THE 
 
 ABANDONED 
 FARMER 
 
 SYDNEYH-PRESTON]
 
 The Abandoned Farmer
 
 The 
 Abandoned Farmer 
 
 By Sydney H. Preston 
 
 Charles Scribner s Sons 
 New York 1901
 
 Pa 
 
 Copyright, 1901, by 
 Charles Scribner s Sons 
 
 All rights reserved
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Paft 
 
 7. Before the Plunge / 
 
 77. Peter Waydean is Found Want 
 ing 22 
 
 777. An Upheaval 45 
 
 IV. The Education of Griggs ... 60 
 
 V. Paul and the Chickens . ... 89 
 
 VI. A Cow and a Calf 104 
 
 Vll. The Advent of William Weddtr . 725 
 
 K777. Marion Rises to the Occasion . .146 
 
 IX. Aunt Sophy s Generosity . . . 168 
 
 X. Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 18} 
 
 XI. The Wedding- Day 795 
 
 XII. The Exit of William Wedder . . 224 
 
 XIII. The Fairy Well 236 
 
 XIV. A Pastoral Call 254 
 
 XV. The Harvest 277
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 BEFORE THE PLUNGE 
 
 " \/OU nee d to turn the little chap loose 
 1 in the country," was the doctor s 
 verdict, given in a low tone that didn t 
 thank Heaven ! attract Paul s attention, 
 though if the child hadn t been absorbed 
 for the moment in driving a brood of imag 
 inary chickens into an imaginary coop 
 under a real parlor table this indiscreet ref 
 erence would have caused a scene. The 
 doctor had been cautioned not to do or say 
 anything that would arouse suspicion in the 
 mind of our offspring as to the real nature 
 of his visit, so he should have known better, 
 but of course he couldn t know what a 
 dread Paul had of sometime having to go 
 somewhere without his parents. 
 
 Marion sank weakly into a chair, then sat
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 up very straight and braced herself for what 
 was coming ; I made a frantic pantomimic 
 appeal to the doctor for temporary silence, 
 then I grabbed Paul by the arm, pointing 
 out the fiction that the chickens had escaped 
 around the end of the table into the hall. 
 When he had darted out in pursuit I shut 
 the door, turning in time to hear Marion say 
 with a piteous break in her voice : " Doc 
 tor, tell us the worst is it his lungs ? " 
 
 His tone, to our over-anxious ears, had 
 suggested a fear that he was about to break 
 the news that our precious boy was doomed 
 to an early grave, and it was a relief to see 
 him not only smile, but look as if he would 
 enjoy a hearty laugh. " Don t be alarmed, 
 Mrs. Carton," he said cheerily. " He s a 
 delicate little fellow, but spry as a cricket 
 and quite sound. Send him to the country 
 for six months, and ha ha ! don t cod 
 dle him so much." 
 
 Send our little Paul to the country ! Even 
 in her half-allayed anxiety Marion smiled at 
 the idea. Paul, who had never been away 
 from her tender care for one hour, who had 
 howled with dismay when he gathered from
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 our unguarded conversation that when little 
 boys went to school they didn t take their 
 parents too! Now Paul, up to this time, 
 fortunately for our peace of mind, had been 
 spared the ordinary illnesses and accidents 
 of childhood ; indeed, so carefully had he 
 been guarded, that at the age of six he had 
 never tasted unboiled water, unsterilized 
 milk or unhygienic bread, and although he 
 had learned to walk upstairs by himself, had 
 never descended alone except when an anx 
 ious parent stood breathlessly at the foot of 
 the stairs ready to break a possible fall. An 
 ordinary child might have rebelled or evaded 
 our watchfulness, but Paul was not an ordi 
 nary child, and he was preternaturally anx 
 ious to avoid danger and keep us up to the 
 mark. His active little mind ferreted out 
 supposititious disasters with alarming real 
 ism until our nerves were unstrung by the 
 constant effort to guard against the possible 
 calamities that he suggested. 
 
 Send Pa-til to the country? Send him 
 
 to the country! A likely thing, indeed! 
 
 and leave us to be tortured by mental visions 
 
 of his dear little incapable feet projecting 
 
 3
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 out of a water barrel or being mowed off by 
 an overgrown lawn-mower, his helpless 
 form impaled upon the horns of a bull or 
 dangling from the mouth of a vicious horse. 
 That evening, after Paul was safely 
 asleep, we talked the whole matter over. We 
 had previously toyed with nebulous schemes 
 of living in the country, but the doctor s 
 opinion transformed what had seemed an 
 impracticable but entrancingly delightful 
 castle-in-the-air to a definite consideration 
 of how we could make it an actuality. As 
 Marion said, it was our plain duty to do 
 what was best for Paul, even if we had to 
 sacrifice a few extraneous luxuries in carry 
 ing it out, and when she used the word duty 
 I knew that, come what would, we were go 
 ing to live in the country. Duty is Marion s 
 strong point ; mine also, in a sort of second 
 hand way, for I have learned to obey the dic 
 tates of her conscience with an amazing 
 alacrity. With her, the principle involved in 
 the most trivial act is a matter of vital im 
 portance, while I am inclined to act first, and 
 from that action deduce a principle to justify 
 the course I have taken. Her mind is in- 
 4
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 tensely analytical, and she believes rigidly 
 what she ought to believe ; I am, perhaps, a 
 trifle more imaginative, more easily swayed 
 by passing enthusiasms, more given to be 
 lieving what I want to believe, less inclined 
 to see a clear-cut difference between black 
 and white. 
 
 It is not strange, therefore, that our opin 
 ions often differ, but in this case we were 
 of one mind from the first, the only difficulty 
 that faced us being the question of ways and 
 means, and on this point Marion was, 
 strange to say, more optimistic than I. 
 
 " I have a feeling, a presentiment," she 
 said, in a tone of fervent conviction, " that if 
 we make up our minds hard enough it will 
 become possible. We ve been talking about 
 this for years, and I never felt until this 
 moment that it was really going to be true." 
 
 For a moment her calm certainty in 
 fluenced my hopes, then I shook my head 
 doubtfully. " You forget," I rejoined, 
 " that there s no other opening in sight, and 
 as long as I m doing Music and Drama 
 for the Observer I must stay in the city. If 
 I had regular hours, if I were a bank clerk, 
 5
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 for instance, we might live in the suburbs, 
 but " 
 
 " We ve been over all that hundreds of 
 times," she interrupted, " and you know that 
 if you had been a bank clerk I wouldn t have 
 married you. You re not going to give up 
 journalism, but I m sure something will 
 happen to let us live where we want to live. 
 And as for the suburbs, it seems to me it 
 would be better to get a real farm in the real 
 country. If we could find a good comfort 
 able farm-house near the railroad with 
 plenty of land around it, I don t believe it 
 would cost us any more than one of those 
 flimsy cottages with a garden plot attached 
 that we looked at last year." 
 
 I found, as we talked the matter over, that 
 Marion s imagination had been fired by the 
 idea of some quaint old-fashioned homestead 
 with gabled roof, open fireplaces and latticed 
 windows, surrounded by ancient shade-trees 
 and a straggling apple-orchard. All these 
 accessories I could appreciate, and, in com 
 parison, an ordinary suburban cottage, one 
 of many others exactly alike, began to seem 
 quite out of the question. There were de- 
 6
 
 lightful possibilities about buying a real 
 farm, not to mention the inviting prospect 
 of running it afterward. 
 
 " That s a capital idea ! " I exclaimed, in 
 eager approval. " I could raise a couple oi 
 hundred dollars to make the first payment, 
 then we could give a mortgage for the bal 
 ance and pay it off with the proceeds of the 
 first year s crop. Then we could soon make 
 enough money to " 
 
 I stopped short, for I became aware that 
 my wife was regarding me with a smile of 
 loving toleration. " There you are again, 
 Henry," she said, with a merry laugh. 
 " What a lot of money we d save if I let you 
 carry out a few of your wild schemes ! 
 We re not going to raise one dollar to make 
 a first payment ; we re not going to give a 
 mortgage, so you ll not be able to pay it off 
 with the first year s crop." 
 
 " But it was your proposal," I protested, 
 " you said " 
 
 " I didn t say we might buy a farm, but I 
 
 think we might be able to rent one for less 
 
 than we pay for this house, and I m sure we 
 
 can live more cheaply in the country than 
 
 7
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 in the city, if we make up our minds not to 
 spend money needlessly." 
 
 It didn t seem to me that a rented farm 
 without a mortgage could be as attractive as 
 the one I had imagined, but I reluctantly ad 
 mitted that Marion s plan might be more 
 economical than mine. If I hadn t done so 
 she certainly would have reminded me of 
 some of my errors of judgment. 
 
 " And now," she continued, " the next 
 thing to consider is how much money we 
 can afford not to spend on the farm." 
 
 At that moment I had mentally unloaded 
 a car of farm implements, resplendent in 
 green and red paint, with the same feeling of 
 delightful excitement that accompanies the 
 unpacking of a Noah s ark. In fact, I had 
 them arranged on the station platform and 
 was directing my hired men how to load the 
 wagons. " Can afford not to spend," I re 
 peated abstractedly. 
 
 There was silence. When I awoke from 
 my reverie I discovered that my wife was 
 gazing at me with a curious expression, her 
 lips tightly compressed. I stood to atten 
 tion at once. 
 
 8
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 "Yes, Marion," I went on briskly. " I 
 was just thinking about that. I was just cal 
 culating how many implements we could 
 buy." 
 
 " Indeed ? And have you decided wheth 
 er you would rather go in for horse-raising 
 or thoroughbred cattle ? " 
 
 " No, I haven t got that far ; but I think 
 a herd of Jerseys would do to start with, 
 then 
 
 " Then you are like other men ! I wonder 
 if any city man ever farmed without losing 
 his common-sense. Can t you see, Henry, 
 that we d be hopelessly in debt if we started 
 in that way ? Why, even if we were wealthy 
 the money would soon be all gone at that 
 rate of spending. How many otherwise 
 level-headed men do you know who have 
 squandered fortunes in farming for pleas 
 ure?" 
 
 " Well, there s Judge Davis, and old 
 Hamilton, and oh, lots of them but, you 
 see, they didn t know how to manage, and I 
 would profit by their mistakes. I wouldn t 
 borrow five hundred dollars, for instance, 
 to invest in Jerseys, without seeing my way 
 9
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 clear to double the money in a year or two 
 by selling gilt-edged butter." 
 
 " Now listen, Henry," said my wife, with 
 the indulgent yet unrelenting smile of a 
 mother who pushes a fragile vase beyond the 
 reach of her infant s grasp ; " you re not go 
 ing to borrow one dollar ; you re not going 
 to have a herd of Jerseys ; you re not going 
 to buy reapers and threshing machines, 
 horses and wagons and windmills. How 
 much would a spade, a rake, and a hoe 
 cost?" 
 
 I gasped. " A spade a rake! " I be 
 gan incredulously, then I smiled a smile of 
 feeble intelligence to conceal the fact that I 
 failed to see the point : I know what it feels 
 like to perpetrate a pointless joke. 
 
 " And a hoe," continued Marion, earnest 
 ly. " How much would they cost?" 
 
 " About two dollars," I replied, in vague 
 wonderment. 
 
 " Then that settles it ! You may spend 
 two dollars in implements, but not another 
 cent. And as for drains " 
 
 " Perhaps you would allow three for 
 them," I interjected, with a derisive laugh. 
 10
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 " Judge Davis spent three thousand in un- 
 derdraining his farm." 
 
 " Then we ll do without underdrains. Do 
 you begin to see now what I mean by de 
 ciding how much money we can afford not 
 to epend." 
 
 " I believe I do," I answered, amused yet 
 fascinated by her idea. " It will total a large 
 amount if you keep on, but I don t see how 
 a farm can be made to pay without invest 
 ing money in it. Why, you ve got to put 
 money into anything, even into a gold mine, 
 before you can get returns." 
 
 It was an unfortunate illustration, as I 
 learned from Marion s pitying look. I 
 winced; I knew what was coming. 
 " Henry," she said, and in her face I saw 
 that she was responding to the call of duty, 
 " I don t grudge one dollar of that money 
 you put into the Emperor shares last year, 
 even if the lesson is wasted on you, as it 
 seems to be ; for that experience made me 
 determine that I would never trust your 
 judgment about investments again when my 
 common-sense tells me you are wrong. 
 Aunt Sophy says that all men who haven t 
 ii
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 been brought up on a farm are attacked by 
 an insane belief, at some period of their lives, 
 that they can make money by farming. She 
 says Uncle Philip had made a hundred 
 thousand dollars in the grocery business 
 when he retired and bought a farm. She 
 implored him not to do it, but he persisted, 
 saying there was heaps of money in farm 
 ing if properly managed, and he could run 
 a farm on business principles and make it 
 pay. But when he died she found he had 
 left only forty thousand dollars for her to 
 live on, and she is convinced that if he 
 hadn t been taken away so suddenly she 
 would have been altogether penniless. Poor 
 Aunt Sophy! She weeps more over that 
 money than over Uncle Philip, and the 
 worst of it is that some semi-religious novel 
 she has read has unsettled her old-fashioned 
 ideas about heaven so that she is afraid that 
 when her turn comes she ll find him at it 
 again. The thought has hardened her so 
 that I shouldn t be surprised if she married 
 old Mr. Fairman and renounced Uncle 
 Philip." 
 
 I had been about to say that I felt my- 
 
 12
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 self to be peculiarly fitted to illustrate pay 
 ing methods of farming, but I desisted. I 
 had been inclined to resent Marion s taunt 
 about the unlucky mining venture, but the 
 serious recital of the woes of her uncle and 
 aunt moved me to laughter. I jocularly de 
 clared I would go around to the bank to see 
 if the money we had saved by not buying a 
 farm had been placed to my credit, but her 
 anxiety that I should understand her theory 
 checked my innocent levity. 
 
 " You wouldn t make light of this matter," 
 she said, reproachfully, " if you understood 
 its importance. Now listen : what I mean 
 is, that instead of calculating how much 
 money we might be able to spend on the 
 farm we should try to see how much we can 
 do without spending. I am sure that is the 
 right way to avoid making a farm not pay. 
 For example, if you think you want to buy 
 an electric potato-digger you ought to save 
 
 up the money and then " 
 
 " And then you ll decide that I can afford 
 not to buy it ! " 
 
 " Probably but don t you see the mon 
 ey would then be clear profit, and you 
 13
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 would have it instead of a useless ma 
 chine." 
 
 " It wouldn t be useless it would dig po 
 tatoes." 
 
 " It might dig potatoes, but Aunt Sophy 
 says you can t depend on any of these con 
 trivances, so the chances are that it would 
 be useless ; besides, you said the Emperor 
 shares would dig gold, and they swal 
 lowed " 
 
 The thought of mining shares is distaste 
 ful to me; to have them dragged into the 
 conversation is distracting ; to look forward 
 to having every budding plan nipped by the 
 chilling reminders of bygone mistakes that 
 my temperament would allow me to forget 
 was not to be endured. " Marion," I inter 
 rupted, hastily, " it s a capital plan ! I ll 
 agree to try it if we ever have a farm, if 
 you ll promise never to do or say anything 
 to remind me of that stroke of bad luck." 
 
 "Don t you mean bad management?" 
 she asked, gayly. " You have a dreadfully 
 lax memory about these things, and I know 
 you would have forgotten the Emperor 
 shares long ago if I hadn t reminded you.
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 However, you know it s for your own good 
 and " 
 
 " It isn t," I protested, with vehemence. 
 " It dulls my sensibilities and hardens my 
 heart." 
 
 Marion shook her head dubiously, but 
 she promised. 
 
 I do not believe in my own presentiments, 
 for I never have any, unless the ever-present 
 optimistic belief that everything I undertake 
 is going to turn out well is a presentiment, 
 but I have learned by experience to place 
 a certain amount of dependence upon Mar 
 ion s. Therefore, for a few days after our 
 conversation I confidently expected some 
 thing to turn up, and every day when I re 
 turned home from the office I saw by her in 
 quiring expectant glance that she was look 
 ing for the fulfilment of her prediction. As 
 time passed, however, I began to think she 
 had been mistaken, though I did not say so, 
 for I know how annoying it is to have 
 one s mistakes pointed out when one is 
 most keenly conscious of them. Besides, to 
 refrain made me feel magnanimous, and that 
 feeling, perhaps, caused a shade of pitying
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 magnanimity to creep into my tone when we 
 discussed the project; so Marion, who is in 
 tensely susceptible to inflections, was per 
 fectly well aware that I was practising one 
 of the higher virtues, as well as showing a 
 delicate consideration for her feelings that 
 she might well copy in regard to mine. Of 
 course, we could do nothing but make plans 
 during the winter; but as spring ap 
 proached, without any prospect of a change 
 that would give me regular hours of work, 
 it seemed as if we should have to give up, 
 for a time, the prospect of moving to the 
 country. 
 
 It was one morning early in March that 
 the unexpected did happen. I was at my 
 desk reading a batch of indignant letters 
 taking me to task for an opinion I had ex 
 pressed in an article on musical culture 
 when a summons arrived from the editor-in- 
 chief. Up to that moment I had been 
 amused by the denials of my assertion that 
 the performance of a Bach fugue on the 
 piano as part of a concert programme 
 should be condemned as provocative of 
 snobbish pretence; that the giving out of 
 16
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 the theme by the performer had become the 
 signal for the audience to assume an air of 
 intense and exalted intellectual enjoyment, 
 though not one person in a hundred could 
 appreciate the logical development of such a 
 composition or distinguish anything but a 
 confused intermingling of the parts ; but the 
 summons from the editor made me regard 
 the matter more seriously. I hurriedly 
 looked over the article to see if I had laid 
 myself open to reproof for indiscretion. 
 Yes, I had ! At the very end the statement 
 glared at me that musicians listened to a 
 fugue with the strained intentness of jug 
 glers watching a fellow-performer keeping 
 three balls in the air ; I had committed the 
 fatal oversight of not saying some musi 
 cians. Probably an irate deputation repre 
 senting the profession so notoriously sensi 
 tive to truthful criticism had waited upon 
 the editor to demand a public retraction of 
 the libel. 
 
 " Sit down, Carton," said the editor, as I 
 entered. " You ve been doing Music and 
 Drama for two years now," he said mus 
 ingly, laying down his pen, " and I don t 
 17
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 think I have expressed my opinion of your 
 work to you personally." 
 
 I shook my head mutely, afraid of what 
 was coming next. 
 
 " That, however, doesn t indicate any 
 want of appreciation on my part. You have 
 changed the former commonplace rut of 
 criticism to something that people read with 
 interest, and if they laugh and swear alter 
 nately, so much the better. You have a 
 knack of telling the truth with a light touch 
 that is quite refreshing. How would you 
 like to edit the agricultural page in the 
 weekly ? " 
 
 I gazed at him in bewilderment ; ready to 
 laugh if he meant to be jocular, incredulous 
 of his serious intention. " The agricultural 
 page ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Rather sudden, eh? Well, I ll tell you 
 how the matter stands. Old Rollings is out 
 of it, and I ve got to fill his place at once. 
 Now it strikes me that farmers don t hanker 
 after instruction in their newspaper they 
 want to be entertained, and I think you 
 might make the thing go. The salary will 
 be higher and you can take your own time 
 
 for the work." 
 
 18
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 " But I don t know much about agricult 
 ure," I protested. 
 
 " That isn t of any consequence. There 
 are the exchanges, the Farmer s Cyclopaedia 
 and the scissors, and you ll learn not to 
 waste space by advising farmers to plant 
 corn in hills three feet apart or to feed potato 
 bugs on paris green. The main thing is to 
 make the department entertaining, so let 
 yourself go and be as funny as you like, pro 
 vided there s a grain of horse-sense at the 
 bottom. For instance, you might have an 
 article on how to make the farm pay, taking 
 as a text um, let me see ah you might 
 advocate " 
 
 "The planting of summer boarders in 
 rows three feet apart ? " I ventured. 
 
 The editor leaned back in his chair and 
 laughed. " Go ahead, Carton," he said 
 warmly. " You mightn t be able to draw a 
 better looking pig in a prize competition 
 than the rest of us, but I d bank on you mak 
 ing a pretty turn to his tail." 
 
 The die was cast, and yet, for a few days 
 at least, I felt as one might, who, accustomed
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 to prate of the certain bliss of a heavenly 
 home, is suddenly presented with a pass to 
 the delectable land. A kaleidoscopic vision 
 dazzled me of a picturesque country house, 
 an orchard, a cow, a horse, real hens for 
 Paul, our own fruit and vegetables, but be 
 yond I could not see clearly, for I was un 
 nerved by the sudden transition from the 
 fine arts to agriculture. I had gained a su 
 perficial insight into rural life from the 
 stand-point of the summer boarder, but 
 I was well aware that I didn t know as 
 much about farming as about art and 
 literature. However, the editor s confidence 
 in my ability to do the work and Marion s 
 glowing enthusiasm caused me to keep my 
 misgivings to myself. Indeed, though I 
 never boast, I find it difficult to detract from 
 another person s estimate of my knowledge 
 or attainments ; it seems less egotistical to 
 smile and look modest than to enlarge upon 
 one s own affairs. There was just one thing 
 that caused me a pang. Marion, in pointing 
 out the advantage it would be to me to have 
 a free hand in writing, casually acknowl 
 edged that for a long time she had felt that 
 20
 
 Before the Plunge 
 
 criticism was not my forte and that I would 
 write better when I had more scope for my 
 imagination. My pained surprise at this 
 confession moved her to merriment, and she 
 laughingly declared that a \voman s vanity 
 was all on the surface, but a man s was un 
 fathomable. Did I answer back? No, I 
 didn t, for when I am truly grieved I merely 
 smile faintly with patient, loving forgive 
 ness ; besides, I didn t know what to say. 
 Afterward for I didn t realize it at the 
 time I saw that I felt hurt, not because she 
 had underrated my previous work, but be 
 cause she had heretofore simulated a proper 
 appreciation of it. I cannot bear to think 
 that my wife is capable of stooping to any 
 kind of pretence, and I am quite single- 
 minded in this, for I like her to be more per 
 fect infinitely more perfect than I am. 
 One would suppose this statement to be un 
 questionable. It isn t ; she immediately 
 asks why, and in the silence which follows 
 when I am trying to think she repeats the 
 query with such challenging meaningful em 
 phasis that, alas ! I cannot say. 
 
 21
 
 II 
 
 PETER WAYDEAN IS FOUND WANTING 
 
 " IV T ^ " sa ^ ^ e P ostm i s tress, shaking 
 1 N her head dubiously, " I don t think 
 you d find a place to suit within a mile of 
 this station. You say you want a small 
 farm with a middling good house, and the 
 only vacant place about here has a hundred 
 acres and the house ain t no better than a 
 shanty." 
 
 It was the prettiest bit of country that we 
 had yet found in our search for our ideal 
 farm, and the answer of the postmistress 
 caused us keen disappointment. Paul s lit 
 tle hand, which had clutched mine with a 
 tense expectant grip, suddenly relaxed. 
 " Are we not going to live in the country ? " 
 he asked, in a trembling voice. 
 
 " Oh, I forgot the Waydean homestead," 
 the postmistress called out, as we turned 
 away ; " but anyway I don t suppose " she 
 22
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 looked at us in turn with a speculative air, 
 smiling slightly " you could strike a bar 
 gain with old Peter." 
 
 " Why not ? " demanded Marion eagerly. 
 " Is it a nice place is it near the railroad? " 
 
 " It s right next the turn of this road, 
 about half a mile south. No one has lived 
 there for twenty years, but he keeps the 
 house in repair, and I guess it s cleaner than 
 most houses that s lived in; but old 
 Peter " she stopped speaking, went to 
 the door and looked apprehensively up and 
 down the road. " Now I ll just tell you the 
 plain truth," she continued confidentially. 
 " I know it looks uncharitable to talk to 
 strangers about your neighbors, but every 
 one round here knows what old Peter is, and 
 if you re going to have any dealings with 
 him you ll need to keep your eyes wide open. 
 He s a crank and a screw, and some 
 wouldn t know they was getti-ng skinned till 
 he d got the job done. And such a man for 
 law ! It don t seem to matter much whether 
 he wins or loses, he can t seem to get along 
 without a suit going on. Now if he hap 
 pened within earshot at this present minute 
 23
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 he d have the law of me and he d summons 
 you for witnesses." 
 
 " Thank you for the warning," I inter 
 jected, as she paused for breath. " What is 
 the house like? " 
 
 " It s one of them old-fashioned kind, with 
 tiny paneSj in the windows set cornery, 
 and " 
 
 " Not diamond panes, surely ? " cried 
 Marion, with a gasp of excitement. 
 
 The postmistress gazed at her with an ex 
 pression of incredulous pity. " Oh, no," she 
 replied ; " just common glass, and I think 
 you d find it trying to have to look out of a 
 different pane with both eyes. Then them 
 big fireplaces would make it hard to heat, 
 but you could board them up and put a base- 
 burner in the hall and run the stove- 
 
 pipe- 
 
 " Oh, no! " ejaculated Marion, in horror. 
 " That would be dreadful ! Are they real 
 big fireplaces, with andirons ? " 
 
 " They re big enough in all conscience, 
 but I don t mind seeing any hand-irons. 
 There s some rubbishy old brass firedogs 
 and fixings." 
 
 24
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 Marion s eyes sparkled with joyful assur 
 ance and she stood up with an eager move 
 ment ; I motioned her to wait. 
 
 " Do you happen to know," I asked the 
 postmistress, " what is the rent of the 
 place?" 
 
 " Well, he asks different rents from differ 
 ent people," she answered slowly, her feat 
 ures showing grim amusement, " and no 
 one has ever managed to strike a bargain 
 with him yet. Last spring a man came 
 along from the city thinking as the place 
 was standing idle anyway he ought to be 
 able to rent it cheap for the summer, so he 
 hunted Peter up to show him round. He 
 was one of them big blustering sort of men 
 that acts as if country people wasn t no bet 
 ter than door mats, but Peter followed him 
 about as meek as Moses, carrying his over 
 coat and umbrella for him. They come in 
 here about train time, then the man pulls out 
 a dime and says, Here, my man, says he, 
 is something for your trouble. It s a ram 
 shackle old house and ain t worth two hun 
 dred a year, but I ll give you fifty for six 
 months. Peter was looking at the dime in 
 25
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 a puzzled sort of way, then he smiled a cu 
 rious sort of smile and bit the edge before he 
 put it in his pocket. You re most too kind, 
 sir, he says, for it has been a great enter 
 tainment to me to show you about, and I 
 don t often have the company of a real gen 
 tleman. I m sorry the place is beyond your 
 means, but the fact is that I couldn t afford 
 to let you have it less than two hundred a 
 month. I m sorry, says he, that you had so 
 much trouble for nothing, but I ll just slip 
 this half-dollar into your pocket and you ll 
 have it to spend when you get back to the 
 city. With that he lays down the overcoat 
 and umbrella and walks out. And for all the 
 fine clothes and jewelry of that man, he used 
 such profane language that I had to ask him 
 to stop or else step outside. That s just like 
 old Peter he s so touchy there s no getting 
 on with him, though he can be as sweet as 
 pie if he happens to take a fancy to a person. 
 
 There was once a man " 
 
 At this point Marion adroitly interposed 
 
 with another question, and in two minutes 
 
 we were on the road to Waydean. Paul and 
 
 I straggled along behind, scarcely able to 
 
 26
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 keep up with Marion s eager pace, as she 
 breathlessly commented upon the delights 
 of living in such a house as the postmistress 
 had described. I became so enthusiastic, in 
 sympathy with her, that by the time we 
 caught a glimpse of the chimneys through a 
 belt of trees I was almost persuaded that 
 open fireplaces and diamond panes were the 
 only essentials of an ideal house. We had 
 been directed to look for the owner at the 
 diminutive cottage he lived in a half mile 
 farther along the road, but with a common 
 impulse we turned in at once to the inviting 
 roadway that led up to the old homestead. 
 On our right a mossy board fence enclosed 
 an old orchard, the gnarled and rugged 
 trunks of the trees set in a carpet of newly 
 sprouted grass, the shadows of the still leaf 
 less branches outlined on the knolls and hol 
 lows just, as Paul expressed it, like a real 
 colored picture out of a real picture- 
 book. 
 
 We hurried along the driveway canopied 
 
 by the spreading branches of the pines that 
 
 grew on each side, and rounding a curve we 
 
 came within sight of a rambling frame house 
 
 27
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 set on a knoll with a neatly terraced lawn 
 sloping toward us. 
 
 From the moment Paul darted forward 
 with a shout of delight and seated himself 
 on the steps of a diminutive colonial porch 
 we felt the joy of possession. We stood off 
 and surveyed the roof. The shingles were 
 delicately tinted in moss-green and a few 
 bricks were missing from the upper courses 
 of the chimneys, but the glass in the win 
 dows was unbroken and the house looked 
 exceedingly habitable and home-like. 
 
 The front door was locked, so we peered 
 in at the lower windows and then went 
 round to the rear, finding the kitchen door 
 wide open. Marion entered first and I saw 
 her run across the room and drop on her 
 knees in front of a cavernous brick fireplace 
 with a little cry of delight. By the time I 
 reached her she was emerging from its sooty 
 recesses with a smudged but radiant coun 
 tenance, smiling exultantly as she swung a 
 rusty iron hook outward. 
 
 " What s that thing? " I asked. 
 
 " That thing ! " she echoed, in pitying in 
 credulity. " Do you mean to say, Henry, 
 28
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 that you don t know a crane when you see 
 one?" 
 
 Before I could plead ignorance she dis 
 covered that the ceiling was timbered, the 
 walls wainscoted, and that a settle stood in 
 the dim corner near the fireplace. " It isn t 
 worth while looking at the rest of the 
 house," she said, sitting down on the settle 
 with a smile of perfect content ; " you may 
 go and find that old man. Whatever hap 
 pens, we re going to rent this place, but 
 don t tell him so bring him to me. In the 
 meantime, remember he s got to take a 
 fancy to you, so be just as charming as you 
 know how to be. Oh, you needn t laugh ! I 
 know charming doesn t seem the right word 
 to apply to a man, but that s what you are 
 when you do your best. You can be more 
 agreeable than any man I ever knew, and 
 you can be more but there, do go, go 
 you d stand around all day if you thought 
 I d go on talking about you." 
 
 There were several points connected with 
 her remarks that I would have liked to have 
 more fully explained, but she was so in 
 sistent that I prepared to go, and it was not 
 29
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 my fault that I didn t start, for we suddenly 
 became aware that Paul was missing. In 
 frantic haste we searched the premises and 
 at last found him sitting on a low mound of 
 freshly turned-up sandy soil at the back of 
 the barn, a batch of sand-cakes neatly laid 
 out on a board beside him. Now Paul had 
 never before sat on the ground, he had never 
 learned how to make any kind of mud-pies, 
 as far as we knew he had never heard of the 
 art, yet some subtle instinct had drawn him 
 to the only spot within reach where there 
 was a heap of suitable soil. The sight was 
 appalling, for it seemed as if our brief forget- 
 fulness must result in his having an attack 
 of pneumonia or some other dreadful ail 
 ment. Not a word did we say before Paul, 
 of course, for we are careful not to alarm the 
 dear boy, both for his sake and our own, but 
 we conversed by expressive glances as we 
 walked back toward the house, assuring 
 each other that we must hope for the best 
 and be prepared for the worst, and that by 
 some miracle he might escape. 
 
 We had stopped to look down the en 
 trance to a large underground root-house, 
 30
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 the door of which was open, when from the 
 inside came a succession of feeble groans. 
 There was a heap of bags in the doorway, 
 and in an instant I realized what had hap 
 pened: that some man had been overcome 
 by the poisonous gases that gather in pits 
 where vegetables are stored. 
 
 I am not one who rashly plunges into 
 danger without weighing the consequences, 
 so I didn t bravely lose my life by rushing 
 into the pit in the vain attempt to carry an 
 other man out, for I saw there were several 
 good reasons against such a course. First, 
 I knew that I couldn t carry a man anywhere 
 even under the most favorable conditions ; 
 second, I couldn t bear to think of the shock 
 to Marion if she should become a widow; 
 third, it was perfectly clear to me that if I re 
 mained in the root-house Marion would at 
 tempt to save me, then Paul would remain 
 outside and become an orphan, a howling 
 orphan. Further, I was not justified in risk 
 ing an undoubtedly valuable life for one that 
 was probably of no account. 
 
 A long pole with a hook on the end would 
 have been useful, or a piece of rope, but
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 neither was to be found, and the groans of 
 the man in the root-house were becoming 
 still more alarming, so, noticing the heavy 
 chain which held the well-bucket, I hur 
 riedly tried to detach it, but to my despair I 
 found it was securely spiked to the well- 
 sweep. It was then that Marion made one 
 of the most brilliant suggestions that I have 
 known her to make : that by swinging the 
 sweep to one side the chain would hang di 
 rectly over the pit. I don t know that she 
 saw the full utility of this move, but I did. 
 Holding my breath, I stood in the doorway 
 until I could dimly see the prostrate figure 
 on the floor, then I darted inside, looped the 
 chain about him and dragged him to the en 
 trance. He was a heavily built, sharp-feat 
 ured man, past middle age, and although he 
 lay on the ground and gasped for breath 
 there was a slight contortion of his features 
 that suggested repressed mirth. Marion 
 wanted me to go for help, but I told her that 
 he was recovering and only needed to be 
 moved from the entrance where he lay to the 
 level ground where the air was fresher. She 
 said I would never be able to get him up the 
 32
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 incline, so I hastened to complete my task, 
 my only fear being that help would arrive 
 too soon. I tenderly arranged a pad of po 
 tato bags across his chest and back, then 
 shortening the chain I passed it under his 
 arms and again looped it around his body. 
 All being ready, I climbed up on the 
 weighted end of the well-sweep, but finding 
 there was not enough weight I persuaded 
 Marion to take my place, then I sprang up 
 beside her. The effect was amazing to us, 
 unaccustomed as we were to this primitive 
 contrivance, for our end descended to the 
 ground with a bump, and, like a hooked fish, 
 high in the air dangled the man whom I had 
 gone to so much trouble to save. He 
 emerged from unconsciousness more rap 
 idly than a butterfly from its chrysalis, and 
 his remarks as he gyrated at the end of the 
 chain were most abusive. The epithets were 
 evidently intended for me, and my anger 
 was aroused to such an extent that I felt in 
 clined to let him stay where he was. " Keep 
 cool," I shouted, " and I ll see about getting 
 you down. Remember," I admonished him, 
 " that that there are ladies in the room. If 
 33
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 you behave yourself and tell me where to 
 find a ladder, I ll try to help you." 
 
 His face grew crimson and he struggled 
 for speech. " A ladder ! " he burst forth, at 
 last. " Get off this darn see-saw." 
 
 I got off, so did Marion; but I don t 
 think we understood the proper way to get 
 off, for there was a surprising thud, and I 
 saw that my patient was sprawling on the 
 ground under the beam. I hastened to his 
 relief, reminding him as I unwound the 
 chain that he should have taken my advice 
 and waited for the ladder. He stood up un 
 steadily, wiping the dirt off his face with his 
 sleeve, then he took off his coat, folded it 
 with ceremony, laid it on the ground and 
 squared up to me. 
 
 " Now," he said, with vicious determina 
 tion, " I m going to settle with you." 
 
 He was such a disreputable and absurd 
 figure that I couldn t help smiling at his 
 demonstrations. " Come, sir," I said per 
 suasively ; " you shouldn t give way to your 
 temper. I know that, from your stand-point, 
 it seems annoying to enter a root-house and 
 then discover that you are suspended at the 
 34
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 end of a well-sweep, but I am not to blame. 
 It would have been far less trouble to me to 
 leave you to be smothered among your 
 potatoes than to drag you out." 
 
 I spoke with effect ; his expression 
 changed, though he studied my face with 
 suspicion. " What s your name ? " he de 
 manded. 
 
 " Henry Carton," I responded, with a cer 
 tain hesitation, born of a diffidence that al 
 ways seizes me when I try to make this an 
 nouncement appear unimportant. " And 
 yours?" I asked, genially. 
 
 " Waydean," he replied, gruffly. 
 
