WILLING AND OBLIGING
Sarah was as good as her word. She not only assembled the entire
Rainbow Hill family in the barn that evening and put Bony through his
paces, but she continued to give "exhibitions" whenever and wherever
she could assemble an audience of one or more. Eventually she took
Bony over to the Gay farm and delighted the children there who thought
he was absolutely the most clever pig they had ever seen and Sarah the
most wonderful trainer.
The fame of Bony spread abroad and gradually Sarah's family grew
accustomed to having a horse and wagon drive in, usually with a couple
of empty milk cans rattling around in the back showing that the driver
was on his way home from the daily trip to the creamery; and to hearing
a knock at the door, followed by a voice asking, "Is the little girl
in--the one with the pig?"
Answered in the affirmative, the inevitable request would be: "Do you
think she would mind letting me see him do tricks? They tell me, down
to the creamery" (or at the store or the postoffice) "that he is sure a
smart pig."
These requests pleased Sarah immensely. She, would sally forth
importantly and rout Bony out of his comfortable box, present him as
one would introduce a famous artist and put him through his program.
The audience never failed to be pleased and grateful and to be generous
with praises. Warren declared that there was small danger of Bony ever
forgetting his accomplishments for hardly a day passed that he wasn't
"billed to appear."
But before Bony attained this place in the limelight, Doctor Hugh and
Jack Welles arrived for their promised two weeks' visit and vacation.
Even her marvelous pig could not hope to compete with these arrivals
and Sarah's interest in Bony slackened slightly though she kept him
rigorously in training.
The doctor and Jack came in the former's car. It was difficult to say
whose disappointment was keenest when Jack announced that he intended
to sleep at the bungalow and eat at Mr. Hildreth's table--Mrs. Willis,
Winnie and Rosemary were equally dismayed.
"Jack dear, I thought of course you'd live with us," protested Mrs.
Willis. "You know we'll love to have you and I'm afraid you won't be
comfortable at the bungalow."
"It won't be any kind of a vacation for you," declared Rosemary.
"You'll have to get up at five o'clock because they have breakfast at
six; and Mrs. Hildreth won't let you put a book or a paper out of
place--Richard says so."
"I'm not saying anything against her cooking," pronounced Winnie,
through the screen door, where she had been drawn by the argument.
"But I tell you this in all honesty, Jack Welles; Mrs. Hildreth puts
too much salt in her oatmeal, to my way of thinking, and she skimps on
the shortening in her pie crust."
Jack glanced across the porch at Doctor Hugh, who was seated in the
swing with Rosemary.
"This isn't a vacation, you know," said Jack mildly. "I've hired out,
at wages, and I'm to go to work to-morrow morning. And it is in the
agreement that Mr. Hildreth is to 'board and lodge' me."
"Well, you can work for him and live here with us, too," suggested
Rosemary comfortably. "Can't he, Mother?"
"It's ever so nice of you to want me," said Jack, "but you see, I've
figured out that I want the complete experience; I want to get up when
the other hired men do and eat breakfast when they do--Winnie wouldn't
like to get me a six o'clock breakfast for the next two weeks--and I
wouldn't let her, if she did."
"Richard doesn't think you'll stick it out for the whole two weeks,"
offered the placid Sarah, looking up from the book she was sharing with
Shirley on the grass rug. "He said so."
Jack flushed, Doctor Hugh looked annoyed and Mrs. Willis sighed.
Sarah's remarks usually aroused varied emotions.
"I think Jack is quite right," said the doctor firmly, before anyone
could speak. "He wants to see this thing through and while he knows
I'd like first rate to have him stay here at the house, I think he'd be
handicapped from the start. There'll be the evenings left him, anyway,
and Sundays--two of them at least."
"You must come to us for Sunday dinner," planned Mrs. Willis instantly.
"I'll ask Richard and Warren, too; Winnie has wanted me to for some
time, but there never seemed to be a mutually convenient time."
So Jack took his suit case over to the bungalow and was introduced to
the little room next to the one shared by Warren and Richard. He had
met Mr. and Mrs. Hildreth on one of his trips to Rainbow Hill with
Doctor Hugh, but he had not seen Warren and Richard till this afternoon.
The three boys shook hands pleasantly. Jack was the youngest by a
couple of years and not so deeply tanned; though, being an active lad
and fond of outdoor sports, he had acquired a coat of brown since the
closing of school. But he felt, looking at the other two, that he
lacked their muscular advantage and a certain hardness that bespoke
sturdy endurance.
"I'm ready to go to work," said Jack, in response to a question from
Mr. Hildreth. "I've brought overalls and I'm said to be willing and
obliging."
Richard grinned and Warren's gray eyes smiled.
"Well, I hope you'll tumble up early in the morning," observed the
farmer, his mind busy already with the next day's work. "We're going
to start picking tomatoes for the cannery."
There wasn't much thrill about the persistent ringing of the alarm
clock the next morning and Jack turned over with a groan. The dial
said five o'clock, though he was sure he had not been asleep longer
than two hours.
"Morning," was Mr. Hildreth's brief greeting when he met his new hand
at the back door. "Glad to see you made it. Warren's your boss--he
knows what has to be done. You'll find him out in the barn, milking."
