Adventures in Contentment

Well, it was wonderful to see our Ruin expand in the warmth of Harriet's presence. He had been doubtful of me; of Harriet, I could see, he was absolutely sure. And how he did eat, saying nothing at all, while Harriet plied him with food and talked to me of the most disarming commonplaces. I think it did her heart good to see the way he ate: as though he had had nothing before in days. As he buttered his muffin, not without some refinement, I could see that his hand was long, a curious, lean, ineffectual hand, with a curving little finger. With the drinking of the hot coffee colour began to steal up into his face, and when Harriet brought out a quarter of pie saved over from our dinner and placed it before him--a fine brown pie with small hieroglyphics in the top from whence rose sugary bubbles--he seemed almost to escape himself. And Harriet fairly purred with hospitality. The more he ate the more of a man he became. His manners improved, his back straightened up, he acquired a not unimpressive poise of the head. Such is the miraculous power of hot muffins and pie! "As you came down," I asked finally, "did you happen to see old man Masterson's threshing machine?" "A big red one, with a yellow blow-off?" "That's the one," I said. "Well, it was just turning into a field about two miles above here," he replied. "Big gray, banked barn?" I asked.