Stretching his arms upward with a comfortable yawn, he rose and sauntered toward the door. 

 "Now you're not to pull out of here, Willie Spence," Celestina objected in a peremptory tone, "until you've had your breakfast. You had none yesterday, remember, thanks to that pump; an' you had no dinner either, thanks to Zenas Henry's pump. You're goin' to start this day right. You're to have three square meals if I have to tag you all over Wilton with 'em. I don't know what it is you've got on your mind this time, but the world's worried along without it up to now, an' I guess it can manage a little longer." 

 Willie regarded his mentor good-humoredly. 

 "I figger it can, Celestina," he returned.  "In fact, I reckon it will have to content itself fur quite a spell without the notion I've run a-foul of now." 

 Celestina offered no interrogation; instead she said, "Well, don't let it harrow you up; that's all I ask. If it's goin' to be a long-drawn-out piece of tinkerin', why there's all the more reason you should eat your three good meals like other Christians. Next you know you'll be gettin' run down, an' I'll be havin' to brew some dandelion bitters for you."  She came to an abrupt stop half-way between the oven and the kitchen table, a bowl and spoon poised in her hand.  "I ain't sure but it's time to brew you somethin' anyway," she announced.  "You ain't had a tonic fur quite a spell an' mebbe 'twould do you good." 

 A helpless protest trembled on Willie's lips. 

 "I—I—don't think I need any bitters, Celestina," he at last observed mildly. 

 "You don't know whether you do or not," Celestina replied with as near an approach to sharpness as she was capable of.  "However, there's no call to discuss that now. The chief thing this minute is for you to sit up to the table an' eat your victuals." 

 Docilely the man obeyed. He was hungry it proved, very hungry indeed. With satisfaction Celestina watched every spoonful of food he put to his lips, inwardly gloating as one muffin after another disappeared; and when at last he could eat no more and took his blackened cob pipe from his pocket, she drew a sigh of satisfaction. 

 "There now, if you want to go back to your inventin' you can," she remarked, as she began to clear away the dishes.  "You've took aboard enough rations to do you quite a while." 

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