Part 12 (1/2)
All this, if it came to the attention of Anson at all, was laid to the schooling the girl had had.
”Of course it'll seem a little slow to you, Flaxie, but harvestin' is comin' on soon, an' then things'll be a little more lively.”
But Gearheart was not so slow-witted. He had had sisters and girl cousins, and knew ”the symptoms,” as Mrs. Green would have put it. He noticed that when Flaxen read her letters to them there was one which she carefully omitted. He knew that this was the letter which meant the most to her. He saw how those letters affected her, and thought he had divined in what way.
One day when Flaxen, after reading her letters, sprang up and ran into her bedroom; her eyes filled with sudden tears, Gearheart crooked his finger at Ans, and they went out to the barn together.
It was nearly one o'clock on an intolerable day peculiar to the Dakota plain. A frightfully hot, withering, and powerful wind was abroad. The thermometer stood nearly a hundred in the shade, and the wind, so far from being a relief, was suffocating because of its heat and the dust it swept along with it.
The heavy-headed grain and russet gra.s.s writhed and swirled as if in agony, and dashed high in waves of green and yellow. The corn-leaves had rolled up into long cords like the lashes of a whip, and beat themselves into tatters on the dry, smooth spot their blows had made beneath them; they seemed ready to turn to flame in the pitiless, furnace-like blast. Everywhere in the air was a silver-white, impalpable mist, which gave to the cloudless sky a whitish cast. The glittering gulls were the only living things that did not move listlessly and did not long for rain. They soared and swooped, exulting in the sounding wind; now throwing themselves upon it, like a swimmer, then darting upward with miraculous ease, to dip again into the s.h.i.+ning, hissing, tumultuous waves of the gra.s.s.
Along the roads prodigious trains of dust rose hundreds of feet in the air, and drove like vast caravans with the wind. So powerful was the blast that men hesitated about going out with carriages, and everybody watched feverishly, expecting to see fire break out on the prairie and sweep everything before it. Work in the fields had stopped long before dinner, and the farmers waited, praying or cursing, for the wheat was just at the right point to be blighted.
As the two men went out to the shed side by side, they looked out on the withering wheat-stalks and corn-leaves with gloomy eyes.
”Another day like this, an' they won't be wheat enough in this whole county to make a cake,” said Anson, with a calm intonation, which after all betrayed the anxiety he felt. They sat down in the wagon-shed near the horses' mangers. They listened to the roar of the wind and the pleasant sound of the horses eating their hay, a good while before either of them spoke again. Finally Bert said sullenly:
”We can't put up hay such a day as this. You couldn't haul it home under lock an' key while this infernal wind is blowin'. It's gittin'
worse, if anythin'.”
Anson said nothing, but waited to hear what Bert had brought him out here for. Bert speared away with his knife at a strip of board. Anson sat on a wagon-tongue, his elbows on his knees, looking intently at the grave face of his companion. The horses ground cheerily at the hay.
”Ans, we've got to send Flaxen back to St. Peter; she's so homesick she don't know what to do.”
Ans' eyes fell.
”I know it. I've be'n hopin' she'd git over that, but it's purty tough on her, after bein' with the young folks in the city f'r a year, to come back here on a farm.” He did not finish for a moment. ”But she can't stand it. I'd looked ahead to havin' her here till September, but I can't stand it to see her cryin' like she did to-day. We've got to give up the idee o' her livin' here. I don't see any other way but to sell out an' go back East somewhere.”
Bert saw that Anson was still ignorant of the real state of affairs, but thought he would say nothing for the present.
”Yes: that's the best thing we can do. We'll send her right back, an'
take our chances on the crops. We can git enough to live on an' keep her at school, I guess.”
They sat silent for a long time, while the wind tore round the shed, Bert spearing at the stick, and Anson watching the hens as they vainly tried to navigate in the wind. Finally Anson spoke:
”The fact is, Bert, this ain't no place f'r a woman, anyway--such a woman as Flaxen's gittin' to be. They ain't nothin' goin' on, nothin'
to see 'r hear. You can't expect a girl to be contented with this country after she's seen any other. No trees; no flowers; jest a lot o'
little shanties full o' flies.”
”I knew all that, Ans, a year ago. I knew she'd never come back here, but I jest said it's the thing to do--give her a chance, if we don't have a cent; now let's go back to the house an' tell her she needn't stay here if she don't want to.”
”Wha' d' ye s'pose was in that letter?”
”Couldn't say. Some girl's description of a pic-nic er somethin'.” Bert was not yet ready to tell what he knew. When they returned to the house the girl was still invisible, in her room. Mrs. Green was busy clearing up the dinner-dishes.
”I don't know's I ever see such a wind back to Michigan. Seems as if it 'u'd blow the hair off y'r head.”