"Oh, yes, I'd forgotten," said Mr. Murdoch. "You've worked a while at printing. I'm willing you should see what you can do. I'd like to speak to Mary. I'm sorry to say that you'll have to sleep in the office, Jack, for we've only one spare room in this nutshell of a house."
"I don't mind that," said Jack.
"I hope I'll be out in a day or so," added the editor. "But, Jack, the press is run by a pony steam-engine, and that foreman couldn't run it to save his life," he added hopelessly.
"Why, it's nothing to do," exclaimed Jack. "I've helped run an engine for a steam thrashing-machine. Don't you be worried about the engine."
Mr. Murdoch was able to be up a little while in the evening, and Mary came in to see him. From what he said to her, it seemed as if there was really very little to do in editing the remainder of the next number of the Eagle.
"I'm so glad you're here," said Mrs. Murdoch, when Mary came out to supper. "I never read a newspaper myself, and I don't know the first thing about putting one together. It's too bad that you should be bothered with it though."
"Why, Mrs. Murdoch," exclaimed Mary, laughing, "I shall be delighted. I'd rather do it than not."
The truth was that it was not easy for either Mary or her brother to be very sorry that Mr. Murdoch was not able to work. They did not feel anxious about him, for his wife had told them it was not a serious attack, and they enjoyed the prospect of editing the newspaper.
After supper Jack and Mary went through the garden to the Eagle office. The pony-engine was in a sort of woodshed, the press was in the "kitchen," as Mary called it, and the front room of the little old dwelling-house was the business office. The editor's office and the type-setting room were up-stairs.
Jack took a look at the engine.