"The manager doesn't like to have me show myself for nothing," said Anak, "but I can't stay under canvas all day to oblige him. My health requires me to walk out in the open air." "Does it require you to walk so fast, Anak?" "Excuse me, Robert; I'm always forgetting." "The manager has less trouble in keeping Madame Leonora in," said Robert. "That's true; she's too fat to walk much. She weighs more than I do, though she's two feet shorter." They had drawn out of the village, and got into the comparatively open country among the farms. They were talking of one subject and another, when suddenly their attention was drawn to a small boy who was running towards them in terror and dismay. "What's the matter?" asked Robert, his sympathy quickly aroused; "are you hurt?" "No," answered the boy, slackening his speed, "but Mr. Tarbox is going to whip Jimmy." "And who is Jimmy?" "Jimmy's my brother." "And what have you been doing?" "We were only cutting across his lot, when he came out and chased us, swearin' awful. I got away, but he's got poor Jimmy, and he's going to horsewhip him," and the poor boy burst into terrified tears. Robert afterwards learned that this Tarbox was a rough, tyrannical old farmer, noted for his bad temper, who appeared to cherish a special antipathy to boys. There was a footpath around his field, which considerably lessened the distance to the main road for some of his neighbors, but in the ugliness of his disposition he forbade it to be used. Men he did not venture to attack, but woe betide the boy who ventured to enter his enclosure. "Where is this Tarbox and your brother?" asked Anak. The boy pointed to a house and lot a little farther on. "We wouldn't have gone across-lots," he explained, "but mother was taken sick, and we got frightened and wanted to call the doctor as soon as we could, and we thought we might do it for once." "Did you tell this man Tarbox the reason you went across his field?" asked Anak. "Yes, but he said it was no excuse, and I am afraid he'll kill poor Jimmy." The little boy fell to weeping again. "There they are!" said Robert. In a field, just off the road, was a strong, brutal-looking man deliberately engaged in tying a boy of twelve to a tree. The whip in his hand showed what he intended to do afterwards. He might indeed have dispensed with tying the boy, for he was quite unable to escape, but he did it on the same principle that a cat plays with a mouse, to increase the terror of the poor victim. His back was turned, so that he did not see the approach of Anak and the two boys. This was what the new-comer heard as they approached: "Oh, please don't whip me, Mr. Tarbox," pleaded the poor boy, in an agony of apprehension. "Then why did you come across my lot, you little rascal?" "I was in a hurry to call the doctor, because mother was sick. Indeed that was the only reason."