Читать книгу The Victors; a romance of yesterday morning & this afternoon - Robert Barr - Страница 5

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Ben McAllister the actual rose to his feet, crossed the ditch and stood on the darkening road confronting Ben McAllister the apocryphal. Jim followed his example. During the last few minutes McAllister’s sensitive mind had undergone some extreme variations, and the result of alternate tension and relaxation was now depression, as if he had been through a mental debauch and was suffering from the consequent headache. He was a fervent lover of truth. Probably some of his ancestors had died for it, and heredity, quite unsuspected by himself, had mixed in his make-up the ingredients of which martyrs are made. There existed deep down in his nature a stratum of undeveloped religious enthusiasm which might some day change him into a fanatic. He was not cognisant of these things, for no country is so unknown to a young man as the labyrinths of his own soul. Ben’s estimate of himself depicted a simple-minded person with an eager desire to get on in the world, honestly of course, with an exaggerated estimate of the powers of others and an undue depreciation of his own, yet doggedly determined to do the best with the resources given him, a resolution modified by the constantly recurring fear that he would not know how to make the best use of the opportunities that might befall him.

His nerves had tingled as he listened to the pedlar’s denunciation of tyranny, and his back stiffened as he heard the rights of citizenship so eloquently laid down; but when a moment later the serious mask was jauntily tossed aside for the comic and Ben realised that the fervid declamation was for the occasion only and not from the heart—that conviction played no part in the oratory—and more especially when he saw the pedlar turn to commercial uses, almost blackmail indeed, the dilemma of the victim with whom he verbally played, McAllister experienced a sensation of loathing that made further communication with the charlatan almost impossible.

He looked at his comrade expecting to find in his face some reflection of the feeling that animated his own breast, but he saw no trace of such. There was, instead, an undeniable expression of admiration for the business dexterity which had so successfully extracted good money from a situation which at one time seemed desperate. Jim shared the almost universal veneration for the player with the trump card who takes the odd trick.

“If you will return to me my licence,” said Ben slowly, “we will get on with our journey. It’s late.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” inquired the stranger with genial curiosity.

“I don’t know.”

“Well, I’m bound for the same place.”

“I want my licence.”

“Oh, see here. We ain’t going to part company just yet. I’ve taken a notion to you fellows. You stood by me like a couple of bricks, and a man does not pick up a real friend on the road every day. No, sir; I ain’t going to let go of you so quick as all that; besides, I can see that you don’t know any more about peddling than a couple of infants. Say, you shouldn’t be allowed out on the road alone, especially at night. I’m going to take care of you.”

“The first thing I want is my licence; after that we can talk of the future. I lent you the licence, it served your turn; now give it back to me if you are an honourable man.”

“I never claimed to be an honourable man, though I’m not such a liar as you think. I’m a pedlar. Besides, you wouldn’t know what to do with the licence if you had it.”

“It’s mine,” persisted Ben.

“Of course it’s yours. Who denies it? Although you must admit that possession’s nine points, and I’ve got possession. Fact is, the ownership of the paper is a debatable question, and I’m quite willing to go into it on the most amicable and conciliatory basis. You see I’m like the man with the tiger by the tail, I don’t know whether to hang on or let go. I must have time to turn round. That fellow who went down the hill may get madder and madder the more he thinks about the business, and I for one wouldn’t blame him. Trouble is the livery stable man. The story will be too good to keep, and by this time to-morrow it will be all over the town. Everybody will be shouting across the street to that inspector, ‘Is this your day for buying stationery?’ or ‘How are you stocked on buttons?’ Now he’s going to have revenge; that’s human nature. He’ll put the state authorities on to me, and I simply daren’t let go this paper till I get one of my own. You see my fix.”

“Still,” expostulated Jim, standing up for his friend, who made no reply to this statement of the case, “the paper is ours, all the same. If you think we can’t get it back, you are mistaken. All we’ve got to do is to go down the hill to that official, tell him the truth and send the sheriff after you.”