 " Peter Waydean ! " I exclaimed, with 
 sudden enthusiasm, as I grasped his hand. 
 " The very man we were looking for ! Al 
 low me to introduce you to Mrs. Carton: 
 Marion, Mr. Waydean." 
 
 He bowed awkwardly, putting on his 
 coat. " Well sir," he ejaculated, with an ex 
 plosive laugh, " you do beat the Dutch ! " 
 
 If our host had been a little remiss on the 
 
 score of politeness at first, he made up for it 
 
 by profuse expressions of gratitude and by 
 
 showing us every attention during the time 
 
 35
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 we spent with him in looking over the 
 place. I saw that he had taken a fancy to us, 
 and that he liked the idea of having such de 
 sirable tenants, for his clear blue eyes, un 
 usually limpid for an elderly man, beamed 
 with kindly intention as he talked ; at the 
 same time, his truthfulness compelled him 
 to say that he couldn t quite forgive me for 
 having hoisted him so high with the well- 
 sweep. " I tell you, Mr. Carton," he said, 
 with a chuckle, " I m mighty thankful to 
 you for hauling me out of that pit, but all the 
 same, I give you fair warning that I m 
 bound to get back on you for the way you 
 done it." 
 
 After we had viewed the barn and stables 
 we all went into the house to talk over the 
 business. He was a man of strong family 
 affection, so he would never part with the 
 homestead, but we were just the sort of 
 people to take care of what was dear to him, 
 and he would be willing to rent the place to 
 us. He could not live in such a large house 
 himself, on account of his wife being an in 
 valid, but he had often refused to rent it to 
 other people, usually because well, he 
 36
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 didn t mind telling us, in confidence, it 
 wasn t every family he would care to have as 
 neighbors and then, there was such a dif 
 ference in children ! Now that dear little 
 lad of ours, he could swear, had never in his 
 life thrown a stone at a window-pane or 
 pencil-marked wall-paper a little peaked, 
 wasn t he? but just wait till he had been 
 six months at Waydean, and had bunnies 
 and guinea-pigs, and chickens, turkeys, 
 lambs and calves, and a pony of his own 
 just wait ! 
 
 It was indeed a delicate matter for me to 
 mention pecuniary compensation. Perhaps 
 if I had been alone I would have ignored 
 that point altogether, but Marion s signifi 
 cant glances I could not ignore, so, though 
 it sounded positively brutal in the face of his 
 disinterested appreciation of our worth, I 
 asked him the rent. 
 
 He made a gesture implying utter indif 
 ference. The fact was that, though most of 
 the people in the neighborhood were grasp 
 ing and mean-minded, he was a man who 
 was built straight-up-and-down-and-square- 
 all-round, and what he considered above 
 37
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 everything was that he would have con 
 genial neighbors. The farm was worth 
 well, he wouldn t say what it was worth, 
 but I might have it at three hundred dollars 
 a year. There were fifty acres of land that 
 would grow enough produce to pay the rent 
 of the whole place and something over, and 
 as I would need a good many implements he 
 would sell me his for a fraction of their cost, 
 and if I wanted a good team of horses and a 
 few cows all I had to do was to make my 
 choice among his. 
 
 I had been fascinated by the frankly in 
 genuous assurance of his manner ; in fact, I 
 was mentally exulting in my good fortune 
 in finding such a generous landlord, when 
 the sound of Marion s voice aroused me. 
 
 " Fifty acres, Mr. Waydean ! " she ex 
 claimed. " That would never do. My hus 
 band is quite opposed to the idea of trying to 
 make money by farming, and " 
 
 " Oh, quite," I interjected, shaking my 
 head with emphasis. 
 
 " We want to live in the country," she 
 continued, " but we can t afford to actually 
 farm." 
 
 38
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 " Between ourselves, Mr. Waydean," I 
 hastened to say, " I ve seen so much of city 
 people fooling away money in farming that 
 I ve made up my mind not to work any more 
 land than I can attend to with a spade, a 
 rake and a hoe." 
 
 He stared at us in turn, incredulity giving 
 place to gloom as he realized that I was se 
 rious ; then he turned to Marion in a burst 
 of candor. " I tell you what, ma am," he 
 said, with warm approval, " I ain t met 
 many men with so much downright com 
 mon-sense as your husband. I ll own that 
 I m a bit sorry that he don t want to work 
 the farm, for I m getting old and I d like a 
 rest, but the truth is that running a farm 
 costs a lot of money, and farmers come out 
 at the wrong end of the horn most years. 
 However, you ve took a fancy to the place 
 and I ve took a shine to you, so I ll tell you 
 what I ll do : I ll work the farming land my 
 self, and you can take the house and 
 grounds for four hundred a year." 
 
 Peter stood in the attitude of an auc 
 tioneer who is forced to throw away a desir 
 able no-reserve lot on the first bid ; surely, 
 39
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 then, my ears had deceived me into thinking 
 that this was a larger sum than he had asked 
 for the whole farm. 
 
 Marion was the first to bpeak. " I don t 
 quite see," she began dubiously, " isn t that 
 more?" 
 
 " Certainly, ma am," he responded ; " but 
 how far d a hundred dollars go in wages for 
 hired help? If I wasn t throwing in my 
 work free I couldn t afford to take them fifty 
 acres off your hands at that figure. Of 
 course, I d sooner you took the hull place at 
 three hundred, then as much more would 
 hire you a man, and if Mr. Carton looked 
 after him pretty sharp there might be 
 enough crop to feed your horses and cow, 
 and he wouldn t have to spend more than 
 a thousand dollars in stock and implements 
 to start with." 
 
 I was slightly irritated that he addressed 
 these remarks solely to Marion ; one might 
 have supposed that he thought she was the 
 head of the family and that I was not even 
 a party of the first part. 
 
 " I ll think the matter over," I began, with 
 
 dignified hauteur, " and let you " 
 
 40
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 Peter turned to me hastily. " That s as 
 reasonable as I can do," he explained, with 
 plaintive determination ; " and I ve got to 
 know right away if you want the place." 
 
 " Well," I began, with an eager eye on 
 Marion for the cue, " I I " 
 
 " There s another man after it," urged 
 Peter, " and he s coming to-morrow for my 
 answer." 
 
 Marion gasped. " We d better pay the 
 the four " 
 
 "The four hundred," I decided, for her, 
 " and let you run the farm." 
 
 " Done," snapped Peter. 
 
 It was evening when we parted from 
 Peter Waydean on the s tation platform. He 
 shook me warmly by the hand as the train 
 appeared. 
 
 " You re a gentleman, Mr. Carton, from 
 the word go," he shouted hoarsely in my ear. 
 " The bargain s made, and though there s 
 no writing betwixt us, there s no need of 
 any, for we re men of honor. I ll tell the 
 other man "
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Yes, certainly," I assented, detaching 
 myself as the train slowed up. 
 
 " Not a word to the neighbors about the 
 well-sweep, or about what you re paying for 
 the place," he continued, holding the lapel 
 of my coat. " They re a prying, gossiping 
 lot, and I wouldn t like it known that you 
 hoisted me on that darn see-saw. It s the 
 first time Peter Waydean was ever treed, but 
 considering that you re the man that done it, 
 we ll cry quits." 
 
 As I caught a flashing steely glint in the 
 depths of his ingenuous blue eyes the con 
 viction was borne in upon me that, like the 
 simulated stillness of a deadly revolving 
 tool, his simplicity and truth were more ap 
 parent than real. And this was the impres 
 sion that made me so silent and thoughtful 
 on our journey back to the city. 
 
 For the close of such an eventful day we 
 had little to say to each other. With every 
 mile that we travelled an unpleasant sus 
 picion grew stronger as I thought over the 
 bargain with that guileful man; gradually 
 the suspicion changed to a certainty, and 
 then it was that I became aware that 
 42
 
 Peter Waydean is Found Wanting 
 
 Marion, who had also been strangely silent, 
 was studying me with a tantalizing air of 
 knowing my thoughts. 
 
 " What is it ? " I asked, with sudden an 
 noyance. 
 
 " I was just thinking," she began, then 
 she stopped to laugh gleefully " do you re 
 member what the postmistress said about 
 him skin " 
 
 " Don t repeat it," I snapped, squirming. 
 " Of course I remember, but I don t see the 
 application." 
 
 " Well, you shouldn t expect to if there 
 isn t any," she said, with renewed mirth. 
 " It was odd, too, that he warned you he d 
 pay you back for hoisting him." 
 
 " Will you be kind enough to explain the 
 connection? " I demanded fiercely. 
 
 It really is unsafe to use that tone with 
 Marion. There was a little flash in her eyes ; 
 my glare faltered, then her brief resentment 
 melted into sympathy. 
 
 " Connection ? " she answered. " Why, 
 what connection could there be ? " 
 
 My hand sought hers, in gratitude. There 
 was a pause, then we both laughed, and 
 43
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 somehow the bitterness of knowing I had 
 been gulled passed away ; I even felt a sym 
 pathetic appreciation of his artistic touch in 
 assuring me that we were both men of 
 honor. 
 
 Suddenly Marion grasped my arm. 
 " Henry," she exclaimed, " he s the man you 
 want ! " 
 
 " The man I want ? " 
 
 " Why, yes ; didn t you say you wanted a 
 central figure for that set of rural sketches 
 you ve planned ?" 
 
 " By Jove," I cried, with kindling enthu 
 siasm, " he s a character all ready made ! If 
 I do him justice, he ll be a a regular gold 
 mine." 
 
 I was rather puzzled by a meaning, but to 
 me, inscrutable smile that lingered on Mar 
 ion s face after this comment, but she so 
 often sees more in a remark of mine than I 
 do that I prefer not to spoil the effect by ask 
 ing for an explanation. 
 
 44
 
 Ill 
 
 "April day on which we moved to 
 1 Waydean was an ideal one in regard 
 to weather, and my arrangements came so 
 near to perfection that we began the usually 
 irksome work of moving with joyous zest. 
 I had chalked a number on every piece of 
 furniture and box of sundries, also on the 
 door of each room in the farm-house, so as 
 to avoid having the kitchen stove carried 
 upstairs and the bedroom furniture placed 
 in the parlor, and this plan elicited warm 
 approbation from Marion. To say that her 
 approval gratified me scarcely expresses my 
 elation, for although I was proud of the 
 plan I was quite prepared to have her point 
 out some fatal defect. I can indulge in 
 platitudes and commonplaces with impu 
 nity, but a really original, trade-marked 
 idea is usually a gauntlet flung into the 
 45
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 arena, the activity of my mind producing 
 a reflex action upon hers. In this case I 
 took extraordinary care to provide against 
 anything happening to mar the successful 
 carrying out of my scheme, not even closing 
 the bargain with the owner of the moving 
 van until he had indorsed it with enthu 
 siasm. This man, Bliggs by name, urged 
 me to patent the idea, waxing as indignant 
 as if I had impugned his moral character 
 when I modestly demurred. 
 
 " Look ere, Mr. Carton," he snapped, 
 " wot could be more simpler ? Wen there s 
 a man or a woman a-standin at the door 
 shoutin to be keerful an hurry up, an put 
 this ere an that there, an hobstructin 
 gin rally, there s bound to be trouble. W y, 
 in Lunnon you don t ketch the bobbies 
 botherin about common drunks in movin 
 season, for they knows there s goin to be a 
 full docket of assaults an batteries an 
 busive langwidges. W y, with your plan 
 there wouldn t be none o that, for a man d 
 jest onload is dray as mum as a trained pig 
 a-pickin hout cards. Mr. Carton," he con 
 cluded, " Hi ll put every blessed piece in the 
 46
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 right room an set up yer kitchen stove an 
 bedstids free." 
 
 My heart warmed to Bliggs, for his active 
 movements as he loaded the wagon inspired 
 me with confidence, and when he drove off 
 with his two helpers I had not a doubt but 
 that he would carry out his cheerful assur 
 ances. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon by the time 
 we locked the door of our dismantled house. 
 The click of the lock sent a lump into 
 my throat that caused me to turn quickly 
 away, but Marion lingered, heaving a lit 
 tle sigh of regret. It is a peculiarity of 
 hers to look back if that process is at all 
 likely to result in a sigh ; for my own 
 part, I prefer to look straight ahead if I sus 
 pect there is to be any attempt to stir up my 
 well of emotion, and, in consequence, on 
 rare occasions I have been called cold 
 blooded. Paul is different in this respect; 
 he is the dividing line between us. Marion 
 caught him younger, and his plastic little 
 soul has been moulded with loving care. He 
 is sympathetic and responsive. He is not 
 like any one musical instrument ; he is like 
 47
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 two. As easily moved as an ^Eolian harp, 
 he has the fire, spirit and continuity of the 
 bagpipes. 
 
 " Look, Paul ! " said his mother tenderly, 
 her eyes moistening. " Say Good-by, old 
 house. ". 
 
 It was, at the least, an injudicious remark. 
 Up to that moment we had been positively 
 gleeful, and Paul had looked upon the 
 change as a glorified picnic, for I had taken 
 pains to instil the belief that Waydean 
 would be an earthly elysium for a small boy ; 
 but now, with a woman s pensive touch, my 
 carefully built fabric collapsed. Paul s big 
 solemn eyes grew cloudy ; a faint crescent 
 appeared on each side of his mouth, deepen 
 ing gradually. I watched this development 
 in dumb despair, while Marion was absorbed 
 in tender reminiscence, then, before I could 
 utter a warning cry, his mouth shot open to 
 the amazing degree that I knew so well. I 
 grabbed him hastily, kneeling down. " Lis 
 ten, Paul ! " I shouted into his ear. " We ll 
 move back to-morrow if you like." 
 
 I stood up suddenly, amazed ; a hand had 
 clutched my collar and almost pulled me 
 48
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 backward Marion s flashing eyes met 
 mine. " Such a falsehood ! " she gasped. 
 " How dare you ! " 
 
 I did not hear these words, but I knew 
 what she said by the motion of her lips ; be 
 sides, her manner made it perfectly plain 
 that I was supposed to have infringed the 
 truth, so speech was superfluous. As a mat 
 ter of fact I could have disproved the charge, 
 but not before Paul, for we strive to avoid 
 discussing such matters before him ; any 
 way, I would have needed a megaphone to 
 make myself heard. Therefore, I stepped 
 humbly aside, with a gesture that indicated 
 my complete willingness to leave the matter 
 to his mother. 
 
 " Paul, dear, listen," she called out, 
 bending over him ; " we re not going to 
 move back ever." 
 
 The effect was instantaneous ; he dropped 
 to the sidewalk, renewing his efforts as he 
 wriggled in anguish. I was obliged to pick 
 him up in accordance with Marion s frantic 
 gestures, and we retreated into the empty 
 house, where she pacified him in course of 
 time. I do not know the precise method she 
 49
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 adopted, but I think, from snatches of con 
 versation that reached me, that beautiful 
 native birds figured largely among others, 
 storks ! I know that storks do not grow at 
 Waydean, yet I preserved a grim silence, 
 thinking what a strong case I might make, 
 were I not too generous to do so. 
 
 I was justly indignant, for I do not seem 
 to be able to make Marion understand that, 
 like her, I have a horror of untruth ; in fact, 
 I am more cautious in my statements than 
 any other journalist I know ; but while I am 
 placidly content to accept any assertion of 
 hers without question, she is likely to quib 
 ble over almost every statement I make. 
 I admit that I am forgetful, that to-morrow 
 I may say exactly the opposite to what I 
 say to-day, that what I condemn in the 
 abstract may seem to me expedient and 
 proper under certain conditions, but I ob 
 ject to being openly accused of prevarica 
 tion. Paul, as I have said, is not an ordi 
 nary child (and although people who are 
 not his parents are inclined to use a compas 
 sionate tone in making that remark, I do 
 so with defiant pride), therefore he should 
 5
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 be treated with tactful consideration not 
 accorded to common children. He re 
 sponds to my sympathetic touch, I am glad 
 to say, with sweet concords; that is, of 
 course, if my elbow is not joggled by his 
 mother. In this case, though I spoke in 
 haste, my words would have stopped Paul s 
 outcry had Marion left him to me, and had 
 she not been prone to suspicion she would 
 have seen that my statement was absolute 
 ly truthful. I knew that the child had been 
 moved by a passing sentiment and would 
 be more than content with our new home 
 once he was transplanted, but I was deeply 
 grieved at his mother suspecting me of 
 being so base as not to be willing to move 
 back to the city the next day if Paul liked. 
 
 We had missed the first afternoon train, 
 and after a dreary wait for the next one 
 we arrived at the little country station just 
 at dusk, and before we reached Waydean 
 darkness had fallen. We groped our way 
 around to the back door and stumbled into 
 the kitchen, where I lit a candle I had 
 brought. My heart sank at the first glance 
 about the room, for it was quite empty and 
 5
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I feared that our goods had not arrived, 
 but when I peered fearfully into the next 
 room I saw that what looked at first like 
 a railroad box-car was a rectangular erec 
 tion of all our household belongings. We 
 stared incredulously by the light of the flick 
 ering candle, walking around the structure 
 in despair. Next the ceiling, like a statue 
 on its massive base, our cooking-stove 
 perched giddily Bliggs had set it up with 
 a vengeance ! on the very bottom lay all 
 our beds and bedding, hopelessly buried, 
 for if I attempted to disturb the pile, down 
 would plunge that threatening mass of 
 metal. Bliggs was a fiend ! 
 
 A strip of torn wall-paper hung down like 
 a banner from a projecting curtain-pole; it 
 was covered with rude pencillings, which we 
 deciphered together after Paul had dropped 
 asleep on my overcoat, with this result: 
 
 Mister Carton. 
 
 hduv a rode. 
 
 hosses nere ded. 
 
 men kickt. 
 
 basht cm fur emttn boteL 
 
 basht em fur mutinin bout Justin stov. 
 5 2
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 to dark to ce cJwk marks. 
 
 done nex bes stile. 
 
 heluv a gob *wel dun. 
 
 wilyum bliggs. 
 
 I opened the kitchen door and looked 
 despairingly out into the darkness; the 
 twinkling light of the next farm-house shone 
 far away like a star on the horizon ; I must 
 go over there and ask for food and lodging 
 as if we were penniless wayfarers. Marion 
 stood beside me, and together we tried to 
 assure each other that the people whose 
 light looked so cheery must be warm 
 hearted and hospitable enough to make us 
 welcome. As we gazed, a second light ap 
 peared near the farm-house ; evidently some 
 person had come out with a lantern, for 
 we could hear his carolling whistle accom 
 panying the gliding movement of the light. 
 It was coming nearer, for we could sobn 
 make out the lilting melody of the whistler 
 and the encircling glow that surrounded 
 him, and I felt Marion s grasp tighten on 
 my arm with a sudden hope that had also 
 sprung up in my breast. Nearer and nearer 
 he came, until the globe of light grew larger 
 53
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 and cast titanic shadows of a pair of nim 
 ble legs that passed around the end of the 
 barn, through the yard, up to our very 
 door, where we stood spellbound; then the 
 whistle ceased, the lantern was raised, and 
 by its dazzling glow we saw a little man 
 with kindly gray eyes and thin reddish 
 whiskers standing there. 
 
 " Good-evenin ! " he called out, cheerily. 
 " We heard there was some people movin 
 in to-day, and we thought you might be 
 kinder upsot, so I come to see if you 
 wouldn t step along over to our place and 
 have supper and stay the night. The missis 
 has the beds ready, and Sairey knows how 
 to fix things comfortable." 
 
 There was a moment s awkward pause, 
 for we were dumb with excess of emotion. 
 
 " You don t know my name, and I don t 
 know yourn," he proceeded. " Mine s Andy 
 Taylor, and my place is next south, over 
 there where you see that light." 
 
 I clutched his hand. " Mr. Taylor," I 
 gasped, " come in. I was afraid you were 
 an angel perhaps you are, but we we re 
 awfully glad to see you." 
 54
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 " It s so good " began Marion, then 
 she collapsed. 
 
 "Why, where s your load?" he asked, 
 looking around the vacant room. 
 
 I showed him, while Marion held the 
 candle aloft. I related my wrongs with 
 passionate fervor; I exhibited the Bliggs 
 epistle, translating the rude characters as I 
 traced them with a trembling forefinger 
 and called down vengeance on the head of 
 the perpetrator. A spasm shot across my 
 visitor s face and his wide-open mouth 
 closed with a snap ; he leaned forward help 
 lessly as if a sneeze had seized him, then 
 a wild outburst of hilarity smote our as 
 tonished ears. " Oh, Lordy, Lordy ! " he 
 groaned. " The upliftin power " he 
 pointed upward to the stove "of of 
 strong drink ! " 
 
 Andy Taylor s lantern shed its cheering 
 rays over us as he led the way across the 
 fields to the distant beacon-light of his 
 house. Forlorn, homesick, discouraged, as 
 we had been, his friendly hospitality filled 
 us with gratitude too deep for words. His 
 unquestioning acceptance of us as guests 
 55
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 was staggering, accustomed as we were to 
 the artificial restrictions of social inter 
 course in the city. As Marion said after 
 ward, I might have been a temporarily 
 retired burglar who had eloped with an 
 other man s wife and kidnapped a child, or 
 we might have been dangerous lunatics, or 
 worse, we might have been vulgar people ! 
 But yet, with the all-embracing charity that 
 thinketh no evil, Andy s sprightly step led 
 us from the chaotic discomfort of our new 
 home to the warmth and cheer that awaited 
 us in his. No wonder, then, that Marion 
 wept like a tired child on the shoulder of 
 the motherly old lady who welcomed us, or 
 that Andy, after one glance at my expres 
 sive face, backed away with a hurried re 
 mark about having to attend to the fire. 
 Later, when Paul had been put to sleep in 
 an old-fashioned billowy feather bed, we 
 settled ourselves in the kitchen for a smoke. 
 We could hear from the sitting-room the 
 continuous restful murmur of the women s 
 voices, rising and falling in the responsive 
 cadences of that sweet communion that be 
 tokens, even in the most prosaic utterances, 
 56
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 the mingling of kindred spirits of the gen 
 tle sex. I look back upon that evening 
 as one of the pleasantest I ever spent, and 
 I enjoyed to the full the quaint sayings and 
 funny stories of the genial little man who 
 entertained me. 
 
 The clock struck eleven before either of 
 us noticed the lateness of the hour. Andy 
 rose reluctantly, knocking the ashes out of 
 his pipe. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Carton," said he, "I m 
 mighty glad you re goin to be a neighbor 
 of mine. The women-folk seem to have hit 
 it off, too," he added, opening the door into 
 the next room, " and " 
 
 He stopped speaking, and a look of as 
 tonishment crossed his face as a tumultuous 
 babel of conversation reached our ears. 
 The voices no longer rose and fell they 
 rose steadily, each dominating the other, it 
 seemed, and yet marvel of marvels ! in 
 perfect amity, though they no longer re 
 sponded but spoke at one and the same 
 time. 
 
 " If it was two men ? " whispered Andy, 
 with a chuckle. 
 
 57
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Exactly," I replied ; " it would mean a 
 fight." 
 
 We listened intently. It was a problem 
 simple to the speakers of gussets, and 
 pleats, and back widths, and yet not one 
 connected sentence could we hear. 
 
 " I tell you what, Mr. Carton," said Andy, 
 in his hoarse whisper, " I ve been married 
 forty-two years, and I ain t found anything 
 yet as entertainin as the ways of a woman." 
 
 "Well," I suggested, "what about the 
 ways of two women ? " 
 
 Andy doubled himself over in silent glee ; 
 as for me, I felt that I had said something 
 rather neat, and tried not to smile myself. 
 Just then the voices in the next room sud 
 denly ceased. 
 
 " Well, I declare ! " exclaimed Mrs. Tay 
 lor. " It s after eleven. I wonder what 
 them men is talkin about so quiet in the 
 kitchen. If your husband lets him, Andy ll 
 jest talk him blind, once he gets started." 
 
 Marion laughed merrily. " Why, Mrs. 
 Taylor," she said, " how absurd ! You 
 don t know Henry, or you wouldn t say 
 that." 
 
 58
 
 An Upheaval 
 
 " Talk about women gossipin , as men do, 
 Mrs. Carton, I believe there s more gossip 
 goes on among the men down at the post- 
 office every day than all the women round 
 here do in a week. Now Andy " 
 
 At that moment Andy softly shut the 
 door, shuffled a chair across the floor osten 
 tatiously and announced in a loud tone that 
 it was time to get to bed. 
 
 S9
 
 IV 
 
 THE EDUCATION OF GRIGGS 
 
 WE had lived for two months at Way- 
 dean, and, although as far as agri 
 cultural operations were concerned we 
 might as well have been in the city, I had 
 begun to appreciate the delights of a coun 
 try life without the usual drudgery, worry 
 and expense. I was not raising grain at 
 two dollars a bushel to sell for fifty cents, 
 or making butter at a cost of a dollar a 
 pound to sell for a quarter of a dollar, but 
 I had time during the hot weather to enjoy 
 the sight of Peter Waydean s waving fields 
 as I swung in a hammock under the trees, 
 while that old sinner frizzled in the glaring 
 sunlight over his work. Occasionally I re 
 freshed myself by sauntering to the field 
 where he happened to be working, to have 
 a little friendly conversation with him, and 
 I never failed to let him know that new 
 beauties were revealed to me day by day in 
 60
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 the agreement to pay him an extra hundred 
 dollars for working his own land. At first 
 he had showed signs of looking upon me 
 with the contemptuous irritation of an 
 angler who has accidentally landed a mud- 
 pout, but when I artlessly hinted that I 
 would have been willing to pay a higher 
 rent for the place rather than make a slave 
 of myself as he did, I could see that his pre 
 vious delight in his own cleverness was 
 completely overshadowed by the bitter re 
 gret that he had not made more of his 
 opportunity. 
 
 We had no cattle of our own, but Peter s 
 were in plain view in the lower field. We 
 had no sheep, but Peter s little flock 
 picturesquely dotted the landscape. We 
 didn t own a horse, but, after all, Marion 
 had a terror of being run away with, and I 
 had made an inflexible rule never to go 
 within range of a horse s hind legs. And 
 in the matter of confining my farm expendi 
 ture to the price of a spade, a rake and a 
 hoe, I had been most loyal and consistent ; 
 I had stuck not only to the letter of our 
 agreement, but also to the spirit. Indeed, 
 61
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I was not merely resigned, but cheerful, 
 knowing that the more closely I appeared 
 to cling to Marion s plan the sooner would 
 she begin to waver. 
 
 But a chance remark that I overheard 
 Abner Davis make one morning as I 
 boarded the train changed my mental atti 
 tude in an instant. " He ain t no reg lar 
 farmer oh, Jiminy, no ! ha, ha ! he s 
 jest " How he finally labelled me to his 
 fellow-rustic I never heard, for the train 
 slowed up at the platform, and his voice 
 was drowned in the noise. I just had time 
 to turn, before I stepped on board, to cast 
 a withering glance backwards a glance 
 that was wasted, however, for Abner was 
 poking the other man in the side with his 
 thumb and they were both doubled over 
 with merriment. Of course, he hadn t in 
 tended me to hear, and I was quite aware 
 that I was not a farmer, either regular or 
 irregular, but it was this fact that made the 
 remark so galling. There are two things I 
 cannot bear: one is what Marion calls the 
 truth, for that always turns out to be some 
 thing odious and objectionable ; the other 
 62
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 is ridicule. That morning my mind was 
 filled with bitterness, for Abner Davis had 
 managed to combine in one brief remark 
 the essence of much that I disliked to hear. 
 The rhythmic beat of the car-wheels clanked 
 out the derisive refrain, " He ain t no reg 
 lar far mer ! " By the time I reached 
 the city I had decided it was due to my 
 self-respect to put things on a different 
 basis. Certainly, I was not a farmer. I had 
 neither a horse, nor a cow, nor a sheep no, 
 not even a guinea-pig! I had no agri 
 cultural implements, except, oh, hateful 
 thought ! a spade, a rake and a hoe. 
 
 I was in this mood when Harold Jones 
 unloaded Griggs upon me in the restaurant 
 where I was taking lunch. I knew from the 
 twinkle in Harold s eye when he introduced 
 us that he meant mischief. " Griggs," he 
 explained to me, " has got farm-on-the- 
 brain. Carton," he explained to Griggs, 
 " had such a severe attack that his mind is 
 unhinged. He imagines ha, ha ! that 
 he s a farmer ! Now you two sit down and 
 exchange symptoms. I have to get back to 
 the office." 
 
 63
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I treated Griggs with distant civility, not 
 because he was thrust upon me, but because 
 it usually takes me a year or more to get 
 beyond formalities with an acquaintance. 
 But Griggs was impervious to hauteur ; he 
 was unconstrained and hearty enough for 
 two. I could see that Harold had spoken 
 the truth in his case, for his farming mania 
 was at its height, and he was overjoyed at 
 finding a man who had done what he mere 
 ly dreamed of doing. He was a produce 
 commission merchant, he told me, and he 
 was convinced that he could double his in 
 come and prolong his life by running a 
 farm in connection with his business. It 
 was a simple proposition, he stated, that a 
 child could grasp. A farmer makes a profit 
 by farming, a commission merchant by 
 commissioning; therefore, if the merchant 
 were also a farmer would he not absorb both 
 profits ? 
 
 Griggs tilted his chair, hooked his thumbs 
 into his waistcoat, and challenged me to 
 point out a flaw in his theory. I de 
 clined, for the simple reason, I said, that it 
 was flawless ; then I rose to make my escape. 
 64
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 Griggs adjured me to sit down for a min 
 ute ; he had a few questions to ask, and I 
 was the man of all men to give him the in 
 formation he sought. 
 
 Now a stitch in time, it is said, saves nine ; 
 a lie, a little one, a mere clerical plea of a 
 pressing engagement, would have saved 
 ninety or more. Had I not instinctively re 
 frained from loosening one stitch in my 
 garment of righteousness it would not have 
 been torn to tatters. 
 
 I hesitated ; I sat down ; I was lost. 
 Griggs grew friendly, more friendly, affec 
 tionate ; he addressed me by my surname, 
 and I realized that I was in the clutches of 
 the objectionable type of person who claps 
 you on the back at the second meeting, and 
 demands with a boisterous laugh, " How 
 goes it, old man ? " 
 
 Beginning with generalities pertaining to 
 agriculture, he questioned me searchingly 
 upon my private affairs. I can parry, and 
 occasionally thrust but not against a bat 
 tering-ram. Grigg s questions were not to 
 be evaded. I could have declined point- 
 blank to answer, thus intimating that he was 
 65
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 a boor, but that would have been unpleasant 
 to me perhaps not to Griggs. I could 
 have followed my natural inclination by 
 telling the truth, but I recoiled from laying 
 bare to a stranger the peculiar economies of 
 our rural life ; besides, I shrink from intru 
 sion with the same shyness that causes me 
 to slink guiltily into a shop if I see a man 
 approaching who is indebted to me. There 
 was but one other alternative ; I took it. I 
 smiled my most frankly ingenuous smile ; I 
 beamed upon him with warm-hearted en 
 couraging candor and lied ! Yes, lied with 
 beggarly duplicity, and I kept on with Spar 
 tan fortitude; and so smooth is the grade 
 on the broad and downward road that pres 
 ently I was enjoying my own depravity. 
 My imaginings no longer appeared as ugly 
 bloated caterpillars, but spun themselves 
 swiftly into chrysalides and instantly 
 emerged as gorgeous butterflies, dazzling 
 to their creator. And yet my mind re 
 mained alert and clear. Every statement 
 that I made was notched deeply into my 
 own brain, so that I could afterwards recall 
 the slightest detail ; into Griggs s also, for 
 66
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 he snapped at, swallowed and assimilated 
 every fragment of information with the 
 avidity of a starved dog. We began in this 
 way : 
 
 " How many acres in your farm? " 
 
 " Fifty." (It really was my farm, for I was 
 paying more than the rent of the whole 
 place to Peter.) 
 
 " How many horses ? " " Five 
 
 two working teams and a fast driver." 
 (Fortunately, I knew Peter s stable.) 
 
 "Cows? .. Calves?" "Three 
 
 cows seven calves." (I was pretty sure 
 of the cows, but I had to guess the 
 jcalves.) 
 
 " Jupiter ! You never raised seven calves 
 
 from three cows? " " Oh, yes. Three 
 
 pair of twins the odd one is last year s." 
 
 " Last year s ! Thought you had only 
 
 been farming two months?" "Yes, 
 
 but I bought one calf with her mother." 
 
 " Three pair of twins first season ! Great 
 Caesar what luck ! What did you pay for 
 the farm ? " " Six thousand, two hun 
 dred and fifty." 
 
 "Cash?" "Cash." 
 
 6?
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " The devil ! You must be well fixed? " 
 "Oh, so, so." 
 
 " How d you make it? " " Emperor 
 
 stock." 
 
 " Emperor ! You must have been in on 
 the ground floor? " " Ground floor." 
 
 " Oh Lord ! How many men do you 
 keep?" "Just one." 
 
 " What do you have to pay him ? " 
 
 " Three hundred a year." 
 
 " Must be a nice place for children. How 
 
 many have you?" "Five." (This 
 
 was theoretically correct. Paul had invent 
 ed two sisters and two brothers, all invisi 
 ble, to play with. A man s family should 
 be screened from publicity, and this reply 
 seemed to make Paul strictly impersonal. 
 He did not ask me how many wives I had.) 
 
 Now I looked upon this person as a man 
 whom I would never meet again, never hav 
 ing met him before, and I parted from him 
 with joy after having answered every ques 
 tion that he asked to his satisfaction, also 
 to my own. I did not dream of entering a 
 maze that would exhaust my ingenuity to 
 find my way out of without ignominiously 
 68
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 crying for help. But before I was done 
 with Griggs I recalled many things of which 
 I had never seen the full significance be 
 fore. One was a tract I had read in my 
 youth entitled, " The First False Step." 
 Another was a remark that Marion had 
 once made in anger : that I would say any 
 thing, without regard to veracity or the im 
 mediate future, to avoid unpleasantness. I 
 had got her to retract the assertion to a cer 
 tain extent by professing to be deeply 
 wounded, as indeed I was, but I saw now 
 that she knew me better than I knew my 
 self. 
 
 Two days later, on my next trip to the 
 city, I found Griggs awaiting me in my of 
 fice. " Hello, old man ! " he exclaimed en 
 thusiastically. " I haven t been able to sleep 
 since I saw you can t think of anything 
 but getting out to see your farm. Why, 
 Carton, what s what the dev " 
 
 " Stand back," I cried warningly, with 
 averted face and outstretched arm " keep 
 well away! I m I m in trouble. My 
 boy my boy " I sank into my chair 
 and covered my face with my hands. 
 69
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Griggs staggered back. " Which one? " 
 he gasped. 
 
 " Which oh, ah Andrew," I answered 
 despairingly. " He broke out last night 
 I m afraid it s " I bowed my head. 
 
 " It s what? " demanded Griggs, moving 
 rapidly away. 
 
 " Scarlet fever," I groaned. 
 
 Griggs vanished. " Say, Carton," he 
 called out, from the other side of the door, 
 " awfully sorry. Other kids all safe? " 
 
 I laughed a hard metallic laugh I 
 knew it sounded like that, for I seemed to 
 stand off and listen. Griggs didn t wait to 
 hear more. " Hell ! " he ejaculated, and his 
 heavy footsteps pounded the stairs. 
 
 I thought that was the last of Griggs. It 
 was for nearly two months. By that time 
 my point of view had changed, as the dan 
 ger of complications receded, so that I 
 sometimes found myself chuckling over the 
 clever way in which I had managed to rid 
 myself of an insufferable bore. I did not 
 mention the matter to Marion, for I well 
 knew that in some things she was incapable 
 70
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 of judicial consideration, without regard to 
 qualifying circumstances; then, reasoning 
 and argument availed not. An act, she in 
 sists, is either right or wrong, therefore it 
 is useless to juggle with words in trying to 
 make out that it is mostly right and only a 
 little wrong. Had Marion developed ar 
 tistic ability, I am sure it would have been 
 in the line of black and white, while my 
 talent would as surely have run to color. 
 It is the moral in a fable that appeals most 
 strongly to her ; it is the fable itself that de 
 lights my imagination. A moral is all very 
 well in its place, like a capstone to a tower, 
 but there it should stay. To detach it for 
 the purpose of concrete personal applica 
 tion, I have explained to Marion, is an out 
 rage on the proprieties of family life. To 
 choose the moment when a man is smarting 
 under the consciousness of error for the 
 purpose of pointing out the folly of his fool 
 ishness is positively inhuman. What, I 
 ask, would have been the moral effect upon 
 the prodigal had his father prepared a feast 
 of proverbs instead of a fatted calf? This 
 question she has never answered except by 
 7 1
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 a baffling tight-lipped smile, a smile that 
 convinces me of the utter folly of hoping 
 that a woman will listen to reason. Yes, I 
 had good cause to believe that mentioning 
 the Griggs episode would lead to useless 
 discussion. 
 
