Nothing had--at least nothing that his mistress or Mrs. Buck could have feared. When Judith went to the kitchen on Sunday morning, the one day she allowed herself to relax, she found the fire crackling in the stove and the kettle filled and ready to boil. Standing by the table, rolling out biscuit, was a small, old mulatto woman, wiry and erect. She was dressed in a stiff, purple calico dress and on her head was a bandanna handkerchief, the ends tied in front and standing up like rabbit ears. Uncle Billy looked at Judith and grinned sheepishly. "Miss Judy, this air Mandy!" "How do you do, Aunt Mandy? I am so glad you have come to help me. You have come for that, have you not?" The old woman continued to roll the dough and cut out the biscuit with a brisk motion, at the same time looking keenly at Judith. "Yes, I reckon that's what I come for mostly, and at the same time I come somewhat to be holped myself. As soon as I git these here biscuits in the oven I'll tell you what Billy air too shamefaced to own up to." She whisked the biscuits into the oven and then proceeded, "Billy air kinder new to this business, but bein' as it's my fifth I'm kinder used to it. Billy an' me done got ma'id yesterday." "Got what?" "Ma'id! I'm his wedded wife. He done come down to Jefferson County courtin', an' bein' as I done buried my fo'th jes' las' year I up'n says yes as quick as a flash. I reckon Billy's been 'lowin' that so long as he couldn't be my fust, owin' to delays an' happenin's, he'd make out to be my las'. I been kinder expectin' that Billy'd come along for fifty-odd years an' every time I'd git a chance to git ma'id I'd kinder put it off, thinkin' he mought turn up, an' every time I'd bury a husband I'd say to myself, 'Now maybe this time Billy'll be comin' along.' I been namin' my chilluns arfter him off an' on. There's Bill an' Billy an' Bildad an' William an' Willy an' one er my gals is named Willymeeter. Of course I knowed he wa' kinder 'sponsible fer Miss Ann, an' I ain't never blamed him none, but I sho' wa' glad ter see him when he come walkin' in las' Wednesday an' jes' tol' me he wa' a needin' me an' he had a home er his own with a po'ch an' all. An' so we got ma'id." Old Billy had realized his dream at last--a house he could call his own, with a porch and geraniums growing on it, and married to Mandy. It mattered not to him that he was her fifth venture in matrimony. "Come next summer, we'll have a box of portulac a bloomin' befo' the house," he said to Judith. "I'm pretty nigh scairt ter be gittin' so many blessings ter onct. Sometimes I kinder pinch myself ter see if I ain't daid an' gone ter Heaben." CHAPTER XXV Uncle Billy Smiles