“I’d do anything I could to bring him back safe home,� said Mr. Jones.
“That’s what you say,� the little woman cried passionately. “But words don’t count. And you are doing your part to starve him. They can’t get food over there, unless we send it to them. It’s being rationed out to folks in France and Italy. The English ships that used to go to South America to get wheat are busy taking over our soldiers and munitions and food, food, food. And there’s just so-o much and all the world to feed—the world and my soldier boy. If we use it wasteful, there won’t be any to send. Yes, sir! I say your good dinner would choke me. I’d feel I was helping to kill my own son. You may not mean it, but it’s true that every time you set down to a meal like this you are helping kill my son, beat our armies, make the Germans win.�
“I don’t want your cake, your pie,� sobbed Sweet William. “I’m hungry, but I—I want to be hungry.�
Mrs. Jones pushed back her plate and sobbed with him. “I can’t swallow a morsel,� she declared. “I can just see Fayett, like when he was a little boy playing with my Tommy�—her own son who was dead—“when they’d come in and say, ‘We’re hungry; give us a snack!’ I ain’t never said ‘no’ to them.� She buried her tear-wet face in her apron.
Mr. Jones winked hard and cleared his throat loudly. “Come, come, mother,� he said. “Don’t you cry. We hadn’t thought ’bout things like she put ’em. I reckon you are right, Mrs. Mallett. Yes, you are! A man that won’t work at home for them that’s fighting over there for him ain’t much of a man. The world to feed—and Fayett! I’ll double the crop of wheat I was going to put in, and I’ll—say, Mrs. Mallett, if you won’t take a feed with me, won’t you and the little boy set and have a bite?�
“That I will, thank you,� said Mrs. Mallett, smiling through tears. “I didn’t mean to fault you too rough, Mr. Jones. But when I think ’bout them things, it’s like I had a pot in me that was boiling over.�
“That’s all right,� answered Mr. Jones. “You put it strong to me; and we’ll put it strong to other folks. We must see Jake Andrews and Pete Walthall, and make ’em know what they’ve got to do. We won’t have men here in our neighborhood that are so low-down and greedy and selfish they won’t do their part. We’ll see to them! What’ll you have, Mrs. Mallett? some corn bread and greens and a bit of bacon? Folks have got to eat, you know, so they can work. Um, um! What’ll I do ’bout my hounds?�
“Come now, Willie, you’ll have a cake and a piece of pie, being as they’re here and got to be et,� said Mrs. Jones, bustling about to get plates and chairs.
Sweet William gravely and wistfully considered the matter. “We don’t have cakes at home,� he said. “But these cakes are already made—with icing tops and raisins! I reckon it won’t hurt for me to eat one—maybe two, to save them. The little Belgians couldn’t get this sugar anyway.� He sighed, not altogether sad, and fell to with a will.