grew very red in the face, hung back from them, and
caught hold of the Deacon's arm.

"Go slow with him, girls," whispered the Deacon to his daughters, after
they were seated at the table. "He's a mighty good boy, but he ain't
used to girls."

"He's rather good looking, if he does act sheepish," returned Mandy.

"Well, he ain't a mite sheepish when there's serious business on hand,"
returned the father. "And next to ourselves, he's the best friend your
brother has."

It had been many years since the wandering, rough-living Shorty had sat
down to such an inviting, well-ordered table. Probably he never had.
No people in the whole world live better than the prosperous Indiana
farmers, and Mrs. Klegg was known far and wide for her housewifely
talents. The snowy table linen, the spotless dishes, the
tastefully-prepared food would have done credit to a royal banquet.
Hungry as he was, the abashed Shorty fidgeted in his chair, and watched
Si begin before he ventured to make an attack. The mother and girls were
too busy plying Si with questions and anticipating his wants to notice
Shorty's embarrassment.

Si was making a heroic effort to eat everything in sight, to properly
appreciate all the toothsome things that loving hands were pressing upon
him, and to answer the myriad of questions that were showered upon him,
and to get in a few questions of his own at the same time. He just found
time to ask Shorty:

"Say, this is great this 's like livin', ain't it?"

And Shorty replied with deep feeling: "Just out o' sight. How in the
world'd you ever come to enlist and leave all this?"

The neighbors began gathering in fathers, mothers and sisters of members
of Co. Q, all full of eager questions as to their kindred, and this
relieved Shorty, for he could tell them quite as well as Si.

The supper ended, the problem of the money in the gun again loomed up.
Everyone had an opinion as to how to extricate the valuable charge.
The women, of course, suggested hair-pins, but these were tried without
success. A gimlet taken from its handle and secured to the ramrod,
refused to take hold.

Somebody suggested shooting the gun across a pond of water, and getting
the money that way, but it was decided that the force of the Springfield
seemed too great for any body of water in the neighborhood. Then Jabe
Clemmons, the "speculative" genius of the neighborhood, spoke up:

"Gentlemen, I've an idee. Deacon, how much is in that small hay