O Pioneers!

Published：2026-07-30 20:46:37 Source: best backyard playsets for 14 year olds under 50 dollars Author: Bouncy Balls

O PIONEERS!

by Willa Sibert Cather

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MICKIEWICZ

Contents

TO THE MEMORY OF
SARAH ORNE JEWETT
IN WHOSE BEAUTIFUL AND DELICATE WORK
THERE IS THE PERFECTION
THAT ENDURES

PRAIRIE SPRING

Evening and the flat land,
Rich and sombre and always silent;
The miles of fresh-plowed soil,
Heavy and black, full of strength and harshness;
The growing wheat, the growing weeds,
The toiling horses, the tired men;
The long empty roads,
Sullen fires of sunset, fading,
The eternal, unresponsive sky.
Against all this, Youth,
Flaming like the wild roses,
Singing like the larks over the plowed fields,
Flashing like a star out of the twilight;
Youth with its insupportable sweetness,
Its fierce necessity,
Its sharp desire,
Singing and singing,
Out of the lips of silence,
Out of the earthy dusk.

PART I.
The Wild Land

I

One January day, thirty years ago, the little town of Hanover, anchored on awindy Nebraska tableland, was trying not to be blown away. A mist of finesnowflakes was curling and eddying about the cluster of low drab buildingshuddled on the gray prairie, under a gray sky. The dwelling-houses were setabout haphazard on the tough prairie sod; some of them looked as if they hadbeen moved in overnight, and others as if they were straying off by themselves,headed straight for the open plain. None of them had any appearance ofpermanence, and the howling wind blew under them as well as over them. The mainstreet was a deeply rutted road, now frozen hard, which ran from the squat redrailway station and the grain “elevator” at the north end of the town to thelumber yard and the horse pond at the south end. On either side of this roadstraggled two uneven rows of wooden buildings; the general merchandise stores,the two banks, the drug store, the feed store, the saloon, the post-office. Theboard sidewalks were gray with trampled snow, but at two o’clock in theafternoon the shopkeepers, having come back from dinner, were keeping wellbehind their frosty windows. The children were all in school, and there wasnobody abroad in the streets but a few rough-looking countrymen in coarseovercoats, with their long caps pulled down to their noses. Some of them hadbrought their wives to town, and now and then a red or a plaid shawl flashedout of one store into the shelter of another. At the hitch-bars along thestreet a few heavy work-horses, harnessed to farm wagons, shivered under theirblankets. About the station everything was quiet, for there would not beanother train in until night.

On the sidewalk in front of one of the stores sat a little Swede boy, cryingbitterly. He was about five years old. His black cloth coat was much too bigfor him and made him look like a little old man. His shrunken brown flanneldress had been washed many times and left a long stretch of stocking betweenthe hem of his skirt and the tops of his clumsy, copper-toed shoes. His cap waspulled down over his ears; his nose and his chubby cheeks were chapped and redwith cold. He cried quietly, and the few people who hurried by did not noticehim. He was afraid to stop any one, afraid to go into the store and ask forhelp, so he sat wringing his long sleeves and looking up a telegraph polebeside him, whimpering, “My kitten, oh, my kitten! Her will fweeze!” At the topof the pole crouched a shivering gray kitten, mewing faintly and clingingdesperately to the wood with her claws. The boy had been left at the storewhile his sister went to the doctor’s office, and in her absence a dog hadchased his kitten up the pole. The little creature had never been so highbefore, and she was too frightened to move. Her master was sunk in despair. Hewas a little country boy, and this village was to him a very strange andperplexing place, where people wore fine clothes and had hard hearts. He alwaysfelt shy and awkward here, and wanted to hide behind things for fear some onemight laugh at him. Just now, he was too unhappy to care who laughed. At lasthe seemed to see a ray of hope: his sister was coming, and he got up and rantoward her in his heavy shoes.

His sister was a tall, strong girl, and she walked rapidly and resolutely, asif she knew exactly where she was going and what she was going to do next. Shewore a man’s long ulster (not as if it were an affliction, but as if it werevery comfortable and belonged to her; carried it like a young soldier), and around plush cap, tied down with a thick veil. She had a serious, thoughtfulface, and her clear, deep blue eyes were fixed intently on the distance,without seeming to see anything, as if she were in trouble. She did not noticethe little boy until he pulled her by the coat. Then she stopped short andstooped down to wipe his wet face.

“Why, Emil! I told you to stay in the store and not to come out. What is thematter with you?”

“My kitten, sister, my kitten! A man put her out, and a dog chased her upthere.” His forefinger, projecting from the sleeve of his coat, pointed up tothe wretched little creature on the pole.

“Oh, Emil! Didn’t I tell you she’d get us into trouble of some kind, if youbrought her? What made you tease me so? But there, I ought to have known bettermyself.” She went to the foot of the pole and held out her arms, crying,“Kitty, kitty, kitty,” but the kitten only mewed and faintly waved its tail.Alexandra turned away decidedly. “No, she won’t come down. Somebody will haveto go up after her. I saw the Linstrums’ wagon in town. I’ll go and see if Ican find Carl. Maybe he can do something. Only you must stop crying, or I won’tgo a step. Where’s your comforter? Did you leave it in the store? Never mind.Hold still, till I put this on you.”

She unwound the brown veil from her head and tied it about his throat. A shabbylittle traveling man, who was just then coming out of the store on his way tothe saloon, stopped and gazed stupidly at the shining mass of hair she baredwhen she took off her veil; two thick braids, pinned about her head in theGerman way, with a fringe of reddish-yellow curls blowing out from under hercap. He took his cigar out of his mouth and held the wet end between thefingers of his woolen glove. “My God, girl, what a head of hair!” he exclaimed,quite innocently and foolishly. She stabbed him with a glance of Amazonianfierceness and drew in her lower lip—most unnecessary severity. It gave thelittle clothing drummer such a start that he actually let his cigar fall to thesidewalk and went off weakly in the teeth of the wind to the saloon. His handwas still unsteady when he took his glass from the bartender. His feebleflirtatious instincts had been crushed before, but never so mercilessly. Hefelt cheap and ill-used, as if some one had taken advantage of him. When adrummer had been knocking about in little drab towns and crawling across thewintry country in dirty smoking-cars, was he to be blamed if, when he chancedupon a fine human creature, he suddenly wished himself more of a man?

While the little drummer was drinking to recover his nerve, Alexandra hurriedto the drug store as the most likely place to find Carl Linstrum. There he was,turning over a portfolio of chromo “studies” which the druggist sold to theHanover women who did china-painting. Alexandra explained her predicament, andthe boy followed her to the corner, where Emil still sat by the pole.

“I’ll have to go up after her, Alexandra. I think at the depot they have somespikes I can strap on my feet. Wait a minute.” Carl thrust his hands into hispockets, lowered his head, and darted up the street against the north wind. Hewas a tall boy of fifteen, slight and narrow-chested. When he came back withthe spikes, Alexandra asked him what he had done with his overcoat.

“I left it in the drug store. I couldn’t climb in it, anyhow. Catch me if Ifall, Emil,” he called back as he began his ascent. Alexandra watched himanxiously; the cold was bitter enough on the ground. The kitten would not budgean inch. Carl had to go to the very top of the pole, and then had somedifficulty in tearing her from her hold. When he reached the ground, he handedthe cat to her tearful little master. “Now go into the store with her, Emil,and get warm.” He opened the door for the child. “Wait a minute, Alexandra. Whycan’t I drive for you as far as our place? It’s getting colder every minute.Have you seen the doctor?”

“Yes. He is coming over to-morrow. But he says father can’t get better; can’tget well.” The girl’s lip trembled. She looked fixedly up the bleak street asif she were gathering her strength to face something, as if she were tryingwith all her might to grasp a situation which, no matter how painful, must bemet and dealt with somehow. The wind flapped the skirts of her heavy coat abouther.

Carl did not say anything, but she felt his sympathy. He, too, was lonely. Hewas a thin, frail boy, with brooding dark eyes, very quiet in all hismovements. There was a delicate pallor in his thin face, and his mouth was toosensitive for a boy’s. The lips had already a little curl of bitterness andskepticism. The two friends stood for a few moments on the windy street corner,not speaking a word, as two travelers, who have lost their way, sometimes standand admit their perplexity in silence. When Carl turned away he said, “I’ll seeto your team.” Alexandra went into the store to have her purchases packed inthe egg-boxes, and to get warm before she set out on her long cold drive.

When she looked for Emil, she found him sitting on a step of the staircase thatled up to the clothing and carpet department. He was playing with a littleBohemian girl, Marie Tovesky, who was tying her handkerchief over the kitten’shead for a bonnet. Marie was a stranger in the country, having come from Omahawith her mother to visit her uncle, Joe Tovesky. She was a dark child, withbrown curly hair, like a brunette doll’s, a coaxing little red mouth, andround, yellow-brown eyes. Every one noticed her eyes; the brown iris had goldenglints that made them look like gold-stone, or, in softer lights, like thatColorado mineral called tiger-eye.

The country children thereabouts wore their dresses to their shoe-tops, butthis city child was dressed in what was then called the “Kate Greenaway”manner, and her red cashmere frock, gathered full from the yoke, came almost tothe floor. This, with her poke bonnet, gave her the look of a quaint littlewoman. She had a white fur tippet about her neck and made no fussy objectionswhen Emil fingered it admiringly. Alexandra had not the heart to take him awayfrom so pretty a playfellow, and she let them tease the kitten together untilJoe Tovesky came in noisily and picked up his little niece, setting her on hisshoulder for every one to see. His children were all boys, and he adored thislittle creature. His cronies formed a circle about him, admiring and teasingthe little girl, who took their jokes with great good nature. They were alldelighted with her, for they seldom saw so pretty and carefully nurtured achild. They told her that she must choose one of them for a sweetheart, andeach began pressing his suit and offering her bribes; candy, and little pigs,and spotted calves. She looked archly into the big, brown, mustached faces,smelling of spirits and tobacco, then she ran her tiny forefinger delicatelyover Joe’s bristly chin and said, “Here is my sweetheart.”

The Bohemians roared with laughter, and Marie’s uncle hugged her until shecried, “Please don’t, Uncle Joe! You hurt me.” Each of Joe’s friends gave her abag of candy, and she kissed them all around, though she did not like countrycandy very well. Perhaps that was why she bethought herself of Emil. “Let medown, Uncle Joe,” she said, “I want to give some of my candy to that nicelittle boy I found.” She walked graciously over to Emil, followed by her lustyadmirers, who formed a new circle and teased the little boy until he hid hisface in his sister’s skirts, and she had to scold him for being such a baby.

The farm people were making preparations to start for home. The women werechecking over their groceries and pinning their big red shawls about theirheads. The men were buying tobacco and candy with what money they had left,were showing each other new boots and gloves and blue flannel shirts. Three bigBohemians were drinking raw alcohol, tinctured with oil of cinnamon. This wassaid to fortify one effectually against the cold, and they smacked their lipsafter each pull at the flask. Their volubility drowned every other noise in theplace, and the overheated store sounded of their spirited language as it reekedof pipe smoke, damp woolens, and kerosene.

Carl came in, wearing his overcoat and carrying a wooden box with a brasshandle. “Come,” he said, “I’ve fed and watered your team, and the wagon isready.” He carried Emil out and tucked him down in the straw in the wagonbox.The heat had made the little boy sleepy, but he still clung to his kitten.

“You were awful good to climb so high and get my kitten, Carl. When I get bigI’ll climb and get little boys’ kittens for them,” he murmured drowsily. Beforethe horses were over the first hill, Emil and his cat were both fast asleep.

Although it was only four o’clock, the winter day was fading. The road ledsouthwest, toward the streak of pale, watery light that glimmered in the leadensky. The light fell upon the two sad young faces that were turned mutely towardit: upon the eyes of the girl, who seemed to be looking with such anguishedperplexity into the future; upon the sombre eyes of the boy, who seemed alreadyto be looking into the past. The little town behind them had vanished as if ithad never been, had fallen behind the swell of the prairie, and the sternfrozen country received them into its bosom. The homesteads were few and farapart; here and there a windmill gaunt against the sky, a sod house crouchingin a hollow. But the great fact was the land itself, which seemed to overwhelmthe little beginnings of human society that struggled in its sombre wastes. Itwas from facing this vast hardness that the boy’s mouth had become so bitter;because he felt that men were too weak to make any mark here, that the landwanted to be let alone, to preserve its own fierce strength, its peculiar,savage kind of beauty, its uninterrupted mournfulness.

The wagon jolted along over the frozen road. The two friends had less to say toeach other than usual, as if the cold had somehow penetrated to their hearts.

“Did Lou and Oscar go to the Blue to cut wood to-day?” Carl asked.

“Yes. I’m almost sorry I let them go, it’s turned so cold. But mother frets ifthe wood gets low.” She stopped and put her hand to her forehead, brushing backher hair. “I don’t know what is to become of us, Carl, if father has to die. Idon’t dare to think about it. I wish we could all go with him and let the grassgrow back over everything.”

Carl made no reply. Just ahead of them was the Norwegian graveyard, where thegrass had, indeed, grown back over everything, shaggy and red, hiding even thewire fence. Carl realized that he was not a very helpful companion, but therewas nothing he could say.

“Of course,” Alexandra went on, steadying her voice a little, “the boys arestrong and work hard, but we’ve always depended so on father that I don’t seehow we can go ahead. I almost feel as if there were nothing to go ahead for.”

“Does your father know?”

“Yes, I think he does. He lies and counts on his fingers all day. I think he istrying to count up what he is leaving for us. It’s a comfort to him that mychickens are laying right on through the cold weather and bringing in a littlemoney. I wish we could keep his mind off such things, but I don’t have muchtime to be with him now.”

“I wonder if he’d like to have me bring my magic lantern over some evening?”

Alexandra turned her face toward him. “Oh, Carl! Have you got it?”

“Yes. It’s back there in the straw. Didn’t you notice the box I was carrying? Itried it all morning in the drug-store cellar, and it worked ever so well,makes fine big pictures.”

“What are they about?”

“Oh, hunting pictures in Germany, and Robinson Crusoe and funny pictures aboutcannibals. I’m going to paint some slides for it on glass, out of the HansAndersen book.”

Alexandra seemed actually cheered. There is often a good deal of the child leftin people who have had to grow up too soon. “Do bring it over, Carl. I canhardly wait to see it, and I’m sure it will please father. Are the picturescolored? Then I know he’ll like them. He likes the calendars I get him in town.I wish I could get more. You must leave me here, mustn’t you? It’s been nice tohave company.”

Carl stopped the horses and looked dubiously up at the black sky. “It’s prettydark. Of course the horses will take you home, but I think I’d better lightyour lantern, in case you should need it.”

He gave her the reins and climbed back into the wagon-box, where he croucheddown and made a tent of his overcoat. After a dozen trials he succeeded inlighting the lantern, which he placed in front of Alexandra, half covering itwith a blanket so that the light would not shine in her eyes. “Now, wait untilI find my box. Yes, here it is. Good-night, Alexandra. Try not to worry.” Carlsprang to the ground and ran off across the fields toward the Linstrumhomestead. “Hoo, hoo-o-o-o!” he called back as he disappeared over a ridge anddropped into a sand gully. The wind answered him like an echo, “Hoo,hoo-o-o-o-o-o!” Alexandra drove off alone. The rattle of her wagon was lost inthe howling of the wind, but her lantern, held firmly between her feet, made amoving point of light along the highway, going deeper and deeper into the darkcountry.

II

On one of the ridges of that wintry waste stood the low log house in which JohnBergson was dying. The Bergson homestead was easier to find than many another,because it overlooked Norway Creek, a shallow, muddy stream that sometimesflowed, and sometimes stood still, at the bottom of a winding ravine withsteep, shelving sides overgrown with brush and cottonwoods and dwarf ash. Thiscreek gave a sort of identity to the farms that bordered upon it. Of all thebewildering things about a new country, the absence of human landmarks is oneof the most depressing and disheartening. The houses on the Divide were smalland were usually tucked away in low places; you did not see them until you camedirectly upon them. Most of them were built of the sod itself, and were onlythe unescapable ground in another form. The roads were but faint tracks in thegrass, and the fields were scarcely noticeable. The record of the plow wasinsignificant, like the feeble scratches on stone left by prehistoric races, soindeterminate that they may, after all, be only the markings of glaciers, andnot a record of human strivings.

In eleven long years John Bergson had made but little impression upon the wildland he had come to tame. It was still a wild thing that had its ugly moods;and no one knew when they were likely to come, or why. Mischance hung over it.Its Genius was unfriendly to man. The sick man was feeling this as he laylooking out of the window, after the doctor had left him, on the day followingAlexandra’s trip to town. There it lay outside his door, the same land, thesame lead-colored miles. He knew every ridge and draw and gully between him andthe horizon. To the south, his plowed fields; to the east, the sod stables, thecattle corral, the pond,—and then the grass.

Bergson went over in his mind the things that had held him back. One winter hiscattle had perished in a blizzard. The next summer one of his plow horses brokeits leg in a prairiedog hole and had to be shot. Another summer he lost hishogs from cholera, and a valuable stallion died from a rattlesnake bite. Timeand again his crops had failed. He had lost two children, boys, that camebetween Lou and Emil, and there had been the cost of sickness and death. Now,when he had at last struggled out of debt, he was going to die himself. He wasonly forty-six, and had, of course, counted upon more time.

Bergson had spent his first five years on the Divide getting into debt, and thelast six getting out. He had paid off his mortgages and had ended pretty muchwhere he began, with the land. He owned exactly six hundred and forty acres ofwhat stretched outside his door; his own original homestead and timber claim,making three hundred and twenty acres, and the half-section adjoining, thehomestead of a younger brother who had given up the fight, gone back to Chicagoto work in a fancy bakery and distinguish himself in a Swedish athletic club.So far John had not attempted to cultivate the second half-section, but used itfor pasture land, and one of his sons rode herd there in open weather.

John Bergson had the Old-World belief that land, in itself, is desirable. Butthis land was an enigma. It was like a horse that no one knows how to break toharness, that runs wild and kicks things to pieces. He had an idea that no oneunderstood how to farm it properly, and this he often discussed with Alexandra.Their neighbors, certainly, knew even less about farming than he did. Many ofthem had never worked on a farm until they took up their homesteads. They hadbeen handwerkersat home; tailors, locksmiths, joiners, cigar-makers,etc. Bergson himself had worked in a shipyard.

For weeks, John Bergson had been thinking about these things. His bed stood inthe sitting-room, next to the kitchen. Through the day, while the baking andwashing and ironing were going on, the father lay and looked up at the roofbeams that he himself had hewn, or out at the cattle in the corral. He countedthe cattle over and over. It diverted him to speculate as to how much weighteach of the steers would probably put on by spring. He often called hisdaughter in to talk to her about this. Before Alexandra was twelve years oldshe had begun to be a help to him, and as she grew older he had come to dependmore and more upon her resourcefulness and good judgment. His boys were willingenough to work, but when he talked with them they usually irritated him. It wasAlexandra who read the papers and followed the markets, and who learned by themistakes of their neighbors. It was Alexandra who could always tell about whatit had cost to fatten each steer, and who could guess the weight of a hogbefore it went on the scales closer than John Bergson himself. Lou and Oscarwere industrious, but he could never teach them to use their heads about theirwork.

Alexandra, her father often said to himself, was like her grandfather; whichwas his way of saying that she was intelligent. John Bergson’s father had beena shipbuilder, a man of considerable force and of some fortune. Late in life hemarried a second time, a Stockholm woman of questionable character, muchyounger than he, who goaded him into every sort of extravagance. On theshipbuilder’s part, this marriage was an infatuation, the despairing folly of apowerful man who cannot bear to grow old. In a few years his unprincipled wifewarped the probity of a lifetime. He speculated, lost his own fortune and fundsentrusted to him by poor seafaring men, and died disgraced, leaving hischildren nothing. But when all was said, he had come up from the sea himself,had built up a proud little business with no capital but his own skill andforesight, and had proved himself a man. In his daughter, John Bergsonrecognized the strength of will, and the simple direct way of thinking thingsout, that had characterized his father in his better days. He would muchrather, of course, have seen this likeness in one of his sons, but it was not aquestion of choice. As he lay there day after day he had to accept thesituation as it was, and to be thankful that there was one among his childrento whom he could entrust the future of his family and the possibilities of hishard-won land.

The winter twilight was fading. The sick man heard his wife strike a match inthe kitchen, and the light of a lamp glimmered through the cracks of the door.It seemed like a light shining far away. He turned painfully in his bed andlooked at his white hands, with all the work gone out of them. He was ready togive up, he felt. He did not know how it had come about, but he was quitewilling to go deep under his fields and rest, where the plow could not findhim. He was tired of making mistakes. He was content to leave the tangle toother hands; he thought of his Alexandra’s strong ones.

“Dotter,” he called feebly, “dotter!” He heard her quick step andsaw her tall figure appear in the doorway, with the light of the lamp behindher. He felt her youth and strength, how easily she moved and stooped andlifted. But he would not have had it again if he could, not he! He knew the endtoo well to wish to begin again. He knew where it all went to, what it allbecame.

His daughter came and lifted him up on his pillows. She called him by an oldSwedish name that she used to call him when she was little and took his dinnerto him in the shipyard.

“Tell the boys to come here, daughter. I want to speak to them.”

“They are feeding the horses, father. They have just come back from the Blue.Shall I call them?”

He sighed. “No, no. Wait until they come in. Alexandra, you will have to do thebest you can for your brothers. Everything will come on you.”

“I will do all I can, father.”

“Don’t let them get discouraged and go off like Uncle Otto. I want them to keepthe land.”

“We will, father. We will never lose the land.”

There was a sound of heavy feet in the kitchen. Alexandra went to the door andbeckoned to her brothers, two strapping boys of seventeen and nineteen. Theycame in and stood at the foot of the bed. Their father looked at themsearchingly, though it was too dark to see their faces; they were just the sameboys, he told himself, he had not been mistaken in them. The square head andheavy shoulders belonged to Oscar, the elder. The younger boy was quicker, butvacillating.

