Chapter 1. HOW JACK HILL DEFENDED HIS MOTHER.
Chapter 2. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE DRUNKARD.

Fred Fearnot and Terry Olcott and Evelyn, his sister, spent the summer season in New York. Evelyn spent most of the time at Fredonia with her mother and friends. She was more than glad to be with them, as well as to escape the long heat of the Southern summer. Of course, she kept in daily communication with the Texas ranch, and gave prompt directions as to what she wanted done in her absence, and the faithful superintendent of the dairy farm kept things going there to her perfect satisfaction.

She had butter shipped to certain poor people in Fredonia, as well as keeping her mother's family supplied with that delicious domestic article.

Many of her friends at Fredonia dubbed her "the Butter Queen," and she laughed and said that she didn't object to it, for in almost every American family good butter was an indispensable article. She insisted that poor butter was an article unfit to eat, and she also insisted that the tasteless white butter produced on the average farm ought to be prohibited by law.

Of course, Evelyn's stock of fine Jersey cows was continually increasing in number, and so were her Berkshire pigs. She heard almost every day of the sale of some of those pigs among the farms for miles and miles around the ranch.

The Crabtree daily paper in nearly every issue had something to say about visits made down to the ranch by ladies and gentlemen of the city; and, of course, Evelyn cut out every little article in reference to her dairy and piggery.

Meanwhile, Fred and Terry spent the most of their time down in New York City, where they had many friends, and where, acting as agents for Evelyn, they sold hundreds of tubs of butter for the purpose of building up a reputation for it in the metropolis, although they had to compete with many Northern and Western farms whereJerseys were kept for the purpose of supplying the butter market.

A well known butter firm out in Indiana had a local paper to write an article about the inferiority of Texas butter. Somebody sent the article to Evelyn down at the ranch, and the superintendent of her dairy cut it out and mailed it to her.

When she read it she was indignant. She had one of the best chemists in New York City to analyze the Western butter and her Texas butter and make a report as to which was the best and most nutritious.

Both specimens were pronounced fine, but the Texas butter was said to have the best flavor, and was more nutritious on account of the food that the cattle fed on down on the ranch.

Evelyn was overjoyed when she read the report, and had it published in various papers throughout the Eastern and Western, as well as the Middle States; and it produced a war throughout the butter section.

Hundreds of farmers wrote that the Western butter was the best, notwithstanding the analysis made by the famous chemist; but all over New York State the newspapers were friends of Evelyn and they took up the fight in her behalf, the result being that her dairy down at the ranch received more orders for butter than could be filled; and, in consequence, the price of the butter advanced about three cents a pound wholesale.

Farmers out West insisted that the butter made from cows which were fed on timothy grass was superior to that of the Southern cows, and so the discussion went on.

Down in the city Fred and Terry both entered into the discussion without Evelyn's knowledge. A newspaper man came to Fredonia to interview Evelyn, and what she told him opened his eyes. The interview was an exceedingly interesting one. She had procured from the New York chemist knowledge of how to discover whether butter was colored artificially or was the natural product of the cow, and she claimed that not an ounce of coloring matter kind ever been used on the ranch. She showed the reporter specimens of the fine Western butter which had been highly colored; and she then and there, in his presence, used some of the mixture, and the result was that the Western butter turned to a sickly color that almost turned the stomach of a person to look at it. Then she used the mixture in some of her own butter and it never lost one particle of its natural flavor or color.

Meanwhile, down in the city, Fred and Terry continued to exhibit great interest in the progress made by Jack Hill, the schoolboy, who was developing so rapidly mentally. They took him with them on several excursions on which he enjoyed himself immensely, and all the time he kept begging them to take him down to Texas with them when they returned to their ranch. Fred was helping Mrs. Hill to pull through the hard times which had overtaken her on account of her husband's lack of employment and drunken habits.

