go up there and ask Mis' Came if she'll lend me
an' your Aunt Jane half her yeast-cake. Tell her we'll pay it back when
we get ours a Saturday. Don't you want to take Thirza Meserve with you?
She's alone as usual while Huldy's entertainin' beaux on the side porch.
Don't stay too long at the parsonage!"

III

Rebecca was used to this sort of errand, for the whole village of
Riverboro would sometimes be rocked to the very centre of its being by
simultaneous desire for a yeast-cake. As the nearest repository was a
mile and a half distant, as the yeast-cake was valued at two cents and
wouldn't keep, as the demand was uncertain, being dependent entirely on
a fluctuating desire for "riz bread," the storekeeper refused to order
more than three yeast-cakes a day at his own risk. Sometimes they
remained on his hands a dead loss; sometimes eight or ten persons would
"hitch up" and drive from distant farms for the coveted article, only to
be met with the flat, "No, I'm all out o' yeast-cake; Mis' Simmons
took the last; mebbe you can borry half o' hern, she hain't much of a
bread-eater."

So Rebecca climbed the hills to Mrs. Came's, knowing that her daily
bread depended on the successful issue of the call.

Thirza was barefooted, and tough as her little feet were, the long walk
over the stubble fields tired her. When they came within sight of the
Came barn, she coaxed Rebecca to take a short cut through the turnips
growing in long, beautifully weeded rows.

"You know Mr. Came is awfully cross, Thirza, and can't bear anybody to
tread on his crops or touch a tree or a bush that belongs to him. I'm
kind of afraid, but come along and mind you step softly in between the
rows and hold up your petticoat, so you can't possibly touch the turnip
plants. I'll do the same. Skip along fast, because then we won't leave
any deep footprints."

The children passed safely and noiselessly along, their pleasure a
trifle enhanced by the felt dangers of their progress. Rebecca knew that
they were doing no harm, but that did not prevent her hoping to escape
the gimlet eye of Mr. Came.

As they neared the outer edge of the turnip patch they paused suddenly,
petticoats in air.

A great clump of elderberry bushes hid them from the barn, but from the
other side of the clump came the sound of conversation: the timid voice
of the Little Prophet and the gruff tones of Cassius Came.

Rebecca was afraid to interrupt, and too honest to wish to overhear.