“Can’t we talk?” asked Toddie.
“Oh, not unless you need to for some particular purpose,” said Mrs. Burton, who, like most other people in trouble, fought most earnestly against any form of diversion which should keep her from the extremity of worry. “Can’t little boys’s mouths ever be quiet?”
“Why, yes,” said Budge, “when there’ something in ’em to keep ’em still.”
In utter desperation Mrs. Burton unpacked all the baskets and told the children to help themselves. As for her, she sought the roadside and gazed earnestly for her husband. Wearied at last by hope deferred she returned to the carriage to find that the boys had eaten all the pie and cake, drank the milk and ate the sugar which were to have formed part of some delicious coffee which Mr. Burton was to have made à la militaire, and had battered into shapelessness a box of sardines by attempting to open it with a stone.
“You bad boys!” exclaimed Mrs. Burton. “Now what will your poor uncle have to eat when he comes back all tired, hungry, and thirsty and all because of your mischief, Budge.”
“Why, we haven’t touched the crackers, Aunt Alice,” said Budge.” They’re what he gave us when we said we was awful hungry, an’ there’s a whole river full of water to drink, like he told us about when he thought we was thirsty.”
The information did not seem to console Mrs. Burton, who ventured to the roadside with the feeling that she could endure it to know that her husband was starving if she could only see him safe back again. The moments dragged wearily on, the boys grew restive and then cross, and at about three in the afternoon, Mr. Burton reappeared. The runaway had nearly reached home, breaking a shoe en route, and his captor had found it necessary to seek a blacksmith. The horse he rode had evidently never been broken to the saddle, and many had been the jeers of the village boys at his rider’s apparent mismanagement. All he knew now was that he was ravenously hungry.
“And the boys have eaten everything but the bread and crackers,” gasped Mrs. Burton. “I’ve not eaten a mouthful.”
“Goodness!” exclaimed Mr. Burton, feeling the boys’s waist-belts; “didn’t they throw anything away?”
“Only down our froats.” said Toddie.