“Boys,” said the father wearily, “I want you to keep the land together and tobe guided by your sister. I have talked to her since I have been sick, and sheknows all my wishes. I want no quarrels among my children, and so long as thereis one house there must be one head. Alexandra is the oldest, and she knows mywishes. She will do the best she can. If she makes mistakes, she will not makeso many as I have made. When you marry, and want a house of your own, the landwill be divided fairly, according to the courts. But for the next few years youwill have it hard, and you must all keep together. Alexandra will manage thebest she can.”

Oscar, who was usually the last to speak, replied because he was the older,“Yes, father. It would be so anyway, without your speaking. We will all workthe place together.”

“And you will be guided by your sister, boys, and be good brothers to her, andgood sons to your mother? That is good. And Alexandra must not work in thefields any more. There is no necessity now. Hire a man when you need help. Shecan make much more with her eggs and butter than the wages of a man. It was oneof my mistakes that I did not find that out sooner. Try to break a little moreland every year; sod corn is good for fodder. Keep turning the land, and alwaysput up more hay than you need. Don’t grudge your mother a little time forplowing her garden and setting out fruit trees, even if it comes in a busyseason. She has been a good mother to you, and she has always missed the oldcountry.”

When they went back to the kitchen the boys sat down silently at the table.Throughout the meal they looked down at their plates and did not lift their redeyes. They did not eat much, although they had been working in the cold allday, and there was a rabbit stewed in gravy for supper, and prune pies.

John Bergson had married beneath him, but he had married a good housewife. Mrs.Bergson was a fair-skinned, corpulent woman, heavy and placid like her son,Oscar, but there was something comfortable about her; perhaps it was her ownlove of comfort. For eleven years she had worthily striven to maintain somesemblance of household order amid conditions that made order very difficult.Habit was very strong with Mrs. Bergson, and her unremitting efforts to repeatthe routine of her old life among new surroundings had done a great deal tokeep the family from disintegrating morally and getting careless in their ways.The Bergsons had a log house, for instance, only because Mrs. Bergson would notlive in a sod house. She missed the fish diet of her own country, and twiceevery summer she sent the boys to the river, twenty miles to the southward, tofish for channel cat. When the children were little she used to load them allinto the wagon, the baby in its crib, and go fishing herself.

Alexandra often said that if her mother were cast upon a desert island, shewould thank God for her deliverance, make a garden, and find something topreserve. Preserving was almost a mania with Mrs. Bergson. Stout as she was,she roamed the scrubby banks of Norway Creek looking for fox grapes and gooseplums, like a wild creature in search of prey. She made a yellow jam of theinsipid ground-cherries that grew on the prairie, flavoring it with lemon peel;and she made a sticky dark conserve of garden tomatoes. She had experimentedeven with the rank buffalo-pea, and she could not see a fine bronze cluster ofthem without shaking her head and murmuring, “What a pity!” When there wasnothing more to preserve, she began to pickle. The amount of sugar she used inthese processes was sometimes a serious drain upon the family resources. Shewas a good mother, but she was glad when her children were old enough not to bein her way in the kitchen. She had never quite forgiven John Bergson forbringing her to the end of the earth; but, now that she was there, she wantedto be let alone to reconstruct her old life in so far as that was possible. Shecould still take some comfort in the world if she had bacon in the cave, glassjars on the shelves, and sheets in the press. She disapproved of all herneighbors because of their slovenly housekeeping, and the women thought hervery proud. Once when Mrs. Bergson, on her way to Norway Creek, stopped to seeold Mrs. Lee, the old woman hid in the haymow “for fear Mis’ Bergson wouldcatch her barefoot.”

III

One Sunday afternoon in July, six months after John Bergson’s death, Carl wassitting in the doorway of the Linstrum kitchen, dreaming over an illustratedpaper, when he heard the rattle of a wagon along the hill road. Looking up herecognized the Bergsons’ team, with two seats in the wagon, which meant theywere off for a pleasure excursion. Oscar and Lou, on the front seat, wore theircloth hats and coats, never worn except on Sundays, and Emil, on the secondseat with Alexandra, sat proudly in his new trousers, made from a pair of hisfather’s, and a pink-striped shirt, with a wide ruffled collar. Oscar stoppedthe horses and waved to Carl, who caught up his hat and ran through the melonpatch to join them.

“Want to go with us?” Lou called. “We’re going to Crazy Ivar’s to buy ahammock.”

“Sure.” Carl ran up panting, and clambering over the wheel sat down besideEmil. “I’ve always wanted to see Ivar’s pond. They say it’s the biggest in allthe country. Aren’t you afraid to go to Ivar’s in that new shirt, Emil? Hemight want it and take it right off your back.”

Emil grinned. “I’d be awful scared to go,” he admitted, “if you big boysweren’t along to take care of me. Did you ever hear him howl, Carl? People saysometimes he runs about the country howling at night because he is afraid theLord will destroy him. Mother thinks he must have done something awful wicked.”

Lou looked back and winked at Carl. “What would you do, Emil, if you was out onthe prairie by yourself and seen him coming?”

Emil stared. “Maybe I could hide in a badger-hole,” he suggested doubtfully.

“But suppose there wasn’t any badger-hole,” Lou persisted. “Would you run?”

“No, I’d be too scared to run,” Emil admitted mournfully, twisting his fingers.“I guess I’d sit right down on the ground and say my prayers.”

The big boys laughed, and Oscar brandished his whip over the broad backs of thehorses.

“He wouldn’t hurt you, Emil,” said Carl persuasively. “He came to doctor ourmare when she ate green corn and swelled up most as big as the water-tank. Hepetted her just like you do your cats. I couldn’t understand much he said, forhe don’t talk any English, but he kept patting her and groaning as if he hadthe pain himself, and saying, ‘There now, sister, that’s easier, that’sbetter!’”

Lou and Oscar laughed, and Emil giggled delightedly and looked up at hissister.

“I don’t think he knows anything at all about doctoring,” said Oscarscornfully. “They say when horses have distemper he takes the medicine himself,and then prays over the horses.”

Alexandra spoke up. “That’s what the Crows said, but he cured their horses, allthe same. Some days his mind is cloudy, like. But if you can get him on a clearday, you can learn a great deal from him. He understands animals. Didn’t I seehim take the horn off the Berquist’s cow when she had torn it loose and wentcrazy? She was tearing all over the place, knocking herself against things. Andat last she ran out on the roof of the old dugout and her legs went through andthere she stuck, bellowing. Ivar came running with his white bag, and themoment he got to her she was quiet and let him saw her horn off and daub theplace with tar.”

Emil had been watching his sister, his face reflecting the sufferings of thecow. “And then didn’t it hurt her any more?” he asked.

Alexandra patted him. “No, not any more. And in two days they could use hermilk again.”

The road to Ivar’s homestead was a very poor one. He had settled in the roughcountry across the county line, where no one lived but some Russians,—half adozen families who dwelt together in one long house, divided off like barracks.Ivar had explained his choice by saying that the fewer neighbors he had, thefewer temptations. Nevertheless, when one considered that his chief businesswas horse-doctoring, it seemed rather short-sighted of him to live in the mostinaccessible place he could find. The Bergson wagon lurched along over therough hummocks and grass banks, followed the bottom of winding draws, orskirted the margin of wide lagoons, where the golden coreopsis grew up out ofthe clear water and the wild ducks rose with a whirr of wings.

Lou looked after them helplessly. “I wish I’d brought my gun, anyway,Alexandra,” he said fretfully. “I could have hidden it under the straw in thebottom of the wagon.”

“Then we’d have had to lie to Ivar. Besides, they say he can smell dead birds.And if he knew, we wouldn’t get anything out of him, not even a hammock. I wantto talk to him, and he won’t talk sense if he’s angry. It makes him foolish.”

Lou sniffed. “Whoever heard of him talking sense, anyhow! I’d rather have ducksfor supper than Crazy Ivar’s tongue.”

Emil was alarmed. “Oh, but, Lou, you don’t want to make him mad! He mighthowl!”

They all laughed again, and Oscar urged the horses up the crumbling side of aclay bank. They had left the lagoons and the red grass behind them. In CrazyIvar’s country the grass was short and gray, the draws deeper than they were inthe Bergsons’ neighborhood, and the land was all broken up into hillocks andclay ridges. The wild flowers disappeared, and only in the bottom of the drawsand gullies grew a few of the very toughest and hardiest: shoestring, andironweed, and snow-on-the-mountain.

“Look, look, Emil, there’s Ivar’s big pond!” Alexandra pointed to a shiningsheet of water that lay at the bottom of a shallow draw. At one end of the pondwas an earthen dam, planted with green willow bushes, and above it a door and asingle window were set into the hillside. You would not have seen them at allbut for the reflection of the sunlight upon the four panes of window-glass. Andthat was all you saw. Not a shed, not a corral, not a well, not even a pathbroken in the curly grass. But for the piece of rusty stovepipe sticking upthrough the sod, you could have walked over the roof of Ivar’s dwelling withoutdreaming that you were near a human habitation. Ivar had lived for three yearsin the clay bank, without defiling the face of nature any more than the coyotethat had lived there before him had done.

When the Bergsons drove over the hill, Ivar was sitting in the doorway of hishouse, reading the Norwegian Bible. He was a queerly shaped old man, with athick, powerful body set on short bow-legs. His shaggy white hair, falling in athick mane about his ruddy cheeks, made him look older than he was. He wasbarefoot, but he wore a clean shirt of unbleached cotton, open at the neck. Healways put on a clean shirt when Sunday morning came round, though he neverwent to church. He had a peculiar religion of his own and could not get on withany of the denominations. Often he did not see anybody from one week’s end toanother. He kept a calendar, and every morning he checked off a day, so that hewas never in any doubt as to which day of the week it was. Ivar hired himselfout in threshing and corn-husking time, and he doctored sick animals when hewas sent for. When he was at home, he made hammocks out of twine and committedchapters of the Bible to memory.

Ivar found contentment in the solitude he had sought out for himself. Hedisliked the litter of human dwellings: the broken food, the bits of brokenchina, the old wash-boilers and tea-kettles thrown into the sunflower patch. Hepreferred the cleanness and tidiness of the wild sod. He always said that thebadgers had cleaner houses than people, and that when he took a housekeeper hername would be Mrs. Badger. He best expressed his preference for his wildhomestead by saying that his Bible seemed truer to him there. If one stood inthe doorway of his cave, and looked off at the rough land, the smiling sky, thecurly grass white in the hot sunlight; if one listened to the rapturous song ofthe lark, the drumming of the quail, the burr of the locust against that vastsilence, one understood what Ivar meant.

On this Sunday afternoon his face shone with happiness. He closed the book onhis knee, keeping the place with his horny finger, and repeated softly:—

He sendeth the springs into the valleys, which run among the hills;
They give drink to every beast of the field; the wild asses quench theirthirst.
The trees of the Lord are full of sap; the cedars of Lebanon which he hathplanted;
Where the birds make their nests: as for the stork, the fir trees are herhouse.
The high hills are a refuge for the wild goats; and the rocks for the conies.

Before he opened his Bible again, Ivar heard the Bergsons’ wagon approaching,and he sprang up and ran toward it.

“No guns, no guns!” he shouted, waving his arms distractedly.

“No, Ivar, no guns,” Alexandra called reassuringly.

He dropped his arms and went up to the wagon, smiling amiably and looking atthem out of his pale blue eyes.

“We want to buy a hammock, if you have one,” Alexandra explained, “and mylittle brother, here, wants to see your big pond, where so many birds come.”

Ivar smiled foolishly, and began rubbing the horses’ noses and feeling abouttheir mouths behind the bits. “Not many birds just now. A few ducks thismorning; and some snipe come to drink. But there was a crane last week. Shespent one night and came back the next evening. I don’t know why. It is not herseason, of course. Many of them go over in the fall. Then the pond is full ofstrange voices every night.”

Alexandra translated for Carl, who looked thoughtful. “Ask him, Alexandra, ifit is true that a sea gull came here once. I have heard so.”

She had some difficulty in making the old man understand.

He looked puzzled at first, then smote his hands together as he remembered.“Oh, yes, yes! A big white bird with long wings and pink feet. My! what a voiceshe had! She came in the afternoon and kept flying about the pond and screaminguntil dark. She was in trouble of some sort, but I could not understand her.She was going over to the other ocean, maybe, and did not know how far it was.She was afraid of never getting there. She was more mournful than our birdshere; she cried in the night. She saw the light from my window and darted up toit. Maybe she thought my house was a boat, she was such a wild thing. Nextmorning, when the sun rose, I went out to take her food, but she flew up intothe sky and went on her way.” Ivar ran his fingers through his thick hair. “Ihave many strange birds stop with me here. They come from very far away and aregreat company. I hope you boys never shoot wild birds?”

Lou and Oscar grinned, and Ivar shook his bushy head. “Yes, I know boys arethoughtless. But these wild things are God’s birds. He watches over them andcounts them, as we do our cattle; Christ says so in the New Testament.”

“Now, Ivar,” Lou asked, “may we water our horses at your pond and give themsome feed? It’s a bad road to your place.”

“Yes, yes, it is.” The old man scrambled about and began to loose the tugs. “Abad road, eh, girls? And the bay with a colt at home!”

Oscar brushed the old man aside. “We’ll take care of the horses, Ivar. You’llbe finding some disease on them. Alexandra wants to see your hammocks.”

Ivar led Alexandra and Emil to his little cave house. He had but one room,neatly plastered and whitewashed, and there was a wooden floor. There was akitchen stove, a table covered with oilcloth, two chairs, a clock, a calendar,a few books on the window-shelf; nothing more. But the place was as clean as acupboard.

“But where do you sleep, Ivar?” Emil asked, looking about.

Ivar unslung a hammock from a hook on the wall; in it was rolled a buffalorobe. “There, my son. A hammock is a good bed, and in winter I wrap up in thisskin. Where I go to work, the beds are not half so easy as this.”

By this time Emil had lost all his timidity. He thought a cave a very superiorkind of house. There was something pleasantly unusual about it and about Ivar.“Do the birds know you will be kind to them, Ivar? Is that why so many come?”he asked.

Ivar sat down on the floor and tucked his feet under him. “See, little brother,they have come from a long way, and they are very tired. From up there wherethey are flying, our country looks dark and flat. They must have water to drinkand to bathe in before they can go on with their journey. They look this wayand that, and far below them they see something shining, like a piece of glassset in the dark earth. That is my pond. They come to it and are not disturbed.Maybe I sprinkle a little corn. They tell the other birds, and next year morecome this way. They have their roads up there, as we have down here.”

Emil rubbed his knees thoughtfully. “And is that true, Ivar, about the headducks falling back when they are tired, and the hind ones taking their place?”

“Yes. The point of the wedge gets the worst of it; they cut the wind. They canonly stand it there a little while—half an hour, maybe. Then they fall back andthe wedge splits a little, while the rear ones come up the middle to the front.Then it closes up and they fly on, with a new edge. They are always changinglike that, up in the air. Never any confusion; just like soldiers who have beendrilled.”

Alexandra had selected her hammock by the time the boys came up from the pond.They would not come in, but sat in the shade of the bank outside whileAlexandra and Ivar talked about the birds and about his housekeeping, and whyhe never ate meat, fresh or salt.

Alexandra was sitting on one of the wooden chairs, her arms resting on thetable. Ivar was sitting on the floor at her feet. “Ivar,” she said suddenly,beginning to trace the pattern on the oilcloth with her forefinger, “I cameto-day more because I wanted to talk to you than because I wanted to buy ahammock.”

“Yes?” The old man scraped his bare feet on the plank floor.

“We have a big bunch of hogs, Ivar. I wouldn’t sell in the spring, wheneverybody advised me to, and now so many people are losing their hogs that I amfrightened. What can be done?”

Ivar’s little eyes began to shine. They lost their vagueness.

“You feed them swill and such stuff? Of course! And sour milk? Oh, yes! Andkeep them in a stinking pen? I tell you, sister, the hogs of this country areput upon! They become unclean, like the hogs in the Bible. If you kept yourchickens like that, what would happen? You have a little sorghum patch, maybe?Put a fence around it, and turn the hogs in. Build a shed to give them shade, athatch on poles. Let the boys haul water to them in barrels, clean water, andplenty. Get them off the old stinking ground, and do not let them go back thereuntil winter. Give them only grain and clean feed, such as you would givehorses or cattle. Hogs do not like to be filthy.”

The boys outside the door had been listening. Lou nudged his brother. “Come,the horses are done eating. Let’s hitch up and get out of here. He’ll fill herfull of notions. She’ll be for having the pigs sleep with us, next.”

Oscar grunted and got up. Carl, who could not understand what Ivar said, sawthat the two boys were displeased. They did not mind hard work, but they hatedexperiments and could never see the use of taking pains. Even Lou, who was moreelastic than his older brother, disliked to do anything different from theirneighbors. He felt that it made them conspicuous and gave people a chance totalk about them.

Once they were on the homeward road, the boys forgot their ill-humor and jokedabout Ivar and his birds. Alexandra did not propose any reforms in the care ofthe pigs, and they hoped she had forgotten Ivar’s talk. They agreed that he wascrazier than ever, and would never be able to prove up on his land because heworked it so little. Alexandra privately resolved that she would have a talkwith Ivar about this and stir him up. The boys persuaded Carl to stay forsupper and go swimming in the pasture pond after dark.

That evening, after she had washed the supper dishes, Alexandra sat down on thekitchen doorstep, while her mother was mixing the bread. It was a still,deep-breathing summer night, full of the smell of the hay fields. Sounds oflaughter and splashing came up from the pasture, and when the moon rose rapidlyabove the bare rim of the prairie, the pond glittered like polished metal, andshe could see the flash of white bodies as the boys ran about the edge, orjumped into the water. Alexandra watched the shimmering pool dreamily, buteventually her eyes went back to the sorghum patch south of the barn, where shewas planning to make her new pig corral.

IV

For the first three years after John Bergson’s death, the affairs of his familyprospered. Then came the hard times that brought every one on the Divide to thebrink of despair; three years of drouth and failure, the last struggle of awild soil against the encroaching plowshare. The first of these fruitlesssummers the Bergson boys bore courageously. The failure of the corn crop madelabor cheap. Lou and Oscar hired two men and put in bigger crops than everbefore. They lost everything they spent. The whole country was discouraged.Farmers who were already in debt had to give up their land. A few foreclosuresdemoralized the county. The settlers sat about on the wooden sidewalks in thelittle town and told each other that the country was never meant for men tolive in; the thing to do was to get back to Iowa, to Illinois, to any placethat had been proved habitable. The Bergson boys, certainly, would have beenhappier with their uncle Otto, in the bakery shop in Chicago. Like most oftheir neighbors, they were meant to follow in paths already marked out forthem, not to break trails in a new country. A steady job, a few holidays,nothing to think about, and they would have been very happy. It was no fault oftheirs that they had been dragged into the wilderness when they were littleboys. A pioneer should have imagination, should be able to enjoy the idea ofthings more than the things themselves.

The second of these barren summers was passing. One September afternoonAlexandra had gone over to the garden across the draw to dig sweetpotatoes—they had been thriving upon the weather that was fatal to everythingelse. But when Carl Linstrum came up the garden rows to find her, she was notworking. She was standing lost in thought, leaning upon her pitchfork, hersunbonnet lying beside her on the ground. The dry garden patch smelled ofdrying vines and was strewn with yellow seed-cucumbers and pumpkins andcitrons. At one end, next the rhubarb, grew feathery asparagus, with redberries. Down the middle of the garden was a row of gooseberry and currantbushes. A few tough zenias and marigolds and a row of scarlet sage bore witnessto the buckets of water that Mrs. Bergson had carried there after sundown,against the prohibition of her sons. Carl came quietly and slowly up the gardenpath, looking intently at Alexandra. She did not hear him. She was standingperfectly still, with that serious ease so characteristic of her. Her thick,reddish braids, twisted about her head, fairly burned in the sunlight. The airwas cool enough to make the warm sun pleasant on one’s back and shoulders, andso clear that the eye could follow a hawk up and up, into the blazing bluedepths of the sky. Even Carl, never a very cheerful boy, and considerablydarkened by these last two bitter years, loved the country on days like this,felt something strong and young and wild come out of it, that laughed at care.

“Alexandra,” he said as he approached her, “I want to talk to you. Let’s sitdown by the gooseberry bushes.” He picked up her sack of potatoes and theycrossed the garden. “Boys gone to town?” he asked as he sank down on the warm,sun-baked earth. “Well, we have made up our minds at last, Alexandra. We arereally going away.”

She looked at him as if she were a little frightened. “Really, Carl? Is itsettled?”

“Yes, father has heard from St. Louis, and they will give him back his old jobin the cigar factory. He must be there by the first of November. They aretaking on new men then. We will sell the place for whatever we can get, andauction the stock. We haven’t enough to ship. I am going to learn engravingwith a German engraver there, and then try to get work in Chicago.”

Alexandra’s hands dropped in her lap. Her eyes became dreamy and filled withtears.

Carl’s sensitive lower lip trembled. He scratched in the soft earth beside himwith a stick. “That’s all I hate about it, Alexandra,” he said slowly. “You’vestood by us through so much and helped father out so many times, and now itseems as if we were running off and leaving you to face the worst of it. But itisn’t as if we could really ever be of any help to you. We are only one moredrag, one more thing you look out for and feel responsible for. Father wasnever meant for a farmer, you know that. And I hate it. We’d only get in deeperand deeper.”

“Yes, yes, Carl, I know. You are wasting your life here. You are able to domuch better things. You are nearly nineteen now, and I wouldn’t have you stay.I’ve always hoped you would get away. But I can’t help feeling scared when Ithink how I will miss you—more than you will ever know.” She brushed the tearsfrom her cheeks, not trying to hide them.

“But, Alexandra,” he said sadly and wistfully, “I’ve never been any real helpto you, beyond sometimes trying to keep the boys in a good humor.”

