It is a well-known fact that many a poor wretch has gone up to the
very gate of Paradise, only to bound back again, as if either he
himself or that bar to bliss were made of India rubber. Nothing could
be more tantalizing or discouraging to the spirit, unless, indeed, it
were the experience of many a despairing and hoping convalescent who
is bandied about by the hand of fate with a shuttlecock movement
betwixt sickness and health.
Many of us feel good for an hour at a time, several hours
occasionally, but to be good overnight--to waken in the morning with
one's resolutions and aspirations as crisp and fresh as they were the
evening before--is proof positive of regeneration.
Once in a while it occurs to the rebellious that things might have
been made a trifle easier. For instance, if only one had to walk
miles to meet the tempter, or if only he had the decency and dignity
to demand that we meet him half way, instead of coming all the way
himself and invading the privacy of our very homes. If only he would
wear his horns and tail all the time, that we might know him on sight
and realize what we are about when we go under, instead of slinking in
clothed as an angel of light. Not that the Andersonvilles, as Nannie
called the mother and son Anderson, looked like angels of light. On
the contrary, they were as ugly as the evil one, but they were without
horns or tails, and so not easily recognizable as that particular and
very reprehensible person. And Nannie was lured by them to let loose
her spirit of mischief.
We have mentioned neighbors once or twice before. Now, the biblical
definition of neighbor covers a wide field, and all experience will
bear me out in an assertion, that apart from numbers the word stands
for all sizes, shapes, and varieties of human being. Nowadays most of
us whisper the term crazy, realizing that we ourselves are liable to
be caught up and incarcerated under that head. Nevertheless within
ourselves we know that some of those about us--and we could point them
out if we were asked--are trying to pass off cracked brains for sound
ones.
Before Steve and Nannie had been domiciled more than a fortnight in
their new abode, where they had fancied that their living was to be of
the best, a fly appeared in the ointment, a fly which directly proved
to be out of its mind--in other words, they discovered that they had
crazy neighbors. Let no one understand me to signify by this the kind
of crazy person who seizes you by the hair and brandishes his fist in
your face, declaring that your hour has come. That is one variety, to
be sure, an unpleasant variety, too; but there are others. If it came
to a matter of weeding out all those whose brains were slightly out of
gear, most of us could appear in court with a batch of crazy
neighbors, thereby depriving a city of some of its principal men and
society of some of its chief ornaments.
No one would like to do this, but when the crack in a neighbor's
brains widens so as to seriously upset his notions of other people's
rights, then he is bound to become not dangerous necessarily, but
certainly troublesome, and some step must be taken in self-defense.
As Steve learned too late, he stood upon contested ground. The former
owner being now in the insane asylum, and having, before she became
unbalanced, deeded the property to her husband (who had subsequently
sold it to Steve), she was temporarily out of the way, but it seemed
that by some oversight she had left outside a mother and a brother,
whom she should have taken in with her.
These relatives, as far as Steve was able to learn, never claimed that
the transfer of property to the husband was invalid because the owner
was at that time insane. Their claim was that she had not gone insane
at all, and that she had, in a manner, been forced into deeding her
property away, and consequently the transaction was null and void and
she still owned it. A written document to this effect was posted on
one of the largest trees near the house soon after the newly wedded
pair moved out there, but Steve found upon investigation that this was
but one of many threads forming a cobweb of prodigious size within the
brains of these peculiar folk whose relative had outrun them to the
asylum. Consequently he was disposed to dismiss the whole matter from
his mind. Not so the crazy neighbors, for they continued to post the
contested place with notices, and Nannie became habituated to plucking
several of these legal _billets-doux_ from the trees every morning
before breakfast.
All this was great sport for Nannie, but the trouble soon took a more
serious turn. The outcome of this latter was an anonymous notification
to Steve that if he failed to take down an obstruction which he had
put across one of the roads on his place to prevent its being used as
a public thoroughfare, he would be mobbed by a crowd of men and boys.
