“And now,” continued Miss Colton, after an interval during which, I
presume, she had been waiting for some reply to her frank declaration
concerning mind and appetite, “what must I do to help? Shall I unpack
the basket?”
I was struggling, as we say in Denboro, to get the ship under control. I
had been taken aback so suddenly that I had lost steerage way. My slight
experience with the vagaries of the feminine mind had not prepared me
for the lightning changes of this kind. Not two minutes before she had,
if one might judge by her look and tone, been deeply offended, almost
insulted, because I refused to permit her wandering off alone into the
woods. My invitation to lunch had been given on the spur of the moment
and with no idea that it would be accepted. And she not only accepted,
but had expected me to invite her, had been fearful that I might not do
so. She told me so, herself.
“Shall I unpack the basket?” she repeated. She was looking at me
intently and the toe of her riding boot was patting the leaves. “What is
the matter? Are you sorry I am going to stay?”
It was high time for me to get under way. There were squalls on the
horizon.
“Oh, no, no!” I exclaimed, hastily. “Of course not. I am delighted. But
you need not trouble to help. Just let me attend to your horse and I
will have lunch ready in a jiffy.”
I led Don over to the little green belt of meadow between the trees and
the sand of the beach, unbuckled the reins and made him fast to a stout
birch. He bent his head and began to pull big mouthfuls of the rich
grass. He, too, was evidently glad to accept my invitation.
When I returned to my camping ground I found the basket unpacked and the
young lady arranging the eatables.
“You shouldn't have done that,” I said. “I am the host here.”
She did not look up. “Don't bother the table maid,” she observed,
briskly. “That fire is not kindled yet.”
I lit the fire and, going over to the bushes, selected two of the fish,
a bass and a pickerel. I carried them down to the shore of the pond and
began cleaning them, using my jacknife and a flat stone. I was nearing
the end of the operation when she came over to watch.
“Why are you doing that?” she asked. “You are not going to cook
them--now--are you?”
“I am going to try,” I replied.
“But how? You haven't anything to cook them in.”
“I don't need it. You don't appreciate the conveniences of this hotel,
Miss Colton. There! now we're ready.”
I rose, washed my hands in the pond, and picked up two other flat
stones, large ones, which I had previously put aside. These I carried
to the fire and, raking aside the burning logs with a stick, laid the
stones in a bed of hot coals.
“Those are our frying pans,” I informed her. “When they are hot enough
they will cook the fish. At least, I hope they will. Now for the
coffee.”
But she waved me aside. “The coffee is my affair,” she said. “I insist
upon making the coffee. Oh, you need not look at me like that. I am not
altogether useless. I studied Domestic Science--a little--in my prep
school course. As much as I studied anything else,” laughingly.
“But--”
“Mr. Paine, I am not on horseback now and you can't hold my bridle as
you did Don's. If you will fill the coffee pot and put it on to boil.
Thank you. I am glad to see that even you obey orders, sometimes.”
I had cooked fish in out-of-door fashion often before, but I am quite
sure I never took such pains as I did with these. They were not culinary
triumphs, even at that, but my guest was kind enough to pronounce them
delicious. The lunch basket contained two plates, but only one knife
and fork. These I insisted upon her using and I got on very well
with sharpened sticks and a spoon. The coffee was--well, it had one
qualification, strength.
We conversed but little during the meal. The young lady said she was too
hungry to talk and I was so confounded with the strangeness of the
whole affair that I was glad to be silent. Sitting opposite me, eating
Dorinda's doughnuts and apple puffs and the fish that I--_I_ had cooked,
was “Big Jim” Colton's daughter, the automobile girl, the heiress, the
“incarnation of snobbery,” the young lady whose father I had bidden go
to the devil and to whom, in company with the rest of the family, I
had many times mentally extended the same invitation. And now we were
picnicing together as if we were friends of long standing. Why, Nellie
Dean could not appear more unpretentious and unconscious of social
differences than this girl to-day! What would her parents say if they
saw us like this? What would Captain Jed, and the rest of those in
rebellion against the Emperor of New York, say? That I was a traitor,
hand and glove with the enemy. Well, I was not; and I did not intend to
be. But for her to--
She interrupted my meditations.
“Mr. Paine,” she observed, suddenly, “you will excuse my mentioning it,
but you are distinctly not entertaining. You have not spoken a word for
five minutes. And you are not attending to my needs. The apple puffs are
on your side of the--table.”
I hastened to pass the paper containing the puffs.
