The boy rushed down the steps, and the Judge bent over Bethany. She had
no wrap on, and the pigeon loft was not kept very warm.

He looked at a thermometer over her head—fifty degrees.

“Child,” he said, gently shaking her, “wake up.”

She drowsily opened her eyes and murmured, “Birds of heaven.”

The Judge shook her again. “Come! Come! Don’t you want some Christmas
dinner?”

She staggered to her little feet. “O! is it you, Mr. Judge! I was
dreaming of you and the birds.”

The Judge smiled, took her hand, and conducted her down the steps, then
carried her in the house. Upon arriving inside they found Mrs. Blodgett,
who had just come from her midday Christmas dinner, eaten at her
daughter’s. She had been overwhelming the unfortunate Betty with
reproaches. If she, Mrs. Blodgett, had been at home the child would not
have been allowed to steal away and give everyone such an upsetting—just
like a careless, giddy girl, and she swept away the little child to make
her toilet for dinner.

From her store of clothes she managed to unearth another dress of the
grandchild Mary Ann’s, for Bethany appeared at the dinner table in pale
blue.

Very pretty she looked as she came gently into the dining room and
allowed old Higby to lift her to a seat beside the Judge.

The table was decorated with holly and red ribbons and a miniature
Christmas tree.

Bethany’s eyes shone brightly. At last she was wide awake, having had
sleep enough to last her for some time.

She said nothing, but her appreciation of her gay and brilliant
surroundings was so intense that, to the secret amusement of the Judge
and Titus, she made up her mind to have a participator—some one who was
not used to this style of living. Instead of waiting for the end of the
meal she put up her hand at once, drew out the ghost of the dead mouse,
and placed him behind a sprig of holly. All through the meal, from soup
to fruit, mousie had his share of what was going. Not a course did he
miss, and it was a very stuffed and overcome ghost that the child
finally wrapped in her handkerchief when they left the table.

The big parlor was lighted, the piano was open, and picture books and
games were laid out, but in some way or other the trio, after dinner,
drifted to the Judge’s study. There on the hearthrug by the fire, with
Princess Sukey, the two children, or, rather, the boy and the child, sat
and talked, while the Judge listened quietly from his armchair. Part of
the time Titus was shouting with laughter. In some marvelous way he had
got over all his bashfulness of the morning. Bethany was such a little
girl that it did not seem worth while to be afraid of her, and then he
was in honor bound to tell her about their visit to the Tingsbys.

Airy, she said, was the name of the eldest girl. Airy, nickname for
Mary, then came Annie, Rodd, Goldie, Gibb, and Dobbie.

“W-w-what’s Dobbie?” inquired Titus, “boy or girl?”

“Why, boy, of course,” responded Bethany, “didn’t you see him?”

“Y-y-yes, I saw a baby sitting on the floor, but I didn’t know which
name belonged to him.”

“Then you had to think a name to him,” said Bethany, dreamily.

“T-t-think a name—what’s that?”

“Why, you know that everything has a name,” said the little girl,
staring at him wonderingly. “There isn’t any ‘it’ about anything. If you
don’t know the name, you just give one.”

“O-o-of course, everything has a name,” said the boy, stoutly, “but if I
don’t know it I don’t give one. I wait till I find out.”

“I don’t,” she replied, shaking her head. “I give a name to everything.”

“Did you give me a name before you heard mine?”

“Of course,” she replied, with dignity.

“W-w-what name did you give me?”

“You won’t be cross?” she said, surveying him doubtfully.

“C-c-certainly not.”

“I gave you the name of Blackie,” she said, with a glance up at his dark
head.

Titus burst into a fit of laughter. “Y-y-you did that last night when
you were so sleepy?”

Bethany nodded her head. “I wasn’t too sleepy to think.”

“A-a-and now—what do you give me now?”

“I give you your own name,” she said, patiently, “but the other one is
in the top of my mind. I could call it down if I wanted to.”

“W-w-would you give this hearthrug a name?” asked the boy, teasingly.

She caressingly passed a hand over the red velvet pile. “Yes, boy, I
call this rug Red Heart.”

Titus did not laugh this time. He stared curiously and silently at her.

The Judge interposed a quiet question. “Did you think me a name before
you knew my real one, little girl?”

“Yes, sir,” she said, shyly, turning round to face him.

“What was it?”

“I called you Mr. White Tree because your white hair is so soft, just
like the blossoms on a little tree in the flower shop on Broadway.”

“Do you call me by that name, now?” pursued the Judge, curiously.

“No, sir.”

“What do you call me?”

She hung her head and twisted her fingers together. “Bethany would
rather not speak that name out loud,” she said, in a low voice.

“It isn’t Judge Sancroft, then,” ventured her senior, kindly.

She shook her head.

“W-w-whisper it,” proposed Titus, bluntly. “I’ve seen girls whisper
things when they would not speak them out.”

She mumbled something to herself that the boy could not hear.

“G-g-go say it in his ear,” stuttered Titus, impatiently.

Bethany looked shyly at the Judge.

“Come, if you want to,” he said, with a smile.

She edged up to him step by step. “It’s Daddy Grandpa,” she whispered in
his ear.

“Why Daddy Grandpa?” he whispered back.

“’Cause Bethany hasn’t any daddy and she hasn’t any grandpa, and she
likes to call you that.”

The Judge had noticed before that in moments of great embarrassment
Bethany often spoke of herself in the third person, therefore he
hastened to reassure her.

“You may call me that name all the time, dear child, if it will be any
comfort to you.”

A strange glow came over her face, apart from the glow of the firelight.
Poor little lonely heart, craving for natural relationship and sympathy!
However, she had been schooled to restrain emotion, and with a simple
“Thank you, sir,” she went back to the hearthrug.

“S-s-sir,” remarked Titus, “it’s getting pretty hot here, and that
pigeon is just roasting herself.”

The Judge wrinkled his eyebrows. “It is most unfortunate that that bird
has contracted the habit of sitting by the fire—most abnormal, most
abnormal. Open the window and see whether she will go out on the
balcony.”

Bethany, who had been sitting as close as possible to Sukey’s basket,
silently adoring her, moved back, and Titus got up and went to a window.

“C-c-come, Sukey.”

The pigeon understood him perfectly well, and, stepping out of her
basket, she walked round and round in a state of great indignation.
“Rookety cahoo! rookety cahoo!”

“Let her alone, boy,” said the Judge, “she won’t go out to-night, it is
too cold. If we insist, she will stand outside and tap on the window
until our nerves are upset. There, close the window. You have cooled the
room. We will keep doing that, in order that we may not suffer from the
heat.”

Titus concealed a smile as he looked out into the cold night. What a
change had come over his grandfather. Who would have imagined last
Christmas that this Christmas he would have a pet pigeon in his study?

“And now you had better go to bed, children,” said the Judge, as the big
hall clock struck ten. “Have you had a nice Christmas, little girl?”

Bethany went and stood beside his armchair. “Sir, it is the best
Christmas I ever had. I shall tell my mamma about it to-night.”

The Judge said nothing, but held out a hand to her.

She clasped his large fingers tightly in her tiny ones. “Good-night,
sir—may I say the name?”

“O, yes—decidedly.”

“Daddy Grandpa,” she murmured, “good-night, Daddy Grandpa. Now Bethany
is like other little girls. She isn’t all alone in the world, like a
poor stray cat.”

The Judge stared dreamily into the fire. What a strange child! He must
take the greatest pains to find a home suitable for her in every
respect.

                              CHAPTER VIII
                        TO ADOPT OR NOT TO ADOPT

“Are you going out?” asked Bethany, wistfully, of the Judge the next
morning.

She had breakfasted with the Judge. She had disappeared afterward to
visit the pigeon loft with Titus, and then when he left the house to
call on his friend Charlie she had gone to the Judge’s study to play
with Sukey. Now she stood regretfully watching him button on his
overcoat.

“Yes, I am,” he replied. “I have a call to make; would you like to go
with me?” he asked, as an afterthought.

Her little face beamed. That was just what she wanted.

“But you haven’t any wraps,” said the Judge. “However, I can bundle you
up in something, and Roblee will drive us to Furst Brothers. There we
will find everything under one roof. Here you are,” and, laughing like a
boy, he smothered her up in the fur coat that he intended to give
Mafferty and carried her out to the sleigh.

A quiet-living man, a man of simple pleasures, one who rarely
experienced new sensations, the trip through Furst Brothers’
establishment was as full of interest to the Judge as a voyage of
exploration would have been to another man.

First they visited the fur department, where Bethany stood in rapt
silence, with shining eyes which she sometimes tightly closed, and then
suddenly opened to make sure that it was not all a dream, while an
obsequious shopwoman tried on one little coat after another.

The Judge’s choice finally fell on a white one with a cap to match, and
Bethany was clad in it. The Judge directed the woman to let the coat
hang open, as the store was very warm. The little cap was put on,
however, and, tightly holding his hand and occasionally glancing down to
smooth the pretty blue satin lining, Bethany walked as if in a trance to
the shoe department.

There she was fitted with several pairs of shoes and slippers. Finally
rubbers were slipped on and a pair of warm, black, woolen gaiters
buttoned over them. Then gloves were chosen, and back they went to the
fur department to buy a little muff which the Judge had forgotten.

“As for dresses and undergarments,” he said to Bethany, “Mrs. Blodgett
must bring you here. Now we will go to see my friend.”

When they were again seated in the sleigh, and Bethany, with a bright
pink spot on each cheek, sat holding her hands tightly clasped in her
muff, the Judge said, “Did you ever hear of Mrs. Tom Everest while you
were living on River Street?”

The child shook her head.

“No; you would not. Well, I must tell you that she is a very charming
and philanthropic young woman, the granddaughter of a once eminent
jurist of this city.”

Bethany had very little idea of what her companion meant, but she
enjoyed being talked to as if she were a young lady, and she gravely
bent her head and said, “Yes, sir.”

“Her grandfather was a much older man than I am, but I well remember him
and his admirable wife, now also dead. Unfortunately, some time after
his death the family lost their money and went to River Street to live.
This girl Berty, or, rather, Mrs. Tom Everest, became greatly interested
in the poor people about her, and when she married she persuaded her
husband to come and live with her instead of moving to another part of
the city. They seem to be quite happy, and are doing much good. I am
going to see her to ask if she knows of any nice family where you would
have young children to play with and be kindly treated.”

“Me, sir?” ejaculated Bethany, faintly.

“Yes; my house is not a suitable place for you. You see, I thought you
were a boy when I brought you home.”

“A boy, sir?” said Bethany, still more faintly. “O, yes, I remember.”

“I wanted a companion for my grandson.”

“I like boys, sir,” murmured the little girl, weakly.

The Judge looked sharply down at her. The lovely color had faded from
her face. Large tears were rolling down her cheeks.

“You have surely not got attached to us in this short time,” he said,
wonderingly.

“It doesn’t take much to keep me, sir,” said Bethany, desperately. “I’ve
been trying not to eat too much—and mousie could get on with less. And I
can work, sir. Lots of times I’ve scrubbed down the stairs for Mrs.
Tingsby.”

The Judge made some kind of a noise in his throat and looked over the
shoulder farthest away from Bethany.

They were gliding swiftly through Broadway. O! the exquisite, clear,
cold air and the lovely sunshine. How good it was to be alive, even if
one were sixty-two; and he had just been stabbing this faithful little
heart beside him. But, pshaw! Nonsense! A child of seven formed no
strong attachments in a day. If he sent her away she would cling as
closely to a kind stranger as she now apparently did to him.

But Bethany was talking, very weakly and brokenly, but still talking,
and he must listen.

“Sir,” she murmured, “I could take care of the birds—those beautiful
birds, and if there was not room in the house I could sleep in that
lovely loft. I would not be nervous and cry, or make any noise to
disturb the horses. Only once in a while, when you were out, I would
like to creep in the house to see that little saint with the hood on.”

The little saint was Sukey, and the Judge smiled.

“Which do you love the best?” he said, sharply, “me and my grandson or
the pigeons?”

“The pigeons, sir,” she said, simply. “But before my mamma died she
said, ‘Bethany, when you grow up you will love human beings better than
the animals and the birds.’”

“Then why did you not stay at home with the birds this morning instead
of coming with me? You wanted to come, didn’t you?”

“Yes, sir. I don’t know what made me want to come, but when I heard you
putting on your coat I left the lovely bird and ran in the hall. It
seemed as if I would be lonely without you.”

The Judge smiled, a somewhat puzzled smile, and did not speak until
Roblee drew up in front of a large, old-fashioned, smartly painted house
on River Street, and said, “Mrs. Everest’s, sir.”

The Judge started, then he turned to Bethany. “Do you want to come in
with me?”

“I—I don’t just feel like it, sir,” she said, hesitatingly, and the
Judge saw that her cast-down face was again wet with tears.

“I will not be long,” he said, kindly, and he rang the bell.

“Yes, Mrs. Everest was at home,” a trim little maidservant informed him,
and she ushered him into a large room on the ground floor.

The painted floor of the room had only one rug, on which a fat baby was
sprawling. A wire screen before a blazing fire kept in sparks and
prevented the possibility of baby’s hands being burnt, or, possibly,
baby’s precious body, for he was alone for the moment.

Between partly open sliding doors the Judge saw in a second large room
an enormous Christmas tree loaded with gifts.

The air of the house was sweet and wholesome. Looking beyond the
Christmas tree, and through long windows which appeared to be
old-fashioned ones made larger, the Judge had a magnificent view of the
river.

“It is possible to be comfortable even on River Street,” he said,
standing with his back to the fire and obligingly giving one foot to the
baby, who was begging frantically for it.

“Good morning, good morning,” said a sudden gay voice, and a
half-girlish, half-womanly figure entered the room and took both the
Judge’s outstretched hands in her own. “The very best of Christmas
blessings on you!”

“And on you,” he said, heartily, “for you deserve them if anyone does.”

“Hush, hush,” she protested, blushingly, then motioning him to the most
comfortable of the many comfortable chairs in the room she took the
roly-poly baby on her lap.

“What do you think of Tom, junior? Isn’t he immense? You naughty baby,
your mouth is black again. He begs like a little dog for everybody’s
feet—licks the blacking off. Just imagine! Now, Judge, do you think
there is anything servile about me or Tom?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Well, this baby is an absolute lackey. Cringes and crawls to
everyone—hasn’t the spirit of a mouse. Fancy liking blacking and coal.
You young rogue!” and she shook him till the baby laughed in glee.

