n', Andy?"

"How much you got done?" demanded Andy.

Uncle William looked at it thoughtfully. "Well, there's quite a piece.
Comin' up?" he said hopefully.

"It don't show any."

"No, it don't show much--yet. It's kind of down below.--Think we're
goin' to have a change?" The tone was full of hopeful interest.

Andy nodded. "Freeze inside of twenty-four hours."

Uncle William scanned the horizon.

"When you calculatin' to finish?" asked Andy.

"Well, I was thinkin' of finishin' to-night."

Andy's gaze sought the sun.

Uncle William took up another brick.

Andy seated himself on a rock. He had done a good day's work. His
conscience was clear; and then William worked better when Andy was
around, and Andy took pride in it. "Where'd you get your bricks?" he
asked.

Uncle William looked at the one in his hand. "I wheeled them over from
the Bodet cellar-place. The' 's quite a pile left there yet."

"They all good?"

"Putty good." Uncle William was working thoughtfully. "We've set by them
bricks a good many times, Andy."

"Yep."

"You remember the things she used to give us to eat?"

Andy swung about. "Who give us?"

"Old Mis' Bodet."

Andy's eye lighted. "So she did. I'd forgot all about 'em."

Uncle William nodded. "There was a kind of tart she used to make--"

Andy broke in. A look of genuine enthusiasm filled his eye. "I
know--that gingery, pumpkin kind--"

"That's it. And you and me and Benjy used to sit and toast our toes by
the fire and eat it--"

"He was a mean cuss," said Andy.

"Who Benjy? Why, we was al'ays fond of Benjy!" Uncle William's face
beamed over the edge of the roof. "We was fond of him, wa'n't we?"

"I wa'n't," said Andy, shortly. "He' lick a feller every chance he got."

"Yes, that's so--I guess that's so." Uncle William was slapping on the
mortar with heavy skill. "But he did it kind o' neat, didn't he?"
His eye twinkled to his work. "'Member that time you 'borrowed' his
lobster-pot--took it up when it happened to have lobsters in it, and
kep' the lobsters--not to hev 'em waste?"

Andy's face was impassive.

"Oh, you was fond of Benjy!" Uncle William spoke cheeringly. "You've
kind o' forgot, I guess. And I set a heap o' store by him. He was jest
about our age--twelve year the summer they moved away. I cried much as a
week, off and on I should think. Couldn't seem to get ust to not havin'
him around."

"Reckon he's dead by this time?" Andy spoke hopefully. A little gr