Explore "The Riddle of Three-Way Creek" by Ridgwell Cullum on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Jane and Blue Pete were doing their best. Their massive bodies were a sumptuous feeding-ground for the swarming mosquitoes, which transformed their cheerful roan coats into something drab and dismal. The air was hot and heavy in the depths of the slough, but the grass was luxuriant, and the hay cut was heavy.
Perched on the iron saddle of the mower, Lightning had no complaint to make against the conditions of his work, or the result of his labours. The heat, and the flies, and the mosquitoes, left the man unheeding. The toughened pores of his skin refused to exude a perspiration that could cause him discomfort. As for the flies, they made no more impression on him than if he had been a brass image. Even the blood-lust of the mosquitoes was little enough likely to obtain satisfaction from his hardening veins. But his temper was more than usually uncertain, and it found expression in a wealth of invective which he hurled at the heads of his devoted team. He sat there like some ragged, bewhiskered vulture, lean, aggressive, alternately cursing and coaxing. Lightning was worried. He was irritated. He was desperately unhappy.