"What have you run away from that churn for?" cried Mrs. Royden, appearing at the door. "Go right back, and fetch the butter before you leave it again!"

"I'm tired," muttered Sam.

"Don't tell me about being tired! You can churn just as well as not."

"Hurts my foot!"

"You can lay your foot on a chair, and——Do you hear?" exclaimed Mrs. Royden, growing impatient of his delay. "Don't let me have to speak to you again!"

Sam hopped into the wood-shed, and began to move the dasher up and down with exceeding moderation. When the wagon drove up to the door, he listened with a sick heart to hear if anything was said about the stray horse. Not a word was spoken on the subject. Even the silence frightened him.

He had never worked so industriously as when Chester entered the shed; and, as the latter passed by without looking at him, he felt certain that retribution was at hand. He listened at the kitchen door, and trembled at every word that was spoken, thinking the next would be something about his unpardonable offence. But his agony was destined still to be prolonged.

"They an't going to say nothing about it till my foot gets well," thought he; "then they'll jest about kill me."

Mrs. Royden had been considerably fretted in getting dinner and her fault-finding had worried poor Hepsy almost to distraction, when the arrival of the clergyman lent quite a different aspect to affairs. He drew the attention of the young children, who had been very much in their mother's way, and dropped a few soft words of wisdom from his lips, which could be taken in a general sense, or understood by Mrs. Royden as applying to her own annoyances in particular. Soon the table was ready, and the entire household, excepting Sam and Hepsy, gathered around it. The former, supposed to be churning, having been warned by Mrs. Royden that he could have no dinner until he had "fetched the butter," was listening to hear if there was any conversation about the horse; and the poor deformed girl, who had preferred to wait and take care of the baby, was shedding solitary tears from the depths of her unhappy heart.

After dinner, Father Brighthopes was sitting on the shaded grass in the yard, relating pleasant stories to the children, when an athletic young man made his appearance at the gate, leading a handsome sorrel horse.

"Hillo, Mark!" cried James, "have you been trading again?"

"Is your father at home?" asked the man with the horse.

James answered in the affirmative, and the other led his animal into the yard, making him dance around him as he approached the little group under the cherry-tree.

Even with hunger in prospective, Sam could not apply himself to the churn when he thought there was any fun going on out-doors. He hobbled out, and took his seat on the grass.

All the children were praising Mark's new horse, which he took especial delight in training before their eyes. At length he led him up to the tree, and talked to him coaxingly, smoothing his face and patting his shining neck.

"Where did you get that plaything?" asked Chester, coming out of the house.

"Ha, how do you do, Ches?" replied Mark, turning around. "When did you get home?"

He tied the halter to the tree, and began to feel of the animal's slender ankles, still maintaining a mysterious silence on the subject of his trade.

"Did you put away the brown horse for this?" asked Chester.

"Where is your father?" was Mark's unsatisfactory rejoinder.

Mr. Royden made his appearance. He was a famous judge of horse-flesh, and his shrewd eye examined the colt's admirable points with evident satisfaction.

"Where did you get him?" he inquired.

"How old is he?" asked Mark.

Mr. Royden looked in the horse's mouth a second time, and pronounced him to be four years old.

"Have you been trading?"

"On the whole," said Mark, "what do you think of him?"

"It's a fine colt; but I think here is a faint appearance of a ring-bone."

Mr. Royden pressed the animal's leg.

"I'll bet you a hundred dollars on it!" cried Mark, quickly, his eye kindling.

He was very sensitive about his horse-property, besides being a choleric man generally; and Mr. Royden only smiled, and shook his head.

"Have you got rid of Jake?"

"Never mind that; tell me what the colt is worth."

Mr. Royden expressed a favorable opinion of the beast, but declined to commit himself.

"Well, it don't make no difference," said Mark, with a smile of satisfaction. "He suits me very well," he added, with an oath.

The clergyman's countenance changed. The smile faded from his lips, and he glanced anxiously from Mark to the little boys who sat on the grass at his feet.

"Better look out about swearing 'fore the minister," said Sam, in a low tone, to Mark.

For the first time the latter regarded the old man attentively. At sight of his thin white locks, the color mounted to the jockey's brow; and when Father Brighthopes raised his calm, sad eyes, Mark's fell before them.

But Mark had some manly traits of character, with all his faults.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he said, frankly. "I wouldn't have used profane language, if I had known there was a minister within hearing."

"My friend," replied Father Brighthopes, in a kind but impressive tone, "you have my forgiveness, if that is of any account; but it seems you should rather forbear from using such language before children, whose minds are like wax, to receive all sorts of impressions—good or bad."

"The truth is," said Mark, "I thought nothing of it. It was wrong, I know."

To conceal his mortification, he began to brush the dust from the colt's feet with a wisp of grass. But his cheek was not the only one that tingled at the old man's words. Chester was very warm in the face; but only the clergyman observed the fact, and he alone could probably have understood its cause.

"To tell the truth," said Mark, laughing, "the colt isn't mine; he belongs to Mr. Skenitt, over on the north road; he has hired me to break him."

"I don't believe that," replied Mr. Royden, half in jest, and half in earnest. "Nobody that knows you would trust you to break a young horse."

"Why not?"

"You're so rash and passionate. You can't keep your temper."

"I believe in whipping, when a horse is ugly," muttered Mark, as if half a mind to take offence,—"that's all."

"You mustn't mind my jokes," said Mr. Royden. "Come, how did you trade?"

"I put away the brown horse, and gave some boot," replied Mark. "By the way, you haven't heard of any one's losing a horse recently, have you?"

"No; what do you mean?"

"Why, Skennit's boys saw a stray one in the road last night."

"Nobody this way has lost one," said Mr. Royden.

Sam's heart beat with painful violence. He was very pale.

"He was running, with a saddle, and with the reins under his feet," continued Mark. "Somebody had probably been flung from him, or he had got away by breaking the halter."

"Was he stopped?" asked Chester.

"Not in that neighborhood, at any rate. It is hard stopping a horse after dark. What's the matter, Sam?"

"Nothing," murmured Sam, faintly.

"What makes you look so white?"

"I—I've got a lame foot."

"And I know where you got it?" thundered Chester, seizing him by the shirt-collar. "It is just as I thought, last night."

"Stop, Chester,—don't be rash!" cried Mr. Royden. "Sam, tell the truth, now, about that horse."

"I fell off," blubbered Sam.

"You incorrigible, lying rascal!" ejaculated Chester. "Why didn't you say so last night?"

"I couldn't help it," and Sam wiped his face with his sleeve. "I didn't run him—and—and he got frightened."

"That has nothing to do with the question. Why didn't you tell the truth, the first thing?"

"Cause—I wasn't looking out-and he was going on a slow trot—when a stump by the side of the road scar'd him—and I fell off."

"But what did you lie about it for?" demanded Chester, fiercely.

"I was afraid I'd git a licking," muttered Sam.

"And now you'll get two of 'em, as you richly deserve. If father don't give 'em to you, I will."

"Hush, Chester, I'll attend to him," said Mr. Royden, more calm than usual on such occasions. "James, put the saddle on Old Boy. One of us must ride after the stray horse, and see where he is to be found. Sam, go and finish that churning, and prepare for a settlement."

With a sinking heart, the rogue obeyed. Mark went off, leading his colt; Chester rode to hunt up Frank; Mr. Royden proceeded to the field, and Father Brighthopes sought the privacy of his room to write. The boys clamored a little while at his door, then went cheerfully away to play with Lizzie in the garden.