Chapter V: Part 5

Now the morning-glories had reached the window tops, and in the little bower above the clothes-lines she and Billy often sat as she told him stories of the real country, of Lammy and Twinkle, the old white horse, and the red peonies, and flew there in imagination. Then the child's big eyes would flash as he gazed at her, and he always ended by asking, "When we stop being birds in this cage, we'll fly right up there to your country and be real birds and see Lammy and Twinkle, won't we?" And Bird always answered, "Yes," to please him, but it was a word that meant nothing to her. So the summer wore on, and Bird did not go back to Laurelville.

IX

'RAM SLOCUM'S TAUNT

While Bird was putting away from her all thought of going back to Laurelville for a summer visit, Lammy Lane was trying in every way to bring about her return.

His mother was the only person in the family or village who really read Lammy aright and valued him at his worth. She never laughed at his various contrivances and mechanical inventions, and when he appeared to be star-gazing, she firmly believed that it was not idleness, but that he was interested in things other than the mere jog-trot work on the farm.

His brothers had all taken up other occupations in factory and shop, and Joshua Lane had expected that easy-going Lammy, the youngest by several years, would naturally drift along into farm work; but the boy had said, when his father had spoken upon the subject, "Farming is all right, only this one isn't big enough for mo'n two, and I like to live in the country for pleasure; but for a trade I'm going into making somethin' that bugs can't eat, and that won't get dried up, nor drowned out neither." To Joshua this remark savoured of feeble-mindedness; but when he repeated it to Dr. Jedd, that keen-eyed person laughed, saying they need not worry about Lammy, for that some day he might surprise them all.

All through June he worked diligently at strawberry picking; then currants and raspberries followed in quick succession, so that it was nearly August, when, with twenty dollars to his credit in the Northboro Savings Bank, he took a vacation and went to his old haunts with the other boys.

Lammy had been bitterly disappointed when he found that Bird could not return to spend the Fourth of July, but he was not in the least daunted; for, after all, what was a whole summer even, when some day Bird would come back for good? The boy firmly believed that something would turn up to enable his father to buy the fruit farm, or if that was impossible, he would try to coax his father and mother to get her back without. There was always plenty to eat, and his home seemed so pleasant to him that he did not realize how hard his parents had to struggle to make both ends meet in the bad seasons when the bugs ate and the drought dried. He did not, of course, know of John O'More's requirement that if Bird ever returned she must be legally adopted, and share and share alike with his brothers and himself; but if he had, it would have made no difference.

Lammy was very fond of prowling in the deep woods and along the river. He had intimate acquaintances among the gray squirrels, always knew where fox cubs could be found, and had once reared a litter of skunk pups under an abandoned barn. Their mother had evidently been trapped,--for he never saw her,--and he fed the young with milk and scraps, in the childish belief that they were some sort of half-wild kittens, and was very much disgusted, when they were old enough to follow him home, that his father declined to have them about, and that they disappeared the very same night.

But the river interested him the most, and he not only knew every swimming and pike hole, perch run and spawning shallow, along its ten-mile course from Northboro down to the Mill Farm at Milltown, and the windings of every trout brook that fed it, but he understood all that went on in the half dozen mills or shops along the route. He could explain exactly how the water was turned on and off and the gearing adjusted in the gristmill, the stamping and perforating done at the button factory, or the sand moulds prepared at the forge where scrap iron was turned into cheap ploughshares and other cast implements.

One very hot day the last part of July when Lammy, together with 'Ram Slocum and Bob Jedd, was going to the pet swimming-hole of the Laurelville boys, a clear pebble-lined pool with a shelving rock on one side that approached the water by easy steps, they heard voices in the woods and came suddenly upon a party of young fellows from the Engineers' Summer School, which had its camp farther down the ridge of hills.

"Hullo!" shouted the foremost, addressing Lammy, who also chanced to be in the lead; "can you tell us if there is any decent place to swim hereabouts? The pond at the Mill Farm is posted 'No Trespassing,' most of the river bed is either too rocky or too shallow, and the only good place we've struck below here has a mud bottom, and looked too much like an eel hole to suit me."

"Yes, 'tis an eel hole, this side of the course," Lammy answered readily, "and t'other side there's pickerel could bite yer toes if they was minded to. I'll show yer a bully place. We're going there now, and it isn't much further up."

"Charge him a quarter for the steer," said 'Ram Slocum, in a loud whisper, kicking Lammy's bare shins to stop him, for he had stepped forward eagerly to lead the way.

"Shan't either," Lammy replied spicily, to 'Ram's astonishment; "water's free up here, even if your pop won't let us swim in the mill-pond, and does charge folks three cents a barrel for taking water when their wells are dry."

'Ram, a strong boy of sixteen, with bright red hair, who usually domineered over all the boys of his age and under,--particularly under,--had never before been so answered by any of his companions, much less Lammy, to whom he often referred as "softy," and his temper rose accordingly. His nickname "'Ram," short for Abiram, referred to his fighting proclivities and the way in which he frequently used his bullet head to knock out an antagonist instead of his fists; and though he did not see fit to follow the matter then and there, in his mind he put down Lammy for punishment when he should next catch him alone.

