Why remain unappropriated blessings? Why waste your sweetness on
the desert air? Somewhere there is a heart that beats for you
alone. He may be on our list. We have bankers, brokers,
clergymen, lawyers, merchants, farmers,—
“Farmers!” said Tekla, thoughtfully.
—machinists, carpenters, masons, and others. Every one of our
clients is a worthy, honorable gentleman who wants a wife. If
you will send $1 and your photograph, we will enter your name
upon our records.
Tekla read and re-read this advertisement. “Only a dollar,—that is not
so much. And they said farmers.”
She raised her eyes to the picture she had pinned up on the wall.
“A farm—and a farmer, and some cows yet, and chickens. A house like
that, and two pigs and two horses and a kitchen all over white
paint—with a yellow floor—”
She hesitated, looked at the picture again doubtfully, and continued.
“It stands in the advertisement that there should be a farmer. I will do
it! I will send yet one dollar.”
Tekla had lived under the influence of Miss Esther so long that whatever
she did was more or less tinged with the old-fashioned fineness which
characterized her large-hearted, gentle-minded mistress. Therefore,
after a considerable amount of earnest effort, she produced this letter:
WHITFIELD, June 8th.
DEAR SIR,—I have read your advertisement and would say that I
inclose herewith one dollar. Please enter my name on your
records, and I would like a farmer.
The farm must contain many acres, also many cows, pigs, sheep,
and a donkey. But there must be no bees, as I do not enjoy
stinging.
I have never lived on a farm, but I have a picture of one, and I
am sure it will be good. I have lived with Miss Esther for seven
years and she has trusted me with the care of her large house,
and she says I am too good for James, who drives for the Doctor.
So please, Dear Sir, if among your worthy and honorable
gentlemen there is a farmer with a farm which I have described,
I should be glad to hear from you by return of post.
Yours to Command,
TEKLA KLEIN.
P. S.—My Mother is dead.
Tekla carefully copied the address given in the advertisement, folded
her letter, and inclosed it in the envelope. Then she took from the top
drawer of the old dresser, which stood in the kitchen closet, a new
dollar bill, which Major Bradford had given her on his last visit. That
was the day, Tekla remembered, when she had taken particular pains with
the brushing of his uniform—it was the day of the dedication of the
soldiers’ monument. She regarded the new bill with real affection. She
had had it more than a year. For a moment she hesitated. What if the
farmer were not forthcoming in response to her request? But before her
hung the picture of the farmhouse, the horses, cows, chickens—not one
single bee was visible.
Tekla’s sense of justice was such that she felt a certain responsibility
to Miss Esther for the spending of her wages, but surely, she thought,
with this particular dollar she had every right to do as she chose.
Therefore, trusting that the end would justify the means, she neatly
folded the bill and placed it carefully with the letter in the already
stamped and addressed envelope, and sealed it.
And so, as we said at first, if Lieutenant Adams had not sent the cast
to his cousin, and if Michael had not been absent the day it came, and
if Miss Esther had not in her impatience insisted upon Tekla’s opening
the box, the little German girl would not have seen the picture of her
farm, the letter would not have been written, Adolf Hecksher would never
have come to Whitfield, this story would never have been written—and
what would you have done then?