"The tormentable, mean, naughty boy! I'd be ashamed to treat a _skeeter_ the way he's treated me! Did I ever coax a boy to go anywhere with me, and then run off and leave him right in the middle of the river? No, _sir_. Sore feet, hey? Didn't anybody ever have sore feet 'fore now, I wonder? Why, I had chilblains last winter so deep they dug a hole into my heels, and,--well, it's no use to make a great fuss,--I didn't cry but two or three times. Blisters! what's that? Nothing but little puffs of water! Perhaps that wasn't why he stopped, though. Just as likely as not he meant all the time to stop, and come a-purpose to see Mr. Diah.

How can you tell? A boy that lies so! There, there, come to think of it, shouldn't wonder if his feet weren't sore a bit! Wish I'd looked at 'em!

"Well, he's backed out, Fred Chase has! I should think he'd feel so mean he never'd want to show _his_ head anywhere again! 'Fore I'd _sneak out_ when I got started! Eh, for shame!"

w.i.l.l.y tore up a handful of gra.s.s, and threw it into the road, and the action served to relieve him a little.

"Well, what'll _I_ do? now let's think. If a tiger should come right down this ferry-hill, and tear me all to pieces, Fred wouldn't care.

'Course not. All he cares is to get enough to eat, and not make his feet sore. He don't care what comes of me. I've got to think it out for myself, what I'd better do. Got to do it myself, too, all alone, and there won't be anybody to help me. Pretty sc.r.a.pe, I should think! Might have known better'n to come!

"Well; will I be a lumberman and go up to the Forks? Let's see; I don'

know the way up there. That makes it bad, 'cause I guess there isn't much of any road to it 'cept spotted trees; that's what I heard once.

Most likely I'd get lost. Fred wouldn't care if I did; be glad, I s'pose. But, then, there's bears. Ugh! Pshaw! who's afraid of bears? And then there's mother--O, I didn't mean to think about mother!"

w.i.l.l.y sighed, but soon roused himself.

"Well, what'll I do? O, wasn't that a real poor breakfast the woman gave us? Don't see how I swallowed it! Makes me sick to think of it. Didn't taste much like mother's breakfasts! I don't want to go where I'll have to drink mola.s.ses in my coffee, and eat fatty potatoes too.

"And who'd take a little boy like me? Folks laugh at little boys--think they don't know a thing. And folks always ask so many questions. They want to know where you come from, and who your father is, and if he's got any cows. And I _won't_ lie. And next thing they'd be sending me home. They'd say home was the best place for little boys. H'm! So it is, if you don't have to get whipped!

"O, my! Didn't I have to take it that last time? Father never hurt so before. Made all the bad come up in my throat, and I can't swallow it down yet. It would be good enough for him if I was dead; for then every time he went out to the barn there'd be that horsewhip hanging up on the nail; and he'd think to himself--'Where's that little boy I used to whip?' And then the tears will come into his eyes, I pretty much know they will. I saw the tears in his eyes once when I was sick. He felt real bad; but when I got well, first thing he did was to whip me again.

Whippings don't do any good. All that does any good is when mother talks to me; and that don't do any good, either. She made me learn this verse:--

"'And thou, Solomon, my son, know thou the G.o.d of thy fathers, and serve him with a perfect heart and a willing mind. If thou seek him, he will be found of thee, but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off forever.'

"There, I know that straight as a book. She prays to G.o.d to make me better, but He doesn't do it yet, and I should think she'd get discouraged. 'Heart like a stone,' she said. That made me want to laugh, for I could feel it beating all the time she spoke, and it couldn't if it was a stone! Bad heart, though, or I wouldn't be so bad myself.

"Well, it's no use to think about badness or goodness now," said w.i.l.l.y, flinging another handful of gra.s.s into the road. "_What'll I do?_ That's the question.

"You see, now, folks have such a poor opinion of boys," added he, his thoughts spinning round the same circle again. "Most wish I was a girl.

O, my stars, what an idea!"

And completely disgusted with himself, he jumped up and turned a somerset.

"Better be whipped three times a day than be a girl!

"But father felt real bad that time I was sick, for I saw him. Not so bad as mother, though. Poor mother! I no business to gone off and left her. What you s'pose she thought last night, when I didn't come back from the post office?"

This question had tried to rise before, but had always been forced back.

"She waited till nine o'clock, and didn't think much queer. But after that she come out of the bedroom, with her face tied up, and said she, 'Hasn't w.i.l.l.y got home yet?' Then they told her 'No,' and father scowled. And she sat up till ten o'clock, and then do you s'pose anybody went out doors to hunt? She didn't sleep a wink all night. Don't see how folks can lie awake so. I couldn't if I should try; but I'm not a woman, you know, and I don't believe I should care much about my boys, if I was. Would _I_ mend their trousis for 'em, when they tore 'em on a nail, going where I told 'em not to? For, says I, I can't bear the sight of a child that won't mind. But you see, mother--

"Poor mother, what'll she do without me? She said there wasn't anybody she could take in her arms to hug but just me. Stephen's too big to sit in her lap, and Love's too big; and there wouldn't anybody think of hugging Seth, if he was ever so little.

