“These chickens are—­are different, Rufus, and—­and so am I,” I answered him with dignity.  “Call me when the gentlemen are ready to breakfast with me.”

“They talked until most daylight, and I knows ’em well enough to not cook fer ’em until after ten o’clock.  They’s gentlemen, they is.”  The tones of his voice were perfectly servile, though it was plain to see that his mental processes were not.

“All right, I’ll eat mine now, Rufus, and then I want you to get me a—­a hammer and some nails.  Also a bucket of whitewash,” I said as I closed the door upon the Birds and preceded him to the house.

“Oh, my Lawd-a-mussy!” he exclaimed as he dived into the refuge of the kitchen, completely routed, to appear with my breakfast upon his tray and with such dignity in his mien that it was pathetic.  I was merciful while I consumed the meal which was an exact repetition of the supper of the ribs of the hog and muffins and coffee; then I threw another fit into him, to quote from Matthew at his worst in the way of diction.

“Please set a bucket of the wood ashes from the living-room fire out at the barn for me, Rufus,” I commanded him with pleasant firmness.

“Yes, Madam,” was the answer I got in a tone of cold despair.  It was thus that the feud with my family traditions was established.

“Also, Rufus, please bring the saw with the hammer and the nails,” was my last hand-grenade as I departed out the back door to the barn.  From the old clock standing against the wall in the back hall I discovered the hour to be exactly seven-thirty, and I felt that I had what would seem like a week ahead of me before the setting of the sun.  However, I was wrong in my judgment, for time fairly fled from me, and it was nine o’clock by my platinum wrist-watch before I had more than got one very wobbly-looking box nailed together on the floor of the barn, and I was deep in both pride and exhaustion.

“I knew I could do it, but I didn’t believe it,” I was remarking to myself in great congratulations when a shadow fell across the light from the door.  I looked up and, behold, Mrs. Silas Beesley loomed up against the sun and seemed to shine with equal refulgence to my delighted eyes!  In her hand she held a plate covered with a snowy napkin, and her blue eyes danced with delighted astonishment.

“Well, well, Nancy!” she exclaimed, as she seated herself upon a bench by the door and began to fan herself with a corner of a snowy kerchief that crossed her ample bosom.  “Looks like you have begun sawing and nailing at the Craddock family estate pretty early in the action though it’s none too soon, and mighty glad I am to see you do it while there is still a little odd lumber left.  I’ve always said that it’s women folks that prop a family and it will soon tumble without ’em.  I am so glad you’ve come, honeybunch, that tears are laughing themselves out of the corner of my eyes.”  This time the white kerchief was dabbed over the keen blue eyes.