ty had thought of it, and the man had to make clear the need
of it in the business world which Steve had come into. With his people
things had always been "swapped"; corn, tobacco and whiskey, for the
few things they needed from a store, and he had seen very few pieces
of money in his life.

"Now, how under the cano_pee_ are you going to come up with the
money?" asked Mr. Follet briskly, and with practical pertinence.

Steve certainly did not know and then Mr. Follet proposed that he stay
with them through the summer, work for him and he would give him his
board and clothes and pay him fifty cents a week.

Steve agreed readily and at once felt a new sense of responsibility
and manliness.

When his arm was quite well Mrs. Follet gave him some long white
garments which she called "nightshirts," and told him to undress at
night and wear them for sleeping! It was a very needless performance,
he felt in his secret heart, but he had already learned to love the
gentle woman and he would have done even more foolish things to please
her. In fact, the thing which she gave him for brushing his hair
seemed at first to bring him to the limit of acquiescence, but the bit
of broken looking-glass stuck in one of the timbers of his room soon
told him that a little smoothing down of his tousled head made an
immense difference in his looks, and somehow made him seem a little
more worthy to be in Nancy's presence.

The little girl had lessons at night from her mother in wonderful
books, and Steve listened with rapt attention each time, beginning
very soon to catch their meaning. It was not long till he had confided
to Nancy how his "mammy" had wanted him to "larn things" too, and that
was another reason why he was trying to get to the city.

"You're going to school then," said the little girl. "My mama teaches
me, and some day she is going to send me to a big, big college."

Mrs. Follet had been a school-teacher from the north in one of the
small Kentucky towns, an orphan girl, who very young had been obliged
to make her own way in the world. She had met Mr. Follet, and in one
of those strange attractions between complete opposites in temperament
and training, had married him. She was a quiet, refined and very
kind-hearted woman. She would gladly have taught the boy, but finding
that he did not know even his letters, she felt that with Nancy in the
second reader, she could not take another pupil who was a beginner.

But when the l