Frances, Lina, and Billy clapped their hands and laughed for joy.

With a terrified and angry shriek their victim, dripping water at every step, ran howling by his tormentors. When he reached a safe distance he turned around, shook a fist at them, and screamed back:

"My papa is going to have you all arrested and locked up in the calaboose."

"Calaboose, nothing!" jeered Jimmy. "You all time wanting to put somebody in the calaboose 'cause they mesmerize you. You got to be mesmerized 'cause it's in the Bible."

A short, stout man, dressed in neat black clothes, was coming toward them.

"Oh, that's the Major!" screamed Billy delightedly, taking the hose and squaring himself to greet his friend of the train, but Jimmy jerked it out of his hand, before either of them noticed him turning about, as if for something forgotten.

"You ain't got the sense of a one-eyed tadpole, Billy," he said. "That's Miss Minerva's beau. He's been loving her more 'n a million years. My mama says he ain't never going to marry n.o.body a tall 'thout he can get Miss Minerva, and Miss Minerva she just turns up her nose at anything that wears pants. You better not sprinkle him. He's been to the war and got his big toe shot off. He kilt 'bout a million Injuns and Yankees and he's name' Major 'cause he's a Confed'rit vetrun. He went to the war when he ain't but fourteen."

"Did he have on long pants?" asked Billy. "I call him Major Minerva--"

"Gladys Maude's got the pennyskeeters," broke in Frances importantly, fussing over her baby, "and I'm going to see Doctor Sanford. Don't you think she looks pale, Jimmy?"

"Pale, nothing!" sneered the little boy. "Girls got to all time play their dolls are sick. Naw; I don't know nothing a tall 'bout your Gladys Maude."

Lina gazed up the street.

"That looks like Miss Minerva to me 'way up yonder," she remarked. "I think we had better get away from here before she sees us."

Two little girls rolling two doll buggies fairly flew down the street and one little boy quickly climbed to the top of the dividing fence.

From this safe vantage point he shouted to Billy, who was holding the nozzle of the hose out of which poured a stream of water.

"You 'd better turn that water off 'cause Miss Minerva's going to be madder 'n a green persimmon."

"I do' know how to," said Billy forlornly. "You turnt it on."

"Drop the hose and run to the hydrant and twist that little thing at the top," screamed Jimmy. "You all time got to perpose someping to get little boys in trouble anyway," he added ungenerously.

"You perposed this yo'self," declared an indignant Billy. "You said Aunt Minerva's so 'ligious she wouldn't git mad."

"Christian womans can get just as mad as any other kind," declared the other boy, sliding from his perch on the fence and running across his lawn to disappear behind his own front door.

Holding her skirts nearly up to her knees Miss Minerva stepped gingerly along the wet and muddy street till she got to her gate, where her nephew met her, looking a little guilty, but still holding his head up with that characteristic, manly air which was so attractive.

"William," she said sternly, "I see you have been getting into mischief, and I feel it my duty to punish you, so that you may learn to be trustworthy. I said nothing to you about the hose because I did not think you would know how to use it."

Billy remained silent. He did not want to betray his little companions of the morning, so he said nothing in his own defense.

"Come with me into the house," continued his aunt, "you must go to bed at once."

But the child protested vigorously.

"Don' make me go to bed in the daytime, Aunt Minerva; me an' Wilkes Booth Lincoln ain't never went to bed in the daytime since we's born, an' I ain't never hear tell of a real 'ligious 'oman a-puttin' a little boy in bed 'fore it's dark; an' I ain't never a-goin' to meddle with yo'

ole hose no mo'."

But Miss Minerva was obdurate, and the little boy spent a miserable hour between the sheets.

CHAPTER VI

SUCCESSFUL STRATEGY.

"I have a present for you," said his aunt, handing Billy a long, rectangular package.

"Thank you, ma'am," said her beaming nephew as he sat down on the floor, all eager antic.i.p.ation, and began to untie the string. His charming, changeful face was bright and happy again, but his expression became one of indignant amaze as he saw the contents of the box.

"What I want with a doll?" he asked angrily, "I ain't no girl."

"I think every little boy should have a doll and learn to make clothes for it," said Miss Minerva. "I don't want you to be a great, rough boy; I want you to be sweet and gentle like a little girl; I am going to teach you how to sew and cook and sweep, so you may grow up a comfort to me."

This was a gloomy forecast for the little boy accustomed, as he had been, to the freedom of a big plantation, and he scowled darkly.

"Me an' Wilkes Booth Lincoln ain't never hafter play with no dolls sence we's born," he replied sullenly, "we goes in swimmin' an' plays baseball. I can knock a home-run an' pitch a curve an' ketch a fly.

Why don't you gimme a baseball bat? I already got a ball what Admiral Farragut gimme. An' I ain't agoin' to be no sissy neither. Lina an'

Frances plays dolls, me an' Jimmy--" he stopped in sudden confusion.

"Lina and Frances and James!" exclaimed his aunt. "What do you know about them, William?"

The child's face flushed. "I seen 'em this mornin'," he acknowledged.

Miss Minerva put a hand on either shoulder der and looked straight into his eyes.

"William, who started that sprinkling this morning?" she questioned, sharply.

Billy flushed guiltily and lowered his eyelids; but only for an instant.

Quickly recovering his composure he returned her gaze steadily and ignored her question.

"I see yo' beau too, Aunt Minerva," he remarked tranquilly.

It was Miss Minerva this time who lost her composure, for her thin, sallow face became perfectly crimson.

"My beau?" she asked confusedly. "Who put that nonsense into your head?"

"Jimmy show him to me," he replied jauntily, once more master of the situation and in full realization of the fact. "Why don't you marry him, Aunt Minerva, so's he could live right here with us? An' I could learn him how to churn. I s'pec' he 'd make a beautiful churner. He sho' is a pretty little fat man," he continued flatteringly. "An' dress? That beau was jest dressed plumb up to the top notch. I sho' would marry him if I's you an' not turn up my nose at him 'cause he wears pants, an' you can learn him how to talk properer'n what he do an' I betcher he'd jest nach.e.l.ly take to a broom, an' I s'pec' he ain't got n.o.body 'tall to show him how to sew. An' y' all could get the doctor to fetch you a little baby so he wouldn't hafter play with no doll. I sho' wisht we had him here," ended a selfish Billy, "he could save me a lot of steps. An'

I sho' would like to hear 'bout all them Injuns an' Yankees what he's killed."

Billy's aunt was visibly embarra.s.sed.

The persistent admiration of this, her one lover, had been pleasing to her, yet she had never been willing to sacrifice her independence for the cares and trials of matrimony. The existing state of affairs between the two was known to every one in the small town, but such was Miss Minerva's dignified aloofness that Billy was the first person who had ever dared to broach the subject to her.

"Sit down here, William," she commanded, "and I will read to you."