A POINT OF KNUCKLING-DOWN
Emarine went along the narrow hall and passed through the open door. There was something in her carriage that suggested stubbornness. Her small body had a natural backward sway, and the decision with which she set her heels upon the floor had long ago caused the readers of character in the village to aver that “Emarine Endey was contrairier than any mule.”
She wore a brown dress, a gray shawl folded primly around her shoulders, and a hat that tried in vain to make her small face plain. There was a frill of white, cheap lace at her slender throat, fastened in front with a cherry ribbon. Heavy gold earrings with long, shining pendants reached almost to her shoulders. They quivered and glittered with every movement.
Emarine was pretty, in spite of many freckles and the tightness with which she brushed her hair from her face and coiled it in a sleek knot at the back of her head. “Now, be sure you get it just so slick, Emarine,” her mother would say,watching her steadily while she combed and brushed and twisted her long tresses.
As Emarine reached the door her mother followed her down the hall from the kitchen. The house was old, and two or three loose pieces in the flooring creaked as she stepped heavily upon them.
“Oh, say, Emarine!”
“Well?”
“You get an’ bring home a dollar’s worth o’ granylated sugar, will you?”
“Well.”
“An’ a box o’ ball bluin’. Mercy, child! Your dress-skirt sags awful in the back. Why don’t you run a tuck in it?”
Emarine turned her head over her shoulder with a birdlike movement, and bent backward, trying to see the offensive sag.
“Can’t you pin it up, maw?”
“Yes, I guess. Have you got a pin? Why, Emarine Endey! If ever I see in all my born days! What are you a-doin’ with a red ribbon on you—an’ your Uncle Herndon not cold in his grave yet! A fine spectickle you’d make o’ yourself, a-goin’ the length an’ the breadth o’ the town with that thing a-flarin’ on you. You’ll disgrace this whole fambly yet! I have to keep watch o’ you like a two-year-old baby. Now, you get an’ take it right off o’ you; an’ don’tyou let me ketch you a-puttin’ it on again till a respectful time after he’s be’n dead. I never hear tell o’ such a thing.”
“I don’t see what a red ribbon’s got to do with Uncle Herndon’s bein’ dead,” said Emarine.
“Oh, you don’t, aigh? Well,Isee. You act as if you didn’t have no feelin’.”
“Well, goin’ without a red ribbon won’t make me feel any worse, will it, maw?”
“No, it won’t. Emarine, what does get into you to act so tantalizin’? I guess it’ll look a little better. I guess the neighbors won’t talk quite so much. You can see fer yourself how they talk about Mis’ Henspeter because she wore a rose to church before her husband had be’n dead a year. All she had to say fer herself was that she liked flowers, an’ didn’t sense it ’u’d be any disrespect to her husband to wear it—seein’s he’d always liked ’em, too. They all showed her ’n a hurry what they thought about it. She’s got narrow borders on all her han’kachers, too, a’ready.”
“Why don’t you stay away from such people?” said Emarine. “Old gossips! You know I don’t care what the neighbors say—or think, either.”
“Well,Ido. The land knows they talk a plenty even without givin’ ’em anything to talk about. You get an’ take that red ribbon off o’ you.”
“Oh, I’ll take it off if you want I sh’u’d.” She unfastened it deliberately and laid it on a little table. She had an exasperating air of being unconvinced and of complying merely for the sake of peace.
She gathered her shawl about her shoulders and crossed the porch.
“Emarine!”
“Well?”
“Who’s that a-comin’ over the hill path? I can’t make out the dress. It looks some like Mis’ Grandy, don’t it?”
Emarine turned her head. Her eyelids quivered closer together in an effort to concentrate her vision on the approaching guest.
“Well, I never!” exclaimed her mother, in a subdued but irascible tone. “There you go—a-lookin’ right square at her, when I didn’t want that she sh’u’d know we saw her! It does seem to me sometimes, Emarine, that you ain’t got good sense.”
“I’d just as soon she knew we saw her,” said Emarine, unmoved. “It’s Miss Presly, maw.”
“Oh, land o’ goodness! That old sticktight? She’ll stay all day if she stays a minute. Set an’ set! An’ there I’ve just got the washin’ all out on the line, an’ she’ll tell the whole town we wear underclo’s made out o’ unbleached muslin!Are you sure it’s her? It don’t look overly like her shawl.”
“Yes, it’s her.”
“Well, go on an’ stop an’ talk to her, so ’s to give me a chance to red up some. Don’t ferget the ball bluin’, Emarine.”
Emarine went down the path and met the visitor just between the two tall lilac trees, whose buds were beginning to swell.
“Good mornin’, Miss Presly.”
“Why, good mornin’, Emarine. Z’ your maw to home?”
“Yes ’m.”
“I thought I’d run down an’ set a spell with her, an’ pass the news.”
Emarine smiled faintly and was silent.
“Ain’t you goin’ up town pretty early fer washday?”
“Yes ’m.”
“I see you hed a beau home from church las’ night.”
Emarine’s face flushed; even her ears grew rosy.
“Well, I guess he’s a reel nice young man, anyways, Emarine. You needn’t to blush so. Mis’ Grandy was a-sayin’ she thought you’d done offul well to git him. He owns the house an’ lot they live in, an’ he’s got five hunderd dollars in the bank. I reckon he’ll have to live with theol’ lady, though, when he gits married. They do say she’s turrable hard to suit.”
Emarine lifted her chin. The gold pendants glittered like diamonds.
“It don’t make any difference to me whuther she’s hard to suit or easy,” she said. “I’ll have to be goin’ on now. Just knock at the front door, Miss Presly.”
“Oh, I can go right around to the back, just as well, an’ save your maw the trouble o’ comin’ to the door. If she’s got her washin’ out, I can stoop right under the clo’s line.”
“Well, we like to have our comp’ny come to the front door,” said Emarine, dryly.
It was a beautiful morning in early spring. The alders and the maples along the hill were wrapped in reddish mist. The saps were mounting through delicate veins. Presently the mist would quicken to a pale green as the young leaves unfolded, but as yet everything seemed to be waiting. The brown earth had a fresh, woody smell that caused the heart to thrill with a vague sense of ecstasy—of some delight deep hidden and inexplicable. Pale lavender “spring beauties” stood shyly in groups or alone, in sheltered places along the path. There was even, here and there, a trillium—or white lily, as the children called it—shivering on its slender stem. There were old stumps, too, hollowed out by long-spentflames into rustic urns, now heaped to their ragged rims with velvet moss. On a fence near a meadow-lark was pouring out its few, but full and beautiful, notes of passion and desire. Emarine paused to listen. Her heart vibrated with exquisite pain to the ravishment of regret in those liquid tones.
“Sounds as if he was sayin’—‘Sweet—oh—Sweet—my heart is breaking!’” she said; and then with a kind of shame of the sentiment in such a fancy, she went on briskly over the hill. Her heels clicked sharply on the hard road.
