n the
tragedy happened. Larkin's horse got a pebble in its foot, and went dead
lame. Howie shot ahead and caught the lady of the house just as she was
reluctantly sallying forth to find one of his trade and leave her order.

"An' she's got a baby--patent foods and biscuits," said Larkin in a
choked voice, "and I saw quite four boys,--oatmeal, tins of jam, bacon,
butter,--I wouldn't have lost her for anything. An' only for giving you
kids a ride this morning I'd have heard sooner, an' got the start of
Howie."

The children felt quite crushed to think they were the cause of Larkin's
great loss. For a loss it was indeed; both boys received commissions on
the accounts of the new customers they obtained, and a lady with a baby
and four hungry boys, not to mention a maid or two, and possible
visitors, was not to be picked up every day.

Then Pauline had a brilliant thought.

"We know of another new one," she cried. "'Tenby' is taken; a man's
coming up by to-night's train. Howie doesn't know, no one knows but
ourselves,--that will make up to you, Larkin. Men eat more than babies."

Larkin was greatly excited. He made rapid plans: he would slip his cards
under the door to-night; he would present himself at the house the
moment it was unlocked in the morning. He would take butter, eggs,
sugar, with him, so that breakfast at least would be comfortable, and
the wife or housekeeper, or maiden sister, whichever the "man" brought
with him, would bless his thoughtfulness, and promptly promise her
custom.

Then his jaw dropped with a sudden recollection.

To-morrow was his holiday--the only whole week-day holiday he received
in six months. He had arranged to go home, as he always did, catching
the 11 o'clock train that night, and travelling through the midnight to
the highest point of the mountains, and into the early dawn down, down
the Great Zigzag on the other side, till he came out on the plain to a
little siding, where he scrambled out with his bundle, and shouldered it
briskly, and trudged along eight miles, perhaps, to a wretched selection
where his father, for his mother and six or seven children younger than
Larkin, fought the losing fight of the Man on the Land. A few hours
here, slipping his wages into his mother's reluctant hand, escorted by
his father round the place to see the latest devices for trapping
rabbits and other pests, telling his brothers stirring tales of the
struggles between himself and Howie, then t