“I beg your pardon,” I said, hurriedly. “I--I was daydreaming, I guess.”
“So I imagined. I forgive you; this lunch would tempt me to forgive
greater sins than yours. Did that delightful old housekeeper of yours
cook all these nice things?”
“She did. So you think Dorinda delightful, do you?”
“Yes. She is so sincere and good-hearted. And so odd and bright and
funny. I could listen to her for hours.”
“Humph! Well, if you were a member of her household you would have that
privilege often. I doubt if her husband considers it such a privilege.”
“Her husband? Oh, yes! I met him. He is a character, too, isn't he?”
“Yes; a weak one.”
She put down her coffee cup and sighed, contentedly.
“I think I never tasted anything so good as this lunch,” she observed.
“And I'm quite sure I never ate so much at one sitting. I am going to
help you clear away, but please don't ask me to do it just now. Have you
finished? You may smoke, if you like.”
I had been longing for a smoke and now I filled my pipe and lighted it.
“Now we can talk, can't we?” she said. “I want you to tell me about your
mother. How is she?”
“Just as she was when you saw her,” I answered. “Mother is always the
same.”
“She is a dear. I had heard so many nice things about her and I was
not disappointed. I intended to make only a short call and I stayed and
stayed. I hope I did not tire her.”
“Not at all. Mother enjoyed your call exceedingly.”
“Did she? I am so glad. I really am. I went to your house with a
good deal of misgiving, Mr. Paine. I feared that my coming might be
considered an intrusion.”
“I told you that it would not.”
“I know. But, under the circumstances--Father's disagreement
with--considering all the--the--Oh, what shall I call it?”
“The late unpleasantness,” I suggested.
Again came the twinkle in her eye. She nodded.
“Thank you,” she said. “That is a quotation, but it was clever of you to
think of it. Yes, considering the late unpleasantness, I was afraid
my visit might be misunderstood. I was fearful that your mother
or--someone--might think I came there with an ulterior motive, something
connected with that troublesome Lane dispute. Of course no one did think
such a thing?”
She asked the question quickly and with intense seriousness. I
remembered Lute's hint and my own secret suspicions, but I answered
promptly.
“Of course not,” I said.
“You did not think that, did you?”
“No,” unblushingly.
“I came because from what I had heard of your mother I was sure she must
be a wonderful woman. I wanted to meet her. And she IS wonderful; and so
patient and sweet and good. I fell in love with her. Everyone must love
her. You should be proud of your mother, Mr. Paine.”
“I am,” I answered, simply.
“You have reason. And she is very proud of you.”
“Without the reason, I'm afraid.”
She did not speak. Her silence hurt. I felt that I knew what she was
thinking and I determined to make her say it.
“Without the reason,” I repeated.
“I did not say that.”
“But you thought it.”
My stubborn persistence was a mistake. Again, as at our meeting in the
grove, I had gone too far. Her answer was as completely indifferent as
speech and tone could be.
“Indeed?” she said, coldly. “It is barely possible that I did not think
about it at all. . . . Now, Mr. Paine, if you are ready shall we clear
away?”
The clearing, most of it, was done silently. I washed the plates, the
coffee pot and other things, in the pond and she packed them in the
basket. As I returned with the knife and forks I found her looking at
the coffee pot and smiling.
“What is the matter?” I asked, sulkily. I was provoked with myself for
forgetting who and what I was, and with her for making me forget. “Isn't
it clean?”
“Why, yes,” she answered, “surprisingly so. Did they teach Domestic
Science at your college, too?”
I started. “MY college!” I repeated. “How did you know I had been at
college? Did Mother tell you?”
She laughed gleefully.
“Did Mother tell you?” I demanded. “If she did--”
“Well, what if she did? However, she did not. But you have told me now.
Harvard, was it? or Yale?”
I tossed the knife and fork into the basket and turned away.
“Princeton, perhaps,” suggested Miss Colton.
I walked over and began to unjoint my rod. I was a fool to be trapped
like this. No one in Denboro except Mother and George Taylor knew of my
brief college career, and now I had, practically, told this girl of it.
She might--if she were sufficiently interested to remember, which
was fortunately not probable--tell her father and he might ask other
questions concerning my history. Where would those questions lead?
I was angrily tugging at the rod when I heard her step behind me. I did
not turn.
“I beg your pardon,” she said.
I pretended not to hear.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Paine,” she said again.
“It's all right,” I muttered. “No apologies are necessary.”
