“Suppose she hadn’t been here?” As I spoke I looked about me for the old negress. At this the child laughed shrilly, with a sound that was like the ironic mirth of an old man. “She is always where I am,” he replied. He was a queer child, I thought as I gazed at him, ugly and pinched, and yet with a charm which I felt from the first moment my eyes fell on him. There was a defiant shyness in his manner, and his little face, under the flaming curls, was too thin and pale for healthy childhood. But, in spite of his strangeness, I had never in my life been so strongly attracted, so completely drawn, to a child. “You must be Pell!” I exclaimed, after a pause in which I had watched him in silence. He stared at me critically. “Yes, I am Pell. How did you know?” “Oh, I’ve heard about you. Uncle Moab told me on the way over.” At the name of Uncle Moab his face grew less blank and hard. “Where is he?” he asked, turning to the driver. “I was going down to the gate to meet him. I want him to mend my kite.” “Uncle Moab went on to his cabin,” answered the young man, and I noticed that he subdued his tone as he might have done to an ill person or a startled colt. “Then I’ll go after him,” replied the child. “I am not afraid.” With a bound he started down the steep road, running in restless leaps, with his bright curls blown out like an aureole round his head. The two black and yellow hounds, jumping up from the stubble, followed, as noiseless as shadows, on his trail; and in a few minutes the three shapes melted into the obscurity of the fields. When I was in the carriage again I remarked inquiringly to the driver: “For a delicate child he does not appear to be timid.” “Not out of doors. He is never afraid out of doors. In the house they have a good deal of trouble with him.” “Do the other children look so thin and pale?” “Oh, no, ma’am. The other children are healthy enough. They don’t get on well with this one, and that’s why he stays out of the house whenever they’ll let him, even when it is raining. Pell is the child of the first Mrs. Blanton.” “Yes, I know. Were you here in her time?” “No, I came afterward. The year the darkeys moved away. But anybody can see how different she must have been from this one, who is the daughter of old Mr. Twine, the miller. She kept house for Mr. Blanton after his first wife died.” This was news to me, for I was absolutely ignorant of the family circumstances. I was eager to learn more of the story; but I could not gossip about my relatives with a stranger, so I said merely,