“He is a fine child,” said the Judge, “the picture of health. And now I
must not take up your time, for I know you are a very busy person. You
may know, or may not know, that for some time I have been looking for an
orphan boy to adopt.”

Mrs. Everest nodded her pretty black head. “Yes, I know.”

“I didn’t apply to you,” said her caller, “because I know your tender
heart. You occupy yourself mostly with the very poor. I wanted a boy of
some respectability.”

“Exactly. Baby, stop licking my belt. Did you ever see such a child?”

“On Christmas Eve, just two days ago,” continued the Judge, “I happened
to stumble on a child that I thought was a boy, but perhaps you know
about it,” for Mrs. Everest was laughing heartily.

“O, yes; River Street knows what River Street does.”

“Then I can omit that part. You know Mrs. Tingsby?”

“O, yes—know her and esteem her. She is a little shy of me because she
is so respectable and so self-supporting. She doesn’t want me to help
her. She thinks she would lose prestige as a boarding-house keeper.
Mafferty—Barry Mafferty, who runs our cat farm—was in last evening. He
gave a glowing account of your visit to Mrs. Tingsby. I wish you could
hear the nice things he says about you.”

“Has he gone back to his farm?” asked the Judge.

“Yes, we persuaded him to go this morning. He gets terribly bored on the
Island, and comes up occasionally to stay for a day or two at Mrs.
Tingsby’s. Then Tom and I have to watch him to see that he does not get
into the saloons.”

“I promised him a fur coat,” said the Judge.

“So he told me. If you leave it here I will see that he gets it.”

“Well,” said the Judge, “to come back to my affair. I don’t want to keep
this little girl. I want to find a good home for her, where her
sensitive nature will be taken into account. I thought perhaps you would
know of such a home.”

“Does she want to leave you?” asked Mrs. Everest, quickly.

“Well, no,” said the Judge, honestly, “I don’t think she does, neither
did she want to leave Mrs. Tingsby to come to me. Children are fickle.”

The pretty girl-woman shook her head. “Mrs. Tingsby’s was different. The
child had been brought up to believe that some day she would know
something better. You should have seen her mother. She was an exquisite
creature. Pale, and cold, and quiet, and shy, and aristocratic, and
making friends only with Mrs. Tingsby. I, in vain, tried to get
acquainted with her.”

“Did you know that Mrs. Tingsby allowed the child to work at making
paper boxes?” asked the Judge.

“No,” said Mrs. Everest, quickly. “She would not dare to have that get
to my ears. Do you know this to be true?”

“Yes; the child was staggering home when I found her.”

Mrs. Everest clasped her baby closer to her. “O, these poor people,
aren’t they extraordinary! Now, that woman’s false pride won’t allow me
to help her, and yet she lets this poor child work—and her own, too, I
daresay, for she would not require of one what she would not require of
the others.”

“I understood her to say that they all had work of some kind through the
Christmas holidays. Can you in any way get at the employers of this
child labor?”

“I shall make it my business to do so,” said Mrs. Everest, warmly. “I
shall go to see Mrs. Tingsby to-day and question her.”

“If you want money for prosecution, call on me,” said the Judge.

“Thank you, I will. Well, what are you going to do about the little girl
if you cannot find a home? Don’t send her back to Mrs. Tingsby’s. Give
her to me, rather.”

“This would be a charming place for her,” said the Judge, looking about
him. “I never thought of that. I don’t know anyone I would rather give
the child to than to you.”

“I should be delighted to have her,” said Mrs. Everest, heartily, “and
would try to make her happy; but in taking her I would not have you
suppose for one single instant that I think you are not a very suitable
and proper person to have charge of her. Do you know, I have often
wondered why you have not done more active charitable work. You are so
eminently qualified for it, and you have always been so generous and so
sympathetic in your donations, that we all know your heart is with us.”

The Judge sighed. “I have had a very busy life, and then my troubles
have made me egotistical. May I bring the little girl in for you to see
her?”

“Certainly, or let me ring. Daisy will get her.”

The happy-faced little maid, upon being instructed, quickly ran
downstairs and returned with Bethany.

Mrs. Everest put down the baby and went to meet her. “How do you do,
dear?” she said, kissing her. Then, drawing her to the fire, she took
off her gloves and rubbed her fingers.

“Why, you are quite cold,” she said; “quite cold, and you look forlorn.”

She took off the fur cap, and for a few minutes silently stroked
Bethany’s pale, unhappy cheeks. Then she whispered, “What is the matter,
darling?”

Not since her mother’s death had a lady, a genuine lady, put her arm
round the shrinking, sensitive child and whispered to her in tones sweet
and clear. Something in Bethany’s heart responded. She could not speak,
but she silently returned the pressure of Mrs. Everest’s hands and gazed
into her eyes in dumb misery.

The Judge, in the meantime, got up, walked about the room in some
embarrassment, and tried to avoid the overtures of the too-friendly
baby, who was creeping briskly after him, gurgling in his throat, and
begging for permission to play with his feet.

“What is the matter?” whispered Mrs. Everest, “is it that you don’t want
to leave the Judge and Titus?”

Bethany silently nodded her head.

“Would you like to come and live with me and be my little girl?” pursued
Mrs. Everest.

She felt the little form shrink within her arms.

“You would rather stay with the Judge?”

Bethany nodded again.

Mrs. Everest looked over her shoulder. “What do you call him?”

“My little pet name for him is Daddy Grandpa,” whispered the child,
brokenly.

“Then leave me, run right up to him, throw your arms round his neck, and
say, ‘Please, dear Daddy Grandpa, don’t send me away from you.’”

Somewhat to Mrs. Everest’s surprise, for she did not know what a relief
the suggestion was to the child’s breaking heart, Bethany broke from her
arms and rushed to the Judge, and, not being able to reach his neck,
clasped his coat, or as much of it as she could grasp, and fairly
shrieked in her nervousness, “Dear Daddy Grandpa, _please_ don’t send me
away from you.”

The Judge stopped short. His first thought was that the active baby had
risen and was seizing him. Then he looked down into Bethany’s agitated
face and said, “What! What!”

“Dear Daddy Grandpa,” she cried again; then her overwrought nerves gave
way, and she burst into a frantic fit of sobbing.

“She doesn’t want to live with me,” said Mrs. Everest, shaking her black
head, and as if remarking, “I am sorry, but it is no concern of mine,”
she sat down and took up her own baby.

Bethany was clasping the coat and crying as if her heart would break.

“Upon my word!” ejaculated the Judge. “Upon my word!”

This was his exclamation in moments of great perplexity. “Little girl!”
he said. “Little girl!”

This torrent of tears distressed him and made him vaguely alarmed.

“Bethany, child,” he said, in haste, “little girl, do you want to go
home?”

Home! That was the magic word that the child wanted.

“O, yes, sir; yes, sir!” she gasped, and with a hurried farewell to Mrs.
Everest the Judge picked up the sorrowful child in his arms and fairly
ran downstairs with her.

                               CHAPTER IX
                            ANOTHER SURPRISE

The Judge’s ship had sailed into clear waters—his venture of the other
day had, so far, proved eminently successful.

It was just one week after his call on Mrs. Everest. On his way home
that day with the disturbed Bethany nestling close to him in the sleigh
he had said to himself many times, “I don’t know what Titus will say—I
don’t know what Titus will say.”

Titus said very little. When his grandfather called him into his study
and told him that Bethany seemed to be greatly upset at the thought of
leaving them, Titus replied briefly, “T-t-then keep her, sir.”

“But the brother for you—the boy I was going to adopt,” said the Judge.

“I-I-I don’t want a brother, sir,” Titus returned; “never did want
one—a-a-am glad to get rid of the thought of one.”

“Then you like this little girl?” said the Judge, anxiously.

“D-d-don’t like her and don’t dislike her,” Titus replied. “She isn’t in
my way—isn’t bad as girls go.”

The matter ended here as far as discussion went, and Bethany slipped
into her place as a member of the household. She was a very good child,
quiet and well behaved, and insensibly she was becoming a great comfort
and a great amusement to the Judge. He loved to see her down on the
hearthrug playing with the pigeon and talking to her. For it was
absolutely necessary for Bethany to have a listener. She dreamed such
wonderful dreams and saw such astonishing visions that it took several
hours a day of some one’s time to listen to her.

Bethany felt that the pigeon was sympathetic. She always listened with
her greenish-yellow eyes bent attentively on her, and at times she
interposed a lively “Rookety cahoo!” So at least she was not asleep, as
the Judge sometimes was, when Bethany was relating her marvels.

She had soon got the Judge to show her the pictures of Ellen and Susie,
his two little girls that had died, and now nearly every night Bethany
fancied that she saw them. She described them dressed in their
old-fashioned little garments, their hair braided in little tails tied
with ribbon, their talk quaint and demure and seasoned with Bethany’s
maxims.

The Judge, touched and amused, listened to as many of her conversations
as he had time or inclination for, then he went to sleep, and Bethany
turned to the pigeon.

On this particular day the Judge was reading his morning’s mail.

Bethany had gone to school—the Judge had found a kindergarten round the
corner on a quiet street—and Titus was taking a lesson from a gentleman
who had effected a number of famous cures in cases of stuttering, and
who came all the way from Boston to treat him.

So far he had done no good. Titus was a mild, persistent, and consistent
stutterer. He never failed to hesitate at the beginning of a sentence
unless he was deeply moved about something—he rarely stopped in the
middle of one.

The Judge, fearing Higby’s bad example, had spoken of sending him away,
though it was with extreme reluctance that he even spoke of discharging
so faithful a servant. Titus’s teacher did not urge him to do so. He
said that Higby was a stammerer, while Titus, as yet, only stuttered.
The boy’s habit could be broken if he gave himself earnestly to breaking
it up. “Wait a little,” he said to the Judge. “He does not take himself
seriously yet. Wait till something rouses him and makes him coöperate
with me.”

“I should think that his comrades making fun of him would arouse him,”
said the Judge.

“It probably will, but later on,” replied the teacher, so the Judge was
obliged to possess his soul in patience.

On this morning Titus was to finish his lesson and then go to school. At
present he was in a small sitting room, while the Judge was in his study
just across the hall.

Presently the master of the house took up a note written in a dainty
feminine hand.

It was from the lady who was teaching Bethany. The Judge read it, then
he began to laugh. Mrs. Hume was speaking of Bethany’s facility in
making paper boxes; she was a marvelous, a wonderful child; she
outdistanced all the others. She was a prodigy.

The Judge laughed more heartily than ever. He could fancy demure little
Bethany’s slender fingers manipulating the too familiar cardboard. The
child had evidently not told her teacher where she had learned the art
of making boxes. She was an honest child, but she was inclined to be shy
with strangers. Just as well in this case for her to be so. Her
associates were mostly Grand Avenue children. Young as they were, they
might look strangely upon the little girl who had been obliged to earn
her living.

It was very amusing, though, to the Judge to read this lady’s gushing
remarks on the subject of Bethany’s dexterity. He laughed again, and
this time with such heartiness that he had to put up a handkerchief to
wipe the tears from his eyes. Then he somewhat ruefully surveyed the
remaining heap of letters.

“Who laughs hard prepares to cry harder,” he said, seriously. “There
will be something there to make me sad.”

There was. The next letter he took up caused his jaw to drop like that
of an old man.

He was absolutely confounded. He sat stock still, gazing with unseeing
eyes at the pigeon, who, sharp enough to perceive that there was
something the matter with him, flew up on the table, paraded over his
heap of letters and papers, and uttered an inquiring “Rookety cahoo?”

The Judge did not hear her, and yet he was listening intently. His own
door was ajar, and when a few minutes later the sitting room door opened
and Titus came out into the hall he called, weakly, “Grandson!”

Now he never said “Grandson!” unless something serious was the matter,
so Titus hastened to him.

“What is it?” he asked, forgetting to stutter as he always did when
greatly excited.

The Judge straightened himself. “I’ve had a blow. Read that—or listen.
The writing is bad,” and he threw himself back in his chair and, putting
on his glasses, took up the letter.

“Who is it from?” inquired Titus.

“Do you remember hearing me speak of Folsom, an old university friend of
mine?”

“The fellow that was so crazy about work among the poor?”

“The same. Poor Folsom, he was always an enthusiast, but I considered
him reliable. He became a clergyman and went to New York in connection
with the mission work of some church. Listen to what he writes:

“‘MY DEAR SANCROFT: What a whiff of good times I have had this morning!
I left the slums for a call on our dear old Georgeson of the Era, into
whose pockets my hand is permitted to go pretty freely. I found him
seated in his magnificent office, a financial king on his throne. He
showed me your letter to him about a boy to adopt. “Georgeson,” said I,
“I have just the thing.” He advised me to correspond with you, but what
need is there of correspondence when I have the very article you want.
An English actor died in my rooms the other day, a man of the highest
respectability. He left one lad—a jewel of a boy, fair-haired and
sunny-tempered. Just the companion you would wish for your own lad, who,
if he resembles his grandfather, will be dark as to hair and eyes. This
boy has absolutely not a relative in the world. He is a thorough
gentleman; you will love him as a son. I have not time to hear from you.
Will put him on one of the morning trains for Boston. You may expect him
some time Thursday. Don’t forget my work among the poor. God has blessed
you freely; freely give.

                                           “‘Your old friend,
                                                       “‘RALPH FOLSOM.’”

“Rattlebrain! Gusher! Enthusiast!” exclaimed the Judge when he finished.
His stupefaction was over. He began to be angry.

“Do you see he does not even ask to hear from me what I think of this,”
he went on, shaking the letter at Titus, who sat open-mouthed. “He is so
sure he is right. He always was—rushed headlong into every breach. I
would not have had him mixed up in this matter for a very great deal.
Georgeson is a foolish man not to keep his own council,” and in
considerable excitement the Judge got up and paced the floor.

“If I knew when he was coming I would meet him at the station and send
him right back to Folsom,” he said at last, stopping before Titus.

“Well, sir,” said the boy, “he’s got to come on the 10:30 or the 3:15.
If he comes on the 10:30 he’s here now. I’ll look out the hall window
now,” and he stepped outside.

“Jiminy!” he exclaimed, rushing back, “here’s an open sleigh coming full
tilt down the avenue with a boy in it.”

The Judge wheeled round as if to go into the hall, then he stopped
short. “I can’t see him. After all, it isn’t his fault, and he has been
lately bereaved. Do you receive him, Titus?”