"This is a most extraordinary condition of affairs," said Steve one
day in talking the matter over with Randolph Chance, "to be racing
around with dogs and cutlasses when you're supposed to be cooling your
brow under your vine and fig-tree."
As if to add insult to injury, the Andersons, mother and son, made a
passageway of the place they claimed (in the name of their daughter
and sister) and persisted in using this, in spite of remonstrance and
even warning.
Now, for some time past Nannie had, by means best known to women, been
contriving to fire Steve's usually placid temper, and the morning
after her visit to Constance's an opportunity presented itself for the
fanning of the flames she had kindled. On opening her door just after
breakfast she saw mother Anderson and her son William land at the
little private pier Steve had built, and then walk with a bold and
rugged step up toward the house _en route_ to the station, some half
mile to the rear.
Now was Nannie's chance!
Such fun to see Steve fight!
"Steve!" she screamed, running into the house, "here are those
dreadful people again! They frighten me to death! I shall never dare
to stay here alone if you don't make an end of their coming!"
Frightened! Ah, Nannie! with that bright color and those dancing eyes!
Steve ran out, his mind aflame at last as he thought of poor little
Nannie's terrors and the offensive note he had received.
"See here, Anderson," he began, "you have been asked to keep away from
this place. It has----"
But just here William, who had no regard for social amenities, cut his
remarks short by a resounding slap in the face.
Steve had never fought in his life. He was rather ashamed of this (had
never confessed it), and the time seemed ripe now to break his peace
record. Drawing back, to give himself a greater spring, he landed a
heavy blow somewhere in mid-air. Said locality surviving the attack,
he withdrew to prepare a fresh onslaught.
Meanwhile he began to notice that he was being smartly thumped by the
enemy, and he aimed a supreme effort in that direction.
His blow was not the "immortal passado" mentioned by Mercutio, but
rather the "punto reverso," for it landed him in the dust, while the
enemy remained on high.
Just at this juncture mother Anderson put in her oar, literally as
well as figuratively, for happening to have that instrument of
navigation in her hand, she proceeded to belabor the prostrate Steve.
"Stop that!" screamed Nannie. "Oh, you bad, fiendish woman! Sick her,
Brownie!"
And away went Brownie and attached himself firmly to Madam Anderson's
train, and beginning a swift rotary movement, so bewildered the old
lady that she lost both oar and enemy, and looked more like a
pirouette dancer than a decorous upholder of the cause of individual
freedom and public highways.
By this time Steve had regained his perpendicular, and tingling with
mortification, started in and really did some inspired work. Taking
the foe by the collar, he shook him as a cat would shake a rat.
"You little puppy! Get out of here!" he roared in a most unnatural
voice.
Then with the oar (which mother Anderson had abandoned when she took
to dancing) in one hand and the dangling enemy in the other, he
proceeded down the slope, out upon the little pier, and after sousing
the refractory William in the lake, dropped him into his boat.
"Now you follow him, and be off--both of you!" he said sternly to
madam, who stood upon the pier, squawking like an old hen on the eve
of decapitation.
She lost no time in obeying him, albeit she continued to work nature's
bellows with great vigor as Steve threw in the oar he held and gave
the boat an energetic thrust.
"Steve, you're a trump!" cried Nannie.
Steve looked at her aghast.
Was this the timid little creature he had been protecting? Evidently
he was as much at sea on the feminine question as before marriage.
He walked slowly up to the house and managed to recover his breath
before he was called for the next scene in this rural drama. Truth to
tell he was disgusted, not because of the disgrace of a quarrel,
but--alas for mankind in even his gentlest aspect!--because he had
failed to get a crack at the enemy.
That evening near dinner-time the plot was thickened by the arrival of
the sheriff, who bore a warrant for the entire Loveland family--dog
included.
"If it hedn't been a new jestice she cudn't hev got it out," he said
apologetically. "She's arrested everybody in sight agin and agin,
includin' her own fam'ly. You hev yer meal now an' then come 'roun'
over ter the jestice's office."
