The Able McLaughlins
“I see somebody coming on the road, Hughie!” he called. “You do not!” answered Hughie. It wasn’t at all likely anybody was coming. Yet in case any¬ thing so unusual was happening, he would just have a look. Sarah waddled after him. Ship ahoy! Was that really something moving down there in the further slough? The three stood still, peering across the prairie, hands sheltering eyes, bare¬footed, the boys in the most primitive of home¬ made overalls, Sarah in an apron unadorned, the golden autumn sunshine blowing around them. They stood looking. ... Then the home-coming children emerged from the tall grass into which the younger ones were strongly forbidden to go, because children some« times got fatally lost in it, and at this signal the three ran to meet them, crying out the news. Gaining the little rise of ground again, upon which the house stood, they all paused together to look at whatever it was that drew near, Mary, the oldest of them, the teacher, Jessie and Flora, James and Peter. Yes! There was no doubt about it now! “ ’Tis a team!” cried Peter. “ ’Tis a pair of grays!” he added in a moment They were all perfectly motionless from curiosity now. Who had grays in that neighborhood? “There’s two men in it,” Mary affirms. Then Peter yells,
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