The doubt that Miss Sally had expressed regarding Pap Briggs' acceptance
of Eliph' Hewlitt as a son-in-law was mild compared with the fact. When
the old man returned the next day from his farm at Clarence and learned
from Miss Sally that she had promised to marry the book agent he was
furiously angry. For two whole days he refused to wear his store teeth
at all, and when he recovered from his first height of anger it was to
settle down into a hard and fast negative. He went about town telling
anyone that would listen to him that there ought to be licenses against
book agents, and once having made up his mind that Miss Sally should not
marry Eliph' as long as he remained alive to prevent it, not even the
friendly approaches of the book agent could move him from his stubborn
resolution. Miss Sally would not think of marrying while her father was
in such a state of opposition, and indeed, Eliph' did not urge it. He
had no desire to defy his father-in-law, and he unwillingly but kindly
agreed to wait.
In this way the autumn faded into winter. Mrs. Tarbro-Smith returned to
New York with a note-book full of dialect and a head full of local color
and types, and if she took Susan with her it was only because she agreed
to bring her back in June, when T. J. Jones was to marry her. Miss Sally
lived on with her father, attending to his wants, which were few and
simple. An egg for breakfast, and enough tobacco to burn all day were
his chief earthly desires, eggs because he could eat them in comfort,
and tobacco because he liked it.
When Miss Sally had moved to town there was one thing she had said her
father SHOULDN'T do, after living all his life on a farm, and that was,
have store eggs for his breakfast.
“Hens is trouble enough, Lord knows,” said Miss Sally, “an' dirty, if
they can't be kep' in their place; but there's some comfort in their
cluckin' round, and I guess I'll have plenty of time, and to spare to
tend to 'em; so, Pap, you won't have to eat no stale eggs for breakfast,
if I kin help it. They ain't nothing' I hate to think on like boughten
eggs. Nobody knows how old they are, nor who's been a-handlin' them; and
eat boughten eggs you shan't do, sure's my name's Briggs!”
So Sally brought half a dozen hens and a gallant rooster to town with
her, and supervised the erection of a cozy coop and hen-yard, and Pap
had the comfort of knowing his eggs were fresh. But fresh or not, it
made no difference to him so long as he had one each morning, and it was
fairly edible.
“These teeth o' mine,” he told Billings, the grocer, “cost twelve
dollars down to Franklin, by the best dentist there; but, law sakes!
A feller can't eat hard stuff with any comfort with 'em for fear of
breakin' 'em every minute. They ain' nothin' but chiney, an' you know
how chiney's the breakiest thing man ever made. That's why I say, 'Give
me eggs for breakfast, Sally,'--and eggs I will have.”
The six hens did their duty nobly during the summer and autumn and a
part of the winter, and Pap had his egg unfailingly; but in December the
long cold spell came, and the six hens struck. It was the longest and
coldest spell ever known in Kilo, and it hung on and hung on until the
entire hen population of Eastern Iowa became disgusted and went on a
strike. Eggs went up in price until even packed eggs of the previous
summer sold for twenty-seven and thirty cents a dozen, and angel-cake
became an impossible dainty.
The second morning that Pap Briggs ate this eggless breakfast he
suggested that perhaps Sally might buy a few eggs at the grocery.
“Pap Briggs,” she exclaimed reproachfully, “the idee of you sayin' sich
a thin! As if I would cook packed eggs! No; we'll wait, and mebby the
hens will begin layin' again in a day or two.”
But they did not, and the days became a week, and two weeks, and still
no eggs rewarded her daily search. Pap knew better than to repeat his
suggestion of buying eggs, for Sally Briggs said a thing only when she
meant it, and to mention it again would only exasperate her.
“Our hens don't lay a blame egg,” Pap told Billings complainingly, “and
Sally won't buy eggs, and I can't eat nothin' but eggs for breakfast, so
I reckon I'll jist have to naturally starve to death.”
“Why don't you try some of our hen-food?” asked Billings, taking up a
package and reading from the label. “'Guaranteed to make hens lay in all
kinds of weather, the coldest as well as the warmest' That's just what
you want, Pap.”