Even a careless observer--and Jack was not that--would have been struck
with the dewy freshness of the grass and shrubbery and the magnificent
splendor of the Eastern sky; and Jack, on his way to the barn, drew a
deep breath of something like contentment.
"Not so bad," he thought, beginning to whistle. "Not so bad, after
all."
Warren glanced up from his milking, his eyes cordial, his busy hands
continuing their task.
"Mr. Hildreth said you're my boss," said Jack directly. "What do you
want me to do?"
"You can't milk, can you?" replied Warren. "No, of course, you haven't
been around cows. Richard is feeding and cleaning the horses--you
might help him."
Jack was inclined to remember the remark Sarah had attributed to
Richard, but five minutes spent in that cheerful youth's company were
enough to dispel any faint resentment he might feel. Richard liked to
chatter and he liked to sing and whistle; and while he showed Jack what
constituted a proper breakfast for a horse and how these useful beasts
should be groomed, he kept up a running fire of comment and
good-natured musical effort that made up in volume what it lacked in
depth. By the time Warren's pails were full and the barn work done,
the three boys were on a friendly footing and they marched into
breakfast to the tune of "There Were Three Crows Sat in a Tree."
Jack could have found it in his heart to wish that Mrs. Hildreth might
think less of time and more of passing comfort. The dining-room of the
bungalow was fully furnished, but the farmer's wife used it only on
state occasions. It made less work, she said, to eat in the kitchen
and she could "get through" a meal more rapidly and take fewer steps
when those to be served were close to the stove.
It fell to the lot of Jack to be close to the stove this morning and he
gave a momentary sigh for the coolness and order and daintiness that he
knew would give atmosphere to the breakfast in Mrs. Willis' household.
Not that he minded eating in the kitchen--he and his mother often did
that when his father was away and thought it a lark; but he did mind
the heat and the haste and the silence in which this, his first meal
with the Hildreths, was consumed.
"Ready?" said Warren briefly, when they had finished, leading the way
to the barn.
They had been working in the barnyard and vegetable garden for an hour
and were on their way to the tomato field--it was necessary to wait for
the heavy dew to dry before they began to work among the vines--when
the Willis family gathered for their breakfast at the round table set
on the porch this warm morning in Doctor Hugh's honor.
"Hugh, will you come watch me wade in the brook?" asked Shirley, eating
her cereal as though hypnotized and quite forgetting to protest that
she didn't see why she had to drink milk.
"You wait till you see Bony, Hugh," Sarah told him. "He's the best pig
you ever saw. He's bright."
"I wish, if you have time, Hugh," said Rosemary, "you'd show me what is
the matter with the camera. Every picture I take is overexposed."
"For mercy's sake, let your brother rest," Winnie admonished them,
bringing in a plate of fresh Parker House rolls. "He only gets a bit
of a breathing spell and he doesn't want to race from one end of this
farm to the other. Take that large brown one, Hughie."
Mrs. Willis, behind the silver coffee pot, smiled at her son.
"Best rolls I ever ate, Winnie," he said appreciatively. "I'll bet if
Mr. Greggs' wife could make rolls like these he'd be a sweeter-tempered
carpenter. I'm going to have the finest of vacations and rest
thoroughly by going everywhere with everybody. I'll watch you wade,
Shirley; and I'll give Sarah my opinion of this remarkable pig;
Rosemary and I will 'snap' the whole farm. But I wish it distinctly
understood that Mother and I have an unbreakable engagement to take a
drive every afternoon, or just after dinner, as she prefers."
"And won't you have to go see any sick people at all?" demanded
Shirley, almost upsetting her glass of milk in the excitement of having
a brother with time to spare.
"I left word with Mrs. Welles that I'd answer emergency calls, of
course," explained Doctor Hugh, answering his mother's unspoken
question. "I've arranged it so I won't have to go the hospital and,
barring the unforeseen, I can count on a free fortnight. So we'll hope
there won't be any sick people to go see, Shirley."
"Where are you going, Rosemary?" the doctor hailed her as she and Sarah
started down the lawn after breakfast was over.
"We thought we'd go down and see Jack," called Rosemary.
Doctor Hugh pushed open the screen door and came down the steps.
"Let Jack get his bearings first," he advised. "There is bound to be a
number of new experiences for him this initial day and I think it will
be kinder to let him get adjusted to his job. He'll be up this evening
and you and Mother can play for him and cheer him up generally."
"Why--why--will he need cheering up?" Rosemary looked so startled that
her brother laughed.
"Not precisely cheering up, perhaps," he said, "but a mental and
physical rest. Jack is bound to have sore muscles, after a long day
bending over tomato crates; he thinks he knows what it means to work,
but he has never worked in his life as he will now. And I don't know,
but I suspect, he may have a sore mind; Jack has never worked for
anyone and he must learn to be 'bossed.' All in all, Rosemary, I'd put
off going down to the tomato field till to-morrow."
"Well--all right," agreed Rosemary reluctantly. "I do think he might
have stayed with us and then he would have had a better time."
"If we're not going down to the field, I'll go get Bony and take him
down to the brook," said Sarah, quick to seize her advantage. "I can
wash him while Shirley goes wading."