ypate were put away for the night. And
presently Helen, who was bravely determined to keep Willie company, found
her head trying to drop off her shoulders, and so she had to give up to
the "sand man," and go to bed.

III.

THE WALKING-STICK A TALKING STICK.

Willie was now all by himself. He put on more wood, and drew the
rocking-chair up by the fire, and lay back in it. It was very still; he
could hear every mouse that moved. The stillness seemed to settle clear
down to his heart. Presently a wagon went clattering by. Then, as the
sound died away in the distance, it seemed stiller than ever. Willie
tried to sleep; but he couldn't. He kept listening; and after all he was
listening to nothing; nothing but that awful clock, that would keep up
such a tick-tick, tick-tick, tick-tick. The curtains were down, and
Willie didn't dare to raise them, or to peep out. He could _feel_ how
dark it was out doors.

But presently he forgot the stillness. He fell to thinking of what his
father had said at dinner. He thought of poor old rheumatic Parm'ly, and
her single bucket of coal at a time. He thought of the blind broom-maker
who needed a broom-machine, and of the poor widow whose children must be
taken away because the mother had no sewing-machine. All of these
thoughts made the night seem dark, and they made Willie's heart heavy.
But the thoughts kept him company.

Then he wished he was rich, and he thought if he were as rich as Captain
Purser, who owned the mill, he would give away sewing-machines to all
poor widows who needed them. But pshaw! what was the use of wishing? His
threadbare pantaloons told him how far off he was from being rich.

But he would go to the Polytechnic; he would become a civil engineer. He
would make a fortune some day when he became celebrated. Then he would
give Widow Martin a sewing-machine. This was the nice castle in the air
that Willie built. But just as he put on the last stone a single thought
knocked it down.

What would become of the widow and her children while he was learning to
be an engineer and making a fortune afterward? And where would he get the
money to go to the Polytechnic? This last question Willie had asked every
day for a year or two past.

Unable to solve this problem, his head grew tired, and he lay down on the
lounge, saying to himself, "Something must be done!"

"Something must be done!" Willie was sure somebody spok