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45 And each hour was an eternity. But that she masked it in modestie,,"Then why did you take it a'tall, I want'a know?","She has made no meal, then?","Has he the will?" asks Mona, foolishly, but impulsively.,"What does it matter if we do miss the train?" she insisted. "We can take the early one in the morning. We'll be home almost as soon."，Billy moved forward, halting a safe distance from his mother. "You'll remember, Ma, that Anse's pants has two hip pockets, an mine only one."，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.，“Not yet,” was the crisp reply, “but Mr. Taylor wants to see you. Jerry King didn’t show up to-day either and he’s worried.”This cuts him to the heart.

CHAPTER II.—CONCERNING BETTY.,The blandishments of soda water fountains, candy stores, and other boyish temptations, found no victim in Billy. But if Mr. Cooper, the tinshop man, had driven hard bargains he would have bankrupted the boy. As it was his weekly allowance suffered in spite of Mr. Cooper’s generosity and Billy’s free access to a rich scrap heap at the rear of the big shop where everything, one would say, in tin and iron was made, from well pipe, tanks, and boilers, to tin wings for Edith’s fairies in the opera.,From where they were sitting, screened by the undergrowth, they could see a section of a rough path that led up the hillside. For a long time nothing happened. As the Indian did not speak, Bob felt it best to remain quiet also. Probably there was a reason for it. The delay did not worry him much, however, as there was plenty of material for his mind to be busy with. Ever since he had talked with Mr. Whitney, events had tumbled upon him one after another. Mr. Whitney had gone and Ted was doing outpost duty. Jerry was on the other side. Only the Indian was left to him and he was not much of a counselor. True, he was beginning to prove himself a great help but through the limitations of language he could not be used to discuss what ought to be done regarding the things they found out. What the outcome of the mess was to be was beyond Bob’s imagination to foresee. He was determined to do what he felt was his duty, and if the consequences were serious it could not be helped.,"Don't ask me, major. I would tell you if I could, but it is impossible.",And evening lives o'er all serene and still,,Here she produced a picture of a nest of young robins, their beaks wide open for a tempting morsel hanging from the bill of father robin.,He is not sure of anything of the kind, but he says it nevertheless, feeling he owes so much to Violet, as the conversation has drifted towards her, and he feels she is placed—though unknown to herself—in a false position.,The driver cracked his whip and the load went on, swaying and creaking as it left the soft sand for the corduroy.,Johnny Blossom bowed himself out and Madame Bakke watched him as long as he was in sight.,"Well, what do you think of Bohemia?" asked Griffin, as they climbed the narrow iron stair again, the time having come for Judith to say good-bye.,For that was just the way the trouble began. He had been walking on his tallest stilts the whole afternoon—the stilts that were exactly, to the dot, one yard fifteen inches and a half tall—and then had sat himself on the fence along the back alley. He was facing the yard, with his back toward the alley, and that disgusting Olsen boy came past and gave him a dig in the back with that sharp stick. Just think of it! Wouldn’t anybody say it was unbearable?,"But why?—why? Is it because you love me? Oh, Mona! If it is that! At times I have thought so, and yet again I have feared you do not love me as—as I love you.".