“I-I-I was going to school,” said Titus, who, having recovered his
equilibrium, began to stutter; “shall I take him with me?”

“Yes, no; I don’t care,” said the Judge. “Tell him how things are if you
get a chance. I’ll see him at lunch.”

Titus darted out of the room, went running and limping down the stairs,
and was beside Higby when he opened the door.

A tall, pale, handsome lad in a thin light overcoat stood on the
threshold.

“Is this Judge Sancroft’s house?” he asked, fixing his bright blue eyes
on Higby and yet casting a glance beyond at Titus.

Higby nodded.

The boy turned, and the driver came running up the steps with a shabby
leather bag.

The boy himself was carrying in his hand a small padlocked wooden box
with a perforated cover. After paying the driver he followed Higby, who
was taking his bag into the hall.

Titus, in his confusion, was saying nothing, and the boy, turning to
him, remarked courteously, “I suppose you are Judge Sancroft’s
grandson?”

“Yes,” replied Titus, simply, “I am.” Then he continued staring at his
guest, until a half smile on the stranger’s face recalled him to
himself.

“Take off your coat,” he said, suddenly, “and come in to the fire. There
isn’t any in the parlor,” and he thrust his head in the doorway, “but
come in the dining room—there’s sure to be a good one there.”

The boy threw his thin coat over a hall chair, put his small wooden box
under it and his hat on top, then followed Titus.

“Are you cold?” inquired Titus, motioning his guest to one of the big
leather-covered chairs by the fireplace and taking the other himself.

“Not at all, thank you,” said the boy, but the hands that he held out to
the blaze were red and covered with chilblains, and Titus, remembering
his thin gloves, felt sorry that he had asked the question.

“I dare say you’re hungry,” observed Titus, suddenly. “I always am when
I’ve been in the train. What would you like? It’s a good while before
lunch.”

“Ah, thank you,” said the other, politely; “if I might have a little
meat, just a little.”

“Meat,” repeated Titus, “certainly. Higby,” and he turned toward the
man, who, with a face brimful of curiosity, was coming in with some coal
for the fire, “please have some meat brought up.”

“And have it raw,” said the stranger, with exquisite courtesy.

Titus threw a glance at the boy’s pale cheeks. He looked sick. Probably
he was taking a raw-meat cure.

“What kind of m-m-meat?” inquired Higby, goggling at the newcomer.

“Any kind,” replied the boy, smoothly.

“What’s your name?” blurted Titus, in an embarrassed manner when Higby
had left the room.

“Dallas de Warren.”

“Ah!” said Titus, and he drew a long breath. Then a succession of
confused thoughts began to pass through his brain. He was not a
brilliant boy, but he was not without shrewdness. He felt that the lad
before him, though perfectly calm and apparently happy, had been led to
expect a different welcome from this. The enthusiastic, elderly
clergyman in New York had probably told the lad that the two Sancrofts
would fall on his neck. What could Titus do to be more agreeable? He
would better apologize for his grandfather. The lad had not mentioned
him, but Titus felt sure that he was thinking of him.

“Dallas,” he said, bluntly, “my grandfather won’t be down till half-past
one. He is busy in his study—gets a lot of letters in the morning.”

“Indeed,” replied the boy, with a movement of his head like that of an
older person, “I can fancy that he is very much occupied. And then he
would hardly get Mr. Folsom’s letter saying I was coming until this
morning.”

“No, he didn’t,” said Titus, “he had just got it when you came.”

“Then I would be a kind of surprise to him,” said the boy, pleasantly,
and his big blue eyes fixed themselves calmly on Titus’s dark face.

The Sancroft boy was in torture. He felt himself growing crimson. His
cheeks would tell the whole story.

They did. The English boy understood. He was not wanted. However, his
manner did not change.

He coolly uncrossed his feet, put the left one where the right one had
been, so that it would get a little more heat from the fire, and
meditatively gazed at the leaping flames.

Titus, with a dull pain at his heart, noted that the boy’s shoes were
more than half worn. One of them, indeed, had a hole in it. Why were
things so unequal in this world? He never used to notice that there was
a difference between other boys and himself. Now he was beginning to see
that boys just as deserving as himself and Charlie Brown were shabbily
and insufficiently dressed. Why, this boy, for instance, had not enough
on to keep him warm. Why was it? Why had he no rich grandfather to
clothe him?

“Here is the meat, sir,” said Higby, trotting into the room with a plate
in his hand; “minced beef, sir,” and he respectfully put it on the table
near the English boy.

A shade passed over the stranger’s face. With all his self-possession he
could not help showing that he was disappointed.

“What’s wrong?” asked Titus, bluntly.

“O, nothing—nothing,” replied Dallas, with a wave of his hand. “Only
that I would have preferred it whole. I should have said so; it was
stupid in me.”

“Have you any more?” said Titus to Higby.

“Yes, sir; a whole joint.”

“Then take that away and get an uncut piece.”

The English boy’s face lighted up strangely.

“And, Higby,” said Titus, “bring crackers and something to drink. What
will you have, Dallas?”

“O, anything,” said the boy, politely; “any kind of wine—sherry,
perhaps.”

Titus drew his dark eyebrows together. “My grandfather is a strict
temperance man; won’t have wine in the house, even for pudding sauces.”

“O, indeed,” said the boy, lightly, and with veiled amusement; “well, it
doesn’t matter. Cold water will do, or a cup of tea.”

“We have homemade w-w-wines, sir,” said Higby, insinuatingly.

“Bring him some rhubarb,” said Titus; “that is good.”

Higby disappeared, and Titus sank back into his chair. There was a heavy
dew of perspiration on his lip. He did not like this business of
entertaining. What could he do to amuse his guest while Higby was
absent? Perhaps the new boy liked pigeons.

“I say,” he remarked, suddenly, “do you like any kind of pet birds?”

Dallas scrutinized Titus’s face intently before he replied; then he
said, “I’m awfully fond of them.”

“What kind?” asked Titus.

“Well, I like canaries and robins—”

Titus’s face was unresponsive, and the stranger went on, tentatively,
“and doves, and linnets, and thrushes, and mocking-birds—”

He had not struck the right kind of bird yet, and he put up a hand and
pushed back the light hair from his pale forehead.

“Cage birds, do you mean?” he said, courteously, “or yard birds?”

“I mean pigeons,” replied his host, dryly.

“O, pigeons,” said Dallas, with relief; “they’re my favorite birds. I
love them.”

He spoke so warmly that Titus’s heart was almost touched in one of his
tenderest spots. Almost, but not quite. He had a vague distrust of this
English boy, with his fine manners and his peculiar, lofty accent.
However, Titus felt ashamed of himself for this distrust, and therefore
said in a gruffly polite tone, “Want to see mine? I’ve got some
beauties.”

The stranger’s face clouded the very least little bit in the world.

“There are one or two things I should like to unpack first,” he said,
eyeing the tray that Higby was bringing in. “After that I should be
delighted—”

“Very well,” said Titus, “you eat your meat and I’ll go see what room
you’re to have.”

Catching sight of Mrs. Blodgett in the big upstairs pantry he rushed in.

“Blodgieblossom,” he said, “there’s a boy here—he’s going to stay all
night. Which room shall I take him to?”

“Bless me, Master Titus,” said the woman, withdrawing her gaze from the
china closet, “give me a little notice. The bed has to be aired and
clean sheets put on, and dusting to be done.”

“I tell you, he’s got to go in it now,” said Titus, imperiously. “I want
him to hurry up and come with me to the pigeon loft.”

Mrs. Blodgett smiled. She took to herself the credit of the acquisition
of so many handsome birds. Everything had to give way to the pigeons,
and, feeling in one of the pockets of her big apron for her bunch of
keys, she said, “You can follow me, dear lad, in five minutes to the wee
clock room. I guess that will do, won’t it?”

“Yes, if it’s large enough,” said Titus, doubtfully.

“It’s big enough for a night or two,” she said, easily, and she
proceeded on her way upstairs.

Near the front hall door she met Higby.

“Say,” he whispered, seizing her by the sleeve, “say, I believe the
Judge has ad-d-dopted another boy.”

Mrs. Blodgett could not speak. She stared at him silently for a few
instants, then with a strange weakness at her knees began ascending the
stairs.

Titus went back to the dining room. The new boy had eaten his crackers
and drunk the wine, but he had the plate of meat in his hand.

“I think I will take this upstairs,” he said, pleasantly.

“All right,” said Titus, and he slowly led the way to the hall.

Everything was gone that belonged to the boy—leather bag, coat, and
wooden box.

His face fell, and he looked almost angry.

“The servants have taken them up,” said Titus, noticing his
discomposure.

“O, very kind of them,” said the boy, hurriedly. “I am so unused to be
waited on,” and he went upstairs so quickly that, although not knowing
the way, he kept ahead of Titus.

Mrs. Blodgett and Higby were both fussing about the little room, where a
Swiss cuckoo clock hung in the corner.

The English boy tried to subdue his impatience as he glanced at them,
and as soon as they left the room he put his plate of meat down on the
dressing table and looked at Titus.

“Wants to eat alone like a dog,” thought the latter to himself, and
saying, “I’ll wait for you outside,” he walked toward the door.

He threw a glance over his shoulder before he went out and saw the
English lad go fussily toward the little padlocked wooden box that he
had been carrying in his hand when he arrived and carefully lift it to
the table beside the plate of meat.

“Must have some treasure in it,” murmured Titus, and he went on his way
to lounge about the halls, wipe the perspiration from his face, and
wonder what his grandfather would say to the English boy.

                               CHAPTER X
                            THE ENGLISH BOY

Bethany came home from school that day full of glee. She had gained a
little prize for good work.

“What kind of work?” inquired the Judge.

Bethany looked up at him and smiled—such a demure, knowing little smile.
Then she pressed his hand to her lips. “Making boxes, Daddy Grandpa.”

She was swinging on the Judge’s hand, leading him down to the lunch
table. Every day she ran up to his study at one o’clock when she came
from school. That gave her time for a little chat with him and a play
with Sukey before the bell rang for lunch.

She noticed that the Judge was graver than usual to-day, and she said
suddenly, “Are you ill, Daddy Grandpa?”

“No, child,” he said, slowly, but he immediately lapsed into gravity. He
always felt deeply mortified and ashamed of himself after any indulgence
in excitement or annoyance. He had been greatly disturbed this
morning—foolishly so. There was no necessity for annoyance. All that he
had to do was to take the affair calmly and to send the boy back.

So it was really with kindness and sympathy that he shook the hand of
the orphan lad standing beside Titus in the dining room.

The English boy was somewhat puzzled. At first he had been sure that
this old gentleman did not want him. Now he was not so sure about it, so
fatherly was the Judge’s manner.

Bethany was the life of the table. She was not a chatterbox, but she
possessed a peculiar mind, and what she said often amused the Judge and
always amused Titus.

The English boy was greatly taken with her. His glance rested often upon
her pretty brown head, and he secretly and bitterly envied her. Here, he
thought, in ignorance of her past life, is a child born to affluence and
delightful surroundings. How little she knows of the cold world and the
struggling for existence there.

Bethany was prattling about ghosts, one of her favorite subjects. Last
night she had talked with Ellen and Susie, the Judge’s two little
daughters.

“W-w-what were they doing?” said Titus, seriously. He did not dare to
jest upon such a subject, though sometimes his boyish soul was sorely
tempted to do so.

“Ellen, she had a little basket in her hands, and she was going to pick
blueberries,” replied Bethany. “She said, ‘Bethany, come with us.’”

“And did you go?” asked Titus.

“’Course I did; I, and Ellen, and Susie set out. We hadn’t gone far when
we met a lion.”

“A-a-a lion!” ejaculated Titus.

“Yes, a truly lion,” said Bethany, smiling enough to show two rows of
white little teeth; “a kind Mr. Lion. Said he, ‘Little girls, come with
me. I’ll show you where the blueberries grow.’ Ellen said, ‘Mr. Lion,
how do you know where the blueberries grow, because we haven’t any lions
in America.’ Mr. Lion said he had run away from a circus because the men
beat him and fired pistols at him, and he was living on blueberries, and
they were very sweet.”

“N-n-now, Bethany,” interposed Titus, “a lion is a meat-eating animal;
it couldn’t live on berries.”

“But, boy,” she replied (she often called him boy), with an obstinate
little shake of her head, “this was a ghost lion.”

“A dream lion, you mean,” said Titus.

She turned her clear eyes on the Judge. “You understand me, Daddy
Grandpa?”

Her faith in him was so great that he would not have had the heart to
shake it even if he had wished to do so. Therefore he nodded kindly, and
Bethany proceeded:

“The dear ghost lion took us on his back—Ellen and Susie and me—and we
hadn’t gone far before we met a bear.”

“A-a-a bear!” said Titus, in pretended surprise.

“Yes, a bad, bad bear. Said the bad, bad bear, ‘I am looking for little
girls.’

“Said the dear ghost lion, with a sweet roar, ‘What kind bf little
girls?’

“Said the big black bear, ‘Little girls who haven’t any home. I eat them
up, or I take them to my cubs in my den.’

“Said the good ghost lion, ‘Why don’t you eat little girls that have
good homes?’

“‘’Cause,’ he said, ‘’cause the fathers and mothers would be so, so
angry. They would come and hunt me and kill my dear baby cubs. I’m only
looking for little orphan girls. Answer my question quick: Have those
little girls on your back got any parents?’

“‘No,’ said the dear lion, ‘but they have the next best thing—they have
a Daddy Grandpa. He’ll kill you and eat your cubs if you dare to touch
them. Stand aside, wretch!’”

Titus, at this quietly dramatic command of the lion, became so convulsed
with amusement that Bethany, in confusion, stopped, and would not go on.

Titus, recovering himself, begged her pardon, but she was inexorable.

“’Ceptin’ Daddy Grandpa, no boy shall ever know what became of the good
lion and the bad bear,” she said, firmly, but without the slightest
resentment, for she immediately went on talking to Titus on other
subjects.

She did not seem to show much curiosity with regard to the English boy,
though he was gazing at her with the greatest amusement and interest.

Her prattle soothed the Judge; she was beginning to be a great comfort
to him. A little girl about the house was more company than a boy, and
she was quieter. He liked boys, and yet there were times when he would
just as soon have a whirlwind in his study as his dear grandson Titus.
Bethany was never noisy, never violent. She crept about the house after
him like a little mouse.

