So Freckles dreamed his dreams, made his plans, and watched his line.  He counted not only the days, but the hours of each day.  As he told them off, every one bringing her closer, he grew happier in the prospect of her coming.  He managed daily to leave some offering at the big elm log for his black chickens.  He slipped under the line at every passing, and went to make sure that nothing was molesting them.  Though it was a long trip, he paid them several extra visits a day for fear a snake, hawk, or fox might have found the baby.  For now his chickens not only represented all his former interest in them, but they furnished the inducement that was bringing his Angel.

Possibly he could find other subjects that the Bird Woman wanted.  The teamster had said that his brother went after her every time he found a nest.  He never had counted the nests that he knew of, and it might be that among all the birds of the swamp some would be rare to her.

The feathered folk of the Limberlost were practically undisturbed save by their natural enemies.  It was very probable that among his chickens others as odd as the big black ones could be found.  If she wanted pictures of half-grown birds, he could pick up fifty in one morning’s trip around the line, for he had fed, handled, and made friends with them ever since their eyes opened.

He had gathered bugs and worms all spring as he noticed them on the grass and bushes, and dropped them into the first little open mouth he had found.  The babies gladly had accepted this queer tri-parent addition to their natural providers.

When the week had passed, Freckles had his room crisp and glowing with fresh living things that represented every color of the swamp.  He carried bark and filled all the muckiest places of the trail.

It was middle July.  The heat of the past few days had dried the water around and through the Limberlost, so that it was possible to cross it on foot in almost any direction—­if one had an idea of direction and did not become completely lost in its rank tangle of vegetation and bushes.  The brighter-hued flowers were opening.  The trumpet-creepers were flaunting their gorgeous horns of red and gold sweetness from the tops of lordly oak and elm, and below entire pools were pink-sheeted in mallow bloom.

The heat was doing one other thing that was bound to make Freckles, as a good Irishman, shiver.  As the swale dried, its inhabitants were seeking the cooler depths of the swamp.  They liked neither the heat nor leaving the field mice, moles, and young rabbits of their chosen location.  He saw them crossing the trail every day as the heat grew intense.  The rattlers were sadly forgetting their manners, for they struck on no provocation whatever, and did not even remember to rattle afterward.  Daily Freckles was compelled to drive big black snakes and blue racers from the nests of his chickens.  Often the terrified squalls of the parent birds would reach him far down the line and he would run to rescue the babies.