nt around. For fear
my parents might insist that he should be put out of his misery, I
removed the hospital to the playhouse, and gave him the range of the
place, forbidding the colored children to tell what was going on. His
agonies were nearly over when, in the distraction of anxiety, I took
Cousin Frank Morton into confidence. He had ridden over with a message
from Cousin Molly Belle.

(Have I mentioned that they had been married for six months?)

The message was to the effect that I must spend the day and night with
her. My mother gave ready consent.

"Molly has been too pale for several days, and has little or no
appetite," she said, looking affectionately at me. "The change will do
her good, and there is no other place where she enjoys a visit more than
at your house. Molly! can't you thank Cousin Frank for taking the
trouble to come for you?"

Strained by conflicting emotions, I fidgeted awkwardly about Cousin
Frank's chair, pinching the hem of my apron into folds, and shifting
from one foot to the other.

"I want to go _dreadfully_!" I got out at length, almost ready to cry.
"_But_--Cousin Frank--wouldn't you like to look at Bay? He's an old hare
that I am taming."

While speaking, I started for the door, and he came after me. My mother
exclaimed, provoked, yet laughing, that I was "getting more ridiculous
every day," but I knew my man, and did not stop.

Bay was throwing a particularly hard fit when we got to him. His cries
had something humanlike in them that pierced ears and heart.

"My dear child!" uttered the shocked visitor. "How long has this been
going on?"

Upon hearing that the poor thing had never seemed really well from the
day he was hurt, and had been "going on like this for four days,
hand-running," he was quite angry--for him.

"I wonder that your mother let you keep him when he was in this state,"
he said seriously; and, seeing the tears I could not drive back, he sat
down on my chair and drew me up to him. "It would be better to kill the
poor creature, at once, dear. He can never be better."

I begged him not to tell my mother about Bay's sickness. I had become
very fond of him, and he was so sweet and patient--and tame,--and I just
couldn't bear to have him killed. Whether he would have granted my
petition or not was not to be tested. While I was speaking, Bay uttered
a shrill scream, leaped up high in the air, and fell over on his back,
dead.

We hurried on the funeral that I