THE HEART OF MILLIE
The Reist farmhouse, always a busy place, was soon rivaling the
proverbial beehive. Mrs. Reist, to whom sentiment was ever a vital,
holy thing, to be treasured and clung to throughout the years, had long
ago, in Amanda's childhood, begun the preparation for the time of the
girl's marriage. After the fashion of olden times the mother had begun
the filling of a Hope Chest for her girl. Just as she instilled into
the youthful mind the homely old-fashioned virtues of honesty,
truthfulness and reverence for holy things which made Amanda, as she
stood on the threshold of a new life, so richly dowered in spiritual
and moral acquisitions, so had the mother laid away in the big wooden
chest fine linens, useful and beautiful and symbolic of the worth of
the bride whose home they were destined to enrich.
But in addition to the precious contents of the Hope Chest many things
were needed for the dowry of the daughter of a prosperous Lancaster
County family. So the evenings and Saturdays of that year became busy
ones for Amanda. Millie helped with much of the plainer sewing and Mrs.
Reist's exquisite tiny stitches enhanced many of the garments.
"Poor Aunt Rebecca," Amanda said one day, "how we miss her now!"
"Yes, ain't?" agreed Millie. "For all her scoldin' she was a good help
still. If she was livin' yet she'd fuss about all the sewin' you're
doin' to get married but she'd pitch right in and help do it."
Philip offered to pull basting threads, but his generosity was not
appreciated. "Go on," Millie told him, "you'd be more bother than
you're worth! Next you'd be pullin' out the sewin'!" He was frequently
chased from the room because of his inappropriate remarks concerning
the trousseau or his declaration that Amanda was spending all the
family wealth by her reckless substitution of silk for muslin.
"You keep quiet," Millie often reproved him. "I guess Amanda dare have
what she wants if your mom says so. If she wants them things she calls
cammysoles made out of silk let her have 'em. She's gettin' married
only once."
"How do you know?" he asked teasingly. "Say, Millie, I thought a
camisole is a dish you make rice pudding in."
"Ach, that shows you don't know everything yet, even if you do go to
Lancaster to school!" And he was driven from the room in laughing
defeat.
It is usually conceded that to the prospective bride belongs the
privilege of naming the day of her marriage, but it seemed to Amanda
that Millie and Philip had as much to do with it as she. Each one had a
favorite month. Phil's suggestion finally decided the month. "Sis,
you're so keen about flowers, why don't you make it a spring wedding?
About cherry blossom time would be the thing."
"So it would. We could have it in the orchard."
"On a nice rainy day in May," he said.
"Pessimist! It doesn't rain every day in May!"
There followed happy, excited times when the matter of a house was
discussed. Those were wonderful hours in which the two hunted a nest
that would be near enough to the city for Martin's daily commuting and
yet have so much of the country about it as to boast of green grass and
space for flowers. It was found at length, a little new bungalow
outside the city limits in a residential section where gardens and
trees beautified the entire street.
"Do you know," Mrs. Reist said to Uncle Amos one day, "there's another
little house for sale in that street. If it wasn't for breakin' up the
home for you and Millie I'd buy it and Philip and I could move in
there. It would be nice and handy for him. I'm gettin' tired of such a
big house. There I could do the work myself. There'd be room for you to
come with us, but I wouldn't need Millie. I don't like to send her off
to some other people. We had her so long a'ready, and she's a good,
faithful worker. Ach, I guess I'll have to give up thinkin' about doin'
anything like that."
"Well, well, now let me think once." Uncle Amos scratched his head.
Then an inscrutable smile touched his lips. "Well, now," he said after
a moment's meditation, "now I don't see why it can't be arranged some
way. There's more'n one way sometimes to do things. I don't know--I
don't know--but I think I can see a way we could manage that--
providin'--ach, we'll just wait once, mebbe it'll come out right."
Mrs. Reist looked at her brother. What did he mean? He stammered and
smiled like a foolish schoolboy. Poor Amos, she thought, how hard he
had worked all his life and how little pleasure he had seemed to get
out of his days! He was growing old, too, and would soon be unable to
do the work on a big farm.
But Uncle Amos seemed spry enough several days later when he and Millie
entered the big market wagon to go to Lancaster with the farm products.
They left the Reist farmhouse early in the morning, a cold, gray winter
day.
"Say, Millie," he said soon after they began the drive, "I want to talk
with you."
"Well," she answered dryly, "what's to keep you from doin' so? Here I
am. Go on."
"Ach, Millie, now don't get obstreperous! Manda's mom would like to
sell the farm and move to Lancaster to a little house. Then she
wouldn't need me nor you."
"What? Are you sure, Amos?"
"Sure! She told me herself. That would leave us out a home. For I don't
want to live in no city and set down evenings and look at houses or
trolley cars. You can hire out to some other people, of course."
"Oh, yea! Amos. What in the world--I don't want to live no place else."
