Part 26 (1/2)

The wind blew very strong.

”I do declare,” said he, ”I shouldn't wonder a bit if the wind blew me away.”

Que was a truthful boy; but he did wonder very much when he found, two seconds afterwards, that the wind _was_ blowing him away. But he didn't wonder at all, when he lay, a minute later, against a huge apple tree; partly because people generally get through wondering when they are at the end of anything, but mostly because the blow stunned Que, so that he didn't know anything for an hour.

When he gradually came to himself, he didn't know where he was. Then a little wind shook a green apple down on his nose, and he concluded that he was under an apple tree; which was quite correct.

Then he looked about to see whether he was in the United States or not; he saw the five juniper trees that had been standing in a row, half a mile from his father's house, ever since he could remember, and concluded that he must be; wherein he was again quite correct.

Then he wondered if any one would come for him, for he felt so stiff and sore that he thought he never could go home alone.

”They'll come for me, _I_ know; for if I've had a gale they must have had one; and if they have had one they'll know that I've had one. Of course they'll come.”

Que felt round for his mail-bag, and got his head on it, and waited.

While he was lying there it occurred to him that the people down in the village wouldn't have been walking about with bags broader than themselves to windward of them, and mightn't have felt the breeze as he did; so his last reasoning wasn't correct at all.

”I'll bet they didn't feel it a bit!” thought Que; and by this time he was so fully in possession of his original faculties, that his reasoning was quite correct again. No one else had felt the gale.

Que put his head on the bag and thought that his end had come, and so cried himself to sleep.

His family had not felt the gale very heavily; but when tea-time came, and Que didn't, they felt that; and when darkness came, and Que didn't, they felt that; and when a report came, with a growl, from the Point that they wanted their mail, Que's father started out with a lantern to find it.

Que, having finished his nap, felt better, and tried to get up; but his ankle didn't want to move; and when he tried again it actually wouldn't move; so he lay down again to wait and watch. When he saw the lantern go by, he called, and his father came.

”What are you doing here, sir?”

”Nothing,” said Que.

”Get up, then.”

”I can't,” said Que.

”You've been asleep, sir.”

”Yes, sir,” said Que.

”What have you done with the mail-bag?”

”It is the mail-bag that's done with me,” said Que.

Then his father took him by the collar, and stood him up, and saw at once what was the matter. Que had sprained his ankle.

It seemed to Que, during the next four weeks, as if that ankle never would heal; but it did at last, and John Lee, who had carried the mail in the mean time, was loath to give the job to Que again. He felt for Que through his pain, but charged him one twelfth of fifty dollars for doing his work a month, and would like to do it a while longer.