"Then I finished, and you hadn't come, so I says, `Well, that's their

fault, and they may go without.' But all the same I says to myself,

`Well, poor chaps, they don't often get a run in the country!' and that

made me a bit soft like, and I pulled a half-quartern loaf in two and

put all the briled ham that was left in the middle, and tied it up in a

clean hankychy for you to eat going home.

"Then I pays for the eating and the horse, harnessed him up, after a

good rub down his legs, and whistled to Juno, who was keeping very close

to me, and we went up the hill to the sand-pit again.

"I shouted and hollered again, and then, as it was got to be quite time

we started, I grew waxy, and pulls out my knife and cuts a good ash

stick out of the hedge for Master Shock, for I put it down to him for

having led you off.

"Still you didn't come, and though I looked all about there was nothing

fresh as I could see, only sand everywhere; and at last I says to

myself, `I sha'n't wait with that load to get out of the pit here,' and

so I started.

"Nice tug the hoss had, but she brought it well out on to the hard road,

and there I rested just a quarter of an hour, giving a holler now and

then.

"`I'm off!' I says at last, `and they may foller. Come on, Juno,' I

says; but the dog wasn't there.

"That made me more waxy, and I shouted and whistled, and she come from

out of the sand-pit and kept looking back, as if she wanted to know why

you two didn't come. She follered the cart, though, right enough; and

feeling precious put out, I went on slowly down the hill; stopped in the

village ten minutes, and then, knowing you could find out that I'd gone

on, I set to for my long job, and trudged on by the hoss.

"It was a long job, hour after hour, for I couldn't hurry--that little

looking load was too heavy for that. And so I went on, and eight

o'clock come, and nine, and ten, and you didn't overtake me, and then it

got to be twelve o'clock; and at last, reg'lar fagged out, me and hoss,

we got to the yard just as it was striking four, and getting to be day.

"I put the hoss up, and saw Juno go into her kennel, but I was too tired

to chain her, and I lay down in the loft on some hay and went off to

sleep.

"I didn't seem to have been asleep above ten minutes, but it was eight

o'clock when Old Brownsmith's brother stirs me up with his foot, and I

sat up and stared at him.




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