“I am not working for you now, Uncle, you know, so I shall have to refuse to do the chores. There is fifty cents due me from Mr. Churchill for fixing his chicken coop. You may get that, I don’t want it.”
Phil turned away once more, and with head erect entered the house, going straight to his room, leaving Abner Adams fuming and stamping about in the front yard. The old man’s rage knew no bounds. He was so beside himself with anger over the fancied impudence of his nephew that, had the boy been present, he might have so far forgotten himself as to have used his cane on Phil.
But Phil by this time had entered his own room, locking the door behind him. The lad threw his books down on the bed, dropped into a chair and sat palefaced, tearless and silent. Slowly his eyes rose to the old-fashioned bureau, where his comb and brush lay. The eyes halted when at length they rested on the picture of his mother.
The lad rose as if drawn by invisible hands, reached out and clasped the photograph to him. Then the pent-up tears welled up in a flood. With the picture pressed to his burning cheek Phil Forrest threw himself on his bed and sobbed out his bitter grief. He did not hear the thump of Abner Adams’ cane on the bedroom door, nor the angry demands that he open it.
“Mother, Mother!” breathed the unhappy boy, as his sobs gradually merged into long-drawn, trembling sighs.
Perhaps his appeal was not unheard. At least Phil Forrest sprang from his bed, holding the picture away from him with both hands and gazing into the eyes of his mother.
Slowly his shoulders drew back and his head came up, while an expression of strong determination flashed into his own eyes.
“I’ll do it—I’ll be a man, Mother!” he exclaimed in a voice in which there was not the slightest tremor now. “I’ll fight the battle and I’ll win.”
Phil Forest had come to the parting of the ways, which he faced with a courage unusual in one of his years. There was little to be done. He packed his few belongings in a bag that had been his mother’s. The lad possessed one suit besides the one he wore, and this he stowed away as best he could, determining to press it out when he had located himself.
Finally his task was finished. He stood in the middle of the floor glancing around the little room that had been his home for so long. But he felt no regrets. He was only making sure that he had not left anything behind. Having satisfied himself on this point, Phil gathered up his bundle of books, placed the picture of his mother in his inside coat pocket, then threw open the door.