Part 28 (1/2)

Milford began to ease the boy to the ground. ”I must bid you good evening here,” he said.

”Won't you come to the house to supper?”

”No. I'll go and eat at a table where no restraint is blunt and where no experiment is a failure.”

”I have offended you,” she said, taking the boy by the hand. ”And I didn't mean it, I'm sure. I hope you don't think that I would say a word against her. We are all fond of her, I'm sure. But we are all interested in you.”

”In me? Who the--the deuce am I? What cause have you to be interested in me? You are not interested in me, except as a sort of freak--a mud-turtle, caught in the lake, viewed by woman with their 'ahs' and 'ohs,' standing back holding their skirts. I know that woman. She is worth----”

”I thought you said you didn't know her till she came out here?”

”I said I'd never spoken to her.”

”Know her but had never spoken to her. The plot curdles. Really, Mr.

Milford, what I said was simply to draw you out. I don't know a thing against her; I don't think she's a failure. Now tell me what you know. I am hungry for something of interest; I'm tired to death of this everlasting market report. If she and you have been mixed up in a romance, tell me, please. Bobbie, don't pull at me. I'm going in a moment.”

”The ripening fruit of a romance,” said Milford, putting his hand on the boy's head. ”Isn't that enough for you?”

”The fruit is a tender care; the bud a careless pleasure,” she replied.

”Tell me about it--now. I might not see you again.”

”Then you will soon forget.”

”Oh, no, I can't forget you. You have had a strong influence on me--for good, I am sure. You have some n.o.ble purpose, hidden away, and when we meet one with a n.o.ble purpose we feel stronger, though we may not know what that purpose is. I long to do something in the world, too----”

”Then love your husband,” said the tactless man.

”What are you saying? I do love him.”

”If you love him, you have a n.o.ble purpose.”

”But who are you to talk so morally?”

”A man who has seen so much vice that he would like to see virtue.

There's my road,” he said, pointing to the gate. ”I must bid you good-bye.”

CHAPTER XIX.

A WOMAN'S THREAT.

A cow that had been hurt by a falling tree went limping down the road, and Milford, looking at her, said that she pictured the pa.s.sing of time.

And when at evening he saw her again, he said that she was the same hour, pa.s.sing twice. In the woods he met the girl from the poor-house, and she told him that Mrs. Blakemore was gone. One afternoon Mrs. Stuvic sent for him, and when he went she scolded him for not having come sooner to lighten the dark hour of her loneliness. She was afraid of solitude. In the bustle of a boarding-house, in fault-finding, in all annoyances, there was life, with no time to muse upon the soul's fall of the year; but in the empty rooms, the quiet yard, the hushed piano, there was a mocking stillness, the companion of death. She hated death.

It had a cold grip, and old Lewson had proved that there was no breaking away from it. To her it was not generous Nature's humane leveler; it was vicious Nature giving one's enemies an opportunity to exult. She declared that if all her enemies were dead, she would not oppose death.

A woman in the neighborhood had sworn that she would drag a dead cat over her grave; she was a spiteful wretch, and she would do it. Years ago there had been a fight over a line fence, and Mrs. Stuvic had won the suit, hence the only proper thing to do was to wait till she was buried and then to drag a dead cat over her grave. A terrible triumph!