Before she reached the long wooden stairs which led from the high plateau down to the one street of Oregon City, Emarine passed through a beautiful grove of firs and cedars. Already the firs were taking on their little plushy tufts of pale green, and exuding a spicy fragrance. Occasionally a last year’s cone drew itself loose and sunk noiselessly into a bed of its own brown needles. A little way from the path a woodpecker clung to a tree, hammering into the tough bark with its long beak. As Emarine approached, it flew heavily away, the undersides of its wings flashing a scarlet streak along the air.
As her eyes ceased following its flight, she became aware that some one was standing in the path, waiting. A deep, self-conscious blush swept over her face and throat. “Emarine never doesanything up by halves,” her mother was wont to declare. “When she blushes, sheblushes!”
She stepped slowly toward him with a sudden stiff awkwardness.
“Oh—you, is it, Mr. Parmer?” she said, with an admirable attempt—but an attempt only—at indifference.
“Yes, it’s me,” said the young fellow, with an embarrassed laugh. With a clumsy shuffle he took step with her. Both faces were flaming. Emarine could not lift her eyes from their contemplation of the dead leaves in her path—yet she passed a whole company of “spring beauties” playing hide-and-seek around a stump, without seeing them. Her pulses seemed full of little hammers, beating away mercilessly. Her fingers fumbled nervously with the fringes on her shawl.
“Don’t choo want I sh’u’d pack your umberell fer yuh?” asked the young man, solemnly.
“Why—yes, if you want.”
It was a faded thing she held toward him, done up rather baggily, too; but he received it as reverently as if it had been a twenty-dollar silk one with a gold handle.
“Does your mother know I kep’ yuh comp’ny home from church last night?”
“Unh-hunh.”
“What ’id she say?”
“She didn’t say much.”
“Well, what?”
“Oh, not much.” Emarine was rapidly recovering her self-possession. “I went right in an’ up an’ told her.”
“Well, why can’t choo tell me what she said? Emarine, yuh can be the contrairiest girl when yuh want.”
“Can I?” She flashed a coquettish glance at him. She was quite at her ease by this time, although the color was still burning deep in her cheeks. “I sh’u’dn’t think you’d waste so much time on contrairy people, Mr. Parmer.”
“Oh, Emarine, go on an’ tell me!”
“Well”—Emarine laughed mirthfully—“she put the backs of her hands on her hips—this way!” She faced him suddenly, setting her arms akimbo, the shawl’s fringes quivering over her elbows; her eyes fairly danced into his. “An’ she looked at me a long time; then she says—‘Hunh!You—leetle—heifer!You think you’re some pun’kins, don’t you? A-havin’ a beau home from meetin’.”
Both laughed hilariously.
“Well, what else ’id she say?”
“I don’t believe you want to know. Do you—sure?”
“I cross my heart.”
“Well—she said it c’u’dn’t happen more’n ev’ry once ’n so often.”
“Pshaw!”
“She did.”
The young man paused abruptly. A narrow, unfrequented path led through deeper woods to the right.
“Emarine, let’s take this catecornered cut through here.”
“Oh, I’m afraid it’s longer—an’ it’s washday, you know,” said Emarine, with feeble resistance.
“We’ll walk right fast. Come on. George! But it’s nice and sweet in here, though!”
They entered the path. It was narrow and the great trees bent over and touched above them.
There was a kind of soft lavender twilight falling upon them. It was very still, save for the fluttering of invisible wings and the occasional shrill scream of a blue-jay.
“Itissweet in here,” said Emarine.
The young man turned quickly, and with a deep, asking look into her lifted eyes, put his arms about her and drew her to him. “Emarine,” he said, with passionate tenderness. And then he was silent, and just stood holding her crushed against him, and looking down on her with his very soul in his eyes. Oh, but a man who refrains from much speech in such an hour has wisdom straight from the gods themselves!
After a long silence Emarine lifted her head and smiled trustfully into his eyes. “It’s washday,” she said, with a flash of humor.
“So it is,” he answered her, heartily. “An’ I promised yuh we’d hurry up—an’ I alwus keep my promises. But first—Emarine—”
“Well?”
“Yuh must say somethin’ first.”
“Say what, Mr. Parmer?”
“‘Mr. Parmer!’” His tone and his look were reproachful. “Can’t choo say Orville?”
“Oh, I can—if you want I sh’u’d.”
“Well, I do want choo sh’u’d, Emarine. Now, yuh know what else it is I want choo sh’u’d say before we go on.”
“Why, no, I don’t—hunh-unh.” She shook her head, coquettishly.
“Emarine”—the young fellow’s face took on a sudden seriousness—“I want choo to say yuh’ll marry me.”
“Oh, my, no!” cried Emarine. She turned her head on one side, like a bird, and looked at him with lifted brows and surprised eyes. One would have imagined that such a thought had never entered that pretty head before.
“What, Emarine! Yuh won’t?” There was consternation in his voice.
“Oh, my, no!” Both glance and movement were full of coquettishness. The very fringes of the demure gray shawl seemed to have taken on new life and vivacity.
Orville Palmer’s face turned pale and stern.He drew a long breath silently, not once removing that searching look from her face.
“Well, then,” he said, calmly, “I want to know what choo mean by up an’ lettin’ me kiss yuh—if yuh don’t mean to marry me.”
This was an instant quietus to the girl’s coquetry. She gave him a startled glance. A splash of scarlet came into each cheek. For a moment there was utter silence. Then she made a soft feint of withdrawing from his arms. To her evident amazement, he made no attempt to detain her. This placed her in an awkward dilemma, and she stood irresolutely, with her eyes cast down.
Young Palmer’s arms fell at his sides with a movement of despair. Sometimes they were ungainly arms, but now absence of self-consciousness lent them a manly grace.
“Well, Emarine,” he said, kindly, “I’ll go back the way I come. Goodby.”
With a quick, spontaneous burst of passion—against which she had been struggling, and which was girlish and innocent enough to carry a man’s soul with it into heaven—Emarine cast herself upon his breast and flung her shawl-entangled arms about his shoulders. Her eyes were earnest and pleading, and there were tears of repentance in them. With a modesty thatwas enchanting she set her warm, sweet lips tremblingly to his, of her own free will.
“I didn’t mean it,” she whispered. “I was only a—a-foolin’.”
The year was older by a month when one morning Mrs. Endey went to the front door and stood with her body swaying backward, and one rough hand roofing the rich light from her eyes.
“Emarine ’ad ought to ’a’ got to the hill path by this time,” she said, in a grumbling tone. “It beats me what keeps her so! I reckon she’s a-standin’ like a bump on a lawg, watchin’ a red ant or a tumble-bug, or some fool thing! She’d leave her dish-washin’ any time an’ stand at the door a-ketchin’ cold in her bare arms, with the suds a-drippin’ all over her apron an’ the floor—a-listenin’ to one o’ them silly meadow-larks hollerin’ the same noise over ’n over. Her paw’s women-folks are all just such fools.”
She started guiltily and lowered her eyes to the gate which had clicked sharply.
“Oh!” she said. “That you, Emarine?” She laughed rather foolishly. “I was lookin’ right over you—lookin’feryou, too. Miss Presly’s be’n here, an’ of all the strings she had to tell! Why, fer pity’s sake! Is that a dollar’s worth o’ coffee?”