“Yes, dear,” he said; “what is it?” for she was patiently waiting for
him to answer some question. “May you go to drive with me this
afternoon? Certainly; it is much pleasanter to have a little girl than
to go alone.”

Then, for they had all finished eating, he got up from the table.

“I want to speak to you, my lad,” he said, laying a hand on the shoulder
of the English boy.

Titus looked pityingly after Dallas as the Judge led the way to the
large, handsome parlor—the one room that they all disliked, since there
was no woman in the house to give it a homelike air.

The Judge closed the door after him, then he turned to Dallas.

“My boy,” he said, kindly, “I am very sorry to inform you that you have
come here through a mistake. Mr. Folsom was not authorized to send you.
I do not see anything for you to do but to go back.”

Whatever the English boy’s feelings were, he bravely surmounted them
and, quietly bowing his head, he said, respectfully, “very well; I will
do as you wish.”

“You look pale,” said the Judge, kindly. “I do not think the air of New
York is good for growing lads, so if you wish I will allow you to stay
here a few days before going back to Mr. Folsom.”

The boy’s face flushed gratefully. “I am greatly pleased to accept your
offer, sir; I will stay gladly.”

“I will advise Mr. Folsom of my decision,” said the Judge, “so that he
can be making other arrangements for you. In the meantime, amuse
yourself as best you can. My grandson will, I know, do all he can to
entertain you,” and the Judge paused and glanced delicately at the lad’s
thin suit of clothes.

“I will take you to my tailor’s this afternoon.”

Dallas’s face became as red as fire. “I would rather not, sir; if I am
not to stay here I can accept no favors.”

“Nonsense, my boy,” replied the Judge. “By staying a few days you are
accepting a favor, and you are not suitably dressed for this cold
weather. If I were a poor boy, and you a well-to-do man, would you not
give me a suit of clothes?”

“Yes, indeed,” he said, earnestly.

“Then think no more about it. It is no disgrace to be poor. It is a
disgrace to suffer when friends are willing to relieve you.”

The Judge paused, and the interview was closed.

Dallas went away, and Titus was informed by his grandfather of what had
occurred.

“I want you to entertain him for a few days,” the Judge said.

“Very well, sir,” replied the boy, submissively, but there was no
pleasure on his face, nor graciousness in his manner.

“Don’t you like this boy?” asked the Judge.

“I don’t know him,” said Titus, gruffly.

The Judge pondered. Titus was not stuttering; he was disturbed in some
way.

“He speaks peculiarly,” remarked the Judge, “at least to our ears. We do
not hear very much that broad sound of the ‘a’ here.”

Titus maintained a grim silence.

“Suppose you were alone in the world?” suggested the Judge, softly.

“I’ll take care of him, sir,” said Titus, almost roughly, and he hurried
away.

He kept his word. For five days he was just as attentive to the stranger
as one lad could be to another. They were scarcely separated one hour,
and there was not a hint of discord between them. The Judge saw very
little of them except at meal times. He was struck by the exquisite and
unfailing courtesy of the newcomer. Nothing ruffled him, nothing caused
him to forget his good manners. They really seemed to be a part of him.
Sometimes the Judge felt a vague uneasiness that all this politeness hid
something that ought to have been revealed—that the boy was too
agreeable to be genuine. He was pretty sure that Titus agreed with him
in this, although he had never heard him discuss his new friend with
anyone.

“Titus,” he said one day when Dallas happened to be away with Charlie
Brown, “Dallas’s visit is drawing to a close. I hope that he considers
it a successful one.”

Titus gave him a peculiar look. “I think he does, sir.”

“The servants have been respectful to him, I hope.”

“They’ve got to be,” said Titus, grimly; “he has a way with him—”

“What kind of a way?” inquired the Judge.

“Hard inside and soft out,” replied the boy, “and his blood is blue.
Theirs is only red.”

“Is he proud of his culture?”

“He’s got a pedigree,” said Titus, gloomily, “a pedigree as long as your
arm, and he carries it in that old leather bag. It takes the de Warrens
away back to William the Conqueror.”

“Why, so have you a pedigree for that matter,” and the Judge smiled.

Titus looked up quickly, and the Judge opened one of his table drawers.
“When I was in England last I went to a heraldic office. I knew that
Sancroft was an old English name, and I wished authentic information
respecting our descent. There I saw our armorial bearings and got the
pedigree. Here it is.”

The boy eagerly took the long slip of paper.

“Do you see,” said the Judge, “you can trace your ancestry back to a
viking of Norway.”

“Hooray!” said Titus, suddenly brandishing the paper as if it were a
weapon, “farther back than his. May I show this to Dallas?”

“Certainly.”

The boy stopped on his way out of the room and said in an injured voice,
“Why didn’t you show me this before, sir?”

“I didn’t know that you would be interested,” said the Judge, in much
amusement. “We pay, or have paid, so little attention to such matters in
America. However, you are typical. The younger generation is thinking
more about ancestral descent than ever the older ones have thought.”

Titus ran away, and the Judge gazed thoughtfully out of the window.
Sukey was on the balcony nodding and bowing very energetically at a
number of common street pigeons who were very anxious to perch beside
her.

Higby had put her bath out in the sun, and it looked very attractive to
them, but she was determined that they should not bathe in her china
bowl.

One male pigeon lighted on the railing, and, strutting and talking to
the princess, at last persuaded himself that she was favorably inclined
toward him. He flew boldly on the edge of the dish. Whereupon Sukey ran
forward, seized him by the short, soft feathers of the neck, and in a
most unprincesslike rage shook him and dragged him about, until at last
he was glad to get away from her.

The Judge smiled and stepped out on the balcony.

He looked down on a calm, homelike scene. All about him were handsome
houses standing in their own grounds. The snow lay thickly over
everything now, even the trees were laden with it, but the winter scene
had a beauty of its own. The day was not cold; it was barely freezing.
Roblee was sweeping the concrete in front of the stable in his shirt
sleeves. Two of the maids were brushing a rug at the back door, and Mrs.
Blodgett was standing in the sunshine watching them, with nothing but an
apron thrown over her head.

Presently Dallas came through the stable and down the walk to the house.
The Judge noticed what a kind smile he threw each of the servants as he
passed them and how respectfully they eyed him.

He waited till he heard the lad coming up the stairs and through the
hall outside his study, then he stepped out to meet him.

How well the boy looked! His new clothes had come the day before. In
deference to his wishes, the Judge had ordered black for him. Dallas had
been very much touched—indeed, he had almost broken down—and he had
confided the information to the Judge that his inability to put on
mourning for his beloved father had been a great grief to him.

“Dallas,” said the Judge, kindly, “Mr. Folsom expects you to-morrow
evening. You must take the early morning train from here.”

A quick, heavy shadow passed over the boy’s face, but he said,
composedly, “Very well, sir. I shall be ready.” Then he passed on to his
room upstairs.

With a strange sinking of the heart the Judge paced slowly up and down
the hall. He was sorry to send the lad away, very sorry indeed, for he
feared that he did not want to go.

Presently he paused in his walk and went to the big hall window
overlooking the street. Where was Bethany? The mild afternoon was
drawing to a close. It would soon be dark; she ought to be in. Just
after dinner she had gone for a drive with him, then had asked
permission to take some flowers to a sick child a few doors away, but
she should have returned by this time. Ah! there she was, crossing the
street. But what was the child doing?

The Judge’s eyes were affectionately fastened on the little white-fur
figure coming toward the house. In the middle of the snowy avenue she
had paused. A coal cart, lately passing, had shaken off some black lumps
on the street. Bethany was surveying these lumps with interest. “Now,
what has she got in her little head?” thought the Judge with amusement.

Suddenly the child bent over. She carefully set down the little pink
beribboned basket in which she had carried the flowers to the sick
playmate, drew a tiny handkerchief from her pocket, and spreading it in
the basket she took off her gloves and was carefully lifting the lumps
of coal one by one, when she had two interruptions. The first came from
two ladies, neighbors, who were going to their homes near by. The Judge
saw them stop and speak to Bethany, then he opened the window.

In unconcealed amusement they were asking her what she was going to do
with the coal.

She seemed to be shyly evading their questions, and as they passed on
the Judge heard one of them say, in a clear voice, “How curious it is
that a black, dirty thing like coal should have such a fascination for
the average child!”

Bethany’s second interruption was not so easily put off. Mrs. Blodgett,
whose keen eyes surveyed not only the interior of the Judge’s mansion
but also its exterior and the avenue on which it was situated, had
espied the stray lamb, and the Judge saw her fat figure descending the
steps with considerable agility and pouncing upon Bethany.

“Here, dear child,” she said, “come into the house this minute.”

Bethany protested slightly, but Mrs. Blodgett calmly seized the basket,
turned it upside down, took her by the hand, and led her into the house.

Just before they arrived outside his study the Judge closed the window
and went inside beside his fire.

“Sir,” said Mrs. Blodgett, knocking on the half-open door, “can you
speak to this little girl?”

“Come in,” he said, and Mrs. Blodgett walked in, still holding Bethany,
who looked disturbed and a little rebellious.

“Now, sir,” said Mrs. Blodgett, decidedly, “I wish you would speak to
this little girl, for she don’t mind me. I’m tellin’ her all the time
that, though you don’t like wastefulness, yet meanness is hateful to
you, and she do the strangest things. She picks up coal and little bits
of sticks for the fire, an’ she goes round an’ smells the soap—”

“Smells the soap?” repeated the Judge, in bewilderment.

“Yes, sir; I caught her the other day. She were in your room. You know,
sir, you has in your bathroom sandalwood soap. Master Titus, he have
pure Castile; the strange boy he have common toilet; in the kitchen we
have Hittaker’s.”

“Ah! Hittaker’s,” interposed the Judge, “is that a good soap?”

“Fine, sir, for a cheap soap. But what I was goin’ to say is this: This
here little girl loves good soap, and, young as she be, she knows the
difference. She rolled your cake in these weeny hands, she put it to
that little nose, she wanted it herself, but what do she do? She slips
into your dish the little bit of sandalwood that I’d given her, she goes
to the upper hall closet an’ takes a cake of Hittaker to her own room.”

“Well!” observed the Judge, patiently. He did not understand what all
this talk about coal, and sticks, and soap meant, and he did not like to
see the sensitive child stand there looking like a culprit.

“Sir,” said Mrs. Blodgett, solemnly, “she be a-tryin’ to save.”

The Judge started. This threw a new light on the subject.

“Yes,” Mrs. Blodgett continued, “I know that this little girl has been a
poor little girl, but her mother were a lady. I can tell by her ways,
an’ I’m tired of tellin’ her that you don’t want her to be a poor little
girl no longer, a pickin’, tradin’, savin’ little girl. You does the
business. She has only to be good an’ not wasteful, but also not
beggarlike. What’s what in one place isn’t what’s what in another. She
have mentioned River Street. Now, River Street aint Grand Avenue.”

“Very well, Mrs. Blodgett,” said the Judge, with a reassuring nod, “I
will talk to her,” and in great relief the fat woman surrendered the
culprit to him and went away.

After the housekeeper’s departure Bethany advanced somewhat timidly to
the fire, and, taking off her cap, coat, and gloves, placed them in a
neat little heap on a chair. Then she looked up apprehensively at the
Judge.

“You’re not angry with Bethany, are you, Daddy Grandpa?”

“No,” he said, “I’m not angry.”

“We used to do it at Mrs. Tingsby’s,” she said, spreading her little
hands to the blaze. “Annie, and Rodd, and Goldie, and I used to take
little pails and go round the streets; on barge days we got lots.”

“What do you mean by barge days,” asked the Judge.

“Days when the barges came up the river with coal. Then the trucks took
it round the city. We followed the trucks. We could keep the kitchen
fire going for days. Lots of children did it, Daddy Grandpa.”

The Judge was ominously silent, and Bethany went on in a depreciatory
way. “Mrs. Tingsby was very good to me. When my mamma died she said,
‘You must do all you can to help her, but do not go round to the hotels
with her.’”

“To the hotels?” repeated the Judge.

“Yes, sir; to the back doors. They give poor people leavings from
plates. Mrs. Tingsby used to get quite nice things sometimes, such as
turkey slices, broken cake, perhaps even whole mutton chops, fish heads
and tails, cut apples, decayed bananas, melted ice cream, lumps of
pudding—”

“Stop!” implored the Judge.

Bethany looked up at him quietly, for she had been gazing at the fire
and speaking in a dreamy fashion.

“They were very good, sir. Once I found a little turnover in a pail Mrs.
Tingsby brought home—the sweetest little turnover I ever ate. There were
lots of surprises. You know Jimmy Fox, the dog man, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t know him.”

“Well, he has lots of dogs, and he lives out the back road near the iron
works. Jimmy always carried a bag; Mrs. Tingsby, she took a pail. One
night Jimmy got a whole rabbit. He was so pleased; but Mrs. Tingsby said
there must have been something the matter with that rabbit, or they
wouldn’t have given him a whole one. However, Jimmy didn’t die, and he
ate it. She saw him.”

The Judge tried to smile, but he could not. He did not find Bethany’s
reminiscences at all amusing.

“Child,” he said, suddenly, “promise me that you won’t pick up any more
coal.”

Bethany looked at him in surprise. “Why, course not, Daddy Grandpa, if
you don’t want me to.”

“And take the soap Mrs. Blodgett gives you; don’t use Hittaker’s.”

“Very well, Daddy Grandpa,” she replied, quietly. “Has Bethany been a
bad girl?”

“No, child, no; but it is not necessary for you to be so economical.”

“I don’t know what that means.”

“It means saving. Do you think that Titus ought to go and pick up sticks
for the fire?”

“No, sir.”

“Why not?”

“Because he isn’t a little poor boy. He is your very own child.”

“Yes, he is my very own grandson, and you are my very own
granddaughter.”

She took a quick step toward him, and in her excitement made one of her
rare slips in speaking. “But he was borned that way.”

“And you are made that way,” said the Judge, firmly. “I make you my
little granddaughter. Unless the Lord takes my money away from me, you
will never have to pick up coal again.”

“I didn’t think you would send me back to River Street, Daddy Grandpa,”
she said, earnestly.

The Judge was silent, not knowing what turn her thoughts would take.

“I thought I was your little girl,” she went on, earnestly, “your little
poor girl. I picked up sticks and coal to help you. It is a good deal
for you to take a little poor girl when you have a rich boy to keep up.”

“Child,” said the Judge, firmly, “I don’t wish any distinction to be
made. You and Titus are on the same footing.”

