gy was
waxing bold. "I'm going to tell him it was writ by a noted po'try-maker,
and I want to find out what his views is as to its fineness."

Maggie looked dubious.

"He might guess," she said.

"How _could_ he?" Peggy raised her face ecstatically. Then Maggie came
close to her mother.

"Ma," she whispered, "don't you know why Billy writ that, and why he
wants to get learning, and what not?"

"No," gasped Peggy, and she felt that the heavens were about to open.

"He wants to be different so he can spark--her!"

"Spark?" Peggy panted inanely as if the word were of foreign tongue.

"Yep, spark."

"Her?"

"Yep. Her. Miss Drew."

Peggy's jaw dropped.

Since the sudden opening of the door, and Billy's unlooked-for entrance,
events had crowded upon Peggy Falstar's horizon.

Her children had been translated. She felt desolate and stricken,
although her heart glowed with pride as she viewed them from afar. In a
last attempt to cling to her familiar attitude toward Maggie at least,
Peggy vaguely remarked:

"I wonder if your being a girl makes you such a plain fool?"

"I 'spose it might," Maggie returned indifferently.

"Well," her mother continued, "don't you go upsetting Billy with any of
your fool ideas."

"I ain't going to hurt 'im." Maggie tossed her head.

"Hurt him!" Peggy sniffed. "You lay this up for future hatching, Maggie
Falstar. You, me, nor nobody ain't ever going to hurt him again and
_know_ it. What hurts he gets, from now on, he ain't going to howl
about."

Just then the supposedly slumbering Billy came out of the inner room.
Mother and sister eyed him critically. He was magnificently attired in
all the meagre finery he could call into service. What he lacked in
attire he made up in the grooming. Billy shone. Billy was plastered.
Billy smelled to high heaven of soap and kerosene. But there was that
about Billy which checked Maggie's ribald jeers, and the mother's
question as to where he was going.

However, Billy was magnanimous in his power. He turned at the outer door
and satisfied his mother's curiosity.

"Anything you want sent up to Joyce's?"

"Joyce's?" gasped Maggie. "Joyce's?"

Billy held her with a glance.

"Joyce's," he repeated. Then receiving no reply, he went out into the
still, cold night.

Billy felt like a man who held the fortune of many in the hollow of his
hand.

Knowing the ways of St. Ange men he felt sure the letter from "the
backwoodsman" to Joyce would