Sharon there descended, passing the reins to a proud Wilbur, for talk with his tenant on the steps of the yellow frame farmhouse.  Sharon bent his thick round leg to raise a foot to a rustic seat, and upon the cushion thus provided made figures in a notebook.  After a time of this, while Wilbur excitingly held the roan horse, made nervous by a hive of bees against the whitewashed fence, he came back to the buggy—­which sagged from habit even when disburdened of its owner—­and they drove to another farm—­a red brick farmhouse, this time, with yellow roses climbing its front.  Here Sharon tarried longer in consultation.  Wilbur staunchly held the roan, listened to the high-keyed drone of a reaper in a neighbouring field, and watched the old man make more figures in his black notebook.  He liked this one of the Whipples pretty well.  He was less talkative than Bill Bardin, and his speech was less picturesque than Starling Tucker’s or even Trimble Cushman’s, who would often threaten to do interesting and horrible things to his big dray horses when they didn’t back properly; but Wilbur felt at ease with Sharon, even if he didn’t say much or say it in startling words.

When Sharon had done his business the farmer came to lead the roan to the barn, and Sharon, taking a pasteboard box from the back of the buggy, beckoned Wilbur to follow him.  They went round the red farmhouse, along a grassy path carelessly bordered with flowers that grew as they would, and at the back came to a little white spring house in which were many pans of milk on shelves, and a big churn.  The interior was cool and dim, and a stream of clear water trickled along a passage in the cement floor.  They sat on a bench, and Sharon opened his box to produce an astonishing number of sandwiches wrapped in tissue paper, a generous oblong of yellow cheese, and some segments of brown cake splendidly enriched with raisins.

“Pitch in!” said Sharon.

“Yes, sir,” said Wilbur, and did so with an admirable restraint, such as Winona would have applauded, nibbling politely at one of the sandwiches.

“Ain’t you got your health?” demanded the observant Sharon, capably engulfing half a sandwich.

“Yes, sir,” said Wilbur.

“Eat like it then.”

So the boy became less conscious of his manners, and ate like it, to Sharon’s apparent satisfaction.  Midway in the destruction of the sandwiches the old man drew from the churn a tin cup of what proved to be buttermilk.  His guest had not learned to like this, so for him he procured another cup, and brought it brimming with sweet milk which he had daringly taken from one of the many pans, quite as if he were at home in the place.

“Milk’s good for you,” said Sharon.

“Yes, sir,” said Wilbur.

“A regular food, as much as anything you want to name.”

“Yes, sir.”  The boy agreed wholly, without wishing to name anything in disparagement of milk.