Ann Arbor Tales Part 26

HERBERT. I recall having read once--in some French book if I remember rightly--that one should never count upon an affianced couple being in a given place at a given time.

MINNIE [_smiling at him_]. I'm not sure that isn't true. Still, Hilda is usually quite discreet, and I can't----

HERBERT. Doubtless they'll be here in a moment; I shouldn't worry.

MINNIE [_suddenly_]. Why, how very impolite of me. To allow you to sit there all this time holding that basket. Won't you set it on the porch?

[HERBERT _has held the basket on his knees with his hands spread out over the cover._]

HERBERT. Oh--ah--I wasn't thinking of--there, I guess that will be safe.

[_He sets the basket on the porch at his side._]

MINNIE [_leaning forward and gazing past him toward the street_]. I wish they'd come! Wasn't it perfectly absurd of me to lose my key? Keeping you here! Are you quite sure you'd just as lief?

HERBERT. Yes, indeed--really--I like to sit out--really, it doesn't matter, not in the least.

MINNIE. Well while we are waiting we might as well go on where we left off. You were saying, on the way up from the livery---- [_Hardly for a moment has_ HERBERT _taken his eyes off the girl at his side._]

HERBERT [_floundering_]. Oh, yes, as I was saying--the--oh--ah--I was say--what _was_ I saying, Miss----

MINNIE. Have you forgotten so soon? I'm afraid the subject couldn't have held all your thought. You were telling me about the triliums.

HERBERT [_brightly_]. Oh, yes, to be sure; of course--the triliums. I was telling you they were to be found on the plains--of all places in the world--right in the heart of the great American desert--as I'm told.

MINNIE [_earnestly_]. Are they, indeed? Really, I never heard of such a thing. Gray says positively, I am sure, that they are to be found growing only in damp soil; near rivers, for instance, or in marshes.

I've never succeeded in finding them around here anywhere except down by the Huron River or out State Street at Tamarack Swamp. And to think of them growing away out there! It is the strangest thing I ever heard of--why, there's no water for miles, is there?

HERBERT. Not a drop. I'm told they've been found in the most barren places; flowering alongside cacti and sage-brush.

MINNIE. You are quite sure they were the trilium, are you? It's possible of course----

HERBERT. That my informant might be mistaken--yes; but I don't think he was. They look precisely the same, and they a.n.a.lyze the same. I've seen his specimens. The leaf is identical in form. It is a trifle larger, that is all. I've never been able to distinguish any other variation, however slight.

MINNIE. Have you ever mentioned it to Professor Yarb? I'm sure----

HERBERT. Yes, I told him about them, and last summer I sent him a box.

He a.n.a.lyzed them and is as much mystified as I. He's going to write a paper on the subject for this year's meeting of the American Society.

MINNIE. How I should love to see some! I wonder if it would be too much trouble for you to send me a few; just one or two. You have some pressed, doubtless. I'd like to take a hand in solving the riddle. I intend to keep up with my botany, no matter where or what I teach, finally.

HERBERT [_joyfully_]. Do you? Do you, really?

MINNIE [_earnestly_]. I do indeed.

HERBERT. Of course I'll send you some. I'll mail you a box as soon----

MINNIE [_with a protesting gesture_]. Oh, I wouldn't have you go to that trouble for the world. Just two or three, in an envelope. They will do quite as well. [_She leans forward again and gazes past him down the street. He does not draw back as he did before._] Why in the world don't they come? I shall have to talk to Hilda, severely.

HERBERT. Oh, don't be hard on her. They're in--that is to say, they think a very great deal of each other, and no doubt----

MINNIE. But it is so terribly late!

HERBERT. I know, but it's very pleasant--such a night--much pleasanter than it is inside. And as for sleep, why one can sleep any night, while such a moon as that, up there, one can't see often.

MINNIE [_quickly_]. I do believe you're sentimental. I'm not a bit, so we'll never get on.

HERBERT [_gazing into s.p.a.ce_]. I don't think two people ought to be alike---- [_He catches himself, stares at the moon and whistles without whistling. Minnie regards him curiously from the end of her eye._]

MINNIE [_examining the cuff of one sleeve_]. What do you mean by that?

HERBERT [_again floundering_]. I--oh--ah--I was just thinking---- We had a lecture on some such subject in psychology the other day.

MINNIE [_with a little sigh_]. Do you enjoy psychology?

HERBERT. Very much.

MINNIE. Have you ever made any experiments?

HERBERT. Only a few, just the more common ones. I've only had one course in it, you see.

MINNIE [_making a thrilling conversational leap_]. I've no doubt it is all very fascinating, but I don't think I should care to marry a psychologist.

HERBERT [_quickly; edging nearer_]. But I'm not a psychologist! I'm a botanist.

MINNIE [_very softly; looking away_]. What do you mean--I----

HERBERT [_seemingly about to run madly into the face of the storm, but recovering himself_]. I--oh--ah--I was just defending myself, you know.

But why wouldn't you care to marry one?

MINNIE [_sighing again_]. Oh, I don't know. I think I should be in mortal terror all the time that he was just a.n.a.lyzing me and every one of my motives.

HERBERT [_dreamily_]. I don't think you would have occasion. If he loved you he couldn't----

MINNIE [_trying to laugh lightly and succeeding in emitting a rather tame cackle_]. Love me! The idea! Who would ever love a spectacled old thing like me?

HERBERT. Oh, you don't know, you know. Besides you shouldn't talk that way about yourself.

MINNIE [_smiling full at him_]. I should tell the truth, shouldn't I?

HERBERT [_locking and unlocking his fingers_]. But it isn't the truth.

MINNIE [_looking down_]. Oh!

HERBERT [_with real courage_]. That's the truth! You see the difference, don't you?

MINNIE. Well, I'd like to know what I am if I'm not that. No one ever intimated before that I am anything else. My little brother has maintained it ever since he learned to talk.

HERBERT. Well, you're not; you're---- [_He hesitates. Thereafter he speaks quite as a locomotive puffs on a steep grade. There are two or three large, l.u.s.ty puffs followed by a chain of spasmodic little puffs_.]