The meal at first was a comparatively silent one, but Roger noted with a contemptuous glance that his sister's hair was arranged more neatly than he had seen it since the previous Sunday, and that her calico dress, collar, and cuffs were scrupulously clean.
"Expecting company?" he asked maliciously.
She understood him and flushed resentfully. "If you wish to go around looking like a scarecrow, that's no reason why I should," she said. "The corn is too large for the crows to pull now, so if I were you I would touch myself up a little. I don't wonder that Miss Jocelyn mistook you for Jotham."
"It's well," retorted Roger, with some irritation, "that your Miss Jocelyn has no grown brothers here, or you would come down to breakfast in kid gloves. I suppose, however, that they have insisted on a tidy and respectful waitress. Will you please inform me, mother, what my regulation costume must be when my services are required? Jotham and I should have a suit of livery, with two more brass buttons on my coat to show that I belong to the family."
"I think that a little more of the manner and appearance of a gentleman would show your relationship better than any amount of brass," remarked his mother quietly.
Roger was almost through his breakfast, and so, at no great loss, could assume the injured part. Therefore with a dignity that was somewhat in marked contrast with his rather unkempt appearance he rose and stalked off to the cornfield again.
"Umph," remarked Mr. Atwood sententiously, as he rose and followed his son. This apparently vague utterance had for his wife a definite and extended meaning. She looked annoyed and flurried, and was in no mood for the labors of preparing a second breakfast.
"The men-folks had better not roil me up too much," she said to her daughter. "If your father had said No! out and out, I wouldn't have brought strangers into his home. But he kinder wanted me to have their money without the bother of having them around. Now one thing is settled—he must either help me make it pleasant for these people, or else tell them to leave this very day."
"And how about Roger?" asked Susan, still under the influence of pique.
"Oh, Roger is young and foolish. He's a-growing yet," and the mother's severe aspect relaxed. He was her only boy.