Jack's father wanted to take the boy out of school and put him into an establishment which would pay him a small salary on account of his talents as a book keeper, but Mrs. Hill objected. Of course, Jack could not get over five dollars a week, and that only in a few places; but he was willing to work even at those figures, although he said that he preferred to continue at school until he could learn a little more. Mrs. Hill was no longer able to give her husband any money for drink, and it was pretty hard with him. He was so desperate at times for lack of stimulants that he one day threatened to thrash his wife if she didn't let him have a dollar. She didn't have but thirty five cents in the house, and he insisted upon her giving him that. She refused, of course, for that was all the money they had to live on during the day. Then, in his desperation, he tried to take it from her by force, the first time in his life that he had ever dared to do so; Jack happened to come in at the time, and, seeing his mother crying and struggling with his father, he didn't stop to ask any questions, but took up a chair and broke it over his father's head.

The drunken man ran him down the stairs with a stick, threatening to kill him for daring to strike him, and Jack knew that he was not physically able to contend with him; so he went down the four flights of stairs and happened to meet with Fred and Terry on the sidewalk in front of the tenement house in which he lived.

"Hello, Jack, what's the trouble now?" and in a few words the boy explained how he had caught his father treating his mother violently for the first time in his life, and that, having struck his father on the head, he was fearing that he would kill him.

"Jack, don't you run a step further," said Terry. "Wait here and I'll give him a lesson."

Fred stood quietly by looking on, preferring that Terry should do the work himself.

Hill came thundering down the stairs with the big stick in his hand, and had such a ferocious expression on his face that he was really repulsive to look at.

Unheeding the two boys, he rushed at Jack with the club raised; but, quick as a flash, Terry stepped between the father and son, seized the descending club and wrench it from his hand.

" Look here, Mr. Hill, what does this mean ? This club is heavy enough to down an ox."

"Get out of my way!" roared the half drunken man. "He's my boy, and I'll do what I please with him."

"Do you mean that you are going to strike him with this club?"

"Yes, I do; and if you interfere I'll knock your brains out!"

"Well, you have declared your intention of committing murder by killing your son. Now, Jack, I'll hold him and you can summon a policeman, and he will have to lie in jail or give bond for good behavior "

Jack, however, refused to call a policeman, which Fred and Terry had expected for the boy was extraordinarily loyal to his father and mother. But Terry held onto him, and his strength was so much greater than Hill's that he held him a prisoner by grasping his arm.

Hill did his best to wrench himself loose from his grasp, but in vain.

"What do you want to kill Jack for, Mr. Hill?" Terry asked.

"Why, he hit me over the head with a chair upstairs in our rooms."

"What! Is that so Jack?"

"Yes, and I'll do it again. He was beating mother, and if he tries it again I shall probably kill him."

"Oh, is that so! Mr. Hill did you dare strike that good wife of yours?"

"That's no business of yours," blurted the drunken fellow, "and if you don't take your hands off me I'll call the police."

"Oh, you will, eh? Call one; call two; call a half dozen or more."

By this time quite a crowd of women and children had gathered in front of the tenement house, and someone ran toward the Bowery to summon a policeman, and in a few minutes an officer appeared.

"Officer," said Terry, ''here is a case for you. This man would have killed his son with this stick had I not taken it away from him."

The officer knew Hill, of course, as did every other officer in that ward, and he said:

"Look here, Hill, how's this?" laying a hand on his shoulder.

"Why, that boy of mine struck me over the head with a chair " The officer looked around at Jack and said:

"Is that so, Jack?"

"Yes, sir. He was fighting mother, and if he does it again I'll hurt him a great deal worse than that. He chased me downstairs with that club, swearing that he would kill me."

"What about that, Hill? I hadn't heard that you had become a wife beater. Your wife is a good woman and one of the best mothers in this ward, and I am sorely astonished at you."

Hill said nothing to this. He seemed to fear that he was at last in the hands of the law, for heretofore he had been able to keep away from the police.

He was not known as a fighter or a disturber of the peace in any way. He would simply get full of liquor, but he usually kept off the street while drunk.

Then Terry spoke up and told the officer that but for him Hill would have brained the boy with that club.

"Did you see him attempt to do so? sir?" the officer asked.

