When I returned from Europe with a finished education, I found that my
fortune also was finished in the most approved modern style, so I left
New York and drifted westward in search of employment. At length I came
to Indiana, and, having not even a cent left, and mustering but one
presentable suit of clothes, I looked about me in a hungry, half
desperate sort of way, till I pounced upon the school in Balhinch. Now
Balhinch is not a town, nor a cross-road place, nor a post-office--it is
simply a neighborhood in the southwestern corner of Union Township,
Montgomery County--a neighborhood _sui generis_, stowed away in the
breaks of Sugar Creek, containing as good, quiet, law-abiding folk as
can be found anywhere outside of Switzerland. My school was a small one
in numbers, but the pupils ranged from four to six feet three in
altitude, and well proportioned. The most advanced class had thumbed
along pretty well through the spelling book. I need not take up your
time with the school, however, for it has nothing at all to do with my
story, excepting merely to explain how I came to be in Balhinch, in the
State of Indiana.
My first sight of Susie Adair was on Sunday at the Methodist prayer
meeting. I was sitting with my back to a window and facing the door of
the log meeting house when she entered. It was July--a hot glary day,
but a steady wind blew cool and sweet from the southwest, bringing in
all sorts of woodland odors. The grasshoppers were chirruping in the
little timothy field hard by, and over in a bit of woodland pasture a
swarm of blue jays were worrying a crow, keeping up an incessant
squeaking and chattering. The dumpy little class leader--the only little
man in Balhinch--had just begun to give out the hymn
"Love is the sweetest bud that blows,
Its beauties never die,
On earth among the saints it grows
And ripens in the sky," &c.,
when Susie came in. Ben Crane was sitting by me. He nudged me with his
elbow and whispered:
"How's that 'ere for poorty?"
I made him no answer, but remained staring at the girl till long after
she had taken her seat. Nature plays strange tricks. Susie, the daughter
of farmer Adair, was as beautiful in the face as any angel could be, and
her form was as perfect as that of the Cnidian Venus. Her motion when
she walked was music, and as she sat in statuesque repose, the
undulations of her queenly form were those of perfect ease, grace and
strength. Her hands were small and taper, a little browned from
exposure, as was also her face. Her hair was the real classic gold, and
her grey eyes were riant with health and content. When her red lips
parted to sing, they discovered small even teeth, as white as ivory. I
can give you no idea of her. Physically she was perfection's self in the
mould of a Venus of the grandest type. Her head, too, was an
intellectual one (though feminine), in the best sense of the word. The
first thought that flashed across my mind was embodied in the words--_A
Venus_--and I still think of her as the best model I ever saw.
"How's that for poorty?" repeated Crane.
"Who is she!" I replied interrogatively.
"She's my jewlarker," said he.
"Your what?"
"My sweetheart."
"What is her name?"
"Susie Adair."
So I came to know her and admire her, and even before that little prayer
meeting was over I loved her. Introductions were an unknown institution
in Balhinch, but I was not long in finding a way to the personal
acquaintance of Susie. I found her remarkably intelligent for one of her
limited opportunities, very fond of reading, sprightly in conversation,
womanly, modest, sweet tempered, and, indeed, altogether charming as
well as superbly beautiful.
As for me, I am an insignificant looking man, and then I was even more
so than now. My hair is terribly stiff and red, you know, and my eyes
are very pale blue, nearly white. My neck is very long and has a large
Adam's apple. I am small and narrow chested, and have slender bow legs.
My teeth are uneven and my nose is pug. I have a very fine thin voice,
decidedly nasal, as you perceive. One thing, however, I am well
educated, polite, and not a bad conversationalist.
Susie was a most entertaining and perplexing study for me from the
start. She treated me with decided consideration and kindness, seemed
deeply interested in my accounts of my travels, asked me many questions
about the old world and good society, sat for hours at a time listening
to me as I read aloud. In fact I felt that I was impressing her deeply,
but she would go with Ben Crane, that long, awkward, ignorant gawk. How
could a young woman of such fine magnetic presence, and endowed with
such genuine, instinctive purity of taste in everything else, bear the
presence of a rough greenhorn like that? Finally I said to myself: she
is kind and good; she cannot bear to slight Ben, though she cares
nothing for him.