Meanwhile Lammy, silently threading through the dense underbrush, followed by Bob Jedd, reached the swimming-hole, while 'Ram slowly brought up the rear, crashing along sullenly, kicking the dead branches right and left so that the little ground beasts fled before him, now and then pausing either to pound a luckless land turtle with a stone, or shake from its perch some bird who, silent and dejected, had sought deep cover for its moulting time.

When he reached the others, he found not only that Lammy had made friends with the students, who, by the way, were a new lot who had recently come to camp, but that they were asking him all sorts of questions to draw out his knowledge of the neighbourhood, and were actually making Lammy a good offer if he would come to the camp daily during their stay, be "chainboy" on their surveying expeditions, and show them many things about the country that it would be a waste of time for them to search out for themselves.

Now Mr. and Mrs. Slocum had been very much stirred up by these same surveyors, and being suspicious, as shifty people usually are, wondered very much if the men were only practising as they claimed, or if they were in the pay of some land company, and prospecting, that they might see where land could be bought in large blocks. They had tried all summer to have 'Ram employed about the camp, that he might keep his eyes and ears open, but so far to no avail. Consequently, when the boy heard the coveted position offered to Lammy, his rage and disappointment got the better of his usually shrewd discretion, and pushing into the group, he almost shouted, his voice pitched high with eagerness:--

"Lammy ain't the one you want; he ain't strong, and he's got no go. I'm two years older and worth twice as much, but I'll take the job at the same price and get pop to let you swim in the mill-pond if you'll hire me."

"I rather think not," said the spokesman, a bronzed, broad-shouldered young fellow of about nineteen. "I'm afraid you might charge us for the air we breathed while we were in swimming; besides, I never employ a sneak if I know it."

Then 'Ram knew that he had been overheard, and he slunk away toward home, owing Lammy a double grudge, and the sounds of shouts of merriment and the splashing of water did not tend to cool his wrath.

As for Lammy, he sat on the edge of the rock, trailing his brown toes in the water in the seventh heaven of content; for he was to help carry those mysterious instruments about for a whole month, and go in and out of the Summer School camp, knowing what was said and done there, instead of gazing at it across the fields. Then, too, perhaps he might some day meet Mr. Clarke, and possibly, though it was a daring thought, get leave to go into the mysterious building in his locomotive works at Northboro that bore the sign "Strictly Private--No Admittance."

Bird and he had often talked of such a possibility. How glad she would be to know! He would write to her all about it.

He did, but had no reply; for the letter reached Bird at one of the times when her uncle was away. Billy had been suffering more than usual, and his mother was consequently very cross and difficult to bear with. Bird put the letter by to answer "to-morrow"; but every day bore its own burden, and the days piled up into weeks.

* * * * *

Joshua worked steadily on the fruit farm all the season, preparing for future crops as conscientiously as if he himself was to be the owner. Of this, however, he had no hope; it was impossible for him to bid on the place, as he had little or no ready money, and the only way to raise this would be to mortgage his own little farm.

This several of his neighbours had suggested, offering to loan him the money; but Joshua had struggled along some fifteen years under the weight of a mortgage, and now that he was freed he did not wish to pick up the burden again. Then, too, his farm with its old ramshackle outbuildings was not worth more than three thousand dollars, while the fruit farm with its rich land, good barn, poultry house, and newly shingled dwelling was valued by good judges at any figure from five to six thousand dollars. For though Aunt Jimmy had scrimped herself in many ways, she was too good a business woman to let her property get out of repair.

Neither of the Lane brothers were as well off as Joshua, so by the last of October the community had decided that the fruit farm must go out of the family, and attention was divided between who would buy it and what Joshua would do with his third of the proceeds,--better his house, or buy more land.

The Slocums were considered to be the most likely purchasers; for Abiram Slocum was known to have much money stored away in various paying farms as well as in the Northboro bank, though the way in which he came by it was not approved, even by the most close-fisted of his neighbours, for 'Biram was what was called a "land shark." He sold worthless parcels of land that would grow nothing but docks and mullein to the hard-working Poles and Hungarians who were fast colonizing the outskirts of Northboro, taking part cash payment, the rest on mortgage, and encouraging them to build. Then when the interest became overdue, owing to inevitable poor crops, he foreclosed, put out the family, and sold the place anew.

So sure did Mrs. Slocum appear to be that she would own the fruit farm, that she took it upon herself to watch the place to see, as she explained when caught by Joshua Lane peeking in at the kitchen window, "that nothing properly belonging to it was took off." He told her in very plain language that whoever bought the farm would buy what there was on it at the time, and no more, as his aunt had trusted him with the management until the final settlement, and that what he did was no man's business save that of the heirs.

In the interval, before it was time to tie up vines and bed the various berries with their winter covering of manure, he turned his attention to Aunt Jimmy's flower garden, a strip of ground enclosed by a neat picket fence, where a box-edged path starting under a rose trellis ran down the middle and disappeared in a grape arbour at the farther end, and everything that was fragrant and hardy and worth growing flanked the walk, while behind, the sweet peas and nasturtiums climbed up to the very fence top in their effort to see and be seen.