I said it like a sullen schoolboy. There was another moment of silence.
Then I heard her move away. I looked over my shoulder. She was walking
toward the meadow where Don, the horse, was picketed. There was offended
dignity in every line of her figure.
For a moment I fought with my pride and injured self-respect. Then I
hurried after her.
“Miss Colton,” I said.
“Well?” she neither turned nor stopped.
“Miss Colton, I should not have answered like that. I was rude.”
She stopped. “You were,” she said.
“I know it. I am sorry. I apologize.”
“No apologies are necessary.”
Here was tit for tat. I did not know what more to say, so I said
nothing.
“Do I understand that you ask my pardon?” she inquired, still without
turning.
“I do. If you will permit me, I will explain. I--”
She whirled about and faced me. To my astonishment she was smiling once
more.
“Of course you won't explain,” she declared. “I had no right to ask
you about your college. But I couldn't help guessing. I told you that
I liked puzzles. We'll say no more about it. I have enjoyed this picnic
and I won't have it spoiled. Now why are you taking your rod apart?”
“Because I know you want to go home and I am going with you to show you
the way.”
“But I don't have to go yet, do I? It is not late. And I thought perhaps
you would let me see you catch another bass. Won't you? Please.”
Once more she had me at a disadvantage. I had no desire for more
fishing, and I was fearful of further questions, but what could I do?
And it was not late--but a little past two o'clock.
So I rigged the rod again and led the way down the shore to the spot
where the sedge extended out into the pond, with the lily pads beyond
it. She walked beside me. Then she seated herself on a fallen tree and
I baited the hook with a lively minnow and cast. For some time I got
not even a nibble. As I waited she and I talked. But now it was I who
questioned.
“Do you like Denboro?” I asked.
“I am beginning to like it very much. At first I thought it very dull,
but now I am getting acquainted.”
“There are few cottagers and summer people here. But in Harniss there is
a large colony. Very nice people, I believe.”
“Yes, I have met some of them. But it was not the summer people I meant.
I am beginning to know the townspeople and to like some of them. I met
that delightful old Captain Warren the other day.”
“He is as good as they make.”
“Indeed he is. And I had an interview with another captain, Miss Dean's
father, yesterday. We had an interesting encounter.”
“So I should imagine. Captain Jed! Whew! It MUST have been interesting.”
“It was. Oh, we were very fierce at first--at least he was, and I fought
for my side as hard as I could. He said Father was a selfish pig for
wanting to close the Lane, and I said it was because of its use by the
pigs that he wished to close it.”
“Ha! ha! How did it end?”
“Oh, we agreed to disagree. I respect Captain Dean for his fight; but
Father will win, of course. He always does.”
“He won't win this time, Miss Colton.”
“Why not? Oh, I actually forgot I was talking to the head and front of
the opposition. So you think he will not win, Mr. Paine?”
“I am sure of it. He cannot close that Lane until I sell it, and I shall
not sell.”
She regarded me thoughtfully, her chin upon her hand.
“It would be odd if he should not, after all,” she said. “He prides
himself on having his own way. It would be strange if he should be
beaten down here, after winning so often in New York. Your mother
told me something of your feeling in the matter, Mr. Paine. Father has
offered you a good price for the land, hasn't he?”
“He has offered me a dozen times what it is worth.”
“Yes. He does not count money when he has set his heart upon anything.
And you refused?”
“Yes.”
“But Nellie Dean says the town also wished to buy and you refused its
offer, too.”
“Yes.”
“You don't seem to care for money, either, Mr. Paine. Are all Cape Cod
people so unmercenary? Or is it that you all have money enough--. . .
Pardon me. That was impolite. I spoke without thinking.”
“Oh, never mind. I am not sensitive--on that point, at least.”
“But I do mind. And I am sorry I said it. And I should like to
understand. I see why the townspeople do not want the Lane closed. But
you have not lived here always. Only a few years, so Miss Dean says.
She said, too, that that Mr. Taylor, the cashier, was almost the only
intimate friend you have made since you came. Others would like to be
friendly, but you will not permit them to be. And, yet for these
people, mere acquaintances, you are sacrificing what Father would call a
profitable deal.”
“Not altogether for them. I can't explain my feeling exactly. I know
only that to sell them out and make money--and heaven knows I need
money--at their expense seems to me dead wrong.”
“Then why don't you sell to THEM?”
“I don't know. Unless it was because to refuse your father's offer and
accept a lower one seemed a mean trick, too. And I won't be bullied into
selling to anyone. I guess that is it, as much as anything.”
