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THE PIXY: A STORY: BY MRS. HAVELOCK
ELLIS
EN TREMAYNE rarely visited his son. They had
quarrelled when Luke married what his father had
termed "a wisp." The estate was more to Ben
Tremayne than the "fancical leanings toward pink
and white" of Luke. There was no appearance, so
Ben thought, of a good family stock being carried
              on by a will o" the wisp. IAow she was dead, how-
 ever, a visit was a matter of decency, like a hearse and bearers. As
 Ben sat uncomfortably in his son's kitchen he shuffled his feet on
 the sanded floor and spat now and then in the little iron spittoon
 with its porcelain bowl. He gazed stolidly for some time on his
 son's bowed head as Luke sat opposite to him with his hands clasped
 between his knees.
    "You be beaten low, Luke. You was never one to cope with
 women's whims. You was bound to take 'em serious. I allus told
 you so but you'd never listen. You was modeled for a bachelor
 and missed 'your calling, but it would have come to the same if
 you'd chosen a plain-featured woman with property to steady you."
    Luke jerked his head.
    "There was never whims," he muttered.
    "You could never see wood for trees, my son. She was a passil
of them," said Ben, "but they was gilded over with smiles and cos-
setings. She've brought you low at last. Her saucy life wasn't
enough, but she've left you to tend yourself and with no heart to
seek a suitable female."
   Luke's head went up and his pale-blue eyes had a flash in them.
   "I'm uplifted beyond all seeming," he said.
   "Not by her death, I reckon ?" queried Ben with a slight sneer.
   "Iss!" answered Luke. "Even in the face of her death. Death
can't snatch what ain't snatchable. It's not as big as-as-"
   "Thy calf love, I suppose," said Ben roughly.
   "No, nor yet as big as our happiness," said Luke. "It cain't
rob me of what's been."
   The older man took a pipe from his pocket and put it back
again.
   "Smoking do help my tongue a bit, but it ain't seemly in the
house of mourning."
   "Smoke away if it'll make thee think different o' she," said
Luke. "Not but that she's beyond thy smearing."
   "Death be oft times a g'eat release," said Ben in a kindlier
voice. "Perhaps better things be ahead for thee vet, my son. The
neighbors do well to call thee Hop o' my Thumb. You'm wonder-
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