Accordingly, after dinner Steve and Nannie walked over to the village,
and after diligent search found the justice, who informed them that he
"did hev a place fer ther trial, but they tuk it from him fer a show
an' he was a-huntin' fer another."
This other being finally discovered, the criminals--Steve, Nannie and
Brownie--were brought in, and William Anderson, being duly sworn, was
perched up in an aged arm-chair and encouraged to unfold his tale of
woe to a crowded house, for the room was full, and even the doors and
windows were blocked by the heads of on-lookers.
"It was about eight o'clock in the morning," William began in a high,
cracked voice--possibly his neck was still dislocated. "My mother and
myself were on our way to meet some friends whom we expected on the
next train. Landing at the pier, we proceeded up toward the cottage
now fraudulently occupied by these people." (Here he pointed
impressively at the wicked ones, whereupon Brownie, who resented
this, barked fiercely and was promptly smothered by the Court.)
"Rounding a corner we encountered this man" (another indication with
that powerful index finger), "who immediately fell upon me with great
fe-roc-i-ty. First he struck me mightily here--then he gave me a
terrific blow here--then one of unparalleled strength here."
By this time Steve was bridling up and looking like a conquering hero.
He really had hit the man! It was the first time he or any one else
had known it.
"He then struck me----" William continued, but the Court interrupted
him.
"Here, here. You've already had enough to kill ten men."
"That's what I was about to say, your honor, and I will not harrow
your honor's feelings by telling more of his awful assault. Seeing
that I was suffering in this manner, my mother approached with an oar,
when she--her" (indicating Nannie by pointing fixedly and by a stony
glare) "rushed upon her fiercely and caused her dog also to charge
upon her, which he did so savagely as to decompose her raiment. In
some way the oar flew out of her hand, and she was most
disrespectfully whirled around and around, so that she is yet
dizzy-headed."
Here madam put her hand to her brow in confirmation.
"I was then taken by the scruff of the neck down to the pier, and
whether I fell in the lake or not I cannot say, but I was wet!"
Here the on-lookers shouted with laughter.
"My mother was then disrespectfully helped in and we were sent
adrift."
He ended in a high-toned, pitiful whine suggestive of a dog's song on
a moonlight night, but this plaint was drowned in the roars of
laughter raised by the audience.
Madam Anderson confirmed and embellished this tale, but Steve's and
Nannie's narrative, giving the circumstances of the case, their
purchase of the place, the annoyances to which these people had
subjected them, the warning that had been sounded to keep them at
arm's length, and the continued disregard of all this, sufficed, in
the opinion of the Court, to acquit them and fix the burden of the
expenses entailed by the suit upon the Anderson shoulders.
One would have supposed that this episode would have satisfied Nannie
for awhile, but she was tireless, and must needs start out to sit hens
soon after the Andersons were laid low. Now, of all unreasoning,
stupid, obstinate, contrary beasts, a sitting hen is well qualified to
carry off the first prize. Nannie had been told that when a hen began
to puff up her feathers until she was swollen to about three times her
natural size, and make a noise that sounded as if she had tried to say
something and the word caught on a hook in her throat, she was ready
to sit. Having three feathered animals in this condition, and having
coaxed Steve into buying some Plymouth Rock eggs at the trivial sum of
three dollars a sitting, Nannie proceeded to capture the hens and put
them upon nests of her own placing, wholly ignorant of the fact that
if there is one thing above all others in which a hen must have her
say, it was in the choice of residence during this vexatious period.
From the moment that Nannie put the hens upon the eggs she led a life
of unexampled activity. No sooner would she turn her back than the
various madams would rise, and with distended feathers and gurgling
clucks dismount from the nests and begin to stalk around the yard, in
defiance of directions to the contrary. The number of times that Steve
was pushed under one side of the house in pursuit of the
escaped--lunatic, I had almost said, and told to remain there while
Nannie ran around and crawled under the other side to head her off,
would pass belief. As a matter of course she was never caught by this
double-barreled attack, but always stalked out from some unexpected
crevice and promenaded the yard as if she owned the premises. The next
move on Steve's and Nannie's part would be to drive her nestward. The
result of this was always to land her in some place precisely
opposite; for the moment she was headed properly she would tilt her
wings and break into a fat, wheezy little run in the direction just
contrary to the one indicated by common sense and lawful authority.
