Part 11 (2/2)

”Yes, you have,” said Jimmy. ”Always, been a thousand times too good to me. But you can't help here. I'm up agin it alone, but put this in your pipe, and smoke it good and brown, if you go, I go. I don't stay here without you.”

”Then it's up to ye na to make it impossible for me to stay,” said Dannie. ”After this, I'll try to be carefu'. I've had no guard on my lips. I've said whatever came into my heid.”

The supper bell clanged sharply a second time.

”That manes more Hivin on the Wabash,” said Jimmy. ”Wish I had a bracer before I face it.”

”How long has it been, Jimmy?” asked Dannie.

”Etarnity!” replied Jimmy briefly.

Dannie stood thinking, and then light broke. Jimmy was always short of money in summer. When trapping was over, and before any crops were ready, he was usually out of funds. Dannie hesitated, and then he said, ”Would a small loan be what ye need, Jimmy?”

Jimmy's eyes gleamed. ”It would put new life into me,” he cried.

”Forgive me, Dannie. I am almost crazy.”

Dannie handed over a coin, and after supper Jimmy went to town. Then Dannie saw his mistake. He had purchased peace for himself, but what about Mary?

Chapter VI

THE HEART OF MARY MALONE

”This is the job that was done with the reaper, If we hustle we can do it ourselves, Thus securing to us a little cheaper, The bread and pie upon our pantry shelves.

Eat this wheat, by and by, On this beautiful Wabash sh.o.r.e, Drink this rye, by and by, Eat and drink on this beautiful sh.o.r.e.”

So sang Jimmy as he drove through the wheat, oats and rye accompanied by the clacking machinery. Dannie stopped stacking sheaves to mop his warm, perspiring face and to listen. Jimmy always with an eye to the effect he was producing immediately broke into wilder parody:

”Drive this mower, a little slower, On this beautiful Wabash sh.o.r.e, Cuttin' wheat to buy our meat, Cuttin' oats, to buy our coats, Also pants, if we get the chance.

By and by, we'll cut the rye, But I bet my hat I drink that, I drink that.

Drive this mower a little slower, In this wheat, in this wheat, by and by.”

The larks scolded, fluttering over head, for at times the reaper overtook their belated broods. The bobolinks danced and chattered on stumps and fences, in an agony of suspense, when their nests were approached, and cried pitifully if they were destroyed. The chewinks flashed from the ground to the fences and trees, and back, crying ”Che-wink?” ”Che-wee!” to each other, in such excitement that they appeared to be in danger of flirting off their long tails. The quail ran about the shorn fields, and excitedly called from fence riders to draw their flocks into the security of Rainbow Bottom.

Frightened hares bounded through the wheat, and if the cruel blade sheared into their nests, Dannie gathered the wounded and helpless of the scattered broods in his hat, and carried them to Mary.

Then came thres.h.i.+ng, which was a busy time, but after that, through the long hot days of late July and August, there was little to do afield, and fis.h.i.+ng was impossible. Dannie grubbed fence corners, mended fences, chopped and corded wood for winter, and in spare time read his books. For the most part Jimmy kept close to Dannie. Jimmy's temper never had been so variable. Dannie was greatly troubled, for despite Jimmy's protests of devotion, he flared at a word, and sometimes at no word at all. The only thing in which he really seemed interested was the c.o.o.n skin he was dressing to send to Boston. Over that he worked by the hour, sometimes with earnest face, and sometimes he raised his head, and let out a whoop that almost frightened Mary. At such times he was sure to go on and give her some new detail of the hunt for the fifty c.o.o.ns, that he had forgotten to tell her before.

He had been to the hotel, and learned the Thread Man's name and address, and found that he did not come regularly, and no one knew when to expect him; so when he had combed and brushed the fur to its finest point, and worked the skin until it was velvet soft, and bleached it until it was muslin white, he made it into a neat package and sent it with his compliments to the Boston man. After he had waited for a week, he began going to town every day to the post office for the letter he expected, and coming home much worse for a visit to Casey's. Since plowing time he had asked Dannie for money as he wanted it, telling him to keep an account, and he would pay him in the fall. He seemed to forget or not to know how fast his bills grew.

Then came a week in August when the heat invaded even the cool retreat along the river. Out on the highway pa.s.sing wheels rolled back the dust like water, and raised it in clouds after them. The rag weeds hung wilted heads along the road. The goldenrod and purple ironwort were dust-colored and dust-choked. The trees were thirsty, and their leaves shriveling. The river bed was bare its width in places, and while the Kingfisher made merry with his family, and rattled, feasting from Abram Johnson's to the Gar-hole, the Black Ba.s.s sought its deep pool, and lay still. It was a rare thing to hear it splash in those days.

The p.r.i.c.kly heat burned until the souls of men were tried. Mary slipped listlessly about or lay much of the time on a couch beside a window, where a breath of air stirred. Despite the good beginning he had made in the spring, Jimmy slumped with the heat and exposures he had risked, and was hard to live with.

Dannie was not having a good time himself. Since Jimmy's wedding, life had been all grind to Dannie, but he kept his reason, accepted his lot, and ground his grist with patience and such cheer as few men could have summoned to the aid of so poor a cause. Had there been any one to notice it, Dannie was tired and heat-ridden also, but as always, Dannie sank self, and labored uncomplainingly with Jimmy's problems. On a burning August morning Dannie went to breakfast, and found Mary white and nervous, little prepared to eat, and no sign of Jimmy.

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