Bethany made a little obstinate movement of her neck. “My mamma told me
all about it, sir. She said, ‘Bethany, when I am dead, remember a
’dopted child isn’t like a real child. She must be sweet, and good,
because people are watching her. She must save everything, even a pin.
She must say every day, “Lord, keep me gentle like a lamb.”’”

The Judge, somewhat disconcerted, said hastily, “I wish your mother had
not told you that.”

Bethany shook her head patiently. “You are very kind, sir, but you can’t
change me—I’m only ’dopted. I’m not borned your really grandchild.”

Her companion was silent for a few minutes, musing on the enormous power
of early impressions and maternal influence. At last he said, somewhat
impatiently, “Then I suppose that as I am not your real grandfather you
do not care much for me.”

Bethany had begun to carefully stack her little arms with her wraps to
take upstairs, but she suddenly laid them down again.

“Sir,” she said, facing him once more, “last night I said to Ellen and
Susie, said I, ‘Girls, you must have been dreadful fond of your dear
grandpa, who was your real grandpa, when I am only his play grandchild,
and I just love him—just love him,’” she repeated, earnestly.

The Judge looked down at the little face glowing in the firelight.

“You are a good child,” he said, softly, and he bent over and kissed her
forehead; “whatever you say, you are my own dear granddaughter after
this.”

She smiled happily, then bent in a reproving way over the pigeon, who
had come in and was pecking at one of her gloves that had fallen on the
hearthrug.

“Little saint, you must not soil Bethany’s glove. You are a rich bird,
and do not understand that poor little girls have to be careful of their
clothes.”

Sukey seized the glove and did her best to toss it into the ashes.

Bethany patiently took it from her, then she looked round. “Daddy
Grandpa, where is Sukey’s pincushion? She wants something to play with.”

The Judge took the cushion from a drawer and put it on the hearthrug,
and the pigeon, trotting over to it, began to pull out the large-headed
pins and throw them about the carpet.

“I’ll pick them up,” said Bethany, “just as soon as I put my things
away,” and she again filled her arms with her wraps, the Judge agreeably
placing the cap on the top of the pile.

“Good-bye,” she said, sweetly, “I’ll soon be back.” Then she bent
forward and looked mysteriously out into the hall, which Higby, strange
to say, had not yet lighted.

“What do you see?” asked the Judge.

“The yellow, spotted dog,” she replied, in a whisper. “I just caught one
little glimpse of his tail. He’s running upstairs. Maybe I’ll find him
under my bed.”

The Judge watched her toiling up the staircase. What a strange child! He
had never heard her express any fear of the darkness. Indeed, it was so
peopled with ghosts and fancies that he doubted if it had any terrors
for her. It was rather filled with companionship. He often heard her
talking to Ellen and Susie, to her mother and the yellow, spotted dog.
Then he must also take into consideration that she was the child of
poverty. Children nursed in the lap of luxury can afford to have nerves.
The children of the poor must steel themselves to privations. Bethany
had never been accustomed to lighted halls till she came here.

Dear little child! What kind of a woman would she make; and as the Judge
went back into his study he put up a fervent prayer, “O! Lord, let me
live till I see what is to become of my own child and the child of my
adoption.”

                               CHAPTER XI
                         DECEIT AND FORGIVENESS

Every morning before breakfast Titus went out to see his pigeons. He
really had not time to do much more than look at them, for he was not an
early riser. His real work in taking care of them was accomplished in
the afternoon, at the close of school.

Bethany had found out about this habit of his of visiting the pigeon
loft, and when he left his room in the morning he always found her
loitering outside, waiting for an invitation to visit the “dear birds.”

“Come on,” Titus always said, and taking her hand he would run out to
the stable.

The pigeons knew her as well as they knew him, and he often allowed her
to give them a few handfuls of hemp seed. This seed, being of an oily
nature, was not fed continuously to them, but they dearly loved it, and
when Bethany stretched out her palms the pigeons flocked round her.

She shivered with delight when she felt their soft necks against her
fingers, and she never laughed lest she should frighten them, although
Titus, standing in the background, was often convulsed with amusement.

The pigeons, in their anxiety to get the seed, would crowd each other.
Then there would be fights. The combatants, withdrawing from the others,
would seize each other by the heads and drag each other about, finally
coming back to find all the seeds gone. Their rueful faces when they
contemplated Bethany’s empty palms were very amusing, and with a foolish
air they always listened to the little girl’s gentle reproaches on the
subject of quarreling.

Sometimes they had dances. That was their nearest approach to play. If
they were particularly hungry when they saw Bethany coming with the hemp
seed, they would all flap their wings and dance about her, often lifting
themselves off their feet and turning round and round.

Since Dallas had come to Riverport he, too, had formed the habit of
going out to see the pigeons, but on the morning of the day on which he
was to leave, Titus and Bethany did not find him waiting for them.

“I-I-I don’t expect him,” said Titus. “I hope—I mean, I think—he’s
packing. His train leaves in an hour and a half. Come on in, Bethany.
I’ll run up and see if I can’t help him.”

Bethany trotted into the house and went into the dining room. The Judge
was just entering it, and presently the servants filed in for prayers.

After prayers came breakfast, and then as the Judge and Bethany sat at
the table Titus entered with a slow step and a rueful face.

“Dallas is ill, grandfather,” he said, slowly.

The Judge looked up. “What is the matter with him?”

“I don’t know, sir,” said Titus, in a peculiar manner. “His face is red,
and he keeps his head under the bedclothes.”

“He was quite well last evening,” said the Judge, and his mind ran back
to the night before, when, to his great relief, the English boy had been
cheerful and entertaining, instead of moping, as he had feared he would
do when he was informed that he must go back to New York.

“Yes, sir,” said Titus, “he played those games fast enough.”

“Perhaps he has taken cold,” said the Judge; “I will go up and see,”
and, throwing his napkin on the table, he went slowly upstairs.

Dallas was red and feverish, and his eyes were bright.

“Have you a headache?” asked the Judge.

“A splitting one,” replied the boy.

“And a pain in your back?”

“Fearful pain,” and the boy groaned.

“I will send for a doctor,” said the Judge. “Will you eat anything?”

“O, no, no; thank you,” and he shook his head.

The Judge went downstairs and telephoned to his physician. Then he went
back to the dining room and finished his breakfast.

As he left the dining room the doctor arrived. Not his own family
physician, to the Judge’s disappointment, but his assistant.

“I wished to see Dr. Moberly,” he said to the young man, who pleasantly
informed him that Dr. Moberly was in New York.

The Judge said nothing, but on accompanying him to the English boy’s
room he saw that the young man was considerably puzzled by the case.

One minute he said he thought the lad was sickening for measles, then he
inclined to scarlet fever, then to a feverish cold.

The Judge kindly but firmly told him that he would not require him to
prescribe for the case, and, bowing him out, he again went to his
telephone.

He would request the superintendent of the City Hospital to call. He had
been greatly impressed by his knowledge of boys.

An hour later Dr. Reynald drove up.

“Against my rules, you know,” he said, shaking his head at the Judge;
“no private practice, but I couldn’t refuse you. What do you want?”

The Judge told him. “I have an English boy staying with me. He was to
have gone to New York this morning. He is ill and can’t go; won’t eat,
and I am anxious about him.”

“Take me to him,” said Dr. Reynald.

They went upstairs together, and Dr. Reynald, after giving a sharp
glance round his patient’s room, went to the windows and pulled back the
curtains. Then he sat down by the bed and fixed his bright, gray eyes on
the boy.

Dallas became a more furious red than ever under his glance, and when
the doctor said, “Let me feel your pulse,” he half hesitated.

Dr. Reynald, however, gave a peremptory tap on the bedclothes, and the
boy put out his hand.

It was only detained a short time. The doctor bent over him, passed a
hand over his forehead, whispered a question, to which the boy gave a
reluctant reply, then, getting up, he nodded to the Judge and went out
of the room, followed by an ashamed, despairing glance from his patient.

The Judge took him in his study and shut the door. “Nothing dangerous, I
hope; not smallpox, for example.”

“Worse than that,” replied Dr. Reynald, shortly.

“Worse? What can it be?”

“A touch of moral leprosy—the boy is shamming.”

“Shamming!” exclaimed the Judge.

“Yes. I don’t know the reason; perhaps you can tell me.”

“He looks sick,” said the Judge, uneasily. “I don’t want to distrust
your word, but is it possible that you are mistaken?”

“Not possible. We sometimes have such cases at the hospital. Then I made
him confess himself that he was. Tell me something about this boy.”

The Judge immediately told him all that he knew, and he had only uttered
a few sentences when he became convinced that Dr. Reynald was right.

“It’s the old, old story,” he said, when he had finished what he knew of
Dallas’s antecedents. “I ought to know it better than most people. It is
easier to do wrong than to do right.”

Dr. Reynald smiled. “Yes, you ought to know; and yet I envy you your
beautiful faith in human nature which you have kept, in spite of your
profession.”

“God knows I have tried to hold on to it,” said the Judge, earnestly. “I
would be willing to lie down and die if for a moment I gave up my belief
that there is good in every human heart.”

“This is not a heinous case,” said Dr. Reynald. “In fact, it is rather
flattering. That storm-tossed lad finds this a quiet haven. He dreads to
leave it.”

“But his duplicity,” said the Judge. “I must be severe with him for
that. Now, evidently last evening when I told him he must leave he was
much shocked. Yet he hid his real feelings.”

“He was thinking out a plan,” said Dr. Reynald. “He is a skillful
diplomat. What are you going to do with him?”

“Tell him to get up and take the train for New York,” said the Judge,
firmly.

“And let him come back again next week.”

The Judge smiled.

“Come, now,” said Dr. Reynald, “confess that you are slightly pleased—an
old fellow like you finding a slip of young life clinging to you.”

The Judge laughed outright. “Ah! doctor, it is my environment that the
boy likes. His poor young soul craves comfort.”

“Not altogether,” and Dr. Reynald shook his head obstinately. “I’ve seen
luxurious interiors where a boy slip would not want to take root.
There’s something about you, Judge, attractive to young life. You ought
to have a dozen youngsters.”

His friend stretched out his hands. “Heaven forbid! but I will confess
it caused me a pang to send this boy back to the New York whirlpool.
Perhaps I am not sorry to shelter him for a time. Something else may
turn up for him. Would you like him?”

“No, thank you,” said Dr. Reynald, politely. “A hospital home and an old
bachelor father would be cold comforts for your boy. No, keep him, but
try to break him of that iniquitous habit of shamming.”

“Do you suppose he has been deceiving in other things?” asked the Judge,
anxiously.

“You said he had eaten no breakfast?”

“Yes, I did. He has eaten nothing this morning.”

“He has been cramming himself with soda crackers. I smelt them on his
breath.”

“But I cannot bring up such a boy as this with Titus,” remarked the
Judge, indignantly.

“Do you think he can deceive your grandson as easily as he deceives
you?” asked the doctor, sharply. “Ah! the _finesse_ of youth—nothing
equals it but the equal understanding of youth.”

The Judge reflected for a minute. Titus’s manner had been very peculiar
when he announced Dallas’s illness. He had also gone off to school
without showing any particular concern about the English boy.

“I believe Titus knew,” exclaimed the Judge.

“I believe he did,” said Dr. Reynald, coolly, “from what I know of
Titus. Don’t distress yourself about a little lying. Children all take
to it as ducks to water. The main thing is to get them out of it, before
they get their feathers wet—and it takes a lot of soaking to wet them.”

“Titus is no story-teller,” said the Judge, thoughtfully, “though he
does other provoking things.”

“How old is he?”

“Fourteen.”

“Then if he has not acquired the habit of lying he won’t get it now.
Don’t be afraid of the English boy, Judge. Give him a chance. It’s an
awful world for motherless and fatherless lads. I see them on the rocks
every day.”

“But I ought to send him back to New York,” said the Judge, weakly.

“No such thing. Go upstairs, give him a tremendous scolding, then
forgive him. You’re not bound to keep him if he proves outrageous. But
he won’t. He’s a delicate slip; he’s looking for some soft corner to
creep into like a sick cat or dog. Put yourself in his place, Judge; put
yourself in his place.”

The Judge did, and he shivered. “I will let him stay,” he said,
suddenly, “on your recommendation, but he must be talked to.”

“Good-bye,” said Dr. Reynald, with a mischievous face, “good-bye. Let me
know when you have a serious case again,” and he hurried out into the
hall and downstairs.

The Judge went thoughtfully up to Dallas’s bedroom.

The boy was half dressed, and when his friend and protector came into
the room he sank on the bed in an attitude of the deepest dejection.

From the depths of his good, kind heart the man was glad to see that the
boy was desperately ashamed of himself.

“Dallas,” he said, kindly, “what have you to say for yourself?”

“Nothing, sir, nothing,” said the lad, turning his face away.

“You have deceived me,” said the Judge, softly.

“Yes, I have deceived you,” said the boy, in a dull voice.

“You feel badly about it?”

“I don’t know,” said Dallas, wearily. “I suppose I do. I am so tired,
sir. I have heard my father speak of hunting in England. The fox turns
and twists; he does not know where to go.”

The boy’s attitude was so listless, his manner so utterly dejected, that
the Judge’s heart was touched with pity. No frantic protestations of
regret, no tears would have appealed to him as did this simple
hopelessness. The boy was done with stratagems.

“Dallas,” he said, gently, “do you like my grandson?”

“Pretty well, sir.”

“You have pretended to like him better than you do?”

“Yes, I have.”

“You have been making yourself agreeable, hoping that I would change my
mind about adopting you?”

“Yes, I have,” he replied, bitterly.

“And when you found you had to go back to New York, what did you plan to
do?”

“I didn’t plan to do anything,” said the boy, in a low, fierce tone.
“What could I do? Your friend, the clergyman, is as poor as a church
mouse; he couldn’t keep me. I’d have to work in some low, dirty place.
O, Lord! I wish I had strength enough of mind to poison myself.”

“Dallas,” said the Judge, “are you a lazy boy?”

“Is it laziness to hate smelling, poverty-stricken people and their
queer ways, to dread to rub elbows all the time with men and boys that
talk horrid, vulgar talk, and that don’t understand you?” asked the boy,
almost rudely.

“I asked you whether you disliked work,” said the Judge, firmly.

The boy stared at him. “I like to study, to handle nice, clean books and
hear nice, clean language; but what does it matter what I like? You have
washed your hands of me,” and, dropping his head, he miserably toyed
with an open penknife that he held in his hand.