One day, after an hour of this sport, Nannie lost patience, and
picking up stones, pelted the feathered truant until she fled out of
sight--in the wrong direction.
"Let her eggs cool!" she exclaimed with a burst of passionate tears.
"I don't care if they get as cold as an iceberg! I wish they'd freeze
her stiff the next time she sits on them!"
Steve began a mild protest, but Nannie turned to walk into the house,
when she caught sight of Madam Hen No. 2 off her nest and stalking
around with the same offensive strut as that of No. 1.
This was too much for her own nervous system, and she rushed upon the
offending hen, and kept up this pace with such vigor that at the end
of ten minutes she had run her down, taken her literally in hand,
borne her squawking into the barn, jammed her down on the nest, and
roofed it with boards, which she nailed on with rocks. This done, she
returned to the house in a state of savage quiet (if I may be allowed
a contradictory term), feeling herself fiercely secure of at least one
sitting.
She was not, however, for madam spared no effort till she burst her
bonds, brought the rocks down upon the heads of herself and her
prospective family, and they all died the death together.
"There's some satisfaction in that," said Nannie. "The stupid, nasty,
mean old thing went with the eggs!"
The third sitting materialized, and a lovelier brood of chicks was
never seen. Steve was surprised and even touched as he stood watching
Nannie in her delight. There was something really womanly in the way
in which the girl coddled the pretty creatures, holding them close to
her face and calling them all the sweet, tender little names in which
a woman's heart goes out to the infantile and the helpless.
Looking and thinking, several things came into Steve's mind, and one
evening he essayed to bring about a better understanding betwixt his
erratic little wife and himself. But alas! though possessed of an
unusually tender heart and of unusually fine intuitions, yet
occasionally Steve was a man, pure and simple, and this was one of the
occasions. Just as Nannie was sitting down to dinner he said:
"Nannie, I've been wondering what is it that makes you act so?"
"I don't act!" stormed Nannie, who was ablaze in a minute. "It's you
who act! You treat me as if I were a two-year-old child!" Then, in a
gust of changed emotion, she took a step nearer to him and cried out:
"I don't want to be bad, but"--she turned now toward the door, and as
she went out looked backward over her shoulder and added impishly--"I
am, and I'm 'fraid I'm going to be."
And off she went--off to the barn, and the next moment there was a
lonely, yearning child-wife sobbing her heart out on Sarah Maria's
neck.
Evidently there was a bond between these two, for Nannie was neither
hooked nor kicked, and when Sarah Maria behaved peacefully at both
ends it was manifest that her heart was touched.
X
Steve returned from town the evening following Nannie's outburst with
a mind heavy laden. That had been his mental condition, indeed, much
of the time since he turned farmer, and I may add that his thoughts
occasionally ran in a sarcastic vein--a course ordinarily foreign to
him. Shortly before that crucial point in his career, his marriage to
Nannie, Randolph Chance had loaned him a beautiful idyl, termed
"Liberty and a Living." Randolph himself had read this as a thirsty
man reads of cool, rock-paved brooks; Steve read it as a poet, a
dreamer, but it would no doubt have had a marked effect upon his
character had he not closely followed it up with Charles Dudley
Warner's "Summer in a Garden," much as one would chase a poison with
its antidote, only in this case the order was reversed, the latter
resembling the poison, since it awoke in his mind gloomy forebodings
and inspired satirical reflections upon the universal mother.
Tuned to this key, he was no doubt ill-prepared, while turning the
clod, to receive into his soul the sweet influences of rural life, and
by reason of their elevating beauty, to be fortified against those
drawbacks and trials with which all paths abound.
