and satisfied all
hands to such an extent that they humbly asked him how much danger there
was of a Japanese invasion of the Philippines, and how long did he think
the great European war would last.

Abashed, prickly with uncomfortableness, Father discovered that the
saloon-keeper was taking up a collection for them. It was done very
quietly, and the man slipped a dollar and fifteen cents into his hand in
so casual a manner, so much as though he were merely making change, that
Father took it and uneasily thrust it into his pocket. He understood the
kindly spirit of it because he himself was kindly. He realized that to
these stay-at-homes the Applebys' wandering was a thing to revere, a
heroism, like prize-fighting or religion or going to war. But he didn't
psychologize about it. He believed in "the masses" because he belonged
to the masses.

As a matter of fact, Father had very little time to devote to meditation
when they hit the road again. He was busy defending himself while
Mother accused him of having lied scandalously. He protested that he had
never said that he had been to San Francisco; they had made that mistake
themselves.

"Now don't you go trying to throw dust in my eyes. I just won't have
this lying and prevaricating and goings-on. I'm just going to-- What's
the matter, Seth? You're limping. Are your feet cold?"

And that was the end of Mother's moral injunctions, for Father, with a
most unworthy cunning, featured the coldness of his feet till she had
exhausted her vocabulary of chiropodal sympathy, after which he kept her
interested in the state of his ears, his hands, and the tip of his nose.
She patted him consolingly, and they toiled on together, forgetting in
the closeness of their comradeship the strangeness of being on an
unknown road, homeless, as a chilly sunset spread bands of cold lemon
and gray across the enormous sky, and all decent folk thought of supper.

Then everything went wrong with the wandering Innocents.

* * * * *

About supper-time Father made another attempt to get himself to play the
mouth-organ, at a mean farm-house which came in sight after a lonely
stretch. Mother was sinking with weariness. He hitched the mouth-organ
out of its case, but again he shrank, and he feebly said, to a
tumble-haired farmer in overalls, "Can I split some wood for you? Mrs.
Smith and I are tramping--"

The farmer ungenerously took him at his word. For an hour he k