“Mighty glad to have you come in,” said Mr. Bascom, cutting large slices of beefsteak for each one, and piling delicate fried potatoes beside them. “Seeing someone takes my mind off myself. Wife thinks I don’t eat the way I should; don’t seem to relish things right.” He took a large spoonful of orange marmalade, and poured thick cream in his cup of coffee.
“No, I don’t relish the way I used to. Try those muffins, Rowland. Take two! There’s only about ten bites in each one. I tell Mrs. Bascom she don’t make them as thick as she used to.”
“Where—” commenced Eddie, but Mrs. Bascom interrupted. “You are an early riser, Eddie, I will say! I do wish I could get Henry up like this. I declare, it is all I can do to drag that boy out of bed. He would sleep till noon if he could. And I do wish school hours could be changed. I say when a child needs his sleep, the way Henry does, he ought to have time to take it. Nothing like good food and rest for children, Mr. Rowland?”
“Yes, and they can sure sleep and eat, these youngsters,” said Mr. Bascom, helping himself to more fried potatoes.
“Well, they ought to,” said Mrs. Bascom, pouring quantities of thick maple syrup over a muffin which she had loaded with butter for Eddie. “Think how they have got to grow! No coffee, Eddie? Well, just you drink some milk.”
“Can’t I go up and wake Fa—Henry up?” asked Eddie, finally stemming the conversational torrent.
“Why, hon, he isn’t here,” said Mrs. Bascom. “He has gone to Cincinnati to see a cousin. He’ll be back in a day or two. I thought, and so did papa, that he looked run down; sort of peaked, and we thought the change would do him good. My sister sets a real good table. Not plain like ours, but things that would sort of tempt him.”
“Well—er, he has a sort of pencil case of mine,” said Eddie, “and I have got to have it.”
“A little brass thing, with sort of pointed ends?” asked Mrs. Bascom, reaching for the muffin plate. “Let me get some hot ones, Mr. Rowland.”
“Yes, that is it,” said Eddie, cheering up. “Perhaps it is up in his bureau. I will look while you get the muffins, Mrs. Bascom.”