This garden had been the apple of Aunt Jimmy's eye, and in spite of all "spells" and oddities, she had tended it wholly herself, her one gentle feminine impulse, as far as the outside world knew, having been giving nosegays to the children that passed the house on their way home from school. If they handled the flowers carelessly, they never received a second bunch, but if they cherished them, slips, seeds, and bulbs were sure to follow, so that Aunt Jimmy's flowers lived long after her in childish garden plots.

Prompted by Lauretta Ann,--for Joshua was too hard-headed and practical to have learned anything about flowers, except that they must be fed and watered like other stock, whether animal or vegetable,--he regulated the various borders, dividing and resetting the roots of hardy plants under his wife's direction, as Aunt Jimmy had done each autumn, while Lammy stood by, eagerly waiting for the "weedings," which he carried home with great care and set out in a corner south of the barn, "to make," as he said, "a little garden for Bird, in case we don't get the fruit farm." His mother encouraged him in this and praised his efforts, giving him some strips of chicken wire to make a trellis, so that his vines might in time cover the end of the old, gray-shingled barn. Even she, however, did not know of another little garden strip on a far-away hillside that he had tended all summer for the sake of his little friend.

* * * * *

In spite of Joshua Lane's rebuke to Mrs. Slocum, she continued spying and insinuating, and not many days later, chancing to drive by the fruit farm half an hour after school was out, and seeing Lammy going up the road, carrying a basket, spade, and water can, followed by faithful Twinkle, she hurried home and bade 'Ram "step lively and follow that Lane boy up, an' see where he's goin', and what he's got, and what he's agoin' to do with it."

Mrs. Slocum was more than usually determined upon annoying the Lanes, since Joshua, as administrator for Terence O'More, had refused payment of the rent owed for the little cottage, until the insurance company had satisfied themselves as to the cause of the fire and paid Abiram's claim. The furniture destroyed, at the lowest estimate, would have been more than enough to cancel the debt.

'Ram, only too glad to do his mother's errand, after the manner of all bullies, waited until Lammy was out of reach of protection and well up on the sheltered "hill road" before he overtook him, asking in a "you've-got-to-tell" tone what he had in the basket and where he was going. Upon Lammy's declining to tell, he announced his intention of following until he found out for himself.

Now it must be remembered that Lammy had the name of being girlish, if not exactly cowardly, that he was only fourteen, and though tall, was of a slender build; while 'Ram was not only broad-shouldered and sixteen, but the village braggart to boot, so that it really took some pluck for Lammy to continue up that houseless road with 'Ram muttering threats and marching close behind. Still Lammy walked straight on past all the farms, to where the runaway Christmas trees stood sentinels around the hillside graveyard. There is no denying that his hand shook as he unlatched the gate, but he did not falter or look back, but went to the corner where were the mounds that marked the graves of Bird O'More's father and mother.

Why the turf was so much greener and smoother than anywhere else in the enclosure no one but Lammy knew, and for a moment 'Ram paused outside the fence in sheer surprise; but as Lammy, kneeling down, took a couple of roots of the red peony from his basket, and prepared to plant one at the top of each flowery mound, his surprise vanished in derision.

"Ain't you a fool for sure!" he shouted, not coming in the enclosure, for, stupid and superstitious like all real cowards, he thought it bad luck to cross a graveyard,--"a fool for sure, planting posies yer stole; top of paupers, too, when even that stuck-up girl that was yer sweetheart's gone off to live with rich folks and has clean forgotten them and you!"

Lammy's trembling fingers fumbled with the earth and his head swam. The first part of 'Ram's jeer made his blood boil, but after all it was a lie, and lies do not sting for long; for poor though O'More was, his debts would be paid to a penny, and Lammy had _bought_ the peony roots from his father as executor by doing extra weeding on the fruit farm.

The last sentence, however, hurt cruelly; for though Lammy did not believe it, he had no way of disproving it even to himself, and so could not say a word to 'Ram in reply; for during the five months since Bird went away only two brief notes had come from her, and these told about city streets and sights, and little or nothing of herself. While, to make it the more strange, when, in the hot August weather, Mrs. Lane had sent her an invitation to come up for the promised visit, enclosing the tickets, which represented some weeks of egg money, and offered herself to go down to New Haven to meet the child, a stiff little note returning the tickets had come by way of reply, and though it was grateful in wording and said something vague about going with Billy for sea air, etc., he could not guess the disappointment that it covered, and that the sea air was merely a chance ferry ride, or the breeze that blew over Battery Park, where they herded daily with hundreds of other children of poorer New York. Lammy had been cut to the heart, and 'Ram's taunt rankled indeed.

Mrs. Lane, however, had read between the lines, her keen insight, confidence in Bird, and motherly love serving as spectacles. She still felt, as she always had done, that Bird was unhappy, and yet too proud to confess it, and that she did not dare write often or come among them, for fear that they should discover what they could not as yet better. For Mrs. Lane remembered O'More's conditional promise only too well, and the possibility of fulfilling her part of adopting the little girl within the year seemed to grow more and more remote.