 It was a warm day in midsummer when I 
 found a note from Griggs in my morning 
 mail. He had learned at the office that I 
 was spending my vacation at home, and he 
 concluded that all danger of infection was 
 over. 
 
 "... Now, old chap," he wrote, " I 
 can t wait any longer; I ve got to have a 
 look at your place. My wife has been dead 
 against my buying a farm, but she has given 
 in this much : that if I can find a city man 
 who gets more out of his farm than he puts 
 into it, she ll let me go ahead. So you re 
 my man, Carton. I want you to give me 
 the tip in regard to facts and figures, and 
 if you have to dress them up a bit, like the 
 Annual Report of a Loan and Investment 
 Company, you may do so, with my blessing. 
 I m no good in that line myself, but I m 
 strong on a second-hand affidavit. I ll 
 7 2
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 drive out on Thursday afternoon to have a 
 look around your farm, then you can post 
 me on details." 
 
 It was nine o clock when I received this 
 epistle. Griggs, I calculated, could not ar 
 rive before the middle of the afternoon, and 
 he would probably not stay more than an 
 hour or two, so as to leave time to drive 
 back to the city by daylight. The problem 
 that confronted me was whether it would 
 be worse for me to tell the truth to Griggs, 
 or to Marion, or to both, or to risk the 
 probability of Marion learning it from 
 Griggs, or of the latter from my wife. I 
 shrank from each solution in turn, and yet, 
 worst of all, was the thought of being bur 
 dened any longer by the secret of my own 
 guilt. I could have made up my mind to 
 confess to Marion had I not been sure that 
 she would insist upon Griggs being told the 
 instant he arrived. That thought hardened 
 my heart. I had gone too far to retreat; 
 Griggs should be deceived to the bitter end. 
 
 It was at this stage of my mental conflict 
 that the thought of confiding in Andy 
 Taylor came to me as a sudden inspiration. 
 73
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 That dear old soul, I felt sure, would take 
 a positive delight in helping me out of this 
 difficulty; indeed, I thought of borrowing 
 his farm for the afternoon, until a better 
 plan presented itself. I couldn t see the 
 humorous side of the matter very clearly 
 just then, but I knew Andy would. He did. 
 I found him hoeing his corn, but he will 
 ingly left his work and sat down in a shady 
 spot with me to listen to my tale. I did not 
 attempt to excuse myself; in fact, I was 
 rather more severe in my self-condemna 
 tion than I thought the circumstances war 
 ranted. I wanted sympathy and encour 
 agement ; I wanted to be assured that I 
 wasn t as miserable a sinner as I declared 
 myself to be ; and I knew that, in dealing 
 with Marion, the way to get what I yearned 
 for was to assume the most abject repent 
 ance. But my serious air failed to impress 
 Andy, for he was so delighted with the 
 humor of the situation that, at first, he gave 
 himself up to unrestrained merriment. I 
 had to paint my despair still more vividly 
 before he subsided into helpful contempla 
 tion. 
 
 74
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 " To tell you the truth, Mr. Carton "I 
 winced at the word, and at the wink that 
 accompanied it " I think it s a darn good 
 joke." He stopped to laugh once more, 
 and I permitted a sorrowful smile to steal 
 over my face. " And as for my opinion of 
 your conduct," he went on, " I believe 
 you re jest a nateral-born play-actor." I 
 started in surprise, for this was not the kind 
 of consolation I had expected. " That 
 bein the case," he concluded, " you ain t no 
 ways blamable." 
 
 " Why, how do you make that out? " I 
 asked, trying to conceal my elation. 
 
 " You done it," he answered, chewing a 
 piece of June grass meditatively, with his 
 eyes half-closed, " as innocent as that little 
 boy of yourn when he makes believe he has 
 all them brothers and sisters. You ain t 
 got all the live-stock that you described, but 
 you want em so bad that your imagination 
 sort of got a cinch on your judgment." 
 
 I grasped his hand in speechless grati 
 tude, not only for the charitable view he 
 took of my conduct, but also that he had 
 pointed out the way to disarm Marion s 
 75
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 criticism when the time came for me to con 
 fess my misdeeds. I looked at my watch. 
 In three or four hours Griggs would ap 
 pear ; there was no time to lose. 
 
 " Mr. Taylor," I said, hesitatingly, not 
 knowing just how to broach my plan, " hav 
 ing gone so far, I I don t quite see my way 
 clear, except by going a little farther." 
 
 Andy nodded in perfect comprehension. 
 " See that strip of tamarac swamp over 
 there ? " he asked. " Well, it ain t no more n 
 half a mile wide, and it d come nateral to 
 me to cut through there in a bee line, but 
 if you was to try, the chances is that every 
 bit of it would look like every other bit, 
 and you d be glad to git out even on the 
 side you started in on." 
 
 " I would," I admitted. " If I could only 
 start afresh ! " 
 
 Andy chuckled again. " Well," he said, 
 with hearty encouragement, " I m prepared 
 to holler round the edge, or go in to look 
 you up, or anything you say. Now, what s 
 your scheme? " 
 
 " It struck me," I replied, casting aside 
 my embarrassment, " that perhaps you 
 76
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 wouldn t mind lending me some stage fur 
 niture for the afternoon." I enumerated the 
 required number of horses, cattle, hogs, and 
 sheep. 
 
 Andy laughed in glee, then he shook his 
 head in assumed solemnity. " No, Mr. Car 
 ton," he said, " I couldn t do that, but I ll 
 give em to you outright ; then, if you like, 
 you can give em back to me in the even- 
 in ." 
 
 I was touched by his evident desire to 
 save me from any unnecessary perversion 
 of the truth, but I assured him that Griggs 
 would not think of asking me if the animals 
 he saw on my place were my own ; besides, 
 I would feel overwhelmed by the munifi 
 cence of this temporary gift. But Andy 
 was obdurate, so I let him have his way. 
 There was just one other difficulty that 
 of getting my wife away from Waydean for 
 the afternoon, but that was easily arranged. 
 I remembered that she was in the first stage 
 of the rag-carpet fever, and had announced 
 her intention of getting Mrs. Taylor to in 
 struct her in the art, so when Andy brought 
 me into the house to have a drink of fresh 
 77
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 buttermilk, I had only to hint at Marion s 
 desire to learn in order to secure a pressing 
 invitation from Mrs. Taylor to bring her 
 over in the afternoon. 
 
 Andy accompanied me to the gate. " Mr. 
 Carton, keep up your spirits," he said en 
 couragingly, in parting, " and everything 
 will go all right. You needn t feel nervous 
 about your wife gittin back too soon, for 
 when two women gits started rag-carpetin 
 they don t remember they ve got husbands 
 until on about supper-time. When they 
 settle down we ll drive the stock over and 
 arrange them to look nateral. I was goin 
 to wash my buggy this afternoon, and I 
 was thinkin I might as well do it over 
 there. I ain t had no experience of play- 
 actin , but you need someone to look like a 
 hired man, and I guess I could do that." 
 
 I had thought of the hired man problem, 
 and the same idea had occurred to me, but 
 I knew it wasn t my place to make the sug 
 gestion. " No, Mr. Taylor," I replied ; " I 
 couldn t think of letting you take such a 
 menial part. I d rather give up the per 
 formance " I wilted suddenly at his look 
 78
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 of sceptical amusement " unless," I added, 
 " you would really like to do it." 
 
 " I really would," he responded, with a 
 broad smile. 
 
 Griggs came. To my amazement, he 
 asked no questions, at first. He had a busi 
 ness-like, preoccupied air, as if he were a 
 bailiff preparing an inventory for a bill-of- 
 sale, and he looked at me, I fancied, as if 
 he suspected I had hastily hidden some of 
 the effects that might legally be attached. 
 He scarcely noticed Peter s growing crops, 
 but he studied the domestic animals intent 
 ly, jotting down memoranda in his note 
 book. The inspection evidently satisfied 
 him that they were not stuffed, although in 
 their unfamiliar surroundings the cattle 
 wore a strained and unnatural expression, 
 as if they thought he was an amateur 
 photographer, and feared they might not be 
 taken full face. His manner exasperated 
 me, but I managed to treat him politely, 
 even when he remarked that my hired man 
 was a rum-looking old coon and that the 
 horses needed grooming. 
 79
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Suddenly he shut his note-book with a 
 snap. " Carton," he burst forth, " I ve been 
 taken in ! " 
 
 " Taken in ? " I ejaculated. He had an 
 equine cast of countenance, and his eyes 
 rolled in such a vicious way that I instinct 
 ively moved directly in front, looking at 
 him fixedly. My surprise was not assumed. 
 
 " Duped bamboozled hoodwinked ! " 
 he snorted. 
 
 I grew pale with rage. I knew I did, 
 though I could not see myself. My eyes 
 flashed ; I could feel them flashing. I would 
 have given five dollars to see their scin 
 tillations in a mirror. I drew myself up 
 to more than my full height thank 
 Heaven, I could at least see myself elon 
 gate ! Andy Taylor, standing beside his 
 buggy with a sopping sponge in one hand, 
 his mouth hanging open and his reddish 
 side-whiskers floating in the breeze, sud 
 denly turned his back and hugged himself, 
 his shoulders heaving in silent spasmodic 
 convulsions. 
 
 " Mr. Griggs," I said icily, my tone, I 
 was pleased to hear, as pale and frosty as a 
 80
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 shaft of the aurora borealis, " what do you 
 mean? " 
 
 " What do I mean ? " he shouted. " I 
 mean that I ll pay Harold Jones back for 
 this I ll teach him not to run a rig on 
 me!" 
 
 " Harold Jones ? " I queried vacantly. 
 
 Griggs burst into a laugh that sounded 
 like a horse s neigh. " Brace up, old man," 
 he adjured me, slapping me on the back. 
 " You don t seem to get on to my meaning, 
 but you don t need to look like an idiot. 
 I ll tell you the whole business." 
 
 Briefly, it seemed, he had happened to 
 meet my friend Harold that day, and had 
 mentioned his proposed visit to my farm ; 
 incidentally, a warm discussion had arisen. 
 Harold had been convulsed with merriment 
 at Griggs s conception of the extensive 
 scope of my farming operations. When 
 Griggs adduced his conversation with me as 
 evidence Harold had laughed still more up 
 roariously, declaring it was the best joke he 
 ever heard further, that my live-stock 
 consisted of five old hens and some chick 
 ens. Griggs knew Harold to be fond of 
 81
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 joking, but had, reluctantly, believed him. 
 He had not expected, he admitted, to see 
 such a well-stocked farm. 
 
 " In other words," I said, with some heat, 
 " you expected to find that I " 
 
 " Hold up ! " interrupted Griggs hastily. 
 " You see, Carton, I was mad at the thought 
 of having been made a fool of. I can un 
 derstand a fellow lying on a business deal, 
 when it s to his interest, but to sit down and 
 lie cold-bloodedly, just for recreation, 
 like " 
 
 " Like whom ? " I demanded wrathfully, 
 as he paused. 
 
 " Like that brute Jones," answered 
 Griggs, with a vicious jerk of his head. 
 " I ll get back on him, you bet ! " 
 
 I began to see daylight. " Come away 
 up to the house and we ll have a little re 
 freshment," I said, with hospitable zeal. 
 
 Griggs brightened. It was a warm day, 
 so I brought him around to the south ve 
 randa, but I would have entertained him 
 anywhere else had I remembered that Paul 
 was there. He was curled up in a chair, 
 absorbed in a book. I knew he was obliv- 
 82
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 ious of what had been going on, but there 
 is never any certainty of what Paul may, or 
 may not, say, and I felt a qualm of misgiv 
 ing. Griggs proceeded to attract his 
 attention by snapping his fingers, as if the 
 boy were a puppy or an infant, remarking, 
 to me, that he was wondering where I kept 
 the kids. Now Paul is not shy, but we 
 never could induce him to notice a stran 
 ger s advances without being formally in 
 troduced, consequently, ff his mind is 
 suddenly withdrawn from his imaginary 
 world, he looks shy; worse, he looks as if 
 he were unseeing, deaf, and an idiot. My 
 mind was preoccupied, or I would have 
 avoided difficulties by introducing Griggs, 
 but I unfortunately neglected that formal 
 ity. Paul s stolid and incurious gaze rested 
 on my visitor; I looked on spellbound, 
 knowing that his mind was working with 
 intensity, and that something was coming; 
 Griggs shuffled uneasily. 
 
 " Well, sonny," said Griggs, at last, 
 " what do you think of me? " 
 
 I have watched a toad sit motionless 
 waiting for a fly to come within reach with 
 83
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 exactly Paul s expression. I noticed that 
 his eyelids didn t even blink. Griggs 
 glanced at me ; I felt, rather than saw, the 
 patronizing condolence of his look. It is 
 the look of the proud father who raises chil 
 dren guaranteed to fit ready-made clothing. 
 
 " Paul," I prompted, with pregnant 
 meaning, "why don t you answer? What 
 do you think of this gentleman ? " 
 
 " I think, father," he answered, in his 
 dreamy, deliberate tone, addressing me 
 pointedly, but still looking at Griggs, " that 
 he looks like a horse." 
 
 I felt as if I were falling from a dizzy 
 height, but the sensation was not altogether 
 painful. Griggs bore up better than I could 
 have hoped, and declared with an attempt 
 at jocularity that he would rather look like 
 a horse than a cow. I had no more pres 
 ence of mind than to reprove Paul on the 
 spot for his rudeness, a course which could 
 only result in one of two things : a howl or 
 an argument. This time it was an argu 
 ment ; but I could better have stood a howl, 
 for he pointed out that his mother had 
 
 taught him to always tell the truth, and 
 
 84
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 " That will do, Paul," I interrupted, hur 
 riedly. " Stand up, and I ll introduce you 
 to Mr. Griggs." 
 
 I left them to entertain each other, while 
 I escaped into the house for the refresh 
 ments. Had I not done so, nothing could 
 have warded off an indignant dissertation 
 from Paul on the difference he was careful 
 to observe between stating actual facts that 
 came under his observation and his habit 
 of making up fictitious persons and events. 
 The latter propensity we never checked, be 
 lieving that nothing should be said to 
 prevent the fullest development of his won 
 derful imagination. My own excursions in 
 the realm of undiluted fiction were trifling 
 in comparison to Paul s ; before him, doubt 
 less, lay a future with his pen beside which 
 even mine must pale to insignificance. 
 
 The room I was in opened upon the 
 veranda. Paul was sitting beside the win 
 dow, and I could hear his voice distinctly, 
 but only the alternate interrogatory rumble 
 of his companion s. Evidently Griggs was 
 making the most of his opportunity to learn 
 more of my domestic concerns. 
 35
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 "Oh, he s all right," I heard Paul an 
 nounce. " He was only playing sick to get 
 out of working. Father said it wasn t 
 worth while to send for the doctor, and we 
 shut him up in the barn so that the others 
 wouldn t take it. We didn t let him out till 
 he said he was quite well thank-you." 
 
 " They re all half-brothers and half- 
 sisters. Not of any consequence, you know 
 just to amuse me." 
 
 " Father said he guessed he d send them 
 to the Orphan s Home ; he couldn t afford 
 to feed such a large family. Then he said 
 he d let me keep them if I made them work 
 hard for their board. I can tell you I keep 
 them going." 
 
 " Father says he cares more for me than 
 for the whole crowd, and that he shouldn t 
 be expected to bring up step-children." 
 
 " Yes, I let them play for an hour on Sat 
 urdays." 
 
 " They re all out picking potato bugs ex 
 cept Tom. He s in jail." 
 
 " Up in the attic. He stole a candy out 
 of my box, and I locked him up for a week. 
 He gets bread and water only once a day." 
 86
 
 The Education of Griggs 
 
 " They each have to bring a full pail of 
 bugs, or else they don t get any tea." 
 
 " Father says he ll have Tom put in the 
 Reformatory if I say the word." 
 
 What further information Griggs gleaned 
 I had no means of knowing, for Paul was 
 doing so well that I thought it better not to 
 interrupt the conversation, and I took the 
 opportunity of having a brief talk with 
 Andy Taylor before returning to the veran 
 da. Griggs was obviously distraught and 
 had little to say except that he was in a 
 hurry to get back to the city, but he looked 
 at me as if he were mentally formulating 
 charges to lay before the Society for the 
 Prevention of Cruelty to Children. He was 
 so engrossed in his thoughts that he neg 
 lected to thank me for holding the gate open 
 as he drove through, then I had difficulty in 
 impressing upon his mind what he should 
 say to Harold Jones. 
 
 " Tell him," I concluded, holding the 
 horse s head, " that I consider it an imperti 
 nence for a mere acquaintance to pry into 
 my private affairs. Is it anyone s business 
 but my own, Mr. Griggs, whether I keep 
 87
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 only a few fowls or a large assortment of 
 domestic animals? Tell him that I would 
 never dream of asking you how many fir 
 kins of butter and crates of eggs you 
 handled in a year, or if your profits exceed 
 
 the commission you 
 
 " G lang there ! " shouted Griggs. 
 
 88
 
 V, 
 
 PAUL AND THE CHICKENS 
 
 " T HAVE no fancy for the country, as 
 1 you know, my dear Marion," wrote 
 Aunt Sophy, in conclusion, " but your de 
 scription of Waydean makes me long to 
 accept your invitation. When I heard that 
 Henry had rented a farm I thought you 
 must be simply crazy to let him do it, but 
 your letter has reassured me. Of course, if 
 he has quite determined not to go to any 
 expense in the expectation of making 
 money out of the land, and if you both want 
 to live there, it is a different thing. I think 
 it is a splendid idea not to work any more 
 land than he can attend to with a spade, a 
 rake and a hoe. Take my advice, Marion, 
 and keep him to that no matter what 
 arguments he may use and you will be 
 perfectly safe. If your poor uncle had only 
 been guided by my advice, or if I had been 
 89
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 less easily swayed by his hopefulness, I 
 would have had more than a pittance to live 
 on now. But no, it was buy this, and buy 
 that, till . . . 
 
 " How lovely it must be to have your own 
 milk and butter and cream and fruit, 
 and, above all, to know that they re clean! 
 And the chickens ! Do you know, I can t 
 touch chickens in the city ; I haven t tasted 
 one for a year, I am so disgusted at the 
 thought of how they may be fed, and yet 
 I am just longing for a taste of plump, 
 clean, . . . grain-fed " 
 
 Marion s voice wavered ; she stopped 
 reading. I uttered a prolonged whistle, 
 then laughed in a hollow mirthless tone 
 that brought a responsive gleam to Mar 
 ion s worried face. She left the breakfast 
 table and looked anxiously out of the win 
 dow at the back of the room, then sat down 
 again with a sigh of thankfulness. 
 
 " What a mercy Paul wasn t within hear 
 ing," she said ; " how he would have 
 howled!" 
 
 I went to the window. Paul was sur 
 rounded by our flock of twenty-seven half- 
 90
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 grown chickens and five hens. In one hand 
 he held his little tin pail of corn ; with the 
 other he dealt out one grain at a time to 
 each in turn, calling the fowl by name and 
 reproving those that tried to snatch the oth 
 ers share. " Jeremiah, here s yours come 
 along Aunt Noddy," I heard him say 
 coaxingly. 
 
 I sat down again and stared at Marion 
 hopelessly ; she responded with a gaze of 
 mute despair ; then we both studied the 
 tablecloth without speaking, feeling that the 
 skeleton we had ignored for months had at 
 last stalked unbidden from the closet. 
 
 As I thought the matter over I could see 
 that Marion was entirely to blame for this 
 hopeless complication. If she had allowed 
 me to get eggs from pure-bred stock for 
 setting we would have had twenty-seven 
 chickens of exactly similar appearance that 
 Paul never could have individualized, never 
 have named, never have loved with the pas 
 sionate fervor that he bestowed on each one 
 of the variegated specimens hatched from 
 eggs at ten cents a dozen. My eggs, I com 
 puted, would have cost not more than five
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 dollars ; so in order to save four dollars 
 and a half, Marion had saddled us with a 
 flock as unapproachable from a culinary 
 stand-point as so many sacred cows. This 
 conclusion presented itself with such clear 
 ness that I was on the point of submitting it 
 to Marion when I remembered how un 
 pleasant it was to me to listen to wholesome 
 truths, so I merely looked unselfish and 
 hummed thoughtfully. 
 
 My wife regarded me with suspicion, her 
 frown deepening. " I have asked you re 
 peatedly," she said, with frosty distinctness, 
 " not to hum, and not to look like that." 
 
 My complaisance vanished. I am not 
 easily irritated, and I try to avoid answer 
 ing back, but I cannot stand being told not 
 to look like that. 
 
 " Marion," I retorted, " I don t wonder 
 you feel annoyed, but you may as well face 
 the difficulty now. I m tired of people ask 
 ing me how we like living in the country, 
 and then remarking that it must be fine 
 to have your own chickens. Of course, I m 
 willing to keep up appearances and to 
 make-believe that having our own chickens 
 92
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 
 is one of our many daily luxuries ; but now 
 that your Aunt Sophy is coming we ve got 
 to eat them, or she ll know the reason why. 
 Oh, yes, I know," I added, as she tried to 
 interrupt " I know we can t have them 
 in the abstract. We ve got to kill and cook 
 and pick the bones of Abner, Jeremiah, 
 Lucy, or some other of the boy s pets ; but 
 if I had had my way about the eggs he 
 couldn t have told one from another, and 
 we might have had an occasional fowl with 
 out these painful personal associations." 
 
 I regretted my rashness when I saw Mar 
 ion s look of calm scorn, her manner lead 
 ing me to expect a revival of some of my 
 mistakes. I can evolve plausible theories, 
 but she usually shatters them with the most 
 distracting personal applications. 
 
 " I hadn t intended to point out that you 
 are responsible," she said, " but since you 
 are so unjust as to try to blame me, I must 
 do so. Don t you see, Henry, that it is but 
 another instance of your habit of evading 
 unpleasant duties. I have told you re 
 peatedly " I squirmed in protest, for I do 
 hate that phrase, and I knew so well what 
 93
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 was coming " that you would say any 
 thing to tide over a disagreeable scene, 
 and it s true." 
 
 " Honestly, Marion," I protested, " I I 
 wouldn t. I d jump into any kind of a 
 scrimmage I d do anything to please you. 
 If you ll only be cheerful I ll I ll see that 
 it doesn t happen " 
 
 " There you are again," she interrupted, 
 in a descending cadence of utter dejection. 
 " Oh, dear it is so hopeless ! Listen, 
 Henry, and see if you can understand this : 
 Paul is now six, and yet he never knew 
 there was such a thing as death until last 
 month. You had your way about that 
 and what was the result? The child nearly 
 went crazy when his bantam hen died. If 
 you had been at home, I have no doubt 
 you would have told him it was asleep, but 
 you more than made up for that by assuring 
 him that it had gone to heaven." 
 
 " I did nothing of the kind," I protested 
 indignantly. " Paul came to me " 
 
 : The child came to me," Marion went 
 on sternly, " perfectly happy in the thought 
 
 of Bijou having gone " 
 
 94
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 " He came to me" I insisted, " asking if 
 Bijou had gone to heaven. I said I 
 hoped " 
 
 " It doesn t matter so much what you 
 said as the way you said it. However, as 
 you say, Aunt Sophy is coming, and we 
 must eat some of those chickens ; so you 
 may face the situation and settle with Paul. 
 If you had explained to him that chickens 
 were made to eat, as I wanted you to do in 
 the first place, you wouldn t have had this 
 trouble now. If I thought it would be a 
 lesson to you I could stand my share, but I 
 know you ll forget all about it in a week 
 and be ready to do the same thing again, 
 so you may as well take the consequences 
 alone." 
 
 I was preparing to ask for a properly exe 
 cuted death-warrant, specifying the first 
 victims by name, but before I could speak 
 my wife dived into her pocket for a hand 
 kerchief and retreated upstairs. 
 
 I can tackle a disagreeable duty when 
 
 there is no other course open to me, but I 
 
 am not upheld, as Marion is, by a strong 
 
 sense of righteousness; indeed, I am in- 
 
 95
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 clined to feel personally unworthy to 
 attempt any good act that is patently out of 
 my line, yet on the rare occasions when 
 Marion behaves in this childish manner I 
 throw my conscientious scruples to the 
 winds in my frantic desire to assuage her 
 grief. 
 
 I found Paul teaching a hen and two 
 chickens to sit still as he drew them around 
 on his little wagon. My resolution wavered 
 as I watched his innocent enjoyment, but 
 the thought of Aunt Sophy spurred me on. 
 Besides, if Marion was bloodthirsty enough 
 to want these poor creatures eaten, it was 
 not for me to feel faint-hearted. 
 
 "Well, Paul," I said, with spurious cheer 
 fulness, "giving them a ride? Are these 
 some ha, ha ! you want to keep for 
 pets ? " 
 
 Paul has a quick ear for a false note. He 
 studied my face with grave wonderment, 
 his earnest gaze piercing my jocose mask. 
 " Why, father," he exclaimed, " your voice 
 sounds so queer and what a funny ques- 
 96
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 tion! They re all pets, of course, I want 
 to keep every one." 
 
 " Come and sit on the bench beside me," 
 I said ingratiatingly, " and we ll have a 
 talk. . . . Do you know that that 
 people sometimes have to that is, that 
 people don t usually raise chickens for 
 pets?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, I know," he replied, nodding 
 his little head with philosophic certainty. 
 " Most boys would rather keep dogs and 
 rabbits, and ponies and other animals ; but 
 I don t want anything for pets except hens 
 and chickens, and perhaps well, I think 
 I would like a pair of white pigeons. I 
 heard you saying to mother that I wasn t 
 a bit like other boys. Is that one way I m 
 different?" 
 
 " It is," I answered with curt emphasis. 
 
 Paul snuggled closer to me and leaned 
 his head on my shoulder. " You say that 
 as if " he hesitated shyly " as if you 
 wished I was like other boys. Am I not as 
 good ? " 
 
 " You re better, my boy, far better ! " I 
 exclaimed, in quick remorse. 
 97
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 This remark may appear injudicious, but 
 Paul is like me in many ways, and there is 
 not a shadow of vanity or self-conscious 
 ness in his character ; no amount of praise, 
 or even flattery, could disturb the natural 
 equipoise of his self-esteem, but he is quick 
 to feel the hurt of unjust depreciation. 
 When Marion forgets my imperfections and 
 tells me I am the best man in the world, I am 
 aware that she is drawing it a little strong ; 
 at the same time, I am strengthened and 
 uplifted by her opinion, and I feel the yearn 
 ing to do noble things, to be more worthy 
 of my pedestal, to attain that serenity of 
 temper which mortals name angelic. 
 
 Paul s face brightened, and I knew that 
 I had made amends for my previous abrupt 
 and jarring tone. I began again cautiously, 
 taking care to speak with soothing mellow 
 ness. " I don t think I ever heard of any 
 one keeping twenty-seven chickens and five 
 hens for pets." 
 
 A merry light danced in Paul s eyes. 
 
 " That s what you said about farming with 
 
 a spade, a rake and a hoe/ he reminded 
 
 me, " and mother said we must do what 
 
 98
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 was right without thinking about other 
 people." 
 
 Chance, instinct, or his inherited nimble 
 mind had enabled him to checkmate me as 
 neatly as Marion could have done it; I 
 moved back. Passing lightly over the ob- 
 jectio-nable features, I briefly sketched the 
 magnitude of the chicken-raising industry 
 for supplying city markets, pointing out the 
 necessity for poor farmers selling their 
 fowls to buy food and clothing. Despite 
 my care he was visibly shocked. 
 
 " No matter how poor we were, you 
 would never send our chickens to market? " 
 he inquired, breathing hard. 
 
 There could be but one answer to that 
 question, and after I had fervently dis 
 claimed the possibility of poverty ever mak 
 ing me so heartless, each of us remained 
 buried in his own thoughts for a brief time. 
 The chickens gathered around, and I fan 
 cied they regarded me with intuitive dread 
 in their glistening eyes, as if they waited to 
 hear my next attempt to seal their doom. 
 An overgrown bully suddenly pecked a 
 weaker brother, pulling out a bunch of 
 99
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 feathers viciously as he spurned the victim 
 with his feet. Paul darted to the rescue and 
 brought the brutal assailant back to the 
 bench a prisoner. 
 
 "What is that villain s name, Paul?" I 
 asked with eager interest. 
 
 " Why, this is Angelica," he answered. 
 " Don t you remember you named him 
 yourself when he was first hatched ? " 
 
 I did remember. He was then a beautiful 
 yellowish ball of fluff, with large, soft, wide- 
 open eyes, the prettiest one of the brood ; 
 now he was grown into a greedy, swagger 
 ing, insolent swashbuckler, proud of his 
 stature and fine plumage. 
 
 " He s a dangerous criminal," I said, feel 
 ing his plump breast appreciatively, " and 
 it might be better to to " somehow the 
 word stuck in my throat ; I hesitated. 
 
 " I know, father," cried Paul joyfully. 
 " I m the policeman and you re the judge 
 he must be tried and then sentenced to 
 wear a muzzle." 
 
 Angelica was tried and sentenced, then 
 muzzled with a small rubber band that fit 
 ted tightly over his bill. His antics amused
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 us so much that for a few minutes I forgot 
 my fatal errand. 
 
 " He looks wicked enough to kill some 
 of the others," I remarked, after a pause. 
 " Do you know, Paul, how a person who 
 kills another is punished? " He looked up 
 with sudden, awed interest. " They put a 
 rope around him, and and " 
 
 "And what?" 
 
 " fine him a dollar and costs." 
 
 " Oh ! " he gasped, " I m so glad that s 
 all. And do they take the rope off after 
 wards ? " 
 
 " I believe they do," I replied, in deep de 
 jection. 
 
 " Father, I just love chickens. Don t 
 you?" 
 
 " I do, indeed," I affirmed, with sudden 
 reckless, despairing intention ; " but I love 
 them in two different ways. If they re nice, 
 well-mannered birds I love to see them 
 running about with their feathers on; but 
 if they re naughty I love to see them not 
 running about with their feathers off." Paul 
 laughed in glee. " Your mother and Aunt 
 Sophy like them too," I went on warily, 
 101
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 my heart thumping; " and I think if chick 
 ens are cruel and bad they deserve to be 
 stuffed " his expression changed sudden 
 ly, but he still looked bravely into my eyes 
 
 " with bread-crumbs, and roasted, with 
 thick brown rich gravy." 
 
 Paul jerked his little hand from mine and 
 stood up in front of me, his face twitching 
 and his eyes brimming. " You greedy 
 greedy GREEDY ! " he gasped. 
 
 " Paul, my boy, listen," I implored ; 
 " your aunt Sophy is coming, and she s aw 
 fully fond " 
 
 My words were lost in a prolonged howl. 
 He had a phenomenal voice, but this de 
 layed howl eclipsed all previous ones. I 
 followed him in frantic haste, eager to for 
 swear all designs on his pets, but he 
 fled as if I were after his scalp. When I 
 finally found him, too late, he was in his 
 mother s arms, and I knew she had prom 
 ised him everything, from the look she 
 turned on me, a look that caused me to 
 slink silently away, a soulless brute, and 
 alas ! a tailless one. 
 
 102
 
 Paul and the Chickens 
 
 " Henry," said Aunt Sophy, compla 
 cently, as I drove her to the station after 
 her visit, " in all the time my husband had 
 his farm I never could get him to use our 
 own chickens. He said they cost him two 
 dollars apiece, being from thoroughbred 
 stock, but I see you have more sense and 
 raise good plain barnyard fowls that you 
 can eat every day if you want to. Why, we 
 must have had them three times a week 
 while I ve been here, and you seem to have 
 a good large flock yet. I ve tried a dozen 
 times to count them, but they always went 
 criss-cross. How many have you got 
 left?" 
 
 " Just twenty-seven," I answered, strok 
 ing my mustache with modest pride. 
 
 103
 
 VI 
 
 1DID not approve of Marion s habit of 
 keeping- accounts at Waydean. There 
 was always a missing balance, but I never 
 could get her to see what a needless worry 
 and waste of time it was to try to locate it, 
 or how much better it is to take my plan 
 and merely count the cash on hand to settle 
 one s financial standing. It is diverting to 
 me to calculate future hypothetical receipts 
 and expenditures, but it is the reverse of 
 entertaining to look backwards at the irrev 
 ocable past, the past that is called back by 
 various carefully entered items in Marion s 
 account book, prominent among which 
 looms payment of three hundred dollars for 
 Emperor mining shares. 
 
 It was one evening while I was engaged 
 
 in preparing my weekly agricultural page 
 
 for the Observer, and Marion was poring 
 
 over her account book that she suddenly 
 
 104
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 dropped her pencil and exclaimed : " Hen- 
 ry!" 
 
 " Well ? " I asked, with meek resigna 
 tion, my brain beginning to stiffen, for I 
 judged from her tone that she had arrived 
 at some miraculous result in figures. 
 
 " We ve been living in the country four 
 months," she said impressively, " and what 
 do you think I find? We ve actually paid 
 more for butter and milk and vegetables 
 than in any four months while we lived in 
 the city." 
 
 " How strange," I commented, trying to 
 look interested. 
 
 My wife smiled slightly, in a way that I 
 find peculiarly irritating. " You re only 
 pretending to listen," she said, " and you 
 couldn t possibly understand while you look 
 like that." 
 
 My weariness vanished ; I started up in 
 dignantly. " While I look like what ? " I 
 demanded. 
 
 Marion laughed. " That s better," she 
 said. " I d rather see you look angry than 
 stupid. Now I ll try again to get your at 
 tention. Do you remember what you said
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 when I gave you the choice of a lawn-mower 
 or a hammock for your birthday ? " 
 
 I did remember. I had made a swift cal 
 culation at the time that a hammock would 
 be easier to run, so I had urged Marion not 
 to go to the expense of a lawn-mower, re 
 minding her also that it might properly be 
 ranked among the tabooed farm imple 
 ments. 
 
 " Certainly," I answered, at a loss to 
 know what was coming, " I said I would 
 prefer a hammock." 
 
 " And do you remember that you prom 
 ised to hire or borrow one of Peter s cows 
 to crop the grass on the lawn ? " 
 
 " Well, I didn t exactly promise. I said 
 it would be easy enough to get one." 
 
 " And now the grass is as long as hay. 
 Why didn t you do it ? " 
 
 I frowned, for I hate insistent, unneces 
 sary questions, questions that are bound 
 to lead up to some unpleasant climax that 
 it would be better to avoid. I could stand 
 being thrown overboard without ceremony 
 better than being forced to walk the plank 
 with measured tread, yet if I protest against 
 106
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 this Socratic method of arriving at conclu 
 sions she tells me with pained surprise that 
 it is for my good, that I should learn not 
 only to regret my mistakes, but to thor 
 oughly understand why I am sorry. Rather 
 than have her say that, I am willing to 
 answer any ordinary question with outward 
 docility. 
 
 " The plan didn t seem so feasible when 
 I thought it over," I replied meekly. " It 
 would have looked foolish to offer to pay 
 Peter for letting me feed his cow, and I 
 couldn t make up my mind to borrow one, 
 so the time slipped away before " 
 
 " Of course it did," she interrupted ; " the 
 way it always does. But, after all, I think " 
 a merry light danced in her eyes " I ll 
 forgive you. There ll be all the more grass 
 for, oh, dear, you do look so funny ! our 
 cow." 
 
 " Our cow ! " I gasped, in stupefaction. 
 
