nes! You can just foot it, after half drowning my sister."

"You better keep your old sister home then," replied Roger, starting for
the gate.

It was a long walk for seven-year legs. Roger was considerably less
active on the return trip than he had been plowing through the sea fog
on his way out. But his mind was hard at work.

"It would be nice to have a railroad all the way out to Prebles'. One
that just us children could use--under the road. And I'd have little
doors that would open up in the road and we'd peek out. And if we saw
any grown ups coming we'd close the door quick. I'd be the engineer and
Ernie the fireman. And we wouldn't have that old Dick at all. He's too
big and cross. The girls could ride if they'd behave and run errands for
us. Let's see. We'd have to dig it out first. Then we'd want ties and
rails and a little engine. I wonder how much it would cost. But it would
be very useful. 'Specially if we let Mr. Preble send his corn to town on
it. He wouldn't have so much trouble with his hired men if they could
ride on my engine, I bet."

This delectable dream, with infinite variations, carried Roger home.
Supper was on the table and Mr. Moore was already in his place. A thin
man, Roger's father, with a deeply lined face and good gray eyes, under
a thatch of iron gray hair. He was a master mechanic, now owner of a
little factory which turned out plowshares. Moore had devised machinery
which enabled him to turn out plowshares of a superior quality, in
greater quantity and at a cheaper rate than any of his larger
competitors in neighboring states. His was only a small concern,
employing twenty-five or thirty men, but even this made Moore the chief
manufacturer of the town of Eagle's Wing, whose only other glory was
that it housed the state university. The members of the college faculty
did not recognize many of the town people socially. But Dean Erskine,
the young new dean of the School of Engineering, had visited the plow
factory and had been so enthusiastic over Moore and his work that he had
come a number of times to the house, bringing Mrs. Erskine with him.
Factory management was a new theme in these days and Dean Erskine found
Roger's father open minded to his theories.

"Well, old son, have you been a good boy to-day?" asked Mr. Moore as
Roger slid into his place at the table.

"No, sir. I've been pretty bad. Say, Papa, how much would it cost to
build a railroad, under the ground, from our hous