Part 42 (1/2)

”Sort o',” replied Walky, calmly. ”Here's your health, Joe. I thought you had that fiddle sold before you went to Hopewell arter it?”

”To tell ye the truth, Walky----”

”Don't do it if it hurts ye, Joe. Haw! haw!”

The barkeeper made a wry face and continued:

”That feller I got it for, only put up a part of the price. I thought he was a square sport; but he ain't. When he got a squint at the old fiddle while Hopewell was down here playing for the dance, he was just crazy to buy it. Any old price, he said! After I got it,” proceeded Joe, ruefully, ”he tries to tell me it ain't worth even what I paid for it.”

”Wal--'tain't, is it?” said Walky, bluntly.

”If it's worth a hundred it's worth a hundred and fifty,” said the barkeeper doggedly.

”Ya-as--_if_,” murmured the expressman.

”However, n.o.body's going to get it for any less--believe me! Least of all that Fontaine. I hate these Kanucks, anyway. I know _him_. He's trying to jew me down,” said Joe, angrily.

”Wal, you take it to the city,” advised Walky. ”You kin make yer spec on it there, ye say.”

There was a storm cloud drifting across Old Ti as the expressman climbed to his wagon seat and drove away from the Inn. It had been a very hot day and was now late afternoon--just the hour for a summer tempest.

The tiny waves lapped the loose s.h.i.+ngle along the lake sh.o.r.e. There was the hot smell of over-cured gra.s.s on the uplands. The flower beds along the hilly street which Janice Day mounted after a visit to the Narnays, were quite scorched now.

This street brought Janice out by the Lake View Inn. She, too, saw the threatening cloud and hastened her steps. Sharp lightnings flickered along its lower edge, lacing it with pale blue and saffron. The mutter of the thunder in the distance was like a heavy cannonade.

”Maybe it sounded so years and years ago when the British and French fought over there,” Janice thought. ”How these hills must have echoed to the roll of the guns! And when Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys discharged the guns in a salvo of thanksgiving over Old Ti's capture--Oh! is that you, Nelson? How you startled me.”

For the young schoolmaster had come up the hill behind her at a breathless gait. ”We've got to hurry,” he said. ”That's going to be what Marty would call a 'humdinger' of a storm, Janice.”

”Dear me! I didn't know you were in town,” she said happily.

”We got the last of the hay in this morning,” said the bronzed young fellow, smiling. ”I helped mow away and the elder was kind enough to say that I had done well and could have the rest of the day to myself.

I fancy the shrewd old fellow knew it was about to rain,” and he laughed.

”And how came you down this way?” Janice asked.

”Followed your trail,” laughed Nelson. I went in to Mrs. Beaseley's of course. ”And then at Drugg's I learned you had gone down to see Jim Narnay's folks. But I didn't catch you there. Goodness, Janice, but they are a miserable lot! I shouldn't think you could bear to go there.”

”Oh, Nelson, the poor little baby--it is so sick and it cheers Mrs.

Narnay up a little if I call on her. Besides, Sophie and the little boys are just as cunning as they can be. I can't help sympathizing with them.”

”Do save some of your sympathy for other folks, Janice,” said Nelson, rather ruefully. ”You ought to have seen the blisters I had on my hands the first week or two I was a farmer.”

”Oh, Nelson! That's too bad,” she cried, with solicitude.

”Too late!” he returned, laughing. ”They are callouses now--marks of honest toil. Whew! see that dust-cloud!”

The wind had ruffled the lake in a wide strip, right across to the eastern sh.o.r.e. Whitecaps were dancing upon the surface and the waves ran a long way up the beach. The wind, rus.h.i.+ng ahead of the rain-cloud, caught up the dust in the streets and advanced across the town.

Janice hid her face against the sleeve of her light frock. Nelson led her by the hand as the choking cloud pa.s.sed over. Then the rain, in fitful gusts at first, pelted them so sharply that the girl cried out.