 " Henry," she burst forth excitedly, 
 " I ve been trying to break it to you gently, 
 but you don t seem to understand. I ve 
 come round to your way of thinking you 
 may go and buy a cow to-morrow." 
 107
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 It was a complete surprise to me that 
 Marion should be so suddenly seized by the 
 desire to own a cow. For my own part I 
 would rather have started with a herd, but 
 still, it was something to be thankful for 
 that she did not insist upon beginning with 
 a goat. Then there was the possibility that 
 a cow might grow into a herd ; that would 
 mean a hired man, horses, implements, a 
 large dairy business, more land, an ultimate 
 fortune. Yes, I was more than gratified 
 that Marion was beginning to see that my 
 ideas on farm management were sound. 
 
 When I asked our butcher the next morn 
 ing if he knew of any cows for sale in the 
 neighborhood we awaited his answer with 
 breathless anxiety. He half-closed his eyes, 
 studying the mud on the wagon-wheel in 
 profound meditation, our suspense intensi 
 fied by this dramatic pause. 
 
 " I ll tell you what I d do," he said, at last, 
 pointing northward impressively with his 
 long knife. . " I d go up there on the clay 
 where the pastures is dried up and the 
 farmers is feedin hay at fifteen dollars a ton, 
 and I d buy a cow for half what she could 
 108
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 be bought for down here where the grass 
 is green." 
 
 That sounded reasonable, and when he 
 proceeded to name some of his customers 
 " on the clay," I stopped him at the name 
 Waydean. 
 
 " Any relation of Peter s ? " I asked, with 
 sudden interest. 
 
 " His brother," he answered, with an odd 
 smile " and it s a dead fright how them 
 two men hate each other ! I believe Peter d 
 go clean off his head if you was to buy a 
 cow from John." 
 
 I smiled with satisfaction. Peter had set 
 his snares in vain in many artful endeavors 
 to sell me some of his belongings ; with 
 sunny smiles I had avoided giving him a 
 chance to add to the exorbitant rent that I 
 paid him, and he could scarcely conceal 
 glances of sour disappointment in my pres 
 ence. That I should buy a cow from any 
 one else would, I knew, be pain to him ; his 
 pain would not be less if I bought her from 
 his brother John. 
 
 " Well," said the butcher, when I had an 
 nounced my intention of having a look at 
 109
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 John Waydean s cattle, " I pass within half 
 a mile of his place on my round, so I can 
 give you a lift if you like to come along with 
 me. Of course," he added, taking a side 
 long survey of me, " John can t skin a man 
 quite so neat as Peter, but he s pretty sharp 
 on a bargain, and you want to keep your 
 weather eye open when you dicker with 
 him. Know much about cattle ? " 
 
 Some people can boast about acquire 
 ments they haven t got ; I cannot. I mere 
 ly looked shrewd and modest, nodding 
 slightly to the butcher, simultaneously with 
 a faint movement of one eyelid. Marion, 
 misunderstanding my silence, exclaimed 
 confidently : " Oh, he knows all about that 
 sort of thing. He writes articles for the 
 Observer." 
 
 At this point I disclaimed, with becoming 
 embarrassment, all pretension to unusual 
 lore, but the butcher looked profoundly im 
 pressed and delighted. 
 
 " That s all right ! " he said cheerily. " I 
 know his cows is mostly fresh, but he s got 
 one or two strippers." 
 
 I went into the house to get ready for 
 no
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 the trip ; Marion followed me. " Henry," 
 she inquired, in a confidential tone, " what 
 are fresh cows, and strippers ? " 
 
 It was the very problem I was wrestling 
 with. If the butcher had not been waiting-, 
 and if Marion hadn t followed me so closely, 
 I would have snatched a moment to consult 
 my books of reference, but I had no time 
 even to collect my thoughts properly. I 
 was in the awkward predicament of the 
 schoolboy who knows he knows the answer 
 to a question, but somehow cannot think of 
 the words. I was in a great hurry, but Mar 
 ion was so anxious for information that I 
 did my best to enlighten her. 
 
 " A fresh cow," I said, struggling into 
 my coat in jerks, " is one in the prime of 
 life and and vigor; a stripper, on the 
 contrary, is merely a a middle-aged 
 juvenile." 
 
 I seized my hat and hurried away. As we 
 drove out of the yard I noticed that Marion 
 was standing in the kitchen doorway gaz 
 ing after me with the expression of one who 
 is prevented from seeing the bottom of a 
 pool by the reflections on its surface. I 
 in
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 waved her a gay farewell and hoped for the 
 best. 
 
 I had a dim idea that I could find out in 
 directly during the drive what the butcher 
 thought these terms meant, but I needed 
 all my mental agility to make a creditable 
 appearance of understanding his voluble 
 allusions to grades, stockers, springers, 
 shorthorns, yearlings, heifers, and numer 
 ous other varieties of cattle. My answers 
 were brief and guarded, and when I tot 
 tered I was so swift to recover my balance 
 that my errors were not apparent to my 
 companion. On such occasions I may 
 sometimes be suspected of not being famil 
 iar with a subject, but I would defy anyone 
 to prove my ignorance. If Marion s repu 
 tation for veracity had not been at stake I 
 might have been willing to act the part of 
 a humble tyro asking for information, but 
 since she had plainly said that I knew all 
 about cattle it was my duty to try to make 
 her statement appear credible. 
 
 I descended from the wagon feeling that 
 I was utterly incapable of choosing a cow, 
 but I concealed my fears under a mask of 
 
 112
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 calm assurance as I bade the butcher good- 
 by. 
 
 " Mr. Carton," he said, in parting, " if you 
 was a greenhorn that didn t know the dif 
 ference between a stocker and a springer, 
 like most city men, I d say to buy your cow 
 off of some other man than John Waydean, 
 but he ll know better than to try to palm 
 off scrub-stock onto you." 
 
 This cheerful prediction almost made me 
 perspire with apprehension, particularly as 
 scrub-stock was a brand new variety that 
 he had not mentioned previously. My con 
 fidence returned, however, when I stood in 
 John Waydean s barnyard and saw his 
 cows paraded for my inspection, for no two 
 of them were alike, and I could tell at a 
 glance which were Jerseys and which were 
 common cows. I took care not to express 
 a preference until I found out which ones 
 their owner appeared most anxious to sell, 
 and these I instantly decided not to buy. 
 Even had I not been warned by the butcher 
 I would have mistrusted John Waydean, 
 for his face had not the prepossessing ap 
 pearance of his brother s, and his manner 
 "3
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 was surly and suspicious. I examined each 
 of the animals with a critical air, ignoring 
 his evident desire to make me believe that 
 an ugly creature resembling a bison was the 
 finest cow, and finally chose a graceful, 
 neat-limbed, fawn-colored Jersey. The re 
 luctance to part with her that I detected in 
 the old man s manner, and the fact of his 
 asking me ten dollars more for her than for 
 any other, confirmed my intuition that I 
 had chosen wisely. I was about to close 
 the bargain when the butcher s words came 
 back to my mind. I looked sharply at the 
 seller. His smooth-shaven face was creased 
 with deep lines about the mouth a mouth 
 resembling his brother Peter s in its smug 
 rigidity, but whether it concealed regret or 
 triumph I could not determine. 
 
 " Mr. Waydean," I said, with stern in- 
 cisiveness, " is that animal a fresh cow or 
 a stripper? " 
 
 His reply had a ring of indignant, 
 scornful reproach. Take her or leave her, 
 he didn t care a blank, but I couldn t 
 run no rig on him by asking such ques 
 tions. However, since I had mentioned the 
 114
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 matter, I d better come into the stable and 
 see the prettiest week-old calf in the coun 
 ty. He d sell it for two dollars, and if I 
 raised it on that cow s milk he d be willing 
 to buy it back in the fall for ten. My lin 
 gering doubts were dispelled when I saw 
 the pretty little soft-eyed creature, and I 
 suddenly remembered that a fresh cow is 
 one with a fresh calf. Marion hadn t spok 
 en about getting a calf, but I felt sure that 
 if I suggested it should be made into veal 
 she would insist upon its being kept, then I 
 would have a tangible nucleus toward the 
 realization of my dream of owning a herd 
 of dairy cows. I closed the bargain hur 
 riedly, with the proviso that he was to hitch 
 up his team and deliver my purchases at 
 Waydean. In a few minutes the calf was 
 hoisted into the wagon, bleating dismally. 
 I looked for some demonstration of sym 
 pathy from its mother, but she appeared 
 quite unconcerned and would not follow 
 until she had been tied to the rear of the 
 vehicle. I thought this rather peculiar, but 
 the old man explained that she had always 
 showed a great fondness for home and was
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 reluctant to leave. During our drive he 
 was almost as voluble as the butcher had 
 been, discoursing of the iniquities of the 
 man whom he was ashamed to call his 
 brother. " Mr. Carton," he warned me 
 solemnly, " I wouldn t put it past him to 
 come over and run that cow down, he ll be 
 that mad that you knew too much to buy 
 one off of him, but don t you believe a word 
 he says. A man that d go into court and 
 swear as he done in connection with my 
 late father s property wouldn t stick at 
 nothin . You watch Pete ; if he ain t took 
 you in on the rent, he ll even up in some 
 other way, for it ain t in him to act straight 
 and square like me." 
 
 "The dear little lovely thing! I do be 
 lieve it s hungry, Henry. How are you 
 going to feed it ? " 
 
 I have been asked many questions for 
 which I have been obliged to invent an 
 swers, but this was not one of them. I 
 had never owned a calf before, so my 
 ideas on calf-raising were logical and con- 
 116
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 elusive. The theory that the progeny of 
 a cow should not be allowed to associate 
 with the mother was, I explained, founded 
 upon true scientific laws. A calf brought 
 up on a milk-pail would learn to take its 
 food at stated intervals, escape indigestion, 
 heaves and hollow horn, and grow up into 
 a gentle, courteous and productive adult; 
 while the mother, segregated from an 
 otherwise guzzling, irrational, worrying 
 offspring, would chew her cud in the placid 
 beatitude most essential to the production 
 of the largest quantity of rich milk. 
 
 Marion listened silently, with a knowing 
 smile, but when I had finished she re 
 marked that I knew perfectly well that I 
 was talking rubbish, and that the natural 
 way of feeding anything was the right way. 
 Hadn t I better get the soup ladle and her 
 mixing-bowl and teach the calf to sit up 
 properly at the kitchen table while I was 
 about it? 
 
 I replied rather hastily, and before I had 
 
 finished speaking Marion left me and went 
 
 into the house. I was alone with a calf, a 
 
 cow, and a guilty conscience ; alone at the 
 
 117
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 very time when I most needed help and 
 encouragement. Five minutes before I 
 had looked on my purchases with exulta 
 tion, while my wife stood in the stable be 
 side me, uttering- ecstatic exclamations of 
 delight because I had bought a cow so 
 beautiful to behold and the dearest little 
 calf that I must never mention in connec 
 tion with veal again ; now, in my black de 
 spair over this disagreement, I hated the 
 innocent cause of it. If Marion had tried 
 persuasion, I would have been willing to 
 cast my theory to the winds, but I could 
 not brook ridicule and I determined to 
 bring up that calf by hand at whatever cost 
 in time and trouble. I decided to begin at 
 once by learning to milk the cow ; after 
 that, I would be in a better position to look 
 up Marion and forgive her for the way I 
 had behaved. 
 
 I didn t expect to become an expert 
 milker at once, but I knew from observa 
 tion how to milk, and I went to work with 
 frantic energy. In a calmer frame of mind 
 I might have waited to tie Ariadne s legs 
 together, they looked so excessively agile ; 
 118
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 however, she allowed me to exhaust every 
 possible grip and password without pro 
 test, also, alas ! without acknowledg 
 ment. When I retreated at last with the 
 empty pail, my dismay was increased by 
 the sideways leaps of joyful anticipation 
 indulged in by the calf in the next stall. 
 Something had to be done to fill up that 
 creature, and I realized with a sense of ut 
 ter desolation that I was left alone to do it. 
 A word of advice, a protest, tears or angry 
 reprisals, would alike have been sweet to 
 my ears at that moment, but I knew Mar 
 ion too well to hope that she would come 
 to my help until I implored her forgive 
 ness ; even then, oh, maddening incon 
 sistency ! she would perhaps be plunged 
 in gloom because I had not enough strength 
 of character to stick to my convictions. 
 No, there was but one course for me: 
 I must prove the worth of my theory, if 
 possible ; if not, I would at least be in a 
 position to capitulate with the honors of 
 war. 
 
 I went into the house and looked up the 
 directions for teaching a calf to drink. I 
 119
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 found that you merely seized it by the nos 
 trils with the thumb and little finger, insert 
 ing the other three into its mouth as you 
 drew its head gently into the pail of milk. 
 This operation sounded rather objection 
 able, but I could not afford to be squeam 
 ish, and I prepared to smuggle our small 
 supply of milk out of the pantry and add it 
 up with water to make a sufficient bulk. 
 As I passed through the kitchen I glanced 
 furtively at Marion in the faint hope that 
 she might be ready to hold out the olive 
 branch, but when I saw that she did not 
 deign to notice my existence a sudden vio 
 lent resentment seized me. Instead of sur 
 reptitiously abstracting the milk, as I had 
 intended, I poured it into the pail with de 
 fiant ostentation ; still, I left the kitchen 
 with a sinking heart, for when Marion neg 
 lected to ask me what I was going to do 
 with that, I knew that she must indeed be 
 in a serious mood. 
 
 I know I followed the directions to the 
 
 letter up to the point when I drew the calf s 
 
 head into the pail and inserted my fingers, 
 
 though much perseverance was needed, for 
 
 120
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 it seemed to be able to travel backwards 
 in all directions at once, faster than I 
 could go forwards ; but after that I am not 
 quite sure what happened. I know there 
 was a violent explosion and upheaval, a 
 blank followed, then I discovered that I 
 was standing in the stable doorway fran 
 tically squeezing three of my fingers be 
 tween my knees to deaden the pain, while 
 the calf stood outside looking at me with 
 an expression of incredulous wonder, its 
 legs sticking out in four different direc 
 tions like props. I wonder whether it was 
 blown out or carried out ; I don t think 
 it walked. I don t think, either, that I lost 
 my presence of mind ; if I did, I found it 
 again instantly. Instead of going into the 
 house for liniment, I calmly turned the cow 
 out of the stable also, then I looked on 
 grimly, resigned to non-interference if the 
 calf should happen to bite its parent or the 
 cow kick her offspring. 
 
 Ariadne looked around apprehensively 
 when she emerged from the stable ; the calf 
 ambled crookedly toward her; she edged 
 away with forward pointed ears ; it fol- 
 
 121
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 lowed hungrily. She trotted toward the 
 open gate, the calf gamboling in pursuit; 
 suddenly her tail straightened and she 
 broke into a mad gallop, so did the calf, so 
 also did I. It was in this order we passed 
 the kitchen door where Marion stood call 
 ing out to me in wild alarm to run, that the 
 cow had broken loose. 
 
 Perhaps it was this cheery information 
 that inspired me to overtake my movable 
 property a mile further down the road, 
 where our butcher, homeward bound, had 
 got off his wagon to turn them back. 
 
 " You might be able to milk a cow that 
 had milk," he said with a chuckle, after 
 listening to my tale, " but it d take Old 
 Nick to raise a calf on a dry one." 
 
 " A dry one ! " I shouted. " Do you 
 mean "- 
 
 " Did the old man tell you it was this 
 cow s calf?" he interrupted. 
 
 " Well, no, I can t remember that he 
 did. He said I d better take the calf too, 
 and I supposed " 
 
 " Exactly then he s salted you right 
 enough! You ve paid forty dollars for a
 
 A Cow and a Calf 
 
 beef cow that he offered to give me for a 
 twenty dollar account he owes me. I m 
 sorry dashed sorry that you ve been 
 took in, but he, he ! ha, ha, ha ! but you 
 let on you knowed all about cattle, and I 
 told you to keep your weather eye " 
 
 " I can stand being swindled," I shouted, 
 in wrath, " but I won t stand any told-you- 
 so business. You ought to have more 
 sense than to talk that way when 
 when " 
 
 " There, there," he interjected sooth 
 ingly " I know jest how you feel. The 
 other day my missis told me I d smash my 
 hand if I went hammerin nails with an axe. 
 Well sir, it wasn t three minutes till I did. 
 Of course I swore a bit, but when I went 
 into the kitchen and the missis asked me 
 first how I done it, and then said she 
 knowed I would, I jest went clean out of 
 my head with rage. I d sooner have gone 
 out and slashed the other thumb than have 
 been spoke to that way." 
 
 My heart warmed to the butcher ; he is 
 a man of fine feelings. He not only gave 
 me twenty dollars for the cow, but prom 
 ised to frighten John Waydean into silence 
 123
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 by representing that I was preparing evi 
 dence for a criminal prosecution. 
 
 " And now," I said, in conclusion, " I d 
 like your candid opinion about the calf. If 
 I decided to raise it, would it be likely to 
 grow into a valuable cow ? " 
 
 " Well," he answered, gulping in a pe 
 culiar, hesitating way, as if he were reluc 
 tant to answer, " you mostly can t tell what 
 kind of a cow a calf will make when it s 
 a week old, but if you if you wanted to 
 raise a cow, you you " 
 
 His face became suffused with a dull pur 
 ple flush, as if he were struggling with a 
 mighty spasmodic sneeze ; he turned his 
 face away, his body shaking convulsively, 
 then with obvious difficulty he continued : 
 " If you wanted to raise a cow you d ought 
 to have bought a a ha, ha, ha ! " 
 
 " Have bought what? " I cried, in exas 
 peration. 
 
 He stopped laughing and looked up and 
 down the road, then leaned over the edge 
 of the wagon-seat with his whip hand 
 shielding one side of his mouth. I hung 
 breathless on his words. 
 
 " A cow calf," he whispered. 
 124
 
 VII 
 
 THE ADVENT OF WILLIAM WEDDER 
 
 1LIKE to forget unpleasant experiences 
 quickly, particularly mistakes of my 
 own, and to that end I hurried home and 
 told Marion everything. Few husbands, I 
 know, would have done so, but I am not 
 one who lacks the moral courage to do 
 right when I know it will be better for me 
 in the end ; nor would I be unwise enough 
 to attempt to conceal the fact that I have 
 faults when I know that it is infinitely wiser 
 to acknowledge them. An error thrust 
 in Marion s way may arouse her compas 
 sion, while a good deed, too obviously 
 placed there, may be pushed aside with 
 well-merited contempt. I prefer to let my 
 virtues bloom in seclusion on either side 
 of her path, for her artistic eye delights to 
 spy out the modest flower that hides itself 
 in verdure. 
 
 125
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Marion vibrated between laughter and 
 tears as she listened to my tale. Did I try 
 to extenuate my conduct, or gloss over my 
 unspeakable stupidity? No; I castigated 
 myself unsparingly. I anticipated the 
 worst that might be said, and said it with 
 superlative fervor. Only thus could I hope 
 to avert the useless, humiliating process of 
 having my mistakes pointed out in detail ; 
 only thus could I evoke the sweet human 
 sympathy I craved, and divert my wife s in 
 dignation toward that adroit old swindler, 
 John Waydean. She was visibly affected 
 by my self-accusation, and I began to 
 breathe more freely. She seemed to be in 
 no haste to interrupt with a word of re 
 proach, or to say that she told me so, or 
 to hope the experience would be a lesson 
 to me. I had begun to reflect that, after 
 all, I wasn t a bad sort of fellow and that 
 man was made to err, when suddenly she 
 burst into tears. 
 
 " Marion," I cried, aghast, " I m an idiot, 
 but there s no use crying over " 
 
 " No," she moaned " no use." 
 
 " It s my fault," I urged, in despair, " but 
 126
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 if it were yours, I m I m blamed if I d 
 cry!" 
 
 " It is my fault," she gasped, with a 
 fresh relapse. 
 
 In a flash I jumped to the conclusion that 
 she was overcome with remorse for having 
 told the butcher that I knew all about cat 
 tle. I saw that it really was her fault, after 
 all, but this was not the time to say so. 
 
 " Not at all," I assured her, with sooth 
 ing generosity. " You must not blame 
 yourself you didn t realize the awkward 
 position you placed me in." 
 
 " No use," she repeated, unheeding. 
 " To think that I should be so taken 
 in!" 
 
 " You taken in?" I cried. "It was I. 
 Who what to oh " 
 
 The words died away in my throat as 
 Marion uncovered her face. Not a word 
 did she say, but her look was insuffer 
 able. 
 
 " I didn t," I protested hotly ; " I never 
 said I knew all about cattle when "- 
 
 I stopped, disconcerted by the expres 
 sive interrogatory turn to the corners of 
 127
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 her mouth. If she had said, in words, that 
 I had convicted myself by my denial, I 
 could have argued the point, but this silent 
 denunciation was distracting. I stared for 
 a moment with uncomprehending hauteur, 
 then strode from the room, trying to make 
 my back view appear like that of a man 
 who might possibly escape being mangled 
 by a train or dying of heart failure until his 
 wife had an opportunity to apologize for 
 her heartless conduct. This device had 
 never failed ; it didn t this time. I was 
 reaching for my hat in the hall when Mar 
 ion called me. I looked back, virtuously 
 impassive, but I could not suppress my joy 
 when I saw in her face, not a sorrowful 
 willingness to forgive me this time, but lov 
 ing toleration. What mattered forty dol 
 lars, or even forty cows, if I might once 
 more be restored to favor? 
 
 It was in all sincerity that I assured her 
 that I would profit by my experience, for it 
 did not seem possible that I could ever 
 again meet a cow on terms of mental supe 
 riority, and yet, in a few days, time and my 
 elastic temperament had such a mellowing 
 128
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 influence that I lost all sensitiveness on the 
 subject ; indeed, after pledging the butcher 
 to secrecy, I found myself telling Andy 
 Taylor with the gusto of an onlooker. 
 And later, when we had, through the good 
 offices of the butcher, found a suitable cow 
 that wasn t dry, I became able to appreciate 
 the humor of the situation with quite an 
 impersonal relish. Our new cow was not 
 a graceful animal, like Ariadne, but she was 
 easy to milk and docile, and, as Marion 
 said, Paul could never be impaled on her 
 horns, for she hadn t any. 
 
 I would not willingly have missed the 
 pleasure of owning a cow, nor the satisfac 
 tion of being able to milk her, but I did not 
 try to disguise from Marion the fact that it 
 was hard work ; indeed, the harder I work, 
 the more I like her to be aware of it. Solici 
 tude is cheering to me, so when, at first, she 
 used to stand beside me and express a fear 
 that I might hurt my back or burst a blood 
 vessel, I worked enthusiastically ; but later, 
 when attending to our cow became a part 
 of the inevitable daily routine, and when I 
 milked in solitude, I got very tired and 
 129
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 thought morbid thoughts about hired men 
 and other farm accessories that were not. 
 
 It is odd that the butcher s aggravating 
 habit of leaving our gate open should have 
 resulted in Marion s suggesting that we 
 should hire William Wedder, the one avail 
 able man exactly suited to our require 
 ments. Also, I afterwards reminded Mar 
 ion, if it had not been for what she called 
 my negligence in not removing the gate- 
 semaphore when winter set in ; William s 
 observant eye would not have detected 
 anything nnusual in the appearance of 
 the place. I recalled, too, that I had sev 
 eral times been prevented from taking 
 down the sign-board by the impossibil 
 ity of rinding the hammer and the wrench 
 at the same time ; not only that, but when 
 both tools were to hand I had a strange in 
 stinct against making use of them for that 
 purpose. Marion smilingly admitted that 
 it was extraordinary ; she suggested that 
 perhaps I was influenced by the same in 
 stinct that led me to leave the Venetian 
 shutters on the window frames all winter, 
 instead of taking them off in the fall and 
 130
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 putting them on again in the spring. How 
 ever, I was proud enough of the success of 
 my invention to be content to see the ob 
 trusive request " PLEASE CLOSE THIS 
 GATE " swing uselessly in the wintry 
 winds, while the gate itself stood open, half 
 buried in the snowdrift that formed around 
 it after every storm. If the gate were 
 closed, the request retreated into obscurity 
 behind a post, but when it was opened the 
 board swung across the roadway, so that a 
 person driving in or out would have to duck 
 his head to avoid it. The butcher, for 
 whose especial benefit I had taken all this 
 trouble, regarded the device with gloomy 
 suspicion when I showed him how it 
 worked. Instead of admiring my ingenu 
 ity, he insinuated that it would be the means 
 of frightening his horses, so I insisted upon 
 his driving in and out several times until 
 they showed complete unconcern. He ap 
 peared depressed by the thought that he 
 could never again pretend that he forgot to 
 close the gate, and although I secretly sym 
 pathized with him in his repugnance to 
 taking unnecessary trouble, I was de-
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 termined to break him off the habit of leav 
 ing the gate open. 
 
 Thus it happened that William Wedder, 
 tramping along the road with a red bundle 
 swung over his shoulder, against a bluster 
 ing March wind, spied something that 
 caused him to stop and think, to lay his 
 stick and bundle in the hollow of a snow 
 drift, smooth out his face to a becoming 
 gravity, and wend his way up to the house. 
 
 It was several hours later in the day 
 when I, returning from the city, halted in 
 the same spot and stared in amazement. 
 The semaphore had vanished, the gate, 
 standing open for months, imbedded in 
 several feet of snow and ice, was now closed, 
 a way being neatly cleared for its move 
 ment. I opened it and the warning notice 
 shot out over my head, in perfect working 
 order. I walked up to the house, puzzled 
 but gratified, trying to conjecture how and 
 why Marion had prepared this surprise. 
 She opened the door, struggling to conceal 
 her laughter at my countenance. 
 
 " How ever did " I began. 
 
 " Hush ! Come into the sitting-room," 
 132
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 she said mysteriously. " There s a man in 
 the kitchen ! " 
 
 " A man ! " I exclaimed, in agitation. I 
 had warned Marion never to admit a tramp 
 in my absence, and somehow I leaped to 
 the conclusion that she had been imposed 
 upon by a hardened villain. It was a relief 
 to think she was no longer alone. 
 
 She nodded. " Not an ordinary tramp," 
 she said. " He s the dearest, funniest lit 
 tle old man, with pink cheeks like a baby s, 
 and so clean looking. When he d had his 
 dinner " 
 
 " You gave him his dinner? " 
 
 " Certainly I did. You don t suppose I 
 sold it to him? Oh, you needn t look so 
 stern ; I ll tell you how it happened. I was 
 just taking my pies out of the oven about 
 eleven o clock when he knocked at the door 
 and said he d like to borrow a shovel for a 
 few minutes. About half an hour later I 
 remembered he hadn t brought it back, and 
 when I looked out of the front window 
 there was the top of his head bobbing up 
 and down at the gate. I got on my things 
 in a hurry and went out to see what he was 
 133
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 doing, and he was scraping the ice so hard 
 with his back turned to me that I had to 
 shout three times before he heard." 
 
 " What s that for ? I called out. For 
 you, ma am, he answered, turning round 
 with the oddest look. For me? I said. 
 Why, I never asked you to dig out our 
 gate. No, ma am, he said, but when I 
 seen that there sign hung out, I thought to 
 myself that some widow with small chil 
 dren lived here, and it wouldn t be much 
 of a job to dig out her gate. Then when 
 you come to the door I seen I w r as mistaken, 
 but I thought I d do it anyway, for it wasn t 
 your fault that you was so young and 
 and " 
 
 I smiled. 
 
 " No, I didn t pay him," she protested, 
 the becoming flush on her cheeks deepen 
 ing. " I offered him a quarter, but he 
 wouldn t take it, so I knew he wasn t trying 
 to flatter me, and I made him come up to 
 the house to get some dinner when he got 
 the gate closed. You should have seen his 
 face when the semaphore went behind the 
 gate-post. He was so delighted that he
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 opened and shut the gate several times to 
 see it work, exclaiming, My, my ! ain t he 
 got a head ! Don t that work beautiful ! : 
 
 " I suppose you did right to give the 
 poor old chap some dinner," I observed, 
 with a complacent smile. 
 
 " When he came into the kitchen," she 
 continued, " he said the smell of hot rasp 
 berry pies was the most appetizing smell in 
 the whole world. He said his aunt used to 
 make them when he was a boy, and once he 
 stole a whole one and ate it, and ever since 
 when he tries to feel sorry the remembrance 
 of the delightful sensation in his insides 
 overpowers his conscience and makes him 
 feel glad. Of course I gave him one for 
 dinner, and I told him he might have 
 another if he wished, but he declared that 
 one was enough that no mortal could 
 stand more than a certain amount of bliss. 
 Just fancy, Henry ; he says his aunt s pies 
 weren t a circumstance to mine ! " 
 
 " The old flatterer ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " You didn t say that when he praised 
 your semaphore," cried Marion, with re 
 sentment.
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I hadn t intended any reflection on the 
 quality of her pies, but it was some little 
 time before she could understand that I 
 really thought them to be infinitely superior 
 to my mother s. 
 
 " After dinner," she went on, " he said 
 he wasn t in a hurry, so he d just cut up 
 some wood and do the stable work until 
 you came home, for he wanted to see 
 you." 
 
 My curiosity was aroused, also my sus 
 picions, for my wife s manner was distinctly 
 ingratiating. That might mean either that 
 she had some new project of her own in the 
 background to submit to me, or that she 
 was about to tack off in another direction in 
 regard to one of mine, as she had done in 
 the case of the cow. 
 
 "About my semaphore?" I inquired 
 warily. 
 
 " So he said," she replied, with a tantaliz 
 ing laugh. " He wants to to handle the 
 county right ! " 
 
 My heart thumped ; my brain seemed to 
 turn a somersault. If Marion had not 
 been swaying to and fro with her handker- 
 136
 
 The Advent of William Wcdder 
 
 chief covering her face as she struggled 
 with her mirth I could not have concealed 
 my exultation. Months before, the suc 
 cess of my device had led me to think of 
 having it patented under the name of " The 
 Eureka Non-Automatic Gate-Closing At 
 tachment," but Marion had nipped my 
 project in the bud. The butcher, too, when 
 I asked his opinion, had chilled my enthu 
 siasm by declaring that if my gate-attach 
 ment proved salable in this locality he 
 would move to some other. Of course, 
 that was before he had become expert in 
 keeping his head out of the way of the sign 
 board, and while he still wore a strip of 
 court plaster on the bridge of his nose. 
 
 Now my judgment was vindicated. A 
 man could surely sell one hundred sema 
 phores at five dollars each in one county; 
 ten counties would enable me to buy Way- 
 dean ; ten more would pay for a train load 
 of implements, as in my day dream of long 
 ago ; another ten would stock the farm with 
 domestic animals; tens of hundreds of 
 counties still remained to furnish the means 
 for nebulous philanthropic schemes.
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Did I breathe hard, grow flushed or pale 
 with excitement, or do anything to indicate 
 that it was the moment of my triumph? 
 No, I didn t. For one thing, I was sure 
 Marion was keeping something from me ; 
 otherwise, why should it seem so funny to 
 her? Until I understood what she meant, 
 I must appear calm, even bored. 
 
 " Well," I said, stifling a yawn, " I ll go 
 and send him off. I wouldn t be bothered 
 selling county rights ; besides, the sema 
 phore isn t patented." 
 
 Marion looked puzzled. " Wait," she 
 said hurriedly, " till I tell 
 
 " I ll get rid of him first," I said, with 
 determination, " and then you can tell me 
 the rest." 
 
 " But he s not to be sent off," she insisted. 
 " Sit down, and I ll tell you everything. 
 He s looking for a place." 
 
 " A place ! " I exclaimed, beginning to 
 see light. " What has that got to do with 
 us? When I proposed hiring a man you 
 said we couldn t afford to hire more than a 
 quarter or an eighth of a man." 
 
 " Exactly. And this old man wants a 
 138
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 place where he need work only two or three 
 hours a day. He won t take any wages, 
 but he d like to have the reading of our 
 books and newspapers. He says he hasn t 
 any use for money as long as he has good 
 readin and nice vittles. " 
 
 I smiled at the persuasive eagerness of 
 her tone. She was evidently bent upon 
 hiring this peculiar old man, but she had 
 expected me to make the proposal so that 
 she could gracefully accede to it. There 
 would be certain advantages, I concluded, 
 accruing to the possession of even the frac 
 tional part of a hired man. For instance, I 
 would at once be relieved of the stable work 
 and the milking of Mary Jane. Then 
 spring was coming on, and I would be able 
 to enjoy the luxury of watching him toiling 
 in the vegetable garden under Marion s 
 supervision. Furthermore, my birthday 
 would arrive with the first green grass, and 
 there were indications that I would be pre 
 sented with a lawn-mower. 
 
 " Well, what did you tell him ? " I asked, 
 trying to look judicial. 
 
 " I said that of course it was a matter for
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 you to decide and I couldn t say anything 
 about it." 
 
 I could not repress a gleam of ironical 
 amusement. She was absolutely truthful, 
 yet it was a convention of hers that my word 
 was law, and that I was the autocrat of the 
 household. It was a postulate I dared not 
 dispute. 
 
 " Yes, of course," I admitted, in response 
 to her frigid, inquiring glance." I ll I ll 
 think it over. In the meantime I ll have a 
 look at him." 
 
 " Well, you d better decide, that is, I m 
 quite, quite willing to give the poor old man 
 a trial." 
 
 Had I been of a different mind from 
 Marion, I could scarcely have resisted Will 
 iam Wedder s persuasive arguments, and 
 when I had talked with him for a few min 
 utes I did not wonder that she had suc 
 cumbed to his fascinating eloquence. I 
 knew his praise of my semaphore must be 
 flattery, and yet I liked it. I felt sure from 
 his manner, his appearance and his conver 
 sation that he was merely masquerading as 
 a hired man, but I wanted to see him play 
 140
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 the part, although he looked more like a 
 well-to-do retired farmer taking a holiday 
 than a man who needed to travel about 
 looking for work. He did not present 
 credentials, but I ignored the question of 
 references, which seemed quite unnecessary 
 in view of his obvious respectability. He 
 knew how to do farm work, he assured me ; 
 he was handy with tools, understood gar 
 dening, and could churn and make butter 
 as well as milk the cow. As to terms, he 
 would not take money, but he would be 
 more than satisfied if he had his board and 
 plenty of reading matter. In the slack 
 time in midsummer, his smooth-shaven 
 jolly face grew solemn as he spoke, per 
 haps, if it wouldn t be too much to ask, and 
 if he needed a new suit of clothes, I might 
 let him have just a township right to sell 
 my gate-closer. 
 
 I fixed my curious gaze upon his rigid 
 features. I knew instinctively that his 
 earnest solemnity was assumed ; I knew by 
 experience that nothing was so effective in 
 baffling any attempt to play off as a steady 
 concentrated stare. His eyes drooped 
 141
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 slightly ; he studied the names on the draw, 
 ers of the spice-cabinet attentively; too at 
 tentively. 
 
 " William," I said, with deliberate, un 
 bending determination, " I have avoided 
 asking you embarrassing questions, but I 
 must know the truth about this semaphore 
 business before I decide whether to engage 
 you or not. What prompted you to dig 
 out my gate ? " 
 
 I saw a faint flicker of almost contempt 
 uous amusement in his face. " Why," he 
 replied, as if he wondered at my asking such 
 a simple question, " I seen that there notice 
 up, of course." 
 
 " I want to know the truth," I repeated 
 slowly, and this time I was almost startled 
 by the perfection with which I imitated 
 Marion s inflexible intonation. 
 
 His face assumed a pained and yet for 
 giving expression, and he regarded the hair 
 broom with intense interest. I waited, as 
 Marion had once waited for me, with the 
 air of being willing to wait until he had 
 time to compute the number of hairs it 
 contained, and I tried to intimate silently 
 142
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 that my waiting could have but one result. 
 This specialty of Marion s was more diffi 
 cult, but I succeeded, for William suddenly 
 laughed and looked me full in the face with 
 engaging candor. 
 
 " Well, sir," he said, as if he found a diffi 
 culty in making the confession, " I didn t 
 like to say so at first, but I thought ha, 
 ha ! it d be a darn good joke on you." 
 
