"I dunno what mother 'd say if she was to find out about it," said Caleb, and he shook his head.

"Ezra Ray was the only one that was out there, an' he said he wouldn't tell."

"Well, mebbe he won't, mebbe he won't. I guess you most hadn't oughter gone unbeknownst to your mother, sonny."

"Barney's sled jest beat Ezra's all holler."

"It did, hey? That allers was a good sled," returned the old man, chuckling.

Caleb went into the pantry again, and returned rattling a handful of corn. "Want a game of holly-gull?" he asked. "I've got a leetle time to spare now while mother's gone."

"Guess so," replied Ephraim. He dragged his chair forward to the hearth; he and his father sat opposite each other and played the old childish game of holly-gull. Ephraim was very fond of the game, and would have played it happily hour after hour had not Deborah esteemed it a sinful waste of time. When Caleb held up his old fist, wherein he had securely stowed a certain number of kernels of corn, and demanded, "Holly-gull, hand full, passel how many?" Ephraim's spirit was thrilled with a fine stimulation, of which he had known little in his life. If he guessed the number of kernels right and confiscated the contents of his father's hand, he felt the gratified ambition of a successful financier; if he lost, his heart sank, only to bound higher with new hope for the next chance. A veritable gambling game was holly-gull, but they gambled for innocent Indian-corn instead of the coin of the realm, and nobody suspected it. The lack of value of the stakes made the game quite harmless and unquestioned in public opinion.

The waste of time was all Deborah's objection to the game. Caleb and Ephraim said not a word about it to each other, but both kept an anxious ear towards Deborah's returning sleigh-bells.

At last they both heard the loud, brazen jingle entering the yard, and Caleb gathered all the corn together and stowed it away in his pocket. Then he stood on the hearth, looking like a guilty child.

Ephraim went slowly over to the window; he did not feel quite so well again.

Deborah's harsh "Whoa!" sounded before the door; presently she came in, her garments radiating cold air, her arms full of bundles.

"What you standin' there for, father?" she demanded of Caleb. "Why didn't you come out an' take some of these bundles? Why ain't you goin' out an' puttin' the horse up instead of standin' there starin'?"

"I'm goin' right off, mother," Caleb answered, apologetically; and he turned his old back towards her and scuffled out in haste.

"Put on your cap!" Deborah called after him.

She laid off her many wraps, her hood and veil, and mufflers and shawls, folded them carefully, and carried them into her bedroom, to be laid in her bureau drawers. Deborah was very orderly and methodical.

"Did you take your medicine?" she asked Ephraim as she went out of the room.

"Yes, ma'am," said he. He did not feel nearly as well; he kept his face turned from his mother. Ephraim was accustomed to complain freely, but now the coasting and the mince-pie had made him patient.

He was quite sure that his bad feelings were due to that, and suppose his mother should suspect and ask him what he had been doing! He was also terrified by the thought of the holly-gull and her unfulfilled order about the apple-paring. He sat very still; his heart shook his whole body, which had grown thin lately. He looked very small, in spite of his sturdy build.

Deborah was gone quite a while; she had left some work unfinished in her bedroom that morning. Caleb returned before she did, and pulled up a chair close to the fire. He was holding his reddened fingers out towards the blaze to warm them when Deborah came in.

She looked at him, then around the room, inquiringly.

"Where did you put the apples?" said she to Caleb.

Caleb stared around at her. "What apples, mother?" he asked, feebly.

"The apples I left for you to pare. I want to put 'em on before I get dinner."

"I ain't heard nothin' about apples, mother."

"Ain't you pared any apples this forenoon?"

"I didn't know as you wanted any pared, mother."

Deborah turned fiercely on Ephraim.

"Ephraim Thayer, look here!" said she. Ephraim turned his poor blue face slowly; his breath came shortly between his parted lips; he clapped one hand to his side. "Didn't you tell your father to pare them apples, the way I told you to?" she demanded.

Ephraim dropped his chin lower.

"Answer me!"

"No, ma'am."

"What have you been a-doin' of?"

"Playin'."

"Playin' what?"

"Holly-gull."

Deborah stood quite still for a moment. Her mouth tightened; she grew quite pale. Ephraim and Caleb watched her. Deborah strode across the room, out into the shed.

"I guess she won't say much; don't you be scared, Ephraim," whispered Caleb.

But Ephraim, curious to say, did not feel scared. Suddenly his mother seemed to have lost all her terrifying influence over him. He felt very strange, and as if he were sinking away from it all through deep abysses.

His mother came back, and she held a stout stick in her right hand.

Caleb gasped when he saw it. "Mother, you ain't goin' to whip him?"

he cried out.

"Father, you keep still!" commanded Deborah. "Ephraim, you come with me!"

She led the way into Ephraim's little bedroom, and he stumbled up and followed her. He saw the stick before him in his mother's hand; he knew she was going to whip him, but he did not feel in the least disturbed or afraid. Ezra Ray could not have faced a whipping any more courageously than Ephraim. But he staggered as he went, and his feet met the floor with strange shocks, since he had prepared his steps for those deep abysses.

He and his mother stood together in his little bedroom. She, when she faced him, saw how ill he looked, but she steeled herself against that. She had seen him look as badly before; she was not to be daunted by that from her high purpose. For it was a high purpose to Deborah Thayer. She did not realize the part which her own human will had in it.

She lifted up her voice and spoke solemnly. Caleb, listening, all trembling, at the kitchen door, heard her.

"Ephraim," said his mother, "I have spared the rod with you all my life because you were sick. Your brother and your sister have both rebelled against the Lord and against me. You are all the child I've got left. You've got to mind me and do right. I ain't goin' to spare you any longer because you ain't well. It is better you should be sick than be well and wicked and disobedient. It is better that your body should suffer than your immortal soul. Stand still."

Deborah raised her stick, and brought it down. She raised it again, but suddenly Ephraim made a strange noise and sunk away before it, down in a heap on the floor.

Caleb heard him fall, and came quickly.

"Oh, mother," he sobbed, "is he dead? What ails him?"

"He's got a bad spell," said Deborah. "Help me lay him on the bed."

Her face was ghastly. She spoke with hoarse pulls for breath, but she did not flinch. She and Caleb laid Ephraim on his bed; then she worked over him for a few minutes with mustard and hot-water--all the simple remedies in which she was skilled. She tried to pour a little of the doctor's medicine into his mouth, but he did not swallow, and she wiped it away.

"Go an' get Barney to run for the doctor, quick!" she told Caleb at last. Caleb fled, sobbing aloud like a child, out of the house.

Deborah closed the boy's eyes, and straightened him a little in the bed. Then she stood over him there, and began to pray aloud. It was a strange prayer, full of remorse, of awful agony, of self-defense of her own act, and her own position as the vicar of God upon earth for her child. "I couldn't let him go astray too!" she shrieked out. "I couldn't, I couldn't! O Lord, thou knowest that I couldn't! I would--have lain him upon--the altar, as Abraham laid Isaac! Oh, Ephraim, my son, my son, my son!"