Alexandra smiled and shook her head. “Oh, it’s not that. Nothing like that.It’s by understanding me, and the boys, and mother, that you’ve helped me. Iexpect that is the only way one person ever really can help another. I thinkyou are about the only one that ever helped me. Somehow it will take morecourage to bear your going than everything that has happened before.”

Carl looked at the ground. “You see, we’ve all depended so on you,” he said,“even father. He makes me laugh. When anything comes up he always says, ‘Iwonder what the Bergsons are going to do about that? I guess I’ll go and askher.’ I’ll never forget that time, when we first came here, and our horse hadthe colic, and I ran over to your place—your father was away, and you came homewith me and showed father how to let the wind out of the horse. You were only alittle girl then, but you knew ever so much more about farm work than poorfather. You remember how homesick I used to get, and what long talks we used tohave coming from school? We’ve someway always felt alike about things.”

“Yes, that’s it; we’ve liked the same things and we’ve liked them together,without anybody else knowing. And we’ve had good times, hunting for Christmastrees and going for ducks and making our plum wine together every year. We’venever either of us had any other close friend. And now—” Alexandra wiped hereyes with the corner of her apron, “and now I must remember that you are goingwhere you will have many friends, and will find the work you were meant to do.But you’ll write to me, Carl? That will mean a great deal to me here.”

“I’ll write as long as I live,” cried the boy impetuously. “And I’ll be workingfor you as much as for myself, Alexandra. I want to do something you’ll likeand be proud of. I’m a fool here, but I know I can do something!” He sat up andfrowned at the red grass.

Alexandra sighed. “How discouraged the boys will be when they hear. They alwayscome home from town discouraged, anyway. So many people are trying to leave thecountry, and they talk to our boys and make them low-spirited. I’m afraid theyare beginning to feel hard toward me because I won’t listen to any talk aboutgoing. Sometimes I feel like I’m getting tired of standing up for thiscountry.”

“I won’t tell the boys yet, if you’d rather not.”

“Oh, I’ll tell them myself, to-night, when they come home. They’ll be talkingwild, anyway, and no good comes of keeping bad news. It’s all harder on themthan it is on me. Lou wants to get married, poor boy, and he can’t until timesare better. See, there goes the sun, Carl. I must be getting back. Mother willwant her potatoes. It’s chilly already, the moment the light goes.”

Alexandra rose and looked about. A golden afterglow throbbed in the west, butthe country already looked empty and mournful. A dark moving mass came over thewestern hill, the Lee boy was bringing in the herd from the other half-section.Emil ran from the windmill to open the corral gate. From the log house, on thelittle rise across the draw, the smoke was curling. The cattle lowed andbellowed. In the sky the pale half-moon was slowly silvering. Alexandra andCarl walked together down the potato rows. “I have to keep telling myself whatis going to happen,” she said softly. “Since you have been here, ten years now,I have never really been lonely. But I can remember what it was like before.Now I shall have nobody but Emil. But he is my boy, and he is tender-hearted.”

That night, when the boys were called to supper, they sat down moodily. Theyhad worn their coats to town, but they ate in their striped shirts andsuspenders. They were grown men now, and, as Alexandra said, for the last fewyears they had been growing more and more like themselves. Lou was still theslighter of the two, the quicker and more intelligent, but apt to go off athalf-cock. He had a lively blue eye, a thin, fair skin (always burned red tothe neckband of his shirt in summer), stiff, yellow hair that would not liedown on his head, and a bristly little yellow mustache, of which he was veryproud. Oscar could not grow a mustache; his pale face was as bare as an egg,and his white eyebrows gave it an empty look. He was a man of powerful body andunusual endurance; the sort of man you could attach to a corn-sheller as youwould an engine. He would turn it all day, without hurrying, without slowingdown. But he was as indolent of mind as he was unsparing of his body. His loveof routine amounted to a vice. He worked like an insect, always doing the samething over in the same way, regardless of whether it was best or no. He feltthat there was a sovereign virtue in mere bodily toil, and he rather liked todo things in the hardest way. If a field had once been in corn, he couldn’tbear to put it into wheat. He liked to begin his corn-planting at the same timeevery year, whether the season were backward or forward. He seemed to feel thatby his own irreproachable regularity he would clear himself of blame andreprove the weather. When the wheat crop failed, he threshed the straw at adead loss to demonstrate how little grain there was, and thus prove his caseagainst Providence.

Lou, on the other hand, was fussy and flighty; always planned to get throughtwo days’ work in one, and often got only the least important things done. Heliked to keep the place up, but he never got round to doing odd jobs until hehad to neglect more pressing work to attend to them. In the middle of the wheatharvest, when the grain was over-ripe and every hand was needed, he would stopto mend fences or to patch the harness; then dash down to the field andoverwork and be laid up in bed for a week. The two boys balanced each other,and they pulled well together. They had been good friends since they werechildren. One seldom went anywhere, even to town, without the other.

To-night, after they sat down to supper, Oscar kept looking at Lou as if heexpected him to say something, and Lou blinked his eyes and frowned at hisplate. It was Alexandra herself who at last opened the discussion.

“The Linstrums,” she said calmly, as she put another plate of hot biscuit onthe table, “are going back to St. Louis. The old man is going to work in thecigar factory again.”

At this Lou plunged in. “You see, Alexandra, everybody who can crawl out isgoing away. There’s no use of us trying to stick it out, just to be stubborn.There’s something in knowing when to quit.”

“Where do you want to go, Lou?”

“Any place where things will grow,” said Oscar grimly.

Lou reached for a potato. “Chris Arnson has traded his half-section for a placedown on the river.”

“Who did he trade with?”

“Charley Fuller, in town.”

“Fuller the real estate man? You see, Lou, that Fuller has a head on him. He’sbuying and trading for every bit of land he can get up here. It’ll make him arich man, some day.”

“He’s rich now, that’s why he can take a chance.”

“Why can’t we? We’ll live longer than he will. Some day the land itself will beworth more than all we can ever raise on it.”

Lou laughed. “It could be worth that, and still not be worth much. Why,Alexandra, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Our place wouldn’t bringnow what it would six years ago. The fellows that settled up here just made amistake. Now they’re beginning to see this high land wasn’t never meant to grownothing on, and everybody who ain’t fixed to graze cattle is trying to crawlout. It’s too high to farm up here. All the Americans are skinning out. Thatman Percy Adams, north of town, told me that he was going to let Fuller takehis land and stuff for four hundred dollars and a ticket to Chicago.”

“There’s Fuller again!” Alexandra exclaimed. “I wish that man would take me fora partner. He’s feathering his nest! If only poor people could learn a littlefrom rich people! But all these fellows who are running off are bad farmers,like poor Mr. Linstrum. They couldn’t get ahead even in good years, and theyall got into debt while father was getting out. I think we ought to hold on aslong as we can on father’s account. He was so set on keeping this land. He musthave seen harder times than this, here. How was it in the early days, mother?”

Mrs. Bergson was weeping quietly. These family discussions always depressedher, and made her remember all that she had been torn away from. “I don’t seewhy the boys are always taking on about going away,” she said, wiping her eyes.“I don’t want to move again; out to some raw place, maybe, where we’d be worseoff than we are here, and all to do over again. I won’t move! If the rest ofyou go, I will ask some of the neighbors to take me in, and stay and be buriedby father. I’m not going to leave him by himself on the prairie, for cattle torun over.” She began to cry more bitterly.

The boys looked angry. Alexandra put a soothing hand on her mother’s shoulder.“There’s no question of that, mother. You don’t have to go if you don’t wantto. A third of the place belongs to you by American law, and we can’t sellwithout your consent. We only want you to advise us. How did it use to be whenyou and father first came? Was it really as bad as this, or not?”

“Oh, worse! Much worse,” moaned Mrs. Bergson. “Drouth, chince-bugs, hail,everything! My garden all cut to pieces like sauerkraut. No grapes on thecreek, no nothing. The people all lived just like coyotes.”

Oscar got up and tramped out of the kitchen. Lou followed him. They felt thatAlexandra had taken an unfair advantage in turning their mother loose on them.The next morning they were silent and reserved. They did not offer to take thewomen to church, but went down to the barn immediately after breakfast andstayed there all day. When Carl Linstrum came over in the afternoon, Alexandrawinked to him and pointed toward the barn. He understood her and went down toplay cards with the boys. They believed that a very wicked thing to do onSunday, and it relieved their feelings.

Alexandra stayed in the house. On Sunday afternoon Mrs. Bergson always took anap, and Alexandra read. During the week she read only the newspaper, but onSunday, and in the long evenings of winter, she read a good deal; read a fewthings over a great many times. She knew long portions of the “Frithjof Saga”by heart, and, like most Swedes who read at all, she was fond of Longfellow’sverse,—the ballads and the “Golden Legend” and “The Spanish Student.” To-dayshe sat in the wooden rocking-chair with the Swedish Bible open on her knees,but she was not reading. She was looking thoughtfully away at the point wherethe upland road disappeared over the rim of the prairie. Her body was in anattitude of perfect repose, such as it was apt to take when she was thinkingearnestly. Her mind was slow, truthful, steadfast. She had not the least sparkof cleverness.

All afternoon the sitting-room was full of quiet and sunlight. Emil was makingrabbit traps in the kitchen shed. The hens were clucking and scratching brownholes in the flower beds, and the wind was teasing the prince’s feather by thedoor.

That evening Carl came in with the boys to supper.

“Emil,” said Alexandra, when they were all seated at the table, “how would youlike to go traveling? Because I am going to take a trip, and you can go with meif you want to.”

The boys looked up in amazement; they were always afraid of Alexandra’sschemes. Carl was interested.

“I’ve been thinking, boys,” she went on, “that maybe I am too set againstmaking a change. I’m going to take Brigham and the buckboard to-morrow anddrive down to the river country and spend a few days looking over what they’vegot down there. If I find anything good, you boys can go down and make atrade.”

“Nobody down there will trade for anything up here,” said Oscar gloomily.

“That’s just what I want to find out. Maybe they are just as discontented downthere as we are up here. Things away from home often look better than they are.You know what your Hans Andersen book says, Carl, about the Swedes liking tobuy Danish bread and the Danes liking to buy Swedish bread, because peoplealways think the bread of another country is better than their own. Anyway,I’ve heard so much about the river farms, I won’t be satisfied till I’ve seenfor myself.”

Lou fidgeted. “Look out! Don’t agree to anything. Don’t let them fool you.”

Lou was apt to be fooled himself. He had not yet learned to keep away from theshell-game wagons that followed the circus.

After supper Lou put on a necktie and went across the fields to court AnnieLee, and Carl and Oscar sat down to a game of checkers, while Alexandra read“The Swiss Family Robinson” aloud to her mother and Emil. It was not longbefore the two boys at the table neglected their game to listen. They were allbig children together, and they found the adventures of the family in the treehouse so absorbing that they gave them their undivided attention.

V

Alexandra and Emil spent five days down among the river farms, driving up anddown the valley. Alexandra talked to the men about their crops and to the womenabout their poultry. She spent a whole day with one young farmer who had beenaway at school, and who was experimenting with a new kind of clover hay. Shelearned a great deal. As they drove along, she and Emil talked and planned. Atlast, on the sixth day, Alexandra turned Brigham’s head northward and left theriver behind.

“There’s nothing in it for us down there, Emil. There are a few fine farms, butthey are owned by the rich men in town, and couldn’t be bought. Most of theland is rough and hilly. They can always scrape along down there, but they cannever do anything big. Down there they have a little certainty, but up with usthere is a big chance. We must have faith in the high land, Emil. I want tohold on harder than ever, and when you’re a man you’ll thank me.” She urgedBrigham forward.

When the road began to climb the first long swells of the Divide, Alexandrahummed an old Swedish hymn, and Emil wondered why his sister looked so happy.Her face was so radiant that he felt shy about asking her. For the first time,perhaps, since that land emerged from the waters of geologic ages, a human facewas set toward it with love and yearning. It seemed beautiful to her, rich andstrong and glorious. Her eyes drank in the breadth of it, until her tearsblinded her. Then the Genius of the Divide, the great, free spirit whichbreathes across it, must have bent lower than it ever bent to a human willbefore. The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.

Alexandra reached home in the afternoon. That evening she held a family counciland told her brothers all that she had seen and heard.

“I want you boys to go down yourselves and look it over. Nothing will convinceyou like seeing with your own eyes. The river land was settled before this, andso they are a few years ahead of us, and have learned more about farming. Theland sells for three times as much as this, but in five years we will doubleit. The rich men down there own all the best land, and they are buying all theycan get. The thing to do is to sell our cattle and what little old corn wehave, and buy the Linstrum place. Then the next thing to do is to take out twoloans on our half-sections, and buy Peter Crow’s place; raise every dollar wecan, and buy every acre we can.”

“Mortgage the homestead again?” Lou cried. He sprang up and began to wind theclock furiously. “I won’t slave to pay off another mortgage. I’ll never do it.You’d just as soon kill us all, Alexandra, to carry out some scheme!”

Oscar rubbed his high, pale forehead. “How do you propose to pay off yourmortgages?”

Alexandra looked from one to the other and bit her lip. They had never seen herso nervous. “See here,” she brought out at last. “We borrow the money for sixyears. Well, with the money we buy a half-section from Linstrum and a half fromCrow, and a quarter from Struble, maybe. That will give us upwards of fourteenhundred acres, won’t it? You won’t have to pay off your mortgages for sixyears. By that time, any of this land will be worth thirty dollars an acre—itwill be worth fifty, but we’ll say thirty; then you can sell a garden patchanywhere, and pay off a debt of sixteen hundred dollars. It’s not the principalI’m worried about, it’s the interest and taxes. We’ll have to strain to meetthe payments. But as sure as we are sitting here to-night, we can sit down hereten years from now independent landowners, not struggling farmers any longer.The chance that father was always looking for has come.”

Lou was pacing the floor. “But how do you knowthat land is going to goup enough to pay the mortgages and—”

“And make us rich besides?” Alexandra put in firmly. “I can’t explain that,Lou. You’ll have to take my word for it. I know, that’s all. When youdrive about over the country you can feel it coming.”

Oscar had been sitting with his head lowered, his hands hanging between hisknees. “But we can’t work so much land,” he said dully, as if he were talkingto himself. “We can’t even try. It would just lie there and we’d work ourselvesto death.” He sighed, and laid his calloused fist on the table.

Alexandra’s eyes filled with tears. She put her hand on his shoulder. “You poorboy, you won’t have to work it. The men in town who are buying up otherpeople’s land don’t try to farm it. They are the men to watch, in a newcountry. Let’s try to do like the shrewd ones, and not like these stupidfellows. I don’t want you boys always to have to work like this. I want you tobe independent, and Emil to go to school.”

Lou held his head as if it were splitting. “Everybody will say we are crazy. Itmust be crazy, or everybody would be doing it.”

“If they were, we wouldn’t have much chance. No, Lou, I was talking about thatwith the smart young man who is raising the new kind of clover. He says theright thing is usually just what everybody don’t do. Why are we better fixedthan any of our neighbors? Because father had more brains. Our people werebetter people than these in the old country. We oughtto do more thanthey do, and see further ahead. Yes, mother, I’m going to clear the table now.”

Alexandra rose. The boys went to the stable to see to the stock, and they weregone a long while. When they came back Lou played on his dragharmonikaand Oscar sat figuring at his father’s secretary all evening. They said nothingmore about Alexandra’s project, but she felt sure now that they would consentto it. Just before bedtime Oscar went out for a pail of water. When he did notcome back, Alexandra threw a shawl over her head and ran down the path to thewindmill. She found him sitting there with his head in his hands, and she satdown beside him.

“Don’t do anything you don’t want to do, Oscar,” she whispered. She waited amoment, but he did not stir. “I won’t say any more about it, if you’d rathernot. What makes you so discouraged?”

“I dread signing my name to them pieces of paper,” he said slowly. “All thetime I was a boy we had a mortgage hanging over us.”

“Then don’t sign one. I don’t want you to, if you feel that way.”

Oscar shook his head. “No, I can see there’s a chance that way. I’ve thought agood while there might be. We’re in so deep now, we might as well go deeper.But it’s hard work pulling out of debt. Like pulling a threshing-machine out ofthe mud; breaks your back. Me and Lou’s worked hard, and I can’t see it’s gotus ahead much.”

“Nobody knows about that as well as I do, Oscar. That’s why I want to try aneasier way. I don’t want you to have to grub for every dollar.”

“Yes, I know what you mean. Maybe it’ll come out right. But signing papers issigning papers. There ain’t no maybe about that.” He took his pail and trudgedup the path to the house.

Alexandra drew her shawl closer about her and stood leaning against the frameof the mill, looking at the stars which glittered so keenly through the frostyautumn air. She always loved to watch them, to think of their vastness anddistance, and of their ordered march. It fortified her to reflect upon thegreat operations of nature, and when she thought of the law that lay behindthem, she felt a sense of personal security. That night she had a newconsciousness of the country, felt almost a new relation to it. Even her talkwith the boys had not taken away the feeling that had overwhelmed her when shedrove back to the Divide that afternoon. She had never known before how muchthe country meant to her. The chirping of the insects down in the long grasshad been like the sweetest music. She had felt as if her heart were hiding downthere, somewhere, with the quail and the plover and all the little wild thingsthat crooned or buzzed in the sun. Under the long shaggy ridges, she felt thefuture stirring.

PART II.
Neighboring Fields

I

IT is sixteen years since John Bergson died. His wife now lies beside him, andthe white shaft that marks their graves gleams across the wheat-fields. Couldhe rise from beneath it, he would not know the country under which he has beenasleep. The shaggy coat of the prairie, which they lifted to make him a bed,has vanished forever. From the Norwegian graveyard one looks out over a vastchecker-board, marked off in squares of wheat and corn; light and dark, darkand light. Telephone wires hum along the white roads, which always run at rightangles. From the graveyard gate one can count a dozen gayly painted farmhouses;the gilded weather-vanes on the big red barns wink at each other across thegreen and brown and yellow fields. The light steel windmills tremble throughouttheir frames and tug at their moorings, as they vibrate in the wind that oftenblows from one week’s end to another across that high, active, resolute stretchof country.

The Divide is now thickly populated. The rich soil yields heavy harvests; thedry, bracing climate and the smoothness of the land make labor easy for men andbeasts. There are few scenes more gratifying than a spring plowing in thatcountry, where the furrows of a single field often lie a mile in length, andthe brown earth, with such a strong, clean smell, and such a power of growthand fertility in it, yields itself eagerly to the plow; rolls away from theshear, not even dimming the brightness of the metal, with a soft, deep sigh ofhappiness. The wheat-cutting sometimes goes on all night as well as all day,and in good seasons there are scarcely men and horses enough to do theharvesting. The grain is so heavy that it bends toward the blade and cuts likevelvet.

There is something frank and joyous and young in the open face of the country.It gives itself ungrudgingly to the moods of the season, holding nothing back.Like the plains of Lombardy, it seems to rise a little to meet the sun. The airand the earth are curiously mated and intermingled, as if the one were thebreath of the other. You feel in the atmosphere the same tonic, puissantquality that is in the tilth, the same strength and resoluteness.

One June morning a young man stood at the gate of the Norwegian graveyard,sharpening his scythe in strokes unconsciously timed to the tune he waswhistling. He wore a flannel cap and duck trousers, and the sleeves of hiswhite flannel shirt were rolled back to the elbow. When he was satisfied withthe edge of his blade, he slipped the whetstone into his hip pocket and beganto swing his scythe, still whistling, but softly, out of respect to the quietfolk about him. Unconscious respect, probably, for he seemed intent upon hisown thoughts, and, like the Gladiator’s, they were far away. He was a splendidfigure of a boy, tall and straight as a young pine tree, with a handsome head,and stormy gray eyes, deeply set under a serious brow. The space between histwo front teeth, which were unusually far apart, gave him the proficiency inwhistling for which he was distinguished at college. (He also played the cornetin the University band.)

When the grass required his close attention, or when he had to stoop to cutabout a head-stone, he paused in his lively air,—the “Jewel” song,—taking it upwhere he had left it when his scythe swung free again. He was not thinkingabout the tired pioneers over whom his blade glittered. The old wild country,the struggle in which his sister was destined to succeed while so many menbroke their hearts and died, he can scarcely remember. That is all among thedim things of childhood and has been forgotten in the brighter pattern lifeweaves to-day, in the bright facts of being captain of the track team, andholding the interstate record for the high jump, in the all-suffusingbrightness of being twenty-one. Yet sometimes, in the pauses of his work, theyoung man frowned and looked at the ground with an intentness which suggestedthat even twenty-one might have its problems.

When he had been mowing the better part of an hour, he heard the rattle of alight cart on the road behind him. Supposing that it was his sister coming backfrom one of her farms, he kept on with his work. The cart stopped at the gateand a merry contralto voice called, “Almost through, Emil?” He dropped hisscythe and went toward the fence, wiping his face and neck with hishandkerchief. In the cart sat a young woman who wore driving gauntlets and awide shade hat, trimmed with red poppies. Her face, too, was rather like apoppy, round and brown, with rich color in her cheeks and lips, and her dancingyellow-brown eyes bubbled with gayety. The wind was flapping her big hat andteasing a curl of her chestnut-colored hair. She shook her head at the tallyouth.

“What time did you get over here? That’s not much of a job for an athlete. HereI’ve been to town and back. Alexandra lets you sleep late. Oh, I know! Lou’swife was telling me about the way she spoils you. I was going to give you alift, if you were done.” She gathered up her reins.

“But I will be, in a minute. Please wait for me, Marie,” Emil coaxed.“Alexandra sent me to mow our lot, but I’ve done half a dozen others, you see.Just wait till I finish off the Kourdnas’. By the way, they were Bohemians. Whyaren’t they up in the Catholic graveyard?”

“Free-thinkers,” replied the young woman laconically.

“Lots of the Bohemian boys at the University are,” said Emil, taking up hisscythe again. “What did you ever burn John Huss for, anyway? It’s made an awfulrow. They still jaw about it in history classes.”

