Instantly Sam was at the door.

"Well, if that don't beat anything I ever saw!" he exclaimed. Then
"like mother, like son," he, too, sat down on the doorsill and
laughed as only youth and health and joy can laugh, for, heading
straight for the door was the fat young Shorthorn, saddled with an
enormous feather-bed, and plodding at her heels was old Billy Norris,
grinning sheepishly.

It took just three seconds for the hands of father and son to meet.
"How's my gal an' my grandson?" asked the old farmer, excitedly.

"Bully, just bully, both of them!" smiled Sam, proudly. Then more
seriously, "Ah, dad, you old tornado, you! Here you fired thunder
at us for a whole year, pretty near broke my mother's heart, and
made my boy's little mother old before she ought to be. But you've
quit storming now, dad. I know it from the look of you."

"Quit forever, Sam," replied old Billy, "fer these mother-wimmen
don't never thrive where there's rough weather, somehow. They're
all fer peace. They're worse than King Edward an' Teddy Roosevelt
fer patchin' up rows, an' if they can't do it no other way, they
jes' hike along with a baby, sort o' treaty of peace like. Yes, I
guess I thundered some; but, Sam, boy, there ain't a deal of harm
in thunder--but _lightnin'_, now that's the worst, but I once heard
a feller say that feathers was non-conductive." Then with a sly
smile, "An' Sam, you'd better hustle an' git the gal an' the baby
on ter this here feather-bed, or they may be in danger of gittin'
struck, fer there's no tellin' but I may jes' start an' storm