Silently Lammy finished his work, picking up every dead leaf that lay on the mounds, and then taking his spade and basket, turned to go home, but there stood his tormentor by the gate.

If anything angers a bully, it is silence. If Lammy had engaged in a war of words, the chances are that 'Ram would have gone away, having had, as he considered it, his fun out. As it was, he really felt that he had been neglected and affronted, so, making believe open the gate as Lammy closed it, he said, "I can dig up them posies twict as quick as you planted 'em."

"Maybe you can, but you won't," cried Lammy, suddenly growing pale and rigid, while he stood outside the gate, but square in front of it.

"Oh, ho, and who 'll stop me?" sneered 'Ram, in amused surprise, standing with his arms akimbo.

Without saying another word, Lammy, the meek, the boy-girl in name, flew at 'Ram with such suddenness, beating and buffetting him, that the big boy was knocked down before he knew it. Recovering his feet quickly, he tried to grapple with the lanky little lad, but Lammy twisted and turned with the litheness of a cat, landing rapid if rather wild blows at each plunge, while Twinkle nipped at 'Ram's heels, until finally 'Ram, seeing that he was outmatched in agility, and determined to conquer without more ado, lowered his head for the celebrated "butt" that generally winded his antagonist.

Lammy's fighting Yankee ancestors must have left the lower end of the graveyard and marched up to encourage him on this occasion; for he was nearly spent and was pausing to get breath when the lunge came, so that his final effort was to give a side twist, and the blow of the red bullet head was received square and full by the locust gate post instead of by Lammy's stomach.

'Ram dropped to the ground, where he lay for several minutes seeing stars, planets, and comets, while a bump as big as an apple appeared in the middle of his forehead and the cords of his neck ached like teeth. Meanwhile Lammy, his nervous strength gone, ran all the way home, and throwing himself on his bed, whither he was followed by his mother, who saw his livid face as he dashed through the kitchen, sobbed as if his heart would break, not from fear, but because in the reaction he remembered what Bird had said of people who fought either with their tongues or fists.

It was not until long afterward that he thought it strange, and wondered why his mother had not scolded him, only hugged him to her comfortable, pillowy breast, when he told his story, and put nearly all of her precious bottle of Northboro cologne on his head to soothe it, and gave him buttered toast, when, after having his cry out, he came down to supper, which dainty was generally regarded as only for the minister or else a "sick-a-bed" luxury. His father meanwhile actually broke into a laugh and said, "Hear yer've been doin' a leetle Declaration o' Independencing on yer own account. Wal, it's sometimes a necessary act fer folks same as countries; Lauretta Ann, I reckon Lammy and me could relish a pot of coffee to-night"--coffee being a Sunday-morning treat.

When it came to the part of his story concerning 'Ram's taunt and his fear that Bird had forgotten them, his mother reassured him for the hundredth time with her own ample faith, but he quite startled her by saying emphatically:--

"That is all right, mother, as far as it goes, but we've just _got_ to buy that fruit farm somehow." And he fell asleep that night, happy in making impossible plans for the purchase.

It was perhaps as well for Lammy's self-conceit that he did not hear his mother talk with Mrs. Slocum, who came in about nine o'clock, tearful, yet at the same time in a threatening rage, demanding that he be "whipped thoro' for half murdering her harmless boy when he was taking an innercent walk, and that if he didn't get the whippin', she'd get a warrant immedjet."

Mrs. Lane waited until she had finished her tirade, and then calling Joshua, who had retreated to the wood-shed, said: "Mis' Slocum here needs a warrant writ hasty; jest you escort her down to the Squire's, as her husband don't seem intrested to go with her. I hate to see a neighbour obleeged to play the man and risk goin' out in the dark alone."

Then as her adversary, seeing herself outflanked, rose to go, she added with apparent sympathy: "Of course I know it's hard for you to feel 'Ram's beat by one half his size, even if the gate post did help Lammy, and folks 'll be surprised to hear it, but you mustn't blame him too much; it was maybe me, his mother, in him worked Lammy's fists so good." And Lauretta Ann looked her visitor straight in the eyes. Some weeks later Mrs. Slocum had reason to remember that look.

X

LAMMY CONSULTS OLD LUCKY

When November came, Joshua Lane had completed his work of preparing the fruit farm for the auction, according to Aunt Jimmy's wish that it should be in full running order when sold.

The old fowls were mostly sold off, and the henhouse was full of the vigorous laying pullets that mean so much in early winter. The fall cow had calved, and the two or three yearlings were as sleek as does.

When the time came for the division of the furniture between the wives of the three Lane brothers by drawing lots, public interest again awakened, and Mrs. Slocum expressed great anxiety lest it should not be done fairly, saying to her husband: "It's a fussy, mixed-up business anyway. Why didn't they auction off the stuff and let folks in to see it done fair? They do say, for all Miss Jemima lived so plain, she had stores of good stuff shut up in those top rooms that even Dinah Lucky never's had a peek at when she went to houseclean. Those old mahogany pieces are worth money at Northboro, and Lauretta Ann's cute enough to know it, but I don't believe those other slab-sided Lane women do; so do you watch your chance and make them an offer so soon as it's divided. There's a wardrobe there, solid mahogany, twice as big as one they ask fifty dollars for in the 'curious' shop. Most likely they'd value cheap, new stuff better."