“I’ll tell you why you can’t do that,” said the pedlar with great good nature. “You sat there without saying a word while I bluffed him. You didn’t wag a jaw when I held him up and sold things to him. Then was your time to speak or forever after hold your peace, as the marriage ceremony has it. You, in a way, compounded a felony, if it was a felony. Whatever it was, anyhow, you’re in it, and you can’t help yourselves. By the way, have youse got any money?”

“Do you want that, too?” asked Jim.

“I wouldn’t mind. Still, we don’t need the cash, except perhaps for a bite to eat, and sometimes not even for that if we strike a white man. As for a bedroom, there’s nothing beats a barn with a nice hay-mow in it this time of the year; but I think we ought to be getting farther from town, where the farmers are not so suspicious and don’t keep their barns locked.”

“As my friend has already said, the first proviso is the giving back of our property. We want the licence,” said Jim.

“Then don’t let’s waste time, but discuss the matter as we go along.”

Saying this the pedlar carried his black box once more to the waggon, flung it in, patted the patient horse, gathered up the reins and climbed into the rickety seat as if he were proprietor of the conveyance. Behind the one seat were two square receptacles which held the goods the young men had been endeavouring to turn into money.

“Come on, youse, if you’re coming,” commanded the pedlar, crying over his shoulder to the two indistinct figures that stood irresolute some distance back on the road.

“What are we to do?” whispered Ben in accents of despair. “I don’t like that fellow at all and don’t want to travel in his company, yet he seems quite capable of driving off with our horse, waggon and licence if we don’t go with him.”

“Say! Are youse coming, or are ye not?” shouted the stranger.

“Well, there is only one of three things to do,” commented Jim, “go with him, let him drive off with our property, or take our property from him.”

“Can we, do you think? That is, can we take it from him?”

“We can try.”

“For the third and last time, are youse coming with me?” repeated the pedlar.

The two comrades rapidly approached the side of the waggon, and the pedlar, chortling to himself, sat as far over to the driving end of the seat as he could, to make room for them.

“I think there’s space enough for the three of us, but if the middle man finds himself uncomfortably crowded, he can easily step back and get a very good place on one of them boxes.”

Jim was the spokesman of their new resolve, and his voice was angry.

“For the third and last time, as you said yourself, or for the fourth or fifth or sixth and last, will you give up that licence, or shall we have to take it from you?”

“Do you mean that?” cried the pedlar, dropping the reins.

“Every word of it.”

With a whoop the intruder sprang into the air clear of the waggon, flinging his arms aloft as if he were about to fly. Before there was time for the two to jump he was down upon them, an arm around each neck like Samson grasping the pillars, bearing them to the ground as if a tree had fallen upon them. When they realised what had happened he had a hand clutching each throat and a knee on each breast, holding them absolutely helpless. There was no trace of annoyance or malice in his voice as he spoke.

“Is it a coercion act ye would be after puttin’ on me? Is that the way one gentleman should address another? Will ye give it up, says you, or shall we take it from ye? Thunder and turf! the answer to that question is plain enough. Ye’ll take it from me. And now set to work at it, an’ let me know when you get it.”

There was now little doubt of his nationality, for while he did not talk with a brogue, there was nevertheless an accent in his sentences brought on by the excitement of the encounter that distinctly pointed to Irish extraction at least.

Jim made some laudable attempts to strike his assailant in the face, which ineffectual blows the uppermost man easily evaded by holding back his head and tightening his grip on Jim’s throat. This caused a cessation of efforts which the under man speedily recognised to be unavailing.

“It’s your time to call the game now, so what are ye going to do about it? I’m quite comfortable here for the night. Are youse as content?”

“Let us up!” gasped Ben. “We had no intention of resorting to violence.”

“Is it resorting to violence? And sure if ye did it would be against the most peaceable man in all this world, the more shame to you; a man simply thirsting for friendship; and we’ll take it from ye, says you. Now, I’m equally ready for a scuffle or a hug, whichever ye like; for a smack in the jaw or a shake of the hand each entirely welcome and returned with cordiality.”

“Where’s your liberty of the citizen, and your freedom of the highway now, you flannel-mouthed Paddy; you Irish hoodlum!” cried Jim, who was displeased and too much excited to speak diplomatically, which proved to be a tactical mistake in the circumstances, evidenced by an increased tightening of the grip and weightier pressure of the knee.

