"She tondt like it dot I come out to see you."
"Oh, she don't?" said Claude. "What's the matter o' me? I ain't a
dangerous chap. I ain't eatin' up little girls."
Nina went on placidly. "She saidt dot you was goin' to marry me undt get
the farm."
Claude grinned, then chuckled, and at last roared and whooped with the
delight of it. He took off his hat and said:
"She said that, did she? Why, bless her old cabbage head--"
The opening of the door and the sudden irruption of Frau Haldeman
interrupted him. She came rushing toward him like a she grizzly bear,
uttering a torrent of German expletives, and hurled herself upon him,
clutching at his hair and throat. He leaped aside and struck down her
hands with a sweep of his hard right arm. As she turned to come again he
shouted,
"Keep off! or I'll knock you down!"
But before the blow came Nina seized the infuriated woman from behind
and threw her down, and held her till the old man came hobbling to the
rescue. He seemed a little dazed by it all, and made no effort to
assault Claude.
The old woman, who was already black in the face with rage, suddenly
fell limp, and Nina, kneeling beside her, grew white with fear.
"Oh, vat is the matter! I haf kildt her!"
Claude rushed for a bucket of water, and dashed it in the old woman's
face. He flooded her with slashings of it, especially after he saw her
open her eyes, ending by emptying the bucket in her face. He was a
little malicious about that.
The mother sat up soon, wet, scared, bewildered, gasping.
"Mein Gott! Mein Gott! Ich bin ertrinken!"
"What does she say--she's been drinkin'? Well, that looks reasonable."
"No, no--she thinks she is trouned."
"Oh, drowned!" Claude roared again. "Not much she ain't. She's only just
getting cooled off."
He helped the girl get her mother to the house and stretch her out on a
bed. The old woman seemed to have completely exhausted herself with her
effort, and submitted like a child to be waited upon. Her sudden
fainting had subdued her.
Claude had never penetrated so far into the house before, and was much
pleased with the neatness and good order of the rooms, though they were
bare of furniture and carpets.
As the girl came out with him to the gate he uttered the most serious
word he had ever had with her.
"Now, I want you to notice," he said, "that I did nothing to call out
the old lady's rush at me. I'd 'a' hit her, sure, if she'd 'a' clinched
me again. I don't believe in striking a woman, but she was after my hide
for the time bein', and I can't stand two such clutches in the same
place. You don't blame me, I hope."
"No. You done choost ride."
"What do you suppose the old woman went for me for?"
Nina looked down uneasily.
"She know you an' me lige one anudder, an' she is afrait you marry me,
an' den ven she tie you get the farm a-ready."
Claude whistled. "Great Jehosaphat! She really thinks that, does she?
Well, dog my cats! What put that idea into her head?"
"I told her," said Nina calmly.
"You told her?" Claude turned and stared at her. She looked down, and
her face slowly grew to a deep red. She moved uneasily from one foot to
the other, like an awkward, embarrassed child. As he looked at her
standing like a culprit before him, his first impulse was to laugh. He
was not specially refined, but he was a kindly man, and it suddenly
occurred to him that the girl was suffering.
"Well, you were mistaken," he said at last, gently enough. "I don't know
why you should think so, but I never thought of marrying you--never
thought of it."
The flush faded from her face, and she stopped swaying. She lifted her
eyes to his in a tearful, appealing stare.
"I t'ought so--you made me t'ink so."
"I did? How? I never said a word to you about--liking you
or--marrying--or anything like that. I--" He was going to tell her he
intended to marry Lucindy, but he checked himself.
Her lashes fell again, and the tears began to stream down her cheeks.
She knew the worst now. His face had convinced her. She could not tell
him the grounds of her belief--that every time he had said, "I don't
like to see a woman do this or that," or, "I like to see a woman fix up
around the house," she had considered his words in the light of
courtship, believing that in such ways the Yankees made love. So she
stood suffering dumbly while he loaded his cream-can and stood by the
wheel ready to mount his wagon.
