Lucky | Page 6

towards the sun.
"I'll be there," said Slocum, and walked away.
* * *
"What, Nana Meers! The ducks are dead! What can you mean?"
exclaimed Mrs. Royster when Nana had imparted the news to her.

"They are dead, that's all," said Nana doggedly. "Give me my dinner."
"You shall never have another bite, you--"
"Yes, she shall too," interposed a voice, the voice of Joe Slocum. He
had come up unperceived by both Mrs. Royster and the girl.
"Here, I'll pay for the birds. I shot 'em. Give the gal her dinner. Air you
goin' to?"
"Yes, but I'll lick her first!" cried the woman, making a spring at Nana.
"Not if I know it," answered the man, placing himself in front of the
child.
Mrs. Royster looked thunder clouds at the intruder.
"I'd like to know what business it is of yours, Joe Slocum," she
ejaculated fiercely. "Don't I house and keep her?"
"Yes," said Slocum impressively drawing close to his angry neighbor,
"but I'll tell you what; the gal's mine. You give her to me, and she's
mine, and I aint goin' to have her sp'iled by thrashin' nor starvin' neither.
You jest put that in your pipe."
Mrs. Royster was somewhat appeased, but muttered something about
encouraging the young imp in her bad ways.
"See here, chick," said Slocum, turning to Nana, "if this here woman
don't treat you well, you jest come to me. Now, will you?"
Nana did something quite unexpected by both enemy and friend. She
turned upon the good Samaritan with,
"No, I won't! Not if she beats me into the ground, I won't not if she
starves me dead!"
CHAPTER III.

FOLK LORE AND THE NEW NEIGHBORS.
YES, I know, or I think I do." The speaker was Lund. Nana had just
told him of her interview with Joe Slocum.
"Well?" said the girl impatiently, as the boy paused a moment studying
the proceedings of a swarm of ants that were bustling about a hill at his
feet.
"Well," continued Lund thoughtfully," it was the day I was sick and
couldn't herd. Joe Slocum came over to see about ridin' to town with
Royster next time he went with a load of cheese, and I heard them
talkin'. I was hidin' under the big vat in the cheese house for fear some
one would find me and set me to work, and I heard Royster tell old
Slocum that as soon as you were big enough, Slocum could pay
Royster three-hundred-dollars for your keep, and marry you. Then they
shook hands, and took a drink out of the bottle that Royster keeps under
a big canister in the cheese house."
"Did they say any more?"
"No. Just then I had to sneeze, and Slocum come and pulled me out
from under the vat. But Royster said 'don't be afeard of the boy. He
won't blab.' And he winked and put his front finger on his forehead."
"Well," said Nana firmly, "I think I see myself marryin' Joe Slocum."
"Won't you have to?"
Nana threw up her chin, and answered by repeating the old, iron-clad
adage of the bullwhackers, "We don't have to do anything but die."
"Oh, Nane! Such a girl! I wonder if you really be crazy. Half the people
say you be."
"Pooh! They're crazy themselves. It's all because I take my own part.
Now you, Lund, you are good; you never sass or talk back, and you're
never called crazy. But between you and me," she went on assuringly,

"you are the craziest of the two."
Lund was half convinced.
"But it's an awful thing to die," he hesitated at length.
"Yes, for bad folks. For good ones it's nice."
"But you ain't good. Everybody says you ain' t."
"Maybe I ain't. I don't care if I ain't. The Lord knows what I have to put
up with. He'll excuse me."
"Maybe he will," said Lund with a sigh of relief, "I hope he will."
"What's this, my sharpies?" called a cheery voice hard by. Both
children started at the sound.
"I've been laying for prairie chickens, but your gabble scares them all
away," the stranger went on. "So you're discussing theology, are you?"
"No, we're talkin' about dyin'," said Lund.
"Your conversation savored of the science which I name. Now, you
leave all these vexing questions to me, for I have a diploma at home,
three feet square, which proves that I'm fully capable of deciding." He
was proud of his superior knowledge and experience, this handsome,
dashing fellow, who stood nearly six feet in his short jacket, high boots,
and corduroy trousers. You could see it in his entire bearing, but more
especially in the arrogant, backward tilt of his broad sombrero, which
disclosed to view an open, genial