“Yes, it is; an’ I guess it’s full weight, too, from the way my arm feels! It’s just about broke.”
“Well, give it to me, an’ come on out in the kitching. I’ve got somethin’ to tell you.”
Emarine followed slowly, pinning a spray of lilac bloom in her bosom as she went.
“Emarine, where’s that spring balance at? I’m goin’ to weigh this coffee. If it’s one grain short, I’ll send it back a-flyin’. I’ll show ’em they can’t cheat this old hen!”
She slipped the hook under the string and lifted the coffee cautiously until the balance was level with her eyes. Then standing well back on her heels and drawing funny little wrinkles up around her mouth and eyes, she studied the figures earnestly, counting the pounds and the half-pounds down from the top. Finally she lowered it with a disappointed air. “Well,” she said, reluctantly, “it’s just it—just to a ’t.’ They’d ought to make it a leetle over, though, to allow fer the paper bag. Get the coffee-canister, Emarine.”
When the coffee had all been jiggled through a tin funnel into the canister, Mrs. Endey sat down stiffly and began polishing the funnel with a cloth. From time to time she glanced at Emarine with a kind of deprecatory mystery. Atlast she said—“Miss Presly spent the day down’t Mis’ Parmer’s yesterday.”
“Did she?” said Emarine, coldly; but the color came into her cheeks. “Shall I go on with the puddin’?”
“Why, you can if you want. She told me some things I don’t like.”
Emarine shattered an egg-shell on the side of a bowl and released the gold heart within.
“Miss Presly says once Mis’ Parmer had to go out an’ gether the eggs an’ shet up the chickens, so Miss Presly didn’t think there’d be any harm in just lookin’ into the drawers an’ things to see what she had. She says she’s awful short on table cloths—only got three to her name! An’ only six napkeens, an’ them coarse ’s anything! When Mis’ Parmer come back in, Miss Presly talked around a little, then she says—‘I s’pose you’re one o’ them spic an’ span kind, Mis’ Parmer, that alwus has a lot o’ extry table cloths put away in lavender.’”
Emarine set the egg-beater into the bowl and began turning it slowly.
“Mis’ Parmer got mighty red all of a sudden; but she says right out—‘No, I’m a-gettin’ reel short on table cloths an’ things, Miss Presly, but I ain’t goin’ to replenish. Orville’s thinkin’ o’ gettin’ married this year, an’ I guess Emarine’ll have a lot o’ extry things.’ An’ then she upsan’ laughs an’ says—‘I’ll let her stock up the house, seein’s she’s so anxious to get into it.’”
Emarine had turned pale. The egg-beater fairly flew round and round. A little of the golden foam slipped over the edge of the bowl and slid down to the white table.
“Miss Presly thinks a good deal o’ you, Emarine, so that got her spunk up; an’ she just told Mis’ Parmer she didn’t believe you was dyin’ to go there an’ stock up her drawers fer her. Says she—‘I don’t think young people ’ad ought to live with mother-in-laws, any way.’ Said she thought she’d let Mis’ Parmer put that in her pipe an’ smoke it when she got time.”
There was a pulse in each side of Emarine’s throat beating hard and full. Little blue, throbbing cords stood out in her temples. She went on mixing the pudding mechanically.
“Then Mis’ Parmer just up an’ said with a tantalizin’ laugh that if you didn’t like the a-commodations at her house, you needn’t to come there. Said she never did like you, anyways, ner anybody else that set their heels down the way you set your’n. Said she’d had it all out with Orville, an’ he’d promised her faithful that if there was any knucklin’-down to be done, you’d be the one to do it, an’ not her!”
Emarine turned and looked at her mother. Her face was white with controlled passion. Her eyesburned. But her voice was quiet when she spoke.
“I guess you’d best move your chair,” she said, “so ’s I can get to the oven. This puddin’ ’s all ready to go in.”
When she had put the pudding in the oven she moved about briskly, clearing the things off the table and washing them. She held her chin high. There was no doubt now about the click of her heels; it was ominous.
“I won’t marry him!” she cried at last, flinging the words out. “He can have his mother an’ his wore-out table cloths!” Her voice shook. The muscles around her mouth were twitching.
“My mercy!” cried her mother. She had a frightened look. “Who cares what his mother says? I w’u’dn’t go to bitin’ off my nose to spite my face, if I was you!”
“Well, I care what he says. I’ll see myself knucklin’-down to a mother-in-law!”
“Well, now, don’t go an’ let loose of your temper, or you’ll be sorry fer it. You’re alwus mighty ready a-tellin’ me not to mind what folks say, an’ to keep away from the old gossips.”
“Well, you told me yourself, didn’t you? I can’t keep away from my own mother very well, can I?”
“Well, now, don’t flare up so! You’re worse ’n karosene with a match set to it.”
“What ’id you tell me for, if you didn’t want I sh’u’d flare up?”
“Why, I thought it ’u’d just put you on your mettle an’ show her she c’u’dn’t come it over you.” Then she added, diplomatically changing her tone as well as the subject—“Oh, say, Emarine, I wish you’d go up in the antic an’ bring down a bunch o’ pennyrile. I’ll watch the puddin’.”
She laughed with dry humor when the girl was gone. “I got into a pickle that time. Who ever ’d ’a’ thought she’d get stirred up so? I’ll have to manage to get her cooled down before Orville comes to-night. They ain’t many matches like him, if his motherissuch an old scarecrow. He ain’t so well off, but he’ll humor Emarine up. He’d lay down an’ let her walk on him, I guess. There’s Mis’ Grisley b’en a-tryin’ fer months to get him to go with her Lily—Lily, with a complexion like sole-leather!—an’ a-askin’ him up there all the time to dinner, an’ a-flatterin’ him up to the skies. I’d like to know what they always name dark-complected babies Lily fer! Oh, did you get the pennyrile, Emarine? I was laughin’ to myself, a-wond’rin’ what Mis’ Grisley’s Lily’ll say when she hears you’re goin’ to marry Orville.”
Emarine hung a spotless dish-cloth on two nails behind the stove, but did not speak.
Mrs. Endey turned her back to the girl and smiled humorously.
“That didn’t work,” she thought. “I’ll have to try somethin’ else.”
“I’ve made up my mind to get you a second-day dress, too, Emarine. You can have it any color you want—dove-color ’d be awful nice. There’s a hat down at Mis’ Norton’s milliner’ store that ’u’d go beautiful with dove-color.”
Emarine took some flat-irons off the stove, wiped them carefully with a soft cloth and set them evenly on a shelf. Still she did not speak. Mrs. Endey’s face took on an anxious look.
“There’s some beautiful artaficial orange flowers at Mis’ Norton’s, Emarine. You can be married in ’em, if you want. They’re so reel they almost smell sweet.”
She waited a moment, but receiving no reply, she added with a kind of desperation—“An’ a veil, Emarine—a long, white one a-flowin’ down all over you to your feet—one that ’u’d just make Mis’ Grisley’s Lily’s mouth water. What do you say to that? You can have that, too, if you want.”
“Well, I don’t want!” said Emarine, fiercely. “Didn’t I say I wa’n’t goin’ to marry him? I’ll give him his walking-chalk when he comes to-night. I don’t need any help about it, either.”
