mages. I don't believe
he will wait for that. I'll see you in one week. Good-day, Mr.
Peakslow."

"Looks like you was takin' a big resk, to let him drive the hoss to
Chicago," Mr. Wiggett remarked confidentially, following Jack out of the
yard.

"I don't see that it is," Jack replied, wiping the sweat from his
forehead. "I didn't wish to be hard on him. It does men good, sometimes,
to trust them."

"Mabbe. But Dud Peakslow ain't like no other man ye ever see. He's got
some quirk in his head, or he never'd have agreed to be responsible for
the hoss and bring him back; ye may bet on that. He means to take some
advantage. Now I'm interested in the case, and I shall hate to see you
swindled."

Jack thanked the old man warmly; but he failed to see what advantage
Peakslow could hope to gain.

"I know him a heap better 'n you dew," said Mr. Wiggett. "Now, it struck
me, when he said he might need a witness, I'd offer to go with him to
Chicago. I could help him with the truckman, and mabbe find out what new
trick he's up tew. Anyhow, I could look arter your hoss a little."

"That would oblige me ever so much!" exclaimed Jack. "But I see no
reason why you should take that trouble for me."

"I take a notion tew ye, in the fust place. Next place, I've been gwine
to Chicago for the past tew weeks, but couldn't somehow git started.
Now, banged if I won't go in with Peakslow!"

Having parted with Jack, the old man returned to propose the arrangement
to his neighbor. He was just in time to hear Peakslow say to his son,--

"I see a twist in this matter 't he don't, shrewd as he thinks he is. If
I lose a good bargain, I'm bound to make it up 'fore ever this hoss goes
out of my hands. You ag'in, Wiggett?"

It was Mr. Wiggett, who concluded that he was quite right in saying that
Peakslow had a quirk in his head.

CHAPTER XVII.

VINNIE MAKES A BEGINNING.

Vinnie learned only too soon why Jack had dreaded so much to have her
enter the Betterson household; and, in a momentary depression of
spirits, she asked herself whether, if she had known all she was
undertaking, she would not have shrunk from it.

The sight of the sick ones, the mother enfeebled in mind as well as in
body, Lord Betterson pompous and complacent in the midst of so much
misery, little Lill alone making headway against a deluge of
disorder,--all this filled her with distress and dismay.

She could think of no relief but in action.

"I shall stifl