The knife was red and stained, and the Judge eyed it suspiciously.
“Dallas,” he went on, decidedly, “deceit is easier to some natures than
to others. I want you to tell me in just how many ways you have tried to
make things appear other than they are since you have been here.”

The boy got up in a tired way, sauntered to a closet, and opened the
door. “There!” he said, bringing out a small box and setting it down on
the floor. “I’ve deceived you all about these ever since I came,” and
taking a little key from his pocket he opened the padlock on the box and
threw back the perforated lid.

The Judge started. There on a perch in the box sat two tiny owls—the
softest, grayest little owls he had ever seen. They sat close to each
other, seemingly not at all afraid, but fixing their large, beautiful
round eyes on Dallas they uttered a simultaneous and soft “Too whoo,
whoo, whoo whoo!”

“Well!” exclaimed the Judge, “well!”

“They are California screech owls,” said the boy, in a dull voice; “my
father’s pets. He loved birds, and bought these once in San Francisco
when he was touring. When he died he asked me to take care of them, and
I have done so for his sake, though I hate them.”

“You hate them!” said the Judge. Was it possible that he had at last
found a young person that did not like birds?

“Yes, I hate them,” said the boy, energetically. “I hate all birds. I’ve
been pretending to like pigeons to curry favor with your grandson. It
doesn’t matter about speaking the truth now that I am going away.”

The Judge looked from the bits of raw meat in the box to Dallas’s red
penknife.

“Where do you get food for them?”

“I buy meat or beg it; and, in fact, all the family but Titus think that
I’m taking a raw-meat cure. Titus caught on to me, though I don’t know
whether he understands what kind of creatures I’m feeding.”

“I hope you don’t keep them in that little box at night?”

“O, no; I let them fly about my room at night. They sleep all day.”

The Judge put on his eyeglasses and stared at the little feathered
creatures, who were sleepily blinking their eyes.

“Would they fly away if you let them out?”

“I don’t think so, sir. My father used to let them out at night, and
they would catch sparrows and bring them to our room and eat them.”

“How curious!” remarked the Judge. Then he went on, “We have no cats
about the house. Let them have their liberty, but give them plenty of
meat. We have not too many sparrows here.”

Dallas looked sharply at him, but the Judge, taking no notice of his
glance, calmly put his glasses in their case and returned them to his
pocket. Then he said, irrelevantly, “Dallas, are you wholly English?”

“No, sir; only on my father’s side. My mother was a Western girl.”

“Has she any relatives living?”

“Only distant ones, and all poor as poverty.”

“How long has your father been dead?”

“Three months.”

“You missed him when he died?”

The boy gave him a look, such a look of utter, hopeless grief, of
unavailing, stifled grief, that the Judge’s kind heart ached with a
sudden ache of pity and comprehension.

“Boy,” he said, “you want a new father.”

“Ah! that is something I shall never have,” exclaimed Dallas, his whole
soul rising in a protest of misery and revolt.

“Here is an unworthy substitute,” said the Judge, quietly tapping his
breast. “Stay with me, Dallas; be my boy.”

The lad once more looked at him. He was more demonstrative than Titus.
If conditions had been a little different he would have thrown himself
on the neck of the kind man before him, he would have sobbed out some of
his unhappiness to sympathetic ears. But the Judge was a comparative
stranger to him, and he was so miserable, and so ashamed of himself,
that it seemed as if he could not be happy for a time at least.

“Get back into bed,” said the Judge, softly. “You are tired and worn out
from mental stress and worry. Your meals will be served here to-day.
To-morrow, if you feel like it, come downstairs and take your place
among us. Only one thing I ask of you—be honest with me, Dallas. Will
you, my boy?”

The lad turned and threw himself full length on the bed. His whole frame
was shaking, and he could not utter a word.

The Judge did not insist, for he was a wise man. Softly closing the
door, and gently shaking his head, he went slowly downstairs.

                              CHAPTER XII
                         THE YELLOW SPOTTED DOG

“I wonder what Titus will say?” muttered the Judge to himself. “I wonder
what Titus will say? Perhaps I should have waited to ask him.”

“Titus,” he said, when his grandson returned home from school, “what do
you think of the English boy?”

Titus grinned, then he said, “How is he?”

“Did you think he was very ill?” inquired the Judge.

“You’re going to keep him,” said Titus, bluntly. “I knew you would. I
knew he would get round you.”

“Do you like him?” asked the Judge, anxiously.

“Not I,” said Titus, contemptuously. “I think he’s a great, big fraud.”

The Judge sighed. Titus’s manner was cool, but he must be greatly
stirred about the matter, for he was not stuttering at all, and at each
reply he made to his grandfather he stepped slightly forward.

Finding himself crowded against the parlor door, the Judge opened it and
went in.

“Grandson,” he said to Titus, who was still advancing, “I want you to do
more good in the world than I have done.”

“I’ll be satisfied to do half as much,” replied Titus, dryly.

“You liked the boy when he came,” said the Judge, uneasily.

“I’ve never liked him for one single minute,” said Titus, striking an
inlaid table with his fist. “I’ve pretended to like him.”

“So you pretend, too?” said the Judge.

“If I didn’t pretend a bit,” said Titus, energetically, “I’d be fighting
from morning till night, with no stops for meals. Suppose I told half
the fellows in school what I think of them?”

“Suppose I told half the men downtown what I think of them?” reflected
the Judge, with inward shrinking.

“But there’s different kinds of pretense,” said Titus, still with
animation and still pursuing his grandfather, who, occasionally looking
over his shoulder, was stepping cautiously round the room. “I saw the
fellow was going to stay here. I wasn’t going to block him. I can keep
out of his way.”

“Then you are not prepared to receive him as a brother?”

“Brother—nonsense,” said Titus, disrespectfully. “I tell you,
grandfather, it’s easier to father a boy than to brother him.”

“He is going to be honest now,” said the Judge.

“Moonshine!” exclaimed Titus, angrily stamping his foot. “He’s a born
actor, like his father.”

“Titus,” said the Judge, mildly, from a corner where he had taken
refuge, “I never saw you do that before. You have been a respectful—”

“Well, I don’t feel respectful now,” said the boy, furiously. “How can I
respect you when I see every Tom, Dick, and Harry pulling the wool over
your eyes?”

“Our interview is at an end,” said the Judge, “and if you will step back
a little I will move toward the door. I am sure that upon thinking this
matter over you will see an apology is due to me.”

Titus sulkily dragged himself from the room. With a sinking of the heart
the Judge noticed that his limp was more perceptible than usual.

“Grandson,” he called after him.

Titus turned round. His grandfather’s face was glowing.

“How can you ever think for an instant,” said the Judge, “that any boy
or any girl can take the place of my only dear child?”

Titus’s sullen face melted.

“I want to make a noble man of you, my boy,” continued the older man,
advancing with both hands outstretched. “I want you to have a great,
generous heart, to get out into the huge world and make thousands of
souls happy. You cannot expect all those souls to be responsive. You
have got to make them happy, in spite of themselves; and how can you
hope to influence thousands when you shrink from only one, and only a
slightly uncongenial soul, at your own fireside? O, my dear grandson,
love everybody, love everybody!”

It would have taken a sterner soul than Titus’s to resist such words,
such ambitious and loving affection.

“Grandfather,” he said, slowly, “I’m sorry.”

The Judge caught his outstretched hand. “My dear boy,” he said, “my dear
boy,” and he pressed the black head to his heart. “My _own_ dear boy.”

Titus uttered a grunt of delight, and ran away. That _own_ was for him.
Fifty thousand English boys could not come between him and his
grandfather.

“Hello, chickie,” he said, catching up Bethany and her big school bag as
they appeared in the doorway. “Hello, chickie,” and he carried her and
the bag up the first of the long staircases.

Laughing and catching her breath with delight, Bethany, after she was
set down on her feet, threw a kiss after Titus and then mounted the next
staircase to her room.

Titus, pursuing a joyous pilgrimage to the stable, encountered Higby,
and gave the old fellow a playful dig in the ribs, which sent him into
his pantry with a crease of delight forming itself about his lips. Mrs.
Blodgett, pursing her lips over a spoiled pudding, was restored to good
humor by a playful pinch and a teasing “Hello, Blodgieblossom!” She
forgot to scold further, and Martha the cook bent over the dish in
question with a relieved smile.

Dashing through the kitchen, Titus tossed Jennie’s apron under the
table, then scampered out to tease and comfort Roblee.

Bethany, as usual, hurried to put away her things, then, kneeling on a
chair before her big basin, she washed her little face and hands and
trotted downstairs to have her before-luncheon chat with the Judge and
the pigeon.

It was astonishing how little waiting on the child required. The Judge
had been ready and willing to engage a youthful maid to attend her, but
Mrs. Blodgett had begged him not to do so, saying that an extra servant
would only be in the way, and that Bethany really required such a small
amount of attention that any of the present maidservants felt it a
pleasure to give it to her. Therefore Bethany had a small room all to
herself between Mrs. Blodgett’s and Dallas’s.

Not finding the Judge in his study, Bethany devoted herself to the
princess.

“I have been learning a new song about you,” she said, prettily. “Now,
listen,” and taking her red dress in her hands she made a little curtsey
and began:

                 “This is the birdie I love the best,
                   This is the Sukey I love to caress.
                 This is the birdie I love the best,
                   This is my darling Sukey.”

In the midst of her bowing and singing the Judge came into the room.
Sukey was standing with one claw uplifted, a pair of attentive eyes
fixed on Bethany, and an expression that seemed to say, “Very pretty,
indeed; please sing some more.”

“Where did you learn that, little girl?” inquired the Judge.

“I just changed it, Daddy Grandpa,” said Bethany, wheeling round. “It is
really and truly a dolly song, but I put in ‘birdie.’”

The Judge was looking intently at her. Was she not going to inquire
about the English boy? She had known that he was ill when she went to
school.

“Don’t you want to know how Dallas is?” he said, suggestively.

“O, yes, poor Dallas. Is he a sick boy yet?”

“No, he is better. He is going to stay here, Bethany.”

She looked up quickly. “To be your other boy—the boy you were looking
for when you found me?”

“Yes—exactly so.”

She made no reply, but, sitting down in the little rocking-chair that
the Judge kept in his study for her, she thoughtfully took Sukey on her
lap and began to stroke her pretty hood.

“Are you glad?” inquired the Judge.

“I would rather have had Charlie Brown,” she said, frankly. “Couldn’t
the Browns take Dallas, and let us have Charlie?”

The Judge did not reply. What a mysterious thing was child nature.
Bethany was sweet and kind with Dallas, but she did not like him as she
did Titus and Charlie Brown.

What was it about the English boy that did not harmonize with the
natures of either Bethany or Titus? It could not be a racial difference,
for the boy was half American. Probably Bethany and Titus, being
essentially honest, felt that there was something about the stranger
that was hidden from them. They did not quite trust him. Now, if Dallas
were to turn over a new leaf and try to be strictly honorable, to try to
mean just what he said, their slight aversion might change to real
liking.

“Daddy Grandpa,” asked Bethany, suddenly, “must I call Dallas
‘Brother’?”

“Yes, you must,” said the Judge, firmly. He would do his best to
reconcile these strong young natures.

Bethany’s face became dreamy. Her fingers stopped stroking the pigeon;
she was wandering off into her spirit land as she often did when things
in her material world went contrary with her.

The Judge, who had been standing watching her, walked back and forth,
and finally extended his promenade to the hall.

When he approached the doorway or entered the study he could catch
sentences from Bethany.

“Yellow, spotted dog, you must not bite clothes. Be a good, gentle dog,
or boys will throw stones at you. Brick, will you let poor doggie sleep
in your hogshead to-night? He is lonely all by himself.”

“So the colored boy slept in a hogshead,” murmured the Judge.

“Hark,” said Bethany, suddenly, “I hear his bark, his sweet, sweet bark.
O, my dear Bylow, my lovely spotted dog, I could hug you.”

The Judge, happening to be near the hall window, and happening to hear a
dog bark, instinctively looked out.

To his amazement a colored boy with a dog was passing on the opposite
side of the street—and the dog was spotted.

“Bethany,” he said, suddenly, “is your colored boy very black?”

She threw up her little head, and, losing her thoughtful expression,
came back to earth. “No, sir; Brick is a kind of a red-brown boy—like
bricks. That is why the boys called him Brick.”

The Judge involuntarily stretched out a hand. He felt like hailing the
dirty-looking mulatto boy now getting out of sight.

“There goes Bylow again,” exclaimed Bethany, “hear his sweet little
voice, Sukey.”

The Judge started. The dog in the street had just uttered a succession
of barks as he turned the corner—most unmelodious and ugly barks, to
tell the truth, but then Bethany’s geese were all swans.

“Child,” he said, “I thought that dog was a ghost dog.”

“So he is a ghost dog,” she remonstrated, gently, “but don’t you know I
told you he was a real dog, too. He isn’t dead. He is only losted.”

“And when he barked just now was he barking as a ghost or a real dog?”

“He is a ghost,” she said, thoughtfully, “because I never see him in the
streets now, but I guess his bark must have been real—it sounded so
_naturelle_. Perhaps he is in the air,” and she looked up at the
ceiling.

The Judge laughed and resumed his walk, but the dog question interested
him considerably, especially later on when he took to meeting the same
colored boy about town with a spotted dog at his heels. The dog had
yellow eyes, and the Judge, knowing that if the boy remained in
Riverport it would only be a question of time as to his meeting with
Bethany, shuddered and shrank within himself, for he knew what the
little girl would do.

                              CHAPTER XIII
                           HIGBY AND THE OWLS

Until the coming of Bethany and Dallas the Judge had never seen Titus in
contact with other boys and girls.

The boy had been brought up alone; when he wanted playmates he went
abroad to seek them. He very seldom brought a boy home to play with him.
The Judge had often remarked this, and had attributed the absence of
children from his own house as an outward sign of Mrs. Blodgett’s inward
dislike of “clutter.” However, since his adoption of Bethany and Dallas
he had noticed that boys and girls came about the house quite freely.

There was therefore some other reason for their previous absence; and in
his new interest in boy and girl study he decided that one child alone
in a home is not a sufficient nucleus for a play place. He cannot gather
round himself as great a variety of interests as several children can.

Another thing the Judge marveled at was the amazing strength of youthful
character. Titus when alone had been submissive, patient, self-effacing.
As soon as these other children had been introduced into the house he
became self-assertive, particular as to his rights, and yet not
disagreeable.

