Meadow Grass: Tales of New England Life Part 20

"Ain't that kind o' gay?"

"Gay? Well, you want it gay, don't ye? I dunno why folks seem to think they've got to live in a hea.r.s.e because they expect to ride in one!

What if we be gittin' on a little mite in years? We ain't underground yit, be we? I see a real good ninepenny paper once, all covered over with green brakes. I declare if 'twa'n't sweet pretty! Well, whether I paper or whether I don't, I've got some thoughts of a magenta sofy. I'm tired to death o' that old horsehair lounge that sets in my clock-room.

Sometimes I wish the moths would tackle it, but I guess they've got more sense. I've al'ays said to myself I'd have a magenta sofy when I could git round to it, and I dunno's I shall be any nearer to it than I be now."

"Well, you _are_ tasty," said Miss Dyer, in some awe. "I dunno how you come to think o' that!"

"Priest Rowe had one when I wa'n't more 'n twenty. Some o' his relations give it to him (he married into the quality), an' I remember as if 'twas yisterday what a tew there was over it. An' I said to myself then, if ever I was prospered I'd have a magenta sofy. I 'ain't got to it till now, but now I'll have it if I die for't."

"Well, I guess you're in the right on't." Miss Dyer spoke absently, glancing from the window in growing trouble. "O Mis' Blair!" she continued, with a sudden burst of confidence, "you don't think there's a storm brewin', do you? If it snows Wednesday, I shall give up beat!"

Mrs. Blair, in her turn, peered at the smiling sky.

"I hope you ain't one o' them kind that thinks every fair day's a weather breeder," she said. "Law, no! I don't b'lieve it will storm; an' if it does, why, there's other Wednesdays comin'!"

AT SUDLEIGH FAIR.

Delilah Joyce was sitting on her front doorstone with a fine disregard of the fact that her little clock had struck eight of the morning, while her bed was still unmade. The Tiverton folk who disapproved of her s.h.i.+ftlessness in letting the golden hours, run thus to waste, did grudgingly commend her for airing well. Her bed might not even be spread up till sundown, but the sheets were always hanging from her little side window, in fine weather, flapping dazzlingly in the sun; and sometimes her feather-bed lay, the whole day long, on the green slope outside, called by Dilly her "spring," only because the snow melted first there on the freedom days of the year. The new editor of the Sudleigh "Star," seeing her slight, wiry figure struggling with the bed like a very little ant under a caterpillar all too large, was once on the point of drawing up his horse at her gate. He was a chivalrous fellow, and he wanted to help; but Brad Freeman, hulking by with his gun at the moment, stopped him.

"That's only Dilly wrastlin' with, her bed," he called back, in the act of stepping over the wall into the meadow. "'Twon't do no good to take holt once, unless you're round here every mornin' 'bout the same time.

Dilly'll git the better on't. She al'ays does." So the editor laughed, put down another Tiverton custom in his mental notebook, and drove on.

Dilly was a very little woman, with abnormally long and sinewy arms.

Her small, rather delicate face had a healthy coat of tan, and her iron-gray hair was braided with scrupulous care. She resembled her own house to a striking degree; she was fastidiously neat, but not in the least orderly. The Tiverton housekeepers could not appreciate this att.i.tude in reference to the conventional world. It was all very well to keep the kitchen floor scrubbed, but they did believe, also, in seeing the table properly set, and in finis.h.i.+ng the was.h.i.+ng by eight o'clock on Monday morning. Now Dilly seldom felt inclined to set any table at all. She was far more likely to take her bread and milk under a tree; and as for was.h.i.+ng, Thursday was as good a day as any, she was wont to declare. Moreover, the tradition of hanging garments on the line according to a severely cla.s.sified system, did not in the least appeal to her.

"I guess a petticoat'll dry jest as quick if it's hung 'side of a nightgown," she told her critics, drily. "An' when you come to hangin'

stockin's by the pair, better separate 'em, I say! Like man an' wife!

Give 'em a vacation, once in a while, an' love'll live the longer!"

Dilly was thinking, this morning, of all the possibilities of the lovely, s.h.i.+ning day. So many delights lay open to her! She could take her luncheon in her pocket, and go threading through the woods behind her house. She could walk over to Pine Hollow, to see how the cones were coming on, and perchance sc.r.a.pe together a basket of pine needles, to add to her winter's kindling; or she might, if the world and the desires thereof a.s.sailed her, visit Sudleigh Fair. Better still, she need account to n.o.body if she chose to sit there on the doorstone, and let the hours go unregretted by. Presently, her happy musing was broken by a ripple from the outer world. A girl came briskly round the corner where the stone-wall lay hidden under a wilderness of cinnamon rosebushes and blackberry vines,--Rosa Tolman, dressed in white _pique_, with a great leghorn hat over her curls. The girl came hurrying up the path, with a rustle of starched petticoats, and still Dilly kept her trance-like posture.

"I know who 'tis!" she announced, presently, in a declamatory voice.

"It's Rosy Tolman, an' she's dressed in white, with red roses, all complete, an' she's goin' to Sudleigh Cattle-Show."

Rosa lost a shade of pink from her cheeks. Her round blue eyes widened, in an unmistakable terror quite piteous to see.

"O Dilly!" she quavered, "how do you know such things? Why, you 'ain't looked at me!"

Dilly opened her eyes, and chuckled in keen enjoyment.