"I did, and so did that gentleman standing there," and he motioned toward Fred.

"Well, I'll have to make a case against you, Hill," said the officer, "so come along with me to the station, and you, too, sir. Come and give your address as a witness; and you too" and he looked at Fred as he spoke.

"All right, sir," said both Fred and Terry. "Go ahead with him and we'll follow you."

As usual, as the officer marched down the street with Hill, half a hundred boys and girls followed them. It was the first time Hill had ever found himself in the hands of the police, and the fright almost sobered him. He began making explanations.

"Hill, you must explain to the judge tomorrow morning in the police court," said the officer. "I am merely doing my duty in taking you in."

"Well, we haven't reached the station yet. What's the matter with your just letting me go, and I won't take another drink of whisky to-day?"

"Look here, Hill, I can't do that. You must go to the station with me. You have been out of work all the summer, and during that time I haven't seen you sober. It will do you good to be locked up for a few weeks. It will give you a chance to sober up. When a man gets so low I down as to beat his wife and try to kill his son it is time that he was sent to state prison."

A few minutes later they reached the police station, land the officer drove back the rabble which had followed them and then reported what he had been guilty of, and the captain said to the keeper of the cells:

"Lock him up, and we'll take him before the judge tomorrow morning."

The officer took the man to one of the cells which the I turnkey pointed out to him, and the door was shut with a slam that could be heard all through the building.

Both Fred and Terry looked around at Jack and noticed that he was as pale as death, while tears were running down his cheeks

"Jack, my boy, don't take it so hard," said Fred, speaking to the lad kindly and laying his hand on his shoulder. "It may be for the best."

"Mr. Fred," said he, "it is because I feel the disgrace so keenly. I am sorry now that I didn't submit and let him beat me with that club."

"That's all nonsense, Jack. It is going to take heroic treatment to break him from drinking, and perhaps when he is taken before the judge to morrow he will feel the disgrace himself, and that may cause him to swear off.'

"Oh, I know him better than that, Mr. Fearnot. He will drink harder than ever, for he is not one to get over a thing of that kind, and he will try to get even with me and Mr. Olcott. Then, too, mother will feel it harder than I do. The judge will fine him, too, and he hasn't got a cent of money to pay it."

"Don't look at it in that light, Jack," said Fred. "Just remember that he was beating your mother, whom, when he married, he promised to support and protect and love as long as life shall last. No one can blame you. I would have done as you did, and probably worse, if my father should strike my mother. I'd give him the full force of my strength."

Jack was still crying silently but deeply.

"Now, Jack, I want to show you what kind of a friend I am to you. Here's a ten dollar bill. It is yours, a present from me. Go home and give it to your mother and tell her where it came from, and then let her buy such things as she and you and your sister need. I'll come up and see her either to night or to morrow morning, just as she may say. I am going to ask her to let me take you with me down to our Texas home, where I will take care of you and see that you finish your education, for we have the very best of schools down there; or, if you insist upon working, I will find you employment in the town by which you can earn a support not only for yourself, but for your mother and sister."

"Mr. Fearnot, I am grateful to you; but mother wouldn't let me go away from home. Texas is a thousand miles from here, and she and sister would be without any protection "

"All right. We'll see about that tomorrow, Jack," and he walked around several blocks from the police station to the tenement house where the Hills lived. There he shook hands with Jack and saw him run up the four flights of stairs to the rooms that the Hills occupied.

Jack astounded his mother by showing her a ten dollar bill and telling her that Fred Fearnot had given it to him for her use, and that his father was locked up in the station house and would be tried the next morning either for wife beating or for threatening to kill him.

It was a terrible shock to her, but said she:

"It had to come some day. I've seen it coming for months and months, Jack. Now, what will become of us, I don't know "

"Why, mother, he hasn't brought a dollar into the house in months, and if we could get along without his help and feed him, too, why we can do so now just as well."

"Jack, I cannot bear to be dependent on others," and she burst into tears and cried most bitterly.

