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It was the middle of the night when he waked.

“Martha.”

The old woman was there, crouched between the lounge and the fire. God knew how her poor bones ached. The Poor Boy would never know.

“Yes, dearie.”

“Put your arms around me like old times and tell me you know I didn’t do it.”

There arose in the room, like sad music, the sound of the old woman’s sobbing.

“I’m so tired,” said the Poor Boy, “and so glad.”

This time he slept till morning.

IV

For many days it appeared as if the Poor Boy’s entire efforts were directed into an attempt to sleep off his troubles. Experience was like a drug of which he could not rid himself; he waked, tried to read, tried to walk, tried to enjoy looking out over the valley, and soon gave it up, and threw himself on his bed, or on the big lounge in the living-room. And these days, of course, so the pendulum swings, were followed by days and nights in which he could not sleep at all.

But old Martha was not worried, though she pretended to be. It was natural that having slept too much he should now sleep too little. She prescribed exercise and usefulness. One day she made him wash all the dishes, and prune all the rose-vines, and tie them in readiness for straw jackets when winter should set in, and she made him split wood in the cellar, and after dinner she made him go to the piano and play Irish music for her until the sweat stood out on his forehead. Then she ordered him under a cold shower, and when he was in bed she pulled up a chair, and told him the longest and dullest story she knew–“The Banshee of Kilmanogg.” And behold he slept, and was wakened by birds in the ivy who were talking over their plans for going south for the winter.

The Poor Boy opened his rested eyes and listened to the birds. There were some who intended to travel by the seaboard air-line, others by the midland air-line; for the most part they were going to Florida and the Gulf States for the cold months; but a certain robin and his wife, tempted by the memory of crumbs and suet which a wise and wonderful old lady always put out for them, had determined to winter at Aiken in the holly-tree that stood by the old lady’s window. There were comparisons of resorts and disputes about them.

In the party were young birds who had never been south at all. And a certain old bachelor bird amused himself very heartily at the expense of these. He did not dwell upon the beauty of the journey that was before them, but upon its inconveniences, its dangers, and its horrors.

“The midland route would be all right,” he said, “if it weren’t for the farmers’ boys with their long guns and the–ever see a cat, Bub?”

“No,” twittered Bub nervously. “Don’t expect to. I’m for the seaboard.”

“That would be sense,” said the old bachelor, “if it weren’t for the Statue of Liberty.”

“The what?”

“It’s a big light–you never know just what it is, because when you fly into it to see, it breaks your neck and all the other worthless bones in your body.”

“I’m not agoing to fly into any light.”

“You think you won’t,” said the bachelor ominously. “But first your brains will scatter figuratively, and then–literally. Too bad!–too bad!”

All the young birds shuddered.

“Those big snakes in the South are rather nasty things, too,” continued the bachelor bird. “I’m used to them, of course, and I’ve proved dozens of times that there’s no such thing as hypnotism; but the effect of a snake’s eye on very young and inexperienced birds is inconceivable, and not to be reconciled to the Darwinian theory or Mendel’s law. What between snakes, hawks, and women’s hats, the life of a bird–“

“Isn’t what it used to be.”

The bachelor turned upon his interrupter and scowled.