ith a general
aroma of cooked food, and there were many shelves behind glass doors on
which dishes were piled. A drawer was opened, and almost instantly in
his ready hands was the largest segment of yellow cake he had ever
beheld. He had not dreamed that pieces of cake for human consumption
could be cut so large. And it was lavishly gemmed with fat raisins. He
held it doubtfully.

"Let's look again," said the preposterous woman. She looked again,
pushing by a loose-swinging door to do it, and returned with a vast area
of apple pie, its outer curve a full ninety degrees of the circle. "Now
eat!" said the woman.

She was, indeed, a remarkable woman. She had not first asked him if he
were hungry.

"I'm much obliged for my pants and this cake and pie," said the boy, so
the woman said, "Yes, yes," and hugged him briefly as he ate.

Not until he had consumed the last morsel of these provisions and eke a
bumper of milk did the woman lead him back to that shaded porch where he
had lately been put to the torture. But now he was another being, clad
not only as became a man among men but inwardly fortified by food. If
stepmothers were like this he wished his own father would find one. The
girl with her talk about cruelty--he still admired her, but she must be
an awful liar. He faced the tormenting group on the porch with almost
faultless self-possession. He knew they could not hurt him.

"Well, well, well!" roared Sharon Whipple, meaning again to be humorous.
But the restored Wilbur eyed him coldly, with just a faint curiosity
that withered the humorist in him. "Well, well!" he repeated, but in
dry, businesslike tones, as if he had not meant to be funny in the first
place.

"I guess we'll have to be going now," said the Wilbur twin. "And we must
leave all that money. It wouldn't be honest to take it now."

The Merle twin at this looked across at him with marked disfavour.

"Nonsense!" said Miss Juliana.

"Nonsense!" said Sharon Whipple.

"Take it, of course!" said Gideon Whipple.

"He's earned it fairly," said Juliana. She turned to Merle. "Give it to
him," she directed.

This was not as Merle would have wished. If the money had been earned he
was still willing to take care of it, wasn't he?

"A beggarly pittance for what he did," said Gideon Whipple, warmly.

"Wouldn't do it myself for twice the amount, whatever it is," said
Sharon.

Very slowly, under the Whipple regard, the Merle twin poured the price
of his