BASEBALL 9

BASEBALL 9 a respected betting brand, stands out among Asian bookmakers and attracts a large number of players.⭐️ CHAPTER XIX.—BETTY’S ILLNESS.,“Here come the Wopps,” said Nell to her companion as the family entered, led as usual by Mrs. Wopp. Mr. Wopp came next especially scoured for the occasion, freshly shaved and with long side hair carefully oiled and combed over the bald spot on his crown. He carried a few long strips of paper in his hand. Beside him walked Betty inwardly disapproving of the two stiff braids with which her head was adorned. Bringing up the rear was Moses, his face shining with soap and satisfaction and wearing a new brown suit at least two sizes too large for him. He was bent on a good time which in his case meant sitting on a side bench with a few other youths and jeering at the mistakes of the dancers. Close at his heels came Jethro who had pleaded so hard to be brought along and had gazed at them with such tragic appeal in his eyes that they could not disappoint him. He was now stationed under a bench, having first been intimidated with dire threats as to what would happen to him should he come out and trip up the dancers.,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.,“Whose Jethro?”,Although she was asleep, Betty was fully conscious in that Dream-World of love and joy where values are real. Nell and Howard saw a tender smile light up her sweet face as Mrs. Wopp’s singing, subdued by distance, floated into the room,，Pat Bliggin’s mind was undoubtedly wandering, so a drastic question was in order.，Mrs. Bennett came in and tried to learn the trouble; but it was some time before May Nell could be induced to tell.，Mrs. Wopp, after ascertaining that the little boy had received no bodily injury, stood mopping her heated face with the half-mended sock. She ceased operations to survey Betty more carefully.He smiled wanly, and her heart ached for him; but she knew sympathy was unsafe just then. “If you could see that comical, crooked eye of yours blinking at me, like a chicken asking your intentions, you’d laugh, Billy.”

“Here I stand upon this stage,“My religion’s purty well wartered now, I guess,” said Moses, sheepishly, to Clarence, who met him at the end of the fateful corridor. That youth had followed his country friend from the Sunday-school hall, but not in time to direct his erring steps.,“When I see Moses was still wearin’ his best Sunday coat an’ pants an’ tearin’ along on that cayuse like John Gilping, I come all out in goose-flesh, Ebenezer, till you’d think the merkery had fell clean down to zero.”,“I’m chored from mornin’ till night, an’ arfter I go to sleep I do some more chorin’ jist to keep my hand in.” Moses was in a distinctly peevish mood.,“I hate to have you stay without Jean,” Billy objected.,He was not more inquisitive than other boys, yet the mystery, the many uncanny tales told of the old house, fired him with a desire to know its secrets. Long before he was born a murder had left its stain there. The owners, suspected but unconvicted, moved away; and for years the house stared vacantly at passers. The coming of the Italians had only increased its bad name. Late travellers on the lonely road declared that shadowy forms and flickering lights passed the lower windows and down into the cavernous basement; yet no sounds ever came from behind the barred doors.,“Yeh, Mar says I’m a reglar jographer I like it so much.”,Billy had been reeling off stanzas of his favorite “Lady of the Lake,”—“by the yard,” Mrs. Bennett said, acting it as he recited, somewhat retarding the work and endangering the dishes. Now he dropped his towel, caught up his mother and raced with her around the room. He was so strong that she was almost helpless in his grasp.,“Any one else?”,The quarantine had been raised, and at night Billy had “the run of the house”; though his days were still spent in “the prison cell” as he called the dark room. It seemed to him that light came in with the little girl, and all the sparkle and fragrance of the young summer without.,“Whoa, Josh! Whoa, Jake!” he roared, apparently exerting himself to the utmost to hold in the skittish pair, but in reality giving a few practised touches on the reins which defeated his commands.,A period of silence followed excepting for the slight sounds made by the workers, the drowsy humming of flies, the murmur of an occasional bee and the faint rustlings of the tall stalks of corn..