"I ain't going to say I'm nothing of the kind," spiritedly replied the under-dog. "You all time wanting somebody to call theirselfs someping.

You're a low-down Isabella skunk yourself."

"You got to say it," insisted the victor, renewing hostilities.

"I'll say I'm a Isabella 'cause Isabella discovered America and's in the Bible," replied the tormented one; "Miss Cecilia 'splained it to me."

Billy accepted his compromise and Jimmy's flattened stomach, relieved of its burden, puffed out to its usual roundness as that little boy rose to his feet, saying:

"Sam Lamb would 'a' died a-laughing, Billy, if he 'd seen you telephoning."

"He 'd better never hear tell of it," was the threatening rejoinder.

CHAPTER XVI

THE HUMBLE PEt.i.tION

Billy, sitting in an old buggy in front of the livery stable, had just engaged in a long and interesting conversation with Sam Lamb.

He was getting out of the vehicle when the sharp wire around a broken rod caught in the back of his trousers and tore a great hole. He felt a tingling pain and looked over his shoulder to investigate. Not being satisfied with the result, he turned his back to the negro and anxiously enquired, "Is my breeches tore, Sam?"

"Dey am dat," was the reply, "dey am busted Fm Dan ter Beersheba."

"What I goin' to do 'bout it?" asked the little boy, "Aunt Minerva sho'

will be mad. These here's branspankin' new trousers what I ain't never wore tell today. Ain't you got a needle an' thread so's you can fix 'em.

Sam?"

"Nary er needle," said Sam Lamb.

"Is my union suit tore, too?" and Billy again turned his back for inspection.

His friend made a close examination.

"Yo' unions is injured plum scanerous," was his discouraging decision, "and hit 'pears ter me dat yo' hide done suffer too; you's got er turrible scratch."

The child sighed. The injury to the flesh was of small importance,--he could hide that from his aunt--but the rent in his trousers was a serious matter.

"I wish I could git 'em mended 'fore I goes home," he said wistfully.

"I tell you what do," suggested Sam, "I 'low Miss Cecilia'll holp yeh; jest go by her house an' she'll darn 'em up fer yuh."

Billy hesitated.

"Well, you see, Sam, me an' Miss Cecilia's engaged an' we's fixin' to marry jes''s soon's I puts on long pants, an' I 'shame' to ask her. An'

I don't berlieve young 'omans patches the breeches of young mans what they's goin' to marry nohow. Do you? Aunt Minerva ain' never patched no breeches for the Major. And then," with a modest blush, "my unions is tore too, an' I ain't got on nothin' else to hide my skin."

Again he turned his back to his friend and, his clouded little face looking over his shoulder, he asked, "Do my meat show, Sam?"

"She am visible ter the naked eye," and Sam Lamb laughed loudly at his own wit.

"I don't believe G.o.d pays me much attention nohow," said the little boy dolefully; "ev'y day I gets put to bed 'cause sumpin's all time a-happenin'. If He'd had a eye on me like He oughter they wouldn't a been no snaggin'. Aunt Minerva's goin' to be mad th'oo an' th'oo."

"May be my of 'oman can fix 'em, so's dey won't be so turrible bad,"

suggested the negro, "'taint fer, so you jes' run down ter my cabin an'

tell Sukey I say fix dem breeches."

The child needed no second bidding,--he fairly flew. Sam's wife was cooking, but she cheerfully stopped her work to help the little boy. She sewed up his union suit and put a bright blue patch on his brown linen breeches.

Billy felt a little more cheerful, though he still dreaded confessing to his aunt and he loitered along the way till it was nearly dark. Supper was ready when he got home and he walked into the diningroom with his customary ease and grace. But he took his seat uneasily, and he was so quiet during the meal and ate so little that his aunt asked him if he were sick. He was planning in his mind how to break the news of the day's disaster to her.

"You are improving, William," she remarked presently, "you haven't got into any mischief to-day. You have been a mighty good little boy now for two days."

Billy flushed at the compliment and shifted uneasily in his seat. That patch seemed to burn him.

"If G.o.d'd jest do His part," he said darkly, "I wouldn't never git in no meanness."

After supper Miss Minerva washed the dishes in the kitchen sink and Billy carried them back to the dining-room. His aunt caught him several times prancing sideways in the most idiotic manner. He was making a valiant effort to keep from exposing his rear elevation to her; once he had to walk backward.

"William," she said sharply, "you will break my plates. What is the matter with you to-night?"

A little later they were sitting quietly in Miss Minerva's room. She was reading "The Christian at Home," and he was absently looking at a picture book.

"Sam Lamb's wife Sukey sho' is a beautiful patcher," he remarked, feeling his way.

She made no answering comment, and the discouraged little boy was silent for a few minutes. He had worn Aunt Cindy's many-colored patches too often to be ashamed of this one for himself, but he felt that he would like to draw his aunt out and find how she stood on the subject of patches.

"Aunt Minerva," he presently asked, "what sorter patches 'd you ruther wear on yo' pants, blue patches or brown?"

"On my what?" she asked, looking at him severely over her paper.

"I mean if you's me," he hastily explained. "Don't you think blue patches is the mos' nat'ral lookin'?"

"What are you driving at, William?" she asked; but without waiting for his answer she went on with her reading.

The child was silent for a long time, his little mind busy, then he began, "Aunt Minerva?"

She peered at him over her gla.s.ses a second, then dropped her eyes to the paper where an interesting article on Foreign Missions held her attention.

"Aunt Minerva, I snagged--Aunt Minerva, I snagged my--my skin, to-day."

"Let me see the place," she said absently, her eyes glued to a paragraph describing a cannibal feast.

"I's a-settin' on it right now," he replied.