mbling through the Long Meadow was talking in its sleep.

Lazily it wound around young maples, and ferny groups--it would crush
them by and by, poor trusting things--then it would stumble against a
rock or pile of loose stones, wake up and repeat the strain it had
learned at its mother's breast, far up in the North Woods.

"I'm here! here! here! I'll be ready by and by, by, by, by." Then on
again, a little faster perhaps, but still dreamily. Children's laughter
sounded far below; a slouching man or woman making for the Black Cat
bent on business or pleasure, passed now and then; all else was still
and seemingly asleep.

Again Jude raised his head and gave that quick glance around.

Jude was awake at last. Little Billy Falstar had roused him two days
before and set the world in a jangle. The child's impish words had
struck the scales from Jude's eyes, and the blinding light made him
shrink and suffer.

"Him and her," the boy had whispered, hugging his bruised and dirty
knees as he squatted by Jude's door; "him and her is sparking some."
Then he laughed the freakish laugh of mischief.

Jude was polishing the gun which John Gaston had given him a year
before, and had trained him to use until he was second only to Gaston
himself for marksmanship. "Him and her--who?" he asked, raising his dull
eyes to Billy's tormenting face.

"Joyce and Mr. Gaston. Him and her is beaux, I reckon. She goes to his
shack; I listened outside the winder once--he reads to her and tells her
things. They walks in the Long Medder, too, and once I saw him kiss
her."

Again the teasing laugh that set every nerve tingling.

Then it was that Jude awoke, and his hot French blood, mingled with his
canny Scotch inheritance, rose in his veins and struck madly against
brain and heart.

He stared at Billy as if the boy had given him a physical blow--then he
looked beyond him at the woods, the sky, the highway and the dejected
houses--nothing was familiar! They all seemed alive and alert. Unseen
happenings were going on--he must understand.

"You saw--him--kiss--her?" The gun fell limply across the man's knees.

"Yep," Billy whipped his dramatic sense into action. He arose and strode
before Jude with Gaston's own manner. "This way. His arms out, and him
a-laughing like, and Joyce she kinder run inter his arms and he held
her, like this--." The close embrace of the childish gesture seemed to
strangle Jude, and he gave a muffled cry. This acted lik