"I guess you're right, Jotham," Old Tilly said.
"But what in the world did they go and lock up for, when we got in just as easy as pie last night?" exclaimed Kent, disgustedly.
"Oh, ask something easy!" Jot cried. "What I want to know is, how we're going to get on the other side o' that door."
The care-taker, if one could call him that, of the old meeting-house, had taken it into his head to take care of it!—or it may have been that the key chanced to be in his pocket, convenient. At all events, the door was securely fastened. The three boys reluctantly gave up the attempt to force it.
"Windows!" Kent suddenly exclaimed, and they all laughed foolishly.
They had not thought of the windows.
"That's a good joke on the Eddy boys!" Old Tilly said. "We sha'n't hear the last of it if anybody lets on to father."
"Better wait till we're on the other side of the windows!" advised Kent.
"Maybe it isn't a joke."
There were windows enough. They were ranged in monotonous rows on all sides of the church, above and below. They all had tiny old-fashioned panes of glass and were fastened with wooden buttons. It was the work of a minute to "unbutton" one of them and jump out.
"There!" breathed Jot in relief, as his toes touched sod again, "I feel as if I'd been in prison and just got out."
"Broken out—that's the way I feel. I wish we could fasten the window again," Old Tilly said thoughtfully.
Kent was rubbing his ankle ruefully.
"It was a joke on us, our mooning round that door all that time, and thinking we were trapped!"
"Oh, well, come on; it doesn't matter, now we're free again."
"Come along—here are our wheels all right," Old Tilly said briskly. "Let's go down to that little bunch of white houses there under the hill, and pick out the one we want to stay over night in."
"The one that wants us to stay in it, you mean! Come on, then."
It was already mid-afternoon. The beautiful Sunday peace that broods over New England's country places rested softly on new-mown fields and bits of pasture and woods. The boys' hearts were made tender by the service they had so unexpectedly attended, and as the beauty of the scene recalled again the home fields, they fell into silence. A tiny, brown-coated bird tilted on a twig and sang to them as they passed. The little throat throbbed and pulsated with eager melody.
Old Tilly listened to the song to its close, then swung round suddenly. His face was like father's when he got up from his knees at family prayers.
"That bird seems singing, 'Holy, holy, holy,'" Old Tilly said softly.
"Can't you hear?"
"Yes, I hear," murmured Jot.
The little white house they picked out sat back from the highway in a nest of lilac bushes. It reminded the boys a very little of home.
"Stop over night? Away from home, be ye? Why, yes, I guess me an' pa can take you in. One, two—dear land! there's three of ye, ain't there? Yes, yes, come right in! I couldn't turn three boys away—not three!"
The sweet-faced old woman in the doorway held out both hands welcomingly. She seemed to get at the history of the three young knights by some instinctive mind-reading of her own—the boys themselves said so little. It was the little old lady's sweet voice that ran on without periods, piecing Old Tilly's brief explanatory words together skillfully.
"Havin' a holiday, be you? I see. Well, young folks has to have their outin's. When they git as old as me an' pa, they'll be all innin's!" she ran on. Suddenly she stooped and surveyed them with a placid attempt at sternness. "I hope you've all be'n to meetin'?" she cried.
Jot's face twisted oddly.
"Yes," Old Tilly answered, subduedly, "we've been to church."
"I thought so—I thought so. Now come in an' see pa—poor pa' He was took again yesterday. He's frettin' dretfully about the hay. Pa—"
Her voice went on ahead and heralded their coming. "Here's three boys come to stop over night with us—three, pa. You're glad there's three of 'em, ain't you? I knew you'd be. When I'd counted 'em up, I didn't hesitate any longer! The littlest one looks a little mite like our Joey, pa—only Joey was handsome," she added innocently.
Kent nudged Jot delightedly. They were entering a quaint, old-fashioned room, and at the further end on a hair-cloth settle lay a withered morsel of an old man. His sun-browned face made a shriveled spot of color against the pillows.
