in the entrance-hall.

"Won't have it--never do in the world! Just going to have his picture over
the living-room fireplace."

And there it hangs--a gigantic reproduction of Old King Cole, done by the
greatest poster artist of America.

Chapter III

THE CHANGELING

He arrived in the arms of his mother, the mulatto nurse having in some
inexplicable and inconsiderate fashion acquired measles on the ship coming
from their small South American republic. Francisco Enrique Manuel Machado
y Rodriguez--Pancho, for short--and his mother were allowed to disembark
only because of his appalling lack of health and her promise to take
harborage in a hospital instead of a hotel.

Having heard of the sanitarium from her sister-in-law's brother's wife's
aunt, who had been there herself, and having traveled already over a
thousand miles, the additional hundred or so seemed too trivial to bother
about. So the senora kept her promise to the officials by buying her
ticket thitherward, and Flanders, the bus-driver, arrived just in time to
see three porters unload them and their luggage on the small station
platform. The senora was weeping bitterly, the powder spattered and
smeared all over her pretty, shallow little face; Pancho was clawing and
scratching the air, while he shrieked at the top of his lungs--the only
part of him that gave any evidence of strength.

Having disposed of the luggage, Flanders hurried back to the assistance of
the senora, whereupon the brown atom clawed him instead of the air and
fortissimoed his shrieking. Flanders promptly returned him to his mother,
backing away to the bus and muttering something about "letting wildcat's
cubs be."

"Wil'cat?" repeated the senora through her sobs. "I don't know what ees
wil'cat. I theenk eet ees one leetle deevil. Tsa, Panchito! Ciera la
boca." And she shook him.

During the drive to the sanitarium Flanders cast periodic glances within.
Each time he looked the atom appeared to be shrieking louder, while his
mother was shaking harder and longer. By the time they had reached their
destination the breath had been shaken quite out of him. He lay back
panting in his mother's arms, with only strength enough for a feeble and
occasional snarl. His bonnet of lace and cerise-pink ribbon had come
untied and had slipped from his head, disclosing a mass of black hair
curled by nature and matted by neglect. It gave the last uncanny touch to
the brown atom's appearance and c