There remained thousands of smaller stumps. To force these from the tough sod and heavy black soil with pick, shovel and bar, was back-breaking labor.
“Give me time,” Johnny would groan when morning came. “There’s a place in my back somewhere that bends. I’ll find it. Just give me time.”
Joke as they might, they could not but feel that progress was woefully slow and that seed-time would find them all unprepared.
One bright day an automobile came bumping over the uneven road to pause before their field. Out from it popped an old friend.
“Blackie!” Johnny exclaimed. “I thought you’d be in Bristol Bay by now.”
“I’m on my way,” Blackie puffed. “And so are you.
“Mr. Lawson,” he exclaimed, “I must draft your boys into my service.”
“What about these stumps,” Mr. Lawson straightened his stiff back.
“What’ll it cost to have ’em out with a tractor?” Blackie demanded.
Both Johnny and Lawrence looked at him with gleaming eyes.