He Fell In Love With His Wife - Edward Payson Roe (the speed reading book .txt) 📗

a beginning do you? Such a breakfast as this before seven in

the morning? I hope you haven’t overtaxed yourself.”

 

“No, only a little of just the right kind of tired feeling.”

 

“Haven’t you left anything for me to do?”

 

“Perhaps. You will know when I’ve put all on the table. What I’ve prepared

is ready.”

 

“Well, this is famous. I’ll go and wash and fix up a little and be right

down.”

 

When Holcroft returned, he looked at her curiously, for he felt that he, too,

was getting acquainted. Her thin face was made more youthful by color; a

pleased look was in her blue eyes, and a certain neatness and trimness about

her dress to which he had not been accustomed. He scanned the table

wonderingly, for things were not put upon it at haphazard; the light biscuits

turned their brown cheeks invitingly toward him,—she had arranged that they

should do that,—the ham was crisp, not sodden, and the omelet as russet as a

November leaf. “This is a new dish,” he said, looking at it closely. “What do

you call it?”

 

“Omelet. Perhaps you won’t like it, but mother used to be very fond of it.”

 

“No matter. We’ll have it if you like it and it brings you pleasant thoughts

of your mother.” Then he took a good sip of coffee and set the cup down again

as he had before under the Mumpson regime, but with a very different

expression. She looked anxiously at him, but was quickly reassured. “I

thought I knew how to make coffee, but I find I don’t. I never tasted

anything so good as that. How DO you make it?”

 

“Just as mother taught me.”

 

“Well, well! And you call this making a beginning? I just wish I could give

Tom Watterly a cup of this coffee. It would set his mind at rest. ‘By

jocks!’ he would say, ‘isn’t this better than going it alone?’”

 

She looked positively happy under this sweet incense to a housewifely heart.

She was being paid in the coin that women love best, and it was all the more

precious to her because she had never expected to receive it again.

 

He did like the omelet; he liked everything, and, after helping her liberally,

cleared the table, then said he felt equal to doing two men’s work. Before

going out to his work, he lighted a fire on the parlor hearth and left a good

supply of fuel beside it. “Now, Alida,” he remarked humorously, “I’ve already

found out that you have one fault that you and I will have to watch against.

You are too willing. I fear you’ve gone beyond your strength this morning. I

don’t want you to do a thing today except to get the meals, and remember, I

can help in this if you don’t feel well. There is a fire in the parlor, and

I’ve wheeled the lounge up by it. Take it quietly today, and perhaps tomorrow

I can begin to show you about butter-making.”

 

“I will do as you wish,” she replied, “but please show me a little more where

things are before you go out.”

 

This he did and added, “You’ll find the beef and some other things on a

swing-shelf in the cellar. The potato bins are down there, too. But don’t

try to get up much dinner. What comes quickest and easiest will suit me. I’m

a little backward with my work and must plow all day for oats. It’s time they

were in. After such a breakfast, I feel as if I had eaten a bushel myself.”

 

A few moments later she saw him going up the lane, that continued on past the

house, with his stout team and the plow, and she smiled as she heard him

whistling “Coronation” with levity, as some good people would have thought.

 

Plowing and planting time had come and under happier auspices, apparently,

than he had ever imagined possible again. With the lines about his neck, he

began with a sidehill plow at the bottom of a large, sloping field which had

been in corn the previous year, and the long, straight furrows increased from

a narrow strip to a wide, oblong area. “Ah,” said he in tones of strong

satisfaction, “the ground crumbles freely; it’s just in the right condition.

I’ll quit plowing this afternoon in time to harrow and sow all the ground

that’s ready. Then, so much’ll be all done and well done. It’s curious how

seed, if it goes into the ground at the right time and in the right way, comes

right along and never gets discouraged. I aint much on scientific farming,

but I’ve always observed that when I sow or plant as soon as the ground is

ready, I have better luck.”

 

The horses seemed infected by his own brisk spirit, stepping along without

urging, and the farmer was swept speedily into the full, strong current of his

habitual interests.

 

One might have supposed the recent events would have the uppermost place in

his thoughts, but this was not true. He rather dwelt upon them as the

unexpectedly fortunate means to the end now attained. This was his life, and

he was happy in the thought that his marriage promised to make this life not

merely possible, but prosperous and full of quiet content.

