Amanda: A Daughter of the Mennonites Part 11

When Amanda entered the kitchen she found her mother and the visitor cutting carpet rags. Old clothes were falling under the snip of the shears into a peach basket, ready to be sewn together, wound into b.a.l.l.s and woven into rag carpet by the local carpet weaver on his hand loom.

"h.e.l.lo," said the girl as she laid a few books on the kitchen table.

"Books again," sniffed Aunt Rebecca. "I wonder now how much money gets spent for books that ain't necessary."

"Oh, lots of it," answered the girl cheerfully.

"Umph, did you buy those?"

"Yes, when I went to Millersville."

"My goodness, what a lot o' money goes for such things these days!

There's books about everything, somebody told me. There's even some wrote about the Pennsylvania Dutch and about that there Stiegel gla.s.s some folks make such a fuss about. I don't see nothin' in that Stiegel gla.s.s to make it so dear. Why, I had a little white gla.s.s pitcher, crooked it was, too, and nothin' extra to look at. But along come one of them anteak men, so they call themselves, the men that buy up old things. Anyhow, he offered to give me a dollar for that little pitcher.

Ach, I didn't care much for it, though it was Jonas's granny's still. I sold it to that man quick before he'd change his mind and mebbe only give me fifty cents."

"You sold it?" asked Amanda. "And was it this shape?"

She made a swift, crude sketch of the well-known Stiegel pitcher shape.

"My goodness, you drawed one just like it! It looked like that."

"Then, Aunt Rebecca, you gave that man a bargain. That was a real Stiegel pitcher and worth much more than a dollar!"

"My goodness, what did I do now! You mean it was worth _more_ than that?" The woman was incredulous.

"You might have gotten five, perhaps ten, dollars for it in the city.

You know Stiegel gla.s.s was some of the first to be made in this country, made in Manheim, Pennsylvania, way back in 1760, or some such early date as that. It was crude as to shape, almost all the pieces are a little crooked, but it was wonderfully made in some ways, for it has a ring like a bell, and the loveliest fluting, and some of it is in beautiful blue, green and amethyst. Stiegel gla.s.s is rare and valuable so if you have any more hold on to it and I'll buy it from you."

"Well, I guess! I wouldn't leave you pay five dollars for a gla.s.s pitcher! But I wish I had that one back. It spites me now I sold it. My goodness, abody can't watch out enough so you won't get cheated. Where did you learn so much about that old gla.s.s?"

"Oh, I read about it in a _book_ last year," came the ready answer.

Aunt Rebecca looked at the girl, but Amanda's face bore so innocent an expression that the woman could not think her guilty of emphasizing the word purposely.

"So," the visitor said, "they did put something worth in a book once!

Well, I guess it's time you learn something that'll help you save money. All the books you got to read! And Philip's still goin' to school, too. Why don't he help Amos on the farm instead of runnin' to Lancaster to school?"

"He wants to be a lawyer," said Mrs. Reist. "I think still that as long as he has a good head for learnin' and wants to go to school I should leave him go till he's satisfied. I think his pop would say so if he was livin'. Not everybody takes to farmin' and it is awful hard work.

Amos works that hard."

"Poof," said Aunt Rebecca, "I ain't heard tell yet of any man workin'

himself to death! It wouldn't hurt Philip to be a farmer. The trouble is it don't sound tony enough for the young ones these days. Lawyer-- what does he want to be a lawyer for? I heard a'ready that they are all liars. You're by far too easy!"

"Oh, Aunt Rebecca," said Amanda, "not all lawyers are liars. Abraham Lincoln was a lawyer."

"Ach, I guess he was no different from others, only he's dead so abody shouldn't talk about him."

Amanda sighed and turned to her mother. "Mother, I'm going up to put on an old dress and when Phil comes we're going over to the woods for arbutus."

"All right."

But the aunt did not consider it all right. "Why don't you help cut carpet rags?" she asked. "That would be more sense than runnin' out after flowers that wither right aways."

"If we find any, Millie is going to take them to market to-morrow and sell them. Some people asked for them last week. It's rather early but we may find some on the sunny side of the woods."

"Oh," the woman was mollified, "if you're goin' to sell 'em that's different. Ain't it funny anybody _buys_ flowers? But then some people don't know how to spend their money and will buy anything, just so it's buyin'!"

But Amanda was off to the wide stairs, beyond the sound of the haranguing voice.

"Glory!" she said to herself when she reached her room. "If my red hair didn't bristle! What a life we'd have if Mother were like that! If I ever think I have nothing to be thankful for I'm going to remember that!"

A little while later she went down the stairs, out through the yard and down the country road to meet her brother. She listened for his whistle. In childhood he had begun the habit of whistling a strain from the old song, "Soldier's Farewell" and, like many habits of early years, it had clung to him. So when Amanda heard the plaintive melody, "How can I leave thee, how can I from thee part," she knew that her brother was either arriving or leaving.

As she walked down the road in the April suns.h.i.+ne the old whistle floated to her. She hastened her steps and in a bend in the road came face to face with the boy.

At sight of her he stopped whistling, whipped off his cap and greeted her, "h.e.l.lo, Sis. I thought that would bring you if you were about. Oh, don't look so tickled over my politeness--I just took off my hat because I'm hot. This walk from the trolley on a day like this warms you up."

His words brought a light push from the girl as she took her place beside him and they walked on.

"That's a mournful whistle for a home-coming," Amanda told him. "Can't you find a more appropriate one?"

"My repertoire is limited, sister--I learned that big word in English cla.s.s to-day and had to try it out on some one."

"Phil, you're crazy!" was the uncomplimentary answer, but her eyes smiled with pride upon the tall, red-haired boy beside her. "I see it's one of your giddy days so I'll sober you up a bit--Aunt Rebecca's at the house."

"Oh, yea!" He held his side in mock agony.

"Again? What's the row now? Any curtain lectures?"

"Be comforted, Phil. She's going home to-night if you'll drive her to Landisville."

"Won't I though!" he said, with the average High School boy's disregard of pure English. "Surest thing you know, Sis, I'll drive her home or anywhere else. What's she doing?"

"Helping Mother cut carpet rags."

"Well, that's the only redeeming feature about her. She does help Mother. Aunt Rebecca isn't lazy. I'm glad to be able to say one nice thing about her. Apart from that she's generally as Millie says, 'actin' like she ate wasps.' But she can't scare me. All her ranting goes in one ear and out the other."

"Nothing there to stop it, eh, Phil?"

"Amanda! That from you! Now I know how Caesar felt when he saw Brutus with the mob."

"It's a case of 'Cheer up, the worst is yet to come,' I suppose, so you might as well smile."

In this manner they bantered until they reached the Reist farmhouse.

There the boy greeted the visitor politely, as his sister had done.

"My goodness," was the aunt's greeting to him, "you got an armful of books, too!"