If it had not been rather pathetic to Mrs. Lane, this breaking up of a house where she had been so much at home, the day of the division would have been one of unalloyed merriment.

In the first place, owing to the way in which Aunt Jimmy had directed the drawing should be managed, the articles were not valued in the usual way and divided so that each of the three women shared alike, but merely numbered, the duplicate slips being shaken up in a basket and drawn by Probate Judge Ricker for Lauretta Ann, the others drawing for themselves, as Joshua preferred that there should be no possible chance of his wife being criticised. While she, cheerful and thoughtful as ever of the comfort of others, prepared a nice lunch on the afternoon appointed, which she and Lammy carried to the fruit farm, and had a cheerful fire in the kitchen stove, with a big pot of fragrant coffee purring away on top of it, when Jason and Henry Lane, the younger brothers, following each other closely, drove into the yard with their wives.

Mrs. Henry Lane was a delicate, sad-looking little woman, quite above the average. She had been one of the teachers in the Milltown public school at the time of her marriage, but the struggle to wrest a living from a small hillside farm, coupled with ill health, had broken her spirit, and she sank into a rocking-chair and began to jiggle the baby that she carried to and fro.

Mrs. Jason, on the contrary, was tall and gaunt, with high cheek-bones. Life had not been very kind to her either, but still she looked as if she could hold her own; and her husband, who only reached her shoulder, fairly quaked and fell away before her like ill-made jelly.

"Do draw up to the table, sisters-in-law both," cried Lauretta Ann, after greeting each heartily. "You must have hurried dinner to get down here by now, and I always do feel hungrier the first cool days than when winter has set square in."

"I _should_ feel better for a cup of coffee," said Mrs. Henry, in a plaintive voice; "we haven't had any for more than two weeks. Henry forgot it when he went to the store, and he doesn't get there as often as he used, now that the mail is delivered around the country by wagon. I've been using tea right along, and I think it's made me nervous; besides, the last I bought from the travelling spice-and-sugar man tasted more like buckwheat shucks and musty hay than anything else."

At this Henry Lane's head sank still farther into the collar of his coat, which was three sizes too big anyway, and he began whittling recklessly at a hard-wood clothespin with a broken knife, which quickly caused a deeply cut finger and much consternation, as the sight of blood always made his wife faint away, and the present occasion was no exception to the rule.

After Lauretta Ann had bathed and bound up the finger, and sent Lammy home for a little of the cherry cordial for which she was famous, she made another effort to serve the lunch, and finally succeeded in cheering the mournful company by sheer force of good temper.

"I do hope you'll draw Grandma Lane's canopy-top cradle and the big rocker that matches, they'd be such comforts to you as you are fixed," Mrs. Joshua said to Mrs. Henry, as putting a friendly arm about her, they went into the sitting room, where Judge Ricker was busy kneading up the numbered papers in the basket as carefully as if he was working lard into flour for tea biscuits, and seated themselves in a semicircle.

"Do you begin, sister-in-law Jason, and you follow next, sister-in-law Henry," said Mrs. Joshua, laying her hand, which would tremble in spite of herself, on Lammy's shoulder. Lammy, by the way, had grown broader and stronger and lost much of his timidity of manner during the two months past. Whether it was the sense of responsibility that working with the college men had given him, or his determination to have Bird come back, his mother could not decide, while his father chuckled whenever the matter was referred to, saying, "'Tain't neither; it was squarin' up at 'Ram Slocum that made a man of him;" and though Lauretta always said, "Sho, pa! ain't you ashamed of aidin' and abettin' a fight?" her smiling expression belied her words.

Mrs. Jason stepped forward and drew--the canopy cradle! A roar of laughter greeted her venture, in which she joined grimly, for her youngest offspring was a six-foot youth of seventeen, while Mrs. Henry sighed and felt secretly injured, though she said nothing.

Next came her turn, and she drew a worked motto in a gilt frame, which read, "The Lord Will Provide," whereat she smiled feebly and whimpered, "I've tried to think so, but I do wish Henry Lane would help Him out better." Mrs. Joshua drew the best china, Mrs. Henry the tall clock, which she straightway declared to be a foot higher than any of her rooms,--she finally traded it with Mrs. Jason for the cradle and rocking-chair,--until at the end of two hours the last number left the basket and three tired and confused women wandered about trying to collect their property.

The great wardrobe had fallen to Mrs. Jason's share, but upon close inspection it proved to be merely stained cherry and not mahogany at all, and its owner remarked that she wished some one would take it off her hands, as it was too big to go in her door, and more than it was worth to truck it home, much less get it in to Northboro, where it would be possible to sell it. Her husband, however, ventured to say it would make a good harness closet for the barn and keep the rats from gnawing the leather; and so with much stretching of muscles and groans of "now heave together" it was loaded with the other articles upon the wagon.