What a strange state being in love is! It is like dreaming in the grass.
One hears the flow of the wind--it is the breath of love--one smells the
flowers, and it is the perfume of a young cheek, the sharp fragrance of
blonde curls. What dreams I had in those days! I could scarcely endure
my school to the end of the first three months. Then I gave it up, and
collecting my wages purchased me some fine clothes--that is, fine for
the time and the place. I recollect that suit now, and wonder how a man
of my taste could have borne to wear it. A black coat, a scarlet vest
and white pants, ending with calf boots and a very tall silk hat! If you
should see me dressed that way now you would laugh till your ribs would
hurt. I do not know how true it is, but, from a pretty good source, I
heard that Ben Crane said I looked like a red-headed woodpecker. One
thing I do know, I never saw a woodpecker with a freckled face. I have a
freckled face.
Ben soon recognized me as his rival and treated me with supreme
impertinence, even going so far as to rub his fist under my nose and
swear at me--a thing at which I felt profoundly indignant, and
considering which I was surely justified in sticking a lucifer match
into Ben's six valuable hay stacks one night thereafter. It was a great
fire, and two hundred dollars loss to Ben. Let him keep his fist out
from under my nose.
But I must come to my story, cutting short these preliminaries. It is a
story I never tire of telling, and a story which has elicited
ejaculations from many.
It was a ripe sweet day in the latter part of September--clear, but hazy
and dreamful--a prelude to the Indian summer. I stood before the glass
in my room at 'Squire Jones's, where I boarded, and very carefully
arranged my bright blue neck-tie. Then I combed my hair. I never have
got thoroughly familiar with my hair. I cannot, even now, comb it, while
looking in a glass, without cringing for fear of burning my fingers. The
long, wavy red locks flow through the comb like flames, and underneath
is a gleam of live coals and red hot ashes. Ben Crane said he believed
my head had set his hay stacks a-fire. Maybe it did. I wished that a
stray flash from the same source would kindle the heart of Susie Adair
and heat it until it lay under her Cytherean breasts a puddle of molten
love. I put my silk hat carefully upon my head and wriggled my hands
into a pair of kid gloves; then, walking-stick in hand, I set out to
know my fate at the hands of Susie. My way was across a stubble field in
which the young clover, sown in the spring, displayed itself in a
variety of fantastic modes. Have you ever noticed how much grass is like
water? Some one, Hawthorne, perhaps, has spoken of "a gush of violets,"
and Swinburne, going into one of his musical frenzies, cries:
"Where tides of grass break into foam of flowers."
I have seen pools of clover and streams of timothy; I have stood ankle
deep in shoal blue grass and have watched for hours the liquid ripples
of the red top. I have seen the field sparrows dive into the green waves
of young wheat, and the black starlings wade about in the sink-foil of
southern countries. Grass is a liquid that washes earth's face till it
shines like that of a clean, healthy child. But clover prefers to stand
in pools and eddies, in which oft and oft I have seen the breasts of
meadow larks shine like gold, the while a few sweet notes, like rung
silver, rose and trembled above the trefoil, all woven, in and out,
through the swash of the wind's palpitant currents--a music of
unspeakable influence. Swallows skim the surface of grass just as they
do that of water. When the summer air agitates the smooth bosom of a
broad green meadow field, you will see these little random arrows
glancing along the emerald surface, cutting with barbed wings through
the tossing, bloom-capped waves, thence ricochetting high into the
bright air to whirl and fall again as swiftly as before. Many a time I
have traced streams of grass to their fresh fountains, where jets of
tender foliage and bubbles of tinted flowers welled up from dark, rich
earth, and flowed away, with a velvet rustle and a ripple like blown
floss, to break and recoil and eddy against the dark shadows of a
distant grove. Such a fountain is a place of fragrance and joy. The bees
go thither to get the sweetest honey, and find it a very Hybla. The
butterflies float about it in a dreamful trance, while in the cool,
damp shade of a dock leaf squats a great toad, like a slimy dragon
guarding the gate of a paradise.
