trying all the while to soothe
Susy, whose heart was beating a quick-step, and who trembled in every
limb.

"Old Grimes is dead, that good old man!" repeated Prudy, with angry
emphasis; "but it wasn't _his_ father. No, indeed; with the old blue
buttons down the back! Why, Peter is an awful man! I saw him once, and
his face looked as if he'd been rubbing it on a pen-wiper! There, Susy,
don't you cry," she added, applying a moral lesson to her sister's
wounded feelings, like a healing plaster; "he's dreadful wicked, and one
of these days he'll get hurt his own self; a horse'll strike _him_!"

"Yes, a horse'll strike _him_!" echoed Dotty Dimple.

"But what good will that do Wings?" moaned Susy. "Evil for evil only
makes things worse."

Her indignation did not lessen, but rather increased, the longer she
reflected upon the subject. What right had a man to abuse anybody's
horse--more especially hers?

"Mr. Grimes ought to be 'dited, and sent to the Reform School or State's
Prison this very night," said she, in her wrath. Prudy thought precisely
the same; also Miss Dimple, who looked upon the whole affair as a joke,
intended for her amusement.

When Mr. Parlin came home to tea, and heard the story, he did not blame
Susy in the least for her indignation, but started off for the
blacksmith's with the limping pony, saying he meant to "inquire into the
business."

"May I go with you?" cried Susy.

"Me, too?" said Prudy, echoed by Dotty.

"Only Susy," replied their father; "she may go if she likes."

Susy very much wondered what her father was going to do. As they
approached the shop, she saw, standing at the door, the man whose face
looked as if it had been "rubbed on a pen-wiper."

"Mr. Grimes," said Mr. Parlin, in a pleasanter manner than Susy thought
was at all necessary, "Mr. Grimes, I believe I owe you for shoeing this
pony."

While Mr. Grimes was making the change, Mr. Parlin added,--

"How happens it, my friend, that this little animal bears such marks of
ill treatment? See how he limps. Look at this gash."

"O," said Mr. Grimes, "he lamed himself by kicking out against the
coal-box; he's a nervous thing."

Mr. Parlin then told the boys' story.

"It is not so, upon my word and honor, sir," replied sooty-faced Mr.
Grimes, with great amazement. "I'll leave it to Mr. Fox."

Mr. Fox, and two or three other men, declared very positively that they
had seen little Wings beating himself against the coal-box;