Autumn Part 8

As she ran she kept saying to herself, over and over, "I won't be like that, I won't, I won't."

It seemed to her as though she were running away from Hillsboro itself, running away from Mrs. Wicket, from her mother, from Thomas Frye, from Anna Barly, from everything she wouldn't be. . . .

"I won't," she cried, "I won't, I won't, I won't, I won't."

"Never."

Mr. Jeminy, who was seated on his coat by the side of the road, got up with a smile. "Well, Anna Barly," he said.

"Ak," she whispered, clapping both hands to her mouth, "how you scared me." She could feel her heart beating with fright; her lips trembled, her eyes filled with tears. She stood staring at Mr. Jeminy, who stared gravely back at her. "Are you going to run away from me, too?"

he asked, at last.

"No," said Anna. Then, all at once, she burst out crying. "I can't help it," she cried, between her sobs. "I can't help it. Don't look at me."

"No," said Mr. Jeminy, "I won't." And he gazed up at the tree tops, dark and sharp against the cold, gray sky.

Anna cried herself out. Then pale and ashamed, she started home again with Mr. Jeminy. "I don't know what got into me," she said. "I don't know what you'll think."

"I think," declared Mr. Jeminy, looking up at the sky, "I think--why, I think this wet weather will pa.s.s, Anna Barly. Yes, to-morrow will be cold and clear."

Anna did not answer him. She was tired; she had played, she had cried, now she wanted to rest.

In Frye's General Store, Mr. Frye and Mr. Crabbe were disputing a game of checkers. They sat opposite each other, stared at the checkerboard, and stroked their chins. Farmer Barly stood watching them. He puffed on his pipe, and nodded his head at every move. But all the while he was thinking about Anna. "Pretty near time she was settling down," he thought.

Mr. Frye jumped over two, and leaned back in his chair with a satisfied smile. The hops of his own men put him into the best of humor. It was not that he wanted to win; he only wanted to do all the jumping. "Let me do the taking," he would have said, "and you can do the winning."

When Mr. Crabbe hopped over three in a row, Mr. Frye became gloomy. He felt that Mr. Crabbe was getting all the pleasure. "You're too spry for me," he said. "You're like a flea. Well. . . ."

"It's your turn, Mr. F.," said Mr. Crabbe.

Mr. Frye looked at the board with distaste. There were no more jumps for him to make. He pushed a round black checker forward.

"There you are," he said.

"Here I go," declared Mr. Crabbe. And he began hopping again.

Mr. Frye shook his head. "I don't know as I'm feeling very good to-day," he told Farmer Barly.

As he was speaking, Anna Barly entered the store, on her way home.

Thomas Frye, who was behind the counter, came forward to meet her.

When she saw him, her cheeks, which were pale, grew red. "He can see I was crying," she thought. "Well, I don't care. I hate him. What did I stop for?"

She remembered that her mother had wanted a spool of white cotton.

"Number eleven," she said.

When she saw her father and Mr. Frye in the corner, she grew sulkier than ever. "They're just laying to settle me down," she thought. And turning to hide her face, still stained with tears, she made believe to wave to some one, out the window.

Mr. Crabbe took another man. "Tsck," said Mr. Frye; "maybe I'd better go and see what Anna wants. Thomas don't appear to know what he's about."

"Leave them be," said Mr. Crabbe, "leave them be." And he winked first at Mr. Barly, and then at Mr. Frye. "Don't go spoiling things," he said.

Mr. Frye allowed his mouth to droop in a thin smile. "Young people are slow to-day," he remarked. "They act like they had something on their minds. Green fruit . . . slow to ripe. In my time we went at it smarter." And he looked thoughtfully at Anna Barly. He saw her in the form of acres of land, live stock, farm buildings, and money in the bank. "Mola.s.ses," he thought; "yes, sir, mola.s.ses. Maple sugar." But when he looked at his son Thomas, he frowned. "Go on," he wanted to say, "go on, you slowpoke."

Farmer Barly also frowned at Thomas Frye. He felt that he was being hurried. "She's well enough where she is," he thought. "She's young yet. A year or two more . . ."

"Well," said Mr. Crabbe, "I look forward to the day." And he waved his hand kindly in the air. "It's your move, Mr. F."

Mr. Frye arose, and walked toward the door, where Thomas was bidding Anna good-by. "See you to-night," Thomas whispered; "heh, Anna?"

"Please yourself," said Anna. And off she went, without looking at Mr.

Frye, who had come to speak to her. When she was gone, Mr. Frye gave his son a keen glance. In it was both curiosity and malice. But Thomas turned away. It seemed to him that women must have been easier to understand when his father was young. For no one could understand them now.

While the storekeeper's back was turned, Mr. Crabbe rearranged the checkerboard. He took up two of Mr. Frye's men and put them in his pocket. Then he winked at Mr. Barly, as though to say: "I'm just a leetle too smart for him."

Farmer Barly winked back. It amused him to have Mr. Frye beaten unfairly. Mr. Frye wanted to get his daughter away from him. "Well,"

he said in his mind, to Mr. Frye, "just go easy. Just go easy, Mr.

Frye." And he winked again at Mr. Crabbe. "That's right," he said, "give it to him."

When Mr. Jeminy left Anna, at the edge of the village, he went to call on Grandmother Ploughman. He found her in the company of old Mrs.

Crabbe, who had brought her knitting over, for society's sake. Mrs.

Ploughman received him with quiet dignity, due to a sense of the wrong she had suffered, for which she blamed Mrs. Wicket, and the Democratic Party. Mr. Ploughman, she often said, had been a good Republican all his life. Unfortunately, he was dead; otherwise, things would have been different.

It seemed to her that the country was being run by a set of villains.

"The world is in a bad way," she declared. "I don't know what we're coming to." And an expression of bleak satisfaction illuminated her face, wrinkled with age.

"Yes," said Mr. Jeminy, "these are unhappy times. I am afraid we are leaving behind us a difficult task for those who follow. They had a right to expect better things of us, Mrs. Ploughman."

"I've not left anything behind," said Mrs. Ploughman decidedly; "not yet."

"I should hope not," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs. Crabbe. "No."

"It's the young," said Mrs. Ploughman, "who get the old into trouble.

Nothing ever suits them until they're in mischief; and then it's up to their elders to pull them out again. I know, for I've seen it, father and son."

"It is the old," said Mr. Jeminy, "who get the young into trouble."

"Is it, indeed?" said Mrs. Ploughman.

"Well, I don't believe it." And she gave Mr. Jeminy a bright, peaked look.

"Then," she continued, "when you've done for them, year in and year out, off they go, and that's the end of it."

"Ah, yes," croaked Mrs. Crabbe; "off they go."

"If it isn't one thing," said Mrs. Ploughman, "it's another. Trouble and death--that's a woman's lot in this world, like the Good Book says."

"Death is the end of everything," remarked Mrs. Crabbe.

"I'm not afraid to die," Mrs. Ploughman declared. "There's things to do the other side of the grave, same as here. And it's a joy to do them, in the light of the Lord. I can tell you, Mrs. Crabbe, I won't be sorry to go. My folks are waiting there for me." Her voice trembled, and she rocked up and down to compose herself. "He needn't try to mix me up," she thought to herself; "not in my own home. No."