"Jake will have that plate pinned down before your spikes are in!" called one.
"Are you going to let the boys from across the creek get ahead of you?" protested another.
A third ran forward with both hands full of nails.
"They're catching you up!" she shouted. "Get them in! I can't have the laugh put on my man."
Husband, sweetheart and brother responded gallantly, and the pace became faster still, until at length Thorne shouted and waved his hand.
"We're through. It's time to quit," he said. "You've done 'most twice as much as I ever figured on your getting in to-night."
They had worked willingly, but it was evident that most of them were as willing to stop. Hammers, saws, and axes were flung together, and the men stood in groups, hot and gasping, in the early dusk. Thorne walked up to their leader.
"I can only say 'Thank you!' though that doesn't go far enough," he said. "What makes the thing seem more to me is that I haven't the least call on one of you."
There was a murmur of denial and then they waited until he turned to Mrs. Farquhar, though he addressed the company generally.
"Now," he invited, "I'll ask you to come in and look at my place."
He moved on ahead with Mrs. Farquhar, while the others fell in behind; but it seemed that the selection he had made did not satisfy all of them, for there was a laugh when somebody cried:
"She has got a good man already! It isn't a square deal!"
Then, and how it came about Alison was never sure, though she had a suspicion that her employer must have connived at it, Mrs. Farquhar either moved or was quietly pushed aside, and she and Thorne were left to cross the threshold together at the head of the company. This appeared to please his guests, for there was further laughter when another voice cried:
"It's the first time. Didn't they teach you manners in the old country, Mavy? What's the matter with giving her your arm?"
Alison was conscious of a certain embarrassment, but she moved on quietly and shot one swift glance at Thorne. He was looking up at the beams above him, of which she was glad, for she was wondering whether the others attached any particular significance to the fact that she was the first woman to enter his new house with him. Dismissing the question as troublesome, she glanced about her and saw the roof framing cutting black against the soft blue of the night overhead. The house, she supposed, would eventually contain four rooms, two on the ground floor and two above, and though only the principal supports had been placed in position yet, she once more wondered how the man and his companions had accomplished so much.