She wept until she became hysterical, and Jack and his sister Cicely bathed her face and hands several times and tried to console her, but she had her cry out, and so did Cicely; for she, too; was deeply pained.

"Now, mother," said Jack, after she had composed herself, "Mr. Fearnot gave me this ten dollar bill and said you must use it for any need that you had. Now, we haven't had anything to day but a cup of weak tea and a few slices of baker's bread. I am hungry and so is sister, and I know that you must be yourself. I will go out and get some things and bring the change back to you;" and, without waiting for any instructions from her, he closed the door after him and went swiftly down the stairs, entering a little grocery store across the street, where he bought about a dollar's worth of provisions.

The grocer seemed to be surprised when he saw the ten dollar bill.

"Had good luck, Jack, eh?"

"Yes, sir," and other than that gave the man no information whatever.

The grocer counted out the change, gave him nearly nine dollars in silver coin, which he stuffed into his pocket, and then taking up the various packages, he went back across the street and made his way up to his mother's rooms.

"Now, mother, we'll have something to eat," said he, and Cicely sprang to the table and opened every package to see what he had brought up.

Jack's sister called over the names of the articles which he had brought up from the grocer's, and she really seemed to forget that her father was locked up in the police station. Mrs. Hill had dried her own tears and glanced over at the good things which Jack had bought. For her sake Jack had bought some little dainties that she had not been able to afford for some time, and she gently chided him for his extravagance.

"Just this once, mother," said he. "I'll go and build a fire in the stove and make a cup of strong coffee for you, and then we'll have something to eat. We have money enough in the house now to feed us for at least two weeks, and then if it comes to the worst we will just have to use the prize money which I won in the oratorical contest in June."

"My son," said his mother, "we all promised each other that we wouldn't touch a penny of that money until starvation stared us in the face. We do not know what the future has in store for us."

"Very true, mother, and I am willing to live on one meal a day rather than to touch a penny of it; but it does look now as though starvation is right after us; and, mother, let me right now tell you what Mr. Fearnot said to me as we were coming away from the police station. He said that he was going to come and ask you to let me go with him down to his home in Texas, where he would clothe and feed me, besides finding employment for me by which I could take care of you and sister."

"Oh, mother," said Cicely, "isn't he a good man?"

"He is one of the best of men," said Mrs. Hill; "but I could never think of letting Jack go a thousand miles away from us, where it might be years before we would ever see him "

"Oh, mother, I didn't think about that. Don't let him go, then."

"I shall not think of such a thing, my child."

"Mother, that is just what I told him. I wish, though, that we could all go down there."

" In that case, what would become of your father, Jack ?"

"Why, let him go to work. He promised to take care of and support you, but now he is trying to make you support him and furnish him with liquor to keep drunk on."

"Jack, would you be willing to go away and leave him here by himself?"

"Yes, mother; but I would be willing to come back and divide my earnings with him if he sobered up and wouldn't spend it for liquor. If he doesn't he will come home in a drunken frenzy some night and kill us all. There is no telling what a man will do when he is drunk."

Mrs. Hill sat still and seemed for several minutes to be thinking hard.

Meanwhile, Jack was making a pot of coffee for her, and Cicely was looking after the steak which she was broiling on the stove. When it was done she set the table, put a few dishes on it, cut a loaf of bread and placed a little butter near by and then Jack, pouring a cup of coffee, said:

"Mother, drink this cup of coffee. It will do you good and strengthen your nerves."

"Yes, mother," put in Cicely, "you haven't had any breakfast to day, so sit down and eat with us; but first sip your cup of coffee," and the two children pulled up a chair to the table for her, and she sat down and proceeded to sip her coffee and eat the bread and steak which Jack had just purchased.

When about half through the meal the consciousness of her situation seemed to overcome the mother entirely, and she burst into tears and wept copiously.

Jack sprang up from the table, went around to her side, threw his arms around her neck and kissed her all over her face.

Cicely followed his example, and they both begged her to not excite herself, but to take things easy.

She returned their caresses, and said that she wouldn't cry any more.

