tried to imitate his smooth, senatorial voice, robust but never
loud. Even when he was hilariously delighted by anything,--as
when poor Mahailey, undressing in the dark on a summer night, sat
down on the sticky fly-paper,--he was not boisterous. He was a
jolly, easy-going father, indeed, for a boy who was not
thin-skinned.



II

Claude and his mules rattled into Frankfort just as the calliope
went screaming down Main street at the head of the circus parade.
Getting rid of his disagreeable freight and his uncongenial
companions as soon as possible, he elbowed his way along the
crowded sidewalk, looking for some of the neighbour boys. Mr.
Wheeler was standing on the Farmer's Bank corner, towering a head
above the throng, chaffing with a little hunchback who was
setting up a shell-game. To avoid his father, Claude turned and
went in to his brother's store. The two big show windows were
full of country children, their mothers standing behind them to
watch the parade. Bayliss was seated in the little glass cage
where he did his writing and bookkeeping. He nodded at Claude
from his desk.

"Hello," said Claude, bustling in as if he were in a great hurry.
"Have you seen Ernest Havel? I thought I might find him in here."

Bayliss swung round in his swivel chair to return a plough
catalogue to the shelf. "What would he be in here for? Better