It'll make my belly ache."

Miss Minerva looked at him severely.

"William," she enjoined, "don't you want to be a smart man when you grow up?"

"Yes 'm," he replied, without much enthusiasm. "Well, jes' lemme ask Jimmy to come over here an' set on the other sider you whils' you read.

He ain't never hear 'bout them tales, an' I s'pec' he'd like to come."

"Very well," replied his flattered and gratified relative, "call him over."

Billy went to the fence, where he signaled Jimmy to meet him.

"Aunt Minerva say you come over an' listen to her read some er the pretties' tales you ever hear," he said, as if conferring a great favor.

"Naw, sirree-bob!" was the impolite response across the fence, "them 'bout the measliest tales they is. I'll come if she'll read my Uncle Remus book."

"Please come on," begged Billy, dropping the patronizing manner that he had a.s.sumed, in hope of inducing his chum to share his martyrdom. "You know Aunt Minerva'd die in her tracks 'fore she'd read Uncle Remus.

You'll like these-here tales 'nother sight better anyway. I'll give you my stoney if you'll come."

"Naw; you ain't going to get me in no such box as that. If she'd just read seven or eight hours I wouldn't mind; but she'll get you where she wants you and read 'bout a million hours. I know Miss Minerva."

Billy's aunt was growing impatient.

"Come, William," she called. "I am waiting for you."

Jimmy went back to his own porch and the other boy joined his kinswoman.

"Why wouldn't Jimmy come?" she asked.

"He--he ain't feeling very well," was the considerate rejoinder.

"Once there was a little boy who was born in Virginia--" began Miss Minerva.

"Born in a manger," repeated the inattentive little boy to himself, "I knows who that was." So, this important question settled in his mind, he gave himself up to the full enjoyment of his chum and to the giving and receiving secret signals, the pleasure of which was decidedly enhanced by the fear of imminent detection.

"Father, I can not tell a lie, I did it with my little hatchet,--" read the thin, monotonous voice at his elbow.

Billy laughed aloud--at that minute Jimmy was standing on his head waving two chubby feet in the air.

"William," said his aunt reprovingly, peering at him over her spectacles, "I don't see anything to laugh at,"--and she did not, but then she was in ignorance of the little conspiracy.

"He was a good and dutiful son and he studied his lessons so well that when he was only seventeen years old he was employed to survey vast tracts of land in Virginia--"

Miss Minerva emphasized every word, hoping thus to impress her nephew.

But he was so busy, keeping one eye on her and one on the little boy on the other porch, that he did not have time to use his ears at all and so did not hear one word.

"Leaving his camp fires burning to deceive the enemy, he stole around by a circuitous route, fell upon the British and captured--"

Billy held up his hands to catch a ball which Jimmy made believe to throw.

Miss Minerva still read on, unconscious of her nephew's inattention:

"The suffering at Valley Forge had been intense during the winter--"

Billy made a pretense behind his aunt's upright back of throwing a ball while the other child held up two fat little hands to receive it. Again he laughed aloud as Jimmy spat on his hands and ground the imaginary ball into his hip.

She looked at him sternly over her gla.s.ses:

"What makes you so silly?" she inquired, and without waiting for a reply went on with her reading; she was nearing the close now and she read carefully and deliberately.

"And he was chosen the first president of the United States."

Billy put his hands to his ears and wriggled his fingers at Jimmy, who promptly returned the compliment.

"He had no children of his own, so he is called the Father of his Country."

Miss Minerva closed the book, turned to the little boy at her side, and asked:

"Who was this great and good man, William?"

"Jesus," was his ready answer, in an appropriately solemn little voice.

"Why, William Green Hill!" she exclaimed in disgust. "What are you thinking of? I don't believe you heard one word that I read."

Billy was puzzled; he was sure she had said "Born in a manger." "I didn't hear her say nothin' 'bout bulrushes," he thought, "so 'tain't Moses; she didn't say 'log cabin,' so 'tain't Ab'aham Lincoln; she didn't say 'Thirty cents look down upon you,' so 'tain't Napolyon. I sho' wish I'd paid 'tention."

"Jesus!" his aunt was saying, "born in Virginia and first president of the United States!"

"George Washin'ton, I aimed to say," triumphantly screamed the little boy, who had received his cue.

CHAPTER, XXIV

A FLAW IN THE t.i.tLE

"Come on over," invited Jimmy.

"All right; I believe I will," responded Billy, running to the fence.

His aunt's peremptory voice arrested his footsteps.

"William, come here!" she called from the porch.

He reluctantly retraced his steps.

"I am going back to the kitchen to bake a cake and I want you to promise me not to leave the yard."