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 who fools around with little bugs than you do in mine."

This time it was Bert who flushed. "I don't mean it that way," he said uncomfortably. "But you've never met Mr. Woods and . . ."

"Oh, let it go at that," his father said. "You're sore at Sam because he's making a better stab at things than you made. If you wanted the job why didn't you take care of it?"

Later, as the boy went up to his room, the scene struck him with a sense of tragedy. Why was it, he wondered miserably, that you could have such a good time with a man who was practically a stranger, and then come home and have things rub wrong with your own father? Perhaps the contentment of the Butterfly Man's cabin had given him a new conception. . . at any rate his mind was off along a channel of thought he had never before explored. From time to time, in his memory, boys not very much older than he had disappeared from Springham, and he had heard vague stories that they "could not get along at home." He was suddenly frightened.

His mother, coming to his room, found him with his face in his hands staring down at the floor.

"Why don't you go down to the store and meet Sam?" she asked. "You can't blame your father for thinking you're nursing a grouch. You haven't been near the store since this clerk was hired. You know, Bert, that does look queer."