"I vow," said Mark, "that looks like rain!"
"Rain—sure enough!" articulated Mr. Royden, with a troubled expression.
"A big sprinkle struck me right on the nose," cried Sam.
"I wish we had got up the hay that was down, the first thing after dinner, and left the cocks," said the farmer, pricking the horses. "I would have risked it in the stack, if I had known it was so well cured. If there should come up a rain, it would be spoilt."
There was real danger, and each man went to work as if the hay was all his own.
"Don't pitch so fast as you did afore, Mark," whined Sam. "You 'most covered me up, fifteen or sixteen times."
"It'll do you good," replied the jockey, heaving a fraction of a ton from the heavy windrow directly upon Sam's head. "Tread it down!"
Father Brighthopes, who had been some time sitting by the stack, to rest his old limbs, observed the threatening clouds, and came out again with his rake.
"You'd better go to the house, Father," said Mr. Royden, in a hurried tone. "I would not have you get wet and take cold for ten times the worth of the hay."
But the old man would not leave the field, which was now a busy and exciting scene. The storm seemed inevitable. Getting the hay into cocks that would shed rain, Chester and the men worked almost miraculously. It seemed as if they had husbanded their strength during the week for this crisis. They were not jaded and disheartened laborers, but bold and active workmen.