FUN AS FARMERS
Grandpa Si and Grandma Sue were alone at a five o’clock breakfast. They
did not wish Jenny to get up that early as there was really nothing to
do, but make the morning coffee, fry the bacon and flapjacks, which
constituted the farmer’s breakfast menu every day in the year.
Silas Warner often tried to persuade his good wife to sleep later,
telling her that he could well enough prepare his own breakfast, but he
had long since desisted, realizing that he would be depriving her of one
of their happiest hours together. It was then, when they were quite
alone, that they talked over many things, and this morning Susan found
her hands trembling as she poured the golden brown coffee into her
husband’s large thick china cup. Silas had asked for three days to
meditate on the serious question of whether or not they should tell Jenny
that she was not their own child, and Susan well knew that this morning
she would hear his decision.
It was not until the cakes were fried and she was seated opposite him
that he looked over at her with his most genial smile, and yet the silent
watcher knew him so well that she could sense that he was not happy in
the decision which he evidently had reached. “Pa, you think it’s best to
tell, don’t you? I can sort o’ see it comin’.”
“I reckon that’s about what my ruminatin’ fetched me to, Susan. You’n me
know how our gal’s hankerin’ for an own sister, and now that Lenora is
goin’, she’ll be lorner ’n ever, Jenny will.” He glanced toward the
closed door which led to the living room where their “gal” slept since
she had given her bed to her guest. “I cal’late we’d better keep it dark
though till Lenora’s gone, then sort of feel our way as how best to tell
it. Thar’s time enough. While Lenora’s here, there ain’t no need for any
other sister for our gal.”
Susan Warner sighed, even while she smiled waveringly. “Wall, Si, if you
think it’s best, I reckon ’tis. But it’ll be powerful hard to have Jenny
thinkin’ the less of us.”
The good man rose and walked around the table and placed a big gnarled
hand on his wife’s shoulder. “Tut! Tut! Susy,” that was the name he had
used in the courtin’ days, “our gal ain’t made of no sech clay as that.
She’ll stick by us all the tighter, you see if ’taint so.”
Further conversation on the subject was prevented by the arrival of
Harold and Charles decked in overalls, which the former lad had obtained
from his mother’s gardener.
Silas Warner stepped out on the side porch to greet them and his grin was
at its widest. “Wall, I swan to glory, if here ain’t my two helpers.
Ready to milk the cow, Harry-lad?”
Mrs. Warner appeared in the open door, her blue checked apron wound about
her hands. She smiled and nodded. “Speak quietly, boys. We like Lenora to
sleep as late as she can,” was her admonition.
The farmer led the way to the barn and there he again stood grinning his
amusement. The boys laughed good naturedly. “Say, them overalls of
your’n, Harry, are sort o’ baggy, ’pears like to me. You could get one o’
Ma’s best pillars in front thar easy.”
The younger lad agreed. “Charles has the best of it. Our gardener is just
about his size. Now if only we had a couple of wide straw hats with torn
brims, we’d look the part.”
Shaking with mirth, the old man led the boys to a shed adjoining the
barn, where on a row of nails were several hats ragged and tattered
enough to suit the most exacting comedian. “Great!” the younger lad
donned one and seizing the milk pail from the farmer’s hand, he struck an
attitude, exclaiming dramatically “Lead me to the cow.” But he was to
find that a college education did not help one to milk, and after a few
futile efforts he rose, and, with a flourish, offered the bench to
Charles, who, having often milked, had the task done in short order.
Harry watched the process closely, declaring that in the evening he would
show them.
That same morning Mrs. Poindexter-Jones awakened feeling better than she
had in a long time.
While Miss Dane was busying herself about the room, the older woman lay
thoughtfully gazing at a double frame picture on the wall. It contained
photographs of two children, one about eight and the other about five.
How beautiful Gwynette had been with her long golden curls and what a
manly little chap Harold. She sighed deeply. The boy had not changed but
the girl——.
Another thought interrupted: “Now that you and Harold both believe that
it may be partly your fault, you may feel differently toward Gwynette.”
“I do love her,” the woman had to acknowledge. “One cannot bring up
anything from babyhood and not care, but I was not wise. I overindulged
the child because she was so beautiful, and I was proud to have people
think her my own, and, later, when she was so heartlessly selfish, I was
hurt. Poor Gwynette.”
Aloud she said: “Miss Dane, please telephone the seminary and tell my
daughter that I am sending the carriage for her at four this afternoon. I
want her to come home. Then, when my son comes, tell him I wish to see
him. He told me that he would be here in the early afternoon.”
“Very well. I will attend to it.” The nurse glided from the room to
telephone Gwynette. Half an hour later she returned. The woman looked up
almost eagerly. Miss Dane merely said, “The message was given.”
She did not care to tell that the girl’s voice had been coldly
indifferent. Her reply had been, “Very well. One place does as well as
another!”
At noon, after a morning cultivating in the fields, the boys were not
sorry when the farmer advised them to take it easy during the afternoon.
The day was very warm.
“Well, we will, just at first, while hardening up.” Harold was afraid the
farmer would think that he was not in earnest about wanting to help, but
there was no twinkle evident in the kind blue eyes of Silas Warner.
