CHAPTER I

BOB AND HIS TROUBLES

“Bob! I say, Bob! Where is that saw?”

“I left it in the barn, Mr. Carrow.”

“Humph! I don’t believe it. I’ve looked all over, and I can’t find it.”

“I left it on the peg where it belongs,” returned the boy, his eyes flashing at the manner in which he had been addressed.

“I don’t believe a word on it!” growled Joel Carrow. “You are always leavin’ things layin’ round loose. Go an’ git it, an’ be quick about it, or you’ll git your hide tanned well, mind that!”

Bob Alden stood for a moment irresolute, and then folded his arms and unflinchingly faced the man before him.

“If the saw isn’t where I put it, I don’t know where it is,” he said.

“What’s that?” roared the farmer. “Don’t talk back to me! Be off with you, and bring it quick.”

Still the boy did not budge. Joel Carrow gazed at him in amazement, then made a rush and seized the youth by the arm.

“See here, what’s got into you this mornin’?” he snarled. “Ain’t you a-goin’ to obey me?”

“No, I’m not,” answered Bob, coolly and firmly.

“You ain’t?” gasped Joel Carrow, scarcely believing he had heard aright.

It was the first time that Bob had stood up for himself, and the mean, miserly farmer for whom he worked could not fully comprehend the turn of affairs.

“No, I am not,” repeated the youth. “Let go of my arm.”

“Oh, I’ll let go!” snarled Joel Carrow, in a rage. “Take that!” and with his disengaged hand he aimed a blow at Bob’s head. The youth ducked, and the fist of the farmer came in sharp and painful contact with a corner of the pig-sty he was repairing. With a howl of pain he let go his hold on the boy and placed his wounded hand to his mouth, and then swung it in the air. The youth lost no time in retreating several paces.

“I’ll fix you!” cried Joel Carrow. “You’re a good-for-nothin’ lazy whelp!”

“Thank you!” returned Bob, with increased coolness. “And you are the meanest man in the State.”

“Shut up!”

“I won’t. I’ve stood your abuse long enough, and now I intend to speak my mind. I’ve worked for you nearly a year now, and in that time you have treated me worse than a dog.”

“I’ve treated you better’n yer deserve,” muttered Joel Carrow, not knowing what else to say.

“You promised to give me ten dollars a month and my board, and you have never yet paid me a full month’s wages, always deducting something for this or that I couldn’t help; and the food you gave me wasn’t fit for a pig.”

With a snarl Joel Carrow sprang toward Bob. The youth had told the plain truth, and it was evident the farmer knew it only too well.

Bob retreated, and his miserly employer followed him into the barn-yard. He had almost succeeded in catching the youth, when he tripped over a pitchfork and fell headlong into a puddle of water. His face was covered with mud, so was his blue jean shirt, and he was a sight to behold.

Bob gazed for a second in silence, and then burst into a peal of laughter.

“Hold up, till I take a snap shot of you!” sang out a voice from the fence behind the barn.

Bob looked in the direction, and beheld a young man seated on the top rail of the fence. The newcomer held a camera on his lap, and the lens was pointed toward Joel Carrow.

Before the farmer could rise from the puddle, there was a click, and the amateur photographer had taken his picture.

Bob gazed with interest at the young man. He had seen the fellow before, and knew him to be the son of a wealthy merchant of New York.

“I was going to take a picture of still life around the barn,” explained the newcomer. “But this suits me better.”

“Go on about yer business,” snarled Joel Carrow.

“What are you chasing that boy for?”

“None o’ yer business, Frank Landes. Clear out, afore I set the dogs on you!”

“I must say you are in a very amiable mood this morning, Carrow,” laughed Frank Landes, without shifting his position.

“Are yer goin’?”

“Not just yet. I saw you try to strike the boy, and I’m curious to know what it’s all about.”

“You have no right on my place.”

“That’s true, Carrow, in one way, but not in another.”

“What do you mean?” returned the farmer, uneasily.

“I came down to tell you that the last consignment of eggs you sent our firm weren’t strictly fresh, and unless you do better in the future, Mr. Dale says he will get his eggs elsewhere.”

“Them eggs were strictly fresh when they left here,” grumbled Joel Carrow.

“That’s not so,” put in Bob. “The eggs were taken from those we had stored all winter, and----”

“Shut up!” interrupted the farmer, red with rage.

