red-headed bye to fight. I've enough."

Whilst I was a simple lad, I wasn't a fool. For me to hold that two-hundred-and-twenty-five-pound rough-and-tumble fighter even, was impossible. He was ashamed of the whole thing. As soon as his ugly temper had the edge knocked off it, he took that way of closing the deal. No bad man at all, old Mick.

"You say that to save my feelings," I said.

"What's that?" says he, rough and hard. "Off with ye!" He wouldn't admit being decent for a farm. He swung away. Then I got another jar. A voice called me and I swung around.

V

"ON MY BUREAU WAS A KNIFE—"

My father stood behind me, such a picture it chills me to think of him. All of his face was chalk-white; his hands shook like palsy. I reckon I can slide over the next little while. You guess what a crazy-mad man, who's fed his mind on darkness for years, would be likely to do. I never raised a hand in defense—took it. At the same time I made my mind up to end this business, quick and strong. I had enough.

Of course, from father's point of view, something could be said. Had I been drunk and fighting at the tavern, as my nice, gentlemanly little friend, Algy Anker, ran and told him, nobody'd blamed him for getting orry-eyed. But he might have asked me what I had to say—a woman-killer gets that show. He used me bad enough, so Eli interfered. "I don't care if I never sell another thing to you," says he; "but, neighbor, you sha'n't hit thet boy ag'in—no, now! There's no use to squirm—you sha'n't do it, and that's all. You run along, Bill."

When mother saw me, she cried out. I was a sight, for sure. Ought to have washed up a bit, and not give her such a shock, but my head was sizzing like a pin-wheel. Only one idea stuck.

"I'm not hurt much, mother," I says. "I want to speak to you."

Mother was quick-witted and hardy-witted, too. She knew there was no boy foolishness in this, so she choked down her feelings, got a basin, clean water, and a towel, and said, "Tell me while I bathe your face."

I told her. It was queer how quiet I felt. I don't know but what it's always that way, though, when a man has made his mind up tight. We seemed almost of an age, mother and me, that little while.

She pleaded with me. 

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