome support in the old wooden fence.，It was on the first of these busy days in San Francisco that the big counterfeiter saw at a distance May Nell’s father; saw the child’s pictures posted in the galleries, hurried back to the “Ha’nt,” and planned the kidnapping as a chance for “getting even” with Mr. Smith, who had discharged him years before for dishonesty. But Billy had thwarted him, brought him safely to justice for all of his crimes.，She turned back and rode up by his side. “Why shouldn’t a girl ride as fast as a boy?” She had a bright, frank face, and her brown eyes were as honest as they were beautiful.“All ready?” cried Captain Billy. “Are you ready, Ladybird?”

But a familiar sound came to his ear, and he turned to see the Doctor’s splendid bays pounding down the street, pulling the buggy almost by the taut reins. Billy followed quickly and was soon closeted with the man, who listened, first with a smile, afterward with grave attention.,“Ebenezer Wopp, I’ve tarlked to you till I’m black in the face, but it’s jist wastin’ valyble breath. Yer brains is allers wool-gatherin’. The hammer’s in yer hip-pocket.”,The orchestra were tuning up, that delightful tilting at the notes that precedes the overture. To Moses were revealed such vistaed glimpses of trees and mountains and rivers as his young eyes had never seen. He saw nothing but the gorgeous scenery and the blaze of lights, and heard nothing but the booming of the drum in the overture. Then becoming more used to the glare and clamor, he cocked one eye aloft and saw youths of his own age eating peanuts in the gallery. It made his mouth water. He surveyed the obnoxious offenders however with the nonchalance of one who has already dined sumptuously. Outwardly Moses was an overgrown, freckle-faced, well-fed boy of commonplace propensities; inwardly he was a battery fully charged.,Billy thought he detected a touch of resigned disappointment in her words, and looked up with a sudden wonder widening his eyes, making them shine even in the dim light of the shaded lamp. “Do you want me to preach, mamma?”,“Moses Habakuk Ezra Wopp an’ Ebenezer Wopp! You’d orter be shamed of yerselves. You shorely must of fell with Lucifer when he come tumblin’ outer the sky. Them swear words make every single hair on my head stan’ on edge.”,“Worse! She said soon I’d have to be very brave—that ain’t bad—but I’m goin’ to be—to be a minister—a preacher!” The last word came with a woe-begone vehemence that made his mother laugh.,“It was all splendid; and, Billy, I never dreamed it was in you! Sister’s operetta would have been a failure if it hadn’t been for you.”,During Betty’s illness these one-sided dialogues were more than usually plentiful. In this way only was Mrs. Wopp able to alleviate the “gnawin’ at her heart-strings” as she said, at having Betty so ill. It also kept the boy alive to the fact that life’s path was not strewn with “cabbage roses.” Such, at least, were the confidences poured into the sympathetic ear of his pinto.,As the children left the school-house, Betty was met by Job. He appeared to be headed for a point at an angle of about forty-five degrees from his mistress, but it was only his corner-wise way of walking, caused by his defective eye. Notwithstanding his seemingly erratic course he reached Betty’s side and thrust his head into the pocket of her small pinafore. He found there what put him into high good humor. Gaily he strutted after his little mistress. Bringing up the rear came Moses shuffling along, accompanied by Jethro. He took from his pocket a huge bun.,“No; I can’t recall what I said.”,The unstinted praise of the children in the operetta, the aftermath of buzz about the “show” at school,—this excitement lasted for a day or so; but on this lowering Sunday tired nature put in a claim for her own; and relaxed nerves were irritably near the surface.,“No; will you tell me?”.