When a man has had a bump upon his only head,
held Mr. Poynter, things are apt to slip away from him. Wherefore one
may pardon him if after repeated commands to go home, and certain
frost-bitten truths about officious young men, he somehow forgot and
reappeared in the camp of the enemy in radiant good humor.
Philip presently arrived with a generous layer of hay under his arm and
a flour bag of tomatoes.
"Hello," he called warmly. "Isn't the sunset bully! It even woke old
Ras up and he's blinking and grumbling like fury." Mr. Poynter fell to
chatting pleasantly, meanwhile removing from his clothing certain wisps
of hay.
"You're always getting into hay or getting out of it!" accused Diane.
Philip admitted with regret that this might be so and Diane stared
hopelessly at his immaculate linen. Heaven alone knew by what
ingenuity Mr. Poynter, handicapped by the peculiar limitations of a
hay-camp, contrived to manage his wardrobe. What mysterious toilet
paraphernalia lay beneath the hay, what occasional laundry chores Ras
did by brook and river, what purchases Mr. Poynter made in every
village, and finally what an endless trail of shirts and cuffs and
collars lay behind him, doomed, like the cheese and buns, as he
feelingly put it, to one-night stands, only Ras and Philip knew; but
certainly the hay-nomad combined the minimum of effort with the maximum
of efficiency to the marvel of all who beheld him.
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