he church--had come in and sat down on the counter, over the darning
needle, and as the grocery man came in with the coal, the boy pulled the
string, and went out door and tipped over a basket of rutabagas, while
the deacon got down off the counter with his hand clasped, and anger
in every feature, and told the grocery man he could whip him in two
minutes. The grocery man asked what was the matter, and the deacon
hunted up the source from whence the darning needle came through the
counter, and as the boy went across the street, the deacon and the
grocery man were rolling on the floor, the grocery man trying to hold
the deacon's fists while he explained about the darning needle, and that
it was intended for the boy. How it came out the boy did not wait to
see.

CHAPTER IV.

HIS PA BUSTED--THE CRAZE FOR MINING STOCK--WHAT'S A BILK?--
THE PIOUS BILK--THE OLD MAN INVESTS--THE DEACONS AND EVEN
THE HIRED GIRLS INVEST--HOT MAPLE SYRUP FOR ONE--GETTING A
MAN'S MIND OFF HIS TROUBLES.

"Say, can't I sell you some stock in a silver mine," asked the bad boy
of the grocery man, as he came in the store and pulled from his breast
pocket a document printed on parchment paper, and representing several
thousand dollars stock in a silver mine.

"Lookahere," says the grocery man, as he turned pale, and thought of
telephoning to the police station for a detective, "you haven't been
stealing your father's mining stock, have you? Great heavens, it has
come at last! I have known, all the time that you would turn out to be
a burglar, or a defaulter or robber of some kind. Your father has the
reputation of having a bonanza in a silver mine, but if you go lugging
his silver stock around he will soon be ruined. Now you go right back
home and put that stock in your Pa's safe, like a good boy."

"Put it in the safe! O, no, we keep it in a box stall now, in the
barn. I will trade you this thousand dollars in stock for two heads of
lettuce, and get Pa to sign it over to you, if you say so. Pa told me I
could have the whole trunk full if I wanted it, and the hired girls are
using the silver stock to clean the windows, and to kindle fires, and
Pa has quit the church, and says he won't belong to any concern that
harbors bilks. What's a bilk?" said the boy, as he opened a candy jar
and took out four sticks of hoarhound candy.

"A bilk," said the grocery man, as he watched the boy, "is a fellow
that plays a man for candy, o