make a book-keeper out of him. But it ain't no use, I've quit. He's got
to go to work."

"An' after I have brung you up the way I have," she wept, starting to cover
her head with the apron and changing her mind.

"You never brung me up," he answered with sad kindliness. "I brung myself
up, ma, an' I brung up Will. He's bigger'n me, an' heavier, an' taller.
When I was a kid, I reckon I didn't git enough to eat. When he come along
an' was a kid, I was workin' an' earnin' grub for him too. But that's done
with. Will can go to work, same as me, or he can go to hell, I don't care
which. I'm tired. I'm goin' now. Ain't you goin' to say goodbye?"

She made no reply. The apron had gone over her head again, and she was
crying. He paused a moment in the doorway.

"I'm sure I done the best I knew how," she was sobbing.

He passed out of the house and down the street. A wan delight came into
his face at the sight of the lone tree. "Jes' ain't goin' to do nothin',"
he said to himself, half aloud, in a crooning tone. He glanced wistfully
up at the sky, but the bright sun dazzled and blinded him.

It was a long walk he took, and he did not walk fast. It took him past the
jute-mill. The muffled roar of the loom room came to his ears, and he
smiled. It was a gentle, placid smile. He hated no one, not even the
pounding, shrieking machines. There was no bitterness in him, nothing but
an inordinate hunger for rest.

The houses and factories thinned out and the open spaces increased as he