Rebecca was used to this sort of errand, for the whole village of
Riverboro would sometimes be rocked to the very centre of its being by
simultaneous desire for a yeast-cake. As the nearest repository was a
mile and a half distant, as the yeast-cake was valued at two cents and
wouldn't keep, as the demand was uncertain, being dependent entirely on
a fluctuating desire for “riz bread,” the storekeeper refused to order
more than three yeast-cakes a day at his own risk. Sometimes they
remained on his hands a dead loss; sometimes eight or ten persons would
“hitch up” and drive from distant farms for the coveted article, only to
be met with the flat, “No, I'm all out o' yeast-cake; Mis' Simmons
took the last; mebbe you can borry half o' hern, she hain't much of a
bread-eater.”
So Rebecca climbed the hills to Mrs. Came's, knowing that her daily
bread depended on the successful issue of the call.
Thirza was barefooted, and tough as her little feet were, the long walk
over the stubble fields tired her. When they came within sight of the
Came barn, she coaxed Rebecca to take a short cut through the turnips
growing in long, beautifully weeded rows.
“You know Mr. Came is awfully cross, Thirza, and can't bear anybody to
tread on his crops or touch a tree or a bush that belongs to him. I'm
kind of afraid, but come along and mind you step softly in between the
rows and hold up your petticoat, so you can't possibly touch the turnip
plants. I'll do the same. Skip along fast, because then we won't leave
any deep footprints.”
The children passed safely and noiselessly along, their pleasure a
trifle enhanced by the felt dangers of their progress. Rebecca knew that
they were doing no harm, but that did not prevent her hoping to escape
the gimlet eye of Mr. Came.
As they neared the outer edge of the turnip patch they paused suddenly,
petticoats in air.
A great clump of elderberry bushes hid them from the barn, but from the
other side of the clump came the sound of conversation: the timid voice
of the Little Prophet and the gruff tones of Cassius Came.
Rebecca was afraid to interrupt, and too honest to wish to overhear. She
could only hope the man and the boy would pass on to the house as they
talked, so she motioned to the paralyzed Thirza to take two more steps
and stand with her behind the elderberry bushes. But no! In a moment
they heard Mr. Came drag a stool over beside the grindstone as he said:
“Well, now Elisha Jeremiah, we'll talk about the red cow. You say you've
drove her a month, do ye? And the trade between us was that if you
could drive her a month, without her getting the rope over her foot and
without bein' afraid, you was to have her. That's straight, ain't it?”
The Prophet's face burned with excitement, his gingham shirt rose and
fell as if he were breathing hard, but he only nodded assent and said
nothing.
“Now,” continued Mr. Came, “have you made out to keep the rope from
under her feet?”
“She ain't got t-t-tangled up one s-single time,” said Elisha,
stuttering in his excitement, but looking up with some courage from his
bare toes, with which he was assiduously threading the grass.
“So far, so good. Now 'bout bein' afraid. As you seem so certain of
gettin' the cow, I suppose you hain't been a speck scared, hev you?
Honor bright, now!”
“I--I--not but just a little mite. I”--
“Hold up a minute. Of course you didn't _say_ you was afraid, and didn't
_show_ you was afraid, and nobody knew you _was_ afraid, but that ain't
the way we fixed it up. You was to call the cow your'n if you could
drive her to the pasture for a month without _bein'_ afraid. Own up
square now, hev you be'n afraid?”
A long pause, then a faint, “Yes.”
“Where's your manners?”
“I mean yes, sir.”
“How often? If it hain't be'n too many times mebbe I'll let ye off,
though you're a reg'lar girl-boy, and'll be runnin' away from the cat
bimeby. Has it be'n--twice?”
“Yes,” and the Little Prophet's voice was very faint now, and had a
decided tear in it.
“Yes what?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Has it be'n four times?”
“Y-es, sir.” More heaving of the gingham shirt.
“Well, you _air_ a thunderin' coward! How many times? Speak up now.”
More digging of the bare toes in the earth, and one premonitory tear
drop stealing from under the downcast lids, then,--
“A little, most every day, and you can keep the cow,” wailed the
Prophet, as he turned abruptly and fled behind the shed, where he flung
himself into the green depths of a tansy bed, and gave himself up to
unmanly sobs.
Cassius Came gave a sort of shamefaced guffaw at the abrupt departure
of the boy, and went on into the house, while Rebecca and Thirza made
a stealthy circuit of the barn and a polite and circumspect entrance
through the parsonage front gate.
Rebecca told the minister's wife what she could remember of the
interview between Cassius Came and Elisha Simpson, and tender-hearted
Mrs. Baxter longed to seek and comfort her Little Prophet sobbing in the
tansy bed, the brand of coward on his forehead, and what was much worse,
the fear in his heart that he deserved it.
Rebecca could hardly be prevented from bearding Mr. Came and openly
espousing the cause of Elisha, for she was an impetuous, reckless,
valiant creature when a weaker vessel was attacked or threatened
unjustly.
Mrs. Baxter acknowledged that Mr. Came had been true, in a way, to his
word and bargain, but she confessed that she had never heard of so cruel
and hard a bargain since the days of Shylock, and it was all the worse
for being made with a child.
Rebecca hurried home, her visit quite spoiled and her errand quite
forgotten till she reached the brick house door, where she told her
aunts, with her customary picturesqueness of speech, that she would
rather eat buttermilk bread till she died than partake of food mixed
with one of Mr. Came's yeast-cakes; that it would choke her, even in the
shape of good raised bread.
“That's all very fine, Rebecky,” said her Aunt Miranda, who had a
pin-prick for almost every bubble; “but don't forget there's two other
mouths to feed in this house, and you might at least give your aunt and
me the privilege of chokin' if we feel to want to!”