Great events turn on small pivots ofttimes, and so it happened that there were some changes in that little house after this. Curiously enough, not long after Nannie's story a great tortoise-shell tomcat appeared in the Earnest home. No one thought of asking Mrs. Earnest if she had brought him there, and the others knew nothing about him. More curiously still, when Mr. Earnest began to grow sulky or ugly, Sir Tortoise Shell would often walk into the room and glare at him with his big, ugly eyes. "Jennie, I believe I'll shoot that cat!" he exclaimed one day. "I can't bear him!" "Oh, no, I couldn't let you hurt him, Gerald," said Mrs. Earnest, who had become quite a spirited little woman in the new and happy atmosphere she breathed now. "I'm so fond of him." She looked demure enough as she stooped to pet the cat, but really her eyes were sparkling with mischief, for truth to tell, she had heard Nannie's story and was ready to adopt a big yellow cat as her coat of arms. Mr. Earnest strolled out on to the gallery. He too was thinking of that story. "I could have stood the trouncing," he said to himself, "and the hanging, and even the drawing and quartering; but when it came to sending all four quarters to the penitentiary for life, what could a poor devil do but cave in?" XIII A week had passed since Steve refused to burden himself longer with Sarah Maria's care and education. As a matter of course he saw that the irascible lady was still retained about the place, but he felt that to be no concern of his so long as their orbits did not cross, and so far Sarah Maria seemed to appreciate his indifference and to thrive upon it. A change of base was effected, however, on the morning of the eighth day, and it came about in this wise. On going down to his little corn-field one morning to see how matters were progressing, Steve found--but perhaps we should first tell how he had, with melancholy eyes, seen most of the results of his summer's hard work come to naught; one vegetable after another had gone the way of the flesh--not a legitimate way, as it should have gone, on the family table, but by the path of some violence that had cut off its usefulness and ended its life prematurely. The corn was about the only article that had escaped such wreckage; it really had flourished and now bade fair to grace the table before long. Once in a while, when his spirits needed propping, Steve allowed himself the comfort of gazing upon the vigorous cornstalks, with their budding tassels, and this was his intent upon this particular day. Alas! the sight he beheld was hardly calculated to raise the spiritual thermometer, so to speak, for Sarah Maria was contentedly munching what corn she had not already trampled under foot. Now, this was more than even Steve could endure, and for once his gentleness and quiet gave way to something resembling a wild storm.