what they called a "hickey,"--a tremendous thump on the head with his thumb and middle finger. If the stitches were big and uneven, he gave two hickeys and a pinch, and one boy got half a dozen, because Johnny said his dirty hands made the thread gray. Mrs. Marshall gathered that it was some sort of secret society, and that they had signed an oath in their own blood not to tell. "Johnny is at the bottom of it," she thought, laughing as she went back to the house. "He has set the other boys to sewing in order to forestall them. Now they cannot tease him, should they hear of his private quilt-piecing." [Illustration] Another week went by of peaceful, uninterrupted evenings, and every night at bedtime Johnny counted out his tale of finished blocks with a sigh of relief. On the second Saturday evening he disappeared immediately after supper. It was nearly an hour later when he came tumbling excitedly into the house. "Look, mother! Look, everybody!" he exclaimed. "It's all done! Here are the three hundred and fifty blocks all in one pile. Now, I'm ready for my money, mother." "Why, Johnny!" gasped Mrs. Marshall, in astonishment. "It isn't possible you have done them all in two short weeks!" "Here they are," answered Johnny, smiling broadly. "Todd got in a hurry for his money, and I was so everlasting tired of the old patchwork that I had to think of some plan; so I farmed out two hundred of the blocks at a quarter of a cent apiece. I got up a sort of secret society, and we sewed after school and on Saturdays in the barn. The boys are waiting around the corner for their money now. There's ten of 'em, and I owe each one a nickel. So give me part of the money in small change, please, mother. Todd's there, too, 'cause I told him that you said you'd pay the very hour they were done." He dropped the bundle in her lap and hopped up and down, holding one foot in his hand. "Now the rifle's mine," he sang. "I can look the whole world in the face, for I owe not any man." He was quoting from the memory exercises at school. His eager face clouded a little at his mother's ominous silence. He shifted uneasily from one foot to another, wondering why she did not speak. At last she said, slowly: "But I had expected to pay you out of the turkey money, and I can't get that before Christmas. I hadn't an idea you could finish before then. And, oh, Johnny!" she added, sadly, "I thought it would be all your own work. What do I care for a quilt made by Tom, Dick, and Harry? I consented to spend so much money on it, because I thought it would give you employment for six or seven weeks at least, and that we would all set such store by a quilt that you had made with your own