 I smiled appreciatively. William had 
 done well ; indeed I could not have done 
 better myself, but I recognized a hollow- 
 ness in his laugh. I waited with silent ex 
 pectancy, as one of Paul s chickens might 
 wait after receiving a grain of corn from 
 his store. 
 
 He paused, looked a little blank, gulped, 
 then with the air of one who reluctantly 
 parts with his last coin, he added : " Be 
 sides, I wanted to see how the semaphore 
 worked." 
 
 I shook my head, sighed, looked at him 
 pityingly, for I saw the misguided man had 
 persuaded himself it was the truth, and I 
 divined, I know not how, that he was mis 
 taken. I tried to recall what Marion would
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 have said at this juncture, and I said it ; 
 indeed, I said it so effectively that I wished 
 Marion had been within earshot. If my 
 voice had not been an octave lower than 
 hers. I might have doubted that it was mine. 
 
 William s peach-tinted cheeks flushed 
 crimson ; he wiped his brow with his red 
 bandanna. " I ain t been cornered like 
 this," he exclaimed, " since my miss " He 
 checked the utterance with an abrupt 
 cough, and continued in a low soliloquizing 
 tone, " Now I come to think of it, the wind 
 was blowin pretty fresh and jest when I 
 come opposite the gate I caught a whiff 
 that set me thinkin ." 
 
 " A whiff? " I asked, in surprise. 
 
 " Hot raspberry pies," he explained, 
 wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. 
 
 I was completely satisfied and engaged 
 him on the spot, sending him to milk at 
 once. He had scarcely departed when the 
 door into the dining-room opened and 
 Marion appeared. I saw from her face that 
 she had been listening to the conversation, 
 and that indignation and amusement 
 struggled for mastery. 
 144
 
 The Advent of William Wedder 
 
 " You wr-r-efch ! " she ejaculated. 
 
 I said nothing. I was master of the situa 
 tion, and I knew it was one of the times 
 when she could imagine more provoking 
 insinuations than I could put into words. 
 
 " What are you laughing at ? " she cried 
 indignantly. 
 
 " I was just thinking " I began, then I 
 paused dramatically. 
 
 "Thinking what?" she demanded. 
 
 " That William Wedder is either a mar 
 ried man or a widower." 
 
 I had intended her to ask me why, and 
 I had the answer ready, but it was the 
 wrong question she propounded. 
 
 " A married man or a widower ? " she re 
 peated slowly ; then her face became sud 
 denly illumined with appreciative mirth. 
 " Oh, I see ! Because it was so hard to get 
 at the exact truth ? " 
 
 " Ye es," I faltered. 
 
 45
 
 VIII 
 
 MARION RISES TO THE OCCASION 
 
 WILLIAM WEDDER, as one-fourth 
 of a hired man, was a distinct suc 
 cess. Not only did he do the ordinary 
 chores that had previously fallen to my lot, 
 but he lightened Marion s household labors 
 by his readiness to churn, wash floors and 
 windows, and to do any other extra work 
 that might have turned her attention from 
 culinary duties. In fact, it soon became 
 apparent that the mainspring of William s 
 energy needed to be kept in working order 
 by a diet that included a liberal supply of 
 raspberry pie or its equivalent, for if the 
 quality or quantity of the dessert were not 
 to his liking his movements became languid 
 and his cheerfulness fled. His own theory, 
 he told me in confidence, was that the des 
 sert compartment of his stomach was so 
 arranged that no amount of plain food 
 would fill it, he was quite sure that was 
 146
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 the case, for the only effect of trying to fill 
 up by substituting plain food for puddings 
 and pies was to make him feel lop-sided. 
 
 But if he was costly to feed he paid for 
 his board by the bountiful supply of vege 
 tables he raised, for our little garden flour 
 ished amazingly under his care. And if 
 we fancied chickens for dinner, it was no 
 longer necessary for me to steal out with 
 the axe at night after Paul was asleep and 
 rouse a horrid clamor among the innocent 
 victims that I tremblingly clutched by the 
 legs. How William did it we never in 
 quired. Indeed, we preferred to think that 
 he didn t, but if he did, it was done in silence 
 and with decorum, and the chickens which 
 I had taken the precaution not to allow Paul 
 to include in his flock appeared on our 
 kitchen table looking quite as if they had 
 just been bought at the market. 
 
 It was during the second summer at 
 Waydean that I noticed the first indication 
 of Marion s longing to own the farm. She 
 began to resent the proximity of Peter s 
 live-stock, when his cattle looked as if they 
 thought of leaping the fence, or when his
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 pigs strayed into the barnyard. Then she 
 began to speculate about the value of the 
 land and how many years it would take us 
 to save enough money to buy it, and if, after 
 all, it would not have been better to have 
 leased the whole farm in the first place, so 
 that we might have had employment for 
 the whole of a hired man. Later, she in 
 sinuated that she would feel more confi 
 dence in me if I had shown myself to be a 
 masterful man by insisting upon the pur 
 chase of a plough to add to our three primi 
 tive implements, and when I contended that 
 a plough would have been useless without a 
 horse, she declared that a horse would have 
 been provided if we had needed one, and if 
 we made up our minds to buy the place we 
 would find a means of raising the money. 
 But in this case I was not as sanguine as 
 Marion, for I knew that Peter would hold 
 out for a price far in excess of the value of 
 the property if he knew we thought of buy 
 ing, and that my present income would only 
 allow us to put away a small sum each year 
 toward the purchase. However, the idea 
 kept working in my mind, though I was 
 148
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 careful not to let our landlord know that 
 we coveted his land, concluding that the 
 best way to deal with him, if we ever were 
 able to buy it, would be through a land 
 agent. In the meantime, I had consider 
 able difficulty in keeping the peace between 
 him and my hired man, for they showed 
 such an antipathy to each other that I feared 
 a dispute would arise that might endanger 
 the renewal of my lease. We had all be 
 come so fond of the place that I was more 
 than willing to go on paying a high rent, 
 and Peter himself, besides being interesting 
 and entertaining, was still a precious mine 
 of literary material. 
 
 Aunt Sophy s interest in Waydean al 
 most equalled our own, and she was en 
 thusiastic in her approbation of our idea of 
 buying the property. She wrote that had I 
 resembled her late husband in temperament 
 she would have advised Marion differently, 
 but considering the wonderful talent I had 
 shown for not buying implements, and my 
 sensible ideas about poultry-raising, she 
 was sure I could be trusted to manage any 
 amount of land economically. 
 149
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Poor Aunt Sophy! She had been ill 
 during the spring, and had delayed her 
 second visit until she would feel stronger ; 
 then a few days before we expected her 
 she telegraphed that she would be unable 
 to leave home and asked Marion to go 
 to her at once, if possible. When this 
 direful message arrived we both felt at 
 the same instant that it meant the end 
 of dear Aunt Sophy. But in addition 
 to the sorrow that welled up in me, the 
 appalling thought seized me that it was now 
 too late to atone for having allowed her to 
 cherish the innocent belief that the fowls 
 she had helped us to eat were of our own 
 raising. I could no longer hope that the 
 memory of the vicarious chickens of last 
 summer would be eclipsed by her enjoy 
 ment of the real home-made ones we had 
 meant to lavish on her this year. Up to 
 this time the fact that Marion had been 
 equally guilty with me, had been consoling, 
 but when I saw by the agonized look on 
 her face that the same dreadful thought 
 had gripped her I hastened to take the 
 blame.
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 " It was my fault, Marion," I gasped 
 penitently. " I bought the chi chick " 
 
 " Don t! " she cried, with a little shriek. 
 " How can you say that dreadful word ? 
 Of course, it was your fault, but will that 
 keep Auntie from dying while she still 
 thinks that that oh, oh ! " 
 
 I must say I had not expected such in 
 gratitude. Considering my generous as 
 sumption of the blame, Marion might at 
 least have said that it wasn t my fault. 
 Some people can perform a kindly act, and 
 then pass on their way serenely; I cannot. 
 I want to stand by and enjoy the effect; I 
 like my beneficence to be appreciated. 
 
 Yet unselfishness, unlike affection, may 
 be wasted ; worse, if ignored, it may arouse 
 a whirlwind of passion, as I found, to 
 Marion s cost. In a most unbridled man 
 ner I disclaimed responsibility. I asserted 
 that Aunt Sophy, if she were dying, would 
 pass away more peacefully if she went on 
 believing that the chickens were home 
 grown ; that anyway, not having spared ex 
 pense, I had procured plumper and jucier 
 ones than the best of Paul s ; that any per-
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 son who would think of disturbing, at such 
 a time, the settled convictions of a dying 
 aunt, was heartless and cruel ; that I did not 
 purpose standing quietly by to have my 
 reputation blasted, when I merely needed 
 to tap my head and whisper to Aunt Sophy 
 that my wife s delusion was a harmless one 
 that might well be ignored ; finally, that a 
 dying aunt would have something else to 
 think about than the origin of the chickens 
 she had eaten last year. I even suggested, 
 with insane hilarity, that she \vould be ab 
 sorbed in speculations as to her chances of 
 reaching Uncle Philip before he had begun 
 to underdrain his celestial estate. 
 
 It was at this point that I came to my 
 senses. Marion had fled from the room 
 with her hands over her ears. 
 
 There are times when a simple acknowl 
 edgment of wrong-doing, or a humble 
 apology, is sufficient ; there are other times 
 when it is expedient for me to confess my 
 utter inability to understand how I could 
 have behaved in such a base and brutal 
 manner ; but only once in years am I 
 obliged to collapse dejectedly, my face ex-
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 pressing horror and revulsion as I wipe 
 cold sweat, imaginary or real, from my 
 brow, while in a broken voice I insist that 
 7 didn t, that if I seemed to, it was the 
 devil who had suddenly possessed me. 
 
 This time Marion was disinclined to ac 
 cept any such explanation, contending that 
 if I allowed myself to become possessed I 
 might take the consequences, and I had such 
 a short time in which to depict the extraor 
 dinary sensations that accompanied the out 
 break that she was ready to start for the 
 train before I had made my case really con 
 vincing. She relented sufficiently, how 
 ever, on the score of parting, to forgive me 
 provisionally, but she hinted that she was 
 taking Paul with her so that if I had another 
 seizure I might enjoy it alone. She hoped, 
 also, that I would make a strong effort to 
 avoid being seized in the presence of 
 strangers who might not understand that I 
 was irresponsible. Did I think she could 
 trust me to behave with decorum if I should 
 
 be sent for to attend poor Auntie s 
 
 obsequies? 
 
 These, and other insinuations, I bore with
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 patient quiet dignity, as became a man who 
 had been lately dispossessed, and my de 
 meanor had such an effect upon Marion 
 that she bade me good-by with the same 
 affectionate warmth that would have fallen 
 to my lot had I behaved with my customary 
 courtesy. 
 
 It was not until the next day that I began 
 to think that we might have been too hasty 
 in concluding that Aunt Sophy was seri 
 ously ill although I could think of no 
 other reason for her sudden change of plans 
 and her summons to Marion, but I was not 
 left long in doubt. That afternoon a tele 
 gram arrived from Marion assuring me 
 that there was no cause for alarm and that 
 she would be home the next day. 
 
 I awaited her arrival with eager curiosity 
 and impatience, and I was mystified to see 
 her step off the train looking radiantly 
 happy. 
 
 Aunt Sophy, she declared, was never bet 
 ter in her life, and looked ten years young 
 er, but no further information could I 
 extract until we reached the house and Paul 
 went off to look after his pets. Then I in- 
 154
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 quired anxiously if she had confessed about 
 the chickens. 
 
 " N no," she admitted, with smiling 
 hesitancy, " I I didn t. Auntie s mind 
 was so taken up with other things." 
 
 This was agreeable news. The idea of 
 Aunt Sophy learning of my duplicity had 
 been painful, when I had supposed she was 
 dying; the image of her in good health and 
 looking ten years younger as she listened to 
 my shortcomings was intolerable. Besides, 
 in weakening on her determination to con 
 fess, Marion had departed from the line of 
 strict moral rectitude that she was continu 
 ally tracing for my uncertain footsteps. 
 This thought I carefully buried, like a dog 
 with a precious bone, to be unearthed when 
 next I was hauled over the coals for not 
 doing the thing I ought to have done. 
 
 " Well," I proceeded, " what s up what 
 did she want you for? " 
 
 A slightly apprehensive look vanished ; a 
 most becoming flush spread over her face. 
 For a moment I imagined, if such a thing 
 were possible, that she radiated with pride 
 and vain-glory.
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " She wanted to ask my advice," she 
 replied, with innocent diffidence. 
 
 " Your advice ! " I shouted, with a burst 
 of laughter. " Christopher Colum Oh ! 
 I I beg your pardon, Marion, I didn t 
 mean " 
 
 I was too late. I am a blundering idiot 
 at times, and my wife thought, naturally, 
 that I was scoffing at the idea of her being 
 qualified to give advice, when, as a matter 
 of fact, I considered her an adept in that 
 accomplishment. I had the painful task of 
 explaining in detail why I had laughed, and 
 the humiliation of admitting that, after all, 
 it wasn t a bit odd for an old lady to crave 
 advice from her niece. 
 
 " Anyway," Marion contended, with re 
 curring indignation, " she isn t really old 
 she s only fifty-three." 
 
 " Is that all? " I inquired, with excessive 
 surprise. " Why, she s she s just in her 
 prime ! " 
 
 "Just what I told her!" exclaimed 
 Marion, with approving enthusiasm. " I 
 said she had half a lifetime before her 
 yet." 
 
 56
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 " Certainly, she has," I agreed. " And 
 what did she want your advice about ? " 
 
 A look of ineffable sweetness, of tender, 
 grand-maternal pride illumined Marion s 
 countenance. I had never seen its like be 
 fore, but somehow I recognized a spiritual 
 inner consciousness made visible ; an in 
 tangible something that a man of less re 
 fined and delicate perceptions would have 
 missed. I didn t know what it meant. I 
 do now. 
 
 " Dear Aunt Sophy," she murmured 
 dreamily, her eyes brimming, her gaze di 
 rected through and far beyond me, in a way 
 that made me feel transparent ; " she was so 
 happy when I settled it ! " 
 
 This remark conveyed no meaning to my 
 mind, yet something within me vibrated in 
 sympathy to her mood, so that for a short 
 time I sat spellbound, caring only to enjoy 
 the subtle delight of feeling what I didn t 
 comprehend. I remembered, years before, 
 in a lecture on mental phenomena, hearing 
 the difference between perception and ap 
 perception explained so minutely that my 
 brain swiftly convoluted whenever I tried to 
 157
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 recall the distinction ; now it was clear. 
 Marion and Aunt Sophy had apperceived 
 together / was apperceiving. There was 
 an inner circle, and I was of it ; yet in the 
 midst of my enjoyment my material mind 
 somehow detached itself, reaching out 
 longingly for more. 
 
 " You settled it ? " I suggested, in a rev 
 erent whisper. 
 
 " I did," she replied softly. 
 
 My mind was a yawning void, Accept for 
 the intrusive suggestion of coffee, plainly 
 absurd, yet some instinct warned me to 
 avoid abruptness. 
 
 " Was she willing to to ? " I ventured. 
 
 "Willing! willing! I should think so. 
 But I know exactly how she felt. Her 
 mind was really made up, I think, though 
 she didn t know it. I could see that al 
 though she thought she wanted my advice 
 she would have been heartbroken if I had 
 advised her not to do it, and I knew that 
 what she needed was my encouragement, 
 
 " You encouraged her," I cried, with 
 sudden inspiration. 
 
 158
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 " Why, of course I did. She was so 
 grateful that she just threw her arms about 
 me and Marion choked with emotion 
 and stopped to wipe away her joyful tears. 
 
 I began to feel distracted, but with an 
 effort I focussed my mind on the main 
 point, setting aside as unimportant a doubt 
 as to what Aunt Sophy had done or said 
 after she had embraced her niece. 
 
 " What disturbed her mind before you 
 settled it?" I asked. 
 
 " She was afraid that I that people 
 might think her old and foolish." 
 
 " And you made her believe that she was 
 I mean, wasn t? " 
 
 " Yes, and I told her that you had often 
 said that people ought to consider it a duty 
 to to live so that that they would enjoy 
 the companionship of suitable companions 
 when they got up in years, and that an 
 elderly person living around among rela 
 tives was to be pitied." 
 
 It was a garbled version of an argument 
 I had used during a previous discussion 
 on the propriety of second marriages. I had 
 contended, with personal indifference, that
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 to an impersonal entity, left alone in this 
 vale of tears with no embarrassing family 
 ties, and feeling no dread of complications 
 in a future state of existence, a second mar 
 riage might prove both expedient and 
 happy. This suggestion I had offered in 
 entire innocence, as I might have distended 
 a paper bag for a child to burst, fancying it 
 would please Marion, as it usually did, to 
 worry a weak argument to tatters ; an op 
 eration which I enjoyed for the sakepf see 
 ing her eyes flash and the becoming color 
 that mounted to her cheeks. But when, 
 amid a torrent of tears, she accused me of 
 being just like other men, and of planning 
 to marry another wife, I was struck dumb 
 with horror. It was painful enough to be 
 brought face to face with the thought of 
 her dying first, but to be branded as a 
 probably faithless wretch was agony. I 
 can try to justify myself for wrong-doing ; I 
 can resent the injustice of being blamed for 
 actions that I refrain from ; but when I 
 suffer for deeds that I wouldn t do in the 
 distant future I am staggered by improb 
 able possibilities. Given the opportunity, 
 160
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 might I not have caused the death of my 
 great-great-grandfather? Consequently, I 
 remained silent, guiltily silent, in appear 
 ance ; and Marion no longer condemned 
 second marriages at least, she hadn t for 
 some months as a disgrace to civilization, 
 her manner indicating sorrowful resigna 
 tion to the inevitable. 
 
 It is strange, but true, that I didn t know 
 what was coming; and yet I thought I 
 knew, too well. My wife had apparently 
 told her aunt of my supposititious inclina 
 tions ; they had wept in each other s arms ; 
 they had apperceived together; awful 
 thought, they had apperceived ME. 
 
 Never before had I been so moved. I 
 rose to my feet, my teeth tightly clenched, 
 vaguely pleased to notice that I stood un 
 steadily ; it was the proper, the most effect 
 ive way. " Marion," I said, in an under 
 tone, gripping her arm, yet careful to press 
 only hard enough for a grip she was such 
 a tender little thing, though so cruel. I 
 had intended to say more, but the one word 
 seemed so full of meaning that I stopped 
 to let it penetrate ; also to give one swift 
 161
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 glance at the reflection of my face in the 
 mirror of the wall-cabinet. That glance 
 showed me that I appeared to be struggling 
 with the unutterable ; I went on doing so. 
 
 Marion s face grew pale and rigid. 
 " Good gracious, Henry ! " she cried, try 
 ing to rise ; " what s the matter? " 
 
 " Sit still," I commanded fiercely, with a 
 bitter smile ; a smile that made my teeth 
 gleam back at me wolfishly from the 
 wall-cabinet. " Matter enough ! You ve 
 wrecked my happiness by telling Aunt 
 Sophy that I wanted another wife." 
 
 " I never did ! " she cried indignantly. 
 " Do you think I could bear to tell anyone 
 if if it was true ? " 
 
 My grasp relaxed. I knew there must 
 be something wrong in my reasoning. 
 " Do you mean," I asked cautiously, " that 
 you couldn t have told her because it wasn t 
 true or or because it was." 
 
 " I couldn t tell her anyway," she cried, 
 with a peal of laughter, covering her face 
 with her hands. " Oh, how funny ! " 
 
 I sat down, feeling strangely flabby and 
 weak. " Then why," I asked helplessly, 
 162
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 mopping my brow, " did you repeat what I 
 said about second marriages? " 
 
 Her smile gave place to a look of anxiety. 
 " Listen, Henry," she entreated, " and try 
 to fix your mind on this. I explained to 
 you that your opinion was the greatest 
 comfort to her, and I told her what you 
 thought because I wanted to settle her 
 mind." 
 
 " Oh, yes just so," I assented. " And 
 it got that way because she was old and 
 foolish." I nodded with a vacuous air of 
 perfect understanding. 
 
 Marion leaned back on the sofa limply 
 and stared at me. " Not because she was 
 old and foolish, for she wasn t," she said 
 helplessly, " but because she thought other 
 people would think she was." 
 
 " Yes, yes," I repeated vacantly ; " then 
 you came along and straightened things 
 out. Now," I added, " you may try your 
 hand on me. My mind s unsettled." 
 
 I felt a foolish smile widening my mouth 
 at Marion s look of alarm, and closed my 
 eyes trustfully as my head drooped back 
 wards. When I opened them again she 
 163
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 was standing behind my chair shaking me 
 with all her might. A fog seemed to drift 
 away from my brain and I suddenly knew 
 what I wanted to ask. " What advice 
 did you give? " I asked, in spasms. 
 
 " To marry Mr. Fair " 
 
 " Marry! " I shouted, leaping to my feet. 
 "Old Fairman?" 
 
 Her eyes shone with triumph. " Mr. 
 Fairman, Henry," she said, in gentle re 
 proof. " Auntie left all the arrangements 
 to me, and she was delighted at the idea of 
 being married here at the end of her visit. 
 I knew you would be glad to do anything 
 you could." 
 
 " But where do I come in? " I asked, in 
 bewilderment. 
 
 " Oh, well, I don t exactly know yet, but 
 I might want you to give her away if we 
 decide to have anyone do that, and there 
 are lots of things you can attend to." 
 
 I smiled a smile that I keep for particular 
 occasions. At times I can be decided ; Mar 
 ion says obstinate. But whether it is ob 
 stinacy or decision, I am as unyielding as a 
 mule when the fit seizes me. I care not 
 164
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 for reason, threats or chastisement; hope, 
 fear, love and all else are encased in the one 
 instinct to stand rigid, with my ears flat 
 against my head and my fore-feet project 
 ing slightly. Marion has learned that the 
 only remedy is to pat me around the nose 
 and put a lump of sugar in my mouth. So 
 have I. 
 
 " I ll do nothing of the kind," I said, with 
 a quick sideways jerk of my head. 
 
 Marion swallowed twice before she 
 spoke. " Henry, dear," she said, sweetly, 
 " I know you must have a good reason for 
 your decision. Tell me what it is, won t 
 you?" 
 
 I hadn t, but when a man is spoken to 
 that way he s got to take notice, or feel like 
 a boor. " It would take too long," I re 
 plied stubbornly, thinking hard. 
 
 " Oh, no, it wouldn t. Come and sit on 
 the sofa and tell me all about it. It s aw 
 fully good of you to take so much interest 
 in my aunt." 
 
 I sat down stiffly on the edge of the sofa, 
 and stared into futurity ; Marion toyed with 
 my hair and looked inquiring. 
 165
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " You ask me to give away your aunt," I 
 began, in stern accusation, " to a man of 
 whom I know literally nothing. I remem 
 ber him only as a well-dressed, respectable- 
 looking old codger, wearing gold-rimmed 
 glasses, a stubby grey beard and no mus 
 tache. He may be virtuous; he may not. 
 He may be in love with your aunt ; he may 
 be in love with her money." 
 
 Marion rested her cheek against my un 
 yielding shoulder and reassured me on 
 every point in the gentlest, most affec 
 tionate manner, though, she knew I would 
 be relieved to hear, I was under no responsi 
 bility in the matter. Anyway, it was only a 
 form, and if I objected to doing it, Auntie 
 could give herself away or send to Colorado 
 for Uncle Richard. "Is that all?" she 
 concluded. 
 
 It wasn t. I wanted to know what had 
 become of the first Mrs. Fairman. After 
 that, there was one thing more that it took 
 much coaxing to extract. 
 
 " It doesn t seem fair," I burst forth, at 
 last. " He can t stop it, and they don t 
 even consider whether he d give his con- 
 166
 
 Marion Rises to the Occasion 
 
 sent, if he had a chance." Marion stared 
 at me stupidly, and I saw that she didn t 
 understand. " Your Uncle Philip," I ex 
 plained, in a low tone. 
 
 I do not care to repeat what she said. At 
 the same time, I cannot see that such a 
 thought is more irreverent than the fact 
 that suggested it. Nor could I see that I 
 should withdraw my objection because, as 
 Marion averred, Uncle Philip would have 
 remarried in a year if Aunt Sophy had died 
 first. Indeed, I was unrelenting until we 
 came to a complete understanding on the 
 whole subject, as follows : 
 
 (a) Second marriages, in the abstract, 
 are objectionable. 
 
 (b) Second marriages are, occasionally, 
 justifiable. 
 
 (c) Some are INCONCEIVABLE. 
 
 167
 
 IX 
 
 AUNT SOPHY S GENEROSITY 
 
 I HAVE often wondered how my wife s 
 Aunt Sophy came to be so fond of me 
 from the very beginning of our acquaint 
 ance. Up to the time that she visited us at 
 Waydean we had met only casually, yet at 
 the end of that short visit we parted the 
 warmest friends ; indeed, she embraced me 
 with motherly affection and implored me 
 to take good care of myself and not work 
 too hard. What, she suggested with ten 
 der solicitude, would Marion and dear little 
 Paul do without me if I shortened my life 
 by overwork? I was deeply affected by 
 her thoughtfulness ; my eyes glistened with 
 emotion as I promised to be careful, for the 
 mental picture of my family sorrowing over 
 my worn-out frame made me realize what a 
 loss I would be. But whatever her good 
 opinion was based upon, force of circum- 
 168
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 stances tended to confirm it, for she found 
 many details of our domestic economies 
 that coincided with her ideas of good man 
 agement, and never failed to attribute to 
 me more than my proper share of credit 
 for the same. It was impossible for me to 
 advance an opinion on any subject without 
 her enthusiastic approval, but whether she 
 approved of the ideas because they were 
 mine, or liked me because of them, I could 
 not determine. Another thing that made 
 her visit enjoyable was Marion s flattering 
 desire to show me up in the best possible 
 light. I was surprised to find that I could 
 work through my repertory of entertaining 
 stories, and yet have my wife join in Aunt 
 Sophy s appreciative laugh with the zest of 
 a first hearing ; and whenever Aunt Sophy 
 nodded to her in confidential admiration of 
 my cleverness she would respond with a 
 most charming flush of gratified pride. 
 Not only that, but I have heard her, on 
 occasions when I was supposed to be ab 
 sorbed in my writing in the next room, al 
 lude to my admirable qualities in an artfully 
 casual way; even stating, when the con- 
 169
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 versation turned on mining stocks, that she 
 was thankful to say that Henry couldn t be 
 induced to put a dollar into any such 
 scheme ! 
 
 But nothing I had said or done impressed 
 Aunt Sophy as favorably as Marion s ver 
 sion of my opinion on second marriages. 
 During the two months she spent with us 
 at Waydean before her marriage I was often 
 embarrassed by her expressions of grati 
 tude to me for being instrumental in help 
 ing her to make up her mind. No one, she 
 said repeatedly, had made her see her duty 
 as clearly as I, and no one else could have 
 said the same things (at this point she al 
 ways paused to take off her glasses and 
 wipe her eyes) in such beautiful and sym 
 pathetic language ; young people so often 
 thought that older persons had no right to 
 marry. Nor could I disclaim the senti 
 ments attributed to me when I saw what a 
 comfort they were to the dear old lady. 
 
 She was very happy in her preparations, 
 
 but to me there was something pathetic in 
 
 her happiness, for I could not help thinking 
 
 of poor Uncle Philip and wondering if she 
 
 170
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 did too, but as far as I could find out I was 
 the only person in the house who became a 
 prey to saddening reflections. This per 
 plexed me to such an extent that sometimes 
 I was distracted by the fear that I, too, 
 might be forgotten a maddening conclu 
 sion, but logically unassailable. At such 
 times I would hesitatingly ask Marion if 
 she were sure Uncle Philip was forgotten, 
 but she would only reply, " Tut ! " or " Stop 
 that ! " in a vicious suppressed whisper. 
 This was unsatisfying, but of course Marion 
 did not understand my need of sympathy, 
 and her mind was not in a favorable condi 
 tion to consider questions relating to 
 psychical research. I had seen her with 
 Mrs. Taylor in the height of her.rag-carpet- 
 ing fever, but her delight in that was slight 
 compared with the bliss of helping to plan 
 Aunt Sophy s trousseau, and I soon real 
 ized that it was not a time when she would 
 be likely to concern herself about either my 
 present or future state. 
 
 But after the anniversary of our wedding 
 day I determined that, as far as I was con 
 cerned, Uncle Philip might remain buried 
 171
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 in oblivion ; if he intruded himself into my 
 thoughts I drove him forth again with con 
 tumely. Only thus could I preserve my 
 self-respect, and at the same time feel that 
 I was at all worthy to partake of the full 
 measure of Aunt Sophy s generous affec 
 tion. The feeling of sympathy that I had 
 cherished for her deceased husband, and 
 the half-reproachful tolerance of her pro 
 jected second marriage, suddenly left me, 
 and I not only transferred my sympathy to 
 Mr. Fairman, but I began to hate the mem 
 ory of Uncle Philip. I might not have 
 gone as far as that if he had not persisted in 
 haunting me after it had become impossible 
 to harbor him without being disloyal to 
 Aunt Sophy, but my conscience became 
 clear when my change of sentiment could 
 no longer be doubted. Had I still felt any 
 mental reservation I could not have accepted 
 her more than generous gift of a cheque for 
 five thousand dollars which she insisted 
 upon giving to each of us on the morning of 
 our wedding anniversary, nor could we 
 have refused without hurting her feelings. 
 " If you say another word," she declared, 
 172
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 in response to our protests, " I ll be of 
 fended. It s a queer thing, indeed, if I m 
 not to be allowed to do what I like with my 
 own money ! You both know perfectly well 
 that my future is provided for, and I d rather 
 have the pleasure of seeing you spend it 
 now than put it away for you until after 
 I m gone, when you mightn t need it so 
 much. You don t need it now? Of course 
 not. Well then, you, Henry, if you can t 
 think of anything else, might spend yours 
 at the races ; Marion can give a real nice 
 ball with hers, if she wants to. Remember, 
 I d like each of you to spend your money 
 without consulting the other, so that you ll 
 feel perfectly free to use it in any way. 
 Put it away for Paul? Not a bit of it. 
 I ll provide for Paul the dear little old- 
 fashioned pet ! Do you know, he came to 
 me yesterday with that solemn expression 
 of his, and said, Auntie, I love you far more 
 than if father had killed all my chickens for 
 
 you to " 
 
 " Oh, Auntie," interrupted Marion, with 
 forced gayety, " I ve intended for ever so 
 long to tell you about
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I cannot bear anyone else to confess my 
 sins, and just as the rapidly ascending pitch 
 of Marion s voice indicated the approach of 
 the climax I recovered my presence of mind 
 and drowned her announcement with a loud 
 laugh. " Awfully good joke ! " I exclaimed. 
 " Last year Paul raised such a hullabaloo 
 about eating his that I ha, ha, ha ! had 
 to buy all we used at the market ! " 
 
 I had expected her to be astonished, per 
 haps shocked ; evidently she wasn t. My 
 laugh stopped short as I saw her nod in 
 knowing assent and smile complacently. 
 
 " Auntie," cried Marion " you knew ! " 
 
 " Well," she admitted, " I won t say I 
 knew exactly, but I ll tell you how it hap 
 pened. Perhaps you remember my saying 
 last summer that Henry sometimes re 
 minded me of your Uncle Philip? " 
 
 " Yes, you often said that he had uncle s 
 smile and tone of voice." 
 
 " And then," she continued, " I noticed 
 that it was always when I spoke about the 
 chickens being so nice that I saw the re 
 semblance, and I remembered that Philip, 
 when he raised fancy fowls, used to bring 
 174
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 me chickens every time he came from the 
 farm, and I never suspected that he bought 
 them at the market until one day we had a 
 pair for dinner that couldn t have been less 
 than ten years old." 
 
 " I thought it would spoil your ap 
 petite if you knew," I began penitently. 
 
 Aunt Sophy laughed, then sobered again 
 in tender reminiscence. " Just what poor 
 Philip said," she mused, shaking her head. 
 " He was a good judge of meat and poultry, 
 but he didn t do as well as you, Henry. 
 There isn t one man in a thousand who 
 could choose as many tender chickens with 
 out being taken in. I never would have 
 guessed they were bought ones if you hadn t 
 come home one day with a pair of legs 
 sticking out of the parcel under your arm. 
 It was so good of you, Henry, to take all 
 that trouble to spare that little darling s feel 
 ings. Not many fathers would have been 
 so unselfish and considerate." 
 
 I said nothing. I can endure being ad 
 mired for my virtues, but Aunt Sophy s 
 commendation made me dumb with excess 
 of emotion and joyous surprise. I had
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 thought myself a pretty good sort of fellow, 
 but the revelation of how much better I 
 really was than I had seemed began to visi 
 bly affect me. I became so agitated that I 
 could feel my nose beginning to twitch like 
 a rabbit s. Marion and Aunt Sophy also 
 looked hysterically inclined to fall into each 
 other s arms in an ecstacy of forgiveness, so 
 I hastily retreated to my study. There was 
 a stovepipe hole in the partition between the 
 two rooms through which detached and 
 semi-detached words were wafted to my 
 ears. Some people would have been self- 
 conscious enough to move out of hearing 
 or to cough artificially, but I do not shrink 
 from the truth. I knew that I was being 
 alluded to, but I knew also that there was no 
 more danger of my being puffed up by self- 
 conceit than of a proprietory stamp enrich 
 ing the contents of the original package. 
 
 " He s tender-hearted, Auntie 
 
 couldn t bear Paul s chickens." 
 
 " like your Uncle Philip! " 
 
 " wouldn t slap mosquito." 
 
 (No ; I d rather blow him from the mouth 
 of a cannon. H. C.) 
 176
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 " Poor Philip once stepped 
 
 toad quite ill." 
 
 " Henry so thoughtful do 
 
 anything make me happy." 
 
 " Yes kindest husband so 
 
 much sense Philip different 
 
 wouldn t listen about farm." 
 
 " Mr. Fairman devoted be 
 
 happy do anything." 
 
 " Oh, Marion! think I m old 
 
 goose." 
 
 I know when a conversation becomes 
 confidential, and I quietly retreated without 
 hearing anything further except some in 
 distinct murmuring and happy sobs. 
 
 From the day my bank account was in 
 creased by the sum of five thousand dollars 
 I made up my mind to spend it all, if neces 
 sary, in the purchase of Waydean. I ex 
 ulted in the anticipation of Marion s delight 
 and amazement on finding that I had pre 
 ferred to do this in place of frittering it 
 away in luxuries that we could do without, 
 or investing it in stocks. I almost wished 
 her birthday was at hand so that I could 
 177
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 celebrate the day by making her a present 
 of the place ; then the idea of giving it to 
 her on Aunt Sophy s wedding-day entered 
 my mind, and this seemed such a capital 
 plan that I decided to carry it out. Few 
 men, I meditated, would have thought of 
 such a graceful acknowledgment of Aunt 
 Sophy s kindness, and I felt that Marion 
 would be doubly pleased that I should think 
 of adding to the joy of the eventful day. I 
 could not help wondering what my wife in 
 tended doing with her money, but she 
 didn t say anything to enlighten me, and I 
 took good care not to allude to it, for fear 
 she should question me in return. She 
 made frequent trips to the city, carrying her 
 little bank-book with an air of importance, 
 but I could see nothing in the results of her 
 shopping to indicate lavish expenditure. 
 For instance, on one trip she bought a wire 
 potato masher for seven cents, a spice cabi 
 net for thirty cents, sixty cents worth of 
 trimming for an old hat, and a pair of silk 
 suspenders for me. The price mark on the 
 latter was carefully obliterated, being a 
 present, so I couldn t tell what they cost; 
 178
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 anyway, it wouldn t have been proper to 
 look at the price, if it had been legible. 
 Evidently, at that rate of spending she 
 would have enough money left to stock the 
 farm when it became hers. 
 
