Planting himself on
the hearth, back to the fire, he held up first one bare foot, then the
other, to the blaze, and at last spoke in a confidential tone:

"Philip lied to you this morning when he said there wa'n't nothing the
matter with him. He knows what made him wash his years, and _I_ know."

"What was it?" I inquired, drawing up the rocker.

"He's a-courting, that's what's the matter."

"Courting!" I exclaimed, incredulously.

"Yes, courting, by grab! You mind Dilsey Warrick, that 'ere little
tow-head come in atter Christmas, from over on Wace?"

Yes, I remembered Dilsey,--a demure dove of a child, in blue home-spun
dress and red yarn stockings, with long, fair hair hanging in two
plaits, and the face of an austere little saint. She is at least three
years older and a head taller than Hen, but it pleases him to speak of
the sex in diminutives.

"You know I pack water to the big house of a morning before breakfast,"
he continued; "well, Dilsey she sweeps off the front porch over yander
then, and Philip _he_ goes round and mends the fence where the hogs
breaks in of a night."

I groaned an assent,--the neighborhood hogs are badly on the rampage,
after our mustard-and turnip-greens, which show temptingly when the snow
melts; and the fence is so frail it gives way constantly to their
assaults.

"Well," proceeded Hen, "that's as good a chanct as he wants, when thaint
nobody much around but me. But I keep my eye on him,--I tip round the
corner of the house right easy, and come up on 'em unexpected."

"You are certainly mistaken about Philip," I said decidedly, "why, he
despises girls, has no earthly use for them, in fact."

"Dag gone _me_, he's got use enough for little Dilsey, by Ned! Gee, I
never see the beat! He sot in a-courting her the day he got out from
eech, and haint stopped to ketch his breath sence. Dad swinge my hide if
that 'ere boy haint been nailing planks on that front fence with
lee-tle-bitty fourpenny nails, so's the hogs'll root 'em off sure every
night, and he'll git to work there and talk to Dilsey of a morning! I
been keeping my eye peeled for him ever sence I seed him give her a'
apple one day at recess,--I knowed then something had happened to him!"

[Illustration: "'Dag gone _me_, he's got use enough for little Dilsey,
by Ned!'"]

I sat speechless.

"But what made him wash his years," continued Hen, with lowered voice
and another glance at the door; "one morning whilst Dilsey was