She went out, closing the door as an exclamation point.
Oregon City kept early hours. The curfew ringing at nine o’clock on summer evenings gathered the tender-aged of both sexes off the street.
It was barely seven o’clock when Orville Palmer came to take Emarine out for a drive. He had a high top-buggy, rather the worse for wear, and drove a sad-eyed, sorrel horse.
She was usually ready to come tripping down the path, to save his tying the horse. To-night she did not come. He waited a while. Then he whistled and called—“Oh, Emarine!”
He pushed his hat back and leaned one elbow on his knee, flicking his whip up and down, and looking steadily at the open door. But she did not come. Finally he got out and, tying his horse, went up the path slowly. Through the door he could see Emarine sitting quietly sewing. He observed at once that she was pale.
“Sick, Emarine?” he said, going in.
“No,” she answered, “I ain’t sick.”
“Then why under the sun didn’t choo come when I hollowed?”
“I didn’t want to.” Her tone was icy.
He stared at her a full minute. Then he burst out laughing. “Oh, say, Emarine, yuh can be the contrariest girl I ever see! Yuh do love to tease a fellow so. Yuh’ll have to kiss me fer that.”
He went toward her. She pushed her chairback and gave him a look that made him pause.
“How’s your mother?” she asked.
“My mother?” A cold chill went up and down his spine. “Why—oh, she’s all right. Why?”
She took a small gold ring set with a circle of garnets from her finger and held it toward him with a steady hand.
“You can take an’ show her this ring, an’ tell her I ain’t so awful anxious to stock her up on table cloths an’ napkeens as she thinks I am. Tell her yuh’ll get some other girl to do her knucklin’-down fer her. I ain’t that kind.”
The young man’s face grew scarlet and then paled off rapidly. He looked like a man accused of a crime. “Why, Emarine,” he said, feebly.
He did not receive the ring, and she threw it on the floor at his feet. A whole month she had slept with that ring against her lips—the bond of her love and his! Now, it was only the emblem of her “knuckling-down” to another woman.
“You needn’t to stand there a-pretendin’ you don’t know what I mean.”
“Well, I don’t, Emarine.”
“Yes, you do, too. Didn’t you promise your mother that if there was any knucklin’-down to be did, I’d be the one to do it, an’ not her?”
“Why—er—Emarine—”
She laughed scornfully.
“Don’t go to tryin’ to get out of it. You know you did. Well, you can take your ring, an’ your mother, an’ all her old duds. I don’t want any o’ you.”
“Emarine,” said the young man, looking guilty and honest at the same time, “the talk I had with my mother didn’t amount to a pinch o’ snuff. It wa’n’t anything to make yuh act this way. She don’t like yuh just because I’m goin’ to marry yuh”—
“Oh, but you ain’t,” interrupted Emarine, with an aggravating laugh.
“Yes, I am, too. She kep’ naggin’ at me day an’ night fer fear yuh’d be sassy to her an’ she’d have to take a back seat.”
“I’ll tell you what’s the matter with her!” interrupted Emarine. “She’s got the big-head. She thinks ev’ry body wants to rush into her old house, an’ marry her son, an’ use her old things! She wants to make ev’rybody toehermark.”
“Emarine! She’s my mother.”
“I don’t care if she is. I w’u’dn’t tech her with a ten-foot pole.”
“She’ll be all right after we’re married, Emarine, an’ she finds out how—how nice yuh are.”
His own words appealed to his sense of the ridiculous. He smiled. Emarine divined the cause of his reluctant amusement and was instantlyfurious. Her face turned very white. Her eyes burned out of it like two fires.
“You think I ain’t actin’ very nice now, don’t you? I don’t care what you think, Orville Parmer, good or bad.”
The young man stood thinking seriously.
“Emarine,” he said, at last, very quietly, “I love yuh an’ yuh know it. An’ yuh love me. I’ll alwus be good to yuh an’ see that choo ain’t emposed upon, Emarine. An’ I think the world an’ all of yuh. That’s all I got to say. I can’t see what ails yuh, Emarine.... When I think o’ that day when I asked yuh to marry me.... An’ that night I give yuh the ring”—the girl’s eyelids quivered suddenly and fell. “An’ that moonlight walk we took along by the falls.... Why, it seems as if this can’t be the same girl.”
There was such a long silence that Mrs. Endey, cramping her back with one ear pressed to the keyhole of the door, decided that he had won and smiled dryly.
At last Emarine lifted her head. She looked at him steadily. “Did you, or didn’t you, tell your mother I’d have to do the knucklin’-down?”
He shuffled his feet about a little.
“Well, I guess I did, Emarine, but I didn’t mean anything. I just did it to get a little peace.”
The poor fellow had floundered upon an unfortunate excuse.
“Oh!” said the girl, contemptuously. Her lip curled. “An’ so you come an’ tell me the same thing for the same reason—just to get a little peace! A pretty time you’d have a-gettin’ any peace at all, between the two of us! You’re chickenish—an’ I hate chickenish people.”
“Emarine!”
“Oh, I wish you’d go.” There was an almost desperate weariness in her voice.
He picked up the ring with its shining garnet stars, and went.
Mrs. Endey tiptoed into the kitchen.
“My back’s about broke.” She laughed noiselessly. “I swan I’m proud o’ that girl. She’s got more o’ me in her ’n I give her credit fer. The idee o’ her a-callin’ him chickenish right out to his face! That done me good. Well, I don’t care such an awful lot if she don’t marry him. A girl with that much spunk deserves agov’nor! An’ that mother o’ his’n ’s a case. I guess her an’ me ’d ’a’ fit like cats an’ dogs, anyhow.” Her lips unclosed with reluctant mirth.
The next morning Emarine arose and went about her work as usual. She had not slept. But there were no signs of relenting, or of regret,in her face. After the first surreptitious look at her, Mrs. Endey concluded that it was all settled unchangeably. Her aspiring mind climbed from a governor to a United States senator. There was nothing impossible to a girl who could break her own heart at night and go about the next morning setting her heels down the way Emarine was setting hers.
Mrs. Endey’s heart swelled with triumph.
Emarine washed the dishes and swept the kitchen. Then she went out to sweep the porch. Suddenly she paused. A storm of lyric passion had burst upon her ear; and running through it she heard the words—“Sweet—oh—Sweet—my heart is breaking!”
The girl trembled. Something stung her eyes sharply.
Then she pulled herself together stubbornly. Her face hardened. She went on sweeping with more determined care than usual.
“Well, I reckon,” she said, with a kind of fierce philosophy, “it ’u’d ’a’ been breaking a good sight worse if I’d ’a’ married him an’ that mother o’ his’n. That’s some comfort.”
But when she went in she closed the door carefully, shutting out that impassioned voice.
It was eight o’clock of a June morning. It had rained during the night. Now the air was sweet with the sunshine on the wet leaves and flowers.
Mrs. Endey was ironing. The table stood across the open window, up which a wild honey-suckle climbed, flinging out slender, green shoots, each topped with a cluster of scarlet spikes. The splendor of the year was at its height. The flowers were marching by in pomp and magnificence.
