Steve stepping forward put out an eager hand, and cried:
“Mr. Follet, don’t you know me?”
But the man only stared, coming forward into the light of the doorway.
“Never saw you before,” he declared at last; “or if I did, can’t tell where under the canopee ’twas.”
Steve laughed with keen enjoyment at hearing the familiar old expression, and said eagerly:
“Don’t you remember Steve, little Steve Langly who worked for you one summer?”
“Steve!” exclaimed Mr. Follet; “of course I do; 161 nobody at my house has forgotten him, not by a jugful,––but this ain’t Steve!”
“This is Steve though, Mr. Follet,––the same Steve, with just as grateful a heart for you and Mrs. Follet as I had the day I left you about a dozen years ago.”
“Well, this does beat me,” said Mr. Follet. “We’ll lock right up and go over to the house. My wife and Nancy will be powerful glad to see you if they can ever think who under the canopee you are.” And he stepped briskly about locking up, and then the two walked over to the house.
Mrs. Follet was seated on the piazza with some light sewing when they came up, and to Mr. Follet’s excited introduction of Mr. Langly she made polite but unrecognizing acknowledgment, and her husband was too impatient to delay his revelation.