Sloan asked no questions until they had forded the stream and were back on the road. Then he inquired, "What's he going to do?"
"Mend the bridge. I told him it had to be done tonight. Said he couldn't. Hadn't any lumber. Couldn't think of it. I told him to pull down the lee side of his house if necessary; said you'd give him the lumber to build an annex on it."
"What!"
"Oh, it's all right. Send the bill to MacBride. I knew your name would go down and mine wouldn't."
The delay had proved costly, and it was half-past seven before they reached the Manistogee hotel.
"Now," said Bannon, "we'll have time to rub down the mare and feed her before I'm ready to go back."
Sloan stared at him for a moment in unfeigned amazement. Then slowly he shook his head. "All right, I'm no quitter. But I will say that I'm glad you ain't coming to Ledyard to live."
Bannon left the supper table before Sloan had finished, and was gone nearly an hour. "It's all fixed up," he said when he returned. "I've cinched the wharf."
They started back as they had come, in silence, Bannon crowding as low as possible in his ulster, dozing. But he roused when the mare, of her own accord, left the road at the detour for the ford.
"You don't need to do that," he said. "The bridge is fixed." So they drove straight across, the mare feeling her way cautiously over the new-laid planks.