Mrs. Endey spread a checked gingham apron on the ironing cloth. It was trimmed at the bottom with a ruffle, which she pulled and smoothed with careful fingers.
She selected an iron on the stove, set the wooden handle into it with a sharp, little click, and polished it on a piece of scorched newspaper. Then she moved it evenly across the starched apron. A shining path followed it.
At that moment some one opened the gate. Mrs. Endey stooped to peer through the vines.
“Well, ’f I ever ’n all my natcherl life!” she said, solemnly. She set the iron on its stand and lifted her figure erect. She placed one hand on her hip, and with the other rubbed her chinin perplexed thought. “If it ain’t Orville Parmer, you may shoot me! That beats me! I wonder ’f he thinks Emarine’s a-dyin’ o’ love fer him!”
Then a thought came that made her feel faint. She fell into a chair, weakly. “Oh, my land!” she said. “I wonder ’f thatain’twhat’s the matter of her! I never’d thought o’ that. I’d thought o’ ev’rythingbutthat. I wonder! There she’s lied flat o’ her back ever sence she fell out with him a month ago. Oh, my mercy! I wonder ’f that is it. Here I’ve b’en rackin’ my brains to find out what ails ’er.”
She got up stiffly and went to the door. The young man standing there had a pale, anxious face.
“Good-mornin’, Mis’ Endey,” he said. He looked with a kind of entreaty into her grim face. “I come to see Emarine.”
“Emarine’s sick.” She spoke coldly.
“I know she is, Mis’ Endey.” His voice shook, “If it wa’n’t fer her bein’ sick, I w’u’dn’t be here. I s’pose, after the way she sent me off, I ain’t got any spunk or I w’u’dn’t ’a’ come anyway; but I heard—”
He hesitated and looked away.
“What ’id you hear?”
“I heard she wa’n’t a-goin’ to—get well.”
There was a long silence.
“Is she?” he asked, then. His voice was low and broken.
Mrs. Endey sat down. “I do’ know,” she said, after another silence. “I’m offul worried about her, Orville. I can’t make out what ails ’er. She won’t eat a thing; even floatin’ island turns agi’n ’er—an’ she al’ays loved that.”
“Oh, Mis’ Endey, can’t I see ’er?”
“I don’t see ’s it ’u’d be any use. Emarine’s turrable set. ’F you hadn’t went an’ told your mother that if there was any knucklin’-down to be did between her an’ Emarine, Emarine ’u’d have to do it, you an’ her’d ’a’ b’en married by this time. I’d bought most ha’f her weddin’ things a’ready.”
The young man gave a sigh that was almost a groan. He looked like one whose sin has found him out. He dropped into a chair, and putting his elbows on his knees, sunk his face into his brown hands.
“Good God, Mis’ Endey!” he said, with passionate bitterness. “Can’t choo ever stop harpin’ on that? Ain’t I cursed myself day an’ night ever sence? Oh, I wish yuh’d help me!” He lifted a wretched face. “I didn’t mean anything by tellin’ my mother that; she’s a-gettin’ kind o’ childish, an’ she was afraid Emarine ’u’d run over ’er. But if she’ll only take me back, she’ll have ev’rything her own way.”
A little gleam of triumph came into Mrs. Endey’s face. Evidently the young man was rapidly becoming reduced to a frame of mind desirable in a son-in-law.
“Will you promise that, solemn, Orville Parmer?” She looked at him sternly.
“Yes, Mis’ Endey, I will—solemn.” His tone was at once wretched and hopeful. “I’ll promise anything under the sun, ’f she’ll only fergive me. I can’tlivewithout ’er—an’ that’s all there is about it. Won’t choo ask her to see me, Mis’ Endey?”
“Well, I do’ know,” said Mrs. Endey, doubtfully. She cleared her throat, and sat looking at the floor, as if lost in thought. He should never have it to say that she had snapped him up too readily. “I don’t feel much like meddlin’. I must say I side with Emarine. I do think”—her tone became regretful—“a girl o’ her spir’t deserves a gov’nor.”
“I know she does,” said the young man, miserably. “I alwus knewIwa’n’t ha’f good enough fer ’er. But Mis’ Endey, I know she loves me. Won’t choo—”
“Well!” Mrs. Endey gave a sigh of resignation. She got up very slowly, as if still undecided. “I’ll see what she says to ’t. But I’ll tell you right out I sha’n’t advise ’er, Orville.”
She closed the door behind her with deliberatecare. She laughed dryly as she went up stairs, holding her head high. “There’s nothin’ like makin’ your own terms,” she said, shrewdly.
She was gone a long time. When Orville heard her coming lumbering back down the stairs and along the hall, his heart stopped beating.
Her coming meant—everything to him; and it was so slow and so heavy it seemed ominous. For a moment he could not speak, and her face told him nothing. Then he faltered out—“Will she? Oh, don’t choo say she won’t!”
“Well,” said Mrs. Endey, with a sepulchral sigh, “she’ll see you, but I don’t know ’s anything ’ll come of it. Don’t you go to bracin’ up on that idee, Orville Parmer. She’s set like a strip o’ calico washed in alum water.”
The gleam of hope that her first words had brought to his face was transitory. “You can come on,” said Mrs. Endey, lifting her chin solemnly.
Orville followed her in silence.
The little room in which Emarine lay ill was small and white, like a nun’s chamber. The ceiling slanted on two sides. There was white matting on the floor; there was an oval blue rug of braided rags at the side of the bed, and another in front of the bureau. There was a small cane-seated and cane-backed rocker. By the sideof the bed was a high, stiff wooden chair, painted very black and trimmed with very blue roses.
There were two or three pictures on the walls. The long curtains of snowy butter-cloth were looped high.
The narrow white bed had been wheeled across the open window, so Emarine could lie and look down over the miles of green valley, with the mellifluous Willamette winding through it like a broad silver-blue ribbon. By turning her head a little she could see the falls; the great bulk of water sliding over the precipice like glass, to be crushed into powdered foam and flung high into the sunlight, and then to go seething on down to the sea.
At sunrise and at sunset the mist blown up in long veils from the falls quickened of a sudden to rose and gold and purple, shifting and blending into a spectral glow of thrilling beauty. It was sweeter than guests to Emarine.
The robins were company, too, in the large cherry tree outside of her window; and sometimes a flight of wild canaries drifted past like a yellow, singing cloud. When they sank, swiftly and musically, she knew that it was to rest upon a spot golden with dandelions.
Outside the door of this room Mrs. Endey paused. “I don’t see ’s it ’u’d be proper to let you go in to see ’er alone,” she said, sternly.
Orville’s eyes were eloquent with entreaty. “Lord knows there w’u’dn’t be any harm in ’t,” he said, humbly but fervently. “I feel jest as if I was goin’ in to see an angel.”
Mrs. Endey’s face softened; but at once a smile came upon it—one of those smiles of reluctant, uncontrollable humor that take us unawares sometimes, even in the most tragic moments. “She’s got too much spunk fer an angel,” she said.
“Don’t choo go to runnin’ of her down!” breathed Orville, with fierce and reckless defiance.
