“All right,” said the Angel. “Jeems Henery, git about yo' work now.”
Thereafter St. Hilda kept watch on James Henry and he was, indeed, a sly one. There was gambling going on. St. Hilda did not encourage tale-bearing, but she knew it was going on. Still she could not catch James Henry. One day the Angel came to her.
“I've got Jeems Henery to stop gamblin',” he whispered, “an' I didn't have to lam' him.” And, indeed, gambling thereafter ceased. The young man who had come for the summer to teach the boys the games of the outside world reported that much swearing had been going on but that swearing too had stopped.
“I've got Jeems Henery to stop cussin',” reported the Angel, and so St. Hilda rewarded him with the easy care of the nice new stable she had built on the hillside. His duty was to clean it and set things in order every day.
Some ten days later she was passing near the scene of the Angel's new activities, and she hailed him.
“How are you getting along?” She called.
“Come right on, Miss Hildy,” shouted the Angel. “I got ever'thing cleaned up. Come on an' look in the furthest corners!”
St. Hilda went on, but ten minutes later she had to pass that way again and she did look in. Nothing had been done. The stable was in confusion and a pitchfork lay prongs upward midway of the barn door.
“How's this, Ephraim?” she asked, mystified. Ephraim was a fourteen-year-old boy who did the strenuous work of the barn.
“Why, Miss Hildy, I jes' hain't had time to clean up yit.”