"
* * * * *
It was less than an hour before Farmer Lear pulled up to the door in
his red-wheeled spring-cart.
"Now, friends," said Mrs. Trueman, as her ears caught the rattle of
the wheels, "I must trouble ye to step outside while I tidy up the
floor."
The women offered their help, but she declined it. Alone she put the
small kitchen to rights, while they waited outside around the door.
Then she stepped out with her bundle, locked the door after her, and
slipped the key under an old flower-pot on the window ledge. Her eyes
were dry.
"Come along, Jan."
There was a brief hand-shaking, and the paupers climbed up beside
Farmer Lear.
"I've made a sort o' little plan in my head," said old Jan at parting,
"of the order in which I shall see ye again, one by one. 'Twill be a
great amusement to me, friends, to see how the fact fits in wi' my
little plan."
The guests raised three feeble cheers as the cart drove away, and hung
about for several minutes after it had passed out of sight, gazing
along the road as wistfully as more prosperous men look in through
churchyard gates at the acres where their kinsfolk lie buried.
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