Truth to tell, Steve was discouraged. He had begun to realize that he
had on his hands not only a small farm, for the tillage of which he
was ill-contrived, but a large child as well, whose rearing and
developing---- Just here he came to a sudden halt in his thought, and
an odd word leaped in:
"Cooking!"
Then the name of that newspaper clipping of which Randolph once told
him--
"How to Cook Wives."
"Well, how in thunder?" he asked himself, and walked homeward from the
station.
Ere he arrived he saw Nannie at the door. She was screaming something
which, on his approach, he found to be--
"Sarah Maria is lost!"
Had Steve said "thank Heaven!" he would merely have been speaking out
of the fullness of his heart. Instead of that, he wheeled like an
automaton and retraced his steps. He knew where to look for her.
There she was, as usual, down near the track, and as Steve approached
she stepped squarely on, and with a set gaze awaited the speedy coming
of the city-bound train. Of course she knew it would kill her, but
like Samson of old she would have the satisfaction of taking a few
acquaintances with her.
Steve dragged her off and managed to get her home, and thus for the
present prevented the sin of self-destruction.
That very evening, after Nannie, like the cow, was corralled (and we
may use this term without reproach, since she had been rampant all
day), a small figure slipped from out the house and hastened to the
garden. His little face, frowsy as is the manner of his breed, was
uplifted, and his saucy little eyes gleamed with fire. He had probably
observed that the peas were flourishing and that they were the one
living result of Steve's heroic labors, unless perhaps we except the
corn, which was still several miles distant from fruitage. No doubt
all this was clear to Brownie, and that was why he took such fiendish
delight in his work of demolition. The naughty little eyes twinkled;
the naughty little mouth opened to emit his short-breathed pants; and
the naughty little tongue hung out as he pranced and leaped, rolled
and gamboled over the cast-down and dejected peas. Finally he chewed
and tore the fragments that remained, and then gave himself a
shake--by no means so severe as he deserved--and strutted into the
house with a "They're-done-for!" air, quite exasperating to witness
when one considered how the poor peas were lying out there prone upon
their faces in the dust, crushed to earth, unlike truth, to rise no
more.
The next morning, all unconscious of the ruin of his crop, Steve was
deliberately making his toilet, when he was startled by roars of
fright. Looking from the window, he perceived a neighbor flying down
the road, with Sarah Maria in his wake. The latter had lowered her
head--not in shame, I grieve to say, but with malicious intent, as was
abundantly evidenced by the height of her tail.
Happily Nannie had seen this procession of two as it passed the house,
and giving chase with swift steps, had caught Sarah Maria's long rope
and wound it several times around a large tree, thus checking her mad
career and saving a worthy citizen for the republic.
The excitement attendant upon all this was very great, especially as
the neighbor was for a time firmly resolved to bring action, not being
satisfied with the action Sarah Maria had brought, but by dint of much
persuasion, both from Steve and also from Randolph Chance, who came to
the rescue, he was at length called off, and Steve was so relieved
that he was able to note the destruction of his peas with scarce a
ripple of emotion.
The calm of the succeeding twenty-four hours was but that which
precedes the storm, and the glassy placidity of Steve's life for that
one day proved to be the deceitful stillness of deep waters. Upon his
return from the city he was again greeted with the welcome
intelligence that Sarah Maria had raised her head, adjusted her hind
legs, whose hinges, owing to much kicking, had been reversed of late,
and betaken herself to parts unknown. Worn out as he was with the
events of the past week, Steve was unequal to a discreet concealment
of his feelings, and the satisfaction he evinced in Nannie's news was
stoutly resented by that singular young person. Indeed, she became so
wrought up--crying, upbraiding, and lamenting--that Steve was obliged
to console her by promising to advertise the errant beast if she were
not found at her usual trysting-place--the railroad track. This he
did, repeating the dose daily for a week, at the end of which time he
received word that Sarah Maria had temporarily located herself on a
farm some forty miles inland. Not being well disposed to a walk of
that length, enlivened by Sarah Maria's society, Steve sent word to
forward the lady by freight.
