"Hold on, please, don't go away; I'd like to talk with you, and tell you how much I've enjoyed listening to your playing."
Upon hearing the stranger say these kind words, the boy apparently reconsidered his intention of running off. He drew himself up proudly, and waited. Elmer saw that while he was a very handsome little fellow, there was no trace of weakness about his face; he had just as resolute a chin as Jem Shock himself; and his blue eyes could evidently flash fire if his spirit were aroused.
So Elmer walked forward and joined the other. Standing there barefooted, and with his clothing well worn, though neatly patched, the boy presented a strange appearance, hugging his cherished violin in its faded case close under his arm. Elmer would never forget the picture he had made as he sat there drawing all those remarkable sounds from the wooden case; he would have labeled such a painting simply "Genius," and let people catch the idea according to their bent.
"You play very sweetly, my boy," he told the other. "I have been listening for a long time. Where did you learn how to handle the bow? Who taught you to make a violin talk, and tell all the things that you have been hearing the birds and the little woods folks saying?"
"My mother showed me how to hold the bow, and the rest I just picked up like, mister," the boy replied.
Elmer was further astonished. He had expected to hear this woods boy speak most ungrammatically; but few lads of his age, who had gone to school for five years or over, could have expressed themselves one-half as well. But then the same mother who had shown him how to grasp the bow must have taken pains to teach him other things that went with the education of a growing boy. His observation had done the rest; for just as Elmer himself was accustomed to doing, this boy had ever heard a thousand voices in the solitudes where he dwelt; and these elements he was weaving into music as he dreamily drew his bow again and again across the responsive strings.
"Do you live near here?" next asked Elmer, who saw that the boy was curiously looking him over, and seemed to be visibly impressed with his khaki suit, as well as his leggings and his campaign hat.
He noticed the glint of suspicion suddenly shoot into the blue eyes.
"What do you want to know that for?" he asked sharply. "Are you a warden, or a revenue officer?"
Elmer laughed in his customary cheery way that usually proved so catching, and made him so many friends.