“I won’t. I said it wasn’t a fair way to do when you shipped them.”

“If yer don’t keep quiet, I’ll wring yer neck!”

Joel Carrow made another dive for the youth. Bob escaped to the barn, but before he could go farther the farmer caught him by the collar, pulled him backward, and threw him down.

“I’ll fix yer!” he foamed, as he caught up a heavy stick, and hauled back ready to strike Bob on the head.

“Don’t you dare strike me, Joel Carrow!”

“Yer can’t worry me, Bob Alden. Let this be a lesson to you.”

Joel Carrow’s hand was about to descend, but the blow never reached its mark.

“Not so fast!” sang out the voice of Frank Landes, and the next instant the farmer was hurled backward, and the stick was wrenched from his grasp.

Taking advantage of the interruption, Bob Alden sprang quickly to his feet.

“I owe you one for that,” he said to Frank Landes.

“No, you don’t,” returned Landes. “If I am not mistaken, it was you saved me from that wild bull the day I was taking pictures over in Sarding’s meadow.”

Bob smiled. He remembered the incident well, in which he had played the part of a hero.

During this time Joel Carrow was muttering a number of nasty things under his breath. He now strode over to where Frank Landes stood, the stick still in his hand.

“You ain’t got no right ter interfere in this fashion,” he began, savagely.

“No?” returned Landes, with just the faintest show of a smile playing around the corners of his mouth.

“No, yer ain’t. I won’t stand it.”

“What do you propose to do about it?”

“I’ll--I’ll have yer arrested.”

At this even Bob was compelled to laugh. The laugh enraged the miserly farmer still more, and his eyes blazed furiously.

“It ain’t no laughin’ matter.”

“You have no right to hit the boy,” returned Frank Landes, sternly.

“What do you know about it?”

“If I hadn’t stepped in you would have nearly killed him.”

“He deserves it,” howled Carrow. “He’s the imp’s own.”

“What’s the row?”

“As I said afore, it’s none o’ your business.”

“He said I hadn’t put the saw where it belonged,” explained Bob. “I placed it on the peg in this barn, and just because it wasn’t there, he told me he was going to tan my hide for me.”

“And I presume you objected to the tanning process, eh?”

“I did.”

“I don’t wonder. Carrow, you are a big brute.”

“What!”

“I’ve said it, and I’ll stick to it. You are a brute and ought to go to jail.”

“Take care, Landes, I ain’t standin’ everything,” snarled the farmer.

“Is this boy anything to you?”

“I hired him ter work on the farm, but he ain’t wuth his salt.”

“He works me half to death,” put in Bob. “He makes me get up at four o’clock every morning, Sundays included, and I don’t have five minutes to myself till it’s time to knock off, generally nine or ten o’clock at night.”

“I wouldn’t stay if I were you,” replied Frank Landes.

“I don’t intend to. I’m going to leave to-day.”

It was a sudden resolution on Bob’s part, but the youth meant it.

“Leave!” ejaculated Joel Carrow, in sudden alarm.

“Yes, leave.”

“Yer month ain’t up.”

“I don’t care.”

“I won’t pay yer a cent.”

“I don’t care for that, either. I’m going, and that’s all there is to it.”

“You ought to pay the boy what is coming to him,” put in Frank Landes.

“Not a cent,” returned the farmer, decidedly.

“You had better, Carrow. If you don’t, I’ll help him take his case to the nearest justice and testify as to how you’ve been treating him.”

“You villain!”

“Softly, sir. You had no more right to hit that boy than you had to hit me. The best thing you can do is to settle up with him.”

Joel Carrow breathed hard. He wanted to say something sharp, to tear somebody to pieces, but he didn’t dare to make a move, and there was really nothing to say.

Frank Landes turned to Bob.

“How much does he owe you?” he asked.

“Five dollars on this month, and three on last.”

“Then, Carrow, pay the boy eight dollars and let him go.”

The coolness of the suggestion amazed the farmer. He stared at the young man and staggered up against a feed box.

“Pay--him--eight--dollars?” he said, with painful slowness.

“Either that, or I will take him to the nearest justice without further delay. You will find going to law much more expensive.”

Joel Carrow gave a groan. Then he brought forth a well-worn pocket-book and with trembling fingers counted out eight greasy bills.

“Now you are acting sensibly,” said Landes, as Bob took the money. “Will you go with me?” he asked, turning to the youth.

“Where to?”

