"I'll get rid of him first," I said, with determination, "and then you
can tell me the rest."
"But he's not to be sent off," she insisted. "Sit down, and I'll tell
you everything. He's looking for a place."
"A place!" I exclaimed, beginning to see light. "What has that got to do
with us? When I proposed hiring a man you said we couldn't afford to
hire more than a quarter or an eighth of a man."
"Exactly. And this old man wants a place where he need work only two or
three hours a day. He won't take any wages, but he'd like to have the
reading of our books and newspapers. He says he hasn't any use for money
as long as he has 'good readin' and nice vittles.'"
I smiled at the persuasive eagerness of her tone. She was evidently bent
upon hiring this peculiar old man, but she had expected me to make the
proposal so that she could gracefully accede to it. There would be
certain advantages, I concluded, accruing to the possession of even the
fractional part of a hired man. For instance, I would at once be
relieved of the stable work and the milking of Mary Jane. Then spring
was coming on, and I would be able to enjoy the luxury of watching him
toiling in the vegetable garden under Marion's supervision. Furthermore,
my birthday would arrive with the first green grass, and there were
indications that I would be presented with a lawn-mower.
"Well, what did you tell him?" I asked, trying to look judicial.
"I said that of course it was a matter for you to decide and I couldn't
say anything about it."
I could not repress a gleam of ironical amusement. She was absolutely
truthful, yet it was a convention of hers that my word was law, and that
I was the autocrat of the household. It was a postulate I dared not
dispute.
"Yes, of course," I admitted, in response to her frigid, inquiring
glance. "I'll--I'll think it over. In the meantime I'll have a look at
him."
"Well, you'd better decide,--that is, I'm quite, quite willing to give
the poor old man a trial."
Had I been of a different mind from Marion, I could scarcely have
resisted William Wedder's persuasive arguments, and when I had talked
with him for a few minutes I did not wonder that she had succumbed to
his fascinating eloquence. I knew his praise of my semaphore must be
flattery, and yet--I liked it. I felt sure from his manner, his
appearance and his conversation that he was merely masquerading as a
hired man, but I wanted to see him play the part, although he looked
more like a well-to-do retired farmer taking a holiday than a man who
needed to travel about looking for work. He did not present credentials,
but I ignored the question of references, which seemed quite unnecessary
in view of his obvious respectability. He knew how to do farm work, he
assured me; he was handy with tools, understood gardening, and could
churn and make butter as well as milk the cow. As to terms, he would not
take money, but he would be more than satisfied if he had his board and
plenty of reading matter. In the slack time in midsummer,--his
smooth-shaven jolly face grew solemn as he spoke,--perhaps, if it
wouldn't be too much to ask, and if he needed a new suit of clothes, I
might let him have just a township right to sell my gate-closer.
I fixed my curious gaze upon his rigid features. I knew instinctively
that his earnest solemnity was assumed; I knew by experience that
nothing was so effective in baffling any attempt to play off as a steady
concentrated stare. His eyes drooped slightly; he studied the names on
the drawers of the spice-cabinet attentively; too attentively.
"William," I said, with deliberate, unbending determination, "I have
avoided asking you embarrassing questions, but I must know the truth
about this semaphore business before I decide whether to engage you or
not. What prompted you to dig out my gate?"
I saw a faint flicker of almost contemptuous amusement in his face.
"Why," he replied, as if he wondered at my asking such a simple
question, "I seen that there notice up, of course."
"I want to know the truth," I repeated slowly, and this time I was
almost startled by the perfection with which I imitated Marion's
inflexible intonation.
His face assumed a pained and yet forgiving expression, and he regarded
the hair broom with intense interest. I waited, as Marion had once
waited for me, with the air of being willing to wait until he had time
to compute the number of hairs it contained, and I tried to intimate
silently that my waiting could have but one result. This specialty of
Marion's was more difficult, but I succeeded, for William suddenly
laughed and looked me full in the face with engaging candor.
"Well, sir," he said, as if he found a difficulty in making the
confession, "I didn't like to say so at first, but I thought--ha,
ha!--it'd be a darn good joke on you."
I smiled appreciatively. William had done well; indeed I could not have
done better myself, but I recognized a hollowness in his laugh. I waited
with silent expectancy, as one of Paul's chickens might wait after
receiving a grain of corn from his store.
He paused, looked a little blank, gulped, then with the air of one who
reluctantly parts with his last coin, he added: "Besides, I wanted to
see how the semaphore worked."
I shook my head, sighed, looked at him pityingly, for I saw the
misguided man had persuaded himself it was the truth, and I divined, I
know not how, that he was mistaken. I tried to recall what Marion would
have said at this juncture, and I said it; indeed, I said it so
effectively that I wished Marion had been within earshot. If my voice
had not been an octave lower than hers I might have doubted that it was
mine.
William's peach-tinted cheeks flushed crimson; he wiped his brow with
his red bandanna. "I ain't been cornered like this," he exclaimed,
"since my miss--" He checked the utterance with an abrupt cough, and
continued in a low soliloquizing tone, "Now I come to think of it, the
wind was blowin' pretty fresh and jest when I come opposite the gate I
caught a whiff that set me thinkin'."
"A whiff?" I asked, in surprise.
"Hot--raspberry--pies," he explained, wiping his mouth with the back of
his hand.
I was completely satisfied and engaged him on the spot, sending him to
milk at once. He had scarcely departed when the door into the
dining-room opened and Marion appeared. I saw from her face that she had
been listening to the conversation, and that indignation and amusement
struggled for mastery.
"You wr-r-etch!" she ejaculated.
I said nothing. I was master of the situation, and I knew it was one of
the times when she could imagine more provoking insinuations than I
could put into words.
"What are you laughing at?" she cried indignantly.
"I was just thinking--" I began, then I paused dramatically.
"Thinking what?" she demanded.
"That William Wedder is either a married man or a widower."
I had intended her to ask me why, and I had the answer ready, but it was
the wrong question she propounded.
"A married man _or_ a widower?" she repeated slowly; then her face
became suddenly illumined with appreciative mirth. "Oh, I see! Because
it was so hard to get at the _exact_ truth?"
"Ye--es," I faltered.