when he brings them in they’re yours. In the meantime, I have twenty cords of wood up in the alley next to my house. If you will go up and saw that twice in two and toss it up into the woodshed, by the time that’s done there’ll be some boots in.”
Of course I saw the peculiar part of learning the shoemaking trade, but I had told so many people that I had to go. I had been sawing wood about half an hour, just long enough to be thoroughly disgusted with any branch of the shoemaking trade, when I heard a familiar cow bell, looked around, and saw my old father come driving our cows past this very woodpile. There was no way to escape, as they were too close. I thought of many ways of eluding discovery; perhaps the safest of the many would be to bend over and saw wood, knowing that as he had never seen me in that position, he would likely pass on by.
But the older and shrewder of the three cows recognized me and stopped, perhaps because she saw so much of her milk on my boots. I didn’t look up, but kept on sawing, pulled the hat down tighter and felt strange. I also felt Father’s hand on my shoulders and dreaded