“We’d do it right over again, most of us,” said the young woman hotly. “Don’tthey ever teach you in your history classes that you’d all be heathen Turks ifit hadn’t been for the Bohemians?”

Emil had fallen to mowing. “Oh, there’s no denying you’re a spunky littlebunch, you Czechs,” he called back over his shoulder.

Marie Shabata settled herself in her seat and watched the rhythmical movementof the young man’s long arms, swinging her foot as if in time to some air thatwas going through her mind. The minutes passed. Emil mowed vigorously and Mariesat sunning herself and watching the long grass fall. She sat with the easethat belongs to persons of an essentially happy nature, who can find acomfortable spot almost anywhere; who are supple, and quick in adaptingthemselves to circumstances. After a final swish, Emil snapped the gate andsprang into the cart, holding his scythe well out over the wheel. “There,” hesighed. “I gave old man Lee a cut or so, too. Lou’s wife needn’t talk. I neversee Lou’s scythe over here.”

Marie clucked to her horse. “Oh, you know Annie!” She looked at the young man’sbare arms. “How brown you’ve got since you came home. I wish I had an athleteto mow my orchard. I get wet to my knees when I go down to pick cherries.”

“You can have one, any time you want him. Better wait until after it rains.”Emil squinted off at the horizon as if he were looking for clouds.

“Will you? Oh, there’s a good boy!” She turned her head to him with a quick,bright smile. He felt it rather than saw it. Indeed, he had looked away withthe purpose of not seeing it. “I’ve been up looking at Angélique’s weddingclothes,” Marie went on, “and I’m so excited I can hardly wait until Sunday.Amédée will be a handsome bridegroom. Is anybody but you going to stand up withhim? Well, then it will be a handsome wedding party.” She made a droll face atEmil, who flushed. “Frank,” Marie continued, flicking her horse, “is cranky atme because I loaned his saddle to Jan Smirka, and I’m terribly afraid he won’ttake me to the dance in the evening. Maybe the supper will tempt him. AllAngélique’s folks are baking for it, and all Amédée’s twenty cousins. Therewill be barrels of beer. If once I get Frank to the supper, I’ll see that Istay for the dance. And by the way, Emil, you mustn’t dance with me but once ortwice. You must dance with all the French girls. It hurts their feelings if youdon’t. They think you’re proud because you’ve been away to school orsomething.”

Emil sniffed. “How do you know they think that?”

“Well, you didn’t dance with them much at Raoul Marcel’s party, and I couldtell how they took it by the way they looked at you—and at me.”

“All right,” said Emil shortly, studying the glittering blade of his scythe.

They drove westward toward Norway Creek, and toward a big white house thatstood on a hill, several miles across the fields. There were so many sheds andoutbuildings grouped about it that the place looked not unlike a tiny village.A stranger, approaching it, could not help noticing the beauty and fruitfulnessof the outlying fields. There was something individual about the great farm, amost unusual trimness and care for detail. On either side of the road, for amile before you reached the foot of the hill, stood tall osage orange hedges,their glossy green marking off the yellow fields. South of the hill, in a low,sheltered swale, surrounded by a mulberry hedge, was the orchard, its fruittrees knee-deep in timothy grass. Any one thereabouts would have told you thatthis was one of the richest farms on the Divide, and that the farmer was awoman, Alexandra Bergson.

If you go up the hill and enter Alexandra’s big house, you will find that it iscuriously unfinished and uneven in comfort. One room is papered, carpeted,over-furnished; the next is almost bare. The pleasantest rooms in the house arethe kitchen—where Alexandra’s three young Swedish girls chatter and cook andpickle and preserve all summer long—and the sitting-room, in which Alexandrahas brought together the old homely furniture that the Bergsons used in theirfirst log house, the family portraits, and the few things her mother broughtfrom Sweden.

When you go out of the house into the flower garden, there you feel again theorder and fine arrangement manifest all over the great farm; in the fencing andhedging, in the windbreaks and sheds, in the symmetrical pasture ponds, plantedwith scrub willows to give shade to the cattle in fly-time. There is even awhite row of beehives in the orchard, under the walnut trees. You feel that,properly, Alexandra’s house is the big out-of-doors, and that it is in the soilthat she expresses herself best.

II

Emil reached home a little past noon, and when he went into the kitchenAlexandra was already seated at the head of the long table, having dinner withher men, as she always did unless there were visitors. He slipped into hisempty place at his sister’s right. The three pretty young Swedish girls who didAlexandra’s housework were cutting pies, refilling coffeecups, placing plattersof bread and meat and potatoes upon the red tablecloth, and continually gettingin each other’s way between the table and the stove. To be sure they alwayswasted a good deal of time getting in each other’s way and giggling at eachother’s mistakes. But, as Alexandra had pointedly told her sisters-in-law, itwas to hear them giggle that she kept three young things in her kitchen; thework she could do herself, if it were necessary. These girls, with their longletters from home, their finery, and their love-affairs, afforded her a greatdeal of entertainment, and they were company for her when Emil was away atschool.

Of the youngest girl, Signa, who has a pretty figure, mottled pink cheeks, andyellow hair, Alexandra is very fond, though she keeps a sharp eye upon her.Signa is apt to be skittish at mealtime, when the men are about, and to spillthe coffee or upset the cream. It is supposed that Nelse Jensen, one of the sixmen at the dinner-table, is courting Signa, though he has been so careful notto commit himself that no one in the house, least of all Signa, can tell justhow far the matter has progressed. Nelse watches her glumly as she waits uponthe table, and in the evening he sits on a bench behind the stove with hisDRAGHARMONIKA, playing mournful airs and watching her as she goes about herwork. When Alexandra asked Signa whether she thought Nelse was in earnest, thepoor child hid her hands under her apron and murmured, “I don’t know, ma’m. Buthe scolds me about everything, like as if he wanted to have me!”

At Alexandra’s left sat a very old man, barefoot and wearing a long blueblouse, open at the neck. His shaggy head is scarcely whiter than it wassixteen years ago, but his little blue eyes have become pale and watery, andhis ruddy face is withered, like an apple that has clung all winter to thetree. When Ivar lost his land through mismanagement a dozen years ago,Alexandra took him in, and he has been a member of her household ever since. Heis too old to work in the fields, but he hitches and unhitches the work-teamsand looks after the health of the stock. Sometimes of a winter eveningAlexandra calls him into the sitting-room to read the Bible aloud to her, forhe still reads very well. He dislikes human habitations, so Alexandra hasfitted him up a room in the barn, where he is very comfortable, being near thehorses and, as he says, further from temptations. No one has ever found outwhat his temptations are. In cold weather he sits by the kitchen fire and makeshammocks or mends harness until it is time to go to bed. Then he says hisprayers at great length behind the stove, puts on his buffalo-skin coat andgoes out to his room in the barn.

Alexandra herself has changed very little. Her figure is fuller, and she hasmore color. She seems sunnier and more vigorous than she did as a young girl.But she still has the same calmness and deliberation of manner, the same cleareyes, and she still wears her hair in two braids wound round her head. It is socurly that fiery ends escape from the braids and make her head look like one ofthe big double sunflowers that fringe her vegetable garden. Her face is alwaystanned in summer, for her sunbonnet is oftener on her arm than on her head. Butwhere her collar falls away from her neck, or where her sleeves are pushed backfrom her wrist, the skin is of such smoothness and whiteness as none butSwedish women ever possess; skin with the freshness of the snow itself.

Alexandra did not talk much at the table, but she encouraged her men to talk,and she always listened attentively, even when they seemed to be talkingfoolishly.

To-day Barney Flinn, the big red-headed Irishman who had been with Alexandrafor five years and who was actually her foreman, though he had no such title,was grumbling about the new silo she had put up that spring. It happened to bethe first silo on the Divide, and Alexandra’s neighbors and her men wereskeptical about it. “To be sure, if the thing don’t work, we’ll have plenty offeed without it, indeed,” Barney conceded.

Nelse Jensen, Signa’s gloomy suitor, had his word. “Lou, he says he wouldn’thave no silo on his place if you’d give it to him. He says the feed outen itgives the stock the bloat. He heard of somebody lost four head of horses,feedin’ ’em that stuff.”

Alexandra looked down the table from one to another. “Well, the only way we canfind out is to try. Lou and I have different notions about feeding stock, andthat’s a good thing. It’s bad if all the members of a family think alike. Theynever get anywhere. Lou can learn by my mistakes and I can learn by his. Isn’tthat fair, Barney?”

The Irishman laughed. He had no love for Lou, who was always uppish with himand who said that Alexandra paid her hands too much. “I’ve no thought but togive the thing an honest try, mum. ’T would be only right, after puttin’ somuch expense into it. Maybe Emil will come out an’ have a look at it wid me.”He pushed back his chair, took his hat from the nail, and marched out withEmil, who, with his university ideas, was supposed to have instigated the silo.The other hands followed them, all except old Ivar. He had been depressedthroughout the meal and had paid no heed to the talk of the men, even when theymentioned cornstalk bloat, upon which he was sure to have opinions.

“Did you want to speak to me, Ivar?” Alexandra asked as she rose from thetable. “Come into the sitting-room.”

The old man followed Alexandra, but when she motioned him to a chair he shookhis head. She took up her workbasket and waited for him to speak. He stoodlooking at the carpet, his bushy head bowed, his hands clasped in front of him.Ivar’s bandy legs seemed to have grown shorter with years, and they werecompletely misfitted to his broad, thick body and heavy shoulders.

“Well, Ivar, what is it?” Alexandra asked after she had waited longer thanusual.

Ivar had never learned to speak English and his Norwegian was quaint and grave,like the speech of the more old-fashioned people. He always addressed Alexandrain terms of the deepest respect, hoping to set a good example to the kitchengirls, whom he thought too familiar in their manners.

“Mistress,” he began faintly, without raising his eyes, “the folk have beenlooking coldly at me of late. You know there has been talk.”

“Talk about what, Ivar?”

“About sending me away; to the asylum.”

Alexandra put down her sewing-basket. “Nobody has come to me with such talk,”she said decidedly. “Why need you listen? You know I would never consent tosuch a thing.”

Ivar lifted his shaggy head and looked at her out of his little eyes. “They saythat you cannot prevent it if the folk complain of me, if your brotherscomplain to the authorities. They say that your brothers are afraid—Godforbid!—that I may do you some injury when my spells are on me. Mistress, howcan any one think that?—that I could bite the hand that fed me!” The tearstrickled down on the old man’s beard.

Alexandra frowned. “Ivar, I wonder at you, that you should come bothering mewith such nonsense. I am still running my own house, and other people havenothing to do with either you or me. So long as I am suited with you, there isnothing to be said.”

Ivar pulled a red handkerchief out of the breast of his blouse and wiped hiseyes and beard. “But I should not wish you to keep me if, as they say, it isagainst your interests, and if it is hard for you to get hands because I amhere.”

Alexandra made an impatient gesture, but the old man put out his hand and wenton earnestly:—

“Listen, mistress, it is right that you should take these things into account.You know that my spells come from God, and that I would not harm any livingcreature. You believe that every one should worship God in the way revealed tohim. But that is not the way of this country. The way here is for all to doalike. I am despised because I do not wear shoes, because I do not cut my hair,and because I have visions. At home, in the old country, there were many likeme, who had been touched by God, or who had seen things in the graveyard atnight and were different afterward. We thought nothing of it, and let themalone. But here, if a man is different in his feet or in his head, they put himin the asylum. Look at Peter Kralik; when he was a boy, drinking out of acreek, he swallowed a snake, and always after that he could eat only such foodas the creature liked, for when he ate anything else, it became enraged andgnawed him. When he felt it whipping about in him, he drank alcohol to stupefyit and get some ease for himself. He could work as good as any man, and hishead was clear, but they locked him up for being different in his stomach. Thatis the way; they have built the asylum for people who are different, and theywill not even let us live in the holes with the badgers. Only your greatprosperity has protected me so far. If you had had ill-fortune, they would havetaken me to Hastings long ago.”

As Ivar talked, his gloom lifted. Alexandra had found that she could oftenbreak his fasts and long penances by talking to him and letting him pour outthe thoughts that troubled him. Sympathy always cleared his mind, and ridiculewas poison to him.

“There is a great deal in what you say, Ivar. Like as not they will be wantingto take me to Hastings because I have built a silo; and then I may take youwith me. But at present I need you here. Only don’t come to me again telling mewhat people say. Let people go on talking as they like, and we will go onliving as we think best. You have been with me now for twelve years, and I havegone to you for advice oftener than I have ever gone to any one. That ought tosatisfy you.”

Ivar bowed humbly. “Yes, mistress, I shall not trouble you with their talkagain. And as for my feet, I have observed your wishes all these years, thoughyou have never questioned me; washing them every night, even in winter.”

Alexandra laughed. “Oh, never mind about your feet, Ivar. We can remember whenhalf our neighbors went barefoot in summer. I expect old Mrs. Lee would love toslip her shoes off now sometimes, if she dared. I’m glad I’m not Lou’smother-in-law.”

Ivar looked about mysteriously and lowered his voice almost to a whisper. “Youknow what they have over at Lou’s house? A great white tub, like the stonewater-troughs in the old country, to wash themselves in. When you sent me overwith the strawberries, they were all in town but the old woman Lee and thebaby. She took me in and showed me the thing, and she told me it was impossibleto wash yourself clean in it, because, in so much water, you could not make astrong suds. So when they fill it up and send her in there, she pretends, andmakes a splashing noise. Then, when they are all asleep, she washes herself ina little wooden tub she keeps under her bed.”

Alexandra shook with laughter. “Poor old Mrs. Lee! They won’t let her wearnightcaps, either. Never mind; when she comes to visit me, she can do all theold things in the old way, and have as much beer as she wants. We’ll start anasylum for old-time people, Ivar.”

Ivar folded his big handkerchief carefully and thrust it back into his blouse.“This is always the way, mistress. I come to you sorrowing, and you send meaway with a light heart. And will you be so good as to tell the Irishman thathe is not to work the brown gelding until the sore on its shoulder is healed?”

“That I will. Now go and put Emil’s mare to the cart. I am going to drive up tothe north quarter to meet the man from town who is to buy my alfalfa hay.”

III

Alexandra was to hear more of Ivar’s case, however. On Sunday her marriedbrothers came to dinner. She had asked them for that day because Emil, whohated family parties, would be absent, dancing at Amédée Chevalier’s wedding,up in the French country. The table was set for company in the dining-room,where highly varnished wood and colored glass and useless pieces of china wereconspicuous enough to satisfy the standards of the new prosperity. Alexandrahad put herself into the hands of the Hanover furniture dealer, and he hadconscientiously done his best to make her dining-room look like his displaywindow. She said frankly that she knew nothing about such things, and she waswilling to be governed by the general conviction that the more useless andutterly unusable objects were, the greater their virtue as ornament. Thatseemed reasonable enough. Since she liked plain things herself, it was all themore necessary to have jars and punchbowls and candlesticks in the companyrooms for people who did appreciate them. Her guests liked to see about themthese reassuring emblems of prosperity.

The family party was complete except for Emil, and Oscar’s wife who, in thecountry phrase, “was not going anywhere just now.” Oscar sat at the foot of thetable and his four tow-headed little boys, aged from twelve to five, wereranged at one side. Neither Oscar nor Lou has changed much; they have simply,as Alexandra said of them long ago, grown to be more and more like themselves.Lou now looks the older of the two; his face is thin and shrewd and wrinkledabout the eyes, while Oscar’s is thick and dull. For all his dullness, however,Oscar makes more money than his brother, which adds to Lou’s sharpness anduneasiness and tempts him to make a show. The trouble with Lou is that he istricky, and his neighbors have found out that, as Ivar says, he has not a fox’sface for nothing. Politics being the natural field for such talents, heneglects his farm to attend conventions and to run for county offices.

Lou’s wife, formerly Annie Lee, has grown to look curiously like her husband.Her face has become longer, sharper, more aggressive. She wears her yellow hairin a high pompadour, and is bedecked with rings and chains and “beauty pins.”Her tight, high-heeled shoes give her an awkward walk, and she is always moreor less preoccupied with her clothes. As she sat at the table, she kept tellingher youngest daughter to “be careful now, and not drop anything on mother.”

The conversation at the table was all in English. Oscar’s wife, from themalaria district of Missouri, was ashamed of marrying a foreigner, and his boysdo not understand a word of Swedish. Annie and Lou sometimes speak Swedish athome, but Annie is almost as much afraid of being “caught” at it as ever hermother was of being caught barefoot. Oscar still has a thick accent, but Louspeaks like anybody from Iowa.

“When I was in Hastings to attend the convention,” he was saying, “I saw thesuperintendent of the asylum, and I was telling him about Ivar’s symptoms. Hesays Ivar’s case is one of the most dangerous kind, and it’s a wonder he hasn’tdone something violent before this.”

Alexandra laughed good-humoredly. “Oh, nonsense, Lou! The doctors would have usall crazy if they could. Ivar’s queer, certainly, but he has more sense thanhalf the hands I hire.”

Lou flew at his fried chicken. “Oh, I guess the doctor knows his business,Alexandra. He was very much surprised when I told him how you’d put up withIvar. He says he’s likely to set fire to the barn any night, or to take afteryou and the girls with an axe.”

Little Signa, who was waiting on the table, giggled and fled to the kitchen.Alexandra’s eyes twinkled. “That was too much for Signa, Lou. We all know thatIvar’s perfectly harmless. The girls would as soon expect me to chase them withan axe.”

Lou flushed and signaled to his wife. “All the same, the neighbors will behaving a say about it before long. He may burn anybody’s barn. It’s onlynecessary for one property-owner in the township to make complaint, and he’llbe taken up by force. You’d better send him yourself and not have any hardfeelings.”

Alexandra helped one of her little nephews to gravy. “Well, Lou, if any of theneighbors try that, I’ll have myself appointed Ivar’s guardian and take thecase to court, that’s all. I am perfectly satisfied with him.”

“Pass the preserves, Lou,” said Annie in a warning tone. She had reasons fornot wishing her husband to cross Alexandra too openly. “But don’t you sort ofhate to have people see him around here, Alexandra?” she went on withpersuasive smoothness. “He IS a disgraceful object, and you’re fixed up so nicenow. It sort of makes people distant with you, when they never know whenthey’ll hear him scratching about. My girls are afraid as death of him, aren’tyou, Milly, dear?”

Milly was fifteen, fat and jolly and pompadoured, with a creamy complexion,square white teeth, and a short upper lip. She looked like her grandmotherBergson, and had her comfortable and comfort-loving nature. She grinned at heraunt, with whom she was a great deal more at ease than she was with her mother.Alexandra winked a reply.

“Milly needn’t be afraid of Ivar. She’s an especial favorite of his. In myopinion Ivar has just as much right to his own way of dressing and thinking aswe have. But I’ll see that he doesn’t bother other people. I’ll keep him athome, so don’t trouble any more about him, Lou. I’ve been wanting to ask youabout your new bathtub. How does it work?”

Annie came to the fore to give Lou time to recover himself. “Oh, it workssomething grand! I can’t keep him out of it. He washes himself all over threetimes a week now, and uses all the hot water. I think it’s weakening to stay inas long as he does. You ought to have one, Alexandra.”

“I’m thinking of it. I might have one put in the barn for Ivar, if it will easepeople’s minds. But before I get a bathtub, I’m going to get a piano forMilly.”

Oscar, at the end of the table, looked up from his plate. “What does Milly wantof a pianny? What’s the matter with her organ? She can make some use of that,and play in church.”

Annie looked flustered. She had begged Alexandra not to say anything about thisplan before Oscar, who was apt to be jealous of what his sister did for Lou’schildren. Alexandra did not get on with Oscar’s wife at all. “Milly can play inchurch just the same, and she’ll still play on the organ. But practising on itso much spoils her touch. Her teacher says so,” Annie brought out with spirit.

Oscar rolled his eyes. “Well, Milly must have got on pretty good if she’s gotpast the organ. I know plenty of grown folks that ain’t,” he said bluntly.

Annie threw up her chin. “She has got on good, and she’s going to play for hercommencement when she graduates in town next year.”

“Yes,” said Alexandra firmly, “I think Milly deserves a piano. All the girlsaround here have been taking lessons for years, but Milly is the only one ofthem who can ever play anything when you ask her. I’ll tell you when I firstthought I would like to give you a piano, Milly, and that was when you learnedthat book of old Swedish songs that your grandfather used to sing. He had asweet tenor voice, and when he was a young man he loved to sing. I can rememberhearing him singing with the sailors down in the shipyard, when I was no biggerthan Stella here,” pointing to Annie’s younger daughter.

Milly and Stella both looked through the door into the sitting-room, where acrayon portrait of John Bergson hung on the wall. Alexandra had had it madefrom a little photograph, taken for his friends just before he left Sweden; aslender man of thirty-five, with soft hair curling about his high forehead, adrooping mustache, and wondering, sad eyes that looked forward into thedistance, as if they already beheld the New World.

After dinner Lou and Oscar went to the orchard to pick cherries—they hadneither of them had the patience to grow an orchard of their own—and Annie wentdown to gossip with Alexandra’s kitchen girls while they washed the dishes. Shecould always find out more about Alexandra’s domestic economy from theprattling maids than from Alexandra herself, and what she discovered she usedto her own advantage with Lou. On the Divide, farmers’ daughters no longer wentout into service, so Alexandra got her girls from Sweden, by paying their fareover. They stayed with her until they married, and were replaced by sisters orcousins from the old country.

Alexandra took her three nieces into the flower garden. She was fond of thelittle girls, especially of Milly, who came to spend a week with her aunt nowand then, and read aloud to her from the old books about the house, or listenedto stories about the early days on the Divide. While they were walking amongthe flower beds, a buggy drove up the hill and stopped in front of the gate. Aman got out and stood talking to the driver. The little girls were delighted atthe advent of a stranger, some one from very far away, they knew by hisclothes, his gloves, and the sharp, pointed cut of his dark beard. The girlsfell behind their aunt and peeped out at him from among the castor beans. Thestranger came up to the gate and stood holding his hat in his hand, smiling,while Alexandra advanced slowly to meet him. As she approached he spoke in alow, pleasant voice.