 The real estate agent whom I consulted 
 smiled loftily when I alluded to Peter Way- 
 dean s reputation for shrewdness and over 
 reaching. " Don t concern yourself about 
 that, Mr. Carton," he said. " We business 
 men are accustomed to deal with these 
 close-fisted farmers. They usually know 
 the value of a farm as well as we do, but we 
 know how to get them down to the bottom 
 figure. We don t run after the owner and 
 let him think we re anxious to buy ; we ap 
 proach him in the most incidental manner, 
 dangling the bait, so to speak, until he s 
 afraid someone else is going to snap it up. 
 Now, the Waydean farm I take to be worth 
 about thirty-five hundred, and you say the 
 old man talks of selling, so if you allow a 
 margin of a hundred or two I think I can 
 secure it without any trouble." 
 
 The calm confidence of Mr. Brooks elated 
 me ; after telling him he might go as high 
 179
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 as four thousand dollars, I went home, cal 
 culating on the way how I would spend the 
 remaining thousand that I would still have 
 to the good. 
 
 A week later Brooks shook his head as I 
 entered his office. " We haven t quite got 
 that deal through, Mr. Carton," he said. 
 " The fact is that there seems to be a snag. 
 Old man appears willing to sell quite 
 genial and all that, but when it comes to 
 figures he fights shy; says he wants more 
 time to think. To hurry him up I made a 
 straight offer of four thousand. I could 
 see that he was inclined to gobble it, but he 
 held back, and when I went out yesterday 
 I discovered why. Ever hear of that being 
 a likely spot for oil or gas ? " 
 
 " Good heavens, no ! " I cried. 
 
 He smiled at my evident alarm. " I 
 haven t either," he assured me, " but I 
 thought perhaps you might have inside in 
 formation. The idea came into my head 
 when I found there was another party as 
 keen to get the place as you." 
 
 " Another party? " I gasped. 
 
 " I met Roper of Bates and Roper, you 
 180
 
 Aunt Sophy s Generosity 
 
 know coming out of the old man s house 
 yesterday. I guess we each suspected the 
 other of being on a private speculation, but 
 after considerable sounding I found that he 
 had been commissioned to buy the place. 
 Then it struck me that you and this other 
 party might have been quietly procpect- 
 ing." 
 
 I shook my head. " I m not after oil or 
 gas wells or anything else in that line," I 
 said decidedly. " I want the place for a 
 quiet home. Who is this other man? " 
 
 " I don t know. Roper didn t name his 
 client, and of course I didn t name mine, but 
 as far as I can make out we ve both had 
 similar instructions. It looks as if the old 
 man were holding off to see who would 
 make the highest bid. Now it isn t worth 
 more than four thousand, but you can de 
 cide whether to bid higher or let it go." 
 
 If anything could have made me more 
 eager it was the knowledge that someone 
 else wanted Waydean. The thought of 
 Marion s dismay if our home should be 
 sold over our heads filled me with the de 
 termination to settle the matter at once. I 
 181
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 told Brooks to go ahead to the extent of 
 five thousand dollars. 
 
 " Well," he said, shaking his head with 
 reluctance, " I d rather lose my commission 
 than see you give that, for the land isn t 
 worth the money, that is, for farming," he 
 added, with a shrewd glance at me, " but 
 that s your look-out, and I ll do my best." 
 
 182
 
 X 
 
 UNCLE BENNY CREATES A DIVERSION 
 
 IT was during the first eighteen months of 
 our life at Waydean that I wrote " The 
 Meditations of Uncle Benny " for the Ob 
 server. I do not allude to these sketches 
 as anything out of the ordinary, for there 
 are times, as Marion says, when it is well 
 for one to neither affirm nor deny the truth. 
 Why it is wrong for me to voice a just and 
 critical appreciation of my literary work, 
 and proper for my wife to openly admire 
 her newly scrubbed floor or her arrange 
 ment of flowers in a vase, I cannot see. Nor 
 can I get her to explain ; she prefers to say 
 that if I cannot see for myself it would be 
 useless for her to try to make me under 
 stand, a baffling inconsequent remark. 
 Nevertheless I am willing to believe that 
 some things are too subtle for my compre 
 hension, and that her instinct is invariably 
 183
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 to be depended upon ; also, that the less I 
 express my admiration for what I have 
 written, the more open and unrestrained her 
 appreciation will become. Consequently, 
 although when the first of the Uncle Benny 
 sketches appeared in print I laughed and 
 applauded as heartily as if the author were 
 unknown to me, I learned to regard the 
 later ones with almost gloomy indifference, 
 or even to subject them to adverse criticism, 
 this course being the one most likely to 
 lead my wife to praise the artistic excellence 
 of my work. 
 
 Personally, I make no claim to artistic 
 excellence, it would be neither becoming 
 nor tactful for me to do so,, but I may 
 mention that the circulation of the Weekly 
 Observer doubled, and then trebled; also 
 that as a result of the popularity of Uncle 
 Benny it soon became necessary to copy 
 right each instalment in advance of publi 
 cation to prevent unauthorized copying by 
 exchanges. I have noticed that to some 
 authors is given the art of writing so that 
 their work appeals to their fellow-creatures 
 at a certain stage of development ; others, 
 184
 
 Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 
 
 again, have that broad human sympathy 
 that puts them in touch with young and 
 old, cultured and uncultured, wise and fool 
 ish. I had no wish to add to the sum of 
 human wisdom and culture, but it was a 
 delight to me that Uncle Benny made 
 people merrier. Paul, at the age of seven, 
 William Wedder, three score years older, 
 were equally infatuated. On Saturday 
 mornings Paul would insist upon having 
 Uncle Benny read aloud to him during 
 breakfast, then he would carry off the paper 
 to peruse it himself at leisure, while William 
 could ill conceal his impatience at having 
 to await his turn. Most authors read their 
 own works aloud, in public, to their friends, 
 or in the family circle ; I do not. It is only 
 fair to state that I might not have reached 
 this exalted plane but for my wife. It was 
 she who made me understand the injustice, 
 the blind selfishness, the distressing egotism 
 that permits an author, revelling in the en 
 joyment of his own imaginings, to inflict 
 them upon a helpless listener whose capac 
 ity for appreciation is so infinitesimal in 
 comparison. It was she who showed me 
 185
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 that Rossetti s sketch of Tennyson reading 
 Maud was not merely a crude picture of the 
 great poet by his friend, but a revelation of 
 the long pent-up sufferings of one who was 
 doomed to sit in an attitude of attention, 
 under the watchful eye of The Author Who 
 Reads His Own Works, ready to respond 
 at a glance with a nod, a smile or a tear. 
 
 Therefore it was Marion who read Uncle 
 Benny to Paul and Aunt Sophy and the 
 author; it was I who, one morning during 
 the reading, heard an unusual sound from 
 the kitchen. Fearing that William, who 
 was taking his breakfast there, had at last 
 miscalculated his swallowing capacity and 
 needed help, I quietly withdrew from the 
 table and opened the door into the kitchen. 
 To my amazement it collided with William s 
 head, and he straightened himself up when 
 he had recovered his equilibrium and looked 
 at me with flushed cheeks and a foolish 
 smile, making no attempt at explanation. 
 Did I ask for one? Certainly not. I 
 begged his pardon and hastened to get the 
 liniment as if it was a most reprehensible 
 act of mine to open the door without warn- 
 186
 
 Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 
 
 ing. I felt angry and humiliated that he 
 had placed me in such an awkward position, 
 but I could not be brutal enough to show 
 my resentment by accusing him of eaves 
 dropping, especially when it appeared to be 
 the case. When he had recovered his 
 speech and remarked incidentally that he 
 was in the act of picking up his hard-boiled 
 egg which had rolled in front of the door, 
 I expressed the keenest regret for my care 
 lessness and assured him I would be more 
 cautious in future. 
 
 Yet the revelation of his depravity was a 
 distinct shock to us until I found that it was 
 the reading of Uncle Benny that had at 
 tracted the dear old man, and that he could 
 not resist the impulse to get within earshot. 
 
 " I may as well own up," he confessed, 
 at last, " that the way the missis reads them 
 stories is as refreshin to my mind as rasp 
 berry pies is to my stomach. She do read 
 most beautiful, and when I hear Master 
 Paul chippin in with them odd sayin s and 
 you and that old lady laughin so cheery I 
 jest can t help listenin ." 
 
 William s spontaneous appreciation was 
 187
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 delightful, and I found his admiration for 
 my fictitious Uncle Benny most amusing, 
 considering how unconscious he was that 
 I was the author, and that he cordially de 
 tested the original of the character, Peter 
 Waydean. But I ceased to enjoy his en 
 thusiasm when it threatened to become a 
 mania, for he unbosomed himself one day 
 of a plan he had made to go to the city to 
 make the personal acquaintance of Uncle 
 Benny at the Observer office. I tried to 
 dislodge this idea, showing him the absurd 
 ity of looking for a person who probably 
 didn t exist, but I was mistaken in thinking 
 my arguments effective, for in a few days I 
 found a letter at my office addressed to 
 Uncle Benny in William s crooked hand 
 writing. I read it with rising indignation. 
 
 " Dear Uncle Benny," he wrote. " I am 
 unknown to you and you to me but your 
 writings has made me feel as if we was old 
 chums. I wanted to go to the city to have 
 a chat with you but the boss he kicked. He 
 says I might be took up for a lunatic if I 
 went to the Observer asking for you. He 
 1 88
 
 Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 
 
 says there aint no such person and if there 
 was he would be some young whip snap 
 that would call the devil and the hoist man 
 to run me out for thinking he was a old 
 man like me. He says it aint none of my 
 business how old you be and what you look 
 like. He says your blame curiosity Will 
 iam might land you in the police cells. 
 Now as far as I can make out you must be 
 well up in years and you write darn good 
 stories. Now I got one or two good stories 
 about the boss that is too good to keep. 
 He aint a regular farmer and he don t know 
 much about working land. He says the 
 way to make the farm pay is to keep from 
 paying out money on it and when I tell him 
 we need a implement he asks how much 
 will it cost and when I tell him he puts that 
 much in the bank and says we can do with 
 out. There aint a implement on the place 
 but three. That shows what kind of a man 
 he is but I ain t going to let him scare me 
 off if you drop me a line to say you want 
 to hear them stories. 
 
 " WILLIAM WEDDER." 
 
 189
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 It was well that I was not within reach of 
 William when I read his epistle, for my 
 wrath would have descended upon him, but 
 having time to think it over before I reached 
 home I concluded to preserve my incognito 
 by ignoring the matter ; besides, I was ex 
 ceptionally busy that week as Aunt Sophy s 
 wedding was near at hand, and I could not 
 afford to risk the loss of his services at such 
 a time. 
 
 As I neared the house that afternoon I 
 heard loud voices in the yard, and when I 
 got within sight I saw my hired man and 
 Peter Waydean walking around each other 
 in the attitude of quarrelsome dogs about 
 to spring. 
 
 " I tell you," snarled Peter, " them darn 
 hens has been living on my field peas, and 
 I believe you drove them over there in the 
 first place." 
 
 " And I tell you," snapped William, 
 " your cattle has broke down the fence and 
 got into my corn twice this week, and your 
 blame hogs " 
 
 At this point I intervened. Peter claimed 
 that his crop of peas had been so destroyed 
 190
 
 Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 
 
 by fowls that it couldn t be harvested ; he 
 hadn t actually seen my hens at work, he 
 admitted, but they must have done the dam 
 age. In rebuttal, William contended that 
 our fowls were honest well-conducted stay- 
 at-homes; they weren t driven away to 
 forage on other people s garden stuff like 
 some cattle and hogs. 
 
 " What s a few corn-stalks ? " shouted 
 Peter. 
 
 " What s a few peas ? " retorted William. 
 
 Again I interposed, but I had to send 
 William away to milk before my landlord 
 could be placated enough to lower his voice 
 to a reasonable pitch, then my anger sud 
 denly flamed to a white heat. I had in 
 tended to soothe his ruffled feelings by pay 
 ing for the damage, but instead, I found my 
 self resenting the imputation that my hens, 
 brought up from the shell to habits of virtue 
 and propriety, could be guilty of such dis 
 honesty. Still, my tone was calm and my 
 manner patronizing as I challenged him to 
 prove his charge; then before he had re 
 covered from his astonishment I advised 
 him to overcome the besetting sin of avarice 
 191
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 that prompted him to swindle me in every 
 possible way. 
 
 I saw that he knew his own weakness, he 
 was so stung by my words ; but there was 
 more of malicious triumph than of blind 
 anger in the ring of his voice. " Proof ! " 
 he ejaculated contemptuously. " The kind 
 of proof you ll get is to have them hens 
 come home without their feathers on if I 
 catch them in my fields. I ve a bit of news 
 for you," he went on, with a grin of satis 
 faction. " I ve had two good offers to sell 
 the place and I was going to give you the 
 chance of topping them, but now that 
 you ve broke out into insulting language I 
 wouldn t sell to you if you offered me ten 
 thousand dollars." 
 
 It was with difficulty that I repressed my 
 amusement; he was so obviously unsus 
 picious that I was a bidder, and when I 
 assured him that the news didn t cause me 
 any concern he grew still more angry. 
 
 " I ll go to the city to-morrow," he threat 
 ened me, " and I ll sell to whichever of them 
 two men wants to live on the place, and 
 you ll have to move when your lease is up." 
 192
 
 Uncle Benny Creates a Diversion 
 
 Again I smiled; nothing he could do 
 would suit me better than to have him hurry 
 up in closing the bargain, but I tried to 
 look as if my smile were forced to hide my 
 disappointment. Peter glanced at me sus 
 piciously as he turned away. 
 
 It is quite an ordinary occurrence to have 
 one s chickens come home to roost, but not 
 without their feathers, as two of mine did 
 the next day. I could not look at them 
 without a shudder, yet I could not keep from 
 looking at them, and until Marion clothed 
 them in two tiny shirts that Paul had worn 
 in his infancy I could not smile at the fasci 
 nating absurdity of their appearance and 
 the consternation of their friends and rela 
 tives. It was only too clear why Peter had 
 not carried out his threat of going to the 
 city that day to close the sale of the place ; 
 he had been lying in wait for my unfortu 
 nate chickens in his pea-field. My blood 
 boiled at the thought of how the malevolent 
 rascal must be chuckling over the way he 
 had proved his case, but my anger was 
 trifling in comparison with William s. 
 
 " I tell you, Mr. Carton," he affirmed,
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " I ll pay him back. I ll make him the 
 laughin stock of the county. Let me catch 
 one of his critters on this side of the fence, 
 and he won t be able to tell whether it s a 
 bird of the air or a beast of the field when it 
 goes home." 
 
 194
 
 M 
 
 XI 
 
 THE WEDDING-DAY. 
 
 Y cheerful, almost sprightly manner, 
 at breakfast on the morning of 
 Aunt Sophy s wedding-day cost me an ef 
 fort, for instead of being able to make 
 Marion a present of Waydean, as I had 
 planned, I was compelled to conceal the de 
 pression I felt at the news from my agent 
 that Peter had sold the place to the " other 
 party," Roper s client. I noticed, during 
 breakfast, that Marion and Aunt Sophy 
 were continually exchanging confidential 
 smiles and glances that were not intended 
 to include me, for they looked consciously 
 unconscious and avoided my eyes when I 
 happened to intercept one of the silent 
 messages. Still, I was so engaged in look 
 ing happy and free from care that the idea 
 of Marion having prepared a surprise for 
 me never entered my mind, although I 
 wondered, when she handed me my mail 
 I9S
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 which William had brought from the post- 
 office, why they both stared at me with such 
 an appearance of eager expectation. At 
 the bottom of the pile my eye was attracted 
 by an envelope with, " Bates and Roper, 
 Land Agents," printed in one corner. It 
 was addressed to Marion, and as I held it up 
 inquiringly she clapped her hands with de 
 light and urged me with impatient vehem 
 ence to read it. With a sickening premoni 
 tion of what was coming I drew out the 
 enclosure with trembling fingers and read 
 a formal notification from the firm to Mrs. 
 Henry Carton that they had, according to 
 instructions, made an agreement with Peter 
 Waydean for the purchase of his farm for 
 the sum of five thousand, one hundred dol 
 lars. For a moment I forgot Marion and 
 Paul and Aunt Sophy as I stared at the 
 paper with open mouth and distended eyes, 
 a ghastly gray-green pallor, so Marion told 
 me afterwards, spreading over my face. A 
 smothered shriek of alarm and the first 
 strident prolonged note of Paul s howl 
 brought me to my senses ; my eyes turned 
 slowly with the glassy stare of an owl. I 
 196
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 had a jumbled idea that Marion s money 
 was gone, also mine, also the farm ; we had 
 been bidding against each other and were 
 ruined. 
 
 " What is it, Henry ? " gasped Aunt 
 Sophy, pressing one hand to her side and 
 breathing heavily. 
 
 " Speak, Henry ! " cried Marion. 
 
 " We ve been sold buncoed duped. 
 Old Peter" I began thickly. 
 
 " You goose ! " exclaimed Marion, with a 
 laugh of sudden relief. " You misunder 
 stand the letter. Of course old Peter has 
 sold the place, but to me ! to me do you 
 understand? And I hereby make you a 
 present of it to-day, because " 
 
 " Because it s my wedding-day," inter 
 jected Aunt Sophy, wiping away tears of 
 happiness. " I thought I d like to see how 
 pleased and proud you d look before I go." 
 
 I awoke to my responsibilities and made 
 a sickly attempt to look gratified. " What 
 a joyful surprise ! " I stammered. " Aw 
 fully obliged not so much for pecuniary 
 value as a token of the day that " 
 My voice was lost in a peal of laughter. 
 197
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Oh, how funny ! Just like your Uncle 
 Philip, Marion." 
 
 " He always will have his little joke, 
 Auntie. Come now, Henry, do be serious, 
 and I ll tell you what a narrow escape we 
 had. There was another man Mr. Roper 
 called him a party after the place." 
 
 " After the place ! " I repeated, with pro 
 found incredulity. 
 
 " There now I thought you d be 
 startled. This man had employed Mr. 
 Brooks to negotiate with Peter, and he kept 
 bidding higher and higher till I was awfully 
 afraid he d get it. Then I got desperate, 
 and I drew the hundred dollars that I had 
 in the savings bank, for I had an idea that 
 the party would stop at five thousand 
 and he did and just yesterday Peter signed 
 the agreement, and I have the cheque for 
 five thousand one hundred dollars all ready 
 to pay over as soon as the legal documents 
 are signed." 
 
 " Well," I commented, drawing a long 
 breath, " it s a good thing he stopped." 
 
 " And wasn t Marion clever to manage 
 so well ? " asked Aunt Sophy. 
 198
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 " She was indeed," I responded warmly. 
 " I would have given up at five thousand." 
 
 Then Marion wondered who the man 
 was, speaking as if he had ceased to exist, 
 and so did Aunt Sophy. I was on the point 
 of wondering also, when it struck me that 
 I could not truthfully do so, and I merely 
 said that as I knew Brooks pretty well he 
 would probably mention the man s name to 
 me, a statement that was unassailable even 
 from Marion s pinnacle of morality, and one 
 that helped me to keep my secret until after 
 Aunt Sophy s departure. 
 
 It was well that I had completed my ar 
 rangements the day before, for I was so 
 distraught by the ordeal I had passed 
 through that I had difficulty even in re 
 membering that I must hurry away to the 
 station to meet Mr. Fairman, who was due 
 to arrive on the ten o clock train, and must 
 be entertained by me until the minister ap 
 peared to perform the marriage ceremony 
 at eleven. Not having an equipage of my 
 own, I had hired the most presentable one 
 to be found in the neighborhood, and the 
 horse being warranted tractable by his 
 199
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 owner, Joe Wrigley, I had no hesitation in 
 driving to the station and back myself, al 
 though as a usual thing, if I have to be near 
 a horse I prefer to be in a position where I 
 can look him in the eye. 
 
 I had been rather irritated by William s 
 behavior that morning, for he had disap 
 peared for an hour after breakfast just when 
 I most needed him, and when he did appear 
 he explained that he had been busy in the 
 smokehouse rigging up a scarecrow and 
 hadn t heard me calling him. This excuse 
 seemed plausible at the time, though I re 
 membered afterwards it was not the season 
 to scare crows, for he had got permission 
 from Marion the day before to take a dis 
 carded sun-bonnet of hers and a pair of 
 Paul s long rubber boots for the purpose, 
 so I warned him to be at the gate to open it 
 when I returned, and drove away. It was 
 not until it was too late to turn back that I 
 found the reins were sticky with grafting 
 wax where William had held them, and that 
 it had melted with the warmth of my hands 
 and ruined my new gloves. It was while I 
 was trying to scrape the wax off with my 
 200
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 pocket knife that Peter Waydean stopped 
 me to ask if I had seen a pig of his that had 
 been missing since the day before. It was 
 the first time I had seen him since our 
 quarrel, so I answered briefly in the nega 
 tive and drove on, but I noticed that he 
 looked after me with surly suspicion, as if 
 he thought I had it concealed under the 
 seat. 
 
 Now when I returned half an hour later 
 I was engrossed in conversation with Mr. 
 Fairman, and I had forgotten all about 
 Peter s quest. The horse was trotting 
 along at a creditable pace ; Mr. Fairman sat 
 upright beside me in starched and immacu 
 late apparel, trying to appear unconcerned 
 about his approaching fate ; I, flicking the 
 animal in the most artfully casual manner 
 to keep him going, had on my best com 
 pany manners. Perhaps this phrase may 
 suggest effort, constraint, artificiality, but I 
 have been told by Marion that no one could 
 possibly be more charming in manner than 
 I, when I choose to be agreeable, but that 
 when I but there, I like to take the sweet 
 without the bitter, and the rest is quite ir-
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 relevant. I was suave, genial, sympathetic ; 
 Mr. Fairman, in that blissfully exalted 
 mood so natural to the occasion, had just 
 drawn my attention to the idyllic beauty of 
 Nature s autumn garb, when suddenly up 
 from the dry ditch at the roadside stumbled 
 Peter Waydean, a dishevelled, disreputable 
 blot upon the scene. Frantically waving 
 his arms, he shouted an invitation to me to 
 stop and give him a chance to do me up. 
 I had an idea that he called me a pig, but we 
 were bowling along at such a rate that I 
 couldn t be sure of his words, though there 
 could be no doubt of his general intentions. 
 For various reasons I did not attempt to 
 stop, and my attention was immediately dis 
 tracted from him by the sight of Marion s 
 old sun-bonnet bobbing up and down in the 
 ditch some distance ahead. If it had been 
 hanging on a tree or lying on the roadside, I 
 would have been quite surprised, but to see 
 it travel along with unvarying speed and 
 apparent dogged intention in a straight line 
 along the inner side of the ditch seemed 
 very like a miracle. That it could do so 
 without legs was inconceivable ; that legs 
 202
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 could belong to it was marvellous, but if so, 
 how many, what size and shape ? I whipped 
 up the horse, with a passing glance at Mr. 
 Fairman. His eyes were riveted on the 
 bonnet with eager wonderment ; he had 
 plainly forgotten for the moment that he 
 was on his way to his wedding. As we 
 neared the lower level of the road we were 
 slightly ahead, and I checked the speed of 
 the horse at the foot of a slope where the 
 ditch ended ; just in time, for like a dissolv 
 ing view there dashed across the road di 
 rectly in front of us the most grotesque 
 object in the way of a quadruped that could 
 be imagined. Its head was hidden in the 
 sun-bonnet ; the short fore-feet were com 
 pletely encased in Paul s worn-out rubber 
 boots ; the body, instead of being hairy, was 
 feathered like that of a Plymouth Rock hen ; 
 around the hind legs flapped a tiny pair of 
 blue trousers only a curly little tail re 
 mained to show it was a pig. 
 
 It came ; it vanished. At the same in 
 stant Joe Wrigley s horse stood up very 
 straight on his hind legs and then prepared 
 to sit down on our laps. Without a word, 
 203
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Mr. Fairman leaned sideways and tried to 
 climb head first over the wheel. I had just 
 time to rescue him by seizing his coat-tails 
 with one hand while I lashed the horse with 
 the whip. The effect of that blow was elec 
 trical, for with a bound the animal sprang 
 forward at a pace that first astonished, 
 and then alarmed me. We passed the Way- 
 dean gate at racing speed, and in a fleeting 
 glimpse of William as he stood there I saw 
 a broad grin merge into open-mouthed 
 horror, and I had the grim satisfaction of 
 knowing that the enjoyment of his nandi- 
 work was swallowed up in remorse. In 
 vain I tugged at the reins ; the horse had 
 the bit between his teeth, and the only effect 
 was to slacken the traces and put the strain 
 of drawing the vehicle on my arms. Per 
 haps if I had been alone I would have felt 
 afraid and have resigned myself to disaster, 
 but I was filled with a fierce resolve to save 
 Mr. Fairman and see him safely married, 
 as arranged. 
 
 He sat bolt upright now, his face pale and 
 drawn as he gripped the seat with both 
 hands. I had no breath to waste, so I re- 
 204
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 mained silent until he said, in feeble gasps: 
 " I think perhaps I d better get out." 
 
 It was then that my mind reached an alti 
 tude of far-seeing clear-sighted wisdom that, 
 under the perilous circumstances, was akin 
 to inspiration. Although ordinary men 
 similarly placed would have reviewed their 
 past misdeeds, or have looked forward with 
 selfish misgiving to approaching dissolu 
 tion, I did not think of my own danger ; my 
 mind was fully occupied with the problem 
 of how to save my companion for his mar 
 riage at eleven o clock. In case this mental 
 attitude may seem heroic, I wish to say 
 frankly that it didn t seem so to me ; if it 
 should be supposed that the impulse was a 
 noble one, let me say that I had no intention 
 of acting nobly ; I also bitterly repel Mar 
 ion s insinuation that it was an ignoble one. 
 The fact is, it did not occur to me that I 
 should analyze my motive, but if I had 
 known how I would be catechized later I 
 would have done so, and thus have avoided 
 trouble. 
 
 As he spoke, Mr. Fairman gazed with 
 longing eyes at the ground that seemed so 
 205
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 invitingly near, with only the upper half of 
 a rapidly revolving wheel to bar his descent. 
 I knew that if I left him to himself he would 
 take that fatal jump, yet I could not have 
 moved a finger to stop him, for I dared not 
 relax my hold on the reins. I must over 
 come with calm and decisive reasoning the 
 alluring idea that had taken possession of 
 him. 
 
 " Mr. Fairman," I said, with quiet au 
 thority, " there is no cause for alarm." 
 He looked beseechingly at me, and I felt 
 encouraged. " If you jumped I con 
 tinued jerkily, my words punctuated by the 
 jolting of the vehicle, " you would either 
 be killed " he shuddered " or mangled." 
 He stared at me with dumb appeal. " If 
 the buggy were in front of a runaway 
 horse we d have to jump, but since we re 
 behind our best plan is to remain seated 
 as long as possible." A faint smile 
 flickered at the corners of his mouth. 
 " We re absolutely safe" I urged, " on the 
 seat but danger begins when we leave 
 it." 
 
 Mr. Fairman gulped. " I see," he said ; 
 206
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 " you ve got a head. Don t let me 
 jump." 
 
 I needed all the head I had, for while the 
 road had been clear so far, I descried a load 
 of hay on the narrow bridge that stretched 
 over the little river in front of us. There 
 was no chance of passing to one side, and I 
 wondered whether the horse would try to 
 plunge through the load or jump over the 
 railing of the bridge. He did neither, for I 
 saw just in time that a track led down to the 
 river, where farmers drove through when 
 the water was low. Pulling with all my 
 strength on one rein, I managed to turn the 
 horse off the main road and we headed 
 straight for the river. A shout of horror 
 arose from my companion, and I had to 
 drop the reins and clasp him in my arms to 
 keep him from jumping out. There was a 
 mighty splash, a sudden shock that almost 
 flung us over the dashboard, and then Joe 
 Wrigley s horse walked, yes walked, calm 
 ly and sedately to the opposite shore. We 
 were safe and dry-shod, but alas ! stranded 
 in mid-stream. The horse had the shafts ; 
 we had the buggy. I looked at my watch ; 
 207
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 time, twenty-five minutes to eleven. We 
 were a mile beyond Waydean, but it was 
 possible to walk there in twenty minutes, if 
 we could get to dry land. No one was in 
 sight along the road, and the load of hay 
 had lumbered on, the driver happily un 
 conscious of how he had been saved from 
 sudden disaster. Mr. Fairman, though still 
 pale and agitated, had recovered enough to 
 remember his appointment, and was dis 
 mayed at our situation. I had to give up, 
 regretfully, for want of time, a fascinating 
 plan of taking off the buggy-top to float 
 shorewards in ; a glance at his gleaming 
 boots and irreproachable trousers caused 
 me to scout the thought of his wading; 
 there was but one course open to me. With 
 many apologies I removed my lower gar 
 ments ; with more apologies I begged Mr. 
 Fairman to do me the favor of carrying 
 them, and stepped into the water. Then I 
 showed him how to gather the skirts of his 
 coat under his arms, get on my back and 
 hold his legs straight out to keep them from 
 touching the water. He politely protested ; 
 I insisted ; he yielded. I am almost certain 
 208
 
 The . Wedding-Day 
 
 I heard him chuckle on the journey ; I knew 
 he vibrated in a suspicious manner; but 
 when I set him down on shore he was quite 
 solemn in thanking me, and his eyes were 
 moist with emotion as he watched me dry 
 myself with the buggy-duster and get into 
 my clothes. 
 
 In my young days I often wished I could 
 have an opportunity to save a human life ; 
 indeed, I have always held myself in readi 
 ness to plunge into any depth of water up 
 to four feet if occasion should arise, and it 
 is all the more remarkable that I really 
 didn t think of having saved Mr. Fairman s 
 life until he mentioned it. But when I 
 looked back I saw that I had saved him at 
 least four times in a quarter of an hour. 
 First, by not abandoning my post when 
 the horse tried to sit down in the buggy ; 
 second, by overcoming his impulse to jump 
 out by my cold dispassionate logic ; third, 
 by holding him in the seat when we ap 
 proached the river ; fourth, by rescuing him 
 from the shipwrecked buggy in perfect con 
 dition for his wedding. 
 
 When we met William Wedder hurrying 
 209
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 along the road in search of us, his anxious 
 and crestfallen air showing how much he re 
 gretted having been the cause of the acci 
 dent, I did not stop to reproach him but 
 sent him on to bring the horse and buggy to 
 Waydean. Fortunately, Aunt Sophy and 
 Marion, knowing nothing of our adventure, 
 had been spared much anxiety, and it was 
 not until after the brief marriage ceremony 
 that Mr. Fairman related how, but for my 
 heroic conduct, Aunt Sophy would not now 
 be Mrs. Fairman. I must say he did me a 
 little more than justice, and I did my best 
 to faintly depreciate my heroism. I found 
 Aunt Sophy s warm-hearted and impulsive 
 demonstration most embarrassing, but it 
 was a peculiar expression of scepticism on 
 Marion s face that made me wish I had not 
 been accused of acting heroically. 
 
 It was not until the Fairmans had de 
 parted and the flutter of Aunt Sophy s 
 handkerchief from the car-window was no 
 longer visible that Marion had a chance to 
 speak to me alone ; then she lost no time. 
 
 " Now," she said, turning to me with an 
 impatient little tap of her foot, " I want to 
 210
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 know the truth about that horse. Didn t 
 you only pretend he ran away ? " 
 
 " Pretend ! " I exclaimed, with rightful 
 indignation, the muscles of my arms still 
 tingling with the strain. 
 
 " Yes," she insisted, with the resolute 
 look that I knew only too well ; a look 
 meaning that no matter what the evidence I 
 would be adjudged guilty; naturally, I 
 flushed under her gaze. " I knew from 
 your manner that you had done something 
 you were ashamed of. Did you do it for 
 one of those insane practical jokes, or be 
 cause you wanted to convince Mr. Fairman 
 that you are the paragon that Aunt Sophy 
 thinks you? " 
 
 My irritation vanished ; being innocent, I 
 could forgive my wife s suspicion. " The 
 fact is, Marion," I explained, with complete 
 candor, " that brute of Joe Wrigley s had 
 the bit between his teeth and I couldn t stop 
 him." 
 
 She laughed scornfully. " He had the 
 
 bit between his teeth ! Just what you told 
 
 poor Mr. Fairman. May I ask where you 
 
 would have liked his bit to be? Between 
 
 211
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 his eyes or his ears, perhaps. If you had 
 a bit in your mouth wouldn t it have to be 
 between your teeth ? " 
 
 I knew her argument was defective, but I 
 got too flustered to think where the weak 
 ness lay, for I felt the matter was getting 
 serious. It is one thing to have the satis 
 faction of showing your wife that she has 
 made a blunder; it is another to confirm 
 her suspicions by your denial. In the end 
 she did appear to believe that the horse ran 
 away and that I really had tried, with some 
 small measure of success, to save Mr. Fair- 
 man s life, but that didn t end the matter. 
 Marion has unusual psychological insight. 
 Not only can she unearth thoughts and mo 
 tives that I am conscious of having, but she 
 can go deeper still, delving into unexplored 
 regions of sub-consciousness to find the 
 thoughts and motives that I am not aware 
 of having. 
 
 " How strange ! " she mused. " You 
 had time to think of so much in those few 
 minutes. Did I understand you to say that 
 your one idea was to save Mr. Fairman ? " 
 
 " Well, that was the dominant one. The 
 
 212
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 other thoughts that flashed through my 
 mind were all dependent on it, as the tones 
 of a musical scale are related to the tonic." 
 
 Not once in years do I think of so apt an 
 illustration within five minutes of the time 
 I need it, and I was so wrapped up in con 
 ceit of my remark that I walked, open-eyed 
 but unseeing, into the most transparent pit 
 fall. Knowing, in my innocence, that I 
 had nothing to conceal, I forgot for the 
 time that I must be on my guard against 
 Marion s digging up something that wasn t 
 there. 
 
 " And you never considered," she asked, 
 " how dreadful it would be for Paul and me 
 if anything happened to you? " 
 
 " It never entered my mind," I answered 
 confidently, " but I can tell you I was afraid 
 the old gentleman would be killed or man 
 gled before he was married then where 
 would Aunt Sophy have been? " 
 
 " Where would Aunt Sophy have been? " 
 
 " Don t you see," I explained, with a 
 
 confidential lowering of my voice, " that if 
 
 he had been killed before the ceremony she 
 
 would have been left out in the cold; 
 
 213
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 whereas, afterwards it wouldn t matter ah 
 so much." 
 
 " Wouldn t matter so " 
 
 " In a pecuniary sense," I interjected 
 nervously. " I know she d be heartbroken 
 and all that, but as a widow I mean, as his 
 widow she d be wealthy, and and she d 
 get over " 
 
 By Marion s stony glare I knew I had 
 struck quicksand ; I felt myself sinking and 
 made one despairing effort to recover my 
 footing. " Of course, I made up my mind 
 that if I didn t pull him through safely, I d 
 give back my five thousand to Aunt Sophy, 
 but Good Heavens ! Marion what s 
 the matter? " 
 
 It has been my lot to arouse anger, sor 
 row, despair, scorn, and various other senti 
 ments consecutively, but never before had 
 I seen them expressed in one composite 
 glance. 
 
 " So that was your motive," she said, 
 with stinging, withering emphasis. " You 
 clutched Mr. Fairman as a miser might 
 clutch his hoard if his house took fire. It 
 wasn t to save his life ; it wasn t for Aunt 
 214
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 Sophy s sake ; he was merely a money sack. 
 Henry, if you hadn t confessed it yourself 
 I wouldn t have believed you were such a 
 mercenary wretch. No wonder you looked 
 ashamed." 
 
 We had just reached the house, and I 
 had no chance to clear my character before 
 Marion ran upstairs and locked herself in 
 her room, so I thought it politic to leave 
 her in silence for a while. I was bristling 
 with indignation, for while I hadn t pre 
 tended that my conduct was praiseworthy, 
 I knew that I had not been cold-blooded 
 and calculating enough to try to save Mr. 
 Fairman from the motive she had sug 
 gested. Indeed, I saw that the explanation 
 that I had formulated in response to Mar 
 ion s insistent questions had no foundation 
 in fact, except possibly a fragmentary im 
 pression that may have flashed across my 
 mind for an instant during our imminent 
 peril, yet I had been thick-headed enough 
 to make it appear that I had been influ 
 enced by these considerations instead of 
 confessing that I had invented them as an 
 afterthought. I knew I should be able to 
 215
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 make Marion see the matter in this light 
 when she had been sufficiently long in se 
 clusion ; in the meantime, I went around 
 to the rear of the house to find William 
 Wedder and to settle my score with him. 
 
