“But you can’t live in the cart in winter,” objected Nell.
“We did last winter, and the winter before too. We backed the cart under a bluff, made a platform with a bit of sheet iron across the shafts, lifted the stove up on to that, and was just as cosy as chipmunks, I can tell you,” said the boy, who was eagerly eyeing Nell’s cooking operations.
“As you say I couldn’t find this place where you live without help, will you let me walk back with you, because I want to see your sick man?” she asked, rather anxiously.
The boy stared at her in undisguised amazement. “Do you mean you are wanting to tramp all the way to Goat’s Gulch, just to see whether old Doss is fit to eat one of your pies?” he demanded.
“I should not like him to have one unless he is fit for it,” Nell said, with a smile. “But if you are willing to let me go with you and will do an errand for me first, I will give you a nice pie to eat when the errand is done, and a big glass of lemonade to drink with it.”
“I’ll take you, though I ain’t, so to speak, much given to walking out with young ladies. What is the errand?” He smacked his lips appreciatively as he looked at the pies; then stuffed his hands deeper in his pockets as he waited to know what was really required of him.
Nell scribbled a few words on a piece of paper, and asked him to carry it across to Mrs. Peters, the station-master’s wife, and wait for an answer.
When the boy had gone on his errand she hurried to get her morning’s baking done, and to arrange matters so that she could leave for a few hours.
The answer sent back by Mrs. Peters was brief and to the point, for she had simply turned Nell’s piece of paper over, and written on the other side in very big letters, “I’ll be there.”
Nell put a big pie on a plate, poured out a glass of lemonade, and bade the boy sit down on the doorstep to eat his lunch.