""Di--de--di--de--"
"Now where on earth have I put that pencil, Babbie? Have I swallowed it? DON"T tell me you"ve seen me swallow it, "cause that flavor of lead-pencil never did agree with me."
The child burst into a trill of laughter.
"Why, Uncle Jed," she exclaimed, "there it is, behind your ear."
"Is it? Sho, so "tis! Now that proves the instinct of dumb animals, don"t it? That lead-pencil knew enough to realize that my ear was so big that anything short of a cord-wood stick could hide behind it. Tut, tut! Surprisin", surprisin"!"
"But, Uncle Jed, a pencil isn"t an animal."
"Eh? Ain"t it? Seemed to me I"d read somethin" about the ragin"
lead-pencil seekin" whom it might devour. But maybe that was a-- er--lion or a clam or somethin"."
Babbie looked at him in puzzled fashion for a moment. Then she sagely shook her head and declared: "Uncle Jed, I think you are perfectly scru-she-aking. Petunia and I are convulshed. We--" she stopped, listened, and then announced: "Uncle Jed, I THINK somebody came up the walk."
The thought received confirmation immediately in the form of a knock at the door. Jed looked over his spectacles.
"Hum," he mused, sadly, "there"s no peace for the wicked, Babbie.
No sooner get one order all fixed and out of the way than along comes a customer and you have to get another one ready. If I"d known "twas goin" to be like this I"d never have gone into business, would you? But maybe "tain"t a customer, maybe it"s Cap"n Sam or Gabe Bea.r.s.e or somebody. . . . They wouldn"t knock, though, "tain"t likely; anyhow Gabe wouldn"t. . . . Come in," he called, as the knock was repeated.
The person who entered the shop was a tall man in uniform. The afternoon was cloudy and the outer shop, piled high with stock and lumber, was shadowy. The man in uniform looked at Jed and Barbara and they looked at him. He spoke first.
"Pardon me," he said, "but is your name Winslow?"
Jed nodded. "Yes, sir," he replied, deliberately. "I guess likely "tis."
"I have come here to see if you could let me have--"
Babbie interrupted him. Forgetting her manners in the excitement of the discovery which had just flashed upon her, she uttered an exclamation.
"Oh, Uncle Jed!" she exclaimed.
Jed, startled, turned toward her.
"Yes?" he asked, hastily. "What"s the matter?"
"Don"t you know? He--he"s the nice officer one."
"Eh? The nice what? What are you talkin" about, Babbie?"
Babbie, now somewhat abashed and ashamed of her involuntary outburst, turned red and hesitated.
"I mean," she stammered, "I mean he--he"s the--officer one that-- that was nice to us that day."
"That day? What day? . . . Just excuse the little girl, won"t you?" he added, apologetically, turning to the caller. "She"s made a mistake; she thinks she knows you, I guess."
"But I DO, Uncle Jed. Don"t you remember? Over at the flying place?"
The officer himself took a step forward.
"Why, of course," he said, pleasantly. "She is quite right. I thought your faces were familiar. You and she were over at the camp that day when one of our construction plans was lost. She found it for us. And Lieutenant Rayburn and I have been grateful many times since," he added.
Jed recognized him then.
"Well, I snum!" he exclaimed. "Of course! Sartin! If it hadn"t been for you I"d have lost my life and Babbie"d have lost her clam chowder. That carpenter feller would have had me hung for a spy in ten minutes more. I"m real glad to see you, Colonel--Colonel Wood.
That"s your name, if I recollect right."
"Not exactly. My name is Grover, and I"m not a colonel, worse luck, only a major."
"Sho! Grover, eh? Now how in the nation did I get it Wood? Oh, yes, I cal"late "twas mixin" up groves and woods. Tut, tut!
Wonder I didn"t call you "Pines" or "Bushes" or somethin". . . .
But there, sit down, sit down. I"m awful glad you dropped in. I"d about given up hopin" you would."
He brought forward a chair, unceremoniously dumping two stacks of carefully sorted and counted vanes and sailors from its seat to the floor prior to doing so. Major Grover declined to sit.
"I should like to, but I mustn"t," he said. "And I shouldn"t claim credit for deliberately making you a social call. I came--that is, I was sent here on a matter of--er--well, first aid to the injured.
I came to see if you would lend me a crank."
Jed looked at him. "A--a what?" he asked.
"A crank, a crank for my car. I motored over from the camp and stopped at the telegraph office. When I came out my car refused to go; the self-starter appears to have gone on a strike. I had left my crank at the camp and my only hope seemed to be to buy or borrow one somewhere. I asked the two or three fellows standing about the telegraph office where I might be likely to find one. No one seemed to know, but just then the old grouch--excuse me, person who keeps the hardware store came along."
"Eh? Phin Babbitt? Little man with the stub of a paint brush growin" on his chin?"
"Yes, that"s the one. I asked him where I should be likely to find a crank. He said if I came across to this shop I ought to find one."
"He did, eh? . . . Hum!"
"Yes, he did. So I came."
"Hum!"
This observation being neither satisfying nor particularly illuminating, Major Grover waited for something more explicit. He waited in vain; Mr. Winslow, his eyes fixed upon the toe of his visitor"s military boot, appeared to be mesmerized.
"So I came," repeated the major, after an interval.
"Eh? . . . Oh, yes, yes. So you did, so you did. . . . Hum!"
He rose and, walking to the window, peeped about the edge of the shade across and down the road in the direction of the telegraph office.
"Phineas," he drawled, musingly, "and Squealer and Lute Small and Bluey. Hu-u-m! . . . Yes, yes."
He turned away from the window and began intoning a hymn. Major Grover seemed to be divided between a desire to laugh and a tendency toward losing patience.
"Well," he queried, after another interval, "about that crank?
Have you one I might borrow? It may not fit, probably won"t, but I should like to try it."