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14                          THE CRISIS

in the last two months!' And he said, 'Oh, Nora, I'm looking for something and I can't find it.' And she said, 'Did you lose it here?'—and he answered, awful sad, 'I think I did.' Why doesn't he buy another one, whatever it is, Cousin Anna?"

"I don't know, dear. Go on—did he say anything else?"

"Uh, huh—my but your face is red! And he said, 'Hit it up, Thomas-kid,' and Tommy opened the book and began to read all the silliest stuff about a lady in a part tending goats in a blue dress, and he said, his uncle did,, 'What's that? What's that?' and he snatched the book away and looked at it, and he said in the funniest voice, 'I thought you said you were studyin' German all along. I never realized till this minute. Who's your teacher, Thomas?' And Tommy said you was. And he said, 'What does she look like?' Tommy said, 'She's awful cute, I must give her that, but she is too darn strict about her old crazy French,' and I said you was my cousin, and I told him not to get gay when he talked about you and if you was strict he needed it. And Mr. Winter said, 'Right-oh!' and asked me a lot of questions, and I said, no, you weren't pretty, but you were awful nice looking and had pretty skin and little feet, and he asked me did I ever spill a cup of cocoa in your lap."

She was on the floor now, her arms around him. "And what else, Philly. Oh Philly, what else?"

"Lemme go, Ann, ain't I tellin' you?" He wriggled himself free. "Oh, yes, and then he said, 'Where does she live?' I said, 'With me, of course,' and he said, 'Here, in Marytown?' and I said, 'Yes, 37 Fortner street, near North,' and he said—oh he swore, Ann—he said, 'My God, to think she's been here all this time. Here, boy, gimme that book,' and he sat down and started to read the old silly stuff to Tommy, and I ran out and jumped on the ice wagon and got my head busted. And will you get me the ukelele [[ukulele]], Anna?"

She would, she assured him, get him anything, and he could go fishing and she would explain to Aunt Emmeline. "And here, take my apron upstairs with you. Why didn't you tell me before, Philly>"

"Well, what was there to tell, Anna?" he asked her, bewildered.

PART V. 

As soon as her mother should come in she'd bathe and dress and go out—but where? After all she was a girl, she must stand still, she didn't even know Mrs. Reynolds. But she could go by the house—yes, but he was to go away Friday, Theo said—why he had gone. Well, he would come back.

The gate clicked. At least, she could tell her mother. But she was crazy—she had only seen him once—well, so had the shepherdess seen the prince only once. Her mother would have to understand. What an age she was talking to one of those old Dorcas society sisters! She ran to the door and, of course, it was he on the steps, his hand just raised to knock.

Together they entered the room, silent, a little breathless. Even he was frightened. As for Anna——— 

"You knew I was coming," he told her. "I didn't find out until Thursday. Somehow I thought you lived in another town. You know you said a shepherdess had come such a long, long way and I thought that meant you had too, and I was afraid to ask you. Oh, I've hunted and hunted, and Tommy, the rascal, told me he was crazy about German because he wanted some illustrated German books he saw in my trunk, and I thought he was studying it," he rushed on breathlessly. "And Thursday night I had to go right away to New York to be sure about something, before I dared to talk to you. And I'm to be a social settlement worker, and I can talk and talk and tell people about all those things," he ended lamely.

Anna stood silent.

"Anna, I thought, I hoped, I wondered"—he stammered. "Oh, do you think you could go with me—I want you so. And don't say you don't know me, we've always known each other, you lovely, brown child." His eyes entreated her.

But she still hung back. "You could talk to people about those wonderful things, but I, what could I do?"

"After the war," he explained to her, "we could go back to Europe and I could build bridges and you could draw the plans, and after we had made enough money we could come back and I could preach my gospel—for nothing."



                THE MAN WHO NEVER SOLD AN ACRE                  15

"But, till then?"

"Till then," he whispered, "you could help me live that wonderful fairy-tale. Dear, I love you so"—and he kissed her tenderly, first on one cheek and then on the other.

"On both jaws," she whispered,, a bit hysterically.

So then he kissed her on her perfect mouth.

Just then her mother, bidding Sister Pauline Vessels an amicable good-bye at the gate, came up the walk. So, hand in hand, they went to tell her about the happy ending.


THE MAIN WHO NEVER SOLD AN ACRE.
[---]
By. J. B. WOODS
[---]

THIRTY-FIVE years ago the county of Hot Springs, in the state of Arkansas, was for the most part under standing timber. On the rocky hills the tall pines were seldom disturbed, except by the occasional prospective home builder in search of board trees from which to rive floor boards and shingles. There were no sawmills of any consequence, for the railroad had come through but a few years before and the commercial possibilities of timber were as yet unrealized. Even in the fertile bottom-lands great tracts of hardwoods were to be found; farmers had but begun to put the deep soil in shape for yearly cultivation. Most of those who owned cleared bottom-lands were obliged to live in towns away from the rivers, for the malarial mosquitoes were so numerous that, in the words of old-timers, it "took three frogs to live through a season." As a result the larger landowners were glad to rent their fields to others, allowing them to take the burden of toil, sickness, and flood loss, knowing that whatever the renter made would be in part their own at the harvest time. The same custom is in vogue at the present day and the renter's fortune is no less precarious.

Under such conditions as these a young man by the name of Taylor Henson rented a field of ten acres about the year 1880 and planted the whole in corn. He worked diligently, early and late, for the farmer's day was from sun-up to sun-down, and by the first of June his crop was in fine condition. Then came a late overflow, the Ouachita spread out over the bottom-lands and either washed away or covered deep with silt the crops of a score of renters surrounding Henson. With characteristic patience they all planted again, knowing that there would be plenty of time to mature a second crop, providing there came enough rain to nourish the plants. The corn came up promptly from the moist earth and the majority of farmers worked it once or twice and then waited for rain, but Henson's method was different; he kept at his little crop continuously, stirring the ground until the top soil was a fine moisture-conserving mulch, although he would not have known what this term meant. The rain did not come! His neighbors finally gave up in disgust, moved their families back to town and searched for work elsewhere. By the time his corn was fairly tassled the man who stood by his guns was satisfied that his crop was a success, so he hired seven helpers and set about saving the fodder from the fields of those who had quit. There was not very much to save, but he secured that little, cured it and stored it away for future reference. When his own crop ripened he gathered the corn and harvested the fodder and before the winter came he sold all that he had to spare to the owners and renters of the land about him. His income from the ten acres amounted to more than one hundred dollars per acre.

But, of course, the money did not come in a lump; in fact, after settling with the merchant who had supplied his needs during crop time, he had just one hundred dollars in ready money, with a fair amount outstanding, when the idea of buying land entered his head. Learning of a forty-acre tract which was soon to be disposed of at