bers. With his fists clenched and the cold sweat on his forehead, he
waited by the roadside for the dark rider, who was coming like the wind.

"Hello!" The puffing horse was pulled sharply to a standstill.

"Oh, Wess!" His determination to die without a sound ended in a broken
cry of gladness, and he wrapped an arm around the hired man's leg to
hold him.

"Bruce! What you doin' here?"

"They plagued me. I'm going home."

"You keep on goin', boy. I'm after you and your father." There was
something queer in the hired man's voice--something that frightened him.
"Your mother's taken awful sick. Don't waste no time; it's four miles
yet; you hustle!" The big horse jumped into the air and was gone.

It was not so much what the hired man said that scared him so, but the
way he said it. Bruce had never known him not to laugh and joke, or seen
him run his horse like that.

"Oh, mamma, mamma!" he panted as he stumbled on, wishing that he could
fly.

When he dragged himself into the room, she was lying on her bed, raised
high among the pillows. Her eyes were closed, and the face which was so
beautiful to him looked heavy with the strange stupor in which she lay.

"Mamma, I'm here! Mamma, I've come!" He flung himself upon the soft,
warm shoulder, but it was still, and the comforting arms lay limp upon
the counterpane.

"Mamma, what's the matter? Say something! Look at me!" he cried. But the
gray eyes that always beamed upon him with such glad welcome did not
open, and the parted lips were unresponsive to his own. There was no
movement of her chest to tell him that she even breathed.

A fearful chill struck to his heart. What if she was dying--dead! Other
boys' mothers sometimes died, he knew, but his mother--_his_ mother! He
tugged gently at one long, silken braid of hair that lay in his grimy
hand like a golden rope, calling her in a voice that shook with fright.

The cry penetrated her dulled senses. It brought her back from the
borderland of that far country into which she had almost slipped.
Slowly, painfully, with the last faint remnant of her will power, she
tried to speak--to answer that beloved, boyish voice.

"My--little boy----" The words came thickly, and her lips did not seem
to move.

But it was her voice; she had spoken; she was not dead! He hugged her
hard in wild ecstasy and relief.

"I'm glad--you came. I--can't stay--long. I've had--such hopes--for
you--little boy. I've dreamed--such dreams--for y