In the night of the third day the children awoke and cried for food. Jehoshaphat rose from his chair, and stood shaking, with breath suspended, hands clinched, eyes wide. He heard their mother rise and go crooning from cot to cot. Presently the noise was hushed: sobs turned to whimpers, and whimpers to plaintive whispers, and these complaints to silence. The house was still; but Jehoshaphat seemed all the while to hear the children crying in the little rooms above, He began to pace the floor, back and forth, back and forth, now slow, now in a fury, now with listless tread. And because his children had cried for food in the night the heart of Jehoshaphat Rudd was changed. From the passion of those hours, at dawn, he emerged serene, and went to bed. * * * * * At noon of that day Jehoshaphat Rudd was in the little office at the back of the shop. John Wull was alone, perched on a high stool at the desk, a pen in hand, a huge book open before him. “I’m come, sir,” said Jehoshaphat, “for the barrel o’ flour.” The trader gave him no attention. “I’m come, sir,” Jehoshaphat repeated, his voice rising a little, “for the flour.” The trader dipped his pen in ink. “I says, sir,” said Jehoshaphat, laying a hand with some passion upon the counter, “that I’m come for that there barrel o’ flour.” “An’ I s’pose,” the trader softly inquired, eying the page of his ledger more closely, “that you thinks you’ll get it, eh?” “Ay, sir.” Wull dipped his pen and scratched away. “Mister Wull!” The trader turned a leaf. “Mister Wull,” Jehoshaphat cried, angrily, “I wants flour. Is you gone deaf overnight?” Impertinent question and tone of voice made old John Wull wheel on the stool. In the forty years he had traded at Satan’s Trap he had never before met with impertinence that was not timidly offered. He bent a scowling face upon Jehoshaphat. “An’ you thinks,” said he, “that you’ll get it?” “I does.” “Oh, you does, does you?” Jehoshaphat nodded. “It all depends,” said Wull. “You’re wonderful deep in debt, Jehoshaphat.” The trader had now command of himself. “I been lookin’ up your account,” he went on, softly. “You’re so wonderful far behind, Jehoshaphat, on account o’ high livin’ an’ Christmas presents, that I been thinkin’ I might do the business a injury by givin’ you more credit. I can’t think o’ _myself_, Jehoshaphat, in this matter. ’Tis a _business_ matter; an’ I got t’ think o’ the business. You sees, Jehoshaphat, eighteen dollars more credit—” “Eight,” Jehoshaphat corrected. “Eighteen,” the trader insisted. Jehoshaphat said nothing, nor did his face express feeling. He was looking stolidly at the big key of the storehouse. “The flour depends,” Wull proceeded, after a thoughtful pause, through which he had regarded the gigantic Jehoshaphat with startled curiosity, “on what I thinks the business will stand in the way o’ givin’ more credit t’ you.” “No, sir,” said Jehoshaphat.