“My! how stubborn you must be.”
“I don't know why I have preached this sermon to you, Miss Colton, your
sympathies in the fight are with your father, naturally.”
“Oh, no, they are not.”
I almost dropped the rod.
“Not--with--” I repeated.
“Not altogether. They are with you, just at present. If you had sold--if
you had given in to Father, feeling as you do, I should not have any
sympathy with you at all. As it is--”
“As it is?” I asked eagerly--too eagerly. I should have done better to
pretend indifference.
“As it is,” she answered, lightly, “I respect you as I would any sincere
fighter for a losing cause. And I shall probably feel some sympathy
for you after the cause is lost. Excuse my breaking in on your sermon,
provided it is not finished, but--I think you have a bite, Mr. Paine.”
I had, very much of a bite. The minnow on my hook had been forgotten and
allowed to sink to the bottom, and a big pout had swallowed it, along
with the hook and a section of line. I dragged the creature out of the
water and performed a surgical operation, resulting in the recovery of
my tackle.
“There!” I exclaimed, in disgust. “I think I have had enough fishing
for one day. Suppose we call it off. Unless you would like to try, Miss
Colton.”
I made the offer by way of a joke. She accepted it instantly.
“May I?” she cried, eagerly. “I have been dying to ever since I came.
“But--but you will get wet.”
“No matter. This is an old suit.”
It did not look old to my countrified eyes, but I protested no more.
There was a rock a little below where we then were, one of the typical
glacial boulders of the Cape--lying just at the edge of the water and
projecting out into it. I helped her up on to this rock and baited her
hook with shrimp.
“Shall I cast for you?” I asked.
“No indeed. I can do it, thank you.”
She did, and did it well. Moreover, the line had scarcely straightened
out in the water when it was savagely jerked, the pole bent into a
half-circle, and out of the foaming eddy beneath its tip leaped the
biggest bass I had seen that day, or in that pond on any day.
“By George!” I exclaimed. “Can you handle him? Shall I--”
She did not look at me, but I received my orders, nevertheless.
“Please don't! Keep away!” she said sharply.
For nearly fifteen minutes she fought that fish, in and out among the
pads, keeping the line tight, handling him at least as well as I could
have done. I ran for the landing net and, as she brought her captive up
beside the rock, reached forward to use it. But she stopped me.
“No,” she said, breathlessly, “I want to do this all myself.”
It took her several more minutes to do it, and she was pretty well
splashed, when at last, with the heavy net dragging from one hand and
the rod in the other, she sprang down from the rock. Together we bent
over the fish.
“A four-pounder, if he is an ounce,” said I. “I congratulate you, Miss
Colton.”
“Poor thing,” she mused. “I am almost sorry he did not get away. He IS a
beauty, isn't he! Now I am ready to go home.”
That journey home was a strange experience to me. She rode Don and
bore the lunch basket and the net before her on the saddle. I walked
alongside, carrying the rod, boots, and the fish in the otherwise empty
bait pail. The sunshine, streaming through the leaves of the arching
boughs overhead, dappled the narrow, overgrown paths with shifting
blotches of light and shadow. Around us was the deep, living green of
the woods, the songs of birds, the chatter of red squirrels, and the
scent of wild honeysuckle. And as we moved onward we talked--that is,
she did most of the talking and I listened. Yet I must have talked more
than I knew, because I remember expressing opinions concerning books
and operas and pictures, subjects I had not discussed for years except
occasionally with Mother, and then only because she was still interested
in them. I seemed, somehow, to have become a different, a younger man,
under the influence of these few hours with the girl I had professed to
hate so cordially. Our companionship--perfectly meaningless as it was,
the mere caprice of an idle day on her part--had rejuvenated me. During
that homeward walk I forgot myself entirely, forgot that I was Ros
Paine, the country loafer; forgot, too, that she was the only child of
the city millionaire, that we had, or could have, nothing in common.
She, also, seemed to forget, and we chatted together as unconsciously
and easily as if we had known each other all our lives.
Yet it may be that her part in the conversation was not altogether
without a purpose. She led me to speak of Denboro and its people, of how
they lived, and of the old days of sailing ships and deep sea skippers.
George Taylor's name was mentioned and I praised him highly, telling of
his rise from poor boy to successful man, as we rated success locally.
“He manages that bank well,” I declared. “Everyone says so. And, from
what I have seen of his management, I know it to be true.”
