The Colonel set aside a plateful for each of the two absent ones, and cleared away the things. Potts stirred the fire in a shower of sparks, picked up a book and flung it down, searched through the sewing-kit for something that wasn't lost, and then went to the door to look at the weather—so he said. O'Flynn sat dozing by the fire. He was in the way of the washing-up.
"Stir your stumps, Jimmie," said the Colonel, "and get us a bucket of water." Sleepily O'Flynn gave it as his opinion that he'd be damned if he did.
With unheard-of alacrity, "I'll go," said Potts.
The Colonel stared at him, and, by some trick of the brain, he had a vision of Potts listening at the door the night before, and then resuming that clinking, scratching sound in the corner—the store corner.
"Hand me over my parki, will you?" Potts said to the Boy. He pulled it over his head, picked up the bucket, and went out.
"Seems kind o' restless, don't he?"
"Yes. Colonel—"
"Hey?"
"Nothin'."
Ten minutes—a quarter of an hour went by.