Part 14 (1/2)

”But you'd better see where you are turning to, young man,” she went on, briskly. ”Isn't yonder the road to Lycurgus Billet's place? He owns the chestnut woods.”

”We can go that way if you like,” admitted Neale. ”But I want to come around by the Ipswitch Curve on the interurban, either going or coming.”

”What for?” asked Ruth, while Agnes cried:

”Oh, don't Neale! I never want to see that horrid place again.”

”I just want to,” said Neale to Ruth. ”Mr. Bob Buckham lives near there and I worked for him once.”

Until Neale's uncle, Mr. William Sorber, had undertaken to pay for the boy's education, Neale had earned his own living after he had run away from the circus.

”Oh, don't, Neale!” begged Agnes, faintly.

”Why shouldn't we drive back that way?” asked Ruth, surprised at her sister's manner and words. Ruth did not know all about Agnes' trouble over the raid on the farmer's strawberry patch. ”But let's drive direct to the chestnut woods now.”

”All right,” said Neale, turning the horses. ”Go 'lang! We'll have to stop at Billet's house and ask permission. He is choice of his woods, for there's a lot of nice young timber there and the blight has not struck the trees. He's awfully afraid of fire.”

”Isn't that Mr. Billet rather an odd stick?” asked Ruth. ”You know, we never were up this way but once. We saw him then. He was lying under a wall with his gun, watching for a chicken hawk. His wife said he'd been there all day, since early in the morning. _She_ was chopping wood to heat her water for tea,” added Ruth with a sniff.

Neale chuckled. ”Lycurgus ought to have been called 'Nimrod,'” he said.

”Why?” demanded Agnes.

”Because he is a mighty hunter. And that is really all he does take any interest in. I bet he'd lie out under a stone wall for a week if he thought he could get a shot at a s...o...b..rd! And he'd shoot it, too, if he had half a chance. He never misses, they say.”

”Such s.h.i.+ftlessness!” sniffed Ruth again. ”And his wife barefooted and his children in rags and tatters.”

”That girl was a bright-looking girl,” Agnes interposed. ”You know--the one with the flour-sack waist on. Oh, Neale!” she added, giggling, ”you could read in faint red marking, 'Somebody's x.x.xX Flour,' right across the small of her back!”

”Poor child,” sighed Ruth. ”That was Sue--wasn't that her name? Sue Billet.”

”A scrawny little one with a tip-tilted nose, and running bare-legged, though she must be twelve,” said Neale. ”I remember her.”

”Poor child,” Ruth said again.

There were other things to arouse the oldest Corner House girl's sympathy about the Billet premises when the picnicking party arrived there. Two lean hounds first of all charged out from under the house to attack Tom Jonah.

”Oh!” cried Dot. ”Stop them! They'll eat poor Tom Jonah up, they are so hungry.”

Tess, too, was somewhat disturbed, for the hounds seemed as savage as bears. Tom Jonah, although slow to wrath, knew well how to acquit himself in battle. He snapped once at each of the hounds, and they fled, yelping.

”And serves 'em just right!” declared Agnes. ”Oh! here comes Mrs.

Lycurgus.”

A slatternly woman in a soiled wrapper, men's shoes on her stockingless feet and her black, stringy hair hanging down her back, came from around the corner of the ramshackle, tumble-down house.

”Why--ya'as; I reckon so. You ain't folks that'll build fires in our woodlot an' leave 'em careless like. Lycurgus, he's gone up that a-way hisself. There's a big eagle been seed up there, an' he's a notion he might shoot it. Mebbe there's a pair on 'em. He wants ter git it, powerful. Sue, she's gone with her pap. But I reckon you know the way?”

”Oh, yes, ma'am,” said Neale. Then, after he had driven on a few yards, he said to the girls: ”Say! wouldn't it be great to catch sight of that eagle?”

”An eagle?” repeated Agnes, in doubt. ”Do you suppose there really is an eagle so near to civilization?”