“I wa’n’t a-runnin’ of her down,” retorted Mrs. Endey, coldly. “You don’t ketch me a-runnin’ of my own kin down, Orville Parmer!” She glowered at him under drawn brows. “An’ I won’t stand anybody else’s a-runnin’ of ’em down or a-walkin’ over ’em, either! There ain’t no call feryouto tell me not to run ’em down.” Her look grew blacker. “I reckon we’d best settle all about your mother before we go in there, Orville Parmer.”
“What about ’er?” His tone was miserable; his defiance was short-lived.
“Why, there’s no use ’n your goin’ in there unless you’re ready to promise that you’ll give Emarine the whip-hand over your mother. You best make up your mind.”
“It’smadeup,” said the young fellow, desperately.“Lord Almighty, Mis’ Endey, it’s made up.”
“Well.” She turned the door-knob. “I know it ain’t the thing, an’ I’d die if Miss Presley sh’u’d come an’ find out—the town w’u’dn’t hold her, she’d talk so! Well! Now, don’t stay too long. ’F I see anybody a-comin’ I’ll cough at the foot o’ the stairs.”
She opened the door and when he had passed in, closed it with a bitter reluctance. “It ain’t the proper thing,” she repeated; and she stood for some moments with her ear bent to the keyhole. A sudden vision of Miss Presley coming up the stairs to see Emarine sent her down to the kitchen with long, cautious strides, to keep guard.
Emarine was propped up with pillows. Her mother had dressed her in a white sacque, considering it a degree more proper than a night-dress. There was a wide ruffle at the throat, trimmed with serpentine edging. Emarine was famous for the rapidity with which she crocheted, as well as for the number and variety of her patterns.
Orville went with clumsy noiselessness to the white bed. He was holding his breath. His hungry eyes had a look of rising tears that are held back. They took in everything—the girl’s paleness and her thinness; the beautiful dark hair, loose upon the pillow; the blue veins inher temples; the dark lines under her languid eyes.
He could not speak. He fell upon his knees, and threw one arm over her with compelling passion, but carefully, too, as one would touch a flower, and laid his brow against her hand. His shoulders swelled. A great sob struggled from his breast. “Oh, Emarine, Emarine!” he groaned. Then there was utter silence between them.
After a while, without lifting his head, he pushed her sleeve back a very little and pressed trembling, reverent lips upon the pulse beating irregularly in her slim wrist.
“Oh, Emarine!” he said, still without lifting his head. “I love yuh—I love yuh! I’ve suffered—oh, to think o’ you layin’ here sick, night after night fer a whole month, an’ me not here to do things fer yuh. I’ve laid awake imaginin’ that yuh wanted a fresh drink an’ c’u’dn’t make anybody hear; or that yuh wanted a cool cloth on your forrid, or a little jell-water, or somethin’. I’ve got up ’n the middle o’ the night an’ come an’ stood out at your gate tell I’d see a shado’ on the curt’n an’ know yuh wa’n’t alone.... Oh, Emarine, Emarine!”
She moved her hand; it touched his throat and curved itself there, diffidently. He threw up his head and looked at her. A rush of passionate,startled joy stung through him like needles, filling his throat. He trembled strongly. Then his arms were about her and he had gathered her up against his breast; their lips were shaking together, after their long separation, in those kisses but one of which is worth a lifetime of all other kisses.
Presently he laid her back very gently upon her pillow, and still knelt looking at her with his hand on her brow. “I’ve tired yuh,” he said, with earnest self-reproach. “I won’t do ’t ag’in, Emarine—I promise. When I looked ’n your eyes an’ see that yuh’d fergive me; when I felt your hand slip ’round my neck, like it ust to, an’ like I’ve b’enstarvin’to feel it fer a month, Emarine—I c’u’dn’t help it, nohow; but I won’t do ’t ag’in. Oh, to think that I’ve got choo back ag’in!”
He laid his head down, still keeping his arm thrown, lightly and tenderly as a mother’s, over her.
The sick girl looked at him. Her face settled into a look of stubbornness; the exaltation that had transfigured it a moment before was gone. “You’ll have to promise me,” she said, “about your mother, you know. I’ll have to be first.”
“Yuh shall be, Emarine.”
“You’ll have to promise that if there’s any knucklin’-down, she’ll do ’t, an’ not me.”
He moved uneasily. “Oh, don’t choo worry, Emarine. It’ll be all right.”
“Well, I want it settled now. You’ll have to promise solemn that you’ll stand by ev’rything I do, an’ let me have things my way. If you don’t, you can go back the way you come. But I know you’ll keep your word if you promise.”
“Yes,” he said, “I will.”
But he kept his head down and did not promise.
“Well?” she said, and faint as she was, her voice was like steel.
But still he did not promise.
After a moment she lifted her hand and curved it about his throat again. He started to draw away, but almost instantly shuddered closer to her and fell to kissing the white lace around her neck.
“Well,” she said, coldly, “hurry an’ make your choice. I hear mother a-comin’.”
“Oh, Emarine!” he burst out, passionately. “I promise—I promise yuh ev’rything. My mother’s gittin’ old an’ childish, an’ it ain’t right, but I can’t give you up ag’in—Ican’t! I promise—I swear!”
Her face took on a tenderness worthy a nobler victory. She slipped her weak, bare arm up around him and drew his lips down to hers.
An hour later he walked away from the house,the happiest man in Oregon City—or in all Oregon, for that matter. Mrs. Endey watched him through the vines. “Well, he’s a-walkin’ knee-deep inpromises,” she reflected, with a comfortable laugh, as she sent a hot iron hissing over a newly sprinkled towel. “I guess that mother o’ his’n’ll learn a thing er two if she tries any o’ her back-sass with Emarine.”
Emarine gained strength rapidly. Orville urged an immediate marriage, but Mrs Endey objected. “I won’t hear to ’t tell Emarine gits her spunk back,” she declared. “When she gits to settin’ her heels down the way she ust to before she got sick, she can git married. I’ll know then she’s got her spunk back.”
Toward the last of July Emarine commenced setting her heels down in the manner approved by her mother; so, on the first of August they were married and went to live with Mrs. Palmer. At the last moment Mrs. Endey whispered grimly—“Now, you mind you hold your head high.”
“Hunh!” said Emarine. She lifted her chin so high and so suddenly that her long earrings sent out flashes in all directions.
They had been married a full month when Mrs. Endey went to spend a day at the Palmer’s. She had a shrewd suspicion that all was not so tranquilthere as it might be. She walked in unbidden and unannounced.
It was ten o’clock. The sun shown softly through the languid purple haze that brooded upon the valley. Crickets and grasshoppers crackled through the grasses and ferns. The noble mountains glimmered mistily in the distance.
Mrs. Palmer was sewing a patch on a tablecloth. Emarine was polishing silverware. “Oh!” she said, with a start. “You, is ’t?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Endey, sitting down, “me. I come to spen’ the day.”
“I didn’t hear yuh knock,” said Mrs. Palmer, dryly. She was tall and stoop-shouldered. She had a thin, sour face and white hair. One knew, only to look at her, that life had given her all its bitters and but few of its sweets.
