Joyce of the North Woods Part 39

All this Billy thought upon as he strode forward whistling comfortably, and his chest swelling proudly.

It was one thing to whistle on the highway of St. Ange, and quite another to whistle in the wilds of the North Solitude.

Billy was full of creature comfort, and the scattered lights of the houses gave cheer and a feeling of security to the boy.

The Black Cat's twinkling eyes had no charm for Billy. They were never to have a charm for him; but as he neared the bungalow his whistle grew intermittent and his legs had an inclination in one direction while his heart sternly bade him follow another. Then, without really being aware of his weakness, Billy found himself knocking on the bungalow door, and his heart thumped wildly beneath the old vest of his father's which he wore closely b.u.t.toned under the coat he had painfully outgrown.

In response to his knock, the wide, hospitable door was flung open, and Billy faced a stranger who quite unnerved him, by the direct and pointed question:

"Why, good evening, little boy; what do _you_ want?"

The glow from within set Billy's senses in a mad whirl, but the "little boy" was like a dash of cold water to his pride and egotism.

"I--I--want--her!" Poor Billy was in a lost state.

"It is--I do believe it is my delectable Billy."

It was _her_ voice, and it floated down to the boy at the gate of Paradise, from the top of a step-ladder. Halfway up the ladder Jock Filmer stood with his hands full of greens and his eyes full of laughter.

"Billy, come up and be welcomed. Get down Jock, you've had your turn."

His turn! A fierce hate rose in Billy's heart; but the stranger closed the door behind him; Aunt Sally and the minister were saying kind things to him, and informing him that the angel who had admitted him was Mrs.

Dale, the Fairy of Christmas, and a great admirer of little boys.

Little boys! Were they bent on insulting him?

Jock descended with that laugh of his that always disturbed Billy's preconceived ideas. Then Billy was facing _Her_ as she bent to meet him halfway.

The glad smile pa.s.sed slowly from Constance Drew's face. The others, below, were talking and forgetting the two upon the ladder.

"Why--Billy--have you--been sick?"

"No, ma'am."

"Did they let you come home for Christmas?"

"No, ma'am. I jest c.u.m."

Constance looked long at him, and at last the laugh was gone even from her dear eyes.

"Billy," she said softly, laying her hands on his shoulders, "you've been keeping your word to me, about swearing, and--and all the rest?"

"Yes'm."

"It's been hard, too, dear, I know; but it has made you into something--better." And then with a shining look on her face she bent and kissed him.

The heat rushed all over Billy's body, following a cold perspiration.

His mouth twitched, and a maddening feeling of tears rose to his smarting eyes.

"I'm--going--over--to--Hillcrest school!" He whispered feebly, "I'm going--to get--learnin', an' things."

"Oh! Billy!"

"Yes'm."

"Oh! my dear Billy."

But such moments in life are brief. They are only permitted as propellers for all the other plain moments which are the common lot.

Billy and Constance came down from the heights morally, spiritually and physically and joined the commonplace things below.

There was corn to pop, and candy to make. There were boxes to unpack, and goodies to eat; so was it any wonder that Joyce and her poor affairs should be relegated to a place outside this Eden?

Then, too, Jock complicated matters. He was shameless in his mirth and jokes. Even the stranger-lady with her wonderful aloofness could not daunt him, but Billy fiercely resented his attentions to the girl for whom he, Billy, had forsaken all else.

To leave the field to Jock was beyond the strength of mere man, so they stayed it out together, and left the bungalow in company just as the clock struck twelve.

It was then that the events of the past forty-eight hours began most to tell upon Billy. His exhausted nerves played him false, and cried out their desperate state.

As he and Jock left the warm, scented room behind them, and faced the white, still cold of an apparently dead St. Ange, the boy turned a drawn face upon Jock, and cried tremblingly, "Say, you better--keep--yer--hands--off!" Jock stood still, and returned Billy's agonized stare with one equally grim.

"I've just reached that conclusion myself, Billy," he said, with every trace of his past mirth gone.

Billy was hoisted on his own petard.

Hatred fled before the sympathy he felt flowing from Jock to him. He wanted to cry; wanted to fling himself upon his companion and "own up,"

but Jock antic.i.p.ated all his emotions.

"See here, kid," he said in a voice new to St. Ange's knowledge of Jock; "you're not the fellow to grudge a poor devil an hour or so of heaven.

There's the hope of an eternity of it for you; but for me there's going to be only--the memory of this hour. Shake hands, old man, and take this from me, straight. Keep yourself _fit_ to touch. Lay hold of that and never let go. The more you care, the more you'll curse yourself, if you don't. It's the only decent offering a man can take to a woman.

Everything else he can hope to gain afterward. A place for her, money, and all the rest; but if he goes to her with dirty hands and a heart full of shame, nothing can make up for it--nothing!

"Billy--I'd give you all I ever hoped to have here or hereafter if I could begin to-night where you are--and with the power to _want_ to keep straight."

Billy shivered and looked dumbly, pathetically into the sad face above him. He had nothing to say. When Jock next spoke he was more like himself.

"Billy, will you see to a little business for me, and keep mum?"

This was quite in the line of the over-burdened Billy, and he accepted off-hand.

"I may--go--into camp before Christmas."

"Don't yer!" advised the boy magnanimously. "I ain't ever going to care again. You can stay here." Jock forbore to smile, but he laid his hand on Billy's shoulder.

"There's two big stacks of young pine trees up to my shack done round in bagging and ticketed to a place down the State. They're Christmas trees for poor kids, and I want you to see to getting them off for me to-morrow or next day, and if Tom Smith airs any remarks, you let on as how they hailed from the bungalow; for that's G.o.d's truth, when all's told."

"They'll go, Jock, you bet!" Billy gulped.

Curiosity was dead within him. Human suffering gave him an insight that soared above idle questioning.