 I met him looking for me, dressed up in 
 his best clothes and carrying his red bundle 
 and stick. 
 
 " William," I said, in my most austere 
 manner, " I haven t had a chance to tell you 
 what I think of your con 
 
 " No, sir," he broke in, " and I m not 
 calculatin to give you a chance. I m 
 off." 
 
 " You re off ! " I ejaculated, my anger 
 suddenly displaced by dismay. " What 
 what s the matter? " 
 
 " Well, sir," answered William, his face 
 broadening to a grin, " there s several rea 
 sons why I d better be off. One is, I d 
 rather go than be sacked ; then, old Way- 
 dean, he s took the notion that I dressed 
 up his pig, and Joe Wrigley says he s gone 
 to swear out a summons." 
 
 His manner was so coy, so engaging, so 
 innocently virtuous and forbearing, that I 
 216
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 could not refrain from an encouraging 
 smile ; somehow I seemed to know exactly 
 how he felt perhaps I, too, in some previ 
 ous state of existence, had found it ex 
 pedient to appear to know less than I did 
 know. 
 
 " What became of the pig, William? " I 
 asked, in a tone that conveyed, I fear, more 
 sympathy than reproof. 
 
 " After you drove off so fast," he replied, 
 " it turned onto the Stone Road, with old 
 Waydean close behind, and that was the 
 last I seen of them, but Joe Wrigley says 
 they met a funeral near the Stone Road 
 Cemetery, and there was a regular circus ; 
 after it was over I seen people drivin past 
 here lookin as if they d been at a Punch 
 and Judy show." 
 
 I smiled appreciatively, feeling a soften 
 ing toward William in view of the enter 
 tainment he had provided, but I saw it 
 would be wiser for him to leave than to wait 
 for Peter s revenge. There was one more 
 point that puzzled me. 
 
 " How did you fasten those boots on the 
 pig?" I asked. 
 
 217
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 There was a momentary triumphant 
 gleam in his eyes, then they opened wide 
 with innocent frankness as he spoke. " Joe 
 Wrigley says there was a wad of graftin 
 wax in each one, and the longer they were 
 on the tighter they d stick. Joe says " 
 
 " William," I interrupted, " why do you 
 keep saying that Joe Wrigley says this and 
 Joe Wrigley says that, when you " 
 
 One eyelid slowly curtained an eye. 
 " You see, Mr. Carton," he said, in a half- 
 whisper, " if you don t know nothin but 
 what Joe says, you don t know enough for 
 evidence, nor too much for your own good, 
 and if that old sinner makes law trouble you 
 can t swear to anythin but hearsay. Joe 
 says it s like a sort of judgment on him, for 
 it ll take as long to get the feathers and wax 
 off that pig as it ll take new feathers to grow 
 on them chickens. He says there ain t but 
 three ways of gettin that kind of wax off : 
 bilin in kerosene, freezin in a ice-cream 
 freezer, or leavin it to nature and the habits 
 of pigs." 
 
 " Well, William," I said regretfully, " I 
 suppose you had better go, but I ll have to 
 218
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 get another man to do the work, for I ll 
 have the farm on my hands in a few days. 
 Peter has signed the agreement to sell." 
 
 " Jee rus lem ! " he exclaimed. " It ll 
 be a bigger circus than I counted on 
 when " 
 
 " When what ? " I asked, as he suddenly 
 checked himself. 
 
 " I was thinkin about the new well up at 
 the barn," he replied, with sudden gravity. 
 " I haven t got down to water yet, but it 
 ain t far off, and Joe Wrigley says he ll 
 come over to-morrow and finish it for you. 
 Well, I must be goin good-by for the 
 present. Mebbe I ll come back when this 
 blows over." 
 
 " Where are you going to ? " I called af 
 ter him, as he hurried off. 
 
 His legs moved faster, as if he feared pur 
 suit, but there was no response until he 
 reached the gate, then he turned and 
 shouted : " To see Uncle Benny ! " 
 
 It is painfully humiliating to stand before 
 
 a locked door and try to convince a silent 
 
 person inside that you have high ideals, 
 
 noble impulses, virtuous aspirations and an 
 
 219
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 unvarying regard for the truth; it is yet 
 more painful if you are the victim of a train 
 of circumstantial evidence that has biassed 
 the mind of the listener ; you are at a further 
 disadvantage if that person is the one who 
 knows your failings better than you do 
 yourself, but there is yet hope if, with all 
 your faults, she loves you still. 
 
 I pleaded and reasoned with Marion in 
 a high, unnatural and despairingly mellif 
 luous voice ; without avail. Then it oc 
 curred to me that I was on the wrong tack, 
 and in a tone of hoarse despair I said I was 
 a brute. This had been effective before, 
 and I listened breathlessly ; there was a faint 
 monosyllabic response, but whether of as 
 sent or dissent I could not determine. With 
 added anguish I declared that I was and 
 that she needn t say I wasn t ; that it would 
 be better for her if I were dead. There was 
 a whole sentence in reply, the gist of it be 
 ing that she hadn t said I wasn t. This was 
 encouraging, so I sought to create a diver 
 sion by telling her that William had gone ; 
 this item was coldly received. Then, like 
 an inspiration, came the thought that I had 
 220
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 still to tell her how we had been bidding 
 against each other. 
 
 " Marion," I called out excitedly, " I 
 know the man who tried to buy the place." 
 
 "Who is he?" 
 
 " Open the door, and I ll tell you." 
 
 " No ; I can hear." 
 
 " He s a perfect brute." I moved away 
 with a heavy tread. It was an excellent 
 move ; the door opened and Marion ran 
 after me. 
 
 "What s his name?" she demanded. 
 
 " He s a man," I replied, with unreprov- 
 ing, sad forgiveness, " who thought he 
 would try to please his wife by making her 
 a present of the place." 
 
 " Good gracious ! Was it that wretched 
 Griggs?" 
 
 " No, his name is Henry Carton." 
 
 Now I had expected the announcement 
 to create a sensation, but I was totally un 
 prepared for the effect it produced. In 
 stead of being appalled to learn that she 
 had thrown away sixteen hundred dollars 
 unnecessarily, she forgave me with every 
 appearance of being delighted to hear the 
 
 221
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 news. An interval followed, during which 
 I didn t care particularly how this blissful 
 state of affairs had come to pass, but I gath 
 ered by degrees that it was because I had 
 quite innocently proved that I was not a 
 mercenary wretch and that I could by no 
 possibility have saved Mr. Fairman s life 
 from any sordid motive. There are prob 
 ably few men more deserving of praise, but 
 I shall not repeat Marion s expressions of 
 affection and respect, in case they should 
 appear extravagant. I bore her apprecia 
 tion with my usual modesty, and when she 
 wondered how she could have behaved so, 
 I said it wasn t any wonder at all, and that I 
 was almost sure I wasn t as good as she 
 said. She declared indignantly that I was 
 far better, and when I tried to add that I 
 had acted like a brute she put her hand over 
 my mouth and threatened to get angry 
 again if I used that word about myself, say 
 ing that I had acted like an angel, and how 
 could I ever forgive her? I assured her 
 that there was nothing to forgive, but if 
 there was I forgave her freely, and I did so 
 with such fervor and unselfishness that
 
 The Wedding-Day 
 
 she almost melted into tears again. Then 
 with the greatest delicacy I suggested that 
 I was grieved that she had been obliged to 
 pay so much more for the farm than if I 
 hadn t been so stupid, but she only said in 
 differently, " Bother the money I ve got 
 you ! " 
 
 Still, I grudged that sixteen hundred 
 dollars, and I thought she ought to show 
 more concern, but I dreaded a return of 
 her suspicion that I was mercenary, so I 
 bothered the money also and remarked that 
 I had her. Then we both made the happy 
 discovery that we had Paul, and Marion 
 reminded me that I had the farm and 
 enough money to stock it, yet in spite of 
 all these blessings it rankled in my mind 
 that when the papers were signed Peter 
 Waydean would have that sixteen hundred 
 dollars above the worth of the farm. 
 
 223
 
 XII 
 
 THE EXIT OF WILLIAM WEDDER 
 
 THE morning after Aunt Sophy s wed 
 ding I slept late, more exhausted by 
 the excitement of the day than I had been 
 aware of, yet in that dreamy state of half- 
 wakefulness before sunrise, I was dimly 
 conscious of hearing the sound of Joe 
 Wrigley s pick and shovel, as he worked 
 at the unfinished well. I remembered that 
 I must go to the city and arrange with 
 Marion s agent for the transfer of the prop 
 erty, and also be ready, in my role of Uncle 
 Benny, to receive William Wedder, if he 
 should call at the Observer office as he 
 had threatened. I was drowsily exulting 
 in William s discomfiture on finding that 
 I was Uncle Benny, when a loud shouting 
 from the direction of the barn awakened 
 me ; a moment later I heard hurried clump 
 ing footsteps and the sound of hammering 
 224
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 at the back door. My first impression was 
 that the earth had caved in and buried Joe 
 Wrigley and that he had come to me for 
 help, but when I hurried into a few essential 
 garments and reached the back door I was 
 relieved to find that Joe was there; pale, 
 breathless, agitated, but unburied. 
 
 " Come quick He! " he gasped, and lum 
 bered off. I followed. 
 
 When I reached the well Peter Waydean 
 was lying prone on his face with his head 
 hanging over the hole. At the sound of 
 my voice he humped himself slowly and 
 stood up, looking at me with an expression 
 of utter misery. 
 
 Joe grabbed my arm and pointed to the 
 well. " He," he repeated, in a hoarse croak 
 " smell." 
 
 I lay down and smelled ; the reeking odor 
 of kerosene oil arose upwards and I stag 
 gered to my feet, stunned by a sudden vision 
 of great wealth. 
 
 Peter was the first to speak. " The 
 farm s worth half a million," he said de 
 spairingly, " and I ve sold it to that shark 
 for fifty-one hundred." 
 225
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 "What shark?" I forced myself to ask. 
 
 " That land shark in the city," he said, 
 turning away with a sudden stiffening of 
 his frame. " But I ll not be robbed," he 
 shouted, raising his clenched hand above 
 his head in a fierce gesture " he hasn t got 
 the deed yet." 
 
 I watched him hurry over the adjoining 
 field, a strange pitying impulse possessing 
 me to run after him and tell him to take 
 back the farm ; then Joe attracted my atten 
 tion. 
 
 " Jest as I struck that streak of clay," he 
 said, pointing downwards, " I seen it get 
 soppy like, but I thought it was water, for 
 I took the smell to be from the ile on my 
 hair, settled into contracted quarters like ; 
 then it began to bubble up faster, an I 
 scooped up a handful to taste, an the next 
 thing I knowed I was up here hollerin for 
 all I was worth. Old Peter, he come 
 runnin over the pasture field, an I lit out 
 for the house to call you." 
 
 In the well I could see a slight bubbling 
 as the oil ran in, and the bottom was now 
 covered with several inches of the fluid, 
 226
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 which looked remarkably clear and of such 
 fine quality that I didn t wonder Joe had 
 mistaken it for water. I told him to stop 
 work and cover the hole with boards, warn 
 ing him not to tell anyone of the discovery. 
 I don t know why I gave him the latter 
 direction, but I had an instinct that it was 
 the correct thing to do and was an evidence 
 of presence of mind on my part. Then I 
 went back to the house to break the news 
 to Marion. 
 
 In my inmost heart I knew that the 
 wealth was rightfully Peter s, though I was 
 legally entitled to reap the benefit of the 
 discovery, but something of the passionate 
 greed that I had seen expressed in his dis 
 torted face stirred my soul, and I went up 
 stairs to tell Marion, feeling, I imagine, like 
 a fugitive bank cashier. But when I looked 
 into her clear eyes I knew there was but 
 one right course, and that was to release 
 Peter from his agreement. Somehow I felt 
 as if I had just escaped from prison when 
 that was settled ; never again do I wish to 
 be burdened with even the thought of un- 
 worked-for riches. 
 
 227
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 I felt sorry for Peter when I hurried over 
 to his house to tell him he could take back 
 his farm without going to law. I regret to 
 say that he did not receive me with open 
 arms or fully appreciate my generosity ; in 
 deed, when I told him that we had employed 
 the land agents to negotiate with him he 
 declared that he never would have signed 
 the agreement if he had known, but he be 
 came more amiable when he understood 
 that Marion and I had been bidding against 
 each other. 
 
 Now when I act nobly, I like the matter 
 to be distinctly understood ; therefore 
 Peter s attitude was disappointing. There 
 wasn t the slightest doubt but that he should 
 have been so affected by my action as to 
 thank me in a voice broken with emotion, 
 begging me at the same time to accept the 
 office of President of the Waydean Oil 
 Company, and fifty per cent, of the capital 
 stock. I did not try to make him see it in 
 the proper light, for that would have been 
 undignified as well as useless, and I was 
 pressed for time, so I bade him a courteous 
 but frigid good-morning. I knew better 
 228
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 than to seek consolation from Marion by 
 letting her know that I had expected grati 
 tude, for such a course would have led to 
 the scornful assertion that I had done noth 
 ing for which gratitude should be expected. 
 So when she asked if he wasn t awfully 
 grateful I answered in the negative, elevat 
 ing my eyebrows in surprise. Marion at 
 once asserted that Peter was a grasping 
 hard-hearted man, and tried to show me 
 how nobly I had behaved ; a point of view 
 that I protested against, with the result that 
 I was praised to an extent that she has never 
 since excelled. 
 
 It was about ten o clock when I took the 
 train for the city, and for the first time I had 
 leisure to think over the astounding dis 
 covery of oil. The short time which had 
 elapsed since I had been awakened by Joe 
 Wrigley had been so full of action that I 
 had difficulty in persuading myself that I 
 hadn t been dreaming, and the farther I got 
 from Waydean, the more incredible ap 
 peared the evidence of my senses that I had 
 seen and smelled oil bubbling up at the bot 
 tom of my fifteen-foot well. 
 229
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 The first thing I did when I got to the 
 Observer office was to consult the encyclo 
 paedia in regard to oil-wells. I do not think 
 I ever received so much mental enlighten 
 ment from that useful compendium in such 
 a short space of time, as during the few 
 minutes I spent over the article on petro 
 leum. William Wedder was not men 
 tioned, but when I closed the book with a 
 bang I knew that the ingenious old rogue 
 had not only carried out his threat of mak 
 ing Peter the laughing-stock of the county, 
 but had included me also. For a short time 
 I was beside myself with rage, then an idea 
 leaped into my mind that suggested delight 
 ful possibilities, and I hurried down to the 
 front office to find out if William had called 
 that morning. 
 
 I have been repeatedly questioned about 
 how I spent the time between lunch and 
 three o clock, but I have two good reasons 
 for evading a direct answer ; one is, that I 
 do not care to say, the other, that I cannot, 
 like some people, tell a lie without provoca 
 tion. Young Evans, at the Inquiry and 
 Subscription wicket, knew that I told him 
 230
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 as I went out at noon that if a smooth- 
 shaven countrified-looking old man asked 
 for Uncle Benny he was to be shown up 
 to my room to await my return. Old 
 Jamieson, the elevator man, knew that I 
 entered by the side door about three o clock, 
 and that I was quite astonished to hear that 
 a visible Uncle Benny had appeared and 
 disappeared during my absence, and that 
 he had been followed into my room by a 
 smooth-shaven rural-looking old codger; 
 that after an interval of loud conversation 
 that could be heard above the rumbling of 
 the presses in the basement, the latter 
 emerged hastily, clattered down the stairs 
 with something in one hand that looked 
 like a human scalp, closely pursued by 
 Uncle Benny, who was excitedly pulling his 
 stovepipe hat down over his ears as he ran, 
 and stopping as he descended the stairs to 
 replace the huge prunella shoes that kept 
 dropping off. 
 
 But it was Meldrum, the cartoonist, 
 
 whose room was opposite mine, who told 
 
 me most about this strange occurrence. " I 
 
 thought there was a fire at first," he said, in 
 
 231
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 relating the affair. " I got into the hall and 
 saw the most remarkable looking old party 
 sitting at your desk. Hairy as a gorilla 
 couldn t see a feature except his nose 
 smoked goggles white hair to his shoul 
 ders white beard down to his belt long- 
 skirted frock coat pants turned up at the 
 bottom, showing his spindle-shanks half 
 way " 
 
 " Spindle-shanks ! " 
 
 " Yes regular pipe-stems and prunella 
 shoes, by Jove ! the kind he wore in the 
 ark voice like a polar bear, and deaf as a 
 door-post. Other chap got completely 
 winded trying to make him hear." 
 
 " What was he like?" 
 
 " Small, smooth-shaven, pink cheeks, 
 blue eyes. Looked like Shem voice away 
 up in G." 
 
 "Could you hear what they said?" 
 
 Meldrum laughed derisively. " Hear?" 
 he repeated. "Hear! Great Scott! If 
 the presses hadn t been running some idiot 
 on the street would have pulled the fire- 
 alarm, sure. When I saw them first Noah 
 had his hand up to his ear and Shem was 
 232
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 yelling into it : Will yum Wed 
 der ! 
 
 " I see/ growls Noah, William was 
 your grandson, and he got married. Go 
 ahead. 
 
 " No, no shouts Shem, that s my 
 
 name. WILL YUM WED 
 
 DER! 
 
 " You ll have to raise your voice, says 
 Noah, I m a little hard of hearing. 
 
 " Then Shem goes at it again, a fifth 
 higher, and Noah catches on and asks him 
 a lot of questions. Where he came from, 
 what family, how he happened to leave 
 home. Shem shouts that he isn t a hired 
 man by birth, and that he left his family 
 because his wife and daughter caught the 
 whole-wheat-and-nut-food fever and tried 
 to feed him on hygienic principles, so after 
 building up his strength on unwholesome 
 food for the summer, he s going back to his 
 family to see if they ve come to their 
 senses." 
 
 " Do you mean to say, Meldrum, that 
 you stood out in the hall and eaves 
 dropped?" 
 
 2 33
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Eavesdropped ! Old Wedder s voice 
 sailed into my room as plainly as if he had 
 the jim-jams. Come now, Carton, you 
 know more about this thing than you pre 
 tend. He brought your name in several 
 times, and if I m not mistaken, he had some 
 good joke on you about your farm. Every 
 little while I d hear Noah growl, That isn t 
 funny. At last I heard Shem fairly yell, 
 That ain t funny, ain t it ? then there was 
 a shout from Noah and a mighty clatter. 
 By the time I got out from behind my desk 
 and into the hall again, all I could see was 
 the top of Noah s stovepipe vanishing down 
 the stairway. Jamieson is certain Shem 
 had his wig. Come now, Carton, make a 
 clean breast of it and tell me who these old 
 parties were. I always thought you wrote 
 the Uncle Benny papers, but perhaps I was 
 mistaken." 
 
 " Meldrum," I said confidentially, " I ll 
 tell you the honest truth, but I want you to 
 keep it quiet. William Wedder was my 
 hired man, and he was determined to see a 
 real Uncle Benny, so to oblige him, I 
 togged myself out for the part at the theat- 
 234
 
 The Exit of William Wedder 
 
 rical costumer s around the corner. I 
 didn t expect ha, ha, ha ! to take you in, 
 though." 
 
 I made this explanation with calm sin 
 cerity, with child-like frankness, and I m 
 sure I don t know what prompted me to 
 cast these pearls of truth before a fellow- 
 journalist, but I did. What was the result? 
 Meldrum sniffed at the gems suspiciously, 
 then chuckled, assuring me as he jocularly 
 slapped my back that he was delighted to 
 know the facts of the case and that he would 
 respect my confidence. 
 
 This is how the rumor originated that the 
 real Uncle Benny was an aged and talented 
 relative of mine, whom I kept in seclusion 
 to restrain his bibulous propensities. It 
 was perhaps as well that I was not aware of 
 this at the time, or I certainly would have 
 been discouraged from the practice of tell 
 ing the undiluted truth. 
 
 2 35
 
 XIII 
 
 THE FAIRY WELL 
 
 I NEED not dwell upon my return to 
 Waydean that evening. It is still pain 
 ful to recall my sensations as I stepped from 
 the train, on finding that Joe Wrigley had 
 so completely disregarded my instructions 
 to tell no one of the discovery that the 
 usually quiet country road between the 
 station and Waydean swarmed with pedes 
 trians returning from an inspection of Will 
 iam Wedder s handiwork. Had I been 
 permitted, as I had hoped, to publicly ex 
 pose the fraud, I could have risen to the 
 occasion and perhaps found a certain solace 
 in doing so ; but to find that in my absence 
 the prying eyes of my neighbors had found 
 the ingenious mechanism by which William 
 had manufactured a flowing well of refined 
 petroleum, and had attributed it to me, 
 was crushing. I could bear up under the 
 236
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 facetious remarks of the people who com 
 plimented me on my success in taking such 
 an excellent rise out of Peter, but when 
 Andy Taylor rushed out of his house and 
 clapped me on the back, I could only look 
 at him in sorrowful reproach, at which his 
 merriment increased. " Mr. Carton," he 
 gasped, " it beats the way you done up that 
 Griggs all hollow. I knew you d get back 
 on Peter, but I didn t know it d be so 
 gosh darn rich. Oh Lordy, to see him 
 when the loose dirt shifted and showed the 
 blue end of the coal-oil barrel ! " 
 
 "The coal-oil barrel?" 
 
 " Yes, you d ought to have laid a few 
 boards of top of the heap, and it wouldn t 
 have shifted with people trampin . You 
 must have let ten gallons run down that 
 iron pipe and how did you ever get it 
 drove so far? I suppose that joke cost you 
 as much as five dollars, but I d say it was 
 cheap at ten." 
 
 In vain I assured Andy that I was inno 
 cent ; he only laughed the harder, reiterat 
 ing his belief that I beat the Dutch and that 
 I was a natural born play-actor; that the 
 2 37
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Griggs episode, charming as it had been, 
 was discounted by my latest histrionic 
 venture. 
 
 By the dim light of my lantern, Marion, 
 Paul and I viewed the wreck of the Way- 
 dean Oil Well when I reached home. Our 
 coal-oil barrel, exhumed from the loose 
 earth that had covered it, had been rolled 
 away from the edge of the hole, leaving the 
 iron pipe exposed. The ground was 
 packed hard with the trampling of many 
 feet. 
 
 " I didn t think there could be such a 
 crowd of people in the country, except at a 
 funeral or an auction sale," said Marion in 
 dignantly. " I was just enraged to sit in 
 the house and see them pass through the 
 yard as if it were a common. I ll never 
 forgive William Wedder I wish I had 
 never baked him a pie." 
 
 " I hope he ll have to live on hygienic 
 wheat biscuits when he gets home," I re 
 sponded. " I hope his wife has learned to 
 cook them in two hundred ways, and 
 whether they re mashed, stewed, fried, pied, 
 creamed, puddinged or jellied, he ll have 
 238
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 disappointment three times a day of finding 
 that they are still the same old wheat bis 
 cuits. That ll be punishment enough for 
 him, but it won t make Peter believe I didn t 
 do this, and by this time he must have got 
 Roper s letter cancelling the agreement." 
 
 " I suppose we ll have to give up the 
 place in the end," said Marion, with a sigh. 
 
 " Don t let Paul hear," I said in a low 
 tone, " or he ll make the dickens of a row." 
 
 At that moment Paul was leaning over 
 the edge dangling a long string into the 
 well ; fishing, I supposed, in my ignorance. 
 For days he had been going about with a 
 dreamy look on his face that betokened a 
 secret play of absorbing interest. I drew a 
 breath of relief when I saw that he didn t 
 look up at Marion s unguarded remark. 
 All would have been well had I not been 
 so misguided as to make a suggestion that 
 aroused Marion s sense of duty and her per 
 sistent belief that I tried to shirk mine. 
 
 " Paul," said she, and even in that one 
 word I detected the compassionate severity 
 suitable to the extraction of a tooth " do 
 
 you know that we ll have to leave 
 
 239
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Marion," I implored, " wait till we get 
 him into the house he ll rouse the neigh 
 borhood." 
 
 I should have known better than to pro 
 test. Once started in the track of duty 
 nothing short of a disastrous collision 
 would stop her. She did pause, but merely 
 to make a remark to me that led to a sharp 
 altercation. We forgot our rule never to 
 give way to our angry passions before Paul ; 
 indeed, he was so unusually silent that we 
 didn t remember his presence until we were 
 suddenly struck dumb by a shrill exclama 
 tion of impatient wrath that arose from the 
 other side of the well. 
 
 " Dar-r-n it ! " he ejaculated, with petri 
 fying distinctness. 
 
 If he had turned into a quick-firing gun 
 and dropped a shell at our feet the effect 
 could not have been more paralyzing. Our 
 boy had been carefully screened, not only 
 from evil, but from vulgarity ; he had never 
 gone to Sunday school, nor been left to the 
 care of a nursemaid. His companions were 
 his toys and domestic pets ; other children 
 he had seen only from a distance, and he 
 240
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 regarded them as curious, but not interest 
 ing, little animals. His face reflected the 
 purity of his mind. I hesitate to say so, for 
 obvious reasons, but his face at the age of 
 seven was simply angelic ; I mean, of course, 
 normally, not when his mouth was wide 
 open in the act of expressing bodily or men 
 tal anguish. And this is not merely his 
 mother s opinion and mine ; it is Aunt 
 Sophy s also. Indeed, Aunt Sophy, who is 
 never tired of drawing attention to his re 
 markable resemblance to a photograph of 
 me as a boy, has gone much farther, and has 
 given utterance to thoughts that we only 
 think. 
 
 Therefore, we turned to each other in 
 dumb amazement ; then I raised the lantern 
 to make sure that it really was Paul who 
 had spoken. He was getting up from his 
 crouching position and the light showed 
 that his little mouth was tightly set and that 
 his wide-open eyes sparkled like stars. 
 Even as we stared at him his lips parted 
 again, and again he said : " Dar-r-r-n it ! " 
 
 I am thankful that the well was partially 
 covered and that I was able to keep Marion 
 241
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 from sliding into it. " Paul! " she cried in 
 horror, " oh, Paul ! " 
 
 I hastened to follow her lead. " Paul," I 
 said, with fierce sternness, " what do you 
 mean, sir? " 
 
 " I mean," he replied accusingly, " that 
 it s all spoiled. They ve taken fright at 
 your squabbling and put out their lamps." 
 
 Again we stared at each other in ques 
 tioning silence. What had taken fright we 
 knew not, but we did know that we had 
 squabbled. 
 
 " Where did you hear that dreadful 
 word?" demanded Marion. 
 
 " Darn ? " queried Paul, with innocent 
 pride. " I heard William Wedder say 
 something when the coal-oil barrel rolled 
 on his foot, and when I asked him I beg 
 your pardon ? he couldn t remember what 
 he had said, then when I kept on asking 
 him to try to remember he said it must 
 have been an exclamation called darn. I 
 think it s ever so much nicer than bother or 
 good gracious" 
 
 " It s a vulgar word, and only vulgar 
 people use it," I commented reprovingly. 
 242
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 " Why, father, William said that when 
 Joe Wrigley s horse stood up on his hind 
 legs you said " 
 
 " Paul," I interrupted hurriedly, " you 
 said something took fright, and " 
 
 " Hush ! " said he, in a mysterious whis 
 per, coming close to me. " It was the 
 fairies. William said if we made an oil well 
 and didn t say anything about it, they d be 
 sure to come to fill their lamps, and they 
 have. I saw three of them climbing up my 
 rope ladder when you frightened them off." 
 
 " Then you knew that William made 
 this ? " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Of course. I helped him to bury the 
 barrel so that the fairies wouldn t know it 
 wasn t a real natural well. He said if we 
 kept it a secret it would be a pleasant sur 
 prise to you when I showed you the fairies. 
 Hush ! They re climbing up the rope lad 
 der again. Peep down through that crack 
 and you ll see them very ve ry quiet 
 ly. There now stand back. I m going 
 to help them up over the edge." 
 
 The next morning Peter Waydean came 
 over to see me, his face wreathed in smiles, 
 243
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 his manner most cordial. " Mr. Carton," 
 he said genially, " I ain t on the hunt for 
 oil wells this morning, but I was on my way 
 to thank you for the trouble you took in 
 rigging up that one when I met your little 
 boy coming over to see me." 
 
 " Paul ! " I exclaimed" to see you? " 
 
 Peter nodded. " Great head on that little 
 chap," he said. " I don t want you to be 
 angry at father about the oil well, he says 
 to me, for William and I made it together, 
 and father didn t know anything about it, 
 says he, standing up straight and stiff. 
 Then he told me the whole business, and 
 although it turned out a good thing for me, 
 I m glad to know it was that scoundrel 
 Wedder that tried to play it off, and not you. 
 Paul was so tickled at me pretending to be 
 lieve he really seen fairies that when he 
 wanted me to say that I d sell the farm to 
 you just the same, I hadn t the heart to tell 
 him it was sold." 
 
 "Sold?" 
 
 " Yes, you see, I thought you had 
 played that trick on me and I was so mad 
 yesterday that when along comes another 
 244
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 agent twice as keen to buy as them other 
 two I jumped at the chance of selling. 
 Name your price, says he, to sell on the 
 spot. Six thousand/ says I, at a bluff. 
 Done, says he ; and in five minutes the 
 agreement was signed." 
 
 " Well," I said, with a sigh, " I suppose 
 we ll have to move." 
 
 " Oh, I don t know," said Peter encour 
 agingly. " Perhaps the party don t want to 
 live here ; though, considering the price," 
 he added, with a shrewd smile, " he didn t 
 buy just for speculation. They say he s got 
 a fine place in the city and heaps of money, 
 and he s just got married again to a widow. 
 I might as well have asked another thou 
 sand, I believe." 
 
 " What is his name? " I asked, with sud 
 den interest. 
 
 " Fairman. He owns what Mr. Car 
 ton, what s the " 
 
 I relaxed my tense grip of his arm. " His 
 first name? " I demanded eagerly. 
 
 " Joseph, I think. What s the matter? " 
 
 I am afraid my explanation was not very 
 clear to Peter. I could not tell him the 
 245
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 cause of my excitement, nor mention the 
 fact that I had saved Mr. Fairman s life 
 several times in one day, for that would 
 have savored of boastfulness ; so I hinted 
 that when we were boys together Mr. Fair- 
 man had saved my life and had ever since 
 regarded me with the highest esteem. Thus 
 I preserved the main fact of our connection, 
 only disguising it enough to let Marion see 
 incidentally afterwards how careful I was 
 to avoid the appearance of vainglory. 
 
 Now when I rushed into the house to tell 
 Marion that Mr. Fairman had bought Way- 
 dean, I did so with the innocent exuberance 
 of expectant delight with which children, 
 not too sophisticated, view brown paper 
 parcels that are delivered at their homes 
 during the Christmas season. Marion s 
 first thought, I could swear, was similar to 
 mine; I could not mistake the vivid flash 
 of happy gratitude that illumined her face, 
 nor the sudden exclamation that was 
 checked at the parting of her lips, yet 
 her tone, when she did speak, expressed 
 the utmost mystification. " Why, how 
 strange ! " said she. 
 
 246
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 For an instant I did not comprehend her 
 mental attitude, but I am remarkably 
 adaptable, not by nature, but by training, 
 and by a swift turn I avoided plunging 
 headlong into an awkward situation. It 
 would show a want of delicacy, a sordid 
 mind, a vulgar expectancy, were I not to 
 ignore the thought that we had both almost 
 uttered. Even though I saw an equine 
 nose, a flowing tail and four legs protruding 
 through the brown paper, I must not guess 
 it was a rocking horse; above all, I must 
 not hope it was to be mine. 
 
 " Yes," I remarked, with innocent be 
 wilderment, " it is very strange. I wonder 
 why he bought it." 
 
 Truly I have learned a thing or two. My 
 wife regarded me with admiration that she 
 scarcely tried to hide. I had saved Mr. 
 Fairman s life without adding a cubit to my 
 stature in her estimation, but by this trifling 
 observance of the proprieties, this delicate 
 expression of native refinement, I stood 
 exalted upon a pedestal. 
 
 " I wonder," repeated Marion, after me, 
 in deep conjecture, " why he bought 
 it?" 
 
 247
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Our eyes met. In hers I could see a far 
 away amused sparkle ; in my own I per 
 mitted a faint twinkle, then we both looked 
 in another direction. 
 
 " Perhaps," I ventured cautiously, " Aunt 
 Sophy will write and tell us." 
 
 " Perhaps she will," said Marion. 
 
 The reward of unconscious virtue arrived 
 by the next mail, in the guise of a long letter 
 from Mrs. Fairman. 
 
 " I can scarcely realize that it is 
 
 only three days since we said good-by," she 
 wrote, " it seems so long ago. Of course 
 we have been travelling most of the time 
 and this is really the first chance I have had 
 to write and tell you about the trip, and 
 how constantly I think of your kindness to 
 me, and what good reason I have to be 
 grateful for the advice that had so much to 
 do with my present happiness. Indeed, I 
 confessed to Joseph how I was influenced 
 by Henry s opinion, and he was quite af 
 fected. He keeps saying to me : A fine 
 young man a noble young man ! He de 
 scribes to me over and over again how 
 248
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 admirably Henry acted in the presence of 
 danger the morning of our wedding; he 
 says he hasn t a doubt but that for Henry s 
 coolness and resource we wouldn t be mar 
 ried now. The thought makes me shud 
 der ! I suppose that is why I feel so nerv 
 ous about him when he is out of sight; I 
 am so afraid of another accident. 
 
 " But really, Marion, he hasn t been away 
 from me for more than half an hour at a 
 time, he is so devoted. Of course, with 
 such large interests he has business to look 
 after, but he does it altogether by telegrams. 
 It amazes me to see the number he sends 
 off, and I m getting quite used to the shoals 
 that arrive, but at first the sight of them 
 made me feel quite ill. He never looks to 
 see if there are more than ten words, and 
 yesterday s hotel bill had an item of $7.62 
 for telegrams ! 
 
 " Somehow I have been thinking a great 
 deal of your poor Uncle Philip lately. I 
 think it must be the resemblance I see in 
 Henry to him that has brought him so vivid 
 ly before me and I have come to the con 
 clusion that I was too hard on him about 
 249
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 the farming. Of course he spent a great 
 deal of money on it, but the spending gave 
 him pleasure, and if he had taken to horse- 
 racing or gambling, or something worse, 
 as so many men do, I would have had real 
 cause to complain. I am older now, and I 
 see that married men when they get to a 
 certain age are inclined to fret and chafe, 
 and perhaps bolt, if they are tethered with 
 too short a rope. I see, too, that I didn t 
 do Philip any good by trying to keep him 
 from farming. Now, dear Marion, I have 
 something to write that will not offend you, 
 I hope. I tried to say it last week, but I 
 couldn t quite get my courage up, for you 
 have a little bit of a temper, dear, and I knew 
 that if I saw your eyes flash I would get 
 flustered and make a bungle of it. You 
 know I always supposed it was Henry s 
 own determination that kept him from buy 
 ing any implements but a spade, a rake and 
 a hoe, but from something Paul said I have 
 surmised that it was because you made him 
 promise not to. Perhaps, at the time, that 
 was a wise precaution, but you are differ 
 ently situated now, and you should modify 
 250
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 your views. Of course Henry will do ex 
 actly as you say, and never let you see what 
 it costs him, and although I admire his com 
 mon sense about saving money, I admire 
 him much more for his unselfish, uncom 
 plaining devotion to your ideas. I believe 
 if he thought it would give you any pleasure 
 he would go and cut off his little finger on 
 the chopping block in the woodshed. But 
 I would advise you strongly, Marion (since 
 you need have no fear for the future), to let 
 him spend all the money he wishes on the 
 farm, and to keep all sorts of fancy stock. 
 Let him go ahead for a year at least and 
 take all the pleasure he can out of it, and 
 you ll find it will pay in the end. There s 
 just one thing I would shut down on, if I 
 were you (though I don t think it s likely 
 he d want to do it, but you never can tell 
 how far they may go if they once get 
 started), that is, underdraining. I don t 
 know anything about overdrains, but I do 
 know that underdrains are simply ruinous, 
 and if you keep Henry from underdraining 
 I don t believe he can waste much money. 
 Now, dear Marion, write soon and let your 
 
 25 1
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 poor old aunt know that you are not 
 offended by this suggestion." 
 