“I reckon not,” said Mrs. Endey, “seein’ I didn’t knock. I don’t knock at my own daughter’s door. Well, forever! Do you patch table-cloths, Mis’ Parmer? I never hear tell! I have see darnt ones, but I never see a patched one.” She laughed aggravatingly.
“Oh, that’s nothin’,” said Emarine, over her shoulder, “we have ’em made out o’ flour sacks here, fer breakfas’.”
Then Mrs. Palmer laughed—a thin, bitter laugh. Her face was crimson. “Yaas,” she said, “I use patched table-cloths, an’ table-clothsmade out o’ flour sacks; but I never did wear underclo’s made out o’ unbleached muslin inmylife.”
Then there was a silence. Emarine gave her mother a look, as much as to say—“What do you think of that?” Mrs. Endey smiled. “Thank mercy!” she said. “Dog-days’ll soon be over. The smoke’s liftin’ a leetle. I guess you an’ Orville’ll git your house painted afore the fall rain comes on, Emarine? It needs it turrable bad.”
“They ain’t got the paintin’ of it,” said Mrs. Palmer, cutting a thread with her teeth. “It don’t happen to be their house.”
“Well, it’s all the same. It’ll git painted if Emarine wants it sh’u’d. Oh, Emarine! Where’d you git them funny teaspoons at?”
“They’re Orville’s mother’s.” Emarine gave a mirthful titter.
“I want to know! Ain’t them funny? Thin’s no name fer ’m. You’d ought to see the ones my mother left me, Mis’ Parmer—thick, my! One ’u’d make the whole dozen o’ you’rn. I’ll have ’em out an’ ask you over to tea.”
“I’ve heerd about ’em,” said Mrs. Palmer, with the placidity of a momentary triumph. “The people your mother worked out fer give ’em to her, didn’t they? My mother got her’n from her gran’mother. She never worked out.She never lived in much style, but she al’ays had a plenty.”
“My-O!” said Mrs. Endey, scornfully.
“I guess I’d best git the dinner on,” said Emarine. She pushed the silver to one side with a clatter. She brought some green corn from the porch and commenced tearing off the pale emerald husks.
“D’you want I sh’u’d help shuck it?” said her mother.
“No; I’m ust to doin’ ’t alone.”
A silence fell upon all three. The fire made a cheerful noise; the kettle steamed sociably; some soup-meat, boiling, gave out a savory odor. Mrs. Endey leaned back comfortably in her rocking-chair. There was a challenge in the very fold of her hands in her lap.
Mrs. Palmer sat erect, stiff and thin. The side of her face was toward Mrs. Endey. She never moved the fraction of an inch, but watched her hostilely out of the corner of her eye, like a hen on the defensive.
It was Mrs. Endey who finally renewed hostilities. “Emarine,” she said, sternly, “what are you a-doin’? Shortenin’ your biscuits withlard?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. Endey sniffed contemptuously. “They won’t be fit to eat! You feathered your nest,didn’t you? Fer mercy’s sake! Can’t you buy butter to shorten your biscuits with? You’ll be makin’ patata soup next!”
Then Mrs. Palmer stood up. There was a red spot on each cheek.
“Mis’ Endey,” she said, “if yuh don’t like the ’comadations in this house, won’t you be so good ’s to go where they’re better? I must say I never wear underclo’s made out o’ unbleached muslin inmylife! The hull town’s see ’em on your clo’s line, an’ tee-hee about it behind your back. I notice your daughter was mighty ready to git in here an’ shorten biscuits with lard, an’ use patched table-cloths, an’—”
“Oh, mother!”
It was her son’s voice. He stood in the door. His face was white and anxious. He looked at the two women; then his eyes turned with a terrified entreaty to Emarine’s face. It was hard as flint.
“It’s time you come,” she said, briefly. “Your mother just ordered my mother out o’ doors. Whose house is this?”
He was silent.
“Say, Orville Parmer! whose house is this?”
“Oh, Emarine!”
“Don’t you ‘oh, Emarine’ me! You answer up!”
“Oh, Emarine, don’t let’s quar’l. We’ve onlyb’en married a month. Let them quar’l, if they want—”
“You answer up. Whose house is this?”
“It’s mine,” he said in his throat.
“You’rn! Your mother calls it her’n.”
“Well, it is,” he said, with a desperation that rendered the situation tragic. “Oh, Emarine, what’s mine’s her’n. Father left it to me, but o’ course he knew it ’u’d be her’n, too. She likes to call it her’n.”
“Well, she can’t turn my mother out o’ doors. I’m your wife an’ this is my house, if it’s you’rn. I guess it ain’t hardly big enough fer your mother an’ me, too. I reckon one o’ us had best git out. I don’t care much which, only I don’t knuckle-down to nobody. I won’t be set upon by nobody.”
“Oh, Emarine!” There was terror in his face and voice. He huddled into a chair and covered his eyes with both hands. Mrs. Palmer, also, sat down, as if her limbs had suddenly refused to support her. Mrs. Endey ceased rocking and sat with folded hands, grimly awaiting developments.
Emarine stood with the backs of her hands on her hips. She had washed the flour off after putting the biscuits in the oven, and the palms were pink and full of soft curves like rose leaves; her thumbs were turned out at right angles. Hercheeks were crimson, and her eyes were like diamonds.
“One o’ us’ll have to git out,” she said again. “It’s fer you to say which ’n, Orville Parmer. I’d just as soon. I won’t upbraid you, ’f you say me.”
“Well, I won’t upbraid choo, if yuh say me,” spoke up his mother. Her face was gray. Her chin quivered, but her voice was firm. “Yuh speak up, Orville.”
Orville groaned—“Oh, mother! Oh, Emarine!” His head sunk lower; his breast swelled with great sobs—the dry, tearing sobs that in a man are so terrible. “To think that you two women sh’u’d both love me, an’ then torcher me this way! Oh, God, what can I do er say?”
Suddenly Emarine uttered a cry, and ran to him. She tore his hands from his face and cast herself upon his breast, and with her delicate arms locked tight about his throat, set her warm, throbbing lips upon his eyes, his brow, his mouth, in deep, compelling kisses. “I’m your wife! I’m your wife! I’m your wife!” she panted. “You promised ev’rything to get me to marry you! Can you turn me out now, an’ make me a laughin’-stawk fer the town? Can you givemeup? You love me, an’ I love you! Let me show you how I love you—”
She felt his arms close around her convulsively.
Then his mother arose and came to them, and laid her wrinkled, shaking hand on his shoulder. “My son,” she said, “letmeshow yuh howIlove yuh. I’m your mother. I’ve worked fer yuh, an’ done fer yuh all your life, but the time’s come fer me to take a back seat. Its be’n hard—it’s be’n offul hard—an’ I guess I’ve be’n mean an’ hateful to Emarine—but it’s be’n hard. Yuh keep Emarine, an’ I’ll go. Yuh want her an’ I want choo to be happy. Don’t choo worry about me—I’ll git along all right. Yuh won’t have to decide—I’ll go of myself. That’s the waymotherslove, my son!”
She walked steadily out of the kitchen; and though her head was shaking, it was carried high.