"Well, now, wait once, Millie. I got a plan all fixed up, something I
wished long a'ready I could do, only I hated to bust up the farm for my
sister. Millie--ach, don't you know what I mean? Let's me and you get
married!"
Millie drew her heavy blanket shawl closer around her and pulled her
black woolen cap farther over her forehead, then she turned and looked
at Amos, but his face was in shadow; the feeble oil lamp of the market
wagon sent scant light inside.
"Now, Amos, you say that just because you take pity for me and want to
fix a home for me, ain't?"
"Ach, yammer, no!" came the vehement reply. "I liked you long a'ready,
Millie, and used to think still, 'There's a girl I'd like to marry!'"
"Why, Amos," came the happy answer, "and I liked you, too, long
a'ready! I used to think still to myself, 'I don't guess I'll ever get
married but if I do I'd like a man like Amos.'"
Then Uncle Amos suddenly demonstrated his skill at driving one-handed
and something more than the blanket-shawl was around Millie's
shoulders.
"Ach, my," she said after a while, "to think of it--me, a hired girl,
to get a nice, good man like you for husband!"
"And me, a fat dopple of a farmer to get a girl like you! I'll be good
to you, Millie, honest! You just see once if I won't! You needn't work
so hard no more. I'll buy the farm off my sister and we'll sell some of
the land and stop this goin' to market. It's too hard work. We can take
it easier; we're both gettin' old, ain't, Millie?" He leaned over and
kissed her again.
"You know," he said blissfully, "I used to think still this here
kissin' business is all soft mush, but--why--I think it's all right.
Don't you?"
"Ach," she laughed as she pushed his face away gently. "They say still
there ain't no fools like old ones. I guess we're some."
"All right, we don't care, long as we like it. Here," he spoke to the
horse, "giddap with you! Abody'd think you was restin' 'stead of goin'
to market. We'll be late for sure this morning." His mittened hands
flapped the reins and the horse quickened his steps.
"Ha, ha," the man laughed, "I know what ails old Bill! The kissin'
scared him. He never heard none before in this market wagon. No wonder
he stands still. Here's another for good measure."
"Ach, Amos, I think that's often enough now! Anyhow for this morning
once."
"Ha, ha," he laughed. "Millie, you're all right! That's what you are!"
That evening at supper Philip asked suddenly, "What ails you two, Uncle
Amos, you and Millie? I see you grin every time you look at each
other."
"Well, nothin' ails me except a bad case of love that's been stickin'
in me this long while and now it's broke out. Millie's caught it too."
"Well, I declare!" Amanda was quick to detect his meaning. "You two
darlings! I'm so glad!"
"Ach," the hired girl said, blushing rosy, "don't go make so much fuss
about it. Ain't we old enough to get married?"
"I'm glad, Millie," Mrs. Reist told her. "Amos just needs a wife like
you. He worried me long a'ready, goin' on all alone. Now I know he'll
have some one to look out for him."
"Finis! You're done for!" Phil said. "Lay down your arms and surrender.
But say, that makes it bully for Mother and me. We can move to
Lancaster now. May we run out to the farm and visit you, Millie?"
"Me? Don't ask me. It's Amos's."
"Millie, you goose," the man said happily, "when you marry me
everything I have will be yours, too."
"Well, did I ever! I don't believe I'll know how to think about it that
way. This nice big house won't seem like part mine."
"It'll be _ours_" Uncle Amos said, smiling at the word.
And so it happened that the preparation of another wedding outfit was
begun in the Reist farmhouse.
"I don't need fancy things like Amanda," declared the hired girl. "I
wear the old style o' clothes yet. And for top things, why, I made up
my mind I'm goin' to wear myself plain and be a Mennonite."
"Plain," said Mrs. Reist. "Won't Amos be glad! He likes you no matter
what clothes you wear, but it's so much nicer when you can both go to
the same church. He'll be glad if you turn a Mennonite."
"Well, I'm goin' to be one. So I won't want much for my weddin' in
clothes, just some plain suits and bonnets and shawl. But I got no
chest ready like Amanda has. I never thought I'd need a Hope Chest.
When I was little I got knocked around, but as soon as I could earn
money I saved a little all the time and now I got a pretty good bit
laid in the bank. I can take that and get me some things I need."
Mrs. Reist laid her hands on the shoulders of the faithful hired girl.
"Never mind, Millie, you'll have your chest! We'll go to Lancaster and
buy what you want. Amos got his share of our mother's things when we
divided them and he has a big chest on the garret all filled with
homespun linen and quilts and things that you can use. That will all be
yours."
"Mine? I can't hardly believe it. You couldn't be nicer to me if you
was my own mom. And I ain't forgettin' it neither! I said to Amos we
won't get married till after Amanda and when you and Phil are all fixed
in your new house. Then we'll go to the preacher and get it done. We
don't want no fuss, just so we get married, that's all we want. It
needn't be done fancy."