noon
`` I 'll take her out on the bank of the canal this evening before bedtime and we 'll have a lark , '' reflected Walker Farr as he toiled in the hot trench . And he stopped quizzing himself as to the whys of this sudden devotion to a freakish notion . He seemed to know at last . When the noon hour came Farr went and sat under a spindling tree and began to read in one of his little books , dismissing thoughts of hunger with the resoluteness of a man who had suffered hollow yearning of the stomach and knew how to conquer it . But he could not escape the keen eyes and kindly generosity of the fraternity of toilers . `` A topper down on his luck a bit -- see his clothes , '' said the foreman , and he took tithes from willing men who were eating from pails that were pinched between their knees ; he carried the food to the young man . Farr accepted with gratitude , ate with thrifty moderation , and hid what remained in the pockets of his coat ; it would serve for his supper .