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pokerrule Regular brand “Billy! You said you weren’t hurt, but you are!” Alarmed, she rose and switched on the light, pulled off the bandage, and turned faint at the wreck of the bright, clean boy who had left her that afternoon. “My boy! You’re dreadfully hurt! I must send for Doctor Carter, and—”,As he crashed again through the close-grown brush he almost forgot the ugly scene just enacted below. He had been sorry to leave Bouncer to come with the girls; now he was glad. It was good to be quite alone up there with Nature in her less familiar places. A dark ravine lured him. Well as he knew the mountain he had never explored this gorge. The delicate fragrance of wild azaleas greeted him; he could see their pale pink bloom tipping the tall trees that rose out of the chaparral forty or fifty feet above the stream that tinkled beneath them.,“Yeh Mar, I’m comin’.”,Supper passed. Edith went to church, Billy to keep an appointment with his teacher; and the spring twilight settled down over the room. Mrs. Bennett knew this would be a trying hour, and hastened her work, inventing some light task for May Nell; hastened also the errand to her own room. Yet though she was gone but a moment, on returning a sob greeted her from the cuddled heap on the couch.,“I think you’ve broke my neck, kid,” he said, feebly, as quaking Billy helped him to his feet.，Moses and Betty were left to mind house, the admonishings of Mrs. Wopp being seasoned with picturesque if carelessly applied texts. The envious might hurl hisses, but Moses and Betty were invulnerable to all such assaults upon their anticipations of the day’s freedom with its already planned joys.，“Mrs. Newman, may I come again,” he turned confidentially to his hostess, “I am head over ears in love with your charming cousin.”，From the kitchen came an unmistakeable odor of cheese. Ebenezer Wopp was having a slight snack before retiring. With the back of his nervous hand he was wiping from the corners of his mouth the telltale crumbs.The boy was very still for a little, but burst out presently: “I’m going to work, mother; as soon as school closes I’ll start.”

But May Nell recovered almost before Mrs. Bennett had time to lift her. “I often do—do—faint,” she apologized, “it isn’t—isn’t ’t all dangerous.” She smiled at Mrs. Bennett, and the smile, the sweet, pale little face with her hair a shining golden halo around it, made of her an ethereal being almost unreal to the awestricken children. Yet she was soon merry again, apparently as well as ever.,“No, Billy never forgets his cats,” his sister answered for him; “though the chickens might sometimes suffer but for mamma. Take your ill-bred felines out, Billy.”,“The darned old robber!” Billy started up and walked restlessly toward the door.,The operetta opened with a weird winter scene, when the Sower (Harold) sowed his grain, and the gnomes and elves set upon him; and evoked Storm King (Jimmy), Wind (Bess), and Frost (Jackson). He was the comedy of the little drama; and dressed all in black, covered with silver spangles and diamond dust, he made a joke that the wine-growers appreciated, for it is the black frosts of April they fear.,“S’tup,” he commanded. Jethro immediately sat up on his hind legs.,“Ebenezer, you might bring in my slumber robe, bein’s I’m so busy an’ Mose an’ Betty’s gone to bed.”,“Oh, no, not a fairy; only Cinderella. Last night I was the poor little cinder girl; now my fairy godmothers, two, have touched me with their wands, needles, and I’m so fine even the Prince didn’t know me.”,The struggle was short. When Jimmy resisted no longer, but, after a fall against the fence with his arm doubled under and back, did not try to rise, Billy came to his senses. He cleared the dust from his eyes a little and turned to see why Jimmy didn’t speak. He lay with closed eyes, motionless!,“We’re seven,” came the echo.,but not the strong log house where——” He hesitated, and May Nell quoted on glibly,,Jethro, lying on a mat at the door, was contentedly gnawing a bone. Nancy, having finished her milk, and still enjoying its flavor from her whiskers, as Betty remarked, stealthily approached her canine playmate. A slight altercation took place concerning the ownership of the bone. It was not long before Jethro walked out of the room, perceptibly toeing in, and probably reflecting that life was too short to wrangle over a bare bone anyway.,The curtain fell a second time to still heartier applause; and the long wait between the acts was forgotten in discussion and approval. The richest people in town had aided Edith with her costuming and properties, that thus every penny of the receipts might be saved for the great purpose. They had brought out all their stores of rich fabric, fine lace, jewels, and ornaments, for the small mummers; and the effect was entrancing..