“And that’s one lie to your credit, for I’m as good an American as you are, in spite of the fact that I was born in the old sod, but left it when I was less than two years old, and that was as reasonably early as one could be expected to recognise an original mistake; but as good as you are and as bad as I am, I am as good as you are, as bad as I am. Do ye hear that, now? And as for them things you speak of on the highway, they go right down fornenst a threat, as you’ll be able to testify ever after. Liberty and freedom are all very well taken in moderation, like the truth we were discussing a while since, but too much of anything is bad for a person. Avoid excess, me boy, if ye want to live long and have a peaceful time on the earth.”

“It’s an interesting subject, and I would rather argue it out on my feet, if you don’t mind,” said Jim more calmly.

“Right you are, and sense is returning to you,” replied their oppressor, without, however, making a motion to relieve them. “Will ye be decent comrades to me for a day or two, and will ye let the licence rest until I have it clear in my mind what is best to be done with it?”

“Yes, yes,” said the parties of the second part, thoroughly defeated. The victor sprang from them as nimbly as he had descended upon them, and a moment later was industriously brushing the dust from their coats, as if their fall had been a deplorable accident which he sympathetically regretted.

He was the first to climb into the waggon, taking the reins again as if the question of his leadership and possession had been amicably settled. Touching up the unambitious horse with the beech gad which took the place of a whip, they jogged along in the darkness toward the east, while he rattled on, giving advice and relating experiences as if nothing untoward had marred the serenity of their companionship. The other two for the most part kept silence, oppressed by the feeling that they were in a measure the guests of the driver, and rather intruders on his hospitality.

“You see, there is nothing to be made on the main thoroughfare, because there’s too many travelling that way. Our dodge is to get off on a side road as soon as we can, and then folks are glad to meet us. I don’t suppose you could get a bed or a meal of victuals from here clear through to Detroit, that is, for nothing, and the nearer you come to a big town the harder it is to forage. I always strike in for the unfrequented districts when I want something to eat and don’t want to pay for it.

“Now I propose not to continue east toward Wayne county, but to strike angleways north toward Oakland, or angleways south toward Monroe county, whichever way you say, or shall we leave it to chance and take the first cross-road we come to? It makes no sort of differ to me, so I leave it for you boys to call the game.” The pedlar said this with an air of accommodating magnanimity that resembled the gracious condescension of a monarch. There was no reply for some minutes, then McAllister, who was above everything good natured and wished to relieve the tension of the situation, said:

“I guess Monroe county would suit Jim best.”

“Then Monroe it is. Do you know anybody there?”

“His name’s Monro, that’s all,” returned Ben.

“Oh, I see. Be gubs, we’re all M’s. Mine’s Maguire; Patrick Maguire. You’ll be saying that’s Irish next.”

“Oh, no. It strikes me as Norman-French,” replied Jim sullenly.

Maguire laughed.

“True for ye,” replied the Irishman. “It’s Norman New York, that’s what it is, and that’s where I’m working my way back. There’s no money in the West, or at least if there is, them that have it don’t want to part with it. It doesn’t seem to me I get my share among these pine woods millionaires and steamboat kings between here and Chicago. I hope there’s better luck waiting me in the East. I tell you what it is, boys, we’re going to stand a mighty good chance of being hungry to-night. We fooled too long at the top of the hill, for people go to bed early in these rural districts, making up by that infamy the still more atrocious crime of early rising. Here, get a move on you.”

He applied the switch to the back of the listless horse, that ambled along through the night, the silence of which the waggon disturbed by the screeching of the axles.

“Say, boys, you ought to keep your axles greased. Make it easier for the horse, and not so melodious, as we jog along life’s weary way.”

“You ought to grease them,” said Jim. “We have nothing to do with this rig.”

Maguire laughed loudly.

“That’s so. I forgot. I’ll attend to it in the morning. Hello, stranger, where are you off to this time o’ night?”

