Rooster Rumble

Rooster Rumble Register and receive 188K “What’s the matter with Billy To-morrow? He’s thirteen! Three and ten! Most a man! He’s all right!”,“Don’t Betty look jist too sweet,” she murmured when she had finally located the child, “Her hair looks as ef she had got tangled up in the milky way an’ there was nothin’ on it but star-dust.”,May Nell watched the flying figure turn out of sight around the mountain; and for a minute the forest grew absolutely still, and the child began to tremble. But a meadow lark, almost from under her feet it seemed, sent forth a rippling song; across the river her mate replied. A flock of white ducks came waddling and quacking from the opposite field, plunged into the water, and swam about noisily, tipping their little tails up and their big bills down as they reached for submerged morsels. Bouncer made a swift circuit of the Lodge, sniffing now and then questioningly; but came soon and sat down in front of May Nell; put his paw on her knee and gave her another short bark.,“No, we won’t!” came a dozen voices.,“Dad an’ Mosey don’t look orful happy,” she laughed. “Smile at me, Mosey.”，And so the story went on. All the wholesome things of the country that children like had come from one and another. And each had been as happy in giving as Billy could possibly be in receiving.，“Too much?” he interrupted; “is anything I have in this world too much to give for the life of my wife and child? Didn’t your son save them both? Save May Nell from—” He turned away and did not attempt to finish his sentence.，How did he know her name, she wondered, yet answered more bravely than she felt. “Yes, sir.” She thought it best to be as polite as possible. “I’m alone now, but the boys are expected every minute.” She would say “boys” even if Clarence didn’t come; it sounded more protecting.The chinking began in earnest. Moses stood, turning till each freckle on his ruddy face shone with honest sweat.

“Jist as soon’s you finish yer dinner an’ yer noon chores, Moses, I want you to go weed them beets,” instructed Mrs. Wopp. “The weeds is chokin’ them out an’ I see the gophers has been eatin’ some o’ them, too.”,“Yer a reglar Mis’ Barnum,” he praised. Whereupon the enterprising program-maker began to devise new and more wonderful side-shows for her admirer.,“Oh, no! It’s too much. We only did what all—”,“Who is going to auction the quilt when it is finished?” inquired Nell Gordon, appealing to her hostess as President of the Ladies’ Aid.,“Well, I’ll see,” replied Moses, but as he plunged his hand again into his pocket the cheerful jingle of coins stirred his masculine sense of ownership to profounder depths and he frowned and turned on his heel.,but not the strong log house where——” He hesitated, and May Nell quoted on glibly,,“She’s the swellest looking one in the whole school,” he whispered to his smiling mother.,“Did you forget their breakfast, Billy?” the child questioned earnestly.,Moses came bearing an achievement of spicy, opaque amber supported and surrounded by tantalizing, toast-brown crust. Before the expectant Mr. Wopp, however, had time to note these details, there was a quick rush of a small black and white object, a crash, some ear-splitting howls, as Moses, pie, Jethro, and one of Mrs. Wopp’s best blue dinner plates were precipitated against Mr. Wopp’s legs. Down his Sunday trousers meandered a yellow glacier which Mrs. Wopp regarded with dismay.,May Nell ran and hugged Mrs. Bennett, and Edith and Billy in turn, nestling afterward in her father’s arms.,“But they are dead,” Jimmy protested.,Clarence and Harry, much wrapped in white about the head, but with bare little white arms and bare little brown legs, came in solemnly and placed some red lanterns on the table. Bess posed in a chair decorated for the occasion, arranged her draperies, pulled nearer the “incense lamp,” which was her father’s Turkish cigar lighter, laid out her cards, and bent over them in grave silence..