"_Bookity book! Bookity book!_" The horseman paused a moment
in front of Uncle Billy's.
John Jay hopped from one foot to the other in his impatient gladness.
Then his heart sank as the hoof-beats went on down the road, _Bookity
book! Bookity book!_ growing fainter and fainter, until at last they
were drowned by the voices of the noisy katydids.
He stood still a moment, so bitterly disappointed that it seemed to him
he could not possibly bear it. Then he went in and shut the door,--shut
the door on all his bright hopes, on all his fond dreams, on the day
that was to have held such happiness, but that had brought instead the
cruelest disappointment of his life.
The tears ran down his little black face as he undressed himself. He sat
on the edge of the trundle-bed a moment, whispering brokenly, "They
wasn't anybody livin' that cared 'bout it's bein' my buthday!" Then
throwing himself face downward on his pillow, he cried softly with long
choking sobs, until he fell asleep.
CHAPTER VI.
Although John Jay bore many a deep scar, both in mind and body, very
little of his life had been given to sackcloth and ashes.
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