“Like it, boy! I should say so! It’s the most beautiful birthday present I ever had.” Barbara spoke with convincing sincerity and her eyes suddenly wrinkled with fun—the fun Jimmy loved. “I’d really like to kiss you six times—and one to grow on, if you’ll allow me, sir,” she said. Jimmy considered this proposition for awhile in silence. “You don’t kiss Peg,” he objected at last. “Mercy no! I should hope not!” laughed Barbara. She seized the child firmly and planted four of the seven kisses on his hard pink cheeks. “Now two more under your curls in the sweet place,” she murmured. “And the last one in the sweetest place of all!” And she turned up his round chin and sought the warm white hollow beneath like a homing bee. “I guess I’ll be some sweeter after I eat six popcorn balls,” observed Jimmy, disengaging himself. “The molasses didn’t spill much.” “Well, I’m glad of that!” cried Barbara. “I guess I’d better get to work. You run out and bring in some chips from the woodpile, and I’ll have that molasses boiling before you can spell Jack Robinson.” “J-a-c-k,” began Jimmy triumphantly; but Barbara chased him out of doors with a sudden access of pretended severity. “You’re getting altogether too clever for me, Jimmy Preston!” she said. Then her face clouded swiftly at the recollection of Stephen Jarvis’s parting words. “What do you propose to do with the boy?” he had asked. “Take care of him,” she had replied defiantly, “and save the farm for him.” It was then that Jarvis had risen, crushing his gray felt hat angrily between his hands. “You’re likely to find it impossible to do either the one or the other,” he said coldly. “The boy is a chip of the old block. As for the farm, I’ve been trying to make you understand for the last half hour that it does not belong to you, unless you can meet the payments before the date I set; and you’ve just told me you can’t do that.” “Let me pop the corn, Barb’ra!” begged Jimmy, sniffing ecstatically at the molasses which was beginning to seethe and bubble fragrantly in the little round kettle. “I like birfdays,” he went on sociably; “don’t; you, Barb’ra? I mean I like _birthdays_. Did I say that right, Barb’ra?” “Yes, dear,” said his sister absent-mindedly. She was drawing out the little round mahogany table. “I’m going to put on the pink china,” she announced, with a defiant toss of her dark head. The defiance was for the Honorable Stephen Jarvis. “It’s beginning to pop!” cried Jimmy excitedly, as he drew the corn-popper back and forth on the hot griddles with a busy scratching sound. “Don’t let it burn,” warned Barbara. “How would you like some little hot biscuits, Jimmy, and some strawberry preserves?” “Strawberry ’serves?” he echoed. “I didn’t know we had any ’serves.” “Well, we have. I’ve been saving ’em for—for your birthday, Jimmy.” “Oh, I’m glad!” cried the little boy, redoubling his efforts. “See me work, Barb’ra. Don’t I work hard?”