egation shouted, "Amen." After the final hymn, he stood at
the door shaking hands.

"Brother Lincoln," he said, "I want you to meet up with a new neighbor.
This here is Mr. Swaney."

Tom shook hands. Then the preacher introduced Abe.

"Are you the new schoolmaster?" Abe asked.

"I don't figure on starting school till after harvest," Mr. Swaney
replied. "Will you be one of my scholars?"

"I'd sure like to come." Abe glanced at his father.

"I reckon not," said Tom stiffly. "Abe has had as much schooling as he
needs."

Back at the cabin, Sarah had dinner on the table. Tom cheered up as he
and Dennis started "swapping yarns." Both were good storytellers and
each tried to tell a better story than the other.

Abe did not like being left out of the conversation. "Pa," he asked,
"can you answer me a question about something in the Bible?"

"I figure I can answer any question you got sense enough to ask."

Johnny and Mathilda nudged each other. They knew what was coming. One
day when the preacher stopped by, Abe had asked him the same question.
The preacher had been downright flustered when he couldn't answer.

"It's just this, Pa," Abe went on. "Who was the father of Zebedee's
children?"

Tom flushed. "Any uppity young one can ask a question. But can he answer
it? Suppose _you_ tell _me_ who was the father of Zebedee's children?"

"I sort of figured," said Abe, "that Zebedee was."

Everyone was laughing except Tom. Then he laughed, too. Sarah was glad.
Abe had told her that Mr. Swaney was at church. She was going to talk to
her husband that very afternoon about sending the children to school,
and she wanted him to be in a good humor.

"What did the preacher have to say?" she asked.

"Well--" Tom was trying to remember. "What he said sort of got lost in
the way he was saying it. How some of those preachers do hop and skip
about!"

"I like to hear a preacher who acts like he's fighting bees," said Abe.

Sarah nodded. The description fitted the preacher "like his own
moccasin," she said.

"You menfolks wait outside," she added. "Soon as the gals and I get the
dishes done, we'll be out to hear Abe preachify."

[Illustration]

The afternoon was warm. Sarah fanned herself with her apron as she sat
down at one end of a fallen log near the door. The rest of the family
lined up beside her. Abe stood before them, his arms folded, as he
repeated the sermon he had heard that morning. Now and then he paused
and s