X3000

X3000 withdraw 2 trillion Edith in white, half smothered in blush roses, with the fairies and their Queen, stood ready in the wings. Billy was also waiting his cue. This time he was to be pulled swiftly in on invisible wheels. Over his satin tunic was a network of glittering mock gems that must have included every yellow bead and spangle in Vine County. From his shoulders floated a cloud of yellow, diamond-dusted tulle; and the crown of gems surrounded a cluster of small lights, a device Billy himself had figured out with the aid of the electric light man.,They were a happy lot. Each held some high-sounding position, the name coined in Billy’s busy brain. His box of abused tools came forth; the much mended wheelbarrow, picks, shovels wobbly from use as well as abuse, improvised things that only an imagination as large as Billy’s could have named tools,—something for each one there.,“I think you’ve broke my neck, kid,” he said, feebly, as quaking Billy helped him to his feet.,“Mannel Rodd, did you ever ketch a fish?”,After the opening exercises of the Sunday-school session, Mrs. Wopp was pained to notice that some of her scholars did not consider attention to the lesson any part of their duty. However, that strict disciplinarian had a vast store of startling reprimands that set all eyes gazing on her sincere countenance.，“Aint that wonderful Miss Gordon? An’ Betty never had a lesson in her life. She jist naterly takes to music,” said Mrs. Wopp complacently.，“No quarreling now. Come, Clarence, do as your mother asks.”，“Yes; but I’m afraid my papa’s dead, he’s been gone so long.” How she hated that word “kid.”“She said, the Queen of Sheba did, that I’d be in danger, and some one would save me. And I’d have a s’prise, and a hus—husband, and fi-five c-chil— children!” She wailed again and hid her face on Mrs. Bennett’s shoulder.

“Now, Moses, look sharp. Quit yer foolin’ an’ git busy,” called Mrs. Wopp, to the son and heir, whose toilet was not even begun. She herself was busy braiding Betty’s fair hair. “Be sure to warsh yer neck an’ ears. Larst party we was to, Mis’ Williams says to me, she says, ‘Is that your Moses settin’ on that bench? La me! he seems darker complected than I ever seed him before. I thort he were some Arfrican,’ she says. I hev always been a godly woman, Moses, ef I do go to a dance now an’ agin. Anyhow, the good book says there is a time to dance, but it aint got no patience with dirt. Git yerself cleaned up, then go an’ hook up the team.”,When the two arrived, Nell Gordon was sitting with the sick child and crooning softly to her. Howard Eliot drew near, accidentally touching the firm round arm of Nell as he did so.,“Miss Gordon here, made me a harnsome lace yoke fer an underwaist, an’ give it to me fer my birthday,” volunteered Mrs. Wopp.,“And Jimmy is already Roderick Dhu.”,Nell’s answer was somehow strangely muffled.,From the lower slopes of the Cedar Hills issued many wide wooded ravines. Of these none were prettier than Spring Coulee which even in winter retained its attractiveness, having a goodly sprinkling of evergreen trees among the poplars and cottonwoods lining its sides. A grassy level formed the bottom of the coulee. Through the centre of this a little crystal-clear stream, rising in the hills behind and swelled by an occasional spring which gushed from the sides of the ravine, danced over its pebbly bed to join Berry Creek a mile away.,“Here, Mose, hoi’ this here jint while I fit the next one inter it.” A tongue-twisting silence ensued.,“A cat tablecloth!” the little girl laughed.,“Well, Moses,” queried his genial host at the supper table, “did the skating go pretty good to-day?”,For a moment Betty stood in an attitude of dejection, but suddenly her face brightened. The muscles at the corners of her mouth stiffened, her little pointed chin was thrust forward ever so slightly and a look came into her brown eyes which said plainly, “Never you mind, Moses Wopp, I’ll get money and more than two bits for my missionary box.”,“She’s the swellest looking one in the whole school,” he whispered to his smiling mother.,Mrs. Wopp drew the green curtains together and turned to the smallest girl in the class..