Page:On Our Selection.djvu/160

146 Mother said it was.

"Quite a bush house."

"Oh, yes," Mother said—"we're right in the bush here."

He began to eat and, as he ate, talked cheerfully of selections and crops and old times and bad times and wire fences and dead cattle. Casey was a versatile ancient.

"When he was finished he shifted to the sofa and asked Mother how many children she had. Mother considered and said, "Twelve." He thought a dozen enough for anyone, and said that his mother, when he left home, had twenty-one—all girls but him. That was forty years ago, and he did n't know how many she had since. Mother and Sal smiled. They began to like old Casey.

Casey took up his hat and went outside, and did n't say "Good-day" or "Thanks" or anything. He did n't go away, either. He looked about the yard. A panel in the fence was broken. It had been broken for five years. Casey seemed to know it. He started mending that panel. He was mending it all the evening.

Mother called to Joe to bring in some wood. Casey left the fence, hurried to the wood-heap, carried in an armful, and asked Mother if she wanted more. Then he returned to the fence.

"J-oe," Mother screeched a little later, "look at those cows tryin' to eat the corn."