"Let me help you," urged Richard. "I'm used to that sort of work."
"No, not to-night. Walk right up to the fire, and make yourself at home."
"Where did you happen to meet Mr. Brown?" asked the wife after a cordial grasp of welcome to the stranger.
"About two miles back. He was very kind to bring me home. I didn't know the way to a tavern."
"'Twouldn't have been like Thomas Brown to leave a stranger by the road side," she said laughing. Then she busied herself pouring a pan of steaming hot biscuit upon a plate, and setting the yellow earthen teapot on the table. Mr. Brown and a young man, his son, came in just as she had completed the arrangements, and after a vigorous washing said, "Draw up now;" and he took his seat at the table.
They sat quiet for a minute looking at Dick, who blushed furiously. At last Mr. Brown said, "I didn't know but you'd say grace. I reckon you're a professor."
Richard instantly folded his hands and asked God's blessing on the food before them.
Every one then took hold in earnest of the business of eating; and Dick perceiving from a dish being pushed toward him that he was expected to help himself, did so. Biscuit and butter and maple molasses, gingerbread and sugar cookies, blackberry preserve and pumpkin pie, and crullers, made a most tempting repast to the hungry traveller.
When they rose from the table the men tipped their chairs back and began to ask questions of Dick, while Mrs. Brown cleared the table, and washed the dishes, occasionally adding a word. In an hour or two the boy had given his new friends a brief history of his life at home, and the occasion of his journey.
Soon after seven a neighbor came in having driven his horse and sleigh into the barn floor. Dick's eyes twinkled at the introduction he received.