"Wha' d' they do?" Silence. "Tell me."
"They—pinched me, an'—an'—talked mean to me," she replied, breaking down again with the memory of the insult.
Anson began to understand.
"Wal, there! You dry y'r eyes, Flaxie, an' go an' git supper; they won't do it again—not this harvest," he added grimly as he marched to the door to enter the buggy.
Bert, coming along from the barn and seeing Anson about to drive away, asked where he was going. Anson tried to look indifferent.
"Oh, I've got a little business to transact with Reeves and some other smart Aleck downtown."
"What's up? What have they be'n doing?" asked Gearheart, reading trouble in the eyes of his friend.
"Well, they have be'n a little too fresh with Flaxen to-day, an' need a lesson."
"They're equal to it. Say, Anson, let me go," laying his hand on the dasher, ready to leap in.
"No: you're too brash. You wouldn't know when to quit. No: you stay right here. Don't say anything to Flaxen about it; if she wants to know where I'm gone, tell her I found I was out o' nails."