ely and I thought I would
take the little chap and--have--have a _Wanderjahr_. You won't need him
now, Mrs. Molly, and I couldn't go without him, could I?" The sadness in
his voice would have killed me if I hadn't let it madden me instead.

"Won't need Billy any more!" I exclaimed with a rage that made my voice
literally scorch past my lips. "Was there ever a minute in his life that
I haven't needed Billy? How dare you say such a thing to me? You are
cruel, cruel, and I have always known it, cold and cruel like all other
men who don't care how they wring the life-blood out of women's hearts,
and are willing to use their children to do it with. Even the law
doesn't help us poor helpless creatures, and you can take our children
and go with them to the ends of the earth and leave us suffering. I have
gone on and believed that you were not like what the women say all men
are, and that you cared whether you hurt people or not, but now I see
that you are just the same, and you'll take my baby away if you want
to--and I can do nothing to prevent it--nothing in the wide world--I am
completely and absolutely helpless--you coward, you!"

When that awful word, the worst word that a woman can use to a man, left
my lips, a flame shot up into his eyes that I thought would burn me up,
but in a half second it was extinguished by the strangest thing in the
world--for the situation--a perfect flood of mirth. He sat down in his
chair and shook all over, with his head in his hands, until I saw tears
creep through his fingers. I had calmed down now so suddenly that I was
about to begin to cry in good earnest when he wiped his eyes and said
with a low laugh in his throat--

"The case is yours, Molly, settled out of court, and the
'possession-nine-points-of-the-law clause' works in some cases for a
woman against a man. Generally speaking, anyway, the pup belongs to the
man who can whistle him down, and you can whistle Bill from me any day.
I'm just his father, and what I think or want doesn't matter. You had
better take him and keep him!"

"I intend to," I answered haughtily, uncertain as to whether I had
better give in and be agreeable, or stay prepared to cry in case there
was further argument. But suddenly a strange diffidence came into his
eyes, and he looked away from me as he said in queer hesitating words--

"You see, Mrs. Molly, I thought, from now on, your life wouldn't have
exactly a place for Bill. Have you considered that you