Then for the next half hour they sat there at the table and ate their meal slowly. Then, when it was over with, the brother and sister washed up the dishes, and Jack never left the room again that afternoon, for he thought it was best to remain with his mother. Several kindhearted neighbors living in the other rooms of the tenement having heard that Hill was locked up in the police station came in to tender what consolation they were capable of, and found Mrs. Hill quiet and calm, and heard her say that she had been expecting something of the kind for a long time.

There were other men in the tenement house who had frequently been locked up on account of too much drink and nothing was thought of it.

They were lightly fined and were out again in a few days, and so it went on until it was a common occurrence in the building; but Mrs. Hill discouraged talking on the subject; in fact; she was not disposed to talk about personal affairs with any of her neighbors.

The next morning Jack stayed at home and kept his mother company. Cicely, though, went to school as usual.

"Jack, are you not going to school to day?" his mother asked.

"No, mother. Mr. Fearnot said he would call to day and I think I had better stay and keep you company. I know that he is going to ask you to let me go to his Texas home with him."

"Well, Jack, you know what I shall say to him, don’t you ?"

"Yes, mother, I think I do; and I told him so yesterday, but I want to hear what he will say about it."

He then assisted his mother in cleaning up the little rooms and making them as tidy as possible.

When Fred came Jack admitted him, and he and his mother shook hands heartily with him, while Mrs. Hill thanked him for his kindness to herself and her children.

"That's all right, madam. Fortunately, I am able to assist friends who need assistance. It is a great pleasure to me to be able to do such things. I am one of those individuals who believe there is more pleasure in giving than in receiving. I brought you a present to day from my Texas home, and that is a little ten pound pail of butter made by Miss Olcott in her dairy; or, at least, made by her workmen. Miss Olcott is Terry Olcott's sister, and I am engaged to marry her. She is known down there as I the 'Butter Queen of Texas.' She makes one hundred pounds a day of golden Jersey butter."

"What!" she gasped. "One hundred pounds a day!”

"Yes, and sometimes one hundred and ten pounds a day. The butter looks almost like new gold," and he unfastened the lid of the little pail and showed it to her.

"Oh, my! but it looks like gold. Let me get a taste of it. It is like the finest Elgin butter we get in the first class stores of this city."

"Yes, madam, that is true; but it is sweeter and more, wholesome than the finest flavored butter from the West." She got a knife from the kitchen and tasted the butter, and words failed to express her appreciation of it. On the sides and lid of the wooden pail was the word, "Olcott. "

"Now, Mrs. Hill," said he, "the way to taste butter is not like you are doing, just taking a little on the tip of your tongue; but take a slice of bread and spread it thick with the butter and eat it. Many a time after a hard day's work that has been my meal. There is more nutriment in that butter than in the finest beefsteak."

Mrs. Hill followed his suggestions, and she and Jack were able to find words to praise the beautiful butter as they wanted to.

"Good gracious, mother! Just think of making six or seven hundred pounds of butter like this every week!"

"Yes, Jack, and if she had two hundred more Jersey cows they could make and sell a thousand pounds a week without any trouble. They receive more orders for it than they can fill."

"Mr. Fearnot," Jack asked, "how many cows has Miss Olcott got?"

"Two hundred and fifty, Jack; and she has over a hundred young calves that twill begin giving milk within another year. She expects to have a thousand milch cows in the course of time. Terry and I have built a splendid dairy establishment for her, and you never saw such a happy girl as she is when she is watching over them and giving instructions to her dairymen. Every one is of the purest Jersey stock, and milk and butter is not the only thing to which she gives her attention. All the butter milk is fed to little pigs of the famous Berkshire breed. They are little, short legged pigs, and when they grow up they are as fat as butter. When little they greedily devour all the buttermilk and sour milk that they can get. I think they are the prettiest little things on four feet. By and by we are going to try the experiment of making cheese. I don't know how it will go down in that warm climate. I see no reason, though, why we can't; for we make our own ice and can keep the cheese and butter cold all the time. Now, I'll tell you some other attractions we have down on our ranch, Jack. In the fall and winter, if you are a good shot, you can go out and kill quail enough to feed a hundred people. Did you ever shoot quail ?"