He turned. "I'm mighty sorry about it," he said. "Mebbe I was to blame.
I didn't mean nothing by it--not a thing. It was all a mistake. Let's
shake hands over it, and call the whole business off."
He held his hand out to her, and with a low cry she seized it and laid
her cheek upon it. He started back in amazement, and drew his hand away.
She fell upon her knees in the path and covered her face with her apron,
while he hastily mounted his seat and drove away.
Nothing so profoundly moving had come into his life since the death of
his mother, and as he rode on down the road he did a great deal of
thinking. First it gave him a pleasant sensation to think a woman should
care so much for him. He had lived a homeless life for years, and had
come into intimate relations with few women, good or bad. They had
always laughed with him (not at him, for Claude was able to take care of
himself), and no woman before had taken him seriously, and there was a
certain charm about the realization.
Then he fell to wondering what he had said or done to give the girl such
a notion of his purposes. Perhaps he had been too free with his talk. He
was so troubled that he hardly smiled once during the rest of his
circuit, and at night he refrained from going up town, and sat under the
trees back of the creamery, and smoked and pondered on the astounding
situation.
He came at last to the resolution that it was his duty to declare
himself to Lucindy and end all uncertainty, so that no other woman would
fall into Nina's error. He was as good as an engaged man, and the world
should know it.
The next day, with his newly painted buggy flashing in the sun, and the
extra dozen ivory rings he had purchased for his harnesses clashing
together, he drove up the road as a man of leisure and a resolved lover.
It was a beautiful day in August.
Lucindy was getting a light tea for some friends up from the Siding,
when she saw Claude drive up.
"Well, for the land sake!" she broke out, using one of her mother's
phrases, "if here isn't that creamery man!" In that phrase lay the
answer to Claude's question--if he had heard it. He drove in, and Mr.
Kennedy, with impartial hospitality, went out and asked him to 'light
and put his team in the barn.
He did so, feeling very much exhilarated. He never before had gone
courting in this direct and aboveboard fashion. He mistook the father's
hospitality for compliance in his designs. He followed his host into the
house, and faced, with very fair composure, two girls who smiled broadly
as they shook hands with him. Mrs. Kennedy gave him a lax hand and a
curt how-de-do, and Lucindy fairly scowled in answer to his radiant
smile.
She was much changed, he could see. She wore a dress with puffed
sleeves, and her hair was dressed differently. She seemed strange and
distant, but he thought she was "putting that on" for the benefit of
others. At the table the three girls talked of things at the Siding, and
ignored him so that he was obliged to turn to Farmer Kennedy for refuge.
He kept his courage up by thinking, "Wait till we are alone."
After supper, when Lucindy explained that the dishes would have to be
washed, he offered to help her in his best manner.
"Thank you, I don't need any help," was Lucindy's curt reply.
Ordinarily he was a man of much facility and ease in addressing women,
but he was vastly disconcerted by her manner. He sat rather silently
waiting for the room to clear. When the visitors intimated that they
must go, he rose with cheerful alacrity.
"I'll get your horse for you."
He helped hitch the horse into the buggy, and helped the girls in with a
return of easy gallantry, and watched them drive off with joy. At last
the field was clear.
They returned to the sitting room, where the old folks remained for a
decent interval, and then left the young people alone. His courage
returned then, and he turned toward her with resolution in his voice and
eyes.
"Lucindy," he began.
"Miss Kennedy, please," interrupted Lucindy, with cutting emphasis.
"I'll be darned if I do," he replied hotly. "What's the matter with you?
Since going to Minneapolis you put on a lot of city airs, it seems to
me."
"If you don't like my airs, you know what you can do!"
He saw his mistake.
"Now see here, Lucindy, there's no sense in our quarrelling."
"I don't want to quarrel; I don't want anything to do with you. I wish
I'd never seen you."
"Oh, you don't mean that! after all the good talks we've had."