There was quite a lively interchange of articles between the women before the rooms were finally cleared, but in the end, owing to Mrs. Joshua's good sense, they all declared themselves well satisfied. Mrs. Jason had secured a good sewing-machine, and Mrs. Henry a parlour organ for which her melancholy spirit pined; while Mrs. Joshua, who had a machine and inwardly detested parlour organs, saying that when needful she could do her own groaning, was made happy by the best parlour set, her own chairs and lounge having been fatally collapsed by her family of men folks of assorted ages.

One thing they all regretted, which was that Aunt Jimmy had ordered all articles of every kind not mentioned in her list should be either burned or buried, according to their kind, and there were many things dear to their feminine hearts in the mass of rubbish that had been accumulating in garret and cellar, barn and loft, these many years as well as much that was salable as junk. It was of no use to object; for Joshua was determined to carry out the will in both spirit and letter, and though it had amused the eccentric old lady to collect and hoard the stuff, she was equally determined that it should never be exposed to the gaze of the curious. Joshua knew that though she thought him slow and without ambition, she trusted him, and he was not going to disappoint her.

* * * * *

As the loaded wagons filed out of the yard, a lean figure might have been seen peering through the branches of a small maple tree in the wood lot just above. It was Abiram Slocum, who, goaded by his wife, was trying to see which cart contained the wardrobe; for she had come back from Northboro the day before all eagerness to get possession of it, for the owner of the "curious shop" had said if the wardrobe was of the size and quality she described, he would pay her fifty dollars for it. Now if the owner would let it go for fifteen or even twenty-five dollars, the profit would give her new paper and a carpet for her best room; for rich as Slocum was reputed to be, he was close-fisted with his wife, and she was obliged to pick up her own pin money like her poorer neighbours, with the exception that she had not succeeded in the egg business, owing to her tendency, whenever possible, to give eleven to the dozen, and sell limed eggs at a high price to ignorant people who desired them for setting.

Abiram presently spied the wardrobe on Jason Lane's load. He was sorry for this, for Mrs. Jason was one of the few people who had ever got the better of him in trade, and a horse trade at that, so he feared she would never sell the furniture, or if she did, would extort full value.

Nevertheless, he slipped hastily from the tree, cut across lots toward the road they must take on their way home, and fifteen minutes later met them when they stopped to rest the horse, as if he was merely sauntering toward the pasture for his cows, and was soon engaged in general conversation upon farm topics that gradually led up toward the furniture.

"Heavy load you've got there," he remarked; "ain't that there closet big for your haouse?"

Jason was about to say that it was, and that they were going to put it in the barn, when he felt his wife looking daggers, and refrained.

"'Tis big, but we can use it," she answered dryly, starting up the horse.

"How about selling it and buying somethin' handier?"

"I ain't anxious. Get along, Whiteface," she said, touching the horse with the whip.

"I'll give yer fifteen dollars for it, here and now, if you'll leave it to my house," Abiram shouted as the wagon began to move away.

"'Twouldn't pay me to turn back."

"Twenty dollars then."

"Nope, I'm in a hurry, and there's a pile of good seasoned wood in the thing."

"She knows its value, sure enough," he said to himself, as the wagon began to climb the hill.

"Give yer twenty-five, and yer can leave it here by the road."

"I reckon you might unpack, pa," the gaunt woman said, a smile hovering about her mouth, adding to Abiram, "Hand up the money, and down she goes."

In five seconds two ten-dollar bills and a five, after a searching scrutiny, found their way into Mrs. Jason's pocket, and the clumsy piece of furniture leaned tipsily against the pasture fence exposed to the full glare of the sun.

Just as Jason Lane had remounted the seat and the wagon had begun to move again, a shout made them look round. There stood Abiram in the middle of the road, stamping and choking with rage so that he could barely speak.

"Stop! hey, stop!" he yelled; "it ain't mahogany; it's only stained wood. Hey, give me my money back or I'll hev ye arrested."

"Who said it was mahogany?" called Mrs. Jason, stopping the horse and fairly beaming with the pleasure of the contention.

Abiram hesitated a moment, felt himself caught, stammered, and said, "Mis' Slocum did."

"Well, go ahead and arrest Mrs. Slocum, then," chimed in Jason, his speech for once meeting his wife's approval.

"Oh, Lordy, Lordy, what 'll she say, 'n' what 'll I do with it?" he moaned to himself, completely caught in the trap set by his own greed.

"I dunno," shouted Mrs. Jason as she moved away, "'nless you put wheels on it to make a wagon and hitch that sorrel mare I sold you to it."

* * * * *

The day of the sale drew near. All that remained to be done was the destroying of the rubbish, and this was no small task.

One entire day a bonfire had raged in the back lot, and what would not burn was the next day taken in the ox-cart thrice filled by Joshua himself and dumped carefully in the great bog-hole.

This quaking bog was one of the wonders of the neighbourhood and its common dumping ground, even though it could only be reached by fording the river above the mill-pond. To the eye it was merely an oozy-looking swamp tract, such as are plentiful near the back-water of rivers, but this particular bit was an ogre that swallowed up everything that was cast in it, only a few hours being necessary to engulf, without leaving a sign, an unlucky cow that had once strayed into it. So that now it was securely fenced about except at one spot, used for dumping, which was protected with logs secured to driven piles.

