"
"I got a _letter_," asserted Ma Bailey mysteriously.
"And you jest said nothin' and sprung him on us! Well, Ma, you sure
fooled me," said Andy, grinning.
"You go 'long." Mrs. Bailey smiled at Andy, who had earned her
forgiveness by crediting her--rather wisely--with having originated the
surprise.
They were chatting and joking when Bill Haskins appeared in the door-way,
his hand wrapped in a handkerchief.
Ma Bailey glared at him over her spectacles. "Got any stickin'-plaster?"
he asked plaintively, as though he had committed some misdemeanor. She
rose and placed a plate and chair for him as he shook hands with Pete,
led him to the kitchen and inspected and bandaged his hand, which he had
jagged on a wire gate, and finally reinstated him at the table, where he
proved himself quite as efficient as most men are with two hands. "Give
Bill all the coffee he wants and plenty stickin'-plaster, and I reckon he
never would do no work," suggested Hank Barley.
Bill Haskins grinned good-naturedly. "I see Pete's got back," he
ventured, as a sort of mild intimation that there were other subjects
worth discussing.
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