ck. I do
wish we knew where Billy is."

Then I remembered, and I said, "Oh, mamma, don't be frightened; Billy
came in half an hour ago."

But when papa, mamma, and I--Biddy coming after us, with her apron up
over her face, and crying, "Och, what a nize!" and "God save us!" every
step--went from room to room, we didn't find Billy.

"Maggie, are you sure you saw him?" said mamma, stopping me, with both
her hands on my shoulders, at the head of the stairs--"are you sure?"

"Oh yes; he went by the window when I was reading in _Beechnut_ about
where Phonny--"

"The cellar!" cried mamma, and drew in her breath just like the sound of
the wind.

Already the clouds had rolled away; the storm was over; and Biddy, who
had been standing at the back stairway window, cried out, "Feth, mem,
an' av me two eyes don't be afther desavin' me, the owld chimbley's
blowed over, an' niver a brick lift o' the poor childer's foine
play-house."

In a moment mamma was down the stairs; papa could not hold her nor catch
up with her, and we all ran after her to the edge of the cellar. Our
pretty Robinson Crusoe house was all ruined. Dirt, sticks, stones, and
everything that had lain about the yard were just as if they had been
swept with a big broom into the cellar; and the big chimney--all blown
to pieces now--helped to fill up the cave.

Mother was crying dreadfully, and I cried too. She went right down on
her knees, and began picking up and throwing out the bricks. Papa could
not stop her; she only said, in a voice that did not sound like mamma's
voice at all, "My Billy's here."

It was so dreadful I can't remember exactly all about it; but papa got
Mr. Ames and one or two other men, and after a while mamma caught hold
of and kissed a little coat sleeve, and a hand so white it didn't look
one bit like Billy's. Mamma thought Billy was dead, and she sat down
very still, and did not try to work any more, but held the hand until
the men had lifted every bit off from Billy; and she went beside them
when he was carried in. He was not dead, he was only stunned; but his
arm, the one mamma found, was broken in three places. He had a great
deal of pain before his arm began to heal; but he never made a bit of
fuss about it, and he never said anything to papa or mamma about the
cellar, and how it happened, except just once when mamma asked him a
question, and he told her he had gone into the cellar to cover up some
of the things if he could. But t