“Well,” said Marty, too much interested in his information to take umbrage at his mother’s correction. “Well, this Bowman is going to build the bridge. It’s his first big job with the V. C. I’m going to carry the chain for him, I am!” the boy added, with satisfaction.
“You’d better be in the cornfield, boy, if we expect to make a crop this year,” remarked Mr. Day.
“Hi tunket! you expect a feller to work all the time,” grumbled Marty. “I done my share of that old corn cultivatin’. Might’s well be a slave as to belong around here——”
His grumbling remarks faded out gradually; his father ignored them, saying:
“I ’low Polktown will pick up a bit if all that’s promised comes true. The steamboat company is going to build a new boat. Got to com-pete with the trains when they git to runnin’.”
“It’s lucky that old tub, the Constance Colfax, has held together as long as she has,” said Mr. Day. “There’s some talk of rebuilding the dock, too. I declare for’t! we won’t know the town, come next year this time.”
Her Aunt Almira turned on Janice suddenly, failing to continue her interest in the vista of changes which marked Polktown’s immediate future.
“Say, Janice, is it true that Mr. Haley is going to leave the school?”
Janice flushed a little; but nobody noticed it, for which she was glad.
“I don’t just know what his plans are, Aunt ’Mira,” said the girl hesitatingly. “He has a chance to become an instructor at the college—of course, beginning in a small way. It is really his work here at the new Polktown school that brought him the offer.”