Part 26 (1/2)

'Paints? What ever are you talking about, Em?'

She had bent over her sewing again, and he could not see her face as she answered, 'When Minnie and I were little girls, I reckon we never had any secrets from each other, at all. I know I talked about things to her I never could have told anybody else. She was that way with me, too.

Well, she always said she wanted to paint, and I wanted to play. She was always copying every picture she saw. I remember she did one picture called A yard of Roses, from a calendar. It was so good you couldn't have told the difference. Don't you remember the time she took the prize at the art exhibit at the country fair, with a picture she had copied, called The Storm? One of the judges said it just made him s.h.i.+ver to look at it, it was so real.'

'Come to think of it, I believe I do recollect something about Min having queer notions. I know us boys used to think she was stuck-up.

What did she mean about the vow and about this picture being of you, by her?'

For a moment there was only the little click of her thimble against the needle. Then she said, 'I guess I can't make it clear to you, Jake.

Minnie always did have her own way of putting things. We had lots of fancies, as we used to call them. But I suppose she was thinking about our old dreams. If they'd come true, she might have painted me, sitting like that.'

'It don't look much like you, even when you was young,' was the reply of the man, not given to 'fancies'; 'but what is it about the vow?'

'I don't know,' said his wife shortly.

It was one of the few lies she had ever told her husband. Just why, having told him so much, she couldn't tell him that Minnie Jackson and she had promised each other that, no matter what happened, nothing should keep them from realizing their ambitions, and that each year they would give a report to each other on their birthday, she could not have said. But suddenly her throat contracted and she could not see the patch on the coat.

'How this lamp does smoke!' she said, as she brushed her hand over her eyes.

'Well,' yawned her husband, 'I guess most folks, leastwise most girls, have silly notions when they're young. Who'd ever think to see you now, that you ever had any such ideas? You're a good wife for a farmer, Em.

There ain't a better woman anywhere, than you.'

It was one of the few times in all the years of their marriage that he had praised her. Jacob Black had never been one to question life or to marvel at its wonders. For him, it held no wonders. The spell of life had caught him when he was young. He had 'fallen in love' with Emmeline Mead and he had married her. She had borne him eight children. Five of them had lived. If Jacob Black had thought about it at all, which he did not, he would have said that was the way life went. One was young. Then one grew old. When one was young, one married, and probably there were children.

The wing of romance had brushed him so lightly in its pa.s.sing, that at the time it had brought to him no yearning for an unknown rapture, no wonder at the mystery of life. After twenty-one years, if he had given it any thought whatsoever, he would have said that their marriage 'had turned out well.' Em had been a good wife; she had risen at daylight and worked until after dark. She wasn't foolish about money. She never went to town unless there was something to take her there. She went to church, of course, and when it was her turn, she entertained the Ladies'

Aid. Such recreations were to be expected. Yes, Em had been a good wife.

But then, he had been a good husband. He never drank. He was a church member. He always hired a woman to do the housework, for two weeks, when there was a new baby. He let Em have the b.u.t.ter and chicken money.

The clock struck nine.

'I'm going to bed,' he said, 'there's lots to do to-morrow. Nearly through your mending?'

'No. Anyhow, I guess I'll wait up for John and Victoria to come home.'

'Better not, if you're tired. John may get in early, but probably Vic will be mooning along.'

'What?' she cried. 'What do you mean by that, Jake Black?'

'Say, Em, are you blind? Can't you see there's something between her and Jim? Haven't you noticed that it isn't John he comes to see now? Haven't you seen how Vic spruces up nights when, he's coming over?'

The woman dropped her sewing in her lap. The needle ran into her thumb.

Mechanically, she pulled it out. She was so intent, looking at him, trying to grasp his meaning, that she did not notice the drops of blood which fell on her mending. When she spoke, it was with difficulty.

'O Jake, it can't be. It just can't be.'

'Why can't it?'

'Why, he's not good enough for Victoria.'

'Not good enough? Why, what's the matter with Jim? I never heard a word against him and I've known him ever since he was a little shaver. He's steady as can be, and a hard worker.'