"That's pa," the little old lady said, by way of introduction. "He was took yesterday, out in the field. It was dretful hot—an' the hay 'most in, too. He's frettin' because he couldn't 've waited a little mite longer, ain't you, pa? I tell him if the boys was here—" She broke off with a quiver in her thin, clear voice. Pa, on the couch, put out his hand feebly and smoothed her skirt.
"We had three boys—ma an' me," he explained quietly. "That's why ma was so quick to take you in, I guess. They was all little shavers like you be."
"Yes, jest little shavers," said ma, softly. "They hadn't got where I couldn't make over 'em an' tuck 'em in nights, when they was took away— all in one week. You wouldn't have thought 'twould have be'n all in one week—three boys—would you? Not three! I tell pa the Lord didn't give us time enough to bid 'em all good-by. It takes so long to give up three!"
Old Tilly and the others stood by in odd embarrassment. Jot was bothered with a strange sensation in his throat.
But the old lady's sorrowing face brightened presently. She bustled about the room busily, getting out chairs and setting straight things crooked in her zeal.
"I guess you're hungry, ain't you? Boys always is—an' three boys! Dear! how hungry three boys can be! I'm goin' out to get supper. Pa, you must do the entertainin'."
The bread was "just like mother's"—white with a delicious crust—and the butter yellow as gold, and Jot helped himself plentifully. "Ma," behind the tea urn, watched him with a beaming face.
"That's right!—I love to see boys eat! I tell pa sometimes I can just see our three boys settin' at this table eatin' one of ma's good meals o' victuals. You must have some of this custard, Joey." A faint essence of added tenderness crept into the wistful old voice at that name. The boys knew that Joey had been the little old lady's baby.
"Joey was a great hand for custard. Joey was a master hearty boy."
After supper, the boys wandered out around the tiny farm. It was at best a rocky, uneven place, but there were evidences of "pa's" hard work on it. Most of the grass had been mowed and carried into the barn, but there was one small field still dotted over with cocks of overripe hay. Old Tilly strode over and examined it with an air of wisdom.
"Too ripe," he commented. "I guess it won't be worth getting in, if it stays out here much longer."
"He meant to have it all in yesterday—she said he did. I mean that little old lady said so," Jot remarked.
"Well, if it isn't all in to-morrow, it's a goner," Old Tilly said decisively.
"Now, boys, there's lots o' good water out in the cistern," the old lady said, when they came back. "I've put the towels handy in the shed. It may be you'll sleep sounder if you have a nice sponge off."
Only too glad, the boys took to the shed, and then followed their guide to the airy room waiting. How the pillows fitted a fellow's head! as Jot said luxuriously. And the beds, how good they felt after those hard church pews! They were sound asleep in a moment.
The little old lady stole in to look at them. She held the lamp high in one hand and gazed down with wistful eyes into the three healthy brown faces. When she went back to pa, her face was wet with a rain of tears.
"They look so good, pa, lyin' there!" she said brokenly. "An' you'd ought to see how much like Joey the littlest one throws up his arm!"
The old man could not sleep. He kept asking if it looked like rain and kept fretting because he could not move his legs about freely.
"I've got to move 'em, ma," he groaned.-"I've got to practice before to-morrer, so's to get the hay in. I've got to get the hay in, ma!"
It was Jot, for a wonder, who slept the longest. He woke with a start of surprise at his strange surroundings. Then he sat up in bed, blinking his eyes open wider. The room was a large one with two beds in it. He and Kent had slept in one, and Old Tilly in the other. It was just before sunrise, and in the east a wide swathe of pink was banding the sky. Outside the window, a crowd of little birds were tuning up for a concert.
Jot rubbed his eyes again. There was no one else in the room. The other boys had vanished completely. He leaped out of bed with a queer sense of fright. Then he made a discovery.