When Mrs. March went back into the barn, she shouted aloud as soon as she saw Rob. He had crawled out of his hay bed. It was too warm: there he sat bolt upright, with his legs straight out in front of him. Nelly had drawn the white drawer legs out to their full length, and set Rob's shoes, toes up, in the hay at the end of them, so it looked as if his legs were all that length; then Mr. March's gray waistcoat came down nearly to his knees, and Billy's old brown coat hung on his shoulders as loosely as a blanket. He looked up at his mother with a perfectly grave face, and did not speak. Nelly was laughing hard. "Isn't he too funny, mamma?" said she. "You can laugh now if you want to, mamma," said Rob politely. "I don't mind your laughing at papa's drawers and waistcoat and Billy's old coat. That's quite different from laughing at me." "Thank you, dear," said Mrs. March: "you're very kind; but I can get along very comfortably without laughing at you now. You're not half so funny as you were when you were covered with the mud." It took so long to dry Rob's clothes, that it was nearly dark when they got back to Rosita. "Well, I reckoned you liked your house so well you weren't coming back to us at all," said the landlord, as they drove up. "Oh, no, sir," cried Rob, "that wasn't it. I fell into the mud by the creek: I always fall into the water each new place we go to. I did it the first thing up in the Pass." The landlord looked closely at him. "What! you been into the creek in them clothes?" "Billy washed them," said Nelly; "they were all black as mud." "Oh!" said the landlord. "Well, there ain't any thing under Heaven that Long Billy can't do: that's certain."