Mrs. Lane watched the loading of the wagon very ruefully, for she now fully realized that all her hopes concerning the fruit farm had come to as complete an end as the load of broken china and rusty tinware. When she saw the old pewter tea-pot, the dents supplemented by a crack, go by on top of a basket of broken flower pots, she begged her husband to let her keep it, saying:--

"Even if it's worth nothin' now, even for drawin' tea, Aunt Jimmy must hev meant somethin' kind when she left it to me, and I'd like it to mind me of the idea, only she got fogged up some way and didn't plan right; fer if she set store by anything, it was by that pot on account of its bein' buried half of the Revolution with great-grandmother Cuddy's best teaspoons and twenty gold guineas all safe inside."

"Lauretta Ann," said Joshua, pausing to rest the heavy basket on the tail-board of the cart, "'tain't often I put my foot down, but now they've set, heel and toe, sock and leather, both of 'em. I'm goin' to do my work legal, but you've been treated shabby, and I ain't a-goin' to hev that tea-pot set up on a shelf for a moniment to that same. If you're too Christian to resent, I'm goin' to do it for yer, which she, bein' my aunt, the quarrel is for me to take upon me, so there!"

Joshua had never before made such a long speech in all their married life, and his wife, fairly awed by his earnestness, said no more, but turning away, took the private pathway homeward that led through the meadow and garden, closing the gap in the wall with brush as she went, for soon now she would have no longer any right to come and go.

That afternoon as Lammy came home from school he saw in the distance his father and the ox-team taking the last load along the highway, and as he realized how soon the auction would take place, his heart sank and his feet dragged heavily along. Turning to take a short cut through the lane, he came face to face with an old coloured man with snow-white, woolly hair, who was scratching up the leaves with his cane, in search of chestnuts.

His name was Nebuchadnezzar Lucky, or Old Lucky, as he was called for short, and he was the husband of Dinah, who was general factotum of the village, and supported her man, who was double her age, by cooking, nursing, or housecleaning, as the season or circumstances demanded, absolutely taking pride in the fact, as if it was his right and his due. For was not Old Lucky a superior being who made charms, brewed herb medicines, and told fortunes, in addition to having turns of "seeing things," which caused him to be regarded with awe by children and the credulous of all ages, even in this prim New England town where witches were once burned?

"Howdy, Massa Lammy? 'Pears like the squir'ls and chippin monkeys has got all the chestnuts this season, and dey ain't left one for old Uncle Lucky to bile soft so's him can eat 'em. You ain't got a handful laid up you could spare 'thout missin', I reckon now?" And the old man gave a persuasive, yet terrifying leer with eyes that were so badly crossed that they fairly seemed tangled.

An idea struck Lammy, as the tales of Lucky's power came back to him, for even the practical folk who scoffed, allowed that there was something queer in it. He would consult the old man as to what he could do to get the fruit farm and Bird back at the same time. But stop! Where was the money to come from? For it was well known among his customers that Lucky could not "see things" until he had rubbed his eyelids with a piece of silver. Lammy's money was all in the bank. Ah! he had it! John O'More's silver dollar that was hidden away in Bird's paint-box!

Away he flew like a scurrying rabbit, leaving Old Lucky muttering in amazement, and in a half-hour returned, carrying a salt-bag full of chestnuts in one hand and the coin wrapped in paper in the other.

The old man, by this time having grown tired of his useless hunt for nuts, had gone home, and Lammy followed him to his cabin that was perched on the edge of the bank overhanging the mill stream. Lucky was sitting in an arm-chair by the window when Lammy entered and stammered out his wish and request for advice, at the same time offering his bag of nuts and the coin which he first polished on his trousers.

If Lucky was surprised at the size of the offering, his usual fee being a quarter, while he never refused a dime, he did not show it, but felt the money carefully, passed it across his dim eyes, munched a nut or two, and falling back in his chair, covered his head with a red and yellow handkerchief and began to mutter, beckoning Lammy to come near and listen, which he did, scarcely daring to breathe. The mutterings went on for several minutes, and then took the form of words.

"Take--a--shotgun," said the voice in a tone meant to be hollow, but which stopped at being cracked, "load him wif bullets you make umsself, go up on de churchyard hill and shoot der shadder of a Christmas tree on a--black,--dark night,--an' den,--an' den--"

"Then what?" besought Lammy, in an agony of suspense.

"Den you'll hear sumpfin'!" shouted Lucky, suddenly pulling the handkerchief from his face and fixing Lammy with a cross-eyed stare that was paralyzing.

"But recommember," Lucky added, shaking his forefinger ominously, "make dem bullets out o' sumpfin' yo' find, not bought nor lead uns, but sumpfin' white like silver, or dis year charm hit won't work."

"But _where_ shall I find it?" gasped Lammy, so much in earnest that he did not realize the absurdity of what the old man said.

This question seemed to take the magician out of his depth, and annoyed him not a little. After casting his eyes helplessly about, they chanced to rest on the stream below the window, when he quickly closed them and whispered, "Yo' must look in water--not in a pond, but in running water!" after which he refused to say another word.