“How do you know?” she asked.
“Because I have had some experience in banking myself. I--”
I stopped short. My tongue was running away with me. She did not ask the
question which I dreaded and expected. Instead she said, looking down at
me:
“You are a loyal friend, aren't you, Mr. Paine.”
“I have reason to be loyal to George,” I answered, with feeling.
“Are you as loyal to yourself?”
I looked up at her in surprise.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I have been trying to understand you, Mr. Paine. Trying to get the
answer to the puzzle. In one way I think I have it. I understand your
attitude in the Lane affair and I think I know why you came to Denboro
and are staying here.”
I stopped short. “You--you know THAT?” I cried.
“I think I do. You believe that your mother needs you and you will not
leave her. That is your reason for living here, I think. But, in another
way, I cannot understand you at all.”
She spoke to the horse and we moved on again. I waited for her to
continue, but she was silent.
“How? What is the other way! The way in which you cannot understand me?”
I asked.
“Shall I tell you? Do you wish me to be perfectly frank?”
“Yes.”
“I cannot understand how a man such as you seem to be, young, educated,
and with life before him, can be content to do as you do, spend your
time in fishing, or sailing, or shooting. To have no ambition at all.
My father was a poor country boy, like your friend, Mr. Taylor, but he
worked night and day until he became what he is now. And even now he
works, and works hard. Oh, I am proud of him! Not because he is what he
is, but because he has done it all himself. If I were a man I would have
some purpose in life; I would do SOMETHING worth while if it were only
to sell fish from a cart, like that old fellow with the queer name--what
is it?--Oh, yes! Theophilus Newcomb.”
I did not answer. She had said all that was necessary, and more. It was
quite enough for me.
“There!” she observed, after a moment. “You asked me to tell you and I
did. If you never speak to me again it will be exactly what I deserve.
But I thought it and so I said it. Expressing my thoughts is one of my
bad habits. . . . Oh, why, we are almost home, aren't we!”
We had come to the edge of the grove bordering Beriah Holt's pasture.
The grove was on the west side of a little hill. Before us the pasture
sloped away to Beriah's house and barn, with the road beyond it. And
beyond that, in the distance, were the steeples and roofs of Denboro.
Among them the gables and tower of the Colton mansion rose, conspicuous
and costly.
She turned in the saddle. “I presume I may leave you now, Mr. Paine,”
she said. “Even you must admit that the rest of the way is plain
sailing. Thank you for your hospitality and for your services as guide.
I will send the basket and net over by one of the servants.”
“I will take them now,” I said, shortly.
“Very well, if you prefer. Here they are.”
I took them from her.
“Good afternoon,” she said. “And thanks once more for a very pleasant
picnic.”
“You are quite welcome, I'm sure. Thank you for your frank opinion of
my--worthlessness. It was kind of you to express it.”
The sarcasm was not lost upon her.
“I meant it as a kindness,” she replied.
“Yes. And it was true enough, probably. Doubtless I shall derive great
benefit from your--words of wisdom.”
Her patience, evidently, was exhausted. She turned away. “Oh, that,” she
said, indifferently, “is your affair. I told you what I believed to
be the truth, that was all. What you do is not likely to be of vast
importance to me, one way or the other. Come, Don!”
Don cantered down the slope. I watched him and his rider disappear
beyond the trees in the distance. Then I picked up my pail and other
burdens and followed in their wake. The sun was behind a cloud. It had
been a strange day with a miserable ending. I was furiously angry with
her, but I was more angry with myself. For what she had told me WAS the
truth, and I knew it.
I strode on, head down, through the village. People spoke to me, asking
what luck I had had and where I had been, but I scarcely noticed them.
As I reached the Corners and was passing the bank someone called my
name. I glanced up and saw George Taylor descending the steps.
“Hold on, Ros,” he hailed. “Wait a minute. What's your rush? Hold on!”
I halted reluctantly.
“Fishing again, I see,” he observed, as he reached my side. “Any luck?”
“Fair,” I told him.
“What pond?”
“Seabury's.”
“Go alone?”
“Yes.” That I had not been alone since was no business of his.
“Humph! You ain't exactly what a fellow'd call talkative this afternoon,
seems to me. Anything wrong?”
“No.”
“Tuckered out?”
“I guess so.”
“Well, so am I, but I ain't had your fun getting that way. Small and I
have been at it night and day getting things in shape so he could leave.
