him to make us go, and then he'd say "go on
now." But he didn't go himself, or much to church either. I never
understood him, he was kind of a mystery.

[Illustration: Sunday school]

Well, on a Sunday in July me and Myrtle was dressed to go and waitin'
for ma to dress Little Billie. It was awful hot and looked like rain,
and my clothes scratched, my shoes hurt; but Myrtle was all quiet and
anxious to go. Little Billie was frettin', like he allus did. He didn't
want to go; and ma was just buttonin' his dress, and had the bowl near
to comb his hair out of. And he kept frettin' and sayin' he didn't want
to go. By and by ma shook him and said: "You never want to go. I never
see such heathen children. None of you want to go." "I do," says Myrtle.
"Yes," says ma, "you do. You're good. But Billie and Skeet make this
same trouble every Sunday." Then Little Billie began to cry worse, and
said his throat hurt him, and ma said, "Let me see." So she looked, and
his throat had white splotches, and she said, "Land of the livin'," and
began to undress him. His head was hot, too. So she put Myrtle and me
out of the room and told us to go and play, and we needn't go to Sunday
School. I changed back to my old clothes and went out under the oak
tree.

Pretty soon the doctor came--Doctor Holland. He drank a lot, but was the
smartest doctor in town, just the same. And he and pa quarreled
sometimes, but they were friends; for pa said Doc Holland meant no harm,
even when he threatened to kill, which he did lots of times, even my pa.
It turned out that Little Billie had the diphtheria and the next day he
was as sick as a child could be, and live. They did everything for him,
even got a kind of a lamp to blow carbolic acid in his throat; but he
got no better. And I never saw my pa so worked up; it showed us what
child he loved the most. He was about frantic and so was ma, and neither
of 'em slept at all, it seemed.

Of course while Little Billie was sick, we dropped the diggin' out at
Salem--I was helpin' around the house. And Mitch said he had no heart
for it. He came onct to see Little Billie and just looked at him and
began to cry and went away. Little Billie was unconscious and didn't
know Mitch.

And grandma came in and helped. She wanted to give Little Billie some
tea she could make from some weeds she'd heard about--but the doctor
said it wouldn't do any good. So she just helped and let ma and the
doctor run it; and the house just