The Washington herald., 1915-10-03

Toon-yeh. He'd been run through the
hard-luck chute for fair. Lost wife
father and four kids by smallpox, in
one month, went mad and shot all
his stock and burned his shack down
Now there was nothin' left but him
and little Wah-be-Sahpedon, or Billy
Black, as we always called him
Nothing but his hands and the baby
and l knew the time when the Injun
could have cleaned up twenty thou
sand dollars.
That was a great kid, though. A
jim dandy, handsome little six-year-
! old, with legs and back as plumb as
bank building, and little fat tum-
my like watermelon.
Toon-Yeh thought everything OF
the baby. Billy Black had his little
| war bonnet, his fine beaded mocca.
sins, his poggamoggan and his pipe
as good as any brave. If he wasn't a
! great boy, | never see one. Not one
! OF US would think of coming back
from town without some kind of trim
ket or play toy for Billy Black.
When old Wind River comes a-roll-
! ing home from his semi-annual ben
! der, ne toted one of these here little
organs revivalists use, behind him, on
Buck.
For lii Billy" says he. Learn to
play on it when he gets bigger.
Never had no religion, po' lii boyP'
And Windy weeps to think of Bills
neglected education. Windy couldn't
separate religion from a parlor or
gan. He had an old maid aunt who
had religion and parlor organ, and
that was his one experience with
either.
But what do you guess about our
friend Belinda? She staked herself
into the game too. Sure! Belinda play
ed miggles and "hrst lick" in the two
ole-cat game, and Anthony, Anthony
over. She could never learn to spin
top, which is more of an art than
your memory leads you to believe it
is. How many of us spun a top on the
first try, to show little Billy? Just ex-
actly none. I've seldom been more
disappointed than when l heaved
that top. l though it was so funny
them other monkeys couldn't do a
simple thing like that! So / winds
her up careful, snaps her down as of
yore, and she whirled off on her ear
without even as much as land on the
peg! Belinda looks at me with that
funny little smile on her face ard
says: "How elaborately trivial"
Belinda certainly come out strong
with that kid The practical side of
her made natural born mother. And
she was a wise woman. Found out
what the little lad really liked and
taught him that, instead of things he
had no use for. He wanted to draw
pietures-all Injuns are great for
that. So she buys him little box of
paints and paper and brushes and
things, and here we have full bloom
artist on the ranch! How he did tear
into that! And the wise face of him,
all puckered up while he made his
nice red cows and blue chickens and
all! Then from this it was easy to
get him to do his A, B, abs, because
she told him that was a kind of
drawing, too. Yes sir, in spite of all
the sidestepping and nonsense, Be-
linda had war material in her loft,
and she was a straight grained bit Of
lumber, working hard to teach the
baby something, for I swear she took
no note of the fact that she made a
hit with the boys by doing so.
The pride Billy took in his work
was pay enough. One day he comes
to me with a most magnificent red
affair I had no trouble in recognizinT =
usually I was a little slow. in hook
ing up with Bills picture idees.
"Greatw says I. That's grand,
DILL T6,t &c ,,<-,r,1 >ar
almost smell it."
He backed away and eyed me. I
gathered at once something had slip
ped. There was the expression of
panied surprise we only see on the
face of the person of ability when his
works amt appreciated.
"Rose," says he. in a deep voice.
"that are no roth-that steer cow"
Believe me, l never worked harder to
square anything. But no go. He sigh
ed deep and trundled along with his
work of art.
Well. sir, a kid-a good kids a
wonderful magician. You couldn't
guess what change was made by
little Billy Black. The lad spelt all
that was meant by Home to every
man Jack of US. And to what man
is that a dearer word than to the
man who never had a home?
Well, it braced Fergy up to the
point of being real attentive to Miss
Belinda. 1t got so he used to tote
around after her, open. They rode
together, went for walks. and read
books together. And Belinda could
handle words-none better. She
honeyed him with fattery, and he
liked it-sure he did! He was one of
them curious kind of fellers like you
and me and the rest of US. And if
person keeps pouring molasses on
you. you sure do get stuck on it after
a while. Leave Belinda alone to work
the thing in good shape! But Fergy?
He was the dreariest solo PLAYER on
the mouth organ that ever mishand-
led the English language. He hadn't
the nerve to speak out, so the thing
backed and filled and hauled around
to another quarter, until Zeke Scraggs
was fit to murder Ferguson. "Ef
he'd only clear that matter up, wife
and me could take a little rest" says
he. "Ef he don't get down to testi-
mony afore long. Pm poing to knock
him crooked for trifin' with Be-
linda's girlish feelin's."
The boys come for miles around to
hear how the match was progressing,
for no old ladies' sewing bee has
anything on the wild, free cowpunch-
er when there's bit of gossip in the
air.