unvarying reply was that there was no work. A few said
there would be plowing after the first rains. Here and there, in a small
way, dry plowing was going on. But in the main the farmers were waiting.

"But do you know how to plow?" Saxon asked Billy.

"No; but I guess it ain't much of a trick to turn. Besides, next man I
see plowing I'm goin' to get a lesson from."

In the mid-afternoon of the second day his opportunity came. He climbed
on top of the fence of a small field and watched an old man plow round
and round it.

"Aw, shucks, just as easy as easy," Billy commented scornfully. "If an
old codger like that can handle one plow, I can handle two."

"Go on and try it," Saxon urged.

"What's the good?"

"Cold feet," she jeered, but with a smiling face. "All you have to do
is ask him. All he can do is say no. And what if he does? You faced the
Chicago Terror twenty rounds without flinching."

"Aw, but it's different," he demurred, then dropped to the ground inside
the fence. "Two to one the old geezer turns me down."

"No, he won't. Just tell him you want to learn, and ask him if he'll let
you drive around a few times. Tell him it won't cost him anything."

"Huh! If he gets chesty I'll take his blamed plow away from him."

From the top of the fence, but too far away to hear, Saxon watched the
colloquy. After several minutes, the lines were transferred to Billy's
neck, the handles to his hands. Then the team started, and the old man,
delivering a rapid fire of instructions, walked alongside of Billy. When
a few turns had been made, the farmer crossed the plowed strip to Saxon,
and joined her on the rail.

"He's plowed before, a little mite, ain't he?"

Saxon shook her head.

"Never in his life. But he knows how to drive horses."

"He showed he wasn't all greenhorn, an' he learns pretty quick." Here
the farmer chuckled and cut himself a chew from a plug of tobacco. "I
reckon he won't tire me out a-settin' here."

The unplowed area grew smaller and smaller, but Billy evinced no
intention of quitting, and his audience on the fence was deep in
conversation. Saxon's questions flew fast and furious, and she was not
long in concluding that the old man bore a striking resemblance to the
description the lineman had given of his father.

Billy persisted till the field was finished, and the old man invited him
and Saxon to stop for the night. There was a disused outbuilding where
they would find a small cook st