Owing to some mistake her car was switched off about ten miles from
the proper station, and thinking that he could bridge that distance,
Steve set out on a train early the next evening, and soon found
himself in reach of the missing member of his household. She was
looking out of the freight car when he arrived, and he noted with a
secret qualm that she shook her head disapprovingly when she saw him.
Steve stood and gazed at her for so long that the man in charge there
finally asked him what he was waiting for. Steve replied that she
looked so happy it seemed a pity to disturb her. The man said that he
didn't regard her as particularly happy, inasmuch as she had all but
kicked out one side of the car. Upon hearing which, Steve hastened to
assure him that that was merely a playful way of hers when her
spirits were at the highest, but the man said that her spirits were
several feet too high for him, and he insisted upon lowering them to
_terra firma_. He was so firm and so disagreeable about this that
Steve was obliged to advance and join him in the difficult
undertaking.
It might seem reasonable to expect that as long as Sarah Maria had
testified vigorously to her disapproval of the freight car she would
be glad to issue from it, and no doubt that would have been the case
had Steve and the station master urged her to remain. The moment,
however, that she saw with her eagle eye that they were making
preparations for her ejectment, her mind was made up, and she spread
her four feet in a manner suggestive of rocks that refuse to fly.
The unhappy men now united their efforts at pulling, but her roots had
evidently gone down to China without stopping; next they endeavored to
pry her up, but she was manifestly stuck by some glue of unparalleled
strength.
By this time the honest sweat was dripping from the brows of both men;
Sarah Maria alone was calm. Various devices were used to dislodge her,
and at the end of an hour she had moved a trifle further than a
glacier does in a similar length of time, and was fully as cold and
calm as this natural phenomenon. As she was quite near the opening of
the car when she took her stand, in a physical as well as in a moral
sense, even the very slight advantage gained by her enemies sufficed
to put her in position to make her final exit when, like Sairy Gamp,
she was "so dispodged."
"Now," said the station master, who by this time had not so much as a
dry thread on him, "if you'll pull I'll twist her tail so's to divert
her attention, and I guess we'll make a go of it."
Steve looked into the threatening eye of Sarah Maria, and foreseeing
his doom if he stood in front of her, told the station master that as
Sarah, for some reason, seemed disinclined to love him, she might be
unwilling to go in his direction, and for that reason he would better
keep out of sight.
"So," he continued, "if you will kindly pull I will kindly twist."
Steve was always polite, and never more so than when excited.
The suggestion appealed to the innocent station master, who saw no
hidden intent in Steve's retreat, and the change of position having
been effected, the two men went to work.
For a time Steve twisted gently, but firmly, while the station master
tugged and jerked, but still none of these things moved her.
All at once there was a transformation scene, and it came about as
suddenly as a flash of lightning from out a clear sky. The
participants never could give a clear and harmonious account of what
happened, and all that an idle on-looker could tell was that while he
was gazing he suddenly heard something strike the roof of the car; in
another instant he had, after the occasional custom of nations,
recognized the belligerency of Sarah Maria. When the din of battle
had subsided he beheld Steve arising from the earth somewhere in the
rear of the car, while the station master, on all fours, was in the
act of picking himself up from a spot just in front of where Sarah had
lately made her heroic stand.
Steve was in no wise perturbed or even surprised. He realized that the
bovine belonged to the gentle sex, and anything was to be expected. As
long as Sarah Maria and his wife spared his life, he felt that he had
no just cause for complaint; both ladies were erratic, and he must
simply look for whatever happened.
Unfortunately, as Steve regarded it, Sarah Maria had not taken her
departure, her long rope having caught around a tree and detained her.
She was well out of the car, however, and the station master washed
his hands of her.
It was by this time nearing dusk, and Steve set out on his long walk
toward home with many misgivings. Under happy circumstances a walk in
the country along the brookside, through meadows and woods in the
evening is quieting, but Steve found it the reverse of this to-night.