Maguire pulled up the horse, which evinced no desire to proceed against the will of its driver, and a man appeared out of the darkness, approaching in a friendly way, coming to a halt and placing his foot on the hub of the front wheel, peering up at them as if to learn whether he had been accosted by neighbours or not. Anyhow, he was disposed to have a friendly chat.

“I’m a-goin’ home, where be you a-goin’?”

“Well, we’re looking for a hotel, perhaps you can give us some directions.”

“I thought you were strangers, fur I didn’t recognise the horse as belonging to these parts. Guess ye kind of got out of yer way, hain’t ye? Ye won’t find no hotels in this district, leastways I never hear tell of ’em. Won’t find a tavern nearer than Ann Arbor or Ypsilanti, and there they do stick it on to ye. A dollar a day, a dollar a day every time, an’ don’t you forget it. If a man’s got plenty of money, all right; if not, the best thing he can do is keep away from them.”

“They do sock it to you, don’t they?”

“You bet. I donno jest where ye cud stay; ye see folks is pretty busy jest now, an’ full up with hired men. Ain’t looking fur a job harvesting, be ye? fur if that’s the case I guess there won’t be no trouble. Hands is powerful skase this season; most always are, come to think of it.”

“Well, we wouldn’t object to a job if we found one to suit us, at least we would take supper and bed to-night, and then see about the job in the morning after breakfast.”

“I guess us farmers gets lots o’ such chances as that. It don’t happen ye be pedlars, do it?”

“It happens kind of that way.”

“Well, them sort of folks don’t jest ’pear to be real pop’lar in the country, most farmers ’lowin’ they’re sort o’ cheats, puttin’ it straight like, and meanin’ no offence, present company bein’ excepted, in a manner o’ speakin’.”

“Certainly, certainly; we’re all of us frauds more or less, excepting the farmers who wouldn’t cheat in measure or quality if you paid ’em for it.” The man with his foot on the hub laughed heartily at this.

“Well, them as don’t cheat finds it mighty hard to make a livin’ nowadays. Didn’t ust to be so in the old times, but I donno, I donno. Guess take ’em year in an’ year out, folks is pretty much the same, straight along. Kin ye bind grain?”

“I don’t know about binding it, but I would guarantee to eat some of the product if I got a chance. You see, we ain’t so much looking for a harvest field to-night as a supper table.”

“How far’d ye come?”

“We drove from Ann Arbor.”

“Well, your horse looks about done out, and I guess it ain’t much of a horse when it isn’t done out. Get left on a trade?”

“No. Bought it for cash.”

“Want to make a dicker? I’ve got one I’ll trade ye fur fifteen dollars to boot, an’ then I’d be losing money, for I don’t see much in that there horse.”

“Of course you don’t, because you’re no judge of horse flesh. That’s a Kentucky bred animal. There’s blood in that horse, and it can do its good mile in two hours without turning a hair, and I’ve got money to bet that it can.”

“Ye hev, eh? I’ve got a wooden horse at home’ll beat that nag o’ yourn, even start from a hilltop—providin’ th’ hill’s steep enough.”

The man laughed boisterously at his own humour, being thus always sure of an appreciative audience. Jim spoke up:

“This arranging of horse trades and horse races is all very well at the proper time, but this isn’t the time. I’m hungry, and the question I’d like to see discussed is where are we going to get something to eat. I suppose you couldn’t give us a snack?”

“O good Lord, no,” cried the man hastily, taking his foot down from the hub and retiring modestly a few steps back into the darkness, his sense of hospitality evidently taking fright at the thought of three persons and a horse. “I’m on a small place a long way from here, livin’ in a kind of shanty at that, an’ my old woman’s gone to bed long ago, an’ I expect I’ll catch gally-wast as it is fur bein’ out s’late m’self. No. I’ll tell ye what to do. You go right on till you come to the schoolhouse, you’ll see th’ lights in it at the next turn, everybody in the section’s there, ’cept me, an’ I’ve just left. If you say you want a job to-morrow you’ll have lots o’ chances fur supper to-night.”

“What’s on at the schoolhouse? Prayer meeting, singing school, magic lantern show, or what?”

“No, tain’t one or t’other; it’s an ’lection meeting.”

