Part 23 (1/2)

”I beg your pardon,” I said, looking up. ”Yes, you don't often have such mild winters on the Cape, Mr. Barlow!”

”No'm, we don't,” said Lovell, ”not very often, ahem!” He moved his chair a peg nearer the gun. ”Quite a--ahem!--quite a little fall of snow we had last night, Miss Hungerford.”

”Any deer tracks? Eh, Lovell?” inquired Grandpa.

”Pa,” said Grandma; ”I wish you'd fill Abigail--seems to me she smells sorter dry.”

”She ain't, for sartin', ma,” replied Grandpa, giving the tea-kettle a shake to verify his a.s.sertions; ”and Rachel's chock full!”

Grandma then gave Grandpa a meaning look, and put her fingers on her lips.

”Well, Cap'n, I saw more rabbit tracks,” replied Lovell, innocently amused at the ludicrousness of the old Captain's speech. ”I did, rather--ahem!--yes, I saw more rabbit tracks--ahem!--ahem!” He gave his chair a desperate hitch gunward. ”I don't suppose they ever do such a thing, where you live, Miss Hungerford, as to go--ahem!--to go sleigh-riding, now, do they, Miss Hungerford?”

”Why, yes,” I said; ”they always do in the winter. I haven't been home through the winter for a year or two past, but I remember what splendid times we used to have.”

I was thinking particularly of a certain snow-fall, that came when I was seventeen years old, and John Cable had just returned from College, with a moustache and patriarchal airs.

Some grinning recollections of the past were also floating through Grandpa's mind. The look of reprehensible mirth was still in his eyes, and he showed his teeth, which gleamed oddly white and strong in contrast with his grizzled countenance.

”I remember”--he began.

”Pa,” said Grandma, with an expressive wink of one eye, and only part of her face visible around the corner of the doorway, through which Madeline had already disappeared; ”pa--I wish you'd come out here a minute, now--I want to see ye.”

”Wall, wall, can't ye see me here, ma? What makes ye so dreadful anxious to see me all of a sudden?” inquired Grandpa. But his face did not lose its thoughtful illumination. ”Wall, as I was a tellin' ye, teacher,” he went on; ”I was only a little shaver then--a little shaver--and my father had one of those 'ere pungs, as we used to call 'em, that he used to ride around in--and he was a dreadful man to swear, my father was, teacher--Lordy, how he would swear!----”

”Pa!” said the great calm voice at the door; ”I'm a waitin' for you to come out, so't I can shet the door.”

”Wall, wall, ma, shet the door if ye want to, I've no objections to havin' the door shet----and we had an old hoss, teacher. Lordy, how lean he was, lean as a skate, and----”

”Bijonah Keeler!”

”Yis, yis, I'm a comin', ma, I'm a comin'.” And wonderful indeed, I thought must have been the tale, which, even under these exasperating circ.u.mstances, kept Grandpa's face a-grin as he ran and shuffled towards the door.

The door was quickly closed behind him by other hands than his own, and then I observed that Lovell's chair had been drawn into frightfully close proximity to his gun.

”I--I think it's pleasanter, that is--I--I sometimes think it's warmer for t-t-two in a sleigh, than--a--'tis--for one, don't you, Miss Hungerford?” said Lovell, and gasped for breath and continued; ”Now, I think of it, you--you wouldn't think of such a thing as going to ride with me to-night, would you, Miss Hungerford? You--you wouldn't think of such a thing, would you now?”

”Why--if you are kind enough to invite me to go sleigh-riding with you, Mr. Barlow?”

”_I_ think so;” said Lovell, grasping his gun, and becoming immediately pale, though composed. ”Yes'm, _I_ think so, certainly, _I_ do.”

”Thank you, I will go with pleasure,” I said.

”Thank you, Miss Hungerford,” said Lovell, rising hurriedly. ”I wish you a pleasant day--_I_ do, with pleasure, and I hope that nothing will happen to prevent!”

And Lovell marched back across the fields as valiantly as a man may, who, on occasions of doubt and peril, takes the precaution to go suitably armed.

During the day the Wallencampers indulged in a mode of recreation, suggestive of that unique sort of inspiration to which they not unfrequently fell victims.

They attached a horse to a boat, a demoralized old boat, which had hitherto occupied a modest place amid the _debris_ surrounding the Ark, and thus equipped, they rode or sailed up and down the lane. It proved a stormy sea, and often, as the boat capsized, the air was rent with screams of mock terror and yells of unaffected delight.