severe head-shakings, was obliged to go to a funeral; but it was Judy's only infirmity, she added, very charitably.

Of course girls did not generally have such business opportunities as these, and it was Gideon's opinion that she was "considerable of a girl, anyhow." It must be confessed that Aunt Esther was a little anxious, and the minister expressed a doubtful hope that she would not prove "a corrupting influence." Gideon told Grazella all his business plans, which Phemie never cared to listen to. It was after tea one evening, and he and Grazella were sitting on the orchard wall, while Phemie and little Adoniram shook the old damson-plum-tree. He told her of the contract he had made with the owners of the canning factory at Bayberry Port, to supply them with berries for the whole season, and, what he wouldn't tell any fellow, of the great find he had made—a blackberry thicket over on the other side of Doughnut Hill, almost an acre, and the berries just beginning to ripen! He was going to sell the plums off his trees, too, and, later on, his crab-apples, he'd got a business opening, she'd better believe.

Grazella's eyes snapped, and her thin, sallow cheeks reddened suddenly. "You'd ought to have a partner!" she cried.

Gideon shook his head doubtfully. "It's awful risky takin' partners," he said. "If they ain't smart, you have to do all the work; if they are, they are apt to cheat you."

"Jicksy!" suggested Grazella, wistfully, breathlessly. "I—I've got a job for him up here—a little one; I didn't tell, because I was afraid your aunt wouldn't ask me to stay another week if she knew; she's scairt of me, and I expect she'd be scairter of Jicksy." (The country-week girl's eyes were sharp.) "Mr. Snell, across the field, said he'd give him his board to help him take care of his cattle, and I heard they were wanting a boy to blow the organ in church. It wouldn't suit Jicksy to throw away his talents workin' for his board; but he's crazy for the country, and the doctor said 'twould be the makin' of him, account of his heart beatin' too fast, and whatever he has to eat he always thinks it enough to go 'round amongst a dozen that's poorer than him. He could blow the organ, for when he belonged to the show he blew up the fat man—all the ingy-rubber fixin's that made him fat, you know, every day: and once he worked for a balloon-man. But if you'd take him for a partner in your business—"

Grazella's eyes were so anxious that Gideon found it hard to shake his head with the proper decision, although he felt strongly doubtful whether Jicksy were "the man for his money."

"He's coming up to Mr. Snell's, anyway," said Grazella, made hopeful by Gideon's evident weakness. "And when you see how smart he is, you'll say you wouldn't have nobody else for a partner! He ain't jest common folks, like you and me, anyhow, Jicksy ain't; his adopted father was a lion-tamer in a circus, awful famous and talented, and Jicksy himself has rode elephants and camels, and travelled 'round in the boa-constructor's cage, and his own uncle is the wild man of the South Seas!"

Gideon's prudent mind still hesitated; he doubted whether these wonderful opportunities especially fitted a boy for the berry business.

Nevertheless, when Jicksy arrived, he succeeded in convincing Gideon of his desirability as a partner, and this in spite of the fact that his appearance was not pleasing. His face was so thin and wizened that it made him look like a little old man, and his black hair standing upright above the snapping black eyes, that were remarkably like Grazella's, gave him a fierce and combative aspect. Farmer Snell professed himself satisfied; he said he was up an' comin' if he wa'n't very likely-lookin'. And he secured the position of organ-blower at the village church, an easy matter, because it was not coveted by the Bayberry boys, owing to the fact that the wind in the ancient instrument would occasionally give out with an appalling screech, and the luckless and innocent blower was always soundly cuffed therefor by the sexton, who held that this summary measure was necessary to preserve the public respect for the organ—which the parish hoped to sell to a struggling young church at the Port as soon as it could afford a new one.

And Aunt Esther did invite Grazella to stay another week. The neighbors thought the reason that she gave a very queer one—because she was kept awake nights by the hard little cough in the room next hers.

Gideon had been influenced by Jicksy's ready tongue. He confided to Phemie that there ought to be one good talker in a business firm, and also by the fact that he didn't expect an equal share of the profits, but realized the value of Gideon's capital and experience. (Gideon had seven dollars and fifty-nine cents, which he kept tucked away under the ticking of his bed and counted over every night.)

Jicksy wasn't extravagant either, as Gideon had feared that he would be. He discovered at once that they were paying Steve Pennyphair, the stage-driver, too much for carrying the berries to the Port. Freedom Towle, the milkman, would carry them among his cans for half as much. Gideon had thought of asking Towle, but the fact was Bobby Towle often went on the route instead of his father, and Bobby was known to be greedy. Jicksy managed that difficulty by fastening some canvas (old hay-caps) securely over the tops of the baskets. Gideon had thought of the plan; he had lain awake half of two nights reckoning how large a hole the price of canvas enough would make in that seven dollars and fifty-nine cents; he hadn't thought of these old hay-caps that Jicksy had found in the barn chamber.

Jicksy was truly honest, and before the end of the second week of the partnership he began to wonder whether an ability to think of things ought not to offset experience; and he had brought home from the Port library a very large book on the relations of capital and labor. But before he had settled these knotty problems of the partnership in his mind something happened that caused a great excitement at Bayberry Corner, and made many people say they were glad they had known better than to take country-week children, for if the girl had not been sent to Sweet Apple Hill the boy would not have come. Jicksy had gone to the canning factory at the Port to collect a bill, and he had not returned. The amount of the bill was twenty-four dollars and sixty-four cents; Gideon had "done" the addition seven times over, and then had Phemie do it; strangely enough, thought Gideon, Phemie had "a head for figures." He had run a pitchfork into his foot, so he could not go and collect the money himself, and although he had a prudent mind, he had not thought of distrusting his partner. But he had heard from the factory that Jicksy had collected the money—and he had disappeared.

As soon as the fact became known there was another development; the minister's watch was also missing. Jicksy had blown the organ for three services with fidelity and success; only once had that fatal scream interrupted the devotions of the congregation, and then it was in a mild and mitigated form. But after the evening service the minister had thrust his watch, which he kept on the desk while he preached, into the absurd little pocket with a tight little elastic and a blue ribbon bow which his wife had made in the embroidered cover of his sermon-case. He explained that he put it there because he knew that his wife liked to have him (he was young and newly married), and therefore he was sure that his memory was not at fault. He had carelessly left the sermon-case on the desk, where the sexton had found it—without the watch. The boy who blew the organ was the only one who had an opportunity to take it. It was the day after this loss that Jicksy took "French leave"; he had "killed two birds with one stone," Bayberry people said.

Grazella's eyes snapped continually; grandpa said she was as hoppin' as a parched pea. She said folks had ought to be ashamed of