Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1898-05-31
CHAPTER XVI.

CHAPTER XVI.
Zone small boys head to lie hated,
and five women, each owlms Two lands,
normally furnished with five fingers
apiece, all engaged on it, How many
fingers all laboring for you, Dren?
There is sum in addition.
Liza Martin held up one hand. On
its index finger small unfinished hat
Of plated palmetto gyrated swiftly.
The boy to whom that intricate mathe-
matical problem had just been submit
ted brought an ancient hobbyhorse To
an abrupt halt and precipitately dis
mounted, the better To criticise the un-
finished hat.
A moment Of reflective silence. With
his pink palmed hands folded behind
his back and his yellow curled head
poised judicially he delivered himself
adversely, MY hat that did float away
on the duck pond was nicer hat than
that. "
II know IL was, you small migrate
That was the work Of professional. I"
She pulled him nearer to her by one
rosy ear. ''And, Dren, now that hats
are worth their weight in gold, you
must become more circumspect You
should never have let il float away.
But, Dren, gave you sum in arith-
metic to do, and you have not done il.
How many fingers have worked on this
hat Of yours Come, now, / will help
you little.
Mamie Colyer brought the palmetto
from the woods, Mother Martin cured
il, Grandmother Strong split IL into
nice little narrow strips, your mother
plated it, and here am sewing it into
shape. You ought to feel tremendously
important, Dren. y
Il do" said the boy, promptly ap-
propriating her homage.
II don't doubt il. +" Liza laughed and
stopped for fresh coil Of the plated
palmetto. "You see, we expect great
things Of you, Dren. You are al the
man we have about TO protect Us when
Seth is out in the fields. But how about
that sum? How many hands all work
ing for you?'
Twelve, said Adrien laboriously.
Twelve! You must be- counting in
your own, Dren. and they don I count
for much at anything yet awhile. You
are wrong, Dren. You generally are
wrong.
The boy received this cutting sum-
mary Of his own inadequacy with COM
posure He was more deeply interested
in the work Liza had resumed than III
his own possible shortcomings
'Is that going TO be a hat or cap?"
"A hat"
with brim and a blue ribbon
band?"
"A brim certainly. A blue ribbon
band! Dren, you are exacting.
II think my grandmother can give
me a blue ribbon band. My grandmoth-
er can give me everything want. She
gets everything out Of the big che st In
the hall up stairs. My grandmother has
everything. Don't you think SO too;'
Evidently you approve of your grand
mother, Dren.
"She is better than my other grand
ma was. She says look like my papa.
and sometimes she cries into the lig
chest My papa is a soldier He don {
come TO See mamma any more My
grandfather Is soldier too. am "A
gentleman am not soldier.
Everybody is that who Is worth call
ing man nowadays, my boy.
Then Seth is a cowardi'
Seth is a hero Seth is q martyr
Seth has to stay AT home to feed small
boys. who let their hats get away from
them ON duck ponds, and good for moth
ing women, who can neither fight nor
hoe corn.
Then are you good for nothing,
Liar
"Yes, emphatically. Then. with a
rippling laugh: "Dren, you are deli.
ciously enter aiming. What would we
do without our one small gentleman
There was dash Of triumph i'll her
voice. She had kept the faith. She had
promised Strong TO "see that affair Of
Adrien's wife and boy properly attend
ed to-" She was also keeping that other
promise about Mamie Colyer. Her whis-
pered farewell to Strong, She shall not
leave me until her father or her lover
claims her., -" had assumed the aspect OF
solemn obligation, and the protesscr 5
daughter had become valued member
Of that little colony Of heroic women
who filled the big house at Sens Souci
with an atmosphere Of cheerful effort
and brave endurance, without which Its
desolate mistress would have been given
over to despair
But father and lover still tarried-
tarried through the signl, IS days when
hope, finding nothing to feed upon,
sickened and died; tarried through the
short gray days Of somber winter,
when the ungathered crops of Sans Sou
ci, missing the harvester's hand, whit
ened and fell earthward, as uncared for
as the winters SNOW; tarried through
springs resurrection days, when the
birds sang Resurgens and built their
nests in the apple trees that shed their
blossoms over the tangled flower bed:
in Gabriella's neglected garden; tarried
through the long, hot summer hours,
when the women applied themselves to
inventive work and Seth grew more
STOPPING with each days labor over the
growing vegetables that must be served
ON the madam table. He had promised
to take good care of all these women,
and, with the patient watchfulness OF q
faithful dog, he was doing it. Into the
inner temple of their anxieties and theiI
emotions he could not enter, even with
the sandled feet Of reverence, but that
neither by day nor by night physical
harm should come to them he had
sworn, and he, too, was keeping the
faith, carrying about with him The
smoldering fires Of his thwarted ambi
tions chiding himself for the mean en-
Wy that would leap up fiercely i'll hi'
heart whenever he thought OF "the res
Of the fellows
Liza was "sOlid comfort" to him IL
those days. She would come out to hin
where he was hoeing the cattagcs ol
watering the asparagus bed 10 tall
over things" their chief topic beint
Adrien's affairs
How queerly it had all turned out
Annabel Summers, the daughter OF
Shingleton milliner, reiening almost su
preme at Sans Souci!
Liza accounted for it sagaciously
AFTER all, Seth, it was the genera
condition Of affairs that made my tasl