“Well,” said Pap, “I been keepin' hens off and on for nigh forty year,
and I ain't ever seen any o' that stuff that was ary good; but I got
to have eggs or bust, so I'll take a can o' that stuff. But I ain't no
hopes of it, Billings, I ain't no hopes.”
His pessimism was well founded. The cold spell was too much even for the
best hen-food to conquer. No eggs rewarded him.
One evening he was sitting in Billings', smoking his pipe and thinking.
He had been thinking for some time, and at length a sparkle came into
his eyes, and he knocked the ashes from his pipe and arose.
“Billings,” he said, “mix me up about a nickel's wuth o' corn-meal,
and a nickel's wuth o' flour, and”--he hesitated a moment and then
chuckled--“and a nickel's wuth o' wash-blue.”
“For heaven's sake, Pap,” said Billings, “have ye gone plumb crazy?”
“No, I ain't,” said Pap. “I ain't lost all my brains yit, nor I ain't
gone plumb crazy yit, neither. That's a hen food I invented.”
“Hen-food!” exclaimed Billings. “You don't 'low that will make hens lay,
do you, Pap?”
“I ain't advisin' no one to use it that don't want to,” said Pap, “but I
bet you I'm a-goin' to feed that to my hens”; and he chuckled again.
“Pap,” said Billings, “you're up to some be-devilment, sure! What is
it?”
“You jist keep your hand on your watch till you find out,” answered Pap,
and he took his package and went home.
“Sally,” he said when he entered the house, “I got some hen-food now
that's bound to make them hens lay, sure.”
She took the package and opened it.
“For law's sake, Pap,” she said, “what kind o' hen-food is that? It's
blue!”
“Yes,” said Pap, looking at it closely, “it IS blue, ain't it? It's a
mixture of my own. I ain't been raisin' hens off an' on fer forty year
for nothin'. You got to study the hen, Sally, and think about her. Why
don't a hen lay in cold weather? 'Cause the weather makes the hen cold.
This will make her warm. You jist try it. Give 'em a spoonful apiece an'
I reckon they'll lay. It don't look like much, but I bet you anything
it'll make them hens lay.”
“I don't believe it,” she snapped, “and I'll hold you to that bet,
sure's my names Briggs.” But the next day she gave them the allotted
portion.
That evening when Pap Briggs knocked the ashes from his pipe and rose
from his seat in Billings' store, he said, “Billings, have you got some
mainly fresh eggs--eggs you kin recommend?”
“Yes, I have,” said Billings, with a grin. “So your hen-food don't work,
Pap?”
Pap chuckled.
“It's a-workin,” he said, “and you can give me a dozen o' them eggs.
And, say, you need't tell Sally.”
Billings laughed. “I'm on,” he said.
Pap put the bag of eggs back of the cracker-box, and put three of them
in his pocket.
When he reached home he quietly slipped around the house and deposited
the three eggs in three nests, and went it.
The next morning Sally greeted him with a smile. “Eggs this mornin',
Pap,” she said. “That hen-food did work like a charm. I got three eggs.”
Pap ate without comment until he had finished the second egg. He felt
that he could eat a dozen, after his long fast.
“It do seem good to have eggs agin,” he said.
That evening, and the next evening he deposited three eggs as before.
On the third morning Sally said: “It's queer about them hens, Pap; they
lay, but they don't cluck like a hen generally does when she lays an
egg.”
Pap hesitated for a moment.
“It's sich cold weather,” he said, “I reckon that's why.”
About a week later Sally said: “I do declare to gracious, Pap, them hens
do puzzle me.”
Pap moved uneasily in his seat.
“The do puzzle me!” repeated Sally. “Here the are layin' right along as
reg'lar as summer-time, and never cluckin' or lettin' on a bit, and
the queerest thing is they jist lay three eggs every day. It don't seem
natural!”
That night Pap put four eggs in the nests. The next night he put in
five, and the next night three, and the danger into which his wiles had
fallen was averted.
One morning Sally startled him by saying: “Pap, I can't make them hens
out. Here they are a-layin' right along, and all at once they quit
layin' decent sized eggs like they ought, and begin layin' little mean
things no better than banty eggs.”
Pap scratched his head.
