"There's work to do," he said to himself. "He's got a mansion ready for me it seems. I won't ever want other folk's nice homes any more as long as I live, 'cause it seems I've got a grander one after all than they can even think of; but then there's other mansions, and he wants people to come and fill them, and he let's us help." Then his voice took a more joyful ring, like that of a strong brave boy ready for work. "There's work to do, plenty of it, and I'll help--I'll help fill _some_ of them." "The poor homeless boy," said the warm-hearted little mother down stairs. "Deary me, my heart does just go out to him. And to think that he owns one of them mansions, and never knew it! Well, now, he shan't ever want for a home feeling on this earth if I can help it. I do believe he's one of the Lord's own, and we must feel honored, Winny dear, because we're called to help him. Don't you think he's a good warm-hearted boy, deary?" "Oh yes," Winny said, indifferently. "But, mother, he does use such shocking grammar." [Illustration] CHAPTER XIV. SIGNS AND WONDERS. Tode bustled into the house half an hour earlier than usual. Before him he carried a great sheet of pasteboard. "Where's Winny?" he asked, sitting down on the nearest chair, out of breath with his haste. "I've got an idea, and she must help me put it on here." "Winny's gone to the store, deary, for some tea. Whatever brought you home so early? Isn't business brisk to-day?" "It was until it came on to rain, and I had to put things under cover, and then I had my idea, and I thought I'd run right home and tend to it." The door opened and Winny came in, tugging her big umbrella. Instinct, it could not have been education, prompted Tode to take the dripping thing from her and put it away. "What on earth is that?" Winny said, pausing in the act of taking off her things to examine the pasteboard. "That's my sign--leastways it will be when your wits and my wits are put together to make it. I got some colored chalk round the corner at the painters, and he showed me how to use 'em." "Tode, you said you would remember not to use ''em' and 'leastways' any more." "So I will one of these days. I keep remembering all the time. Say, won't that make a elegant sign? I never thought of a sign in my life till Pliny Hastings he came along to-day. Did you ever see Pliny Hastings?" "No. Tode, I _do wish_ you would begin to study grammar this very evening. You're enough to kill any body the way you talk."