Pippin; A Wandering Flame

he imbecile girl sat at his feet and listened, rocking to and

ndee, and "Silver Threads among the Gold," which made Mrs. Bailey cry and Jacob blow his nose loudly. He was about to give th

he said hastily. "I was thinkin'-leastways I wa'n't thinkin'-well, it don't

eeted him. Mrs. Bailey'

ment! If you don't mind standing in the doorway of old Mr. Blossom's room,

and threw back his head and sa

n read my

ons in t

arewell to

my weep

me of its lines are patently absurd: but I wish the hymnologists could hear Pi

l I bathe m

of heave

wave of tr

peaceful

passion in his voice made them all start. "Don't you feel it? Don't you feel somethin' crinklin' all thro

Blossom snickered. It is not a pretty w

stant, his eyes ablaze again, b

face. "You darned old son of a broken whisky jug, you dare to snicker before th

ed by his side, and he flushed scarlet from throat to forehead. He stood so

hamed." He leaned over the poor old sinner, who was still gasping from the sudden onslau

shrunken figure and settled th

ou go to sleep! I was a mutt to shake

ppin, thought he was all creation? Because if so, he took leave to tell him he wasn't, nor anything approachin' it. Reassured on this point, he further observed that perhaps on the whole it might be best for him

What was it you promised Elder Hadley? To look for the grace of God in every

ray, and all? I couldn't find no

knotted brows, the inner-both of him-wrestling with

nd, no more than they were a dumb critter's. Didn't he want his little gal, want her real bad?

let the Lord run things a spell, as He was full able to do. And start off next morni

d Pippin. "Gorry to 'Liza, Mr. B

arn doorway, watched him with growing wonder and admiration. His fingers seemed almost to twinkl

ted a crackerjack at bindin'; but you work twice as f

with a smile, his hands neve

like that," he said. "There's so many things to take their minds off. Now,

rily, shifting his position a little t

t takes time and attention. Now I feel the cloud, and that's all there

oad, and wave upon wave of fair rolling country, sinking gradually to where the river flowed between its darkly wooded banks; overhead a sky of dazzling blue flecked with cloudlets of no less dazzling white. There

as his look had been. "Well, you get me, Mr. Brand, ev

dvantages. For one thing, changes don't trouble a born-blind man as they do seeing folks. I hear talk about this person looking poorly, and that one having gone gray, and lost his teeth, and like that; that don't trouble me, you see, not a mite.

e in his voice, and Pip

' lady, now!" he said

When Lucy first grew up, I made a-a picture (so to say! I never saw a

on't have. Take hearing. I hear twice what most folks do, and I hear things no seeing person can hear; undertones,

s-I can tell a silk rustle from a

There's many hold that the outer ear has nothing to do with hearing, but I don't know! I don't know! The Doctor told me of a king who wanted to know everything that was said in his house-palace, like!-and he built it in the

I had t

im, brutal figure lurks in the bac

t. My ears are thick to-night. Is that a cop's whistle, or

training!"

wer, or my bacon when it's smoked just to the fine point, or-why, take smoke alone, all the various kinds of it! Wood smoke, and good tobacco, and leaves burning in the fall of the year, and brush fires in spring! And there's herbs, southernwood, mint, lemon balm-wonderful pleasure in odors, yes, sir! And when you come to touch, why t

r fingers needed no sandpaper to sharpen their exquisite touch! Is that

ake a -- -- good un; but I ain't certain but I'll wrin

Bashford, and wholly corre

young man. Why, with that, and your fine ears, you-why-" he laughs his cheery laugh-"I won't go s

he patient look-well, there! If an Angel could be old-that is to say, gettin' on in years-and blind, this would sure be him! Now-come to see a face like this, you know the Lord has ben there: is th

lks, I like to know about 'em; what they've no objection to tellin' is what I would

s don't always find young ones that care to hear their old stories. I should be please

jamb. "This is great!" he murmured. "This certainly is great. I'd oug

, measured, clipped, laid them in

n, that's Mrs. Bailey now; we lived next door, and played together always, her and Jacob and me. I says, 'Lucy, who are they always saying "Poor child!" about? Is it you?' And Lucy says, 'I wouldn't wonder, Dave! My front teeth has come out, and I am a sight.' Little girl seven years old: she was that thoughtful always, Lucy was. She was doing me good turns every day and all day when we was little: once, I remember, I had a chance to do her one. We w

nd Pippin looke

e was a girl at the Institution who lost her sight by b

I know what burnin' feels like, just a mite of it. Not

himsical smile. "That puts me in mind of the first-no, the second-day I was there. I was to see the Doctor, the head of the Institution-he was away the day I came-and I was left alone in his office to

