Part 12 (2/2)
There's tay in the pot, and I'll fry yez up a spider full o' pork and taters, if that'll do yez?”
The menu sounded tempting indeed to Sammy. He accepted the woman's invitation instantly and entered the house, past the staring children.
The two oldest of the group, a shrewd-faced boy and a sharp-featured girl, stood back and whispered together while they watched the visitor.
Sammy was so much interested in the bountiful breakfast with which the housewife supplied him that he thought very little about the children peering in at the door and open windows. When he had eaten the last crumb he asked his hostess how much he should pay her.
”Well, me bye, I'll not overcharge ye,” she replied. ”If yez have ten cents about ye we'll call it square--an' that's only for the mate, as I said before is so high, I dunno.”
Sammy produced the knotted handkerchief, put it on the table and untied it, displaying the coins it held with something of a flourish.
The jingle of so many dimes brought a sigh of wonder in unison from the young spectators at door and windows. The woman accepted her dime without comment.
Sammy thanked her politely, wiped his mouth on his sleeve (napery was conspicuous by its absence in this household) and started out the door. The smaller children scattered to give him pa.s.sage; the older boy and girl had already gone out of the badly fenced yard and were loitering along the road in the direction Sammy was traveling.
”Hullo! Here's raggedy-pants,” said the girl saucily, when Sammy came along.
”How did you get them holes in your breeches, kid?” added the boy.
”Never you mind,” rejoined Sammy gruffly. ”They're _my_ pants.”
”Stuck up, ain't you?” jeered the girl and stuck out her tongue at him.
Sammy thought these were two very impolite children, and although he was not rated at home for his own chivalrous conduct, he considered these specimens in the road before him quite unpleasant young people.
”Ne'er mind,” said the boy, looking at Sammy slyly, ”he don't know everything. He ain't seen everything if he is traveling all by himself. I bet he's run away.”
”I ain't running away from you,” was Sammy's belligerent rejoinder.
”You would if I said 'Boo!' to you.”
”No, I wouldn't.”
”Ya!” scoffed the girl, leering at Sammy, ”don't talk so much. Do something to him, Peter.”
Peter glanced warily back at the house. Perhaps he knew the large, red-faced woman might take a hand in proceedings if he pitched upon the strange boy.
”I bet,” he said, starting on another tack, ”that he never saw a cherry-colored calf like our'n.”
”I bet he never did,” crowed the girl in delight.
”A cherry-colored calf,” scoffed Sammy. ”Get out! There ain't such a thing. A calf might be red; there _are_ red cows--”
”This calf is cherry-colored,” repeated the boy earnestly. ”It's down there in our pasture.”
”Don't believe it,” said Sammy flatly.
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