When Lammy reached home, his mother was setting the supper on the table, while his father and brothers were going over the same old arguments as to the possibility or impossibility of buying the fruit farm. Lammy smiled to himself as he lifted Twinkle to his shoulder and then put the dog on a chair beside him, his usual place at meal-times, where he waited, one ear up and one down, until it was time to be fed.

No one noticed how red the boy's cheeks were and how his eyes shone, as he hurried from supper to learn his lessons, that he might have time in the morning to begin his search for metal for the magic bullets before going to school. He thought if he had the material, all else would be easy, for there was an old bullet-mould in the workroom in the barn, where mending was done, also an iron pot that had been used for melting solder.

He did not tell his mother of his plan, not that he meant in any way to deceive her; but if she knew nothing, the surprise at the result would be all the greater.

For the next two or three days Lammy went up and down the river banks from the Mill Farm to the upper fork, apparently as aimlessly as in the time that he was dubbed "Look-out Johnny," and the neighbours nodded, and said, "The brace he got fightin' didn't last,--he's trampin' again," while his mother took it to heart and thought it was because he was grieving for Bird, as they had heard nothing definite or satisfactory from her for more than a month, and then only a few words on a card inquiring for Twinkle.

When Saturday came, Lammy started off in the morning early, asking his mother for a lunch to carry with him, which was nothing unusual. This day, instead of heading downstream, he started above the mill and followed the river up toward the woods. All the forenoon he looked here and there, and after eating his luncheon came out of the woods near where the highway branched and crossed the ford on the way to the bog dumping ground.

He stood there a few minutes, idly watching the dead leaves swirl along, and an occasional fish dart by, when his eyes became fixed upon an object lying close under a big stone in mid-stream; it glistened as the sun shone upon it, and then turned dull again. Whatever it was, it fascinated him strangely, and jumping from stone to stone, he soon reached it. "Only an old tin pan," he muttered in disgust; "that won't make bullets."

As luck would have it, the stone upon which he stood turned, making him jump splash into the water, kicking the pan as he went. When he recovered himself, he looked about for footing, and there where the pan had been, to his amazement, lying almost at his feet, was the pewter tea-pot!

"However did that get here?" he exclaimed; but the answer was so simple that he guessed it at once. The tea-pot, in company with the pan, had been jolted from the ox-cart in crossing the ford on its way to the dump, and so escaped being swallowed.

"Hurrah!" cried Lammy, picking up the treasure and making his way to land, where he danced about in glee. "This 'll melt into bullets first rate, and it's kind of white like silver if it's cleaned. When it's melted, pop can't call it 'an eyesore' or a 'moniment,' so it's no harm for me to take it home."

He could not tell why, but he took off his coat and wrapped it carefully around the tea-pot, and then slipped from the highway into the woods again.

When he reached home, it was still early afternoon. His father was cutting wood in the upper lot, and his mother had gone to Northboro with eggs for her Saturday customers, so Lammy had the place to himself.

First he buried the tea-pot deep in the feed bin, and taking the key of the house from its hiding-place under the door-mat, stole up to his room for dry shoes and socks, as it was a cold day and his sopping feet were already making him shiver and feel tight in the throat. Somehow the possession of the tea-pot gave him an uneasy feeling. Did it really belong to him? He hung about the house for a time, then walked straight out the gate and down to the Squire's office in the town house. This same "Squire" was a man of education as well as a lawyer, and Lammy's knock was answered by a cheery "Come in!" which he did, saying, all in one breath and quite reckless of grammar, "Please, sir, if I find anything that's been took to the dump, but fell off and not been swallowed, would it be mine to make bullets of?"

The Squire looked up from under his bushy eyebrows and smiled at the lad encouragingly. "Certainly it would be yours, my boy; what is intentionally thrown away is fair plunder for any one." And with a hasty "Thank you, sir," Lammy was off again with an easy conscience, to find an old axe, break up the tea-pot, and melt it if possible before his parents' return. Ah, but Lucky's charm was surely working.

"Strange child that," said the Squire, looking after him; "he'll either turn out a fool or a genius. There is no middle path for such as he. I must keep my eye on him."

XI

THE PEWTER TEA-POT

When Lammy reached home he hurried into the barn, carefully closing both door and windows. In looking about for an old axe whose edge would not be hurt by chopping metal, he stumbled over a rusty anvil that was half buried in litter. This he managed to drag into the light; then digging the tea-pot from the feed bin, he began his work.

First he wrenched off the cover and battered it into small pieces, which he put into the solder pot. Chop, chop! the handle gave way next, then the queer sprawling legs. He made several blows at the thick, clumsy, curved spout without hitting it, for his hands trembled with excitement combined with the chill of his wet feet.

Finally he landed a square blow a little above where the spout joined the body, but instead of cutting the metal quite through, the blade wedged, so he dropped the axe and seizing the tea-pot, proceeded to wrench off the spout.

"It's got tea leaves stuck in it," he said to himself, as he pulled and twisted at it. "Nope, brown paper," as a small roll of paper, the size, thickness, and length of a cigarette fell to the floor. To this he paid no attention, but continued to chop at the tea-pot until it was all in bits, tightly packed in the solder pot, and covered with an old plate.