He's gone. Went this noon. And that ain't the worst of it; I haven't got
anybody yet to take his place. I'll have to be cashier and bookkeeper
too for a spell. There's applicants enough; but they don't suit. Guess
likely you'll have to help me out, after all, Ros. The job is yours if
you say the word.”
He laughed as he said it. Even to him the idea of my working was a joke.
But the joke did not seem funny to me, just then. I walked on for some
distance without a word. Then I asked a question.
“What is expected of a man in that position?” I asked.
“Expected? Why, plain bank bookkeeping--not much else at first. Yet
there's a good chance for a likely fellow to be considerable more, in
time. I need help in my part of the work. That's why I haven't hired
any of the dozen or so who are after the place. What makes you ask? You
don't know of a good man for me, do you, Ros?”
“When do you want him to begin?”
“To-morrow morning, if he satisfies me.”
“Would I satisfy you?”
“You! Humph! Try me and see, that's all I'd ask.”
“All right. I'll be on hand in the morning.”
He stopped, looked at me, and then seized me by the arm.
“See here!” he cried, “I'm lost in the fog, I guess likely. What do you
mean by that? Is it time to laugh--or what?”
“It may be; I don't know. But I take the bookkeeper's position in your
bank. Now, good-by. Don't talk to me. I don't feel like talking.”
“But--but, Ros.”
“Good-by.”
I walked on. I had taken but a few steps when he overtook me.
“Ros,” he said, “I ain't going to say but just one thing. If you meant
what you said I'm the most tickled man on the Cape. But you ain't asked
a word about the salary.”
“I know it. I haven't asked because I don't care. I'll be on hand in the
morning.”
I left him standing there, and hurried down the Lower Road. As I had
said to him, I did not feel like talking. I did not want even to see any
one. I wanted to be let alone. But it was fated that I should not be,
not yet. Sim Eldredge was waiting for me around the corner. He stepped
out from behind the fence where he had been hidden.
“Ros!” he whispered. “Ros Paine! Wait. It's me, Sim. I want to ask you
somethin'. Wan't that George Taylor you was speakin' to just now?”
“Yes,” I answered, impatiently. “What of it?”
“Say, Ros, you and me ain't pulled that Colton trade off, but it ain't
my fault. You ain't got no hard feelin's against me, I know. And I want
you to do a little mite of favor for me. Will you?”
“What is it? If it has anything to do with the Lane, I tell you now
that--”
“It ain't--it ain't. It's about that bookkeepin' job in the bank, Henry
Small's place, the one he's just quit. I've got a third cousin, name of
Josiah Badger, over to South Harniss. He's a smart young chap, and an
A-1 accountant at figgers. He's been keepin' books down at the fish
wharf--see? Now, he'd like that job and, bein' as you and George are
so thick, I cal'lated maybe you'd sort of use your influence along of
George, and--and get it for him. There ain't nothin' in it for me--that
is, nothin' much. But I feel friendly toward Josiah and you know I like
to do little kindnesses for folks. So--”
“There! there!” I interrupted. “It's no use, Sim. I can't help you.”
“Why! yes you can.”
“No, I can't. I don't know your cousin, and besides--well, you are too
late. The place is filled.”
Sim's expression changed. He looked surprised and crestfallen.
“Filled?” he exclaimed. “Why, no, 'tain't! If 'twas I'd have known it,
wouldn't I? Who'd you hear had got it? Whoever you heard, 'tain't so.”
“Yes, it is.”
“How do you know? Who is it, then?”
I hesitated. Before noon of the next day every soul in Denboro would
have heard the news. Eldredge might as well hear it now.
“I've taken the place myself,” I said.
“You?” Sim actually forgot to whisper; he shouted the word. “YOU! Ha!
ha! ha! Ros, quit your foolin'.”
“I'm not fooling. I go to work in the bank to-morrow morning.”
“But--Oh, my soul! You! Aw, I know better! Say, Ros, don't let's waste
time like this. Fun's all right, but . . . My heavens to Betsy! YOU work
for a livin'! If I believed that I'd believe anything. Tell me, now. Who
has got that job? . . . Why don't you answer me?”
I answered him. “Shut up!” I said, fiercely. Then I vaulted the fence
and set out for home across lots.
I heard the next day that Sim went back to the post-office and informed
the gathering there that Ros Paine had taken to drinking.
“He was tight as a biled owl,” declared Sim; “and ugly--don't talk!
Wanted to fight me because I wouldn't believe he was goin' to work. Him!
What in the everlastin' would HE want to work for? My heavens to Betsy!”