"But _is_ there?"

"Don't he bring you things?"

"Oh, there _ain't_ any!" There was a sullen desperation in this, as of one
done with quibbles. But the woman still paltered wretchedly.

"Well, if you don't lie down and go to sleep quicker'n a wink I bet you
anything he won't bring you a single play-pretty."

There came an unmistakable blare of triumph into the busy snore on the
cot.

But the heart of the skeptic was sunk. This evasion was more
disillusioning than downright confession. A moment the little boy regarded
her, wholly in sorrow, with big eyes that blinked alarmingly. Then came
his last shot; the final bullet which the besieged warrior will sometimes
reserve for his own destruction. There could no longer be any pretense
between them. Bravely he faced her.

"Now--you just needn't try to keep it from me any longer! I _know_ there
ain't any--" One tensely tragic second he paused to gather himself--"_It's
all over town!_" There being nothing further to live for, he delivered
himself to grief--to be tortured and destroyed.

Clytie set the candle on the bureau and came to hover him. Within the
pressing arms and upon the proffered bosom he wept out one of those griefs
that may not be told--that only the heart can understand. Yet, when the
first passion of it was spent she began to reassure him, begging him not