"But the ride home was worth it all!"
CHAPTER XXVI.
" "Tis merry, "tis merry, in good green wood, So blithe Lady Alice is singing; On the beech"s pride, and the oak"s brown side, Lord Richard"s axe is ringing."
LADY OF THE LAKE.
Philetus came, and was inducted into office and the little room immediately; and Fleda felt herself eased of a burden.
Barby reported him stout and willing, and he proved it by what seemed a perverted inclination for bearing the most enormous logs of wood he could find into the kitchen.
"He will hurt himself!" said Fleda.
"I"ll protect him! ? against anything but buckwheat batter,"
said Barby, with a grave shake of her head. "Lazy folks takes the most pains, I tell him. But it would be good to have some more ground, Fleda, for Philetus says he don"t care for no dinner when he has griddles to breakfast, and there aint anything much cheaper than that."
"Aunt Lucy, have you any change in the house?" said Fleda, that same day.
"There isn"t but three and sixpence," said Mrs. Rossitur, with a pained, conscious look. "What is wanting, dear?"
"Only candles ? Barby has suddenly found we are out, and she wont have any more made before to-morrow. Never mind."
"There is only that," repeated Mrs. Rossitur. "Hugh has a little money due to him from last summer, but he hasn"t been able to get it yet. You may take that, dear."
"No," said Fleda, "we mustn"t. We might want it more."
"We can sit in the dark for once, said Hugh, "and try to make an uncommon display of what Dr. Quackenboss calls "sociality!"
"No," said Fleda, who had stood busily thinking, "I am going to send Philetus down to the post-office for the paper, and when it comes, I am not to be balked of reading it; I"ve made up my mind. We"ll go right off into the woods and get some pine knots, Hugh ? come! They make a lovely light. You get us a couple of baskets and the hatchet; I wish we had two; and I"ll be ready in no time. That"ll do!"
It is to be noticed, that Charlton had provided against any future deficiency of news in his family. Fleda skipped away, and in five minutes returned arrayed for the expedition, in her usual out-of-door working trim, namely, an old dark merino cloak, almost black, the effect of which was continued by the edge of an old dark mousseline below, and rendered decidedly striking by the contrast of a large whitish yarn shawl worn over it; the whole crowned with a little close-fitting hood made of some old silver-grey silk, shaped tight to the head, without any bow or furbelow to break the outline. But such a face within side of it! She came almost dancing into the room.
"This is Miss Ringgan! as she appeared when she was going to see the pine-trees. Hugh, don"t you wish you had a picture of me?"
"I have got a tolerable picture of you, somewhere," said Hugh.
"This is somebody very different from the Miss Ringgan that went to see Mrs. Evelyn, I can tell you," Fleda went on, gaily. "Do you know, aunt Lucy, I have made up my mind that my visit to New York was a dream, and the dream is nicely folded away with my silk dresses. Now, I must go tell that precious Philetus about the post-office; I am so comforted, aunt Lucy, whenever I see that fellow staggering into the house under a great log of wood! I have not heard anything in a long time so pleasant as the ringing strokes of his axe in the yard. Isn"t life made up of little things?"
"Why don"t you put a better pair of shoes on?"
"Can"t afford it, Mrs. Rossitur. You are extravagant."
"Go and put on my India-rubbers."
"No, Ma"am ? the rocks would cut them to pieces. I have brought my mind down to ? my shoes."
"It isn"t safe, Fleda; you might see somebody."
"Well, Ma"am! But I tell you I am not going to see anybody but the chick-a-dees and the snow-birds, and there is great simplicity of manners prevailing among them."
The shoes were changed, and Hugh and Fleda set forth, lingering a while, however, to give a new edge to their hatchet ? Fleda turning the grindstone. They mounted then the apple-orchard hill, and went a little distance along the edge of the table-land, before striking off into the woods. They had stood still a minute to look over the little white valley to the snow-dressed woodland beyond.
"This is better than New York, Hugh," said Fleda.
"I am very glad to hear you say that," said another voice.
Fleda turned, and started a little to see Mr. Olmney at her side, and congratulated herself instantly on her shoes.
"Mrs. Rossitur told me where you had gone, and gave me permission to follow you, but I hardly hoped to overtake you so soon."
"We stopped to sharpen our tools," said Fleda. "We are out on a foraging expedition."
"Will you let me help you?"
"Certainly ? if you understand the business. Do you know a pine-knot when you see it?"
He laughed, and shook his head, but avowed a wish to learn.
"Well, it would be a charity to teach you anything wholesome,"
said Fleda; "for I heard one of Mr. Olmney"s friends lately saying that he looked like a person who was in danger of committing suicide."
"Suicide! One of my friends!" he exclaimed, in the utmost astonishment.
"Yes," said Fleda, laughing; "and there is nothing like the open air for clearing away vapours."
"You cannot have known that by experience," said he, looking at her.
Fleda shook her head, and, advising him to take nothing for granted, set off into the woods.
They were in a beautiful state. A light snow, but an inch or two deep, had fallen the night before; the air had been perfectly still during the day; and though the sun was out, bright and mild, it had done little but glitter on the earth"s white capping. The light dry flakes of snow had not stirred from their first resting-place. The long branches of the large pines were just tipped with snow at the ends; on the smaller evergreens every leaf and tuft had its separate crest. Stones and rocks were smoothly rounded over, little shrubs and sprays that lay along the ground were all doubled in white; and the hemlock branches, bending with their feathery burden, stooped to the foreheads of the party, and gave them the freshest of salutations as they brushed by. The whole wood-scene was particularly fair and graceful. A light veil of purity, no more, thrown over the wilderness of stones, and stumps, and bare ground ? like the blessing of charity, covering all roughnesses and unsightlinesses ? like the innocent, unsullied nature that places its light shield between the eye and whatever is unequal, unkindly, and unlovely in the world.
"What do you think of this for a misanthropical man, Mr.
Olmney? there"s a better tonic to be found in the woods than in any remedies of man"s devising."
"Better than books?" said he.
"Certainly! ? No comparison."
"I have to learn that yet."
"So I suppose," said Fleda. "The very danger to be apprehended, as I hear, Sir, is from your running a tilt into some of those thick folios of yours, head foremost. There"s no pitch there, Hugh ? you may leave it alone. We must go on ?
there are more yellow pines higher up."
"But who could give such a strange character of me to you?"
said Mr. Olmney.