.

After one stricken glance at the spectacle Sarah tottered to her feet
and retreated none too steadily into the house. But it wasn't the
condition of the boy's clothes which held Caleb's gaze. He was
watching his face. For as Steve marched across the lawn the dangerous
whiteness of the boy's countenance half frightened the man. His lips
were a thin streak across a jaw tight clamped and flecked with blood in
one corner. And his eyes had the wide-open fixity of a sleep-walker.
Steve had reached the top of the steps in his mechanical approach
before Caleb spoke. And even then, when he turned, he seemed only half
to see the two men who were waiting his coming.

"Well?" faltered Caleb.

The boy stopped short and slowly turned his head. Both men heard that
breath, short and harsh, in the moment of silence.

"Just what does this mean?" Caleb attempted again. "Where have you
been?"

He hardly recognized the boy's voice.

"I been daown to the city," Steve slurred the words. "I been daown to
git Miss Sarah a dozen eggs--and I run into trouble--daown
there--a-gittin' 'em!"

"I--I should assume that you had," murmured Caleb. "But you've brought
the eggs back with you, or most of them, I see, even though they aren't
in particularly edible condition."

That was as long as Allison could endure it; he burst into a fit of
laughter which lasted until he was moaning for breath. And Steve,
teeth set, waited without moving until the noisy outburst was over.

"You'd better go upstairs and get into your old clothes," Caleb advised
him then. "And I'll get you something less--less dangerous to wear
before night."

But the boy stood rigid still.

"Will you," he asked, "will you give me another quarter now?"

Allison looked up quickly from wiping his eyes.

"A quarter," echoed Caleb slowly, even while he reached into his pocket
and handed the coin to the boy. "Now what do you----Here, where are
you going now?"

Steve had turned and was marching down the steps. He paused a minute
to explain, however.

"Why, I'm goin' back daown to the city," he grated out. "I'm goin'
back after Miss Sarah's eggs!"

And he went and when he returned the creases in the paper bag which
held his purchase were as fresh as when it had left the grocer's
counter.

"Well I'm--I'm damned!" Allison murmured, after the boy had entered the
house. "I _am_ damned! You'll have to bring that youngster over, Cal,
and introduce him to the ch