s?
You've never thought, have you? Say, laddie, it would break her up the
back. It would surely. She'd feel she'd done you a harm--and that in
itself is sufficient--and she'd feel she was upsetting Will. And
between the two she'd be most unhappy. Say, can't you like him? Can't
you make up your mind to get on with him right when he comes back?
Can't you, laddie?"

The boy's eyes suddenly lifted from the fire, and the storm was still
in them.

"I hate him!" he snarled like a fierce beast.

"I'm sorry--real sorry."

"Don't you go fer to be sorry," cried the boy, with that strange
quickening of all that was evil in him. "I tell you Will's bad. He's
bad, an' he sure don't need to be, 'cause it's in him to be good. He
ain't like me, I guess. I'm bad 'cause I'm made bad. I don't never
think good. I can't. I hate--hate--allus hate. That's how I'm made,
see? Will ain't like that. He's made good, but he's bad because he'd
rather be bad. He's married my sister because she's a fool, an' can't
see where Jim Thorpe's a better man. Jim Thorpe wanted to marry her.
He never said, but I can see. An' she'd have married him, on'y fer
Will comin' along. She was kind o' struck on Jim like, an' then Will
butts in, an' he's younger, an' better lookin', an' so she marries
him. An'--an' I hate him!"

"But your sister? What's poor Eve going to do with you always hating
Will? She'll get no happiness, laddie, and you'd rather see her happy.
Say, if you can't help hating Will, sure you can hide it. You needn't
to run foul of him. You go your way, and he can go his. Do you know
I'm pretty sure he'll try and do right by you, because of Eve----"

"Say, Peter, you're foolish." The boy had calmed, and now spoke with a
shrewd decision that was curiously convincing. "Will'll go his way,
and Eve won't figger wuth a cent with him. I know. Eve'll jest have to
git her toes right on the mark, same as me. He's a devil, and I know.
Will'll make Eve hate herself, same as he'll make me. Say, an' I'll
tell you this, Eve'll hev to work for him as well as me. I know. I can
see. You can't tell me of Will, nor of nobody that's bad--'cause I ken
see into 'em. I'm bad, an' I ken see into folks who 're bad."

There was no argument against such an attitude as the boy took.
Besides, Peter began to understand. Here was an unique study in
psychology. The boy either fancied he possessed--or did possess--such
unusual powers of observation that they almost amounted to th