The boys, hoes over their shoulders, walked single file through the field
of corn toward the farmhouse. The girls had not yet seen them and they
expected to be well laughed at. Nor were they mistaken. They found Jenny
and Lenora out in the kitchen garden. The former maiden had been
gathering luscious, big, red strawberries, while her friend sat nearby on
a rustic bench. Jenny stood upright, her basket brimming full, and so she
first saw the queer procession.
“Oh, Lenora, do look! Is it or is it not your brother Charles?” The
grinning boys doffed their frayed straw hats and made deep bows. Jenny
pretended to be surprised. “Why, Harold, is that you? I thought Grandpa
had hired a tramp or two to help out. My, but you look hot!”
“Indeed, young ladies, it does not take much perspicacity to make that
discovery.” He mopped his brow with his handkerchief as he spoke.
Charles laughed. “It’s harder on Harold than on me. We do this sort of
thing every day up at the Agricultural School.”
Then, to tease, he added: “Why don’t you invite the girls to watch you
milk this evening?”
“Well, I may at that,” the younger boy said, nothing daunted by their
laughter. “But just now we must hie us to our cabin. I promised to visit
Mother about two.” Then to Charles he suggested: “Before we eat the good
lunch Sing Long will have for us, suppose we go swimming, old man, what
say?”
“Agreed! It sounds good to me!” Turning to his sister, Charles took her
hand lovingly. “I’ll be over to spend the afternoon with you, dear?”
Harold, glancing almost shyly at the other girl, wished he could say the
same thing to her. Then it was he recalled something. “Charles,” he said,
“Mother wanted me to bring you over to the big house this afternoon. I
call it that to designate it from the cabin. She is eager to meet my new
friend.”
“Indeed I shall be very glad to meet your mother.” Then smiling tenderly
at the girl whose hand he still held, he said: “You do feel stronger
today, don’t you, sister?” She nodded happily, then away the two boys
ran.
An hour later, refreshed and sleek-looking after their swim, they sat at
a small table on the pine-sheltered side porch and ate the good lunch
Sing Long had prepared for them.
“This is great!” Charles enthusiastically exclaimed. “I’d like Lenora to
see it.”
“Better still, in a few days, when she is able to walk this far, we will
invite the girls to dine.” Harold hesitated, flushed a little and added
as an after thought: “Of course we’ll ask my sister, too.” Again he had
completely forgotten Gwynette. His good resolution was going to be hard
to put into effect, it would seem.
“I shall be glad to meet your mother and also your sister,” Charles was
saying.
An impulse came to Harold to confide in Charles. Ought he or ought he
not? He knew that he could trust his new friend and his advice might be
invaluable. And so he began hesitatingly: “I’m going to tell you
something, Charles, which I never told to anyone else. In fact, it’s only
recently that Mother realized I knew about it. But now a complication has
risen. We, Mother and I, don’t know _what_ is best to do, and what is
more, Silas and Susan Warner have to be considered.”
“Don’t tell me unless you are quite sure that you want to, old man,”
Charles said in his frank, friendly way, adding, “We make confidences,
sometimes, rather on an impulse, and wish later that we had not.”
“Yes, I know. There are fellows I wouldn’t trust to keep the matter dark,
but I know that you will. We especially do not wish Jenny Warner to know
or Gwynette, my sister, until we have figured out whether or not it would
be best. Of course, my mother and the Warners thought they were doing the
right thing. Well, I won’t keep you wondering about it any longer. I’ll
tell you the whole story as Mother told it to me only two days ago.”
Charles listened seriously. They had finished their lunch and had
sauntered down to the cliff before the tale was completed.
“That certainly is a problem,” was the first comment. “I can easily
understand that your mother wished to keep the matter a secret, but I do
feel sorry for the girls. No one knows the comfort my sister has been to
me. I would have lost a great joy out of my life if she had been taken
from me—if we had grown up without knowing each other.”
“Of course you would, old man,” Harold agreed heartily. “But, you see, I
early figured out that Gwynette couldn’t be my own sister, and I have
never really cared for her nor has she for me. Well, she’ll be coming
home tomorrow and then you can tell better, perhaps, after having met
her, how to advise me. Mother said she would abide by my decision. I
asked Mums to postpone for two weeks an ultimatum in the matter.” Then,
placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder, he added: “Now I must go over
and see Mother. If you care to wait in the cabin, I’ll be back in half an
hour. I’ll find out when my mother will be able to see you.”
“Of course I’ll wait. Lenora ought to rest after lunch, I suppose. I’ll
be glad to browse among the interesting books. Don’t hurry on my
account.”
Ten minutes later Harold was admitted to his mother’s room.
“I am keeping awake just for this visit,” the smiling woman said when he
had kissed her. “Is your friend with you?”
“No, he is at the cabin. I thought perhaps at first you would rather see
me alone. I will go back and get him if you would like to meet him now.”
Instead of answering him, the woman turned to the nurse, who was seated
at a window sewing: “Miss Dane, if I sleep for two hours, I might meet
Harold’s friend about five, don’t you think?” The nurse assented.
To her son she then said, “I would like you and your friend to dine here
every evening. Please begin tonight.”
She purposely did not tell Harold that his sister would be at home and
would need his companionship.