minutes, Billy," he said. "I want to talk to the
nice lady."

The nice lady was looking rather stupefied as Wesley approached her.

"Where in the name of sense did you get that awful child?" she demanded.

"He is a young gentleman who has been stopping Elnora and eating her
lunch every day, part of the time with the assistance of his brother
and sister, while our girl went hungry. Brownlee told me about it at the
store. It's happened three days running. The first time she went without
anything, the second time Brownlee's girl took her to lunch, and the
third a crowd of high school girls bought a lot of stuff and met them at
the bridge. The youngsters seemed to think they could rob her every day,
so I went to see their father about having it stopped."

"Well, I should think so!" cried Margaret.

"There were three of them, Margaret," said Wesley, "that little
fellow----"

"Hyena, you mean," interpolated Margaret.

"Hyena," corrected Wesley gravely, "and another boy and a girl, all
equally dirty and hungry. The man was dead. They thought he was in a
drunken sleep, but he was stone dead. I brought the little boy with me,
and sent the officers and other help to the house. He's half starved.
I want to wash him, and put clean clothes on him, and give him some
supper."

"Have you got anything to put on him?"

"Yes."

"Where did you get it?"

"Bought it. It ain't much. All I got didn't cost a dollar."

"A dollar is a good deal when you work and save for it the way we do."

"Well, I don't know a better place to put it. Have you got any hot
water? I'll use this tub at the cistern. Please give me some soap and
towels."

Instead Margaret pushed by him with a shriek. Billy had played
by producing a cord from his pocket, and having tied the tails of
Margaret's white kittens together, he had climbed on a box and hung them
across the clothes line. Wild with fright the kittens were clawing each
other to death, and the air was white with fur. The string had twisted
and the frightened creatures could not recognize friends. Margaret
stepped back with bleeding hands. Sinton cut the cord with his knife
and the poor little cats raced under the house bleeding and disfigured.
Margaret white with wrath faced Wesley.

"If you don't hitch up and take that animal back to town," she said, "I
will."

Billy threw himself on the grass and began to scream.

"You said I could have fried chicken for supper," he wailed. "You said
she