The three days passed slowly, but at length the Saturday night came, and he prepared to be off.  But good Mrs. Tinch entreated him to remain with them over Sunday, and, as Archie wasn’t sure that it would be quite right for him to travel on Sunday, he decided to do so.  So the next day he brushed his only suit of clothes, and drove with his late employer to church, where Farmer Tinch sat in a front seat and passed the bread and wine at communion.  Archie’s heart rose to his throat as he saw this paragon so devout in church.  He felt like rising in his seat and denouncing him before all the people as a tyrant and a hard-hearted wretch.  But he kept quiet, though he found it impossible to partake of the communion under such circumstances.

The Tinches had brought their dinner with them, and at noon they all sat on one of the grassy mounds in the churchyard, to take some refreshment before the afternoon service began.  When they had finished, Archie wandered off, and came to a crowd of boys who were romping behind the church.  When they saw him approach, they all stopped their noise, and looked at him wonderingly.  Evidently they were not used to seeing strange boys.  The silence was soon broken, however, by one of the boys calling out, “Why, fellers, thet’s the chap what’s been workin’ fer Hiram Tinch.”  This announcement was enough to make Archie an even greater object of interest than before, for the boys seemed to think that any person who could work for Farmer Tinch, and come out of the ordeal none the worse for wear, must be something wonderful.  Archie was soon on good terms with them all, however, and told them of his plan of going to New York.  The boys were all attention, and soon he was the hero of the occasion.  When the bell rung for the afternoon service he was still telling them of the things he was going to do, and none of them wanted to go into the church.  Archie persuaded them to enter, however, but he was not surprised to meet them all along the road when he left Tinch’s early Monday morning.

It was almost time to go to bed when they reached the farmhouse that night, so Archie went at once to his attic, being anxious to start fresh on his journey the next day.  He was now determined to push on as rapidly as possible, hoping to reach the city within three or four days.  He was somewhat afraid that he wouldn’t be able to do this, but he was going to try, anyhow.

At daylight Monday morning he was on the way, and when the various boys he met the day before said good-bye to him and wished him good luck, he felt that his stay at Tinch’s had not been without benefits of some sort.  He had made some boy friends, and he was four dollars richer, Archie was sensible enough, too, to realise that his experience would be a valuable one to him in the future.  He knew now what hard work was, at any rate.

The morning walk was delightful.  The September weather was perfect, and all along the road were fruit-trees laden with every sort of good thing to eat a boy could wish for.  And as the trees were on the public thoroughfare, Archie did net hesitate to help himself freely as he went along, so that he didn’t require any meal at noon.