CHAPTER VIII.

JIMMY BARNARD'S SIN.

THE next summer, when Maurice, having been in F— only half an hour, gaily ran over the hill to the cottage, with a present for Kitty under his arm, he found her not lying prostrate as before, but sitting nearly erect, her fingers busy with her ribbons.

There was a kind of frame attached to the bed, which her physician had sent her from the hospital, and which raised her to any position she wished. Her fingers were not straight, to be sure; but she was able to use them without much pain, for which she was so thankful she could scarcely speak of it without tears.

When Maurice, with rosy checks and sparkling eyes, unfolded his bundle and laid before her half-a-dozen numbers of a popular magazine, and showed her that each number contained patterns of various kinds of fancy work, such as she could easily imitate, she gave a scream of joy.

"Just the very thing I want," she said, over and over again. "It will be such pleasure to make something new, and lay aside these old patterns, which people only buy to lay in their drawers out of sight."

"I sent money to the Editor," said Maurice, entering with all his heart into her joy, "and every month, one number will come till the year is through. There's nice reading in them about birds and beasts. Mamma read some of it to me."

Mr. Seyton thought his son old enough this year to go to the public school. There was, just over the hill, a little red school-house, the very one in which he had learned his letters years ago, and now, he introduced his son to the teacher, remarking, playfully,—

"My wife says I've turned out so well, she wants Maurice to commence his education here where I did."

"I'll do my best for him," answered the teacher, in the same tone; "and hope the boy may become as good a man as his father."

At first the little fellow did not enjoy the company of so many boys, but, after a few days' acquaintance, grew to be delighted with the new arrangements. When he came home, he would talk by the hour about the lessons, and how near the head he was, and what fun they had playing tag at recess, and how Bob Munger was going to make a kite that would fly a mile right up into the sky, and how the boys were going to give him all the string they could find.

Mrs. Seyton was very much surprised, therefore, when one Wednesday noon he came home very sober and silent, and sat down to his dinner without whistling, or without a word about the school. It was a half holiday, and usually there would have been an earnest pleading for permission to join his companions at their play on the common; but now he took a seat on a cricket near his mamma, and asked her whether she had any thread for him to wind.

"Don't you want to play?" she asked, gazing in his flushed face.

He cast down his eyes, blushing crimson.

"I don't feel like playing," he faltered, trying to control his voice.

Mrs. Seyton wondered what had happened, but did not like to press him for the reason, as she was sure he would tell her by and by. She smilingly placed a skein of bright-colored zephyr on his hands, winding it loosely on her fingers. When it was done, he jumped up, asking,—

"Mamma, may I go and see Kitty?"

"Yes, dear, I like to have you there; she says you're a great help to her."

With a good-bye kiss, he bounded away.

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