 Marion stopped reading, covered her face 
 with her hands and laughed hysterically, 
 exclaiming, " Oh, how funny ! You poor, 
 poor, down-trodden creature ! " 
 
 I was dumb with astonishment at first, 
 there was much food for reflection in the 
 letter, but what surprised me most was the 
 absence of any allusion to Mr. Fairman s 
 buying the farm. " Is that all? " I asked, 
 with breathless incredulity. 
 
 It wasn t. Marion found another sheet 
 marked, " Later." 
 
 " Joseph came in a few minutes ago and 
 handed me one of those telegrams to read. 
 Imagine my astonishment at finding he has 
 bought Waydean for Henry ! It seems 
 that on our wedding-day he made up his 
 mind to do this, and never said a word to 
 me about it. If he had I certainly would 
 have said he was too late. How fortunate, 
 after all, that your bargain with Peter fell 
 through. I think Joseph is more pleased 
 to be able to make Henry a present of Way- 
 252
 
 The Fairy Well 
 
 dean than about anything that has happened 
 since we saw you last, and I can t tell you 
 how glad I am. You see, Marion, Henry 
 can go ahead with perfect confidence." 
 
 253
 
 A PASTORAL CALL 
 
 FOR nearly two years I had rigidly ad 
 hered to Marion s scheme of inex 
 pensive farming, with the result that we 
 refrained from spending money at a rate 
 that should have enabled us to amass a 
 fortune in course of time. The rent which 
 I paid to Peter practically included a 
 bonus to him for working his own land, but 
 this was a mere trifle to the outlay that 
 would have been necessary had I essayed 
 the role of an ordinary amateur farmer. 
 Thus, from the standpoint of economy I can 
 cheerfully testify that the plan was a success, 
 but at times its chafing restrictions irritated 
 me almost to the point of rebellion, as when 
 I heard Abner Davis insinuate that I was 
 not a regular farmer. This feeling, how 
 ever, gradually wore away, as I learned that 
 Marion s plan not only meant a pecuniary 
 254
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 saving, but also a freedom from many re 
 sponsibilities and worries inseparable from 
 the lot of the ordinary farmer. At all times 
 I could rise superior to the devastations of 
 potato-bugs and cut-worms, early and late 
 frosts, hog-cholera, hail-storms, floods, 
 droughts, and mortgage interest. It was 
 this consideration that made me hesitate to 
 adopt Aunt Sophy s suggestion that I 
 should indulge myself by launching forth 
 in the fatuous career of the irregular farmer 
 who spends his fortune in the delightful 
 pursuit of a phantom profit, but when I be 
 gan to fully realize that we owned Way- 
 dean and that I had five thousand dollars in 
 the bank, the prospect of farming on a 
 larger scale became distinctly alluring. At 
 this point I suddenly made the astounding 
 discovery that Marion had entered upon a 
 policy of absolute non-interference in the 
 matter. Not only did she neglect to point 
 out the proper course for me to take, but 
 she also declined to express an opinion or 
 make a comment upon anything even re 
 motely connected with farming operations; 
 nor would she explain her reasons for this 
 255
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 extraordinary behavior, or admit that she 
 had reasons. I could only guess that it was 
 Aunt Sophy s letter which had influenced 
 her to this complete inaction and apparent 
 indifference to my agricultural operations. 
 It was then that I became aware how 
 dependent I was upon my wife s judgment 
 and how much I distrusted my own. Like 
 a caged bird unwittingly made free, I felt 
 bewildered and forsaken and vainly tried to 
 be restored to favor. I am amenable to 
 reason, to flattery, or to anything else that 
 helps to make life pleasant and more worth 
 living; not so with Marion. It is hopeless 
 to attempt to change her purpose by ex 
 ternal influences, and I soon gave up the 
 thankless task of trying to extract an 
 opinion from her that she was bound to 
 keep to herself. It was while I was still in a 
 state of mental bewilderment over her be 
 havior that Peter Waydean came forward 
 with what appeared to be a most reasonable 
 proposition. While I had been puzzling 
 over what I should do with the farm, it 
 appeared that he, by a curious coincidence, 
 was in a similar state of indecision about 
 256
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 what he should do without it. He hadn t 
 realized, he said, when he sold the place to 
 Mr. Fairman, how attached he was to the 
 old homestead or how bereft of occupation 
 he would feel when he no longer cultivated 
 the land that he had cropped for half a cen 
 tury. He could scarcely make me under 
 stand how gratified he was that I, and not a 
 stranger, was now the owner; indeed, the 
 idea had occurred to him that, considering 
 our friendly relations as neighbors, we 
 might make an arrangement, to our mutual 
 advantage ahem ! to work the land on 
 shares. 
 
 I had but a vague idea of what working 
 land on shares meant, and I had to ask him 
 to explain the term. Instead of giving me 
 a precise definition, he began by pointing 
 out that if I worked the farm myself I would 
 have the expense of keeping a hired man 
 all the year round, as well as extra hands 
 in the busy season ; I would have a con 
 tinued outlay for farm-stock, implements, 
 feed and sundries. On the other hand, i 
 we worked the land on shares, he would be 
 willing to do all the work himself and pro- 
 2 57
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 vide everything necessary, if I were willing 
 to pay him the three hundred dollars that it 
 would cost me to keep a hired man. 
 
 "And the produce?" I asked warily, 
 though I felt inclined to agree on the spot. 
 
 Peter rubbed his chin thoughtfully before 
 he spoke. " I was going to say that we 
 might share and share alike, but I m ready 
 to do more than that," with an expansive 
 smile. " You see, as I told you once be 
 fore, taking one year with another, farm 
 ing don t pay, and you might have to share 
 two years losses against one year s profits." 
 He paused for a moment, and I nodded 
 knowingly. " Now," he continued, " I ll 
 take the hull darned crop myself, and if it 
 don t pay expenses you don t lose, but if 
 there is any profit once in a while, I ll have 
 something for horse and cow feed." 
 
 This offer sounded so generous that I 
 almost succumbed ; indeed, I would have 
 agreed at once but for the caution inspired 
 by my previous dealings with him, and the 
 remembrance that Marion counted it one of 
 my failings that my first impulse was always 
 to agree with any plausible proposition. 
 258
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 This thought gave me moral courage 
 enough to withhold my consent until I had 
 time to talk it over with my wife. 
 
 Now when I eagerly began to explain the 
 advantages of working the land on shares I 
 was so full of the subject that I forgot tem 
 porarily that Marion was leaving me to my 
 own devices, nor did I remember till I 
 paused for her opinion, and heard the in 
 teresting comment that I d better get the 
 whitewash mixed up so that we could do 
 the kitchen right after dinner. 
 
 I mixed the whitewash with fierce energy. 
 After dinner I applied it with a concentrated 
 vigor that, properly distributed, would have 
 whitened the White House. As I worked, 
 I ruminated bitterly upon Marion s aggra 
 vating reserve, doubly annoying in that I 
 had an instinct that she saw a fatal flaw in 
 the plan which was not apparent to me. 
 When I finished the walls and ceiling of the 
 kitchen I found that I had incidentally 
 whitened the stove, the floor and myself. 
 
 To my surprise, Marion made no com 
 ment on this as she prepared to scrub the 
 floor, her features expressing calm content, 
 2 59
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 with perhaps a suggestion of scornful 
 amusement that was not definite enough to 
 justify me in accusing her of implying that 
 I hadn t done the work neatly. She had 
 just dipped her scrubbing brush into the 
 pail of water, and I was in the act of remov 
 ing my bespattered overalls, when the front 
 door-bell rang. It was such an unusual 
 occurrence at Waydean for anyone to come 
 to the front door that the sound of the bell 
 at this juncture created a commotion. 
 Neither of us was presentable, but Marion 
 seized a towel and rubbed some splatches of 
 lime off my face, hurried me into an old 
 coat and declared I must go. I had learned 
 previously that on any special occasion it is 
 always the man who must go, so I did not 
 protest. I even went willingly, for the bell 
 rang a second time with a portentous re 
 verberation that thrilled me with expect 
 ancy that something was about to happen, 
 and I was in the mood to enjoy something 
 happening. As I glanced at the mirror in 
 the hall I was startled to see that my hair 
 and beard were powdered a delicate gray 
 with the lime, and that the lines in my face 
 260
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 looked like the deep seams of old age, but 
 as this couldn t be helped I opened the door 
 with my usual air of inquiring dignity. 
 
 " How are you, Mr. Waydean ? " de 
 manded a hearty voice, and a large, bearded, 
 black-clothed, silk-hatted man grasped my 
 hand with a fervent pressure. 
 
 I am singularly open to sympathy, and 
 at that particular time I would have wel 
 comed the benediction of a wayside beggar, 
 so I returned the hearty hand-clasp and re 
 plied that I was from fair to middling, 
 warmly inviting him to walk into the parlor. 
 It did not occur to me until he spread his 
 coat tails and inverted his hat on the floor 
 that he looked as if he might be an ex- 
 clerical insurance or book agent, and I was 
 rather more relieved than impressed when 
 he announced that he was the new pastor 
 of the only church in the neighborhood. I 
 attempted to apologize for my disordered 
 appearance and to explain that I was not a 
 church-goer, also that Waydean was not 
 my name, but that of the place. 
 
 " Not one word, Mr. Waydean," he in 
 terrupted, his deep voice drowning my 
 261
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 courteous utterance. " You wouldn t think 
 so, perhaps, but I was brought up on a farm, 
 and I have learned that clothes do not make 
 a man. Would you be a different person, 
 let me ask, were you clothed in sheepskins 
 or purple and fine linen ? " 
 
 " I never tried either of those costumes," 
 I answered, " but if you saw me in my ordi 
 nary clothes you wouldn t take me for a 
 farmer." 
 
 " Come now, Mr. Waydean," he urged, 
 tapping my knee insistently ; " would you 
 or would you not be the same man? A 
 straight answer, if you please no hedg 
 ing." 
 
 " Well," I admitted, " I suppose I would 
 be the same man, but I d look mighty dif 
 ferent." 
 
 He leaned back in his chair, contemplat 
 ing me with a satisfied smile. " I am 
 pleased to see that you are willing to grant 
 that you are in error," he said, stroking his 
 beard ; " it s always better to tell the truth 
 at first than to wait until you are obliged to 
 do so. But this, of course, is not what I 
 called to say, and I must come to the point. 
 262
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 I ve preached in this church two Sabbaths, 
 and you have not been present. May I ask 
 you why ? " 
 
 " Well I I m not much in the habit of 
 going to church. I " 
 
 " Hedging again, Mr. Waydean," he said, 
 holding up a warning forefinger. " I must 
 insist upon your being perfectly frank. I 
 have reason to suppose you have stayed 
 away on account of this petty disagreement 
 with Brother Bunce and Brother Lemon. 
 Is not that the fact ? " 
 
 Alas, I could not say ! Had I known the 
 particulars of the petty disagreement he 
 mentioned I might have hazarded an ad 
 mission that he was correct in his surmise, 
 for I find it easier to acknowledge that a 
 person is right in a matter of no interest to 
 me than think up arguments on the other 
 side. I felt like a small boy who is called 
 upon to decide instantly whether his pun 
 ishment will be mitigated or increased if 
 he confesses to a deed of which he is both 
 innocent and ignorant. I looked in every 
 direction but at my accuser, and remained 
 silent. 
 
 263
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 " Mr. Waydean," he went on, with a note 
 of sympathetic compassion that would have 
 softened my heart had I been a sinner, " I 
 find it is better to begin work in a new 
 sphere by smoothing out anything that has 
 caused discord, so I have come to you to 
 day as a peacemaker to speak about your 
 demeanor in church, which, I understand, 
 has been the primary cause of this trouble." 
 
 " My demeanor in church? " I cried, with 
 indignant incredulity. 
 
 " Not a word, if you please, until I have 
 stated the case in full, as I understand it; 
 then I shall listen to your explanation. You 
 are in the habit of sleeping in church, 
 and " 
 
 Again I struggled to disclaim the habit 
 of church-going. Again his masterful voice 
 drowned my protest. 
 
 " I can assure you, Mr. Waydean, that 
 we all have habits of which we are totally 
 unconscious. I, for instance, invariably 
 moisten my thumb in turning the leaves of 
 the pulpit Bible, and I am inclined to dis 
 believe my wife when she mentions the 
 matter afterwards. Now, I want you to 
 264
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 take my word for it that you have the habit 
 I am about to speak of, even though you 
 may think you haven t." 
 
 I remembered with an effort that my 
 name was Peter Waydean ; at the same time 
 I was thrilled by a sudden conviction that, 
 as resistance seemed useless, a delightful 
 situation would result if I consented to play 
 the part that was being thrust upon me so 
 vigorously. There was no sound of scrub 
 bing from the kitchen, and I was positive 
 that Marion had left her work to listen to 
 the conversation. This consideration gave 
 zest to the idea, for things seemed to have 
 been providentially arranged so that Marion 
 might remain in the background, wrathfully 
 powerless to interfere in what had every 
 appearance of proving to be a most enter 
 taining masquerade. 
 
 " Mr. Hughes, I ll try," I said meekly. 
 
 " Well then, I will say frankly that I think 
 it excusable if you occasionally fall asleep 
 during the sermon on a warm day, con 
 sidering that you have but one day s rest in 
 the week from most arduous manual labor ; 
 but, it happens, your pew is between 
 265
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Brother Bunce s and Brother Lemon s, and 
 they, too, are sometimes overcome by 
 somnolency. Don t be offended if I put the 
 matter plainly, they both complain that 
 you have the habit of going to sleep 
 and " 
 
 " But what right have they to complain 
 of my going to sleep, when they " 
 
 " There, there ! be calm, and I ll ex 
 plain. Remember, they are both liberal 
 givers and pillars of the church, and we 
 must do nothing to alienate them ; indeed, 
 if we can do anything to make them more 
 comfortable it is our duty to do so. Now 
 they do not complain of your going to sleep, 
 but they protest against having their rest 
 disturbed by ahem ! your your snor 
 ing." 
 
 "My snoring!" I exclaimed wrathfully. 
 " Let me inform you, sir, I never snore. 
 I " A choking guttural sound from the 
 dining-room, followed by an artificial femi 
 nine cough, arrested my denial. I gulped 
 twice, then I went on humbly : " I should 
 say, rather, that I was not aware I snored." 
 
 " Well put, Mr. Waydean," said my men- 
 366
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 tor approvingly. " I remember the first 
 time my wife told me I snored I was quite 
 irritated, so I know how you feel. But I 
 have investigated this matter thoroughly 
 before coming to you, and I find the opinion 
 is universal that you are in fault." 
 
 " Well, then, what are you going to do 
 about it? If I m not wanted in the church 
 I m willing to stay away." 
 
 " No, no, my dear sir, I will not hear of 
 such a thing. I am determined that no one 
 shall leave the church during my pastorate. 
 I would suggest, however, that you might 
 change your pew to one at the rear of the 
 building under the gallery. You would be 
 more comfortable there, and Bunce and 
 Lemon would be out of range, so to 
 speak." 
 
 "Never," I protested firmly. "I shall 
 either keep my pew at the front, or leave the 
 church." 
 
 " You will listen to reason, Mr. Way- 
 dean," he insisted, with confident decision. 
 " I was told that you were obstinate, and 
 that I might as well leave you alone, but I 
 want you to set a good example to your 
 267
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 neighbors and show them you are a man of 
 sense. May I ah ask you to call in Mrs. 
 Waydean, if she is at home ? " 
 
 It was a move that took me unawares ; I 
 almost broke out into a cold sweat. There 
 was a sudden dull thump in the dining-room 
 that sounded as if the cat had jumped down 
 from the top of the dresser to the floor, and 
 I knew that Marion in her dismay had 
 dropped into a chair. Somehow this sound 
 was inspiriting. She could not get upstairs 
 without being seen by our visitor, and in 
 her old skirt she was as impotent to inter 
 rupt any statement I chose to make as if she 
 were bound and gagged. Therefore, with 
 inward relish and outward regret, I an 
 swered that my wife had been so unfortu 
 nate as to twist her ankle and had been 
 confined to her bed for two days. 
 
 He only paused to express the proper 
 condolences before returning to the point ; 
 leaning forward confidentially, he lowered 
 his voice. " The fact is, Mr. Waydean, I 
 sympathize with your stand in the matter, 
 but we must all make sacrifices for the good 
 of the community. You must consider that 
 268
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 these men give liberally, and how, may I 
 ask, could the revenue be made up if they 
 left the church ? " 
 
 More was implied by the diplomatic sug- 
 gestiveness of his tone than by the words. 
 There was a pause, during which I pursed 
 up my lips, half-closed my eyes, and 
 thoughtfully rubbed the bristles on my 
 chin. " Well," I remarked at length, in a 
 reflective tone, " I suppose you think I 
 might do a little better ? " 
 
 ; To be quite frank, I think you might," 
 he responded. " It is a delicate matter to 
 mention, but you have the reputation of 
 being the wealthiest man in the neighbor 
 hood, and and " 
 
 " And the closest," I added, with a touch 
 of asperity. " To be quite frank with you, 
 Mr. Hughes, I didn t take much stock in 
 your predecessor, or I might have given 
 more ; but now I may perhaps feel differ 
 ently. You make Bunce and Lemon at 
 tend to their own beams, and I ll tell you 
 what I ll do. I ll Again that falsetto 
 cough from the next room checked my flow 
 of speech. I had completely forgotten 
 269
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 Marion, having become so absorbed in my 
 part. 
 
 " Well? " he asked expectantly. 
 
 I glanced around nervously and lowered 
 my voice almost to a whisper. " I ll give as 
 much cash as I gave before; besides, I ll 
 give half my crop." 
 
 " Half your crop ! " he exclaimed in 
 amazement. 
 
 " Half my crop," I solemnly asserted ; 
 " if you care to send for it. Perhaps you 
 could get Bunce and Lemon to team the 
 produce to market? " 
 
 " I ll attend to that," he responded cheer 
 fully. " I ll get up a bee, and lend a hand 
 myself. I hope, ho, ho, ho ! that you 
 will have a large crop. What do you pro 
 pose to grow next year ? " 
 
 " Well, I I haven t quite decided." 
 
 " Considering that I have a half-interest, 
 let me suggest potatoes." 
 
 " Potatoes ! " I exclaimed. " Why, they re 
 not worth digging this year fifteen cents a 
 bag!" 
 
 The minister laughed. " Ninety-nine 
 farmers out of a hundred will reason in the 
 270
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 same way," he said ; " then the crop will be 
 short and the prices high. Be the hun 
 dredth man, and plant potatoes." 
 
 I thanked him for the advice, which 
 seemed to me to be excellent. He rose to 
 go, then placed his hand affectionately on 
 my shoulder. " Keep your pew," he said, 
 " and leave me to settle with Brothers 
 Bunce and Lemon ; but if, as a favor to me, 
 you could keep from going to sleep ? " 
 
 I could not resist the urgent friendliness 
 of his appeal. " Mr. Hughes," I responded, 
 " I can promise never to close my eyes while 
 listening to your sermons ; more than that, 
 I ll see that Bunce and Lemon keep awake 
 also." 
 
 His eyes twinkled with appreciative 
 humor as he thanked me, and a sudden re 
 morse seized me for taking advantage of 
 his insistent belief that I was Peter Way- 
 dean. I might have yielded to my inclina 
 tion to confess, had not Marion s cough 
 given place to a series of energetic move 
 ments which I interpreted as a threat that 
 she was preparing to enter the room to ex 
 pose my duplicity. As a usual thing I am 
 271
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 easily intimidated, but sometimes when I 
 get beyond my depth I become bold, defiant, 
 reckless. I had, after all, done no wrong ; I 
 had merely accepted a situation that had 
 been forced upon me. My wife, on the con 
 trary, had behaved with heartless indiffer 
 ence. After training me to depend upon 
 her judgment, after teaching me to obey the 
 dictates of her conscience, she had, without 
 a word of warning, sympathy or apology, 
 left me to wrestle alone with a momentous 
 question ; left me to be tossed about like a 
 tailless kite or a rudderless boat. Well, it 
 was my plain duty to teach her a lesson, and 
 I saw the way to point a pretty moral and 
 at the same time settle my doubts as to the 
 wisdom of allowing Peter to work my land 
 on shares. Marion had refused her opinion 
 on this matter ; she might now listen while 
 I appealed to a stranger. 
 
 " Mr. Hughes," I said hurriedly, as he 
 picked up his hat, " sit down for five min 
 utes more I want to ask your advice." 
 
 He did so, and briefly, very briefly, for 
 the sounds indicated that Marion was des 
 perately sponging her skirt on the dining- 
 272
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 room table, I sketched a proposition sim 
 ilar to Peter s. " Now," I concluded, " do 
 you consider that a fair arrangement for 
 the city man as well as for the farmer ? " 
 
 " A fair arrangement ! " he exclaimed. 
 "Where is the city man s share?" 
 
 " Wouldn t it be in the money he wouldn t 
 spend by not working the land himself? " I 
 asked earnestly. 
 
 He laughed in joyous abandonment. 
 " Really, Mr. Waydean," he gasped, " you 
 have an extraordinary mind. But it doesn t 
 pay to juggle with one s conscience, even 
 in the case of a city man it would be down 
 right extortion." 
 
 Again I was moved by his geniality to 
 confess that I was not the man I seemed ; 
 again was this virtuous resolve crushed. 
 Before I could speak, he went on : " You 
 wouldn t have asked me this if your con 
 science hadn t troubled you. Three hun 
 dred dollars bonus for the farmer and all 
 the produce ! " Again his smile broke out 
 afresh as he looked at me in mild reproof. 
 " Oh, I know what you re thinking. I, too, 
 thought at one time that amateur farmers 
 273
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 were designed by Providence to add to the 
 prosperity and entertainment of legitimate 
 cultivators of the soil, but oh, dear me ! 
 three hun ho, ho, ho ! Why, you d kill 
 your goose." 
 
 " Goose ! " I cried fiercely. " Do you 
 mean to call me a goose? " 
 
 " No, no, I was going to say you d kill 
 your goose " 
 
 " Don t say it, then," I adjured him, with 
 bitter resentment. " If you mention any 
 thing oval and metallic and glittering, I ll 
 have a a nervous prostration. Why do 
 men of your profession want to wreck the 
 nerves of your listeners by firing off the 
 most obvious remarks, the stalest plati 
 tudes, the most hackneyed metaphors? 
 Why can t you sometimes say something 
 unexpected? I d go to church if I could 
 listen to sermons in which I didn t always 
 know what was coming next." 
 
 It was his turn to wince. An angry flush 
 mounted to his cheeks, and he positively 
 glowered at me. " Permit me to say," he 
 thundered, extending his right arm in a 
 pulpit gesture, " that I wasn t going to 
 274
 
 A Pastoral Call 
 
 mention the gol " I don t know what he 
 wasn t going to mention, for I clapped my 
 hands over my ears just in time to escape 
 hearing, because I felt that I really couldn t 
 bear a certain reference that he seemed bent 
 upon making. The next words that reached 
 me were : " was about to say that if you 
 pluck all the feathers off your goose out of 
 season the result will be fatal. Mr. Way- 
 dean, you are behaving in " 
 
 " Don t," I implored" don t Mr. Way- 
 dean me again. I m not old Waydean. 
 I m 
 
 "You re not Peter Waydean?" he 
 gasped. 
 
 " No, I m not." 
 
 " I I was told this was the Waydean 
 homestead." 
 
 " It is," I said, regaining my composure, 
 " but he doesn t live here." 
 
 He stared at me blankly. " And you? " 
 
 " Oh, I m only the city man." 
 
 He picked up his hat and moved toward 
 the door. " Good-afternoon," he said frig 
 idly. 
 
 Remorse for what was past and despair 
 275
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 for what was to come gripped me. " I m 
 sorry for the mistake," I said, following 
 him to the door, " but you wouldn t give 
 me a chance to explain." 
 
 Without a word or look in reply, he 
 walked away, selfishly absorbed in his own 
 thoughts. 
 
 276
 
 XV 
 
 THE HARVEST 
 
 {SUPPOSE the law of retributive pun 
 ishment is, strictly speaking, a just one, 
 but I feel sure there is such a thing as carry 
 ing it too far, especially when it is applied 
 without regard to the mitigating circum 
 stances that sometimes prompt a usually 
 tractable man to kick over the traces. I 
 think, in a case of this kind, a deeper moral 
 effect may be obtained by the application 
 of the beautiful theory that crime, like 
 virtue, has its own inevitable reward, 
 apart from any extraneous punishment 
 that the human intellect can devise. Years 
 before, when the latter philosophy was 
 expounded to me by Marion during a 
 discussion on the subject, it seemed a 
 mere abstract proposition that verged on 
 absurdity, but in the painful moments 
 that elapsed between the departure of the 
 minister and my hesitating entrance to 
 277
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 the dining-room its true significance burst 
 upon me like a ray of sunshine. I would 
 remind Marion of her convictions; I 
 would tell her I had adopted her view ; she 
 would refrain, in deference to her own un 
 swerving opinions, to add to the mental an 
 guish that had already led me to see how 
 unwise it was to give way to evil impulses. 
 
 Therefore, encouraged by this thought, I 
 faced my wife as if nothing had happened 
 since I left the kitchen to answer the sum 
 mons of the .door-bell. I was prepared to 
 find her indignant, wrathful, in tears, but I 
 did not expect to see her sitting in an at 
 titude of apathetic despair, dry-eyed and 
 speechless. 
 
 " Good heavens, Marion ! " I cried. 
 " What s the matter ? " 
 
 It was some time before I could get her 
 to ans\ver ; then it was a positive relief to 
 see her lips move and hear her say faintly, 
 " You ve done it now." 
 
 I had difficulty in finding out what I had 
 done. A gleam of hope thrilled me when at 
 last she revived enough to attack in the 
 open. 
 
 278
 
 The Harvest 
 
 Then, and not till then, did I develop my 
 strategic lines of defence. First, I pleaded 
 justification; second, that my vivid imag 
 ination, like Paul s, had led me to believe 
 for the time that I was Peter ; third, that I 
 had tried in vain to make the minister un 
 derstand that I was not Peter; fourth, that 
 my desire for sympathy and companionship 
 had warped my judgment and caused me to 
 innocently yield to temptation; fifth, that I 
 could not see that I had done wrong ; sixth, 
 that the burden of poignant grief for my con 
 duct was more than I could bear ; seventh, 
 that any attempt to rub it in would harden 
 my heart and stifle the reproaches of my 
 own conscience; eighth, well, to the final 
 argument upon which I based my futile 
 hopes Marion replied that her own attitude, 
 born of the humiliating discovery of the 
 kind of man I really was, might well be con 
 sidered part of the inevitable consequences 
 of my misdeeds, and that if she had ever 
 given me cause to believe that she thought 
 differently she took it all back. 
 
 It was then, with my guns spiked, that I 
 surrendered unconditionally. I only pleaded 
 279
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 that for Paul s sake dear little Paul, who, 
 in his plays, so innocently invented fictions 
 that rivalled Munchausen s we should 
 gather up the little fragments of our shat 
 tered happiness and piece them together 
 with calm resignation. I was about to sug 
 gest that we should seek consolation in a 
 life of self-abnegation by trying to do good 
 to others, but, seeing that Marion was ob 
 viously moved, I desisted. I am proud to 
 say I know how far to go ; I am prouder 
 that I know when to stop and keep a good 
 thing for another occasion. 
 
 Marion was melted, and no regular 
 farmer was ever more grateful to see the 
 welcome rain after a scorching drought 
 than I was to see her tears. She was melted, 
 and yet, strange to say, I could not get her 
 to assure me that I was forgiven, and I am 
 so constituted that I cannot be content with 
 out warm assurances to that effect. 
 
 Months went by, and we regained our 
 happiness to an amazing extent ; indeed, if 
 Marion had not still refused to confirm it, 
 I would have supposed that I was complete 
 ly forgiven, for she sometimes went so far 
 280
 
 The Harvest 
 
 as to smile in recalling my conversation with 
 the minister. I no longer worried over her 
 refusal to express an opinion about the 
 farm, for I had made up my mind to have 
 nothing to do with Peter, and to grow po 
 tatoes, and potatoes, and yet more potatoes. 
 I had a strong instinct that potatoes would 
 be trumps. Seed was cheap, though labor 
 came high. Joe Wrigley was the only avail 
 able man, and though he had previously 
 been eager to work for me at a dollar and a 
 half a day, his terms went up to two dollars 
 when I tried to hire him for the season. I 
 thought his wholesale price should be lower 
 than the retail one, but I had to agree to his 
 terms. Day after day he ploughed and har 
 rowed and planted, until I called a halt on 
 the first of July with about one-third of the 
 farm in potatoes. Throughout the summer 
 I bore the jocular allusions of my experi 
 enced neighbors to the potato farm, replying 
 only with a shrewd and complacent smile; 
 later, I was flattered to notice that knowing 
 glances of amusement were conspicuously 
 absent when I entered the post-office at mail 
 time, and that my casual remarks were 
 281
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 treated with grave consideration. Later 
 still, when the price went up to a dollar and a 
 half a bag, and the prospect that I would 
 have a large crop became a certainty, I was 
 able to indulge in exultant calculations of 
 my probable profits. These delightful an 
 ticipations were slightly marred by Marion s 
 persistent lack of enthusiasm, and the fact 
 that when I asked her if she could ever for 
 give me she always replied that she hoped 
 to be able to before winter. There was 
 something so pointed and yet elusive in this 
 remark that I could not fathom her mean 
 ing, and it was not until I noticed that when 
 ever I mentioned potatoes a peculiar tight 
 expression appeared about her mouth that 
 I could guess she was reserving her forgive 
 ness until my promise was redeemed. 
 
 One day in the beginning of October I 
 wrote a brief note to the minister. Now I 
 had never seriously considered the possi 
 bility of ignoring the promise I had made 
 during my lapse of identity, but I will con 
 fess that it was with a pang I prepared to 
 redeem it, for I loved every one of those 
 conical heaps that dotted my fields, with a 
 282
 
 The Harvest 
 
 passionate first love that I knew I could 
 never feel again. Indeed, if I could have 
 preserved them from decay, I would rather 
 have left the pyramids where they stood, as 
 a lasting monument to the genius of the city 
 man who raised more than two thousand 
 dollars worth of potatoes at a cost of less 
 than one thousand, but with iron resolution 
 I determined to keep to the letter of my 
 promise. Of course, I might have done so 
 in a private and incidental manner, but I 
 frankly admit that I believe if a man chooses 
 to be noble and generous he ought to be so 
 in a manner that gives him the most enjoy 
 ment and furnishes the most telling example 
 to others. 
 
 On the morning of the twenty-first of 
 October the Fairmans arrived to spend with 
 us the first anniversary of their wedding, and 
 not a small part of the pleasure of seeing 
 them again was, to me, the delighted ad 
 miration they expressed on making a tour 
 of the pyramids. Aunt Sophy was so ex 
 uberant over my success, and her husband 
 so frankly astonished when he rapidly cal- 
 283
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 culated the value of the crop in dollars and 
 cents, that I had much difficulty in retaining 
 my usual modest and unassuming manner. 
 Even Marion, despite a certain inflexible set 
 to her mouth that I detected under her com 
 pany expression, couldn t help looking re 
 gretfully pleased. 
 
 We had a most enjoyable dinner, sitting 
 so long over the table that Paul excused 
 himself and went out to play, but it was only 
 a short time until he came running back 
 with the petrifying news that there was a 
 funeral entering the gate. There was a 
 simultaneous rush to the front windows, and 
 out on the road we all saw a long line of 
 democrats beginning to move slowly 
 through our gate. Between the trees, at the 
 head of the procession, we caught fleeting 
 glimpses of a professional silk hat and a suit 
 of black clothes. 
 
 " Henry!" cried Marion, with a lit 
 tle shriek. " You wouldn t let them 
 bury ?" 
 
 " Well, I don t know. If it s a Waydean 
 and the custom 
 
 " Henry! " shrieked Aunt Sophy, clasping 
 Marion in her arms. 
 
 284
 
 The Harvest 
 
 " Really," began Mr. Fairman, " I I" 
 
 " They ve stopped in the yard," yelled 
 Paul, putting his head in the doorway. 
 
 I headed the rush to the back window, 
 then one more rush brought us all into the 
 yard, Mr. Fairman in the rear, supporting 
 the ladies, while Paul, who revels in sudden 
 excitement, skipped about us in glee. The 
 driver of the first wagon was Peter Way- 
 dean ; the professional person descending 
 with his back to us was the Rev. Daniel 
 Hughes. He came forward with a genial 
 smile and greeted me warmly. 
 
 " Mr. Carton," he said, " we have come to 
 take advantage of " 
 
 My arm was gripped from behind. " Pay 
 him to take it away at once," whispered 
 Aunt Sophy in my ear, with fierce energy, 
 pressing her purse into my hand. 
 
 There was a sudden silence; the dramatic 
 moment had arrived. I stepped back and 
 courteously introduced Mr. Hughes to 
 Aunt Sophy, to Marion, to Mr. Fairman. 
 In a few simple and carefully chosen words 
 I explained that Mr. Hughes and my neigh 
 bors had come at my request to take one- 
 285
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 half of my crop for the benefit of the church. 
 Then the minister made a most handsome 
 acknowledgment, and I tried to look dep 
 recating. There was rapt attention on the 
 part of the listeners, the men on the wagons 
 being visibly impressed, those at the rear 
 craning their necks to get a better view of 
 the tableau. Aunt Sophy beamed gratifica 
 tion ; her husband sighed regretfully, as if 
 he thought the contribution rather large. 
 And in Marion s eyes I read the most 
 charming and complete forgiveness that 
 could fall to the lot of an erring husband ; 
 indeed, they were brimming with such per 
 fect trust and confidence in my innate no 
 bility of character that I instantly resolved 
 to become even more worthy of her esteem. 
 
 We watched the long line of wagons pass 
 through the barnyard and round the end of 
 the barn on the way to the back fields, and 
 as I stood slightly in advance of the others 
 I heard Mr. Fairman wonder in a low tone 
 if I proposed to run for the legislature. 
 
 " Just like a thing your Uncle Philip 
 would have done ! " murmured Aunt Sophy 
 to Marion. 
 
 286
 
 The Harvest 
 
 A fleeting spasm crossed Mr. Fairman s 
 face, then his calm serenity returned. I 
 fancy that Uncle Philip had better be 
 dropped, or Aunt Sophy s husband s admir 
 ation for me may lapse. 
 
 On the last wagon rode Abner Davis. He 
 returned my salute with respectful so 
 lemnity, and I could scarcely repress a smile 
 of triumph as I recalled his derisive remark 
 that I was not a regular farmer. Paul, some 
 latent boyish instinct stirring within him, 
 ran after the wagon and clung to the tail 
 board, an unheard of feat for him. 
 
 " I wonder what kind of a farmer Abner 
 Davis will call you now," said Marion, voic 
 ing my complacent pride. 
 
 At that moment loud guffaws, Abner s 
 unmistakable laugh and his companion s, 
 reached us from the wagon that had rounded 
 the barn, and Paul came dashing back, 
 breathless. 
 
 "Father/ he called out, gleefully, "I 
 heard him say that any man who would give 
 half of such a fine crop to " 
 
 " To what ? " I asked, with eager interest 
 as Paul stopped for breath. 
 287
 
 The Abandoned Farmer 
 
 -to the church when- 
 
 " Oh, hurry, Paul ! " cried his mother. 
 " potatoes were such a price was 
 
 We waited in suspense, various flattering 
 allusions to my generous gift suggesting 
 themselves as that mischievous boy stopped 
 to spin around on his heels and laugh in 
 elfish glee. 
 
 " Was what? " we cried in chorus. 
 
 " A da-r-r-n fool ! " shrieked Paul. 
 
 288
 
 Date Due
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY 
 
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