“What! An election at this time of the year?”

“Well, a sorter kinder ’lection in a way of speakin’, ’special ’lection fur this here district an’ the ’joinin’ one. Seems kinder stupid to put it right in th’ middle ah harvest time, but that’s all them folks knows what fixes up them things. Ye see the question comes down to this: Ditch or no ditch?”

“Well, that’s perfectly clear ... as clear as ditch-water. Which side are you on?”

“Oh, say, Maguire,” protested Jim, “I’m on the side of supper, and hang the ditch. Let’s get on, there’s no use in pottering away here. I believe Ben’s asleep as it is, and I know the horse dropped off long ago.”

“Now, you keep your hair on. Don’t you fret. If you want to succeed in a neighbourhood you must post yourself on the subject that interests that neighbourhood. Go on about this here ditch, stranger.”

The stranger, seeing that there was no further hint of attack on his larder, had advanced again and had replaced his cowhide boot on the hub, quite palpably prepared to spend the night in amiable converse, in spite of his formerly expressed fear of his wife.

“Well, I’m agin it myself; so’s most o’ them at the schoolhouse, and that’s why we met to take steps for a veto at the polls. Ye see they think they want a big ditch t’ dreen a swamp a few miles from here, an’ put a tax on all the property all round to pay fur it, so much a year fur ten years. Well, we say let them as wants this ditch pay fur it.”

“That seems reasonable.”

“Well, the other fellows don’t want to do that; they say it’s for the improvement of all this part of the country, and so all this part of the country ought to be taxed fur it.”

“That seems reasonable, too. So you’re going to vote on it. Which side’s going to win?”

“Well, I cud tell ye that better day after ’lection. It’s about nip an’ tuck, six o’ one and half a dozen o’ t’other.”

“All right. Most interesting situation. Thanks ever so much. Think they won’t all have left the schoolhouse by the time we can get there?”

“Well, I guess not if ye hurry.”

“Oh, we’ve just got the animal for speed. Good-night. Git up, there.”

The harvest moon had risen while they talked and had gradually outlined the beauties of the landscape as a picture is slowly developed on a photographic plate. The plaintive cry of the whippoorwill came from a neighbouring thicket, ending abruptly in a “kuh-whip” as the screeching waggon approached. The schoolhouse proved to be a wooden structure with three windows on each side and a small porch and double door at the end facing the road. It stood some distance back from the thoroughfare near the centre of a plot half an acre or so in area, surrounded by a board fence. The gate had been taken off its hinges and had disappeared, and the ground was as barren as a similar piece of the great desert. Not a tree nor a shrub nor a flower gladdened the eye in the educational yard, although this was a land of trees, shrubs and flowers.

The lights were out in the schoolhouse, and the meeting had dispersed, but a number of enthusiasts lingered round the gateway, some leaning against the fence, others seated on the inclined board, which from its rain-shedding function was nailed to the top of the cedar posts at an angle slightly less than that of the roof of a house, and thus, on occasion, formed a somewhat insecure elevated bench. Some smoked and listened. Others laid down the law in animated fashion.

“Good-evening, gentlemen,” cried Maguire, pulling up opposite the group.

“Evenin’,” came the answering salutation from several, all talk ceasing for the moment.

“Well, gentlemen,” said Maguire, facing round to them, dropping the reins and throwing his right leg over the end of the seat, letting his foot swing easily, “this is going to be a pretty close contest.”

“You bet it is,” cried one, a trace of astonishment in his voice at being accosted by a stranger who showed such familiarity with purely local affairs.

“The chances are, gentlemen, that this here ditch is going to be dug, and every spadeful taken out of the trench takes a portion of cash out of your pockets, and, as times go, there ain’t any too much money there now compared with the amount of work you have to put in to accumulate it. Now, offhand, the way it strikes a sane man without interest in the question either way is that whoever wants that there ditch dug let them put their hands in their own pockets and pay for it, and meanwhile keep their claws out of your purses and mine.”

“Hear, hear!” “Bully fur you!” “That’s the way to talk!” “That hits the nail on the head!” “Now you’re shouting!” were some of the cries that greeted these sentiments expressed from the light waggon.