It was the day before Christmas—an Oregon Christmas. It had rained mistily at dawn; but at ten o’clock the clouds had parted and moved away reluctantly. There was a blue and dazzling sky overhead. The rain-drops still sparkled on the windows and on the green grass, and the last roses and chrysanthemums hung their beautiful heads heavily beneath them; but there was to be no more rain. Oregon City’s mighty barometer—the Falls of the Willamette—was declaring to herpeople by her softened roar that the morrow was to be fair.
Mrs. Orville Palmer was in the large kitchen making preparations for the Christmas dinner. She was a picture of dainty loveliness in a lavender gingham dress, made with a full skirt and a shirred waist and big leg-o’-mutton sleeves. A white apron was tied neatly around her waist.
Her husband came in, and paused to put his arm around her and kiss her. She was stirring something on the stove, holding her dress aside with one hand.
“It’s goin’ to be a fine Christmas, Emarine,” he said, and sighed unconsciously. There was a wistful and careworn look on his face.
“Beautiful!” said Emarine, vivaciously. “Goin’ down-town, Orville?”
“Yes. Want anything?”
“Why, the cranberries ain’t come yet. I’m so uneasy about ’em. They’d ought to ’a’ b’en stooed long ago. I like ’em cooked down an’ strained to a jell. I don’t see what ails them groc’rymen! Sh’u’d think they c’u’d get around some time before doomsday! Then, I want—here, you’d best set it down.” She took a pencil and a slip of paper from a shelf over the table and gave them to him. “Now, let me see.” She commenced stirring again, with two little wrinkles between her brows. “A ha’f a pound o’ citron; aha’f a pound o’ candied peel; two pounds o’ cur’nts; two pounds o’ raisins—git ’em stunned, Orville; a pound o’ sooet—make ’em give you some that ain’t all strings! A box o’ Norther’ Spy apples; a ha’f a dozen lemons; four-bits’ worth o’ walnuts or a’monds, whichever’s freshest; a pint o’ Puget Sound oysters fer the dressin’, an’ a bunch o’ cel’ry. You stop by an’ see about the turkey, Orville; an’ I wish you’d run in ’s you go by mother’s an’ tell her to come up as soon as she can. She’d ought to be here now.”
Her husband smiled as he finished the list. “You’re a wonderful housekeeper, Emarine,” he said.
Then his face grew grave. “Got a present fer your mother yet, Emarine?”
“Oh, yes, long ago. I got ’er a black shawl down t’ Charman’s. She’s b’en wantin’ one.”
He shuffled his feet about a little. “Unh-hunh. Yuh—that is—I reckon yuh ain’t picked out any present fer—fer my mother, have yuh, Emarine?”
“No,” she replied, with cold distinctness. “I ain’t.”
There was a silence. Emarine stirred briskly. The lines grew deeper between her brows. Two red spots came into her cheeks. “I hope the rain ain’t spoilt the chrysyanthums,” she said then, with an air of ridding herself of a disagreeable subject.
Orville made no answer. He moved his feet again uneasily. Presently he said: “I expect my mother needs a black shawl, too. Seemed to me her’n looked kind o’ rusty at church Sunday. Notice it, Emarine?”
“No,” said Emarine.
“Seemed to me she was gittin’ to look offul old. Emarine”—his voice broke; he came a step nearer—“it’ll be the first Christmas dinner I ever eat without my mother.”
She drew back and looked at him. He knew the look that flashed into her eyes, and shrank from it.
“You don’t have to eat this ’n’ without ’er, Orville Parmer! You go an’ eat your dinner with your mother, ’f you want! I can get along alone. Are you goin’ to order them things? If you ain’t, just say so, an’ I’ll go an’ do ’t myself!”
He put on his hat and went without a word.
Mrs. Palmer took the saucepan from the stove and set it on the hearth. Then she sat down and leaned her cheek in the palm of her hand, and looked steadily out of the window. Her eyelids trembled closer together. Her eyes held a far-sighted look. She saw a picture; but it was not the picture of the blue reaches of sky, and the green valley cleft by its silver-blue river. She saw a kitchen, shabby, compared to her own,scantily furnished, and in it an old, white-haired woman sitting down to eat her Christmas dinner alone.
After a while she arose with an impatient sigh. “Well, I can’t help it!” she exclaimed. “If I knuckled-down to her this time, I’d have to do ’t ag’in. She might just as well get ust to ’t, first as last. I wish she hadn’t got to lookin’ so old an’ pitiful, though, a-settin’ there in front o’ us in church Sunday after Sunday. The cords stand out in her neck like well-rope, an’ her chin keeps a-quiv’rin’ so I can see Orville a-watchin’ her——”
The door opened suddenly and her mother entered. She was bristling with curiosity. “Say, Emarine!” She lowered her voice, although there was no one to hear. “Where d’ you s’pose the undertaker’s a-goin’ up by here? Have you hear of anybody——”
“No,” said Emarine. “Did Orville stop by an’ tell you to hurry up?”
“Yes. What’s the matter of him? Is he sick?”
“Not as I know of. Why?”
“He looks so. Oh, I wonder if it’s one o’ the Peterson childern where the undertaker’s a-goin’! They’ve all got the quinsy sore throat.”
“How does he look? I don’t see ’s he looks so turrable.”
“Why, Emarine Parmer! Ev’rybody in town says he looksso! I only hope they don’t know what ails him!”
“Whatdoesail him?” cried out Emarine, fiercely. “What are you hintin’ at?”
“Well, if you don’t know what ails him, you’d ort to; so I’ll tell you. He’s dyin’ by inches ever sence you turned his mother out o’ doors.”
Emarine turned white. Sheet lightning played in her eyes.
“Oh, you’d ought to talk about my turnin’ her out!” she burst out, furiously. “After you a-settin’ here a-quar’l’n’ with her in this very kitchen, an’ eggin’ me on! Wa’n’t she goin’ to turn you out o’ your own daughter’s home? Wa’n’t that what I turned her out fer? I didn’t turn her out, anyhow! I only told Orville this house wa’n’t big enough fer his mother an’ me, an’ that neither o’ us ’u’d knuckle-down, so he’d best take his choice. You’d ought to talk!”
“Well, if I egged you on, I’m sorry fer ’t,” said Mrs. Endey, solemnly. “Ever sence that fit o’ sickness I had a month ago, I’ve feel kind o’ old an’ no account myself, as if I’d like to let all holts go, an’ just rest. I don’t spunk up like I ust to. No, he didn’t go to Peterson’s—he’s gawn right on. My land! I wonder ’f it ain’t old gran’ma Eliot; she had a bad spell—no, hedidn’t turn that corner. I can’t think where he’s goin’ to!”
She sat down with a sigh of defeat.
A smile glimmered palely across Emarine’s face and was gone. “Maybe if you’d go up in the antic you could see better,” she suggested, dryly.
“Oh, Emarine, here comes old gran’ma Eliot herself! Run an’ open the door fer ’er. She’s limpin’ worse ’n usual.”
Emarine flew to the door. Grandma Eliot was one of the few people she loved. She was large and motherly. She wore a black dress and shawl and a funny bonnet, with a frill of white lace around her brow.