"Bless ye!" she said, "I can't help imposin' on ye, no more 'n a cat could help ketchin' a mouse, if't made a nest down her throat. Why, I see ye comin' round the corner! But when folks thinks you're a witch, it ain't in human natur' not to fool 'em. I _am_ a witch, ain't I, dear? Now, ain't I?"

Rosa's color had faltered back, but she still stood visibly in awe of her old neighbor.

"Well," she owned, "Elvin Drew says you can see in the dark, but I don't know's he means anything by it."

Again Dilly broke into laughter, rocking back and forth, in happy abandonment.

"I can!" she cried, gleefully. "You tell him I can! An' when I can't, folks are so neighborly they strike a light for me to see by. You tell him! Well, now, what is it? You've come to ask suthin'. Out with it!"

"Father told me to come over, and see if you can't tell something about our cows. They're all drying up, and he don't see any reason why."

Dilly nodded her head sagely.

"You'd better ha' come sooner," she announced. "You tell him he must drive 'em to pastur' himself, an' go arter 'em, too."

"Why?"

"An' you tell him to give Davie a Sat.u.r.day, here an' there, to go fis.h.i.+n' in, an' not let him do so many ch.o.r.es. Now, you hear! Your father must drive the cows, an' he must give Davie time to play a little, or there'll be dark days comin', an' he won't be prepared for 'em."

"My!" exclaimed Rosa, blankly. "My! Ain't it queer! It kind o' scares me. But, Dilly,"--she turned about, so that only one flushed cheek remained visible,--"Dilly, 'ain't you got something to say to me? We're going to be married next Tuesday, Elvin and me. It's all right, ain't it?"

Dilly bent forward, and peered masterfully into her face. She took the girl's plump pink handy and drew her forward. Rosa, as if compelled by some unseen force, turned about, and allowed her frightened gaze to lie ensnared by the witch's great black eyes. Dilly began, in a deep intense voice, with the rhythm of the Methodist exhorter, though on a lower key,--

"Two years, that boy's been arter you. Two years, you trampled on him as if he'd been the dust under your feet. He was poor an' strugglin'.

He was left with his mother to take care on, an' a mortgage to work off.

An' then his house burnt down, an' he got his insurance money; an' that minute, you turned right round an' says, 'I'll have you.' An' now, you say, 'Is it all right?' _Is_ it right, Rosy Tolman? You tell _me_!"

Rosa was sobbing hysterically.

"Oh, I wish you wouldn't scare me so!" she exclaimed, yet not for a moment attempting to withdraw her hand, or turn aside her terrified gaze. "I wish I never'd said one word!"

Dilly broke the spell as lightly as she had woven it. A smile pa.s.sed over her face, like a charm, dispelling all its prophetic fervor.

"There! there!" she said, dropping the girl's hand. "I thought I'd scare ye! What's the use o' bein' a witch, if ye can't upset folks? Now don't cry, an' git your cheeks all blotched up afore Elvin calls to fetch ye, with that hired horse, an' take ye to the Cattle-Show! But don't ye forgit what I say! You remember we ain't goin' to wait for the Day o' Judgment, none on us. It comes every hour. If Gabriel was tootin', should you turn fust to Elvin Drew, an' go up or down with him, wherever he was 'lected? That's what you've got to think on; not your new hat nor your white _pique_. (Didn't iron it under the overskirt, did ye? How'd I know? Law! how's a witch know anything?) Now, you 'ain't opened your bundle, dear, have ye? Raisin-cake in it, ain't there?"

Rosa bent suddenly forward, and placed the package in Dilly's lap. In spite of the bright daylight all about her, she was frightened; if a cloud had swept over, she must have screamed.

"I don't know how you found it out," she whispered, "but _'tis_ raisin-cake. Mother sent it. She knew I was going to ask you about the cows. She said I was to tell you, too, there's some sickness over to Sudleigh, and she thought you could go over there nussing, if you wanted to."

"I 'ain't got time," said Dilly, placidly. "I give up nussin', two year ago. I 'ain't got any time at all! Well, here they come, don't they?

One for me, an' one for you!"

A light wagon, driven rapidly round the corner, drew up at the gate.

Elvin Drew jumped down, and helped out his companion, a short, rather thickset girl, with smooth, dark hair, honest eyes, and a sensitive mouth. She came quickly up the path, after an embarra.s.sed word of thanks to the young man.

"He took me in," she began, almost apologetically to Rosa, who surveyed her with some haughtiness. "I was comin' up here to see Dilly, an' he offered me a ride."

Rosa's color and spirits had returned, at the sight of her tangible ally at the gate.

"Well, I guess I must be going," she said, airily. "Elvin won't want to wait. Good-by, Dilly! I'll tell father. Good-by, Molly Drew!"

But Dilly followed her down to the road, where Elvin stood waiting with the reins in his hands. He was a very blond young man, with curly hair, and eyes honest in contour and clear of glance. Perhaps his coloring impressed one with the fact that he should have looked very young; but his face shrunk now behind a subtile veil of keen anxiety, of irritated emotion, which were evidently quite foreign to him. Even a stranger, looking at him, could hardly help suspecting an alien trouble grafted upon a healthy stem. He gave Dilly a pleasant little nod, in the act of turning eagerly to help Rosa into the wagon. But when he would have followed her, Dilly laid a light but imperative hand on his arm.

"Don't you want your fortune told?" she asked, meaningly. "Here's the witch all ready. Ain't it well for me I wa'n't born a hunderd year ago?