. "How in the airthly di

master voice! I've never forgot the words either. 'The first lesson-the hard lesson-you have first to learn is-to be blind-to live in the world without light-to look up

we to one of hi

, gazing at the face that was in

reat! It-it sounds like a song, don't it, Mr. Brand? Or-like Psalms, some w

I suppose it showed in my face, for the Doctor said, 'Here's a little fellow who already knows how to be blind! Come here, my son!' I went straight to him-his voice led me, you understand: I could always follow a voice, from the time I learned to walk. He laid his hand on my head and turned my face up, studying me. I knew that; I felt his eyes, is the only way I can put it. 'Born blind, weren't you, my boy?' he said. 'Twasn't often the Doctor had to be told anything about blind folks-or se

her head cocked, her bright yellow eye fixed on the blind man with the false air of intelligence affected by hens,

k hen pecked vigorously, trying to get every grain swallowed before any one else should come; but the motion of Brand's hand broug

ughtn't, and it's true; but she has such a way with her! Th

u tired of listening? 'Tisn't much of a

, Mr. Brand! I'm learnin' something 'most every wor

. Spare time and evenings, I'd make brooms and baskets, and the neighbors took all I could make. Sometimes I'd make a trip round other places, same as you do with your wheel, Pippin. I liked that real well. Lucy and Jacob had married by that time-I always knew they would! I-yes, I always knew they would, and right and fitting it was. Jacob's folks had passed on, and he and Lucy lived there next door to us, and was like brother and sister to me, as they always had been. Cyrus is a pleasant place; yes, sir, we've all been happy, only when Lucy lost her little David-named for me, yes, and like my own to me. That was a grief,

ew but fertile acres, and "felt a call to do for you." Lucy Bailey sometimes spoke of it to her husband with amused indignation. "Fairly driven out of his home, David was! Th

ive power. "You'd think 'twould go faster by itself!" Pippin thought; then reproached him

at exe for a month!" he said. "It

n't he?" said Pippin. "I s

tter time of the two. She's small and spry, you know, and Wisk gets in her way so

ame hobbling up, and with a wheeze by way of greeting, planted

o in and say good-by to the folks, and then I'm off. Mr. Brand, I thank you a thousand times for all you've told me, and you may be sure I shan't forge

d man urging him to come sooner a

, Mister." Pippin tu

the latter. "I'll step along wi

rn, he looked back over his shoulder. "Or a drink of som

pin shortly. He was not

e in no such place as this if I didn't. Brand's a stand-offish kind of cuss, but he don't measure up so much higher than other folks as what he thinks, mebbe. They make of him because he's blind, but I'll bet a dollar he don't suffer nights the way I do. Got

say good-by to the Kingdom folks-for a spell. They'd see him again, too. Elegant folks!-and go find that little gal, or young woman, or whatever she was, and then just

ve some perfoomery, the best I can lay hands on. And you shall have them

he room, but the

y. "Feeding the hens, I presume likely.

little gal, and you can pray yourself black in the face and I won't say a word. It just took me that way, you know; you prayin' as slick as a Gospel shark, and Ni

, and the bed

Don't you go and have another o

ith you!" said Jacob. "Take a

b pointed out briefly the merits of each animal; Pippin responded with suitable encomiums. Both men were absent and constrained. It was not till they rea

h. "So you found your wa

ppin. "I never saw a

Doodle" (his one tune)

king to you, and so has all the inmates. I never saw 'em take so to any one, unless 'twas Cap'n Parks, and he's an old friend. What I would say is, Pippin, we're gettin' on i

n! Now wouldn't that-" He turned to Mr. Bailey with shining eyes. "You're real good, sir!" he said simply. "You're-you're

grave nod. Pippin looked about

along it to observe the straightness of the grain. Returning with his prize, he produced his own knife

re doin' everything in the world for 'em, and it's great. Yes, sir, it's great! And the farm, and the garding-why, it'

d the kindly face. "T

though not to forget the others either, when I git a chance at 'em. Now see! I can't go but a little ways at a time, can I? It's like I was learnin' to walk-if you see what I mean. I don't know just what the Lord has for me to do, 'cept the first

his companion looking out over the fields with eyes full

sively. "Have I said anything I shouldn

d the troubled eyes on him, seemed to hesitate; final

em oats looks good, don't they?" H

the oats. "They are dandy, sure. You was sp

him with those troubled eyes. At last he seemed t

ne boy needs help the worst way. I expect he's

ith interest. "Where'll I find him?

wn to us. He went to school, and he helped me with the chores and helped m' wife with hers, and was handy boy all round. Mebbe we worked him too hard; he's only sixteen. We never thought it, but mebbe we did. Yet he seemed happy-whistlin' all over the place, jokin' and like t

" murmured Pippi

accounts. Pippin, that boy left us an innocent boy, that never had a bad word in his mouth that ever I heard, nor no one round here. He come back-" the gruff voice faltered-"he come back different, sir. He'd slap t

'em!" Pip

his nose in the book, and his eyes startin' out of his head. There warn't no cows nor no farm nor nothin' for him those times. I'd get real worked up, now and the

here and a little there. Folks begun to talk, and some claimed 'twas tramps, and some begun to wonder-He's only a boy

e anxious eye

u'll find one boy that knows just where hookin' ends and stealin' begins, you'll find a dozen t

eemed so taken with him. We give him a bed, and next day I set him to work hoein'-said he wanted work, you understand-and he appeared pleased as pie. Myron was hoein', too; we can't keep the witch grass out of that field, try our best. I was busy in the barn that day, choppin' hay, but yet I'd come out now a

ured himself that it was all right; it hurt, and

p and run, but they was too quick for him-he see from the window there was two of 'em-and though he hollered and fired his gun, they got off, and he couldn't find hide nor

olishing his thoughtfully on his coat sleeve. Finally he shut his knife with a snap, and stra

ell you just now? That I couldn't see but just one step ahead, wasn't

e-" began Jac

ee. Look! Where would them two go? They'd strike the nearest town, wouldn't they, so's they could lay up a bit, and spend their swag? Well, what's the near

cketed his knife and stick, pulled out his file,

dandy one. Don't say a word; don't ask me anything; but if you can trust me-if y