"No, sir, I never did; and I don't think I ever ate any, for in the city here quail is very high."

"What! Never ate any quail ?"

"No, sir, I never did; for one has to go out a consider able distance from the city to find quail to shoot, and those in the city are too expensive for us."

"Well, down there our whole family could eat quail three times a day and it would cost nothing but the powder and shot it takes to kill them. Then, in the timber along the creeks, there are wild turkeys in the greatest abundance, and rabbits and squirrels are so numerous that you can have them every day on the table if you wish. Then there is a lake on the ranch a small one, it is true, having just a few acres of ground in extent where you can get all the fish you want. I have ridden a horse into that lake up to his body in depth and caught a string of fish.',

"What! Sat in the saddle and fished?" asked Jack, in amazement.

"Yes, Jack, my boy. Now, if your mother and sister will come down there with you we can give you a house to live in or you can live with us, and in either case it shall not cost you a penny. Terry and I will pay all the expenses, for you must know that provisions on a ranch like ours cost nothing."

"Mr. Fearnot," spoke up Mrs. Hill, "I can't understand how such things can be."

"No, because you have never lived on a ranch."

"I have never lived on a ranch, but I know that it costs money to raise cattle, no matter in what part of the world one lives."

"Well, people don't live down there without doing something If you and your two children will go down there you can assist Evelyn in her dairy work, while Jack can I continue to pursue his studies in the schools at Crabtree, or I can give him work as a book keeper; for we run the ranch on purely business principles. We would be very glad to have Cicely and you in the house as company for

Evelyn, and I am sure that you can all find something to do."

"Mr. Fearnot, I am sure that I feel grateful for your kindness, but it seems to me that it would be deserting my husband."

"Madam, that is a question for you to settle in your own mind. I don't wish to say a word to persuade you to do that; but you will pardon me for saying that it appears to me that he has deserted you, and is a burden instead of a help. If he finds that he is left to his own resources he will probably let liquor alone and return to his former industrious and temperate habits, and, in that case, you could come back to him without expense to you; for I am amply able to send you and Cicely and Jack back to New York if you decide to come. I am satisfied, though, that you will be perfectly contented to remain down there."

"Mr. Fearnot," said Mrs. Hill, "if you say that you think it will be for the benefit of all of us I will pack up my few belongings and go down with you."

"Madam, I do say it. I think that it will be better for the health of Jack and Cicely, as well as for yourself, to come down there and become members of our household. You can find plenty of employment, and Jack and Cicely can pursue their studies there better than here."

"My dear Mr. Fearnot, are you sure that Miss Olcott would be pleased to have us all with her?"

"Yes, I am sure of it. You and she are both refined and cultured women, and I am certain you would be congenial and good company for each other. I have talked with her and Mr. Olcott about it, and they both say that if I thought that it would in any way benefit your two children and yourself to bring you along. Miss Olcott thinks with Terry and me that it may be the means of I reforming your husband."

"Well, I will think it over, Mr. Fearnot, and at the present time I know nothing that would prevent my going down with you."

Jack was too happy to contain himself. He almost shouted, for he had never lived out of the city in his life. It was a long, long trip which he knew he would enjoy, and he was anxious to commence the journey.

"Now, look here, Mrs. Hill," said Fred; "don't think of taking your household goods down there, for you won't need them. My advice to you is to sell off everything for just what they will bring. I promise you on my word of honor that you shall have employment, and Jack shall either go to school or keep the ranch books, as he pleases, while your daughter can have the benefit of one of the finest teachers of music in the United States."

When Hill was brought before the police magistrate he found himself charged with two offenses, one for wife-beating and the other for threatening to kill Jack.

Both Fred and Terry appeared against him on the latter charge. Mrs. Hill would say nothing against her husband herself, and when the question was put to her as to whether he had beaten her, she said that he had simply tried to take what little money she had away from her.

To be continued...