to explain his absence, as only a mother will. Old Billy waxed
suspicious, then jumped at facts. The marriage was bad enough,
but this being left in the lurch at the eleventh hour, his son's
valuable help transferred from the home farm to Mr. Willson's, with
whom he always quarreled in church, road, and political matters, was
too much.

"But, father, you never paid him wages," ventured the mother.

"Wages? Wages to one's own son, that one has raised and fed and
shod from the cradle? Wages, when he knowed he'd come in fer part
of the farm when I'd done with it? Who in consarnation ever gives
their son wages?"

"But, father, you told him if he married her he was never to have
the farm--that you'd leave it to Sid, that he was to get right off
the day he married her."

"An' Sid'll get it--bet yer life he will--fer I ain't got no son
no more. A sneakin' hulk that leaves me with my wheat standin' an'
goes over to help that Methodist of a Willson is no son of mine.
I ain't never had a son, and you ain't, neither; remember that,
Marthy--don't you ever let me ketch you goin' a-near them. We're
done with Sam an' his missus. You jes' make a note of that." And
old Billy flung out to his fields like a general whose forces had
fled.

It was but a tiny, two-room shack, away up in the back lots, that
Sam was able to get for Della, but no wayfarer ever passed up the
side road but they heard her clear, young voice singing like a