“You got a vote in these parts?” inquired a cautious old farmer who was leaning against the gate-post.

“No, I ain’t, but I got something that’s a darned sight better; I’ve got a proposal to make and the brains and the energy to back it. You hear the toot of my bazoo. I’m a pedlar myself and I go all over this country, and I hear what people are talking about. They talk freely with me, because they know I haven’t a vote, and I’m here to-day and gone to-morrow, so it don’t make no difference one way or t’other, an’ I talk free with them, just as I do with you and everybody else. All right. Consequence is that the way you’re a-going on you’re going to get licked, an’ that’s what’s the matter with the hoss.”

“Oh, I don’t know ’bout that,” demurred a bystander.

“Of course you don’t: that’s why I’m telling ye. See? You’ll know about it after the voting, but that’ll be too late. Now’s the time to know, when it will do some good. I tell you, you’re licked at this present moment, and you don’t need to take the trouble of going to the polls at all, because your staying home will only make the ditch majority bigger and won’t affect the result. The taxes will be there just the same. Now, what you lack is organisation; you want a machine on this thing. But organisation takes time and you haven’t the time to spare at this season of the year. Think of the darn fool idea of bringing on a vote right in the middle of harvest! That shows you how much those in authority know of the wants of the farming community. Now, I’ll take hold of this organisation business, and I’ve got two good men here to help me. We’ll first canvass the section and find out how everybody is going to vote. Just as it is in this crowd, there will be some fellows on the fence.” (There was a laugh at this, and Maguire, warming with his theme, stood up in the waggon.) “Very well, it’s the simplest possible question in addition and subtraction. Say we want five or ten—we find that out when the canvass is finished—we’ve got to induce five or ten of those fellows on the fence to come down, and to come down in our yard at that.”

“Whatter you goin’ to make out of it?” asked the cautious individual.

“Now that’s the way I like to hear a man talk,” continued Maguire, admiringly. “What am I going to make out of it? If I told you I was doing this for my health, or because I simply loved this farming community, you’d know I was a liar, wouldn’t you—or a politician, which is exactly the same thing? Now, as I told you, I’m a pedlar, and if I make a good living at it that’s simply because I sell goods at a price about half, and less than half you could get them elsewhere, same quality. You needn’t laugh, I can prove it to you now if anybody’s got some cash in his pocket. Any gentleman oblige me by handing up a dollar and see how much I give for it? No takers? This isn’t market day I suppose. No gentleman’s entitled to question my remarks unless he stands ready to test ’em by producing the coin. It’s a case of put up or shut up. Well, as I was saying, I’ve made money at this business simply because nobody can compete with me. That’s right. I’m giving it to you straight. Why, one of the biggest officials in Ann Arbor, this very evening, got out a livery stable rig and followed me along the Ypsilanti road and bought two dollars’ worth of goods from me, and it paid him to do it, too, after settling for the buggy and all. You can ask these two young men who are with me if you won’t take my word for it, and I never saw either of them before to-day; ain’t it just as I state it, boys?” (appealing to Ben and Jim). “You saw him follow me and you heard the very first words he spoke. ‘Are you the fellow that was peddling in Ann Arbor this afternoon?’ he says. You heard him, and you saw me sell him the goods and get the two dollars, now didn’t you?”

“Yes,” said Ben. “He did follow you in a buggy, and you did sell him two dollars’ worth of goods, but—”

“Why, of course. I wouldn’t give you any guff, for I know ’twouldn’t be any use. But I hope to be struck in my tracks if it isn’t true. Well, then, I expect to do a good deal of business in this district, and the better I’m known the more business I’ll do, and when I leave you’ll all be after me, like that fellow in Ann Arbor.”

“What’ll you be trying to get away with? Horses?”

