ON.

If ever "bwother Fwank" felt a thrill of joy, it was then. Willie ran
straight to his arms, in spite of the long-legged officer striding to
catch him, and pulling down his neck, hugged him, and kissed him, and
hugged and kissed him again, with such ardor that the delighted
bystanders cheered, and the pursuing policeman stepped back with a laugh
of melting human kindness.

"He's too much for me, that little midget is," he said, returning to his
place. "Does he belong to you, ma'am?" addressing a lady whose humid eyes
betrayed something more than a stranger's interest in the scene.

"They are my children," said the lady. "Will you be so good, sir, as to
tell the drummer boy to step this way?"

But already Frank was coming. How thankful he then felt that he was not a
private, confined to the ranks! In a minute his mother's arm was about
him, and her kiss was on his cheek, and Helen was squeezing one hand, and
his father the other, while Willie was playing with his drumsticks.

"I am all the more glad," he said, his face shining with gratitude and
pleasure, "because I was just giving you up--thinking you wouldn't come
at all."

"Only think," said Helen, "because you wrote on your letter, _In haste_,
the postmaster gave it to Maggie Simpson yesterday to deliver, for she
was going right by our house; but Dan Alford came along and asked her to
ride, and she forgot all about the letter, and would never have thought
of it again, I suppose, if I hadn't seen the postmaster and set off on
the track of it this morning. She had gone over to her aunt's, and I had
to follow her there; and then she had to go home again, to get the letter
out of her other dress pocket; but her sister Jane had by this time got
on the dress, in place of her own, which was being washed, and worn it to
school; and so we had to go on a wild-goose chase after Jane."

"Well, I hope you had trouble enough for one letter!" said Frank.

"But you haven't heard all yet," said Helen, laughing, "for when we found
Jane, she had not the letter, she had taken it out of the pocket, when
she put the dress on, and left it on the bureau at home. So off again we
started, Maggie and I, but before we got to her house, the letter had
gone again--her mother had found it in the mean time, and sent it to us
by the butcher boy. Well, I ran home, but no butcher boy had made his
appearance; and, do you think, when I got to the meat shop, I found him
deliberately sawing