"No; you"re strange, and she"d kick you over the fence."
"O, I guess not," he remarked; but he let the girl finish her milking.
He again carried the milk back; he also took the "slop" to the pigs and threw the hay to the horses, while the girl gave the new milk to the b.u.t.ting calf; then back to the house where they strained the milk. Then the young man was sent into the front room while the girl changed from work to Sunday attire.
The front room was very hot and uncomfortable. The young man looked about on the familiar scene. There were the same straight-backed chairs, the same homemade carpet, more faded and threadbare than ever, the same ugly enlarged photographs within their ma.s.sive frames which the enterprising agent had sold to Mrs. Duke. There was the same lack of books or music or anything pretty or refined; and as Dorian stood and looked about, there came to him more forcibly than ever the barrenness of the room and of the house in general. True, his own home was very humble, and yet there was an air of comfort and refinement about it. The Duke home had always impressed him as being cold and cheerless and ugly.
There were no protecting porches, no lawn, no flowers, and the barn yard had crept close up to the house. It was a place to work. The eating and the sleeping were provided, so that work could be done, farm and kitchen work with their dirt and litter. The father and the mother and the daughter were slaves to work. Only in work did the parents companion with the daughter. The visitors to the house were mostly those who came to talk about cattle and crops and irrigation.
As a child, Carlia was naturally cheerful and loving; but her sordid environment seemed to be crushing her. At times she struggled to get out from under; but there seemed no way, so she gradually gave in to the inevitable. She became resentful and sarcastic. Her black eyes frequently flashed in scorn and anger. As she grew in physical strength and beauty, these unfortunate traits of character became more p.r.o.nounced. The budding womanhood which should have been carefully nurtured by the right kind of home and neighborhood was often left to develop in wild and undirected ways. Dorian Trent as he stood in that front room awaiting her had only a dim conception of all this.
Carlia came in while he was yet standing. She had on a white dress and had placed a red rose in her hair.
"O, say, Carlia!" exclaimed Dorian at sight of her.
"What"s the matter?" she asked.
"Here you go dolling up, and look at me."
"You"re all right. Open the door, it"s terribly stuffy in here."
Dorian opened the tightly stuck door. Then he turned and stood looking at the girl before him. It seemed to him that he had never seen her so grown-up and so beautiful.
"Say, Carlia, when did you grow up?" he asked.
"While you have been away growing up too."
"It"s the long dress, isn"t it?"
"And milking cows and feeding pigs and pitching hay." She gave a toss to her head and held out her roughened red hands as proof of her a.s.sertion.
He stepped closer to her as if to examine them more carefully, but she swiftly hid them behind her back. The rose, loosened from the tossing head, fell to the floor, and Dorian picked it up. He sniffed at it then handed it to her.
"Where did you get it?" he asked.
She reddened. "None of your--Say, sit down, can"t you."
Dorian seated himself on the sofa and invited her to sit by him, but she took a chair by the table.
"You"re not very neighborly," he said.
"As neighborly as you are," she retorted.
"What"s the matter with you, Carlia?"
"Nothing the matter with me. I"m the same; only I must have grown up, as you say."
A sound as of someone driving up the road came to them through the open door. Carlia nervously arose and listened. She appeared to be frightened, as she looked out to the road without wanting to be seen. A light wagon rattled by, and the girl, somewhat relieved, went back to her chair.
"Isn"t it warm in here?" she asked.
"It"s warm everywhere."
"I can"t stay here. Let"s go out--for a walk."
"All right--come on."
They closed the door, and went out at the rear. He led the way around to the front, but Carlia objected.
"Let"s go down by the field," she said. "The road is dusty."
The day was closing with a clear sky. A Sunday calm rested over meadow and field, as the two strolled down by the ripening wheat. The girl seemed uneasy until the house was well out of sight. Then she seated herself on a gra.s.sy bank by the willows.
"I"m tired," she said with a sigh of relief.
Dorian looked at her with curious eyes. Carlia, grown up, was more of a puzzle than ever.
"You are working too hard," he ventured.
"Hard work won"t kill anybody--but it"s the other things."
"What other things?"
"The grind, the eternal grind--the dreary sameness of every day."
"You did not finish the high school. Why did you quit?"
"I had to, to save mother. Mother was not only doing her usual house work, but nearly all the outside choring besides. Father was away most of the time on his dry farm too, and he"s blind to the work at home. He seems to think that the only real work is the plowing and the watering and the harvesting, and he would have let mother go on killing herself.
Gee, these men!" The girl viciously dug the heel of her shoe into the sod.
"I"m sorry you had to quit school, Carlia."
"Sorry? I wanted to keep on more than I ever wanted anything in my life; but--"
"But I admire you for coming to the rescue of your mother. That was fine of you."
"I"m glad I can do some fine thing."
Dorian had been standing. He now seated himself on the bank beside her. The world about them was very still as they sat for a few moments without speaking.
"Listen," said he, "I believe Uncle Zed is preaching. The meeting house windows are wide open, for a wonder.
"He can preach," she remarked.
"He told me you visit him frequently."
"I do. He"s the grandest man, and I like to talk to him."
"So do I. I had quite a visit with him this afternoon. I rather fooled him, I guess."
"How?"