The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1896-05-08


Copyright, 1885, by Bachelor, Johnson &
Bachelle".
PARTI.
Towards I o'clock OH a summer even
ing in July, Rosanne should have been
helping her mistress in the dairy, in
stead Of which she was sitting under
the shadow of the big water barrel at
the Kitchen door and writing to her
sweetheart. She wrote to tell him how
she had been given leave to so home
next Sunday, and she did not stop to
consider that she was at this very mo-
ment risking the loss of her holiday, by
getting into disgrace for neglect of duty.
But it was not Rosanne's way to think
of more than one thing at time, 50
when it occurred to her that John GA
han, who had called about the loan of a
hay shaker, might post a letter for her
as he went home, she acted upon the
idea without further reflection. She
had her paper spread out on the barrel
stand: and craned her curly head over it
at unlikely angles as she enjoined Dan
MCLEAN to meet her ut Hunts, in Kill
bracken, where the gig would drop her
next Saturday evening.
Meanwhile the dairy work had been
going on well enough without her. Mrs.
COnrOy had 4 pleased smile when she
saw the ripe yellow cream curl smooth
it to the rich contents of her great wide
mouthed gatheringcrock. She thought
they would have grand churning to-
morrow. and at least dozen pounds of
butter for Saturdays fair. But when
she had finished, she recollected that
Rosanne should have been there to carry
the pigs their supper of sour skim milk
and after calling her in vain several
times, she sent little Ned to find her,
instant; Ned delivered the message
with the pithy addition: "She's rag
in: and so in frightened haste Rosanne
finished addressing her envelope with
wild blots. and overset the ink bottle,
and rushed away to fetch the bucket.
When she reached the dairy she was
relieved at finding nobody there to scold
her, and, still hurry-driven. she filled
her bucket and ran off with it across the
yard. Rosanne rather liked seeing the
pigs ut their supper, they wriggled so
all over with en- joyment, and she now
leaned against the sty door to watch
them. She began to sing Norah Creina.
but i'll the middle of the first verse she
stopped abruptly:: \ frightful misgiving
had suddenly seized her, come she knew
not whence. She leaned forward and
,"oNNN Aa'o thS ttOuSu, Slle Sllilcueu up
her bucket and examined it carefully
and then she perceived that she had in
deed done dreadful thing. In her
haste she had emptied the wrong crock,
and had thrown a weeks gathering of
cream to the pigs!
How dreadful it was she could esti-
mate by the pride her mistress took in
the row of rich, yellow-topped milk
pans, the precautions with which she
surrounded them, her wrath if any
clumsiness imperiled them. What
made her mind up all in minute not
to face it. She would run away home.
1t was no such great distance across
the fields: she might get there, she sup
posed. before it was quite dark. She
thought her father would be glad to see
her, and, if so, her stepmother must
perforce acquiesce. But at all events
there was Dan Mclean, who would be
certainly '.as pleased as anythin',' and
make much of her and take her part,
whatever happened Dams stalwart
sanne's future. Beyond a doubt she
had lost her chance of getting a holiday
IN any other way, she thought, us she
raced at full speed back to the house,
For she had no time to hesitate, as the
discovery might at any moment prevent
her flight. Luckily, almost everybody
was out in the hay field, and she got IN
to her attic unperceived There she
collected her few most cherished DOS
sessions-the rest might be fetched aft
erwards-threw on her shawl and once
more dared the creaking, gathering
stairs and the passage that led by the
vored her; she escaped all their periIs
and was presently scrambling through
the gap in the brierE hedge into the
meadows at the back of the hay yard
She ran all the way through the first
field. because she had such vivid pict
ure in her mind of what might be at
that very minute happening within
doors. She could almost see Mrs. Con
roy's face as she stared into the empty
cream crock and hear her terrible cali.
s o@d and PER Ef6remp nrn +ho k4saqns Ro
her scud along like a abbit
But at the end of the field she heard
real voices, for the haymakers were re-
turning to the house, so she slipped
out of their way behind smooth-sided
haycock. When they passed she stole
back to the foot path and on again.
About Kilcrumlyn farm the land was
all down in meadow and the fields were
bordered by thick bosky hedges. Tall
cocks threw shadows nearly across
some of them, and the interspaces were
ing aftergrass, under westering sun
beams. On others the newly-mown
swathes still lay in the soft waves, and
the shorn sward underneath was paler-
hued, not having had time to thrust IN
any young blades since the sweep of the
scythe went by. Along under the hedge
the remnant of the meadow made a
fringe with feathery crests, droopins
and creamy plumes. tall stalks that I'M
furled white sunshades, and here and
there a scarlet poppy. The drops of an
earlier shower still twinkled beneath
them, and Rosanne's crisp pink calico
skirt grew limp and bedraggled as she
brushed by. But she did not heed this
for the one article of dress that she
much regarled-her new hat, with it's
wreaths of curious buff and crimson
roses-rested safely on her head, and
her head was full of preoccupying specu.
lations. She began to think that per-
haps, after all, no such harm was done
That is to say. it was, of course, a woful
pity about the beautiful cream; but
for the matter of losing her place there:
by, she wasn't sure that she wouldn't as
lief as not quit being in service. And
she thought it as like rs not that when
she came home this way Dan Mclean
would again take up the notion of their
getting married after the harvest. That
was what he had wanted to do in the
spring, if her stepmother had not put
it into everybody's head that it would
be better for them to get together few
pounds before they set up housekeep-
ing. Rosanne now said to herself that
she did not see any occasion for it. She
wondered, too, what sort of girl Mag
gle Walsh, her stepsister, who had just
come to live at home, was apt to be-
She had presentiment that there
would be little love lost between them
However, that didn't much signify
by reason Of Dan.
Through three or four fields Rosanne
passed without meeting anything to in
terrupt these cogitations. Now and then
the voices of home-going hay-makers
were waited over a hedge, and belated
cornerake was heard from long way
off family "creak-creaking.' The shad.
ows heightened silently all about, and
the sunlit interspaces seemed as they
shrank to grow more jewel-like in their
glinting gold on green. In a sheltering
corner a large olive-mottled frog started
up out of the tangled grass, and went
fjnging himself On before her in long
series of expanding leaps; but at last she
almost trod on him as he stopped and sat
suddenly squatting. At the same mo-
H.