o the rain and began walking briskly down the
road. They had gone scarcely more than a rod, however, when something
brushed against Jack Harvey, and a hand was laid lightly on his arm. He
jumped back in some alarm, for they had heard no footsteps, nor dreamed
of anybody being near.

To their relief, a girl's merry peal of laughter--coming oddly enough
from out the storm--sounded in their ears; and a slight, quaint little
figure stood in the road before them.

"Oh, how you did jump!" she exclaimed, and laughed again, like some
weird mite of a water-sprite, pleased to have frightened so sturdy a
chap as Jack Harvey. "I won't hurt you," she continued, half-mockingly.
"I'm Bess Thornton. Gran' got the supper for you. Oh, but I'm just
furious at Witham for being so mean."

Henry Burns and Harvey, taken all by surprise, stood staring in
amazement. A faint glimmering in the sky came to their aid and they
discerned, indistinctly, a girl, barefoot and hatless, of age perhaps
twelve, poorly dressed in a gingham frock, apparently as unmindful of
the rain as though she were, indeed, a water-sprite.

"Well, what is it?" asked Henry Burns. "Witham doesn't say come back,
does he?"

"Not he!" cried the little creature, impetuously, "Oh, the old
bogey-man! He's worse than the wicked giant in the book. I wish I was a
Jack-the-giant-killer. I'd--"

Words apparently failing her to express a punishment fitting for Col.
Witham, the child shook a not very formidable fist in the direction of
the tavern, then added, sharply, "Where are you going?"

"Up to that house on the hill," said Harvey. "They'll take us in there,
won't they?"

The answer was not encouraging.

"No-o-o, not much he won't," cried the girl. "Oh, don't you know old
Farmer Ellison? He's worse than Witham. He hates you."

"Guess not," said Henry Burns. "We never saw him."

"No, but you're from the city," said the child. "He hates all of you.
Haven't I heard him say so, and shake his old cane at Benton? He'll cane
you. He'll set the collies on you--"

"I'd like to meet anything that I could kick!" cried Harvey, clenching
his fist. "What kind of a place is this we've got into? That's what I'd
like to know. Henry, where in this old mud-hole shall we go? Think of
it! Three miles to Benton on this road."

"That's what I've come to tell you," said the child, "though I'd catch
it from Witham if he knew--and old Ellison, wouldn't he be mad?"

The very idea seemed to af