As I slowly walked across that stubble field, now and then stepping into
a tuft of clover, out from which a quail would start, whirling away in a
convulsion of flight, I allowed dreams of bliss to steal rosily across
my brain. I scarcely saw the great gold-sharded beetles that hummed and
glanced in the mellow sun-light. I heard like one half asleep, as if far
away, the sharp twitter of the blue bird and the tender piping of the
meadow lark. Susie Adair was all my thought. I recollect that, just as I
climbed the fence at the farther side of the clover field, I saw a white
winged, red headed woodpecker pounce upon and carry off a starry
opal-tinted butterfly, and I thought how sweet it would be if I could
thus steal away into the free regions of space the object of my gentler
passion. But then what wonderful big wings I should have needed, for my
Venus of the hollow of the hill of Balhinch was no airy thing. Her tall,
strong body and magnificent limbs equalled one hundred and forty pounds
avoirdupois! My own weight was about one hundred and twenty.
As I neared Susie's home I began, for the first time in my life, to
suffer from palpitation. The shadow of a doubt floated in the autumn
sun-light. I set my teeth together and resolved not to be faint hearted.
I must go in boldly and plead my cause and win.
When I reached the gate of the Adair farmhouse I had to look straight
over the head of a very large, sanctimonious-faced bull-dog to get a
view of the vine covered porch. This dog looked up at me and smiled
ineffably; then he came to the gate and stood over against me, peeping
between the slats. I hesitated. About this time Ben Crane came out of
the house with a banjo in his hand. He had been playing for Susie. He
was a natural musician.
"'Feared o' the dog, Mr. Woodpecker?" said he. "Begone, Bull!" and he
kicked the big-headed canine aside so that I could go in.
I heard him thrumming on his banjo far down the road as Susie met me at
the door. How wondrously beautiful she was!
"Sit down Mr. ----, and, if you do not care, I'll bring the churn in and
finish getting the butter while we talk."
I was delighted--I was charmed--fascinated. Susie's father had gone to a
distant village, and her mother, a gentle work-worn matron, was in the
other room spinning flax, humming, meantime, snatches of camp meeting
hymns. The sound of that spinning-wheel seemed to me strangely mournful
and sad, but Susie's deep, clear gray eyes and cheerful voice were the
very soul of joyousness, health and youth. She brought in a great
fragrant cedar churn, made to hold six or eight gallons of cream, and
forthwith began her labor. She stood as she worked, and the exercise
throwing her entire body into gentle but well-defined motion, displayed
all the riches of her contour. The sleeves of her calico gown were
rolled up above the elbows, leaving her plump, muscular arms bare, and
her skirt was pinned away from her really small feet and shapely ankles
in such a way as to give one an idea, a suggestion, of supreme innocence
and grace. Her long, crinkled gold hair was unbound, hanging far below
her waist, and shining like silk. Her lips, carmine red, seemed to
overflow with tender utterances.
Ever since that day I have thought churning a kind of sacred, charmingly
blessed work, which ought to be, if really it is not, the pastime of
those delightful beings the ancients called deities. Cream is more
fragrant, more delicious, more potent than nectar or ambrosia. A cedar
churn is more delicately perfumed than any patera of the gods. And, I
say it with reverence, I have seen, swaying lily-like above the churn, a
beauty more perfect than that which bloomed full grown from the bright
focus of the sea's ecstatic travail.
What a talk Susie and I had that day! Slowly, stealthily I crept nearer
and nearer to the subject burning in my heart. I watched Susie closely,
for her face was an enigma to me. I never think of her and of that day
without recalling Baudelaire's dream of a giantess. More happy than the
poet, I really saw my colossal beauty stand full grown before me, but,
like him, I wondered--
* * * "Si son coeur couve une sombre flamme
Aux humides brouillards qui nagent dans ses yeux."
I could not tell, from any outward sign, what was going on in her heart.
No sphinx could have been more utterly calm and mysterious. She had a
most baffling way about her, too. When at last I had reached the point
of a confession of my maddening love, she broke into one of my
charmingest sentences to say--
"Mr. ----, you'd better move farther away from the churn or I might
spatter your clothes."
