"By gum! Well, I'll give you just one hundred dollars if you'll do it!" exclaimed Peter. "You see my grandfather and father owned this land before me. We've been on the plowing job so long we have it reduced to a system, so it comes easy for me, and I take pride and pleasure in it; I had supposed my boys would be the same. Do you really think you could manage it?"
"Sure," said Mickey. "Only, if you really mean it, not now, nor ever, do you want son to know it. See! The medicine wouldn't work, if he knew he took it."
"Well I'll be jiggered!" laughed Peter. "I guess you could do it, if you went at it right."
"Well you trust me to do it right," grinned Mickey. "Loan me sonny for a week or two, and you can have him back for keeps."
"Well it's worth trying," said Peter. "Say, when will you be this way again?"
"'Most any day," said Mickey. "And your lady said she'd be in Multiopolis soon, so we are sure to have a happy meeting before long. I think that is Mr. Bruce's car coming. Goodbye! Be good to yourself!"
With a spring from where he was standing Mickey arose in air, alighted on the top rail of the division fence, then balancing, he raced down it toward the road. Peter watched him in astonishment, then went back to his plowing with many new things on his mind. Thus it happened that after supper, when the children were in bed, and he and his wife went to the front veranda for their usual evening visit, and talk over the day, she had very little to tell him.
As was her custom, she removed her apron, brushed her waving hair and wore a fresh dress. She rocked gently in her wicker chair, while her voice was moved to unusual solicitude as she spoke. Peter also had performed a rite he spoke of as "brushing up" for evening. He believed in the efficacy of soap and water, so his body, as well as his clothing, was clean. He sat on the top step leaning against the pillar where the moonlight emphasized his big frame, accented the strong lines of his face and crowned his thick hair, as Nancy Harding thought it should be, with glory.
"Peter," she said, "did you notice anything about that boy, this afternoon, different from other boys?"
"Yes," answered Peter slowly, "I did Nancy. He didn't strike me as being one boy. He has the best of three or four concealed in his lean person."