Even little Bethany had a strong character. Little men and women—grown
people in miniature, the Judge often thought to himself as he gazed at
the three young heads about his table.

Dallas’ success as a member of his family had so far exceeded his most
sanguine expectations. The Judge had written a rather amusing letter to
Mr. Folsom on the subject of his adoption of the boy, and had told him
firmly that although he was keeping Dallas he was to be the last child
of adoption. He wished no others. Alas! the Judge was no prophet.

Mr. Folsom, in his delight, had come to Riverport, and had had a
three-days’ visit at the Judge’s and many long conversations with
Dallas. The Judge could not but acknowledge that Dallas was in part a
changed boy. He could not expect him to make himself over all at once,
but the lad was certainly more sincere. He was still polite, exceedingly
polite, but he did not bore himself and other people by doing things
that were against his nature.

For instance, he had given up his ceaseless companionship of Titus. The
two went their respective ways. They did not quarrel, neither did they
harmonize and to the Judge’s amusement they even went to school at
separate times.

If there was a question of championship Titus was at Dallas’ side, and
one day the Judge did hear a species of altercation between the two
boys—an altercation that had ended in a reconciliation. Titus had Dallas
penned in a corner out in the garden under the Judge’s study balcony.

“Look here, if you don’t try to drop your blamed old English accent I’ll
stop fighting for you,” he said. “I ’most got my nose broken to-day.
Can’t you say ‘fast’? It isn’t ‘fost.’”

“Fast, fast,” said Dallas, submissively.

“Now say ‘last.’”

Dallas said “last” and “mast” and many other words, until at last he got
out of patience and rebelled. “I don’t want to lose my English accent. I
am proud of being English.”

“Then you do your own fighting,” said Titus, furiously.

“What makes you think I can’t fight,” said Dallas, and his pale cheeks
grew pink. “I’m taller than you.”

“Taller,” sneered Titus; “you’re soft like a stick of candy.”

He began his sentence on his feet, but finished it on his back in a bank
of snow.

He was up like a flash and standing before Dallas, who was ejaculating,
“You little black lead pencil.”

Titus’s wrath was all gone, to the Judge’s amazement, and he was
gurgling in his throat: “How did you do it? Teach me that trick—come on,
Dallas, teach me.”

The English boy’s contempt faded, and he smiled complacently at the
changed face before him.

“I will tell you something,” he said, grandly. “Once my father was to
figure in a wrestling match on the stage. Now, he was a good all-round
athlete, but he was not satisfied with himself. We were in New York at
the time. You have heard of Billy McGee, the trainer?”

Titus caught his breath. “O, yes—yes.”

“Well, he got Billy McGee to come and train him. It cost a fearful sum,
but father gave it. Billy taught my father, and my father taught me. So
you needn’t fight my battles any more.”

Titus’s face was glowing. “I say,” and he linked his arm in Dallas’s,
“tell me some of those tricks of throwing. I don’t know a thing.”

The Judge groaned. The boys were walking away together arm in arm. “O,
this glorification of brute strength,” he muttered, “the bane of the
rising generation,” and holding out a finger to the pigeon, who was
bowing and cooing to him, he stepped into the house. He must talk to
these boys on the subject of fighting, and seating himself in his
favorite chair he began to prepare a fatherly or grandfatherly speech.

Bethany came in and, seeing that he did not wish to be disturbed, sat
down on the rug with Sukey.

Higby brought in the afternoon mail, and with a stifled yawn laid it on
the table and departed.

Poor old Higby! He was a very early riser, and at the close of every day
he began to get sleepy, and immediately after the seven o’clock dinner
of the household he retired to his room. Jennie, the parlor maid, took
upon herself his duty of going to the hall door when there was a ring.

On this particular day the Judge composed his speech, then went down to
dinner with Bethany. Somewhat to his dismay, somewhat to his relief, and
just a little to his amusement, Titus and Dallas came to the table like
two brothers. Their eyes were on each other, their attentions were for
each other; they scarcely saw the Judge and Bethany.

Ah! the enthusiasm of youth, and shaking his head the Judge requested
them both to accompany him to his study after dinner. Upon arriving
there he talked to them very seriously on the evil of picking quarrels
with other boys and the demoralizing effects of an appeal to brute
force.

The boys were listening attentively and respectfully, when their minds
were most forcibly withdrawn by a succession of blood-curdling shrieks
from the floor above.

With one accord they all sprang to their feet and ran out to the hall.

“B-b-burglars! Th-th-thieves! F-f-fire! M-m-murderers!” rang out in
stammering tones.

Poor old Higby, in the fine dressing-gown that the Judge had given him
at Christmas, and in a pair of bedroom slippers to match that Mrs.
Blodgett had made for him, was running downstairs, screaming at the top
of his voice, and with eyes starting from his head.

“R-r-ring up the police,” he went on, “c-c-catch them alive!”

“Higby,” commanded the Judge, firmly, “calm yourself and tell us what is
the matter.”

The old man gained some degree of composure upon arriving in the hall
and seeing himself surrounded by friends.

“They ’m-m-most killed me,” he said, wildly, stepping up and down and
clasping his head with his hands. “They t-t-tried to dig their knives in
me, but I r-r-ran like a fox.”

Though considerably older than the Judge, his head was not white, but
was covered with a thin crop of grizzled hair.

“O, blood!” he moaned, miserably, bringing down one hand and extending
it toward the Judge, “blood! blood!”

There were red streaks on his hands, and the Judge looked at them
seriously.

“Higby, begin from the first. What has happened to you?”

The man began to step backward and to stammer violently.

“S-s-sir, I was in m-m-my room, b-b-back through the upper hall in the
L.”

“Turn him round, some one,” called Mrs. Blodgett, who was hurrying up
from below. “He’s backing downstairs.”

Titus sprang forward, took him by the sleeve, and led him past the group
of frightened maids to a safe corner by the hall window.

From there he went on with his story.

“W-w-was in m-m-my room in my bed, s-s-sound asleep, d-dreaming of home
and m-m-mother. S-s-sir,” and he turned to the Judge, “w-w-we lived in a
little house b-b-by a running brook, n-n-near a w-w-wood. I woke up,
s-s-sir, c-c-crying. Then I heard a s-s-sound, sir, l-l-like the sounds
of o-o-old times.”

“Well?” said the Judge, encouragingly.

“I-I-I got up, sir; I put on m-m-my gown a-a-and s-s-slippers; I-I-I
went out in the h-h-hall, sir.”

“And what happened?”

“Th-th-the burglars must h-h-have been waiting, s-s-sir. They j-j-jumped
on me from behind. Th-th-they struck me on the h-h-head with their sharp
knives, s-s-sir.”

“Did you see them?” asked the Judge, sharply.

“I-I-I thought I saw one, sir. He was all in b-b-black, sir, and he
d-d-dug his knife in me.”

The Judge looked mystified. If it had been the middle of the night he
would have believed Higby’s story, but early in the evening he could not
for a moment suppose that any thieves would rush out and attack a person
who was simply walking along a hall. However, he turned to the boys.

“Come upstairs with me and we will make a thorough search.”

“Wait a minute, please, sir,” said Dallas. “May I ask Higby what the
sound was that drew him from his bed?”

“T-t-the sound of owls, sir,” stammered Higby, “of little ow-ow-owls
sittin’ on the trees an’ hootin.’”

Dallas gave Titus a queer look, and the latter immediately burst out
laughing.

“’Pon my word; poor old Higby,” gasped Titus. “You’ve been fooled.”

The manservant looked at him indignantly, while Dallas turned to the
Judge, who was waiting for an explanation.

“You told me not to keep my birds so closely, sir, so I let them do
pretty much as they please. I open my window every night at dusk. They
must have got in through some other window into the hall. It is a habit
of owls to pounce on anything furry or hairy.”

“I know that,” said the Judge, with a hearty laugh. “I’ve heard of their
descending on the fur caps of hunters. Well! well! poor old Higby,” and
he turned to him. “Come, now, get over your fright. Those were only
little birds that attacked you—Master Dallas’s little owls.”

Higby was in a speechless rage. He did not dare to get angry with the
Judge, but he did not for a moment believe that his assailant had been a
bird.

“Come, come,” said the Judge, humoring him; “to satisfy you we will make
a search.”

Quite a procession moved up the stairway—the Judge, holding Bethany’s
hand, in advance, the two boys and the servants following.

Upon arriving in the upper hall and traversing it to the L beyond, where
the servants’ bedrooms were over the kitchen and pantries, Dallas kept
looking sharply about.

One peculiarity of the Judge was that he liked plenty of light. At night
the electric lights were turned on in every hall and every room, whether
occupied or not.

“I do not see the culprits,” said Dallas, “but I will call,” and he gave
a tentative “Too whoo, whoo, whoo whoo!”

“Too whoo, whoo, whoo whoo,” said two little soft voices near them.

Dallas stuck his head out a window. “Ah, there are the miscreants,
sitting on the limb of that tree.”

The branches of the big, leafless old elm brushed the hall window, and
the little owls sitting there were calmly contemplating a rising moon.

The Judge let Bethany look at them, then he said: “See, Higby, there are
your burglars. There are no traces of any others here. No man would be
bold enough to pass through this lighted house, and if he did why should
he attack you?”

“I-I-I saw him,” burst from Higby, “a b-b-big black man.”

The Judge looked down at Bethany. She was tightly clasping his hand, and
the expression of her face was doubtful.

“They were owls that attacked you, Higby,” he said, decidedly; “don’t
let me hear any more nonsense about a burglar. Come downstairs,
children,” and he turned about.

Bethany would not let go his hand, even when they entered the study.

“I will read aloud a little to compose her thoughts before she goes to
bed,” the Judge reflected. “No fairy tales to stimulate her imagination,
but something that she will not understand,” and he took from his
bookshelves a volume of Milton’s works.

He seated himself by the table, drew his reading light toward him, and
began. After a time he looked down at the little figure sitting on the
stool at his feet.

“I suppose you don’t understand this, Bethany,” he said, patronizingly.

“O, don’t speak, don’t speak, Daddy Grandpa,” she said, impatiently;
“please go on.”

She had lifted her head. Her face had lost its dreamy expression. It was
glowing, radiant, and intensely interested. The Judge went on
mechanically:

           “‘There the companions of his fall, o’erwhelmed
           With floods and whirlwinds of tempestuous fire—’”

Why, the child was understanding what he read, he reflected with
surprise, or, rather, she was putting her own interpretation upon it.

“Bethany,” he asked after a time and slowly closing the book, “what do
you make of all this?”

“O, I think,” she said, eloquently, “that Satan must be the father of
that bad black man that struck Higby, and his home must be in the fiery
gulf.”

The Judge smiled. “Bethany, those were Dallas’s owls that attacked
Higby. There was no black man there.”

“But, Daddy Grandpa,” she said, incredulously, “little birds could not
be so bad.”

“I fear they were bad, Bethany. Birds are not all good. They are like
children. Some are good, some bad; but come, it is your bedtime.”

“It doesn’t feel my bedtime,” she said, quickly.

“But it is. Little girls ought to get to bed early.”

“Sometimes I sat up late when my mamma was alive,” she said, coaxingly.

“I think you would better go,” said the Judge.

“There is no one up there that I know,” she replied, drearily.

“How about Ellen and Susie; you tell me they live in the wall beside
your bed.”

“They have gone to the country to see the place where they are buried,”
she said, quickly.

The Judge was silent. Sometimes his studies of childhood mystified him.
Just now he was afraid that Higby’s foolish story had caused this
heretofore fearless child suddenly to become afraid to go upstairs to
bed.

While he was thinking she silently caressed the pigeon, which had hopped
up into her lap, but after a time she put up one of her tiny hands and
convulsively seized his large one. “Daddy Grandpa, read some more. You
have a honey voice.”

The Judge smiled broadly, then he took up a magazine from the table.
What would best put a little girl to sleep? Ah! the political situation
in the far East, and this time Bethany did go to sleep. Her head was
against his knee so he could not move, but through the doorway he hailed
Dallas, who was coming out of the sitting room opposite, where he and
Titus prepared their lessons.

“Dallas, send Mrs. Blodgett here.”

“Mrs. Blodgett,” he said, when she came puffing up the stairway and
stood before him, “have a bed moved in this little girl’s room and let
one of the maids sleep there in future. I don’t think that it is good
for her to be alone so much.”

Mrs. Blodgett nodded her head. “Just what I’ve been a-thinkin’, sir. I’m
willin’, I’m sure, to take her in my own room next door.”

“No, no; you need your sleep,” said the Judge. “You are getting older,
and you have brought up one family. Let one of the girls attend to this
child.”

“She do talk a lot to herself in her room, sir. I hears her laughin’ and
chattin’ with them two blessed little girls of yours.”

“Doesn’t she talk of other children?” asked the Judge.

“O, bless you, yes, sir, an’ she also talks to tables, an’ chairs, an’
carpets, an’ that ghost mouse. She do have a name for everything in her
room, an’ you’d think she had a whole menagerie to hear her growl an’
bark.”

“Must be the spotted dog,” said the Judge to himself with a smile, and
he again took up his magazine.

Mrs. Blodgett waddled away. “Sure an’ it’s a wonderful thing how at his
age he do take on the ways of a family man. He ought to ’a’ had a dozen
children.”

The Judge was instinctively a model person at managing children. To
begin with, he loved them; and to end with, he did not fuss over them.
Just now he was becoming intensely uncomfortable on account of this
solid little lump against his slightly rheumatic knee. If he took her up
and laid her on the sofa he might wake her, so he gave her a cautious
little push. She gently rolled over. He guided her head and assisted the
indignant pigeon to fly away. Now Bethany was comfortably stretched on
the floor sleeping soundly, her pretty mouth wide open, after the
fashion of civilized children.

The Judge had heard of Indian mothers closing the mouths of their babes,
so he bent over and gently brought the child’s lips together. To his
delight they stayed closed, and with a sigh of relief he stretched out
his long legs, took up his magazine, and looked enjoyably about him
before he went on with his reading.

He was intensely fond of his books; indeed, reading was almost a passion
with him, and the evening hours were the pleasantest part of the day.

Work was over, the children were safely in the house—for since Titus’s
accident he always had a little anxiety about boys and girls absent from
their own rooftrees—and he was free to amuse himself in this most
delightful of ways.

Alas for the Judge! He had not read five sentences when he heard a
shrill, insistent voice, not in this upper hall, but in the one below,
away down by the front door.

