Part 15 (1/2)
Douglas had been standing not far off listening with considerable interest to the angry conversation between master and man. But when he saw Stubbles take the wild plunge, he rushed forward and picked up the injured man. The latter was groaning and cursing, contending that he was killed, and that the teamster was to blame for the accident.
Lifting him in his arms, Douglas carried him up the steps just as Mrs.
Stubbles came from the house.
”Oh! what is the matter?” she cried. ”What has happened to Simie?”
”He's had a bad fall,” Douglas replied. ”Hold the door open while I carry him into the house. Show me where to lay him.”
Into the sitting-room he carried the wounded man, and placed him upon a large sofa near the window. Mrs. Stubbles followed, and stood over her husband, wringing her hands in despair.
”Are you much hurt, Simie?” she asked. ”Shall I send for the doctor?”
”Shut up your bawling!” her husband ordered. ”I'm not killed, though I thought I was at first. Get some warm water and bathe my bruises.
Confound that teamster! I'll discharge him at once. What business had he to drive in front of the house and then talk back to me as he did?
When is Ben coming back?”
”He expected to get home this morning,” Mrs. Stubbles replied.
”He expected to do so, did he? H'm, he's always expecting to do things he never does. He should have been here to look after the haying.
I've got too many things on my mind already without having to bother with that.”
”Don't be too hard on the dear boy, Simie. He is to bring the girls, you know. They must have delayed him.”
”Yes, yes, that's just like you; always excusing Ben, the worthless scamp. If he were as interested in business as he is in running around in the car and spending so much time in the city, what a help he would be to me. But hurry up with that water, can't you? My, I'm sore!”
”You won't need me any more now, I suppose,” Douglas remarked when Mrs.
Stubbles had left the room. ”I might as well get to work.”
”Who are you, anyway?” the injured man asked, turning his little squinting eyes upon Douglas' face. For the first time he seemed to realise that it was a stranger who had a.s.sisted him.
”I am John Handyman, Jake Jukes' help,” was the reply. ”I have come to give you a hand with the hay this afternoon.”
”And isn't Jake coming?”
”No. He has hay of his own to get in, and so I offered to come in his stead.”
”Just like Jake,” Stubbles growled, ”always thinking of himself. He knows very well what a fix I am in. I don't know what this place is coming to, anyway. One can't get a neighbour to do a hand's turn, and the men you hire these days are as impudent as the devil.”
”Don't you worry about the hay,” Douglas soothed. ”We can get it in all right this afternoon.”
”Do you know anything about haying?”
”I was brought up on a farm, and should know something about it.”
”You look big and strong enough,” and Stubbles viewed him from head to foot. ”Say, are you the chap who beat Jake in a wrestling bout lately?”
”So you heard about that little encounter, did you?”
”Oh, yes, I naturally hear of such things sooner or later. But what are you doing here, anyway? You don't look like a man who has been in the habit of hiring out.”