By-and-by it grew dark, and I could hear only the dip of his paddle and water washing on the bow. “Say,” he exclaimed, suddenly, “that's an awful curious riddle that you've got in your pocket there.” “What do you make of it?” I asked. He seemed not to hear me, but continued to work his paddle in silence until we got out below the Mill House. “Did you ever hear of the ghost riddles?” he asked, presently. “No.” “Well, I wouldn't wonder if it was one of em. “What are the ghost riddles?” I asked. “I'll tell you some time; my sister had one give to her,” he said, as he started down the river. “I want you to stay all night with us!” I called. But I could hear only the sound of his feet on the gravel as they hurried away. ADVENTURE III.--BEING THAT OF THE BUNGWOOD COW [Illustration: 9045] HAT week my clerkship began with Mr. Weatherby. To my great disappointment “the Pearl of great price” had left the village of Mill Pond, having gone nobody knew where. It was my duty to sweep the floor and clean the windows, pump the kerosene, draw the West India molasses, and, when not otherwise employed, to sell tea, candy, and tobacco. The kerosene department took most of my time. Of course, I was in love with a girl much older than I, but the odor of petroleum, which, in spite of soap and water, maintained its hold upon me day and night, gave me the feeling of a tethered dog. Hope would not live with it, somehow. Then my face itself was so innocent of beard, beauty, or manliness. The little mirror which hung in a corner of the store flung back at me, always, a look of sheer contempt. One day, when I was alone, I took a store razor and began my first shave. As I went on, my face seemed to be enlarging and taking a highly serious view of itself. I stood by the mirror feeling it. As I did so, secret and burning thoughts began to move my tongue. Unconsciously I was talking to myself when I heard a loud guffaw. It was Bony Squares, lately returned from a far city to his home at Mill Pond. He was a printer who had travelled much, and could box and play ball and keep a crowd roaring on the store-steps every Saturday night. Moreover, he wore boiled shirts, and collars cut very low, and wonderful neckties of colored silk, and had a smart way with him. “Ah, ha!” he exclaimed, “you've been a-shav-ing yerself!” I smiled and blushed, and said nothing. He dropped his walking-stick and hopped over it two or three times, and cackled, “Ha, ha! ho, ho! You're going to have a mustache, and then you're going to see a gal by the name o' Mary.” It seemed as if ruin stared me in the face. “Lend me two dollars,” Bony Squares demanded. “Come, be quick about, it or I'll tell on ye--hope t' die if I don't.”