“I tell you I must see the Jedge. I hevn’t got no message.”

Strange to say, the voice, which was shrill and uncultured rather than
noisy, woke Bethany like the sound of a trumpet.

Instantly rousing herself she sat up and looked composedly at the Judge.
There was not the slightest sign of confusion about her, or any
bewildered look as of a child hastily aroused from sleep.

“Daddy Grandpa,” she said, quickly, “I’m the yellow spotted dog,” and
beginning to growl and snap horribly she went down on hands and feet and
crawled under a big table in a corner—a favorite play place because it
had a long, heavy cover whose sheltering folds concealed a castle, a
ship, a railway train, an ogre’s cavern, or any other fancy that Bethany
chose to indulge in.

The Judge looked after her submissively. His part was not to rebel, but
to await developments.

Then he turned his head to the doorway.

“Sir,” said Jennie, in a puzzled voice, “there’s a little poor girl
craving to see you.”

“Bring her up,” said the Judge, promptly, and he tried to think where he
had heard that shrill voice before.

Two minutes later he knew, for Airy Tingsby, the smart, pert girl, the
head of the Tingsby clan, and the one who had been so saucy and
impertinent to him, now stood within a few feet of his chair.

                              CHAPTER XIV
                            A CALL FROM AIRY

The Judge was a gentleman, and he was in his own house, so he got up,
motioned her to a seat, and said, politely, “Good evening.”

“Good-night,” she said, curtly, then she looked about her.

O, the bitter envy and discontent of her face! The Judge averted his
eyes. It was not pleasant to see that expression on the face of a child,
for she was scarcely more.

“Why hev you got all this?” she said, suddenly, “and why hev I nothin’?”

The Judge made no reply except that of a mournful shake of his head.

“And why,” she went on, leaning eagerly forward from her chair and
pinching the thin sleeve of her jacket, “do I hev to wear shoddy cloth
an’ you wear broadcloth?”

“Only Oxford cloth,” said the Judge, protestingly, “only Oxford in this
house suit.”

“How much did you pay for it?” she asked, grimly.

He made no reply, and she continued. “How much did you lay out on that
diamond neck pin; how much did your house cost and this fine furniture?”

The Judge discreetly evaded an answer by a protesting wave of his hand,
and at the same time thought that a few months previous to this he would
have bowed the saucy little girl from the room. Now, although he wanted
to get back to his reading, and he gazed wistfully at the heap of new
literature on his table, he was really anxious to hear what the girl had
to say. Something lay under this—so much he had learned of youthful
ways. How the little wretches understood that he was interested in their
confidences. They were as sharp as grown people.

“My girl,” he said, kindly, “what have you come here for?”

Before she answered him she pointed half angrily, half curiously at
Sukey. “What’s that, an’ what’s it starin’ at me for, like as if I had
no right to be here?”

The pigeon, to the Judge’s amusement, had resented Airy’s entrance as
much as Bethany had done, but instead of retreating she advanced,
stepping high, and curling each pink claw with indignation. The look on
her high-bred face was delicious, coming from a pigeon. Her
greenish-yellow eyes were stony, every feather in her hood quivered and
seemed to close more protectingly about the little white head.

Once or twice before, the Judge had seen her act so in the presence of
poor people, and he had laid her indignation down to a sense of smell,
like that of the average dog, who hates a poor or dirty person. But Airy
was a very clean child. The Judge knew what kind of a mother Mrs.
Tingsby was, so his theory of smell would scarcely hold good in this
case.

Possibly Sukey was sympathizing with Bethany, whom she had got to love
devotedly. Anyway, the Judge must answer the child, so he said, kindly,
“The bird is a pigeon; she is called a Jacobin.”

“She’s an ugly thing, anyway,” replied Airy, sulkily, “an’ she hates me.
Shoo!” and she clapped her hands.

The indignant Sukey, who was no heroine, turned tail and scuttled under
Bethany’s table, where the Judge heard a low growl of welcome greet her.
Then, his two pets safely disposed of, he looked expectantly at Airy,
hoping that she would remember his question as to her motive for calling
on him.

She did remember, and, sinking back in her chair with a weary gesture,
she said, “I’ve come to tell you that I wants to be a lady.”

“Poor child!” murmured the Judge, involuntarily. Then he tried to
realize the enormity of the question thrust upon him.

“Why warn’t I born a lady?” pursued Airy, uncompromisingly. “Why warn’t
I born your darter?”

“Well,” said the Judge, hesitatingly, “well, I suppose it pleased
Providence to place you in another sphere.”

“Sphere!” she repeated, sneeringly, “that’s no word I ever heard. ’Pears
to me you rich folks make up words to suit yourselves. But if I don’t
know ‘sphere,’ I do not know one word, an’ that’s ‘Fiddlesticks!’”

“Well,” replied the Judge, with a polite movement of his head, “your
word is a good old English one used by Southey, Thackeray, and others,
though I believe it is unknown just how and why it became an expression
of contempt.”

“I don’t know what you’re drivin’ at,” replied Airy, wearily, “but I’m
goin’ to say my proposition over again: I wants to be a lady!”

The Judge, having heard the announcement before, bore it this time with
fortitude.

“An’ what’s more,” she went on, “I wants you to help me.”

“What can I do?” inquired the Judge, in mild surprise.

“You can gab a bit with me now an’ then,” she said, earnestly. “Why, I
took to you the first time I see you.”

“Did you,” replied the Judge. “Well—ahem!—I fancied that you were not
much taken with me.”

“I was mad with you,” she said, frankly, “mad because I figgered that
you was returnin’ Bethany on us. Then I was mad to think you didn’t get
mad.”

“Do you get mad easily?”

“Awful easy. I’m mad ’most all the time. You see, I’m kind of sickly,
an’ I hevn’t much relish for what I eats, an’ nothin’ makes you mad like
pickin’ at yer food.”

“Poor child!” said the Judge, sympathetically.

“But I’m goin’ to be a lady,” she said, and her little sharp face
hardened, “if I lives. If I dies it don’t matter.”

She was silent for a few seconds, being employed in a search among her
patched and darned but clean garments for a rag of a handkerchief, as
white as the morsel of linen peeping from the Judge’s own pocket.

“And what steps have you taken in the matter?” inquired the Judge,
knowing that he was expected to take an interest in this question of
ladyhood.

“Fust of all, I’ve quit work,” she replied. “What air you laughin’ at?”
for the Judge was unable to conceal his amusement.

“Just at the idea of a lazy lady,” he replied; “go on, please.”

“Did I say I was goin’ to be lazy?” she returned, fiercely. “I’ve just
stopped shopgirlin’ it, but I’m a-studyin’ like sixty.”

“O, going to school?”

“Yes, sir. Onct before I went, before I got into Moses & Brown’s big Dry
Goods Emporium—all the latest fashions in ladies’ neckwear, underwear,
street wear, house wear, weddin’ wear, funeral wear, summer wear, winter
wear, an’ so on.”

The Judge drew a long breath. “Indeed!”

“Yes, I’m a-schoolin’ it. I tell you, when I saw where Bethany had come,
an’ when that boy of yours come hurryin’ down River Street with books
an’ things for us an’ hurryin’ off again like as we was poisoned, I
begun to think, ‘It’s time I was lookin’ higher.’”

A doubtful expression passed over the Judge’s face, but instead of
resenting it she went hurriedly on: “So the next time Barry Mafferty
comes in, says I to him, ‘Barry, I wants to be a lady.’ Says he, ‘Then
quit yer shop an’ go to school, an’ I’ll teach you Latin an’ French,
’cause you’ll not get them in the fust grades of the public.’ An’ he
gave me a book. I can say _mensa_ now—_mensa_, _mensæ_, _mensæ_,
_mensam_, _mensa_, _mensa_. _Mensæ_, _mensarum_, _mensis_, _mensas_,
_mensæ_, _mensis_. An’ _musa_, too,” and she glibly rattled off the
declension of _musa_.

“And do you know what _musa_ means?” inquired the Judge, somewhat
helplessly, when she at last paused for want of breath.

“_Musa_, amuse,” she replied, quickly.

“And what is a muse?” pursued the Judge.

“You don’t know what amuse is at your time of life!” she said, sharply.
“Come on, now, you’re just foolin’ me.”

“Ask Mafferty to tell you about the Muses the next time you go to him,”
said the Judge. “At present you have a wrong idea of the meaning of the
word.”

“Hev I?” she said, sharply. “I’ll find out better. Want to hear some
French?”

“If you like,” replied the Judge, politely.

“_Javvey_, _tavvey_, _lavvey_, _nouzaviong_, _vouzaviez_, _ilzong_. Do
you know what that means?”

“I can guess,” replied her friend, calmly.

“You want ter laugh,” she said, suddenly; “you’re bustin’, I can see,
but wait till I’m gone. I hate to be larfed at.”

The Judge guiltily hung his head.

“Now,” she said, in a businesslike way, “I don’t want yer for teachin’
me French nor langwidges, nor grammar. What I wants is ladyness from
yer. Come on, now, what’s the fust thing in bein’ a lady?”

She was intensely, terribly in earnest, and the Judge braced up.

“Well,” he said, seriously, “first of all, before I can give you one
single word of advice, I want to know what you intend to make of young
ladyhood—providing you attain to it.”

“Don’t understand all yer big words,” she said, “but I catches yer
meanin’. What do I want to be a lady for? I wants to be a lady so as to
make you an’ other men stand round.”

“Very good,” murmured the Judge; “but go on, pray.”

“What does you care for me now?” she said, disdainfully. “My name’s mud
to you. I’m a River Street rat. Aint it so?”

“Well,” said the Judge, in a puzzled voice, “you are so extreme that I
will have to qualify your statement.”

“It’s true,” she said, grimly, “you ’spises me. That makes me mad,
’cause I know the Lord made us both. That my mother has taught me, an’ I
believe her. The Lord loves me as much as he loves you, but that don’t
satisfy me. I’m goin’ to make you love me, too.”

The Judge shuddered, despite himself. This little sharp-voiced,
bad-tempered, ambitious, plain-featured specimen of humanity was
extremely repellent to him. It was really an act of Christian charity on
his part to sit and listen to her.

But he must subdue his dislike. The poor little creature was unhappy. If
he sent her away uncomforted and unaided he would have a sleepless
night. Happily or unhappily for himself, he had so humored his
conscience through life that he was obliged slavishly to obey its
dictates or suffer the consequences.

Therefore he said, kindly, “What other object have you in becoming a
lady besides that of making men stand round?”

“I wants to help my mother,” she said, solemnly, “an’ get her out of
River Street. I wants a little home out among the fields for her where
the ’lectrics run past an’ she can come in town fer her shoppin’. She’s
a faithful mother, sir; she’s brought us up good.”

The Judge’s eyes filled with tears. Poor little, weak, frail creature,
and yet not weak, for a noble spirit animated her sickly body.

“Now I am with you, my girl,” he exclaimed. “Now I will help you, for
this aspiration is noble.”

The touch of sympathy caused a smile to break over her face. “An’ the
children, sir,” she said, “could play. There’s grass out there where
they could play. There aint no grass on River Street.”

“Don’t they play in the park that Mrs. Everest got for the River Street
children?”

“O, yes, sir, but there be so many feet an’ so little grass. It’s all
tramped down afore it has time to grow. Now, sir, please tell me, for I
must be goin’, what is the fust thing, in your opinion, to be a lady?”

The Judge considered a minute, then he said: “Let us take your call in
sections. When you came in the house I heard your voice away up here
shrill and insistent. Now, what was there unladylike about that?”

“I ought to ’a’ spoke low,” she said, eagerly, “soft an’ low.”

“A real lady always speaks in a sweet voice, my child. Don’t scream when
talking.”

“The real ladies did that when they come a-shoppin’,” she replied. “They
said, ‘Please show me some white lace,’ jus’ as soft as milk.”

“Then take that as your first rule,” said the Judge. “Pitch your voice
low. Next I would say that your manner was aggressive when you came in.”

“An’ what are you tryin’ to give me there?” she said, quickly. “What’s
aggressive?”

The Judge was intensely amused. Her words were rude, but so well had she
remembered his advice that her voice was pitched in a low, almost a
sweet, key.

“Rule two,” he observed, “be respectful. Now, I am a much older person
than you. You should not address me in the rude, flippant tone in which
you address a street urchin. But I am perhaps wrong here. In the course
of my life I have observed how popular are the persons who have respect
for everyone—even their own servants. One human being has no right to
treat another human being with disrespect. Just wait a minute and I will
give you an object lesson,” and getting up he rang the bell.

Presently there was a knock at the door.

“You hear that?” he said to Airy. “The maid knocks at the door of this
room because it is not a public but a private room. She knocks at our
bedroom doors also. She does not knock at the dining room or the parlor
door. That is one way of being respectful. Now see how politely she will
answer me when she enters,” and he said in a clear voice, “Come in.”

Jennie stepped inside and stood in her neat gown and white apron looking
expectantly at him.

“Has a parcel come for me this evening from the druggist’s?” inquired
the Judge.

“Yes, sir, quite a large parcel. Would you like to have it here?”

“No, thank you; in my bedroom.”

“Very well, sir. Is that all?”

“Yes, Jennie; but no—go to the sitting room and ask Master Dallas to
come here.”

“Certainly, sir,” and with a pleasant look she closed the door and went
away.

The Judge looked at Airy. Her lips were parted, her eyes were intense.

“Now you will see a polite, respectful boy,” he said, and at that
instant there was another knock at the door.

“Come in,” said the Judge, and Dallas appeared.

“My boy,” said the Judge, “this young girl is a daughter of a woman who
was very kind to Bethany.”

Dallas turned to Airy and made her such an exquisite bow that she caught
her breath and gasped, “O, my!”

The Judge bit his lip. “Miss Airy Tingsby and Mr. Dallas de Warren. Now
you will know each other the next time you meet. How have you been
getting on with your studies this evening, Dallas?”

“Very well, sir, though perhaps not as well as usual, on account of the
Higby affair. It amused Titus.”

“Will you give Miss Airy an account of it?” said the Judge. “It is not
polite for two persons to talk before a third of something that he or
she does not understand.”

In a perfectly calm and courteous way Dallas, without appearing to
notice that his new acquaintance belonged to one of the poorest classes
in society, gave her an account of the unfortunate Higby’s fright.

Airy hung on his words in entranced silence. Never before in her young
life had anyone addressed her with so much deference. A delightful