“Don’t you know me, Alexandra? I would have known you, anywhere.”

Alexandra shaded her eyes with her hand. Suddenly she took a quick stepforward. “Can it be!” she exclaimed with feeling; “can it be that it is CarlLinstrum? Why, Carl, it is!” She threw out both her hands and caught his acrossthe gate. “Sadie, Milly, run tell your father and Uncle Oscar that our oldfriend Carl Linstrum is here. Be quick! Why, Carl, how did it happen? I can’tbelieve this!” Alexandra shook the tears from her eyes and laughed.

The stranger nodded to his driver, dropped his suitcase inside the fence, andopened the gate. “Then you are glad to see me, and you can put me up overnight?I couldn’t go through this country without stopping off to have a look at you.How little you have changed! Do you know, I was sure it would be like that. Yousimply couldn’t be different. How fine you are!” He stepped back and looked ather admiringly.

Alexandra blushed and laughed again. “But you yourself, Carl—with thatbeard—how could I have known you? You went away a little boy.” She reached forhis suitcase and when he intercepted her she threw up her hands. “You see, Igive myself away. I have only women come to visit me, and I do not know how tobehave. Where is your trunk?”

“It’s in Hanover. I can stay only a few days. I am on my way to the coast.”

They started up the path. “A few days? After all these years!” Alexandra shookher finger at him. “See this, you have walked into a trap. You do not get awayso easy.” She put her hand affectionately on his shoulder. “You owe me a visitfor the sake of old times. Why must you go to the coast at all?”

“Oh, I must! I am a fortune hunter. From Seattle I go on to Alaska.”

“Alaska?” She looked at him in astonishment. “Are you going to paint theIndians?”

“Paint?” the young man frowned. “Oh! I’m not a painter, Alexandra. I’m anengraver. I have nothing to do with painting.”

“But on my parlor wall I have the paintings—”

He interrupted nervously. “Oh, water-color sketches—done for amusement. I sentthem to remind you of me, not because they were good. What a wonderful placeyou have made of this, Alexandra.” He turned and looked back at the wide,map-like prospect of field and hedge and pasture. “I would never have believedit could be done. I’m disappointed in my own eye, in my imagination.”

At this moment Lou and Oscar came up the hill from the orchard. They did notquicken their pace when they saw Carl; indeed, they did not openly look in hisdirection. They advanced distrustfully, and as if they wished the distance werelonger.

Alexandra beckoned to them. “They think I am trying to fool them. Come, boys,it’s Carl Linstrum, our old Carl!”

Lou gave the visitor a quick, sidelong glance and thrust out his hand. “Glad tosee you.”

Oscar followed with “How d’ do.” Carl could not tell whether their offishnesscame from unfriendliness or from embarrassment. He and Alexandra led the way tothe porch.

“Carl,” Alexandra explained, “is on his way to Seattle. He is going to Alaska.”

Oscar studied the visitor’s yellow shoes. “Got business there?” he asked.

Carl laughed. “Yes, very pressing business. I’m going there to get rich.Engraving’s a very interesting profession, but a man never makes any money atit. So I’m going to try the goldfields.”

Alexandra felt that this was a tactful speech, and Lou looked up with someinterest. “Ever done anything in that line before?”

“No, but I’m going to join a friend of mine who went out from New York and hasdone well. He has offered to break me in.”

“Turrible cold winters, there, I hear,” remarked Oscar. “I thought people wentup there in the spring.”

“They do. But my friend is going to spend the winter in Seattle and I am tostay with him there and learn something about prospecting before we start northnext year.”

Lou looked skeptical. “Let’s see, how long have you been away from here?”

“Sixteen years. You ought to remember that, Lou, for you were married justafter we went away.”

“Going to stay with us some time?” Oscar asked.

“A few days, if Alexandra can keep me.”

“I expect you’ll be wanting to see your old place,” Lou observed morecordially. “You won’t hardly know it. But there’s a few chunks of your old sodhouse left. Alexandra wouldn’t never let Frank Shabata plough over it.”

Annie Lee, who, ever since the visitor was announced, had been touching up herhair and settling her lace and wishing she had worn another dress, now emergedwith her three daughters and introduced them. She was greatly impressed byCarl’s urban appearance, and in her excitement talked very loud and threw herhead about. “And you ain’t married yet? At your age, now! Think of that! You’llhave to wait for Milly. Yes, we’ve got a boy, too. The youngest. He’s at homewith his grandma. You must come over to see mother and hear Milly play. She’sthe musician of the family. She does pyrography, too. That’s burnt wood, youknow. You wouldn’t believe what she can do with her poker. Yes, she goes toschool in town, and she is the youngest in her class by two years.”

Milly looked uncomfortable and Carl took her hand again. He liked her creamyskin and happy, innocent eyes, and he could see that her mother’s way oftalking distressed her. “I’m sure she’s a clever little girl,” he murmured,looking at her thoughtfully. “Let me see—Ah, it’s your mother that she lookslike, Alexandra. Mrs. Bergson must have looked just like this when she was alittle girl. Does Milly run about over the country as you and Alexandra usedto, Annie?”

Milly’s mother protested. “Oh, my, no! Things has changed since we was girls.Milly has it very different. We are going to rent the place and move into townas soon as the girls are old enough to go out into company. A good many aredoing that here now. Lou is going into business.”

Lou grinned. “That’s what she says. You better go get your things on. Ivar’shitching up,” he added, turning to Annie.

Young farmers seldom address their wives by name. It is always “you,” or “she.”

Having got his wife out of the way, Lou sat down on the step and began towhittle. “Well, what do folks in New York think of William Jennings Bryan?” Loubegan to bluster, as he always did when he talked politics. “We gave WallStreet a scare in ninety-six, all right, and we’re fixing another to hand them.Silver wasn’t the only issue,” he nodded mysteriously. “There’s a good manythings got to be changed. The West is going to make itself heard.”

Carl laughed. “But, surely, it did do that, if nothing else.”

Lou’s thin face reddened up to the roots of his bristly hair. “Oh, we’ve onlybegun. We’re waking up to a sense of our responsibilities, out here, and weain’t afraid, neither. You fellows back there must be a tame lot. If you hadany nerve you’d get together and march down to Wall Street and blow it up.Dynamite it, I mean,” with a threatening nod.

He was so much in earnest that Carl scarcely knew how to answer him. “Thatwould be a waste of powder. The same business would go on in another street.The street doesn’t matter. But what have you fellows out here got to kickabout? You have the only safe place there is. Morgan himself couldn’t touchyou. One only has to drive through this country to see that you’re all as richas barons.”

“We have a good deal more to say than we had when we were poor,” said Louthreateningly. “We’re getting on to a whole lot of things.”

As Ivar drove a double carriage up to the gate, Annie came out in a hat thatlooked like the model of a battleship. Carl rose and took her down to thecarriage, while Lou lingered for a word with his sister.

“What do you suppose he’s come for?” he asked, jerking his head toward thegate.

“Why, to pay us a visit. I’ve been begging him to for years.”

Oscar looked at Alexandra. “He didn’t let you know he was coming?”

“No. Why should he? I told him to come at any time.”

Lou shrugged his shoulders. “He doesn’t seem to have done much for himself.Wandering around this way!”

Oscar spoke solemnly, as from the depths of a cavern. “He never was muchaccount.”

Alexandra left them and hurried down to the gate where Annie was rattling on toCarl about her new dining-room furniture. “You must bring Mr. Linstrum overreal soon, only be sure to telephone me first,” she called back, as Carl helpedher into the carriage. Old Ivar, his white head bare, stood holding the horses.Lou came down the path and climbed into the front seat, took up the reins, anddrove off without saying anything further to any one. Oscar picked up hisyoungest boy and trudged off down the road, the other three trotting after him.Carl, holding the gate open for Alexandra, began to laugh. “Up and coming onthe Divide, eh, Alexandra?” he cried gayly.

IV

Carl had changed, Alexandra felt, much less than one might have expected. Hehad not become a trim, self-satisfied city man. There was still somethinghomely and wayward and definitely personal about him. Even his clothes, hisNorfolk coat and his very high collars, were a little unconventional. He seemedto shrink into himself as he used to do; to hold himself away from things, asif he were afraid of being hurt. In short, he was more self-conscious than aman of thirty-five is expected to be. He looked older than his years and notvery strong. His black hair, which still hung in a triangle over his paleforehead, was thin at the crown, and there were fine, relentless lines abouthis eyes. His back, with its high, sharp shoulders, looked like the back of anover-worked German professor off on his holiday. His face was intelligent,sensitive, unhappy.

That evening after supper, Carl and Alexandra were sitting by the clump ofcastor beans in the middle of the flower garden. The gravel paths glittered inthe moonlight, and below them the fields lay white and still.

“Do you know, Alexandra,” he was saying, “I’ve been thinking how strangelythings work out. I’ve been away engraving other men’s pictures, and you’vestayed at home and made your own.” He pointed with his cigar toward thesleeping landscape. “How in the world have you done it? How have your neighborsdone it?”

“We hadn’t any of us much to do with it, Carl. The land did it. It had itslittle joke. It pretended to be poor because nobody knew how to work it right;and then, all at once, it worked itself. It woke up out of its sleep andstretched itself, and it was so big, so rich, that we suddenly found we wererich, just from sitting still. As for me, you remember when I began to buyland. For years after that I was always squeezing and borrowing until I wasashamed to show my face in the banks. And then, all at once, men began to cometo me offering to lend me money—and I didn’t need it! Then I went ahead andbuilt this house. I really built it for Emil. I want you to see Emil, Carl. Heis so different from the rest of us!”

“How different?”

“Oh, you’ll see! I’m sure it was to have sons like Emil, and to give them achance, that father left the old country. It’s curious, too; on the outsideEmil is just like an American boy,—he graduated from the State University inJune, you know,—but underneath he is more Swedish than any of us. Sometimes heis so like father that he frightens me; he is so violent in his feelings likethat.”

“Is he going to farm here with you?”

“He shall do whatever he wants to,” Alexandra declared warmly. “He is going tohave a chance, a whole chance; that’s what I’ve worked for. Sometimes he talksabout studying law, and sometimes, just lately, he’s been talking about goingout into the sand hills and taking up more land. He has his sad times, likefather. But I hope he won’t do that. We have land enough, at last!” Alexandralaughed.

“How about Lou and Oscar? They’ve done well, haven’t they?”

“Yes, very well; but they are different, and now that they have farms of theirown I do not see so much of them. We divided the land equally when Lou married.They have their own way of doing things, and they do not altogether like myway, I am afraid. Perhaps they think me too independent. But I have had tothink for myself a good many years and am not likely to change. On the whole,though, we take as much comfort in each other as most brothers and sisters do.And I am very fond of Lou’s oldest daughter.”

“I think I liked the old Lou and Oscar better, and they probably feel the sameabout me. I even, if you can keep a secret,”—Carl leaned forward and touchedher arm, smiling,—“I even think I liked the old country better. This is allvery splendid in its way, but there was something about this country when itwas a wild old beast that has haunted me all these years. Now, when I come backto all this milk and honey, I feel like the old German song, ‘Wo bist du, wobist du, mein geliebtest Land?’—Do you ever feel like that, I wonder?”

“Yes, sometimes, when I think about father and mother and those who are gone;so many of our old neighbors.” Alexandra paused and looked up thoughtfully atthe stars. “We can remember the graveyard when it was wild prairie, Carl, andnow—”

“And now the old story has begun to write itself over there,” said Carl softly.“Isn’t it queer: there are only two or three human stories, and they go onrepeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before; like thelarks in this country, that have been singing the same five notes over forthousands of years.”

“Oh, yes! The young people, they live so hard. And yet I sometimes envy them.There is my little neighbor, now; the people who bought your old place. Iwouldn’t have sold it to any one else, but I was always fond of that girl. Youmust remember her, little Marie Tovesky, from Omaha, who used to visit here?When she was eighteen she ran away from the convent school and got married,crazy child! She came out here a bride, with her father and husband. He hadnothing, and the old man was willing to buy them a place and set them up. Yourfarm took her fancy, and I was glad to have her so near me. I’ve never beensorry, either. I even try to get along with Frank on her account.”

“Is Frank her husband?”

“Yes. He’s one of these wild fellows. Most Bohemians are good-natured, butFrank thinks we don’t appreciate him here, I guess. He’s jealous abouteverything, his farm and his horses and his pretty wife. Everybody likes her,just the same as when she was little. Sometimes I go up to the Catholic churchwith Emil, and it’s funny to see Marie standing there laughing and shakinghands with people, looking so excited and gay, with Frank sulking behind her asif he could eat everybody alive. Frank’s not a bad neighbor, but to get on withhim you’ve got to make a fuss over him and act as if you thought he was a veryimportant person all the time, and different from other people. I find it hardto keep that up from one year’s end to another.”

“I shouldn’t think you’d be very successful at that kind of thing, Alexandra.”Carl seemed to find the idea amusing.

“Well,” said Alexandra firmly, “I do the best I can, on Marie’s account. Shehas it hard enough, anyway. She’s too young and pretty for this sort of life.We’re all ever so much older and slower. But she’s the kind that won’t bedowned easily. She’ll work all day and go to a Bohemian wedding and dance allnight, and drive the hay wagon for a cross man next morning. I could stay by ajob, but I never had the go in me that she has, when I was going my best. I’llhave to take you over to see her to-morrow.”

Carl dropped the end of his cigar softly among the castor beans and sighed.“Yes, I suppose I must see the old place. I’m cowardly about things that remindme of myself. It took courage to come at all, Alexandra. I wouldn’t have, if Ihadn’t wanted to see you very, very much.”

Alexandra looked at him with her calm, deliberate eyes. “Why do you dreadthings like that, Carl?” she asked earnestly. “Why are you dissatisfied withyourself?”

Her visitor winced. “How direct you are, Alexandra! Just like you used to be.Do I give myself away so quickly? Well, you see, for one thing, there’s nothingto look forward to in my profession. Wood-engraving is the only thing I careabout, and that had gone out before I began. Everything’s cheap metal worknowadays, touching up miserable photographs, forcing up poor drawings, andspoiling good ones. I’m absolutely sick of it all.” Carl frowned. “Alexandra,all the way out from New York I’ve been planning how I could deceive you andmake you think me a very enviable fellow, and here I am telling you the truththe first night. I waste a lot of time pretending to people, and the joke of itis, I don’t think I ever deceive any one. There are too many of my kind; peopleknow us on sight.”

Carl paused. Alexandra pushed her hair back from her brow with a puzzled,thoughtful gesture. “You see,” he went on calmly, “measured by your standardshere, I’m a failure. I couldn’t buy even one of your cornfields. I’ve enjoyed agreat many things, but I’ve got nothing to show for it all.”

“But you show for it yourself, Carl. I’d rather have had your freedom than myland.”

Carl shook his head mournfully. “Freedom so often means that one isn’t neededanywhere. Here you are an individual, you have a background of your own, youwould be missed. But off there in the cities there are thousands of rollingstones like me. We are all alike; we have no ties, we know nobody, we ownnothing. When one of us dies, they scarcely know where to bury him. Ourlandlady and the delicatessen man are our mourners, and we leave nothing behindus but a frock-coat and a fiddle, or an easel, or a typewriter, or whatevertool we got our living by. All we have ever managed to do is to pay our rent,the exorbitant rent that one has to pay for a few square feet of space near theheart of things. We have no house, no place, no people of our own. We live inthe streets, in the parks, in the theatres. We sit in restaurants and concerthalls and look about at the hundreds of our own kind and shudder.”

Alexandra was silent. She sat looking at the silver spot the moon made on thesurface of the pond down in the pasture. He knew that she understood what hemeant. At last she said slowly, “And yet I would rather have Emil grow up likethat than like his two brothers. We pay a high rent, too, though we paydifferently. We grow hard and heavy here. We don’t move lightly and easily asyou do, and our minds get stiff. If the world were no wider than my cornfields,if there were not something beside this, I wouldn’t feel that it was much worthwhile to work. No, I would rather have Emil like you than like them. I feltthat as soon as you came.”

“I wonder why you feel like that?” Carl mused.

“I don’t know. Perhaps I am like Carrie Jensen, the sister of one of my hiredmen. She had never been out of the cornfields, and a few years ago she gotdespondent and said life was just the same thing over and over, and she didn’tsee the use of it. After she had tried to kill herself once or twice, her folksgot worried and sent her over to Iowa to visit some relations. Ever since she’scome back she’s been perfectly cheerful, and she says she’s contented to liveand work in a world that’s so big and interesting. She said that anything asbig as the bridges over the Platte and the Missouri reconciled her. And it’swhat goes on in the world that reconciles me.”

V

Alexandra did not find time to go to her neighbor’s the next day, nor the next.It was a busy season on the farm, with the corn-plowing going on, and even Emilwas in the field with a team and cultivator. Carl went about over the farmswith Alexandra in the morning, and in the afternoon and evening they found agreat deal to talk about. Emil, for all his track practice, did not stand upunder farmwork very well, and by night he was too tired to talk or even topractise on his cornet.

On Wednesday morning Carl got up before it was light, and stole downstairs andout of the kitchen door just as old Ivar was making his morning ablutions atthe pump. Carl nodded to him and hurried up the draw, past the garden, and intothe pasture where the milking cows used to be kept.

The dawn in the east looked like the light from some great fire that wasburning under the edge of the world. The color was reflected in the globules ofdew that sheathed the short gray pasture grass. Carl walked rapidly until hecame to the crest of the second hill, where the Bergson pasture joined the onethat had belonged to his father. There he sat down and waited for the sun torise. It was just there that he and Alexandra used to do their milkingtogether, he on his side of the fence, she on hers. He could remember exactlyhow she looked when she came over the close-cropped grass, her skirts pinnedup, her head bare, a bright tin pail in either hand, and the milky light of theearly morning all about her. Even as a boy he used to feel, when he saw hercoming with her free step, her upright head and calm shoulders, that she lookedas if she had walked straight out of the morning itself. Since then, when hehad happened to see the sun come up in the country or on the water, he hadoften remembered the young Swedish girl and her milking pails.

Carl sat musing until the sun leaped above the prairie, and in the grass abouthim all the small creatures of day began to tune their tiny instruments. Birdsand insects without number began to chirp, to twitter, to snap and whistle, tomake all manner of fresh shrill noises. The pasture was flooded with light;every clump of ironweed and snow-on-the-mountain threw a long shadow, and thegolden light seemed to be rippling through the curly grass like the tide racingin.

He crossed the fence into the pasture that was now the Shabatas’ and continuedhis walk toward the pond. He had not gone far, however, when he discovered thathe was not the only person abroad. In the draw below, his gun in his hands, wasEmil, advancing cautiously, with a young woman beside him. They were movingsoftly, keeping close together, and Carl knew that they expected to find duckson the pond. At the moment when they came in sight of the bright spot of water,he heard a whirr of wings and the ducks shot up into the air. There was a sharpcrack from the gun, and five of the birds fell to the ground. Emil and hiscompanion laughed delightedly, and Emil ran to pick them up. When he came back,dangling the ducks by their feet, Marie held her apron and he dropped them intoit. As she stood looking down at them, her face changed. She took up one of thebirds, a rumpled ball of feathers with the blood dripping slowly from itsmouth, and looked at the live color that still burned on its plumage.

As she let it fall, she cried in distress, “Oh, Emil, why did you?”

“I like that!” the boy exclaimed indignantly. “Why, Marie, you asked me to comeyourself.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” she said tearfully, “but I didn’t think. I hate to see themwhen they are first shot. They were having such a good time, and we’ve spoiledit all for them.”

Emil gave a rather sore laugh. “I should say we had! I’m not going hunting withyou any more. You’re as bad as Ivar. Here, let me take them.” He snatched theducks out of her apron.

“Don’t be cross, Emil. Only—Ivar’s right about wild things. They’re too happyto kill. You can tell just how they felt when they flew up. They were scared,but they didn’t really think anything could hurt them. No, we won’t do that anymore.”

“All right,” Emil assented. “I’m sorry I made you feel bad.” As he looked downinto her tearful eyes, there was a curious, sharp young bitterness in his own.

Carl watched them as they moved slowly down the draw. They had not seen him atall. He had not overheard much of their dialogue, but he felt the import of it.It made him, somehow, unreasonably mournful to find two young things abroad inthe pasture in the early morning. He decided that he needed his breakfast.

VI

At dinner that day Alexandra said she thought they must really manage to goover to the Shabatas’ that afternoon. “It’s not often I let three days go bywithout seeing Marie. She will think I have forsaken her, now that my oldfriend has come back.”

After the men had gone back to work, Alexandra put on a white dress and hersun-hat, and she and Carl set forth across the fields. “You see we have kept upthe old path, Carl. It has been so nice for me to feel that there was a friendat the other end of it again.”

Carl smiled a little ruefully. “All the same, I hope it hasn’t beenquitethe same.”

Alexandra looked at him with surprise. “Why, no, of course not. Not the same.She could not very well take your place, if that’s what you mean. I’m friendlywith all my neighbors, I hope. But Marie is really a companion, some one I cantalk to quite frankly. You wouldn’t want me to be more lonely than I have been,would you?”

Carl laughed and pushed back the triangular lock of hair with the edge of hishat. “Of course I don’t. I ought to be thankful that this path hasn’t been wornby—well, by friends with more pressing errands than your little Bohemian islikely to have.” He paused to give Alexandra his hand as she stepped over thestile. “Are you the least bit disappointed in our coming together again?” heasked abruptly. “Is it the way you hoped it would be?”

Alexandra smiled at this. “Only better. When I’ve thought about your coming,I’ve sometimes been a little afraid of it. You have lived where things move sofast, and everything is slow here; the people slowest of all. Our lives arelike the years, all made up of weather and crops and cows. How you hated cows!”She shook her head and laughed to herself.