“I am bound to Stampton, on a camera tour. I will pay your way if you care to go.”

“I’ll jump at the chance,” returned Bob, quickly. “I would like----”

“Joel! Joel Carrow! Where are you?” came in the shrill voice of the farmer’s wife. “Here you are leavin’ the pig-sty wide open an’ all the pigs running into the garden! Mercy sakes! one of ’em’s in the dairy! Come quick, you big fool, an’ tend to ’em, or I’ll be out there with a broom!”

Mrs. Carrow’s angry voice was coming nearer, and without stopping to parley longer with the others, Joel Carrow darted from the barn, and after the scampering pigs who were scattering in all directions.

“Now is your chance to get away,” said Frank Landes, hurriedly. “I presume you have a better suit of clothes than that.”

Bob shook his head.

“This is my best and only one.”

“And your shoes?”

“The same, and also the hat. But I have a few things up in my room,” and running up the ladder to the part of the loft called his room Bob soon reappeared with a small bundle tied up in a piece of old table oil-cloth.

“Here are all my duds,” he laughed. “Ain’t quite a trunk full, is it? Now I’m ready to----”

A wild cry from outside reached their ears, and both ran to the door-way and then out into the barn-yard.

“By Jove! that’s rich!” cried Frank Landes. “I must take another picture by all means!”

He hurried for his camera, and meanwhile Bob stood by the corn-crib laughing merrily.

Joel Carrow and his wife had cornered two of the frisky porkers and were doing their best to catch them. The pigs began to squeal, and suddenly one of them darted under Mrs. Carrow’s foot just as she raised it to step out of the way. She fell down, and Joel Carrow went with her, while both pigs flew over a log and went crashing into the glass top of a hothouse bed.

The farmer rose up and went after the pigs. He was so mad he did not notice the hot-bed frame, and before he knew what he was doing, he, too, was smashing glass at the rate of a dozen panes a second.

“Joel! you good-for-nothing man!” shrieked Mrs. Carrow. “Come out o’ thet!”

Mrs. Carrow arose, madder than a hornet. Near at hand was a broom, and, picking it up, she went after her husband.

“We had better get out before they see us,” said Bob. “I’ve got my fill of the place.”

“Come on, then.”

Frank Landes leaped the fence and Bob quickly followed. In a few minutes the two were on a country road and out of sight of the Carrow farm.

As they walked along the two became thoroughly acquainted. There was something in Bob Alden’s composition that pleased Frank Landes, and he became thoroughly interested in the youth.

“And you say you are an orphan, Bob?” he said.

“So far as I know,” returned the youth. “Old Thompson, of Windham, brought me up, and he said he never knew where I came from.”

“Where did he get you?”

“He never told me. I intended to ask him once, but before I could get the chance he was killed over to the flour mill. Then I had to shift for myself, for his relatives came in and cleared out the house and wouldn’t have nothing to do with me.”

“That was hard luck.”

“It wasn’t as hard as falling in with Joel Carrow,” answered Bob. “Gee Christopher! but he was a hard one to get along with. If I had stayed there another month I would have committed suicide.”

“Well, as I said before, I will take you to Stampton with me if you wish to go, and I’ll pay expenses on the way. But what will you do when you get there?”

“I don’t know.”

“Finding work is no easy job in a city.”

“I reckon I’ll fall on my feet. I generally do. I would like to learn to take pictures,” concluded the boy.

More talk followed, and they hurried along until it was past noon.

“About dinner-time,” said Frank Landes, consulting his watch. “Let us see if we can’t get dinner at that farm-house just beyond.”

They walked to the farm-house, and, after some talk, the farmer’s wife agreed to furnish them with a meal for twenty cents each--a price which Landes promptly paid.

“By jinks! this is what I call a spread,” cried Bob, as he surveyed the fairly well-filled table. “I never struck such a table at Carrow’s.”

“Well, fill up, Bob,” laughed Landes. “The price is the same.”

And Bob did fill up, much to the amusement of the woman who had served the meal, a fat, jolly person.

After the meal Landes lit a cigar and sat down on the stoop to enjoy it. He offered Bob one, but the youth shook his head and munched an apple instead.

The cigar finished, Frank Landes arose and stretched himself.

“Well, Bob, we might as well be on our way.”

“I’m ready whenever you are, Mr. Landes.”

Landes took up his camera and satchel, and Bob his bundle, and both started on again.