"I got a mite o" cheese," he answered, approaching the fire and spreading his hands to the blaze.
"You got anything else? Now, Solon, don"t you keep me here on tenter-hooks! You got a letter?"
"Well," said Solon, "I thought I might as well look into the post-office an" see."
"You thought so! You went a-purpose! An" you walked because you al"ays was half shackled about takin" horses out in bad goin". You hand me over that letter!"
Solon approached the table, a furtive twinkle in his blue eyes. He lifted the bag and opened it slowly. First, he took out a wedge-shaped package.
"That"s the cheese," said he. "Herb."
"My land!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Miss Susan, while the schoolmaster looked on and smiled. "You better ha" come to me for cheese. I"ve got a plenty, tansy an" sage, an" you know it. I see it! There! you gi" me holt on "t!" It was a fugitive white gleam in the bottom of the bag; she pounced upon it and brought up a letter. Midway in the act of tearing it open, she paused and looked at Solon with droll entreaty. "It"s your letter, by rights!" she added tentatively.
"Law!" said he, "I dunno who it"s directed to, but I guess it"s as much your"n as anybody"s."
Miss Susan spread open the sheets with an air of breathless delight. She bent nearer the lamp. ""Dear father and auntie,"" she began.
"There!" remarked Solon, in quiet satisfaction, still warming his hands at the blaze. "There! you see _"t is_ to both."
"My! how she does run the words together! Here!" Miss Susan pa.s.sed it to the schoolmaster. "You read it. It"s from Jenny. You know she"s away to school, an" we didn"t think best for her to come home Christmas. I knew she"d write for Christmas. Solon, I told you so!"
The schoolmaster took the letter, and read it aloud. It was a simple little message, full of contentment and love and a girl"s new delight in life. When he had finished, the two older people busied themselves a moment without speaking, Solon in picking up a chip from the hearth, and Susan in mechanically smoothing the mammoth roses on the side of the carpet-bag.
"Well, I "most wish we"d had her come home," said he at last, clearing his throat.
"No, you don"t either," answered Miss Susan promptly. "Not with this snow, an" comin" out of a house where it"s het up, into cold beds an"
all. Now I"m goin" to git you a mite o" pie an" some hot tea."
She set forth a prodigal supper on a leaf of the table, and Solon silently worked his will upon it, the schoolmaster eating a bit for company. Then Solon took his way home to the house across the yard, and she watched at the window till she saw the light blaze up through his panes. That accomplished, she turned back with a long breath and began clearing up.
"I"m worried to death to have him over there all by himself," said she.
"S"pose he should be sick in the night!"
"You"d go over," answered the schoolmaster easily.
"Well, s"pose he couldn"t git me no word?"
"Oh, you"d know it! You"re that sort."
Miss Susan laughed softly, and so seemed to put away her recurrent anxiety. She came back to her knitting.
"How long has his wife been dead?" asked the schoolmaster.
"Two year. He an" Jenny got along real well together, but sence September, when she went away, I guess he"s found it pretty dull pickin". I do all I can, but land! "t ain"t like havin" a woman in the house from sunrise to set."
"There"s nothing like that," agreed the wise young schoolmaster. "Now let"s play some more. Let"s plan what we"d like to do to-morrow for all the folks we know, and let"s not give them a thing they need, but just the ones they"d like."
Miss Susan put down her knitting again. She never could talk to the schoolmaster and keep at work. It made her dreamy, exactly as it did to sit in the hot summer sunshine, with the droning of bees in the air.
"Well," said she, "there"s old Ann Wheeler that lives over on the turnpike. She don"t want for nothin", but she keeps her things packed away up garret, an" lives like a pig."
""Sold her bed and lay in the straw.""
"That"s it, on"y she won"t sell nuthin". I"d give her a house all winders, so "t she couldn"t help lookin" out, an" velvet carpets "t she"d got to walk on."
"Well, there"s Cap"n Ben. The boys say he"s out of his head a good deal now; he fancies himself at sea and in foreign countries."
"Yes, so they say. Well, I"d let him set down a spell in Solomon"s temple an" look round him. My sake! do you remember about the temple?
Why, the nails was all gold. Don"t you wish we"d lived in them times?
Jest think about the wood they had--cedars o" Lebanon an" fir-trees. You know how he set folks to workin" in the mountains. I"ve al"ays thought I"d like to ben up on them mountains an" heard the axes ringin" an"
listened to the talk. An" then there was pomegranates an" cherubim, an"
as for silver an" gold, they were as common as dirt. When I was a little girl, I learnt them chapters, an" sometimes now, when I"m settin" by the fire, I say over that verse about the "man of Tyre, skillful to work in gold, and in silver, in bra.s.s, in iron, in stone, and in timber, in purple, in blue, and in fine linen, and in crimson." My! ain"t it rich?"
She drew a long breath of surfeited enjoyment. The schoolmaster"s eyes burned under his heavy brows.
"Then things smelt so good in them days," continued Miss Susan. "They had myrrh an" frankincense, an" I dunno what all. I never make my mincemeat "thout snuffin" at the spice-box to freshen up my mind. No matter where I start, some way or another I al"ays git back to Solomon.
Well, if Cap"n Ben wants to see foreign countries, I guess he"d be glad to set a spell in the temple. Le"s have on another stick--that big one there by you. My! it"s the night afore Christmas, ain"t it? Seems if I couldn"t git a big enough blaze. Pile it on. I guess I"d as soon set the chimbly afire as not!"
There was something overflowing and heady in her enjoyment. It exhilarated the schoolmaster, and he lavished stick after stick on the ravening flames. The maple hardened into coals brighter than its own panoply of autumn; the delicate bark of the birch flared up and perished.
"Miss Susan," said he, "don"t you want to see all the people in the world?"
"Oh, I dunno! I"d full as lieves set here an" think about "em. I can fix "em up full as well in my mind, an" perhaps they suit me better"n if I could see "em. Sometimes I set "em walkin" through this kitchen, kings an" queens an" all. My! how they do shine, all over precious stones. I never see a di"mond, but I guess I know pretty well how "t would look."
"Suppose we could give a Christmas dinner,--what should we have?"
"We"d have oxen roasted whole, an" honey--an"--but that"s as fur as I can git."
The schoolmaster had a treasury of which she had never learned, and he said musically:--
... ""a heap Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd; With jellies soother than the creamy curd, And lucid syrops, tinct with cinnamon; Manna and dates, in argosy transferr"d From Fez; and spiced dainties, every one, From silken Samarcand to cedar"d Lebanon.""
"Yes, that has a real nice sound. It ain"t like the Bible, but it"s nice."
They sat and dreamed and the fire flared up into living arabesques and burnt blue in corners. A stick parted and fell into ash, and Miss Susan came awake. She had the air of rousing herself with vigor.
"There!" said she, "sometimes I think it"s most sinful to make believe, it"s so hard to wake yourself up. Arter all this, I dunno but when Solon comes for the pigs" kittle to-morrer, I shall ketch myself sayin", "Here"s the frankincense!""
They laughed together, and the schoolmaster rose to light his lamp. He paused on his way to the stairs, and came back to set it down again.
"There are lots of people we haven"t provided for," he said. "We haven"t even thought what we"d give Jenny."
"I guess Jenny"s got her heart"s desire." Miss Susan nodded sagely.
"I"ve sent her a box, with a fruit-cake an" pickles and cheese. She"s all fixed out."
The schoolmaster hesitated, and turned the lamp-wick up and down. Then he spoke, somewhat timidly, "What should you like to give her father?"
Miss Susan"s face clouded with that dreamy look which sometimes settled upon her eyes like haze.