“You must allow, Sally,” he said, “that it's quite a strain on a hen
to keep a-layin' right along through such weather as this, and I'm only
thankful they lay any. Mebby if you give them a leetle more o' that
hen-food they'll do better.”
“I believe it,” said Sally. “Why, it's wonderful, Pap. I shouldn't be a
bit surprised to find 'em layin' duck eggs if I jist give 'em enough o'
that stuff.”
Pap looked closely at her face, but it was innocent of guile. She
suspected nothing.
The next day the eggs were of the proper size.
“It's a real blessin' to have hens a-layin',” she said one day. “I took
half a dozen over to the minister's wife this mornin', and she was so
pleased! She said it was sich a blessin' to have fresh eggs again.
She was gittin' sick o' them she's been buyin' at Billings'. She was
downright thankful.”
About a week later she said:
“Them hens of ourn do beat all creation. I run out o' that hen-food a
week ago, and I hain't give them a mite since, and they keep a-layin'
jist the same. I can't make head nor tail of them, Pap.”
Pap squirmed in his chair.
“Pshaw, now, Sally,” he said, “you'd ought to have let me know you was
out. You oughtn't to do that. Feed 'em plenty of it. They deserve it.
If you stop feedin' them they'll stop layin' pretty soon. The effect of
that hen-food don't last more'n two weeks. No,” he said thoughtfully,
“ten days is the longest I ever knowed it to last 'em.”
If Pap Briggs enjoyed his eggs for breakfast he enjoyed as fully the
many laughs he had with Billings over the scheme, and Billing found
it hard to keep his promised secrecy. It would be such a good story to
tell. But Pap exhorted him daily, and he did not let the secret out.
One Sunday morning Pap came down to his breakfast and took his seat.
Sally brought his coffee and bacon. Then she brought him a plate of
moistened toast.
“You've forgot the eggs, Sally,” said Pap admonishingly.
“They ain't none this morning,” said Sally briefly.
Pap looked up and saw that her mouth was set very firmly.
“No eggs?” he asked tremulously.
“No,” she said decidedly, “no eggs! I kin believe that hens lay eggs and
don't cluck, and I kin believe that hens lay eggs all winter, and I kin
believe that Plymouth Rock hens lay Leghorn eggs and Shanghai eggs and
Banty eggs, Pap, but when hens begin layin' spoiled eggs I ain't no more
faith in hens.”
Pap laid down his knife and fork.
“Spoiled eggs!” he ejaculated.
“Yes, spoiled eggs,” she declared. “You and Billings ought to be more
careful.”
Pap turned his bacon over and eyed it critically. Then he frowned at it.
Then he chuckled.
“You needn't laugh,” said Miss Sally severely. “You don't get no more
eggs until the hens begin laying regular. You can eat moistened toast.
You ain't fair to me, pa. You set up to say who I shall marry, when I'm
old enough to know for myself, and then you go and cheat me about eggs.
Mebby I ain't old enough to know who to marry, but I'm old enough to run
this house for you, and you don't get no more eggs. No more eggs until
spring, or until I can marry who I want to.”
Pap looked at the mushy piece of toast and grinned sheepishly.
“You'd be worse of 'n ever, Sally,” he said meekly, “if so be you
married a man that felt he had to hev eggs every morning. They'd be two
of us then.”
“Well, I'd just have to buy eggs then,” she said, “if that come to pass.
I couldn't expect these few hens to lay enough eggs in winter for two
men. If I had to buy eggs for a husband, I'd buy them.”
The old man ate his toast slowly and without relish.
“Sally,” he said that afternoon, “I guess mebby you'd better git
married. I'm gittin' old. You'd better marry that book agent whilst you
got a chance.”
It was Pap Briggs who urged an early date, after that, and who was most
joyous at the wedding.
“Pap,” asked Sally one morning soon after she and Eliph' were married,
while the three were sitting at breakfast, “what ever made you swing
round so sudden and want me to marry Eliph', after objectin' so long?”
Her father looked at Eliph' slyly and chuckled.
“Eggs,” he said. “I fooled you that time, Sally. I knowed when I said to
go ahead that Eliph' has to have eggs for breakfast. Doc Weaver told me
so.”