The stranger glanced at him critically.
“You may, sir,” he returned at length. “I am pleased to observe that you do not appear to be steeped in sin. At least, your language is not sprinkled with the oaths which have cut my sensitive nature to the quick. I am the Reverend Jeremy Pennyfeather, a preacher and expounder of the Word. On my morning ramble through the clean, sweet, dewy world, I chanced to pass this house, and finding the door ajar, I entered, seeking a moment’s rest, and, perhaps—er—a little—er—sustenance, without which these poor carnal bodies of ours cannot uphold the burdens of life.”
Dick gazed at him in astonishment. He certainly did not speak as if he were quite right in the head.
“Your morning ramble?” he repeated. “You live somewhere near here?”
The Reverend Pennyfeather hesitated.
“At the moment I am without a—er—fixed charge,” he explained. “I travel about carrying the Word and doing what little good I can by the way. It sometimes happens, as in the present instance, that I am temporarily without a roof over my head or—only for the moment, I assure you—the necessary fuel to keep this poor machine of mine—er—going.”
Dick’s face cleared. The fellow was some wandering preacher, possibly crack-brained, and apparently little better than a tramp. He had simply come in there for breakfast.
“Oh, I see,” he said quickly. “You want something to eat. Just come out to the kitchen, will you?”
The man followed him slowly, with majestic steps, but there was no mistaking the hungry glitter in his eyes or the suppressed eagerness with which he fell to on the simple fare which Dick laid before him. He certainly ate as if he were half starved, and Merriwell was far from regretting the time wasted in waiting until he had finished.
When there was nothing more left in sight, Pennyfeather arose with a sigh.