Wesley rubbed his grimy hand across his eyes.
"She scolded awful and told us to go down to the clam flats and not to come home till we'd got two bushels o' clams for the hens. Fast as I get a roller full and go over and emp'y 'em on the bank the crows come 'n' eat 'em up—look a' there!"
I saw.
"Wesley, your load does seem greater than you can bear." He wore trousers of a style prevalent among the Basins, of meal sacks; only his were not shaped at all—there was simply a sack for each leg, tied with gathering strings at the ankles. His jacket was as much too small for his stout little person as his trousers were voluminous; and Miss Pray, who was artistic by freaks, had made it with an impertinent little tail like a bird's tail.
Wesley was not only afflicted, he was ludicrous in the face of high heaven.
"There 's got to be a new deal," blubbered he, with his fist in his eyes, "or I shall kick."
"Could you kick in those trousers, Wesley?" I said.
He regarded me curiously, then replied with evident faith: "I could, nights."
"Ah! I'm so lame that I couldn't even kick much, nights, Wesley."
His countenance changed from its self-pity; he removed the fist from his eyes. "I've always wondered," he said, "'t you didn't kick more."