This, somehow, disconcerted and bothered me. But Susie was so calm and
sweet about it, her gray eyes beamed so mysteriously innocent of any
impropriety, that I soon regained my lost eloquence.
How sharply and indelibly cut in my memory, like intaglios in ivory, the
surroundings of that scene, even to the minutest detail! For instance, I
can see as plainly as then my new silk hat on the floor between my
knees, containing a red handkerchief and a paper of chewing tobacco. I
recall, also, that a slip-trod shoe lay careened to one side near the
centre of the room. The bull-dog came to the door and peeped solemnly in
a time or two. A string of dried pumpkin cuts hung by the fireplace, and
under a small wooden table in one corner were piled a few balls of
"carpet rags." I sat in a very low chair. A picture of George Washington
hung above a small square window. The floor was ash boards uncarpeted. I
heard some chickens clucking and cackling under the house.
Finally, I recollect it as if it were but yesterday, I said:
"I love you, Susie--I love you, and I have loved you ever since I first
saw you!"
How tame the words sound now! but then they came forth in a tremulous
murmur that gave them character and power. Susie looked straight at me
a moment, and I thought I saw a softer light gather in her eyes. Then
she took away the churn dasher and lid and fetched a large bowl from a
cupboard. What a fine golden pile of butter she fished up into the bowl!
I drew my chair somewhat nearer, and watched her pat and roll and
squeeze the plastic mass with the cherry ladle. A little gray kitten
came and rubbed and purred round her. Again the bull-dog peeped in. A
breeze gathered some force and began to ripple pleasantly through the
room. Far away in the fields I heard the quails whistling to each other.
An old cow strolled up the lane by the house and round the corner of the
orchard, plaintively tinkling her bell. Steadily hummed Mrs. Adair's
spinning wheel. I slipped my hat and my chair a little closer to Susie,
and by a mighty effort directed my burning words straight to the point.
I cannot repeat all I said. I would not if I could. Such things are
sacred.
"Susie, I love you, madly, blindly, dearly, truly! O, Susie! will you
love me--will you be my wife?"
Again she turned on me that strange, sweet, half smiling look. Her lips
quivered. The flush on her cheeks almost died out.
"Answer me, Susie, and say you will make me happy."
She walked to the cupboard, put away the bowl of butter and the ladle,
then came back and stood by the churn and me. How indescribably charming
she looked! She smiled strangely and made a motion with her round strong
arms. I answered the movement. I spread wide my arms and half rose to
clasp her to my bosom. A whole life was centred in the emotion of that
moment. Susie's arms missed me and lifted the churn. I sank back into my
chair. How gracefully Susie swayed herself to her immense height, toying
with the ponderous churn held far above her head. I saw a kitten fairly
fly out of the room, its tail as level as a gun barrel; I saw the
bull-dog's face hastily withdraw from the door; I saw the carpet balls,
the pumpkin cuts and the print of Washington all through a perpendicular
cataract of deliciously fragrant buttermilk! I saw my hat fill up to the
brim, with my handkerchief afloat. I heaved an awful sigh and leaped to
my feet. I saw old Mrs. Adair standing in the partition door, with her
arms akimbo, and heard her say--
"W'y, Susan Jane Samantha Ann! What 'pon airth hev ye done?"
And the Venus replied:
"I've been givin' this 'ere little woodpecker a good dose of
buttermilk!"
I seized my hat and shuffled out of the door, feeling the milk gush from
the tops of my boots at each hasty step I made. I ran to the gate, went
through and slammed it after me. As I did so I heard a report like the
closing of a strong steel trap. It was the bull-dog's teeth shutting on
a slat of the gate as he made a dive at me from behind. I smiled grimly,
thinking how I'd taste served in buttermilk.
On my way home I passed Ben Crane's house. He was sitting at a window
playing his banjo, and singing in a stentorian voice:
"O! Woodpecker Jim,
Yer chance is mighty slim!
Jest draw yer red head into yer hole
And there die easy, dern your soul,
O! slim Woodpecker Jim!"
I was so mad that I sweat great drops of pure buttermilk, but over in
the fields the quails whistled just as clear and sweet as ever, and I
heard the wind pouring through the stubble as it always does in autumn!