The boy's mother stood with her arms wrapped in her dirty
apron and listened, too.
[Illustration: Hearing about Jesus]
But it was the boy who sat breathless till the story was done.
Then he scrubbed a ragged sleeve across eyes and nose and spoke
in a choked, angry voice. "I wish I'd been there. I bet them
guys wouldn't-wouldn't got so fresh with--with him. But listen,
Lady!" His dark eyes were fiercely questioning. "Why ain't
nobody told us? It sure seems like we ought to been told
before."
All the way home Jimmie sat silent. As the car stopped, he got
his voice. "Miss Pink'ton, did he mean, honest, he didn't know
about God and Jesus?"
Miss Pinkerton nodded. "He--he didn't know he had a Heavenly
Father."
"And no Gramma either," Jimmie mumbled. "Gee."
8: THE HOPYARDS
Through February, March, and part of April, the Beecham family
picked peas in the Imperial Valley.
"Peas!" Rose-Ellen exploded the word on their last night in the
"jungle" camp. "I don't believe there are enough folks in the
world to cat all the peas we've picked."
"And they aren't done with when they're picked, even," added
Daddy. "Most of them will be canned; and other folks have to
shell and sort them and put them into cans and then cook them and
seal and label the cans.
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