“Do you uns want we uns to drive the critter? We uns mostly goes along ’thout no axtra chawge.”
“Sure we want you. What do you charge for the mule and driver?”
“Wal, time was when Josephus brought as much as fifty cents a day, but he ain’t to say so spry as onct, an’ now we uns will be satisfied to git thirty cents, with a feedin’ of oats.”
“Oats! Who has oats? Not I. The only critter we have eats gasoline. I tell you, son, you feed Josephus yourself and we will feed you and pay you fifty cents a day for your animal. I don’t believe a mule could work for thirty cents and keep his self-respect.”
“Wal, Josephus an’ we uns don’t want no money what we uns don’ arn,” and the little mountain boy flushed a dark red under his sunburned, freckled face.
He was a very ragged youngster of about twelve. His clothes smacked of the soil to such an extent that you could never have told what was their original color. What sleeves there were left in his shirt certainly must once have been blue, but the body of that garment showed spots of candy pink calico, the kind you are sure to find on the shelves of any country store. His trousers, held up by twine, crossed over his wiry shoulders, were corduroy. They had originally been the color of the earth and time and weather had but deepened their tone. His eyes shone out very clear and blue in contrast to the general dinginess of his attire. His was certainly a very likable face and the young men were very much attracted to the boy, first because of his ready wit, shown from his first words, and then because of his quick resentment at the possibility of any one’s giving him or his mule money they had not earned.
“Of course, you are going to earn it,” reassured Lewis. “Now you go home and get your mule and as soon as we can cook some dinner for ourselves and satisfy our inner cravings, we will all get to work. You and Josephus can dig and Bill and I will begin to build.”
“Please, sir, wouldn’t you uns like Gwen to cook for you uns and wash the platters an’ sich? She is a great han’ at fixin’s.”
“Gwen! Who is Gwen?”
Another stone slipped from behind the boulder from which the boy had emerged and then a young girl came timidly forth.