“I didn’t when we milked together. I walked up to the pasture corners thismorning. I wonder whether I shall ever be able to tell you all that I wasthinking about up there. It’s a strange thing, Alexandra; I find it easy to befrank with you about everything under the sun except—yourself!”

“You are afraid of hurting my feelings, perhaps.” Alexandra looked at himthoughtfully.

“No, I’m afraid of giving you a shock. You’ve seen yourself for so long in thedull minds of the people about you, that if I were to tell you how you seem tome, it would startle you. But you must see that you astonish me. You must feelwhen people admire you.”

Alexandra blushed and laughed with some confusion. “I felt that you werepleased with me, if you mean that.”

“And you’ve felt when other people were pleased with you?” he insisted.

“Well, sometimes. The men in town, at the banks and the county offices, seemglad to see me. I think, myself, it is more pleasant to do business with peoplewho are clean and healthy-looking,” she admitted blandly.

Carl gave a little chuckle as he opened the Shabatas’ gate for her. “Oh, doyou?” he asked dryly.

There was no sign of life about the Shabatas’ house except a big yellow cat,sunning itself on the kitchen doorstep.

Alexandra took the path that led to the orchard. “She often sits there andsews. I didn’t telephone her we were coming, because I didn’t want her to go towork and bake cake and freeze ice-cream. She’ll always make a party if you giveher the least excuse. Do you recognize the apple trees, Carl?”

Linstrum looked about him. “I wish I had a dollar for every bucket of waterI’ve carried for those trees. Poor father, he was an easy man, but he wasperfectly merciless when it came to watering the orchard.”

“That’s one thing I like about Germans; they make an orchard grow if they can’tmake anything else. I’m so glad these trees belong to some one who takescomfort in them. When I rented this place, the tenants never kept the orchardup, and Emil and I used to come over and take care of it ourselves. It needsmowing now. There she is, down in the corner. Maria-a-a!” she called.

A recumbent figure started up from the grass and came running toward themthrough the flickering screen of light and shade.

“Look at her! Isn’t she like a little brown rabbit?” Alexandra laughed.

Maria ran up panting and threw her arms about Alexandra. “Oh, I had begun tothink you were not coming at all, maybe. I knew you were so busy. Yes, Emiltold me about Mr. Linstrum being here. Won’t you come up to the house?”

“Why not sit down there in your corner? Carl wants to see the orchard. He keptall these trees alive for years, watering them with his own back.”

Marie turned to Carl. “Then I’m thankful to you, Mr. Linstrum. We’d never havebought the place if it hadn’t been for this orchard, and then I wouldn’t havehad Alexandra, either.” She gave Alexandra’s arm a little squeeze as she walkedbeside her. “How nice your dress smells, Alexandra; you put rosemary leaves inyour chest, like I told you.”

She led them to the northwest corner of the orchard, sheltered on one side by athick mulberry hedge and bordered on the other by a wheatfield, just beginningto yellow. In this corner the ground dipped a little, and the blue-grass, whichthe weeds had driven out in the upper part of the orchard, grew thick andluxuriant. Wild roses were flaming in the tufts of bunchgrass along the fence.Under a white mulberry tree there was an old wagon-seat. Beside it lay a bookand a workbasket.

“You must have the seat, Alexandra. The grass would stain your dress,” thehostess insisted. She dropped down on the ground at Alexandra’s side and tuckedher feet under her. Carl sat at a little distance from the two women, his backto the wheatfield, and watched them. Alexandra took off her shade-hat and threwit on the ground. Marie picked it up and played with the white ribbons,twisting them about her brown fingers as she talked. They made a pretty picturein the strong sunlight, the leafy pattern surrounding them like a net; theSwedish woman so white and gold, kindly and amused, but armored in calm, andthe alert brown one, her full lips parted, points of yellow light dancing inher eyes as she laughed and chattered. Carl had never forgotten little MarieTovesky’s eyes, and he was glad to have an opportunity to study them. The browniris, he found, was curiously slashed with yellow, the color of sunflowerhoney, or of old amber. In each eye one of these streaks must have been largerthan the others, for the effect was that of two dancing points of light, twolittle yellow bubbles, such as rise in a glass of champagne. Sometimes theyseemed like the sparks from a forge. She seemed so easily excited, to kindlewith a fierce little flame if one but breathed upon her. “What a waste,” Carlreflected. “She ought to be doing all that for a sweetheart. How awkwardlythings come about!”

It was not very long before Marie sprang up out of the grass again. “Wait amoment. I want to show you something.” She ran away and disappeared behind thelow-growing apple trees.

“What a charming creature,” Carl murmured. “I don’t wonder that her husband isjealous. But can’t she walk? does she always run?”

Alexandra nodded. “Always. I don’t see many people, but I don’t believe thereare many like her, anywhere.”

Marie came back with a branch she had broken from an apricot tree, laden withpale yellow, pink-cheeked fruit. She dropped it beside Carl. “Did you plantthose, too? They are such beautiful little trees.”

Carl fingered the blue-green leaves, porous like blotting-paper and shaped likebirch leaves, hung on waxen red stems. “Yes, I think I did. Are these thecircus trees, Alexandra?”

“Shall I tell her about them?” Alexandra asked. “Sit down like a good girl,Marie, and don’t ruin my poor hat, and I’ll tell you a story. A long time ago,when Carl and I were, say, sixteen and twelve, a circus came to Hanover and wewent to town in our wagon, with Lou and Oscar, to see the parade. We hadn’tmoney enough to go to the circus. We followed the parade out to the circusgrounds and hung around until the show began and the crowd went inside thetent. Then Lou was afraid we looked foolish standing outside in the pasture, sowe went back to Hanover feeling very sad. There was a man in the streetsselling apricots, and we had never seen any before. He had driven down fromsomewhere up in the French country, and he was selling them twenty-five cents apeck. We had a little money our fathers had given us for candy, and I boughttwo pecks and Carl bought one. They cheered us a good deal, and we saved allthe seeds and planted them. Up to the time Carl went away, they hadn’t borne atall.”

“And now he’s come back to eat them,” cried Marie, nodding at Carl. “That IS agood story. I can remember you a little, Mr. Linstrum. I used to see you inHanover sometimes, when Uncle Joe took me to town. I remember you because youwere always buying pencils and tubes of paint at the drug store. Once, when myuncle left me at the store, you drew a lot of little birds and flowers for meon a piece of wrapping-paper. I kept them for a long while. I thought you werevery romantic because you could draw and had such black eyes.”

Carl smiled. “Yes, I remember that time. Your uncle bought you some kind of amechanical toy, a Turkish lady sitting on an ottoman and smoking a hookah,wasn’t it? And she turned her head backwards and forwards.”

“Oh, yes! Wasn’t she splendid! I knew well enough I ought not to tell Uncle JoeI wanted it, for he had just come back from the saloon and was feeling good.You remember how he laughed? She tickled him, too. But when we got home, myaunt scolded him for buying toys when she needed so many things. We wound ourlady up every night, and when she began to move her head my aunt used to laughas hard as any of us. It was a music-box, you know, and the Turkish lady playeda tune while she smoked. That was how she made you feel so jolly. As I rememberher, she was lovely, and had a gold crescent on her turban.”

Half an hour later, as they were leaving the house, Carl and Alexandra were metin the path by a strapping fellow in overalls and a blue shirt. He wasbreathing hard, as if he had been running, and was muttering to himself.

Marie ran forward, and, taking him by the arm, gave him a little push towardher guests. “Frank, this is Mr. Linstrum.”

Frank took off his broad straw hat and nodded to Alexandra. When he spoke toCarl, he showed a fine set of white teeth. He was burned a dull red down to hisneckband, and there was a heavy three-days’ stubble on his face. Even in hisagitation he was handsome, but he looked a rash and violent man.

Barely saluting the callers, he turned at once to his wife and began, in anoutraged tone, “I have to leave my team to drive the old woman Hiller’s hogsout-a my wheat. I go to take dat old woman to de court if she ain’t careful, Itell you!”

His wife spoke soothingly. “But, Frank, she has only her lame boy to help her.She does the best she can.”

Alexandra looked at the excited man and offered a suggestion. “Why don’t you goover there some afternoon and hog-tight her fences? You’d save time foryourself in the end.”

Frank’s neck stiffened. “Not-a-much, I won’t. I keep my hogs home. Otherpeoples can do like me. See? If that Louis can mend shoes, he can mend fence.”

“Maybe,” said Alexandra placidly; “but I’ve found it sometimes pays to mendother people’s fences. Good-bye, Marie. Come to see me soon.”

Alexandra walked firmly down the path and Carl followed her.

Frank went into the house and threw himself on the sofa, his face to the wall,his clenched fist on his hip. Marie, having seen her guests off, came in andput her hand coaxingly on his shoulder.

“Poor Frank! You’ve run until you’ve made your head ache, now haven’t you? Letme make you some coffee.”

“What else am I to do?” he cried hotly in Bohemian. “Am I to let any oldwoman’s hogs root up my wheat? Is that what I work myself to death for?”

“Don’t worry about it, Frank. I’ll speak to Mrs. Hiller again. But, really, shealmost cried last time they got out, she was so sorry.”

Frank bounced over on his other side. “That’s it; you always side with themagainst me. They all know it. Anybody here feels free to borrow the mower andbreak it, or turn their hogs in on me. They know you won’t care!”

Marie hurried away to make his coffee. When she came back, he was fast asleep.She sat down and looked at him for a long while, very thoughtfully. When thekitchen clock struck six she went out to get supper, closing the door gentlybehind her. She was always sorry for Frank when he worked himself into one ofthese rages, and she was sorry to have him rough and quarrelsome with hisneighbors. She was perfectly aware that the neighbors had a good deal to put upwith, and that they bore with Frank for her sake.

VII

Marie’s father, Albert Tovesky, was one of the more intelligent Bohemians whocame West in the early seventies. He settled in Omaha and became a leader andadviser among his people there. Marie was his youngest child, by a second wife,and was the apple of his eye. She was barely sixteen, and was in the graduatingclass of the Omaha High School, when Frank Shabata arrived from the old countryand set all the Bohemian girls in a flutter. He was easily the buck of thebeer-gardens, and on Sunday he was a sight to see, with his silk hat and tuckedshirt and blue frock-coat, wearing gloves and carrying a little wisp of ayellow cane. He was tall and fair, with splendid teeth and close-cropped yellowcurls, and he wore a slightly disdainful expression, proper for a young manwith high connections, whose mother had a big farm in the Elbe valley. Therewas often an interesting discontent in his blue eyes, and every Bohemian girlhe met imagined herself the cause of that unsatisfied expression. He had a wayof drawing out his cambric handkerchief slowly, by one corner, from hisbreast-pocket, that was melancholy and romantic in the extreme. He took alittle flight with each of the more eligible Bohemian girls, but it was when hewas with little Marie Tovesky that he drew his handkerchief out most slowly,and, after he had lit a fresh cigar, dropped the match most despairingly. Anyone could see, with half an eye, that his proud heart was bleeding forsomebody.

One Sunday, late in the summer after Marie’s graduation, she met Frank at aBohemian picnic down the river and went rowing with him all the afternoon. Whenshe got home that evening she went straight to her father’s room and told himthat she was engaged to Shabata. Old Tovesky was having a comfortable pipebefore he went to bed. When he heard his daughter’s announcement, he firstprudently corked his beer bottle and then leaped to his feet and had a turn oftemper. He characterized Frank Shabata by a Bohemian expression which is theequivalent of stuffed shirt.

“Why don’t he go to work like the rest of us did? His farm in the Elbe valley,indeed! Ain’t he got plenty brothers and sisters? It’s his mother’s farm, andwhy don’t he stay at home and help her? Haven’t I seen his mother out in themorning at five o’clock with her ladle and her big bucket on wheels, puttingliquid manure on the cabbages? Don’t I know the look of old Eva Shabata’shands? Like an old horse’s hoofs they are—and this fellow wearing gloves andrings! Engaged, indeed! You aren’t fit to be out of school, and that’s what’sthe matter with you. I will send you off to the Sisters of the Sacred Heart inSt. Louis, and they will teach you some sense, Iguess!”

Accordingly, the very next week, Albert Tovesky took his daughter, pale andtearful, down the river to the convent. But the way to make Frank want anythingwas to tell him he couldn’t have it. He managed to have an interview with Mariebefore she went away, and whereas he had been only half in love with herbefore, he now persuaded himself that he would not stop at anything. Marie tookwith her to the convent, under the canvas lining of her trunk, the results of alaborious and satisfying morning on Frank’s part; no less than a dozenphotographs of himself, taken in a dozen different love-lorn attitudes. Therewas a little round photograph for her watch-case, photographs for her wall anddresser, and even long narrow ones to be used as bookmarks. More than once thehandsome gentleman was torn to pieces before the French class by an indignantnun.

Marie pined in the convent for a year, until her eighteenth birthday waspassed. Then she met Frank Shabata in the Union Station in St. Louis and ranaway with him. Old Tovesky forgave his daughter because there was nothing elseto do, and bought her a farm in the country that she had loved so well as achild. Since then her story had been a part of the history of the Divide. Sheand Frank had been living there for five years when Carl Linstrum came back topay his long deferred visit to Alexandra. Frank had, on the whole, done betterthan one might have expected. He had flung himself at the soil with savageenergy. Once a year he went to Hastings or to Omaha, on a spree. He stayed awayfor a week or two, and then came home and worked like a demon. He did work; ifhe felt sorry for himself, that was his own affair.

VIII

On the evening of the day of Alexandra’s call at the Shabatas’, a heavy rainset in. Frank sat up until a late hour reading the Sunday newspapers. One ofthe Goulds was getting a divorce, and Frank took it as a personal affront. Inprinting the story of the young man’s marital troubles, the knowing editor gavea sufficiently colored account of his career, stating the amount of his incomeand the manner in which he was supposed to spend it. Frank read English slowly,and the more he read about this divorce case, the angrier he grew. At last hethrew down the page with a snort. He turned to his farm-hand who was readingthe other half of the paper.

“By God! if I have that young feller in de hayfield once, I show him someting.Listen here what he do wit his money.” And Frank began the catalogue of theyoung man’s reputed extravagances.

Marie sighed. She thought it hard that the Goulds, for whom she had nothing butgood will, should make her so much trouble. She hated to see the Sundaynewspapers come into the house. Frank was always reading about the doings ofrich people and feeling outraged. He had an inexhaustible stock of storiesabout their crimes and follies, how they bribed the courts and shot down theirbutlers with impunity whenever they chose. Frank and Lou Bergson had verysimilar ideas, and they were two of the political agitators of the county.

The next morning broke clear and brilliant, but Frank said the ground was toowet to plough, so he took the cart and drove over to Sainte-Agnes to spend theday at Moses Marcel’s saloon. After he was gone, Marie went out to the backporch to begin her butter-making. A brisk wind had come up and was drivingpuffy white clouds across the sky. The orchard was sparkling and rippling inthe sun. Marie stood looking toward it wistfully, her hand on the lid of thechurn, when she heard a sharp ring in the air, the merry sound of the whetstoneon the scythe. That invitation decided her. She ran into the house, put on ashort skirt and a pair of her husband’s boots, caught up a tin pail and startedfor the orchard. Emil had already begun work and was mowing vigorously. When hesaw her coming, he stopped and wiped his brow. His yellow canvas leggings andkhaki trousers were splashed to the knees.

“Don’t let me disturb you, Emil. I’m going to pick cherries. Isn’t everythingbeautiful after the rain? Oh, but I’m glad to get this place mowed! When Iheard it raining in the night, I thought maybe you would come and do it for meto-day. The wind wakened me. Didn’t it blow dreadfully? Just smell the wildroses! They are always so spicy after a rain. We never had so many of them inhere before. I suppose it’s the wet season. Will you have to cut them, too?”

“If I cut the grass, I will,” Emil said teasingly. “What’s the matter with you?What makes you so flighty?”

“Am I flighty? I suppose that’s the wet season, too, then. It’s exciting to seeeverything growing so fast,—and to get the grass cut! Please leave the rosestill last, if you must cut them. Oh, I don’t mean all of them, I mean that lowplace down by my tree, where there are so many. Aren’t you splashed! Look atthe spider-webs all over the grass. Good-bye. I’ll call you if I see a snake.”

She tripped away and Emil stood looking after her. In a few moments he heardthe cherries dropping smartly into the pail, and he began to swing his scythewith that long, even stroke that few American boys ever learn. Marie pickedcherries and sang softly to herself, stripping one glittering branch afteranother, shivering when she caught a shower of raindrops on her neck and hair.And Emil mowed his way slowly down toward the cherry trees.

That summer the rains had been so many and opportune that it was almost morethan Shabata and his man could do to keep up with the corn; the orchard was aneglected wilderness. All sorts of weeds and herbs and flowers had grown upthere; splotches of wild larkspur, pale green-and-white spikes of hoarhound,plantations of wild cotton, tangles of foxtail and wild wheat. South of theapricot trees, cornering on the wheatfield, was Frank’s alfalfa, where myriadsof white and yellow butterflies were always fluttering above the purpleblossoms. When Emil reached the lower corner by the hedge, Marie was sittingunder her white mulberry tree, the pailful of cherries beside her, looking offat the gentle, tireless swelling of the wheat.

“Emil,” she said suddenly—he was mowing quietly about under the tree so as notto disturb her—“what religion did the Swedes have away back, before they wereChristians?”

Emil paused and straightened his back. “I don’t know. About like the Germans’,wasn’t it?”

Marie went on as if she had not heard him. “The Bohemians, you know, were treeworshipers before the missionaries came. Father says the people in themountains still do queer things, sometimes,—they believe that trees bring goodor bad luck.”

Emil looked superior. “Do they? Well, which are the lucky trees? I’d like toknow.”

“I don’t know all of them, but I know lindens are. The old people in themountains plant lindens to purify the forest, and to do away with the spellsthat come from the old trees they say have lasted from heathen times. I’m agood Catholic, but I think I could get along with caring for trees, if I hadn’tanything else.”

“That’s a poor saying,” said Emil, stooping over to wipe his hands in the wetgrass.

“Why is it? If I feel that way, I feel that way. I like trees because they seemmore resigned to the way they have to live than other things do. I feel as ifthis tree knows everything I ever think of when I sit here. When I come back toit, I never have to remind it of anything; I begin just where I left off.”

Emil had nothing to say to this. He reached up among the branches and began topick the sweet, insipid fruit,—long ivory-colored berries, tipped with faintpink, like white coral, that fall to the ground unheeded all summer through. Hedropped a handful into her lap.

“Do you like Mr. Linstrum?” Marie asked suddenly.

“Yes. Don’t you?”

“Oh, ever so much; only he seems kind of staid and school-teachery. But, ofcourse, he is older than Frank, even. I’m sure I don’t want to live to be morethan thirty, do you? Do you think Alexandra likes him very much?”

“I suppose so. They were old friends.”

“Oh, Emil, you know what I mean!” Marie tossed her head impatiently. “Does shereally care about him? When she used to tell me about him, I always wonderedwhether she wasn’t a little in love with him.”

“Who, Alexandra?” Emil laughed and thrust his hands into his trousers pockets.“Alexandra’s never been in love, you crazy!” He laughed again. “She wouldn’tknow how to go about it. The idea!”

Marie shrugged her shoulders. “Oh, you don’t know Alexandra as well as youthink you do! If you had any eyes, you would see that she is very fond of him.It would serve you all right if she walked off with Carl. I like him because heappreciates her more than you do.”

Emil frowned. “What are you talking about, Marie? Alexandra’s all right. Sheand I have always been good friends. What more do you want? I like to talk toCarl about New York and what a fellow can do there.”

“Oh, Emil! Surely you are not thinking of going off there?”

“Why not? I must go somewhere, mustn’t I?” The young man took up his scythe andleaned on it. “Would you rather I went off in the sand hills and lived likeIvar?”

Marie’s face fell under his brooding gaze. She looked down at his wet leggings.“I’m sure Alexandra hopes you will stay on here,” she murmured.

“Then Alexandra will be disappointed,” the young man said roughly. “What do Iwant to hang around here for? Alexandra can run the farm all right, without me.I don’t want to stand around and look on. I want to be doing something on myown account.”

“That’s so,” Marie sighed. “There are so many, many things you can do. Almostanything you choose.”

“And there are so many, many things I can’t do.” Emil echoed her tonesarcastically. “Sometimes I don’t want to do anything at all, and sometimes Iwant to pull the four corners of the Divide together,”—he threw out his arm andbrought it back with a jerk,—“so, like a table-cloth. I get tired of seeing menand horses going up and down, up and down.”

Marie looked up at his defiant figure and her face clouded. “I wish you weren’tso restless, and didn’t get so worked up over things,” she said sadly.

“Thank you,” he returned shortly.

She sighed despondently. “Everything I say makes you cross, don’t it? And younever used to be cross to me.”

Emil took a step nearer and stood frowning down at her bent head. He stood inan attitude of self-defense, his feet well apart, his hands clenched and drawnup at his sides, so that the cords stood out on his bare arms. “I can’t playwith you like a little boy any more,” he said slowly. “That’s what you miss,Marie. You’ll have to get some other little boy to play with.” He stopped andtook a deep breath. Then he went on in a low tone, so intense that it wasalmost threatening: “Sometimes you seem to understand perfectly, and thensometimes you pretend you don’t. You don’t help things any by pretending. It’sthen that I want to pull the corners of the Divide together. If you WON’Tunderstand, you know, I could make you!”

Marie clasped her hands and started up from her seat. She had grown very paleand her eyes were shining with excitement and distress. “But, Emil, if Iunderstand, then all our good times are over, we can never do nice thingstogether any more. We shall have to behave like Mr. Linstrum. And, anyhow,there’s nothing to understand!” She struck the ground with her little footfiercely. “That won’t last. It will go away, and things will be just as theyused to. I wish you were a Catholic. The Church helps people, indeed it does. Ipray for you, but that’s not the same as if you prayed yourself.”

She spoke rapidly and pleadingly, looked entreatingly into his face. Emil stooddefiant, gazing down at her.

“I can’t pray to have the things I want,” he said slowly, “and I won’t pray notto have them, not if I’m damned for it.”

