rs to his beard--and her wild eyed bronzeness
caused her to give a startled ejaculation. Daddy was gone; and Frederick
the toad, was her all. The thought of the reptile she loved brought her
quickly to her feet. Frederick should sleep in the shanty while Daddy
was away. Tessibel halted apprehensively in the open doorway.

From the shore willows, hoot owls pierced the inky night with their
sonorous cries--while in throaty discord, a million marsh frogs bellowed
farewell to summer. The lake shores caught the unceasing waves in
eternal laps, the rhythm soothing the ears of the squatter girl as her
unfathomable gaze pierced the midnight gloom. But the weight of sorrow
and longing on the strong nature, untried by emotion, strangled the
rising fear, and Tessibel advanced a step to the pebbly path. Once
outside in the darkness, she lifted her voice and repeated as of yore,

"Rescue the perishin'
Care for the dyin'."

Never before had the words roused her as now--Daddy Skinner needed that
refrain.

She darted around the corner of the mud cellar, and shoving her hand
into the familiar hole in the log, Tessibel drew Frederick quickly out.
She dropped him into her blouse and retraced her steps to the shanty.
She could never be lonely and quite without hope if Frederick were with
her. Hadn't she loved him for four long months, and daily fed him his
portion of flies? She took him from her bosom, where many times he had
sunk into toad dream-land, and without looking at him placed him on the
floor.

"It air a bad night for us, Frederick," she said out loud, "it air. But
you'll not sleep in the log to-night, but in Daddy's bed. And I'll just
pretend ye air Daddy, and when ye croak with the daylight ye can have
all the flies lightin' on the sugar, and then we air goin' after Daddy
and bring him home to the shanty, Frederick."

Tessibel turned her head and glanced at Frederick. Generally when she
spoke he would give an answering grunt. She gazed at him but dared not
venture closer. Had she lost her mind like Jake Brewer's sister, when
they brought home the body of her drowned husband? Tessibel lighted
another candle and then the third--the match burned low between her
fingers as she touched it to the fourth. Once more she looked upon the
horrid sight--terror striving and struggling for some outlet in her torn
young soul. Frederick blinked a pair of beady eyes, filmed with
death,--he moved a mutilated body with pai