Not that he had no still moments, in which the brain might work and
memory hold sway; there were such, indeed, at first, for Sarah Maria
set out with him so gently and quietly that the station master
concluded she must be one of those feminines who wax irritable when
their way of life is disturbed, and that once relieved of the box-car
she would proceed as a domestic animal should.
Even Steve began to entertain hopes of her reformation, but these were
soon dashed to the ground, and he went with them. He arose (he had by
this time become an expert at arising), and again there was a truce,
which he gratefully accepted, for he was ready enough to enjoy peace
while it lasted.
Walking by a brook which skirted a little farm, his mind was busy with
reflections. Heretofore he had looked at these places and seen them in
the gross, as it were; now no detail escaped him. He saw to-night
that the weeds were rampant among the peas and that in the next bed
the onions were drooping, evidently having been trampled upon.
"Why is it," he argued gently to himself, "vicious things flourish in
the face of every discouragement, while it requires so much coaxing
and care to keep good and useful articles above ground? One might jump
up and down on a weed continuously every day for a month, and the
moment his back was turned it would be up again, whereas once stepping
on a young blade of corn or the first shoots of an onion is the end of
it."
Then he looked at Sarah Maria and bethought him how she never had a
sick day since they owned her, while a tractable, useful cow would
have died half a dozen times over in this period, of pneumonia or
consumption.
"Why is it?" he asked.
He might have answered this question and thus solved a problem that
has been perplexing humanity ever since Adam and Eve were told to go,
but Sarah Maria preferred her own movements to those of the
intellect, and realizing that it was growing late, she set off on a
hard run for home.
Now Steve had never in his college days, ranked as an athlete, but as
he flew over the ground that night, with the long rope that bridged
the difference betwixt himself and Sarah Maria quite taut, he had an
injured feeling, as of one to whom injustice had been done. Not even
the champion runner had ever made such time.
The violence of his gait would have proved exhaustive had it been too
long continued, but Sarah Maria was merciful, and ere long Steve came
upon her standing in her box-car attitude. She loosened up by-and-by
and again started toward home with the speed of a race-horse, but this
time Steve was in front, and could his friends have seen how well he
kept in front they would have covered him with adulation.
Before long the rope was taut once more, and Steve's sense of security
was in such marked and delightful contrast to his feelings when it
slackened that he told Sarah Maria repeatedly to take her time--he was
in no hurry whatever. Neither was Sarah, apparently, for between
balking and running, and capering about in a truly extraordinary
manner she passed the better portion of the night. Finally, in
despair, Steve laid the case before her and asked if she would look at
the matter dispassionately and consider the lateness of the hour and
their distance from the domestic roof--would she, he urged, keep this
great central truth in sight?
She said that she would not, and she said it so rudely that Steve felt
hurt. When he had gotten up and given himself a good rubbing, he found
that Sarah Maria, like some little angel, had gone before, and he
hobbled after her as fast as his bruises would permit.
They reached home at last, and a late moon glowered down at them with
calm severity. Truth to tell, both Steve and Sarah looked as if they
had been on a spree, and both were callous as to appearances. Their
one idea was to part company as soon as possible.
Out of respect to the Society for the Prevention, and so forth, Steve
decided to give his interesting companion a drink; then he would have
done with her forever. Having secured her to a near tree, he
approached the pump, pail in hand.
But Sarah Maria was watching him narrowly, and as she looked there
rankled in her seemingly quiet breast the memory of her wrongs. There
was still a twist in her tail, left over from the box-car, and several
kinks in her temper, and influenced by these she approached Steve just
as he bent to lift the pail, and slipping her horns under him,
dexterously lifted him from the ground and sent him crashing through
the nearest window, which chanced to be that of his chamber.
"For the love of mercy!" screamed Nannie, starting up from her sleep
in the next room, "what is happening now?"
"I'm coming to bed," said Steve.