Marie turned away, wringing her hands. “Oh, Emil, you won’t try! Then all ourgood times are over.”

“Yes; over. I never expect to have any more.”

Emil gripped the hand-holds of his scythe and began to mow. Marie took up hercherries and went slowly toward the house, crying bitterly.

IX

On Sunday afternoon, a month after Carl Linstrum’s arrival, he rode with Emilup into the French country to attend a Catholic fair. He sat for most of theafternoon in the basement of the church, where the fair was held, talking toMarie Shabata, or strolled about the gravel terrace, thrown up on the hillsidein front of the basement doors, where the French boys were jumping andwrestling and throwing the discus. Some of the boys were in their whitebaseball suits; they had just come up from a Sunday practice game down in theballgrounds. Amédée, the newly married, Emil’s best friend, was their pitcher,renowned among the country towns for his dash and skill. Amédée was a littlefellow, a year younger than Emil and much more boyish in appearance; very litheand active and neatly made, with a clear brown and white skin, and flashingwhite teeth. The Sainte-Agnes boys were to play the Hastings nine in afortnight, and Amédée’s lightning balls were the hope of his team. The littleFrenchman seemed to get every ounce there was in him behind the ball as it lefthis hand.

“You’d have made the battery at the University for sure, ’Médée,” Emil said asthey were walking from the ball-grounds back to the church on the hill. “You’repitching better than you did in the spring.”

Amédée grinned. “Sure! A married man don’t lose his head no more.” He slappedEmil on the back as he caught step with him. “Oh, Emil, you wanna get marriedright off quick! It’s the greatest thing ever!”

Emil laughed. “How am I going to get married without any girl?”

Amédée took his arm. “Pooh! There are plenty girls will have you. You wanna getsome nice French girl, now. She treat you well; always be jolly. See,”—he beganchecking off on his fingers,—“there is Sévérine, and Alphosen, and Joséphine,and Hectorine, and Louise, and Malvina—why, I could love any of them girls! Whydon’t you get after them? Are you stuck up, Emil, or is anything the matterwith you? I never did know a boy twenty-two years old before that didn’t haveno girl. You wanna be a priest, maybe? Not-a for me!” Amédée swaggered. “Ibring many good Catholics into this world, I hope, and that’s a way I help theChurch.”

Emil looked down and patted him on the shoulder. “Now you’re windy, ’Médée. YouFrenchies like to brag.”

But Amédée had the zeal of the newly married, and he was not to be lightlyshaken off. “Honest and true, Emil, don’t you want ANY girl? Maybe there’s someyoung lady in Lincoln, now, very grand,”—Amédée waved his hand languidly beforehis face to denote the fan of heartless beauty,—“and you lost your heart upthere. Is that it?”

“Maybe,” said Emil.

But Amédée saw no appropriate glow in his friend’s face. “Bah!” he exclaimed indisgust. “I tell all the French girls to keep ’way from you. You gotta rock inthere,” thumping Emil on the ribs.

When they reached the terrace at the side of the church, Amédée, who wasexcited by his success on the ball-grounds, challenged Emil to a jumping-match,though he knew he would be beaten. They belted themselves up, and Raoul Marcel,the choir tenor and Father Duchesne’s pet, and Jean Bordelau, held the stringover which they vaulted. All the French boys stood round, cheering and humpingthemselves up when Emil or Amédée went over the wire, as if they were helpingin the lift. Emil stopped at five-feet-five, declaring that he would spoil hisappetite for supper if he jumped any more.

Angélique, Amédée’s pretty bride, as blonde and fair as her name, who had comeout to watch the match, tossed her head at Emil and said:—

“’Médée could jump much higher than you if he were as tall. And anyhow, he ismuch more graceful. He goes over like a bird, and you have to hump yourself allup.”

“Oh, I do, do I?” Emil caught her and kissed her saucy mouth squarely, whileshe laughed and struggled and called, “’Médée! ’Médée!”

“There, you see your ’Médée isn’t even big enough to get you away from me. Icould run away with you right now and he could only sit down and cry about it.I’ll show you whether I have to hump myself!” Laughing and panting, he pickedAngélique up in his arms and began running about the rectangle with her. Notuntil he saw Marie Shabata’s tiger eyes flashing from the gloom of the basementdoorway did he hand the disheveled bride over to her husband. “There, go toyour graceful; I haven’t the heart to take you away from him.”

Angélique clung to her husband and made faces at Emil over the white shoulderof Amédée’s ball-shirt. Emil was greatly amused at her air of proprietorshipand at Amédée’s shameless submission to it. He was delighted with his friend’sgood fortune. He liked to see and to think about Amédée’s sunny, natural, happylove.

He and Amédée had ridden and wrestled and larked together since they were ladsof twelve. On Sundays and holidays they were always arm in arm. It seemedstrange that now he should have to hide the thing that Amédée was so proud of,that the feeling which gave one of them such happiness should bring the othersuch despair. It was like that when Alexandra tested her seed-corn in thespring, he mused. From two ears that had grown side by side, the grains of oneshot up joyfully into the light, projecting themselves into the future, and thegrains from the other lay still in the earth and rotted; and nobody knew why.

X

While Emil and Carl were amusing themselves at the fair, Alexandra was at home,busy with her account-books, which had been neglected of late. She was almostthrough with her figures when she heard a cart drive up to the gate, andlooking out of the window she saw her two older brothers. They had seemed toavoid her ever since Carl Linstrum’s arrival, four weeks ago that day, and shehurried to the door to welcome them. She saw at once that they had come withsome very definite purpose. They followed her stiffly into the sitting-room.Oscar sat down, but Lou walked over to the window and remained standing, hishands behind him.

“You are by yourself?” he asked, looking toward the doorway into the parlor.

“Yes. Carl and Emil went up to the Catholic fair.”

For a few moments neither of the men spoke.

Then Lou came out sharply. “How soon does he intend to go away from here?”

“I don’t know, Lou. Not for some time, I hope.” Alexandra spoke in an even,quiet tone that often exasperated her brothers. They felt that she was tryingto be superior with them.

Oscar spoke up grimly. “We thought we ought to tell you that people have begunto talk,” he said meaningly.

Alexandra looked at him. “What about?”

Oscar met her eyes blankly. “About you, keeping him here so long. It looks badfor him to be hanging on to a woman this way. People think you’re getting takenin.”

Alexandra shut her account-book firmly. “Boys,” she said seriously, “don’tlet’s go on with this. We won’t come out anywhere. I can’t take advice on sucha matter. I know you mean well, but you must not feel responsible for me inthings of this sort. If we go on with this talk it will only make hardfeeling.”

Lou whipped about from the window. “You ought to think a little about yourfamily. You’re making us all ridiculous.”

“How am I?”

“People are beginning to say you want to marry the fellow.”

“Well, and what is ridiculous about that?”

Lou and Oscar exchanged outraged looks. “Alexandra! Can’t you see he’s just atramp and he’s after your money? He wants to be taken care of, he does!”

“Well, suppose I want to take care of him? Whose business is it but my own?”

“Don’t you know he’d get hold of your property?”

“He’d get hold of what I wished to give him, certainly.”

Oscar sat up suddenly and Lou clutched at his bristly hair.

“Give him?” Lou shouted. “Our property, our homestead?”

“I don’t know about the homestead,” said Alexandra quietly. “I know you andOscar have always expected that it would be left to your children, and I’m notsure but what you’re right. But I’ll do exactly as I please with the rest of myland, boys.”

“The rest of your land!” cried Lou, growing more excited every minute. “Didn’tall the land come out of the homestead? It was bought with money borrowed onthe homestead, and Oscar and me worked ourselves to the bone paying interest onit.”

“Yes, you paid the interest. But when you married we made a division of theland, and you were satisfied. I’ve made more on my farms since I’ve been alonethan when we all worked together.”

“Everything you’ve made has come out of the original land that us boys workedfor, hasn’t it? The farms and all that comes out of them belongs to us as afamily.”

Alexandra waved her hand impatiently. “Come now, Lou. Stick to the facts. Youare talking nonsense. Go to the county clerk and ask him who owns my land, andwhether my titles are good.”

Lou turned to his brother. “This is what comes of letting a woman meddle inbusiness,” he said bitterly. “We ought to have taken things in our own handsyears ago. But she liked to run things, and we humored her. We thought you hadgood sense, Alexandra. We never thought you’d do anything foolish.”

Alexandra rapped impatiently on her desk with her knuckles. “Listen, Lou. Don’ttalk wild. You say you ought to have taken things into your own hands yearsago. I suppose you mean before you left home. But how could you take hold ofwhat wasn’t there? I’ve got most of what I have now since we divided theproperty; I’ve built it up myself, and it has nothing to do with you.”

Oscar spoke up solemnly. “The property of a family really belongs to the men ofthe family, no matter about the title. If anything goes wrong, it’s the menthat are held responsible.”

“Yes, of course,” Lou broke in. “Everybody knows that. Oscar and me have alwaysbeen easy-going and we’ve never made any fuss. We were willing you should holdthe land and have the good of it, but you got no right to part with any of it.We worked in the fields to pay for the first land you bought, and whatever’scome out of it has got to be kept in the family.”

Oscar reinforced his brother, his mind fixed on the one point he could see.“The property of a family belongs to the men of the family, because they areheld responsible, and because they do the work.”

Alexandra looked from one to the other, her eyes full of indignation. She hadbeen impatient before, but now she was beginning to feel angry. “And what aboutmy work?” she asked in an unsteady voice.

Lou looked at the carpet. “Oh, now, Alexandra, you always took it pretty easy!Of course we wanted you to. You liked to manage round, and we always humoredyou. We realize you were a great deal of help to us. There’s no woman anywherearound that knows as much about business as you do, and we’ve always been proudof that, and thought you were pretty smart. But, of course, the real workalways fell on us. Good advice is all right, but it don’t get the weeds out ofthe corn.”

“Maybe not, but it sometimes puts in the crop, and it sometimes keeps thefields for corn to grow in,” said Alexandra dryly. “Why, Lou, I can rememberwhen you and Oscar wanted to sell this homestead and all the improvements toold preacher Ericson for two thousand dollars. If I’d consented, you’d havegone down to the river and scraped along on poor farms for the rest of yourlives. When I put in our first field of alfalfa you both opposed me, justbecause I first heard about it from a young man who had been to the University.You said I was being taken in then, and all the neighbors said so. You know aswell as I do that alfalfa has been the salvation of this country. You alllaughed at me when I said our land here was about ready for wheat, and I had toraise three big wheat crops before the neighbors quit putting all their land incorn. Why, I remember you cried, Lou, when we put in the first bigwheat-planting, and said everybody was laughing at us.”

Lou turned to Oscar. “That’s the woman of it; if she tells you to put in acrop, she thinks she’s put it in. It makes women conceited to meddle inbusiness. I shouldn’t think you’d want to remind us how hard you were on us,Alexandra, after the way you baby Emil.”

“Hard on you? I never meant to be hard. Conditions were hard. Maybe I wouldnever have been very soft, anyhow; but I certainly didn’t choose to be the kindof girl I was. If you take even a vine and cut it back again and again, itgrows hard, like a tree.”

Lou felt that they were wandering from the point, and that in digressionAlexandra might unnerve him. He wiped his forehead with a jerk of hishandkerchief. “We never doubted you, Alexandra. We never questioned anythingyou did. You’ve always had your own way. But you can’t expect us to sit likestumps and see you done out of the property by any loafer who happens along,and making yourself ridiculous into the bargain.”

Oscar rose. “Yes,” he broke in, “everybody’s laughing to see you get took in;at your age, too. Everybody knows he’s nearly five years younger than you, andis after your money. Why, Alexandra, you are forty years old!”

“All that doesn’t concern anybody but Carl and me. Go to town and ask yourlawyers what you can do to restrain me from disposing of my own property. And Iadvise you to do what they tell you; for the authority you can exert by law isthe only influence you will ever have over me again.” Alexandra rose. “I thinkI would rather not have lived to find out what I have to-day,” she saidquietly, closing her desk.

Lou and Oscar looked at each other questioningly. There seemed to be nothing todo but to go, and they walked out.

“You can’t do business with women,” Oscar said heavily as he clambered into thecart. “But anyhow, we’ve had our say, at last.”

Lou scratched his head. “Talk of that kind might come too high, you know; butshe’s apt to be sensible. You hadn’t ought to said that about her age, though,Oscar. I’m afraid that hurt her feelings; and the worst thing we can do is tomake her sore at us. She’d marry him out of contrariness.”

“I only meant,” said Oscar, “that she is old enough to know better, and she is.If she was going to marry, she ought to done it long ago, and not go making afool of herself now.”

Lou looked anxious, nevertheless. “Of course,” he reflected hopefully andinconsistently, “Alexandra ain’t much like other women-folks. Maybe it won’tmake her sore. Maybe she’d as soon be forty as not!”

XI

Emil came home at about half-past seven o’clock that evening. Old Ivar met himat the windmill and took his horse, and the young man went directly into thehouse. He called to his sister and she answered from her bedroom, behind thesitting-room, saying that she was lying down.

Emil went to her door.

“Can I see you for a minute?” he asked. “I want to talk to you about somethingbefore Carl comes.”

Alexandra rose quickly and came to the door. “Where is Carl?”

“Lou and Oscar met us and said they wanted to talk to him, so he rode over toOscar’s with them. Are you coming out?” Emil asked impatiently.

“Yes, sit down. I’ll be dressed in a moment.”

Alexandra closed her door, and Emil sank down on the old slat lounge and satwith his head in his hands. When his sister came out, he looked up, not knowingwhether the interval had been short or long, and he was surprised to see thatthe room had grown quite dark. That was just as well; it would be easier totalk if he were not under the gaze of those clear, deliberate eyes, that saw sofar in some directions and were so blind in others. Alexandra, too, was glad ofthe dusk. Her face was swollen from crying.

Emil started up and then sat down again. “Alexandra,” he said slowly, in hisdeep young baritone, “I don’t want to go away to law school this fall. Let meput it off another year. I want to take a year off and look around. It’sawfully easy to rush into a profession you don’t really like, and awfully hardto get out of it. Linstrum and I have been talking about that.”

“Very well, Emil. Only don’t go off looking for land.” She came up and put herhand on his shoulder. “I’ve been wishing you could stay with me this winter.”

“That’s just what I don’t want to do, Alexandra. I’m restless. I want to go toa new place. I want to go down to the City of Mexico to join one of theUniversity fellows who’s at the head of an electrical plant. He wrote me hecould give me a little job, enough to pay my way, and I could look around andsee what I want to do. I want to go as soon as harvest is over. I guess Lou andOscar will be sore about it.”

“I suppose they will.” Alexandra sat down on the lounge beside him. “They arevery angry with me, Emil. We have had a quarrel. They will not come hereagain.”

Emil scarcely heard what she was saying; he did not notice the sadness of hertone. He was thinking about the reckless life he meant to live in Mexico.

“What about?” he asked absently.

“About Carl Linstrum. They are afraid I am going to marry him, and that some ofmy property will get away from them.”

Emil shrugged his shoulders. “What nonsense!” he murmured. “Just like them.”

Alexandra drew back. “Why nonsense, Emil?”

“Why, you’ve never thought of such a thing, have you? They always have to havesomething to fuss about.”

“Emil,” said his sister slowly, “you ought not to take things for granted. Doyou agree with them that I have no right to change my way of living?”

Emil looked at the outline of his sister’s head in the dim light. They weresitting close together and he somehow felt that she could hear his thoughts. Hewas silent for a moment, and then said in an embarrassed tone, “Why, no,certainly not. You ought to do whatever you want to. I’ll always back you.”

“But it would seem a little bit ridiculous to you if I married Carl?”

Emil fidgeted. The issue seemed to him too far-fetched to warrant discussion.“Why, no. I should be surprised if you wanted to. I can’t see exactly why. Butthat’s none of my business. You ought to do as you please. Certainly you oughtnot to pay any attention to what the boys say.”

Alexandra sighed. “I had hoped you might understand, a little, why I do wantto. But I suppose that’s too much to expect. I’ve had a pretty lonely life,Emil. Besides Marie, Carl is the only friend I have ever had.”

Emil was awake now; a name in her last sentence roused him. He put out his handand took his sister’s awkwardly. “You ought to do just as you wish, and I thinkCarl’s a fine fellow. He and I would always get on. I don’t believe any of thethings the boys say about him, honest I don’t. They are suspicious of himbecause he’s intelligent. You know their way. They’ve been sore at me eversince you let me go away to college. They’re always trying to catch me up. If Iwere you, I wouldn’t pay any attention to them. There’s nothing to get upsetabout. Carl’s a sensible fellow. He won’t mind them.”

“I don’t know. If they talk to him the way they did to me, I think he’ll goaway.”

Emil grew more and more uneasy. “Think so? Well, Marie said it would serve usall right if you walked off with him.”

“Did she? Bless her little heart! SHE would.” Alexandra’s voice broke.

Emil began unlacing his leggings. “Why don’t you talk to her about it? There’sCarl, I hear his horse. I guess I’ll go upstairs and get my boots off. No, Idon’t want any supper. We had supper at five o’clock, at the fair.”

Emil was glad to escape and get to his own room. He was a little ashamed forhis sister, though he had tried not to show it. He felt that there wassomething indecorous in her proposal, and she did seem to him somewhatridiculous. There was trouble enough in the world, he reflected, as he threwhimself upon his bed, without people who were forty years old imagining theywanted to get married. In the darkness and silence Emil was not likely to thinklong about Alexandra. Every image slipped away but one. He had seen Marie inthe crowd that afternoon. She sold candy at the fair. Whyhad she everrun away with Frank Shabata, and how could she go on laughing and working andtaking an interest in things? Why did she like so many people, and why had sheseemed pleased when all the French and Bohemian boys, and the priest himself,crowded round her candy stand? Why did she care about any one but him? Whycould he never, never find the thing he looked for in her playful, affectionateeyes?

Then he fell to imagining that he looked once more and found it there, and whatit would be like if she loved him,—she who, as Alexandra said, could give herwhole heart. In that dream he could lie for hours, as if in a trance. Hisspirit went out of his body and crossed the fields to Marie Shabata.

At the University dances the girls had often looked wonderingly at the tallyoung Swede with the fine head, leaning against the wall and frowning, his armsfolded, his eyes fixed on the ceiling or the floor. All the girls were a littleafraid of him. He was distinguished-looking, and not the jollying kind. Theyfelt that he was too intense and preoccupied. There was something queer abouthim. Emil’s fraternity rather prided itself upon its dances, and sometimes hedid his duty and danced every dance. But whether he was on the floor orbrooding in a corner, he was always thinking about Marie Shabata. For two yearsthe storm had been gathering in him.

XII

Carl came into the sitting-room while Alexandra was lighting the lamp. Shelooked up at him as she adjusted the shade. His sharp shoulders stooped as ifhe were very tired, his face was pale, and there were bluish shadows under hisdark eyes. His anger had burned itself out and left him sick and disgusted.

“You have seen Lou and Oscar?” Alexandra asked.

“Yes.” His eyes avoided hers.

Alexandra took a deep breath. “And now you are going away. I thought so.”

Carl threw himself into a chair and pushed the dark lock back from his foreheadwith his white, nervous hand. “What a hopeless position you are in, Alexandra!”he exclaimed feverishly. “It is your fate to be always surrounded by littlemen. And I am no better than the rest. I am too little to face the criticism ofeven such men as Lou and Oscar. Yes, I am going away; to-morrow. I cannot evenask you to give me a promise until I have something to offer you. I thought,perhaps, I could do that; but I find I can’t.”

“What good comes of offering people things they don’t need?” Alexandra askedsadly. “I don’t need money. But I have needed you for a great many years. Iwonder why I have been permitted to prosper, if it is only to take my friendsaway from me.”

“I don’t deceive myself,” Carl said frankly. “I know that I am going away on myown account. I must make the usual effort. I must have something to show formyself. To take what you would give me, I should have to be either a very largeman or a very small one, and I am only in the middle class.”

Alexandra sighed. “I have a feeling that if you go away, you will not comeback. Something will happen to one of us, or to both. People have to snatch athappiness when they can, in this world. It is always easier to lose than tofind. What I have is yours, if you care enough about me to take it.”

Carl rose and looked up at the picture of John Bergson. “But I can’t, my dear,I can’t! I will go North at once. Instead of idling about in California allwinter, I shall be getting my bearings up there. I won’t waste another week. Bepatient with me, Alexandra. Give me a year!”

“As you will,” said Alexandra wearily. “All at once, in a single day, I loseeverything; and I do not know why. Emil, too, is going away.” Carl was stillstudying John Bergson’s face and Alexandra’s eyes followed his. “Yes,” shesaid, “if he could have seen all that would come of the task he gave me, hewould have been sorry. I hope he does not see me now. I hope that he is amongthe old people of his blood and country, and that tidings do not reach him fromthe New World.”

PART III.
Winter Memories

I

Winter has settled down over the Divide again; the season in which Naturerecuperates, in which she sinks to sleep between the fruitfulness of autumn andthe passion of spring. The birds have gone. The teeming life that goes on downin the long grass is exterminated. The prairie-dog keeps his hole. The rabbitsrun shivering from one frozen garden patch to another and are hard put to it tofind frost-bitten cabbage-stalks. At night the coyotes roam the wintry waste,howling for food. The variegated fields are all one color now; the pastures,the stubble, the roads, the sky are the same leaden gray. The hedgerows andtrees are scarcely perceptible against the bare earth, whose slaty hue theyhave taken on. The ground is frozen so hard that it bruises the foot to walk inthe roads or in the ploughed fields. It is like an iron country, and the spiritis oppressed by its rigor and melancholy. One could easily believe that in thatdead landscape the germs of life and fruitfulness were extinct forever.

