it seemed like
getting home when I got off the train and saw your squaw vines
running over the porch like they used to."

"Ya? You remember dat?" she wiped her eyes. "I got a pot-pie
today, and green peas, chust a few, out of my own garden."

"Bring them along, please. We don't get anything but canned stuff
in camp."

Some railroad men came in for lunch. Mrs. Voigt beckoned Claude
off to the end of the counter, where, after she had served her
customers, she sat down and talked to him, in whispers.

"My, you look good in dem clothes," she said patting his sleeve.
"I can remember some wars, too; when we got back dem provinces
what Napoleon took away from us, Alsace and Lorraine. Dem boys is
passed de word to come and put tar on me some night, and I am
skeered to go in my bet. I chust wrap in a quilt and sit in my
old chair."

"Don't pay any attention to them. You don't have trouble with the
business people here, do you?"

"No-o, not troubles, exactly." She hesitated, then leaned
impulsively across the counter and spoke in his ear. "But it
ain't all so bad in de Old Country like what dey say. De poor
people ain't slaves, and dey ain't ground down like what dey say
here. Always de forester let de poor folks come into de wood and
carry off de limbs dat fall, and de dead trees. Und if de rich
farmer have maybe a liddle more manure dan he need, he let de
poor man come and take some for his land. De poor folks don't git
such wages like here, but dey lives chust as comfortable. Und dem
wooden shoes, what dey makes such fun of, is cleaner dan what
leather is, to go round in de mud and manure. Dey don't git so
wet and dey don't stink so."

Claude could see that her heart was bursting with homesickness,
full of tender memories of the far-away time and land of her
youth. She had never talked to him of these things before, but
now she poured out a flood of confidences about the big dairy
farm on which she had worked as a girl; how she took care of nine
cows, and how the cows, though small, were very strong,--drew a
plough all day and yet gave as much milk at night as if they had
been browsing in a pasture! The country people never had to spend
money for doctors, but cured all diseases with roots and herbs,
and when the old folks had the rheumatism they took "one of dem
liddle jenny-pigs" to bed with them, and the guinea-pig drew out
all the pain.

Claude would have liked to listen longer, but he wanted to find
the old