had brought the invitation into the stables on that night just as to-night
he had brought the letter from the Chicago company, and just as Sam was
shaking his head in refusal of the invitation in at the stable door had
come the children. Led by the eldest, a great tomboy girl of fourteen with
the strength of a man and an inclination to burst out of her clothes at
unexpected places, they had come charging into the stables to carry Sam
off to the dinner, Freedom laughingly urging them on, his voice roaring in
the stable so that the horses jumped about in their stalls. Into the house
they had dragged him, the baby, a boy of four, sitting astride his back
and beating on his head with a woollen cap, and Freedom swinging a lantern
and giving an occasional helpful push with his hand.

A picture of the long table covered with the white cloth at the end of the
big dining room in Freedom's house came back into the mind of the boy now
sitting in the barren little kitchen before the untasted, badly-cooked
food. Upon it lay a profusion of bread and meat and great dishes heaped
with steaming potatoes. At his own house there had always been just enough
food for the single meal. The thing was nicely calculated, when you had
finished the table was bare.

How he had enjoyed that dinner after the long day on the road. With a
flourish and a roar at the children Freedom heaped high the plates and
passed them about, the wife or the tomboy girl bringing unending fresh
supplies from the kitchen. The joy of the evening with its talk of the
children in school, its sudden revelation of the womanliness of the tomboy
girl, and its air of plenty and good living haunted the mind of the boy.

"My mother never knew anything like that," he thought.

The drunken man who had been sleeping aroused himself and began talking