“That’s all right, boys; I can take a joke as well as the next man. I don’t need no horses, because I’ve got the best nag in the place, as you can see for yourselves. Racing stock, that animal is. Got overheated winning the Darby at Louisville, and has been trying to get rested ever since. No, gentlemen; I don’t ask a cent for organising this campaign and putting the other fellows in the ditch they don’t want to pay for, but I’d like to have a little of your good will, and when you come to do business with me—any article not found satisfactory, money cheerfully refunded. And now—to come to the point, for it’s getting late—and I don’t seem to be able to get a word in edgeways in this discussion—who’s the leader on our side of the fence, or I should say on our side of the ditch?”

Several answered promptly: “Byfield. Step forward, Byfield. He’s asking for you.”

“All right, Mr. Byfield, what do you say?” queried Maguire, glancing over the assemblage, when an elderly man who had taken no part in the debate, hitherto stepped forward and cleared his throat. Maguire fastened his gaze on Byfield as if he had known all along who he was.

“I guess it’s pretty much as the stranger says,” remarked Byfield slowly, “and we’ll need all the help we can get. If these men don’t want any cash out of pocket, I guess it might pay us to listen to what their plans are; but I for one don’t guarantee anything.”

“Certainly not and ’nuff sed,” proclaimed Maguire, cordially. “Well, as I remarked, it is getting late and everybody wants to go home. I know I’m tired, for we came lickety-blinder all the way from Ann Arbor to be present at this meeting and nearly arrived too late, all on account of this official delaying us. I’ll see you in the morning, Mr. Byfield, and lay my plans before you, and now if you will oblige us by telling me the way to the nearest hotel we’ll be jogging on, for we took such a hurried supper at Ann Arbor that I want to get something more to eat.”

“As fur a hotel,” said Byfield, solemnly, “there ain’t any, but if you don’t mind roughing it a bit you could come with me. I kin give you a place to put the horse, and a bed in the loft if you don’t mind sleeping three together.”

“Oh, anything will do for us. I’d rather sleep in the hay-mow than anywhere else. These boys will take to the loft, and I’ll bunk in the hay. Lord! I know how crowded things are at a farmhouse in harvest time. I was raised on a farm. Well, boys, so long. See you later.”

With this he took up the reins and drove slowly down the road, the farmer refusing his gracious offer of a ride, saying he preferred to walk by the side of the waggon, one son and a hired man following in the wake. The rest of the people dispersed, some going one way and some another, their voices carrying far in the still evening air.

Byfield was silent, and Maguire, having accomplished what he set out to accomplish, seemed to have no further desire to speak. Ben and Jim had got out of the democrat and were walking together close behind it, talking to each other in whispers.

“What are we to do to get back the licence and secure possession of our belongings again? The more I see of this fellow the less I like him, and I don’t propose to be dragged through life after him in this manner,” said Ben.

The practical minded Jim replied:

“I’m content to be dragged in his wake until we have something to eat and a night’s rest. He seems to be heading in the direction of those two requisites with a directness that arouses my admiration. To-morrow, with the help of some of the farm hands and a few of the neighbours, we will drag the licence from him if he won’t give it up peaceably. I rather imagine that the reason he doesn’t want to room with us is because he fears we will regain possession of it while he is asleep.”

“I shouldn’t wonder.”

“Well, we’ll tackle the question and him to-morrow when we’re fresh.”

The procession turned through an open gateway into an ample farmyard, walled in on three sides by a group of buildings comprising barns, stables, drivehouses and sheds. The hired man, who had evinced a warm admiration of Maguire’s oratorical gifts, assisted expertly at the unhitching of the horse.

The house, a short distance from the barns, was, like them, of wood, and although it needed a coat of paint was nevertheless a homelike and comfortable-looking structure, shaded by clustering locust trees. A well with a board roof over it, having underneath the roof a roller round which was coiled many turns of rope that testified to the depth of the excavation, was situated near the rear of the house. One end of the rope was attached to a full bucket that rested on the ledge. Maguire lifted the bucket to his lips and took a long, satisfying drink, refreshing on a warm night.

There was not a light visible in the house, and the party went round to the back and entered the kitchen. Here the son had lighted a candle, and had occupied the time the others spent at the stables in setting out bread, butter, a pitcher of milk and some corned beef. The silent farmer made no complaint that the pedlar and his two comrades did not do ample justice to the fare thus spread before them.