away, "that I never
intended to say it. I didn't realize it myself until it was scared out
of me."

Lambert put on his coat.

"It won't bear talking about."

"It never hit me," George said, huskily, "that even a cat couldn't look
at a queen."

"Perfectly possible," Lambert said as he walked off, feeling his
bruises, "only the queen mustn't see the cat."

IV

George went, obliterating as best he could the souvenirs of battle.
Water, unfortunately, was a requisite, and the nearest was to be found
at his own home. His mother gasped.

"You did! After what I said!"

At the pump he splashed cold water over his face and arms.

"I thrashed him," he spluttered.

"I guess that settles it for your father and me."

"Young Planter won't tell anybody," George assured her. "Although I
don't see how he's going to get away with it unless he says he was run
over by an automobile and kicked by a mule."

"What's come over you?" she demanded. "You've gone out of your head."

He dodged her desire for details. As Lambert had said, the thing
wouldn't bear talking about. For the first time in his life he stood
alone, and whatever he accomplished from now on would have to be done
alone.

He saw his father striding toward them, the anxious light gone from his
eyes. George experienced a vast relief.

"Father looks a little more cheerful," he commented, drying his face.

"Get supper, Ma," the man said as he came up.

She hesitated, held by her curiosity, while he turned on George.

"I don't wonder you couldn't open your mouth to me. You're to be out of
here to-morrow."

"I'd made up my mind to that."

"And Old Planter wants to see you at nine o'clock to-night."

"Since you and Ma," George said, "seem on such good terms with him I
suppose I'll have to go."

"Thank the Lord we are," his father grumbled. "I wouldn't have blamed
him if he had packed us all off. He was more than fair. I've looked
after you so far, but you'll have to shift for yourself now."

"And the only thing I didn't like about it," George mused, "was leaving
you and Ma."

"What did he say to Miss Sylvia?" his mother whispered.

"Said he couldn't get along without her, and was going to have her."

He might have been speaking of one who had ventured to impersonate the
deity.

"And he touched her! Put his arms around her!"

The horror in his mother's face grew.

"Georgie! Georgie! What could you have been thinking of?"

He leaned against the