I just know he was kind enough to change clothes with you so you could run away better! And here you're keeping him in that dress when you ought to know it makes him uncomfortable--doesn't it, little boy?"

The little boy movingly ogled her with a sidelong glance of grat.i.tude for what at the moment seemed to be the first kind words he had ever heard.

"You have her give me back my pants!" said he. Then for the first time he faced his inquisitors eye to eye. "I want my own pants!" he declared, stoutly. Man spoke to man there, and both the male Whipples stirred guiltily; feeling base, perhaps, that mere s.e.x loyalty had not earlier restrained them.

"Indeed, you blessed thing, you shall have them this moment!" said the cruel stepmother. "You two march along with me."

"And not keep them till Harvey D. comes home?" It was the implacable Juliana.

"Well"--Mrs. Harvey considered--"I'm sure he would adore to see the little imps, but really they can't stand it any longer, can you, dears?

It would be bad for their nerves. We'll have to be satisfied with telling him. Come along quickly!"

"I will, too, run away!"

The girl flung it over her shoulder as she swaggered into the hall. The Wilbur twin trod incessantly on her heels.

"Wants his pants!" murmured Sharon Whipple. "Prunes and apricots! Wants his pants!"

"Mistake ever to part with 'em," observed Gideon. "Of course she browbeat him."

"My young friend here tells me she bribed him," explained Juliana.

"She gave him a lot of money and I'm keeping it for him," said her self-possessed young friend, and he indicated bulging pockets.

"Looted her bank," said Juliana.

"Forehanded little tike," said Sharon, admiringly. "And smart! She can outsmart us all any day in the week!"

In a dim upper bedroom in the big house Wilbur Cowan divested himself of woman's raiment for probably the last time in his life. He hurried more than he might have, because the room was full of large, strange, terrifying furniture. It was a place to get out of as soon as he could.

Two b.u.t.tons at the back of the dress he was unable to reach, but this trifling circ.u.mstance did not for more than a scant second delay his release. Then his own clothes were thrust in to him by the stepmother, who embarra.s.singly lingered to help him b.u.t.ton his own waist with the faded horseshoes to the happily restored pants.

"There, there!" she soothed when he was again clad as a man child, and amazingly she kissed him.

Still tingling from this novel a.s.sault, he was led by the woman along a dim corridor to a rear stairway. Down this they went, along another corridor to a far door. She brought him to rest in a small, meagrely furnished but delightfully scented room. It was scented with a general aroma of cooked food, and there were many shelves behind gla.s.s doors on which dishes were piled. A drawer was opened, and almost instantly in his ready hands was the largest segment of yellow cake he had ever beheld. He had not dreamed that pieces of cake for human consumption could be cut so large. And it was lavishly gemmed with fat raisins. He held it doubtfully.

"Let's look again," said the preposterous woman. She looked again, pushing by a loose-swinging door to do it, and returned with a vast area of apple pie, its outer curve a full ninety degrees of the circle. "Now eat!" said the woman.

She was, indeed, a remarkable woman. She had not first asked him if he were hungry.

"I'm much obliged for my pants and this cake and pie," said the boy, so the woman said, "Yes, yes," and hugged him briefly as he ate.

Not until he had consumed the last morsel of these provisions and eke a b.u.mper of milk did the woman lead him back to that shaded porch where he had lately been put to the torture. But now he was another being, clad not only as became a man among men but inwardly fortified by food. If stepmothers were like this he wished his own father would find one. The girl with her talk about cruelty--he still admired her, but she must be an awful liar. He faced the tormenting group on the porch with almost faultless self-possession. He knew they could not hurt him.

"Well, well, well!" roared Sharon Whipple, meaning again to be humorous.

But the restored Wilbur eyed him coldly, with just a faint curiosity that withered the humorist in him. "Well, well!" he repeated, but in dry, businesslike tones, as if he had not meant to be funny in the first place.

"I guess we'll have to be going now," said the Wilbur twin. "And we must leave all that money. It wouldn't be honest to take it now."

The Merle twin at this looked across at him with marked disfavour.

"Nonsense!" said Miss Juliana.

"Nonsense!" said Sharon Whipple.

"Take it, of course!" said Gideon Whipple.

"He's earned it fairly," said Juliana. She turned to Merle. "Give it to him," she directed.

This was not as Merle would have wished. If the money had been earned he was still willing to take care of it, wasn't he?

"A beggarly pittance for what he did," said Gideon Whipple, warmly.

"Wouldn't do it myself for twice the amount, whatever it is," said Sharon.

Very slowly, under the Whipple regard, the Merle twin poured the price of his brother's shame into his brother's cupped hands. The brother felt religious at this moment. He remembered seriously those things they told you in Sunday-school--about a power above that watches over us and makes all come right. There must be something in that talk.

The fiscal transaction was completed. The twins looked up to become aware that their late confederate surveyed them from the doorway. Her eyes hinted of a recent stormy past, but once more she was decorously apparelled.

"Your little guests are leaving," said the stepmother. "You must bid them good-bye."

Her little guests became statues as the girl approached them.

"So glad you could come," she said, and ceremoniously shook the hand of each. The twins wielded arms rigid from the shoulder, shaking twice down and twice up. "It has been so pleasant to have you," said the girl.

"We've had a delightful time," said the Merle twin.

The other tried to echo this, but again his teeth were tightly locked, and he made but a meaningless squeak far back in his throat. He used this for the beginning of a cough, which he finished with a decent aplomb.

"You must come again," said the girl, mechanically.

"We shall be so glad to," replied the Merle twin, glancing a bright farewell to the group.

The other twin was unable to glance intelligently at any one. His eyes were now glazed. He stumbled against his well-mannered brother and heavily descended the steps.

"You earned your money!" called Sharon Whipple.

The Wilbur twin was in advance, and stayed so as they trudged down the roadway to the big gate. With his first free breath he had felt his importance as the lawful possessor of limitless wealth.

"Bright little skeesicks," said Sharon Whipple.

"But the brother is really remarkable," said Gideon--"so well-mannered, so sure of himself. He has quite a personality."

"Other has the gumption," declared Sharon.

"I've decided to have one of them for my brother," announced the girl.

"Indeed?" said Gideon.