"Yes, mother wants _me_. I remember that song she sings about the Scotch woman that lost her baby, and she cries a little before she gets through."

The words were set to a plaintive air, and w.i.l.l.y hummed it over to himself,--

"I ha'e naebody now, I ha'e naebody now To clasp at my bosom at even, O'er his calm sleep to breathe out a vow, And pray for the blessing of Heaven."

"Poor mother, how that makes her cry! Why, I declare, I'm crying too!

Somehow seems's if I couldn't get along without mother. But there, I won't be a cry-baby! Hush up, w.i.l.l.y Parlin!

"WHAT'LL I DO? Wish I hadn't come. Wish I'd thought more about mother--how she's going to feel.

"What if I should turn right round now, and go home? Why, father'd whip me worse'n ever--_that's_ what. Well, who cares? It'll feel better after it's done smarting. Guess I can stand it. Look here, Will Parlin, I'm going."

Bravo, w.i.l.l.y! With both feet he plunged into the river, and waded slowly across. Very slowly, for his mind was not fully made up yet. There was a great deal of thinking to be done first; but he might as well be moving on while he thought. Every now and then rebellious pride, or anger, or shame would get the better of him, and he would wheel round, with the impulse to strike off into the unknown _Somewhere_, where boys lived without whippings. But the thought of his mother always stopped him.

Was there an invisible cord which stretched from her heart to his--a cord of love, which drew him back to her side? He could see her sorrowful face, he could hear her pleading voice, and the very tremble in it when she sang,--

"I ha'e naebody now, I ha'e naebody now."

"But I'd never go back and take that whipping, if it wasn't for mother!"

He no longer felt obliged to hide from the approach of every human being; and when a pedler, driving a "cart of notions," called out, "Want a lift, little youngster?" he was very glad to accept the offer. To be sure, he only rode two or three miles, but it was a great help.

It was noon, by that time, "high noon too," and the smell of nice dinners floated out to him from the farm-houses, as he trudged by; but to beg a meal he was ashamed. When he reached Cross Lots it was the middle of the afternoon. He went up to the stump near the mill, where he and Freddy had sat the night before; and, as he seated himself, he thought with a pang of that pocket full of doughnuts, so freely made way with.

He had eighteen cents in his wallet; but what good did it do, when there was no store at hand where a body could buy so much as a sheet of gingerbread? He was starving in the midst of plenty, like that unfortunate man whose touch turned all the food he put in his mouth into gold.

Beginning to think he would almost be willing to be whipped for the sake of a good supper, he rose and walked on.

When he reached the Noonin farm, a mile and a half from home, the night shadows were beginning to fall, but he could see in the distance a horse and wagon coming that made his heart thump loud. The horse was old Dolly; and what if one of the men in the wagon should be his father?

No, it was only Seth and Stephen; but Seth was almost as much to be dreaded as Mr. Parlin himself.

"You here, you young rogue?" called out Stephen, in a tone between laughing and scolding, for he would not have w.i.l.l.y suspect how relieved they were at finding him. "You here? And where's Fred?"

"Up to Harlow, to Mr. Diah's," replied w.i.l.l.y, and coolly climbed into the wagon.

"Better wait for an invitation. How do you know we shall let you ride?"

said Stephen, turning the horse's head towards home.

"First, we'd like to know what you've got to say for yourself," put in Seth, in that cold, hard tone, which always made w.i.l.l.y feel as if he didn't care how he had acted, and as if he would do just so again.

"I suppose you are aware that you have been a very wicked, deceitful, disobedient boy?"

w.i.l.l.y made no reply, but lay down on the floor of the wagon, and curled himself up like a caterpillar.

"Don't be too hard on him, Seth," said Stephen, who could not help pitying the poor little fellow in his shame and embarra.s.sment; "I don't believe you meant to run away--now did you, w.i.l.l.y?"

The child was quite touched by this unexpected kindness. So they were not sure he did mean to run away? If he said "No," they would believe him, and then perhaps he wouldn't have to be whipped. But next instant his better self triumphed, and he scorned the lie. Uncurling himself from his caterpillar ball, he stammered,--

"Yes, I did mean to, too."

A little more, and he would have told the whole story. He longed to tell it--how life had seemed a burden on account of his whippings, and how he and Fred had planned to set up in business for themselves, but Fred had backed out. But before he had time to speak, Seth said, sternly,--

"You saucy child!"