Part 8 (1/2)

”Well, come in, then, and have a bite. You've earned it all right this morning. Bring your help in, Jake. I guess there's enough for all.”

Mrs. Jukes' anger soon pa.s.sed, and by the time they reached the house she was in a more pleasant frame of mind. She was a bright, active little body, and Douglas won her friends.h.i.+p at once by the interest he took in her two children, a girl of six and a boy of three. While Mrs.

Jukes was busy placing the breakfast upon the table, Douglas had the children on his knees, and was asking them their names and quizzing them about the things in which they were interested. Though very busy, Mrs. Jukes noticed this, and she felt greatly pleased at the attention the stranger paid to her offspring. She noted, as well, his refined face, his gentle manner, and the words he used, for Mrs. Jukes had been a school teacher before she married, and, according to her husband, she had ”a great deal of larnin'.” She knew enough, at least, to keep Jake in his place, and to make him attend strictly to his work, with the result that their farm was the best cultivated one in the community.

”You sit here, sir,” she told Douglas, putting a chair in place. ”I'm sorry there isn't more for breakfast. I didn't expect company this morning.”

”Why, this is a meal fit for a king,” Douglas replied. ”It's been years since I've eaten pancakes, ham and gravy. And that bread looks good, too. Did you bake it yourself, Mrs. Jukes?”

”Oh, yes, I do all my own cooking. But that bread isn't as good as I generally make. We just opened a new barrel of flour, and it doesn't seem to be as good as the last we had.”

”It's no wonder that you are the best wrestler in the parish,” Douglas remarked to Jake.

”Why?” the farmer asked, with his mouth full of pancake.

”Because of what you eat. Wouldn't any one be strong with such food as this?”

”But you put me down, though,” Jake acknowledged, ”an' you haven't been eatin' sich grub.”

”Ah, it wasn't my strength, remember. It was simply a little trick I learned years ago.”

”Will ye larn me the trick?” Jake asked. ”I'd like to try it on Joe Preston the next time we have a bout together. My, it would surprise him.”

”What, were you two wrestling this morning?” Mrs. Jukes enquired.

”Yep, an' he put me down,” her husband explained. ”Ye should have seen the way he did it, Susie. I struck the ground kerflop, right on my shoulders, an' they are sore yit from the thump.”

No one noticed the look of wonder mingled with admiration upon Empty's face as Jake uttered these words. He forgot to eat, as he watched Douglas across the table. Any one who could put down the champion of Rixton was a marvel in Empty's eyes, and worthy of more than a pa.s.sing notice. He had not forgotten how this stranger had taken his part down by the big elm, and would not let Jake hit him the second time.

Mrs. Jukes was almost as much surprised as Empty. Though she could handle her husband and make him do what she wished, she, nevertheless, had a great admiration for his prowess as a wrestler, and was proud of his standing in the community. It was his local renown which had appealed to her when she was teaching school in Rixton, and had enabled Jake to capture her from his rivals, for Susie Perkins had been greatly admired and sought after by the young men of the place.

”Do you know anything about farm work?” she asked.

”I was brought up on a farm, and should know something about it,”

Douglas replied.

”But you haven't done any hard work of late, have you?”

”How do you know that?”

”Oh, I can tell by your hands. They are not hard and rough like Jake's, for instance, and your face is not burnt as if you had been out working in the sun.”

Douglas smiled, and held up his hands for inspection.

”Please do not judge by these,” he replied, ”but rather by my brain, heart and feet. They are all pretty well worn. A week or so in the field will remedy the defects of my face and hands, and make them more like your husband's.”

”I'm goin' to try ye out fer a week,” Jake remarked, ”an' if ye understand hayin' as well as ye do wrestlin' ye're the man fer me.”

”Just for my board and lodging,” Douglas added.

”Well, that's fer you to say.”