But really, it didn’t need all of this clamor to get the McBirneys out of bed. Since sunup, Thomas McBirney had been planting cotton on the red clay terraces of his mountain farm; and Mary McBirney, his wife, had been busied laying her hearth-fire, getting the breakfast and feeding the crowing, cackling, gobbling creatures in the yard. And three times she had thrust her head in at the door of the lean-to to say that if she were a boy she’d get up and see what a pretty day it was. James Stuart McBirney, otherwise Jim, thought his mother was right about almost everything, but he did differ with her about getting up when a fellow felt like a log and his eyes were as tight as ticks. He had heard her say there was a time for everything, and it seemed to him that the time to sleep was when a fellow was sleepy. Why should sensible people send him to bed when he wasn’t sleepy and make him get up when he was? Besides, something kept nagging away in the back of his mind. It was something that he ought to remember, and couldn’t quite, on account of being so sleepy. Or perhaps he didn’t want to remember it. At any rate, it wouldn’t let him rest in comfort, but pecked away like a woodpecker at a tree. So, in spite of himself, it all came back to him. Ma was out of “fat pine” for kindling, and he must go hunting it. Well, if he must— “It don’t seem as you ought to be so long getting into such a few clothes, Jimmy,” a soft voice called. “You’ll be falling into lazy habits if you don’t set a watch on yourself, and you’ll never get shet of them, long as you live.” “Yessum,” said Jim. “I can see your pa a-coming ’cross the fields now, and I reckon if you don’t do some hustling he’ll catch you dawdling.” “Yessum.” “And, Jimmy!” “Yessum?” “I’ve been hearing that Aunt Nan Leiter’s got a making of that blue dye like I’ve been wanting. I reckon after you’ve got the wood you’d better walk over yon and get the bucket of it she promised to give me.” “Yessum.” “And, Jimmy, here’s your pa.” “Yessum.” “Ain’t you washed yet, son? Shame on you!” There was a wild splashing of water on the back porch where the wash basin stood, a gasping and panting, and then, with one last “Yessum,” James Stuart McBirney stood in the door. His turned-up nose, his freckles and his blue eyes all shone as if he had polished them, and his curling, clay-colored hair had drawn itself up in tight ringlets about his head. He had been hoping that no one would pay any attention to him, and he had his wish. Ma was setting breakfast on the table, steaming hot from the hearth. Pa was standing outside the door shading his eyes with one hand. “What all are you peering at that a-way, Pa McBirney?” asked his wife. “Is it some one coming over the gap? I heard tell that Sam Bixby and his brothers was about to bring over a string of horses from their place for trading day at Lee. As like as not it’s them you’re seeing.”