 

The calling of the born agriculturist, like that of the fisherman, has in it

the element of chance and is therefore full of moderate yet lasting

excitement. Holcroft knew that, although he did his best, much would depend

on the weather and other causes. He had met with disappointments in his

crops, and had also achieved what he regarded as fine successes, although they

would have seemed meager on a Western prairie. Every spring kindled anew his

hopefulness and anticipation. He watched the weather with the interested and

careful scrutiny of a sailor, and it must be admitted that his labor and its

results depended more on natural causes than upon his skill and the careful

use of the fertilizers. He was a farmer of the old school, the traditions

received from his father controlled him in the main. Still, his good common

sense and long experience stood him fairly well in the place of science and

knowledge of improved methods, and he was better equipped than the man who has

in his brain all that the books can teach, yet is without experience. Best of

all, he had inherited and acquired an abiding love of the soil; he never could

have been content except in its cultivation; he was therefore in the right

condition to assimilate fuller knowledge and make the most of it.

 

He knew well enough when it was about noon. From long habit he would have

known had the sky been overcast, but now his glance at the sun was like

looking at a watch. Dusty and begrimed he followed his team to the barn,

slipped from them their headstalls and left them to amuse themselves with a

little hay while they cooled sufficiently for heartier food. “Well now,” he

mused, “I wonder what that little woman has for dinner? Another new dish,

like enough. Hanged if I’m fit to go in the house, and she looking so trim

and neat. I think I’ll first take a souse in the brook,” and he went up

behind the house where an unfailing stream gurgled swiftly down from the

hills. At the nearest point a small basin had been hollowed out, and as he

approached he saw two or three speckled trout darting away through the limpid

water.

 

“Aha!” he muttered, “glad you reminded me. When SHE’S stronger, she may enjoy

catching our supper some afternoon. I must think of all the little things I

can to liven her up so she won’t get dull. It’s curious how interested I am

to know how she’s got along and what she has for dinner. And to think that,

less than a week ago, I used to hate to go near the house!”

 

As he entered the hall on his way to his room, that he might make himself more

presentable, an appetizing odor greeted him and Alida smiled from the kitchen

door as she said, “Dinner’s ready.”

 

Apparently she had taken him at his word, as she had prepared little else than

an Irish stew, yet when he had partaken of it, he thought he would prefer

Irish stews from that time onward indefinitely. “Where did you learn to cook,

Alida?” he asked.

 

“Mother wasn’t very strong and her appetite often failed her. Then, too, we

hadn’t much to spend on our table so we tried to make simple things taste

nice. Do you like my way of preparing that old-fashioned dish?”

 

“I’m going to show you how I like it,” he replied, nodding approvingly. “Well,

what have you been doing besides tempting me to eat too much?”

 

“What you said, resting. You told me not to get up much of a dinner, so I

very lazily prepared what you see. I’ve been lying on the lounge most of the

morning.”

 

“Famous, and you feel better?”

 

“Yes, I think I shall soon get well and strong,” she replied, looking at him

gratefully.

 

“Well, well! My luck’s turned at last. I once thought it never would, but if

this goes on—well, you can’t know what a change it is for the better. I can

now put my mind on my work.”

 

“You’ve been plowing all the morning, haven’t you?” she ventured, and there

was the pleased look in her eyes that he already liked to see.

 

“Yes,” he replied, “and I must keep at it several days to get in all the oats

I mean to sow. If this weather holds, I shall be through next week.”

 

“I looked in the milk-room a while ago. Isn’t there anything I could do there

this afternoon?”

 

“No. I’ll attend to everything there. It’s too damp for you yet. Keep on

resting. Why, bless me! I didn’t think you’d be well enough to do anything

for a week.”

 

“Indeed,” she admitted, “I’m surprised at myself. It seems as if a crushing

weight had been lifted off my mind and that I was coming right up. I’m so

glad, for I feared I might be feeble and useless a long time.”

 

“Well, Alida, if you had been, or if you ever are, don’t think I’ll be

impatient. The people I can’t stand are those who try to take advantage of

me, and I tell you I’ve had to contend with that disposition so long that I

feel as if I could do almost anything for one who is simply honest and tries

to keep her part of an agreement. But this won’t do. I’ve enjoyed my own

dinner so much that I’ve half forgotten that the horses haven’t had theirs

yet. Now will you scold if I light my pipe before I go out?”

 

“Oh, no! I don’t mind that.”

 

“No good-natured fibs! Isn’t smoke disagreeable?”

 

She shook her head. “I don’t mind it at all,” she said, but her sudden

paleness puzzled him. He could not know that he had involuntarily recalled

the many times that she had filled the evening pipe for a man who now haunted

her memory like a specter.

 

“I guess you don’t like it very much,” he said, as he passed out. “Well, no

matter! It’s getting so mild that I can smoke out of doors.”

 

With the exception of the episode of dinner the day was chiefly passed by

Alida in a health-restoring languor, the natural reaction from the distress

and strong excitements of the past. The rest that had been enjoined