"Lessen what?" cried Lem darkly.
"Lessen a month," replied Scraggy, "and ye'll kiss the brat, and he'll call ye 'Daddy,' and he'll love ye like I do, Lemmy dear."
Lem was rigid, as the woman smoothed down his shaggy gray hair and patted his hard face. Suddenly he started to his feet.
"Ye say, Scraggy, that ye'll bring the boy lessen a month?"
"Yep, lessen a month. And, Lemmy, he be a beautiful baby! Ye'll love him, will ye, Lemmy?"
"Yep. And now ye take yer cat, Screechy, and get back to bed, and when ye get the boy bring him to the scow." He hesitated a moment; then said, "Ye don't know, do ye, where Flea and Flukey run to?"
Scraggy's face dropped.
"Be they gone?" she stammered, rising.
"Yep, for a long time; and Granny Cronk be dead."
"Then ye didn't get Flea, Lem?"
"Nope. And I don't want the brat, Scraggy; I only want the boy." He spoke with meaning, and when he stood on the hut steps he turned back to finish, "Ye'll bring him, will ye, Owl?"
"Yep, Lemmy love, lessen a month."
Scraggy greedily watched the shadowy form move away in the light of the lantern. "Pussy, Pussy," she muttered, as she closed the door, "black Pussy, come a beddy; yer ole mammy be that happy that her heart's a bustin'."
When Screech Owl, although the happiest woman in the squatter settlement, fell asleep with the cat in her arms, her pillow was wet with tears.
* * * * *
Through long days of anxious waiting for Flukey's recovery, Flea struggled with the Bible lessons Ann set for her each day. Yet she could not grasp the meaning of faith. She prayed nightly; but uttered her words mechanically, for the Savior in the blue sky seemed beyond her conception. In spite of Miss Shellington's tender pleading, in spite of the fact that Flukey believed stanchly all that Ann had told them, Flea suffered in her disbelief. Many times she sought consolation in Flukey's faith.
"Ye see, Flea, can't ye," he said, one morning, "that when Sister Ann says a thing it's so? Can't ye see it, Flea?"
"Nope, I can't. I don't know how God looks. I can't understand how Jesus ruz after he'd been dead three days."
"He did that 'cause He were one-half God," explained Flukey, and then, brightening, added, "Sister Ann telled me that if He hadn't been a sufferin' and a sufferin', and hadn't loved everybody well enough, God wouldn't have let Him ruz. 'Twa'n't by anything He did after He were dead that brought Him standin' up again."