As for the young man himself, he had a blithe, open look which Carraway found singularly attractive, the kind of look it warms one's heart to meet in the long road on a winter's day. Leaning idly against the lintel of the door, and fingering a bright axe which he was apparently anxious that they should retain, he presented a pleasant enough picture to the attentive eyes within the kitchen.
"You'd as well keep this axe as long as you want it," he protested earnestly. " It's an old one, anyway, that I sharpened when you asked for it, and we've another at home; that's all we need."
"It's very kind of you, Jim, but ours is mended now," replied
Cynthia, a trifle stiffly.
"If we need one again, we'll certainly borrow yours, "added Lila, smiling as she looked up from the glasses she was filling with fresh buttermilk.
"Sit down, Jim, and have dinner with us; there's no hurry," urged Tucker hospitably, with a genial wave toward the meagerly spread table. "Jim's a great fellow, Mr. Carraway; you ought to know him. He can manage anything from a Sunday-school to the digging of a well. I've always said that if he'd had charge of the children of Israel's journey to the promised land he'd have had them there, flesh-pots and all, before the week was up."
"I can see he is a useful neighbour," observed Carraway, glancing at the axe.
"Well, I'm glad I come handy, " replied Jim in his hearty way; "and are you sure you don't want me to split up that big oak log at the woodpile? I can do it in a twinkling."
Cynthia declined his knightly offer, to be overruled again by
Lila's smiling lips.
"Christopher will have to do it when he comes in, " she said; "poor Christopher, he never has a single moment of his own."
Jim Weatherby looked at her eagerly, his blue eyes full of sparkle. "Why, I can do it in no time," he declared, shouldering his axe, and a moment afterward they heard his merry strokes from the woodpile.