Alexandra has settled back into her old routine. There are weekly letters fromEmil. Lou and Oscar she has not seen since Carl went away. To avoid awkwardencounters in the presence of curious spectators, she has stopped going to theNorwegian Church and drives up to the Reform Church at Hanover, or goes withMarie Shabata to the Catholic Church, locally known as “the French Church.” Shehas not told Marie about Carl, or her differences with her brothers. She wasnever very communicative about her own affairs, and when she came to the point,an instinct told her that about such things she and Marie would not understandone another.

Old Mrs. Lee had been afraid that family misunderstandings might deprive her ofher yearly visit to Alexandra. But on the first day of December Alexandratelephoned Annie that to-morrow she would send Ivar over for her mother, andthe next day the old lady arrived with her bundles. For twelve years Mrs. Leehad always entered Alexandra’s sitting-room with the same exclamation, “Now webe yust-a like old times!” She enjoyed the liberty Alexandra gave her, andhearing her own language about her all day long. Here she could wear hernightcap and sleep with all her windows shut, listen to Ivar reading the Bible,and here she could run about among the stables in a pair of Emil’s old boots.Though she was bent almost double, she was as spry as a gopher. Her face was asbrown as if it had been varnished, and as full of wrinkles as a washerwoman’shands. She had three jolly old teeth left in the front of her mouth, and whenshe grinned she looked very knowing, as if when you found out how to take it,life wasn’t half bad. While she and Alexandra patched and pieced and quilted,she talked incessantly about stories she read in a Swedish family paper,telling the plots in great detail; or about her life on a dairy farm inGottland when she was a girl. Sometimes she forgot which were the printedstories and which were the real stories, it all seemed so far away. She lovedto take a little brandy, with hot water and sugar, before she went to bed, andAlexandra always had it ready for her. “It sends good dreams,” she would saywith a twinkle in her eye.

When Mrs. Lee had been with Alexandra for a week, Marie Shabata telephoned onemorning to say that Frank had gone to town for the day, and she would like themto come over for coffee in the afternoon. Mrs. Lee hurried to wash out and ironher new cross-stitched apron, which she had finished only the night before; achecked gingham apron worked with a design ten inches broad across the bottom;a hunting scene, with fir trees and a stag and dogs and huntsmen. Mrs. Lee wasfirm with herself at dinner, and refused a second helping of apple dumplings.“I ta-ank I save up,” she said with a giggle.

At two o’clock in the afternoon Alexandra’s cart drove up to the Shabatas’gate, and Marie saw Mrs. Lee’s red shawl come bobbing up the path. She ran tothe door and pulled the old woman into the house with a hug, helping her totake off her wraps while Alexandra blanketed the horse outside. Mrs. Lee hadput on her best black satine dress—she abominated woolen stuffs, even inwinter—and a crocheted collar, fastened with a big pale gold pin, containingfaded daguerreotypes of her father and mother. She had not worn her apron forfear of rumpling it, and now she shook it out and tied it round her waist witha conscious air. Marie drew back and threw up her hands, exclaiming, “Oh, whata beauty! I’ve never seen this one before, have I, Mrs. Lee?”

The old woman giggled and ducked her head. “No, yust las’ night I ma-ake. Seedis tread; verra strong, no wa-ash out, no fade. My sister send from Sveden. Iyust-a ta-ank you like dis.”

Marie ran to the door again. “Come in, Alexandra. I have been looking at Mrs.Lee’s apron. Do stop on your way home and show it to Mrs. Hiller. She’s crazyabout cross-stitch.”

While Alexandra removed her hat and veil, Mrs. Lee went out to the kitchen andsettled herself in a wooden rocking-chair by the stove, looking with greatinterest at the table, set for three, with a white cloth, and a pot of pinkgeraniums in the middle. “My, a-an’t you gotta fine plants; such-a much flower.How you keep from freeze?”

She pointed to the window-shelves, full of blooming fuchsias and geraniums.

“I keep the fire all night, Mrs. Lee, and when it’s very cold I put them all onthe table, in the middle of the room. Other nights I only put newspapers behindthem. Frank laughs at me for fussing, but when they don’t bloom he says,‘What’s the matter with the darned things?’—What do you hear from Carl,Alexandra?”

“He got to Dawson before the river froze, and now I suppose I won’t hear anymore until spring. Before he left California he sent me a box of orangeflowers, but they didn’t keep very well. I have brought a bunch of Emil’sletters for you.” Alexandra came out from the sitting-room and pinched Marie’scheek playfully. “You don’t look as if the weather ever froze you up. Neverhave colds, do you? That’s a good girl. She had dark red cheeks like this whenshe was a little girl, Mrs. Lee. She looked like some queer foreign kind of adoll. I’ve never forgot the first time I saw you in Mieklejohn’s store, Marie,the time father was lying sick. Carl and I were talking about that before hewent away.”

“I remember, and Emil had his kitten along. When are you going to send Emil’sChristmas box?”

“It ought to have gone before this. I’ll have to send it by mail now, to get itthere in time.”

Marie pulled a dark purple silk necktie from her workbasket. “I knit this forhim. It’s a good color, don’t you think? Will you please put it in with yourthings and tell him it’s from me, to wear when he goes serenading.”

Alexandra laughed. “I don’t believe he goes serenading much. He says in oneletter that the Mexican ladies are said to be very beautiful, but that don’tseem to me very warm praise.”

Marie tossed her head. “Emil can’t fool me. If he’s bought a guitar, he goesserenading. Who wouldn’t, with all those Spanish girls dropping flowers downfrom their windows! I’d sing to them every night, wouldn’t you, Mrs. Lee?”

The old lady chuckled. Her eyes lit up as Marie bent down and opened the ovendoor. A delicious hot fragrance blew out into the tidy kitchen. “My, somet’ingsmell good!” She turned to Alexandra with a wink, her three yellow teeth makinga brave show, “I ta-ank dat stop my yaw from ache no more!” she saidcontentedly.

Marie took out a pan of delicate little rolls, stuffed with stewed apricots,and began to dust them over with powdered sugar. “I hope you’ll like these,Mrs. Lee; Alexandra does. The Bohemians always like them with their coffee. Butif you don’t, I have a coffee-cake with nuts and poppy seeds. Alexandra, willyou get the cream jug? I put it in the window to keep cool.”

“The Bohemians,” said Alexandra, as they drew up to the table, “certainly knowhow to make more kinds of bread than any other people in the world. Old Mrs.Hiller told me once at the church supper that she could make seven kinds offancy bread, but Marie could make a dozen.”

Mrs. Lee held up one of the apricot rolls between her brown thumb andforefinger and weighed it critically. “Yust like-a fedders,” she pronouncedwith satisfaction. “My, a-an’t dis nice!” she exclaimed as she stirred hercoffee. “I yust ta-ake a liddle yelly now, too, I ta-ank.”

Alexandra and Marie laughed at her forehandedness, and fell to talking of theirown affairs. “I was afraid you had a cold when I talked to you over thetelephone the other night, Marie. What was the matter, had you been crying?”

“Maybe I had,” Marie smiled guiltily. “Frank was out late that night. Don’t youget lonely sometimes in the winter, when everybody has gone away?”

“I thought it was something like that. If I hadn’t had company, I’d have runover to see for myself. If you get down-hearted, what will become of the restof us?” Alexandra asked.

“I don’t, very often. There’s Mrs. Lee without any coffee!”

Later, when Mrs. Lee declared that her powers were spent, Marie and Alexandrawent upstairs to look for some crochet patterns the old lady wanted to borrow.“Better put on your coat, Alexandra. It’s cold up there, and I have no ideawhere those patterns are. I may have to look through my old trunks.” Mariecaught up a shawl and opened the stair door, running up the steps ahead of herguest. “While I go through the bureau drawers, you might look in thosehat-boxes on the closet-shelf, over where Frank’s clothes hang. There are a lotof odds and ends in them.”

She began tossing over the contents of the drawers, and Alexandra went into theclothes-closet. Presently she came back, holding a slender elastic yellow stickin her hand.

“What in the world is this, Marie? You don’t mean to tell me Frank ever carriedsuch a thing?”

Marie blinked at it with astonishment and sat down on the floor. “Where did youfind it? I didn’t know he had kept it. I haven’t seen it for years.”

“It really is a cane, then?”

“Yes. One he brought from the old country. He used to carry it when I firstknew him. Isn’t it foolish? Poor Frank!”

Alexandra twirled the stick in her fingers and laughed. “He must have lookedfunny!”

Marie was thoughtful. “No, he didn’t, really. It didn’t seem out of place. Heused to be awfully gay like that when he was a young man. I guess people alwaysget what’s hardest for them, Alexandra.” Marie gathered the shawl closer abouther and still looked hard at the cane. “Frank would be all right in the rightplace,” she said reflectively. “He ought to have a different kind of wife, forone thing. Do you know, Alexandra, I could pick out exactly the right sort ofwoman for Frank—now. The trouble is you almost have to marry a man before youcan find out the sort of wife he needs; and usually it’s exactly the sort youare not. Then what are you going to do about it?” she asked candidly.

Alexandra confessed she didn’t know. “However,” she added, “it seems to me thatyou get along with Frank about as well as any woman I’ve ever seen or heard ofcould.”

Marie shook her head, pursing her lips and blowing her warm breath softly outinto the frosty air. “No; I was spoiled at home. I like my own way, and I havea quick tongue. When Frank brags, I say sharp things, and he never forgets. Hegoes over and over it in his mind; I can feel him. Then I’m too giddy. Frank’swife ought to be timid, and she ought not to care about another living thing inthe world but just Frank! I didn’t, when I married him, but I suppose I was tooyoung to stay like that.” Marie sighed.

Alexandra had never heard Marie speak so frankly about her husband before, andshe felt that it was wiser not to encourage her. No good, she reasoned, evercame from talking about such things, and while Marie was thinking aloud,Alexandra had been steadily searching the hat-boxes. “Aren’t these thepatterns, Maria?”

Maria sprang up from the floor. “Sure enough, we were looking for patterns,weren’t we? I’d forgot about everything but Frank’s other wife. I’ll put thataway.”

She poked the cane behind Frank’s Sunday clothes, and though she laughed,Alexandra saw there were tears in her eyes.

When they went back to the kitchen, the snow had begun to fall, and Marie’svisitors thought they must be getting home. She went out to the cart with them,and tucked the robes about old Mrs. Lee while Alexandra took the blanket offher horse. As they drove away, Marie turned and went slowly back to the house.She took up the package of letters Alexandra had brought, but she did not readthem. She turned them over and looked at the foreign stamps, and then satwatching the flying snow while the dusk deepened in the kitchen and the stovesent out a red glow.

Marie knew perfectly well that Emil’s letters were written more for her thanfor Alexandra. They were not the sort of letters that a young man writes to hissister. They were both more personal and more painstaking; full of descriptionsof the gay life in the old Mexican capital in the days when the strong hand ofPorfirio Diaz was still strong. He told about bull-fights and cock-fights,churches and fiestas, the flower-markets and the fountains, the musicand dancing, the people of all nations he met in the Italian restaurants on SanFrancisco Street. In short, they were the kind of letters a young man writes toa woman when he wishes himself and his life to seem interesting to her, when hewishes to enlist her imagination in his behalf.

Marie, when she was alone or when she sat sewing in the evening, often thoughtabout what it must be like down there where Emil was; where there were flowersand street bands everywhere, and carriages rattling up and down, and wherethere was a little blind boot-black in front of the cathedral who could playany tune you asked for by dropping the lids of blacking-boxes on the stonesteps. When everything is done and over for one at twenty-three, it is pleasantto let the mind wander forth and follow a young adventurer who has life beforehim. “And if it had not been for me,” she thought, “Frank might still be freelike that, and having a good time making people admire him. Poor Frank, gettingmarried wasn’t very good for him either. I’m afraid I do set people againsthim, as he says. I seem, somehow, to give him away all the time. Perhaps hewould try to be agreeable to people again, if I were not around. It seems as ifI always make him just as bad as he can be.”

Later in the winter, Alexandra looked back upon that afternoon as the lastsatisfactory visit she had had with Marie. After that day the younger womanseemed to shrink more and more into herself. When she was with Alexandra shewas not spontaneous and frank as she used to be. She seemed to be brooding oversomething, and holding something back. The weather had a good deal to do withtheir seeing less of each other than usual. There had not been such snowstormsin twenty years, and the path across the fields was drifted deep from Christmasuntil March. When the two neighbors went to see each other, they had to goround by the wagon-road, which was twice as far. They telephoned each otheralmost every night, though in January there was a stretch of three weeks whenthe wires were down, and when the postman did not come at all.

Marie often ran in to see her nearest neighbor, old Mrs. Hiller, who wascrippled with rheumatism and had only her son, the lame shoemaker, to take careof her; and she went to the French Church, whatever the weather. She was asincerely devout girl. She prayed for herself and for Frank, and for Emil,among the temptations of that gay, corrupt old city. She found more comfort inthe Church that winter than ever before. It seemed to come closer to her, andto fill an emptiness that ached in her heart. She tried to be patient with herhusband. He and his hired man usually played California Jack in the evening.Marie sat sewing or crocheting and tried to take a friendly interest in thegame, but she was always thinking about the wide fields outside, where the snowwas drifting over the fences; and about the orchard, where the snow was fallingand packing, crust over crust. When she went out into the dark kitchen to fixher plants for the night, she used to stand by the window and look out at thewhite fields, or watch the currents of snow whirling over the orchard. Sheseemed to feel the weight of all the snow that lay down there. The branches hadbecome so hard that they wounded your hand if you but tried to break a twig.And yet, down under the frozen crusts, at the roots of the trees, the secret oflife was still safe, warm as the blood in one’s heart; and the spring wouldcome again! Oh, it would come again!

II

If Alexandra had had much imagination she might have guessed what was going onin Marie’s mind, and she would have seen long before what was going on inEmil’s. But that, as Emil himself had more than once reflected, was Alexandra’sblind side, and her life had not been of the kind to sharpen her vision. Hertraining had all been toward the end of making her proficient in what she hadundertaken to do. Her personal life, her own realization of herself, was almosta subconscious existence; like an underground river that came to the surfaceonly here and there, at intervals months apart, and then sank again to flow onunder her own fields. Nevertheless, the underground stream was there, and itwas because she had so much personality to put into her enterprises andsucceeded in putting it into them so completely, that her affairs prosperedbetter than those of her neighbors.

There were certain days in her life, outwardly uneventful, which Alexandraremembered as peculiarly happy; days when she was close to the flat, fallowworld about her, and felt, as it were, in her own body the joyous germinationin the soil. There were days, too, which she and Emil had spent together, uponwhich she loved to look back. There had been such a day when they were down onthe river in the dry year, looking over the land. They had made an early startone morning and had driven a long way before noon. When Emil said he washungry, they drew back from the road, gave Brigham his oats among the bushes,and climbed up to the top of a grassy bluff to eat their lunch under the shadeof some little elm trees. The river was clear there, and shallow, since therehad been no rain, and it ran in ripples over the sparkling sand. Under theoverhanging willows of the opposite bank there was an inlet where the water wasdeeper and flowed so slowly that it seemed to sleep in the sun. In this littlebay a single wild duck was swimming and diving and preening her feathers,disporting herself very happily in the flickering light and shade. They sat fora long time, watching the solitary bird take its pleasure. No living thing hadever seemed to Alexandra as beautiful as that wild duck. Emil must have feltabout it as she did, for afterward, when they were at home, he used sometimesto say, “Sister, you know our duck down there—” Alexandra remembered that dayas one of the happiest in her life. Years afterward she thought of the duck asstill there, swimming and diving all by herself in the sunlight, a kind ofenchanted bird that did not know age or change.

Most of Alexandra’s happy memories were as impersonal as this one; yet to herthey were very personal. Her mind was a white book, with clear writing aboutweather and beasts and growing things. Not many people would have cared to readit; only a happy few. She had never been in love, she had never indulged insentimental reveries. Even as a girl she had looked upon men as work-fellows.She had grown up in serious times.

There was one fancy indeed, which persisted through her girlhood. It most oftencame to her on Sunday mornings, the one day in the week when she lay late abedlistening to the familiar morning sounds; the windmill singing in the briskbreeze, Emil whistling as he blacked his boots down by the kitchen door.Sometimes, as she lay thus luxuriously idle, her eyes closed, she used to havean illusion of being lifted up bodily and carried lightly by some one verystrong. It was a man, certainly, who carried her, but he was like no man sheknew; he was much larger and stronger and swifter, and he carried her as easilyas if she were a sheaf of wheat. She never saw him, but, with eyes closed, shecould feel that he was yellow like the sunlight, and there was the smell ofripe cornfields about him. She could feel him approach, bend over her and lifther, and then she could feel herself being carried swiftly off across thefields. After such a reverie she would rise hastily, angry with herself, and godown to the bath-house that was partitioned off the kitchen shed. There shewould stand in a tin tub and prosecute her bath with vigor, finishing it bypouring buckets of cold well-water over her gleaming white body which no man onthe Divide could have carried very far.

As she grew older, this fancy more often came to her when she was tired thanwhen she was fresh and strong. Sometimes, after she had been in the open allday, overseeing the branding of the cattle or the loading of the pigs, shewould come in chilled, take a concoction of spices and warm home-made wine, andgo to bed with her body actually aching with fatigue. Then, just before shewent to sleep, she had the old sensation of being lifted and carried by astrong being who took from her all her bodily weariness.

PART IV.
The White Mulberry Tree

I

The French Church, properly the Church of Sainte-Agnes, stood upon a hill. Thehigh, narrow, red-brick building, with its tall steeple and steep roof, couldbe seen for miles across the wheatfields, though the little town ofSainte-Agnes was completely hidden away at the foot of the hill. The churchlooked powerful and triumphant there on its eminence, so high above the rest ofthe landscape, with miles of warm color lying at its feet, and by its positionand setting it reminded one of some of the churches built long ago in thewheat-lands of middle France.

Late one June afternoon Alexandra Bergson was driving along one of the manyroads that led through the rich French farming country to the big church. Thesunlight was shining directly in her face, and there was a blaze of light allabout the red church on the hill. Beside Alexandra lounged a strikingly exoticfigure in a tall Mexican hat, a silk sash, and a black velvet jacket sewn withsilver buttons. Emil had returned only the night before, and his sister was soproud of him that she decided at once to take him up to the church supper, andto make him wear the Mexican costume he had brought home in his trunk. “All thegirls who have stands are going to wear fancy costumes,” she argued, “and someof the boys. Marie is going to tell fortunes, and she sent to Omaha for aBohemian dress her father brought back from a visit to the old country. If youwear those clothes, they will all be pleased. And you must take your guitar.Everybody ought to do what they can to help along, and we have never done much.We are not a talented family.”

The supper was to be at six o’clock, in the basement of the church, andafterward there would be a fair, with charades and an auction. Alexandra hadset out from home early, leaving the house to Signa and Nelse Jensen, who wereto be married next week. Signa had shyly asked to have the wedding put offuntil Emil came home.

Alexandra was well satisfied with her brother. As they drove through therolling French country toward the westering sun and the stalwart church, shewas thinking of that time long ago when she and Emil drove back from the rivervalley to the still unconquered Divide. Yes, she told herself, it had beenworth while; both Emil and the country had become what she had hoped. Out ofher father’s children there was one who was fit to cope with the world, who hadnot been tied to the plow, and who had a personality apart from the soil. Andthat, she reflected, was what she had worked for. She felt well satisfied withher life.

When they reached the church, a score of teams were hitched in front of thebasement doors that opened from the hillside upon the sanded terrace, where theboys wrestled and had jumping-matches. Amédée Chevalier, a proud father of oneweek, rushed out and embraced Emil. Amédée was an only son,—hence he was a veryrich young man,—but he meant to have twenty children himself, like his uncleXavier. “Oh, Emil,” he cried, hugging his old friend rapturously, “why ain’tyou been up to see my boy? You come to-morrow, sure? Emil, you wanna get a boyright off! It’s the greatest thing ever! No, no, no! Angel not sick at all.Everything just fine. That boy he come into this world laughin’, and he beenlaughin’ ever since. You come an’ see!” He pounded Emil’s ribs to emphasizeeach announcement.

Emil caught his arms. “Stop, Amédée. You’re knocking the wind out of me. Ibrought him cups and spoons and blankets and moccasins enough for an orphanasylum. I’m awful glad it’s a boy, sure enough!”

The young men crowded round Emil to admire his costume and to tell him in abreath everything that had happened since he went away. Emil had more friendsup here in the French country than down on Norway Creek. The French andBohemian boys were spirited and jolly, liked variety, and were as muchpredisposed to favor anything new as the Scandinavian boys were to reject it.The Norwegian and Swedish lads were much more self-centred, apt to beegotistical and jealous. They were cautious and reserved with Emil because hehad been away to college, and were prepared to take him down if he should tryto put on airs with them. The French boys liked a bit of swagger, and they werealways delighted to hear about anything new: new clothes, new games, new songs,new dances. Now they carried Emil off to show him the club room they had justfitted up over the post-office, down in the village. They ran down the hill ina drove, all laughing and chattering at once, some in French, some in English.

Alexandra went into the cool, whitewashed basement where the women were settingthe tables. Marie was standing on a chair, building a little tent of shawlswhere she was to tell fortunes. She sprang down and ran toward Alexandra,stopping short and looking at her in disappointment. Alexandra nodded to herencouragingly.

“Oh, he will be here, Marie. The boys have taken him off to show him something.You won’t know him. He is a man now, sure enough. I have no boy left. He smokesterrible-smelling Mexican cigarettes and talks Spanish. How pretty you look,child. Where did you get those beautiful earrings?”

“They belonged to father’s mother. He always promised them to me. He sent themwith the dress and said I could keep them.”

Marie wore a short red skirt of stoutly woven cloth, a white bodice and kirtle,a yellow silk turban wound low over her brown curls, and long coral pendants inher ears. Her ears had been pierced against a piece of cork by her great-auntwhen she was seven years old. In those germless days she had worn bits ofbroom-straw, plucked from the common sweeping-broom, in the lobes until theholes were healed and ready for little gold rings.

When Emil came back from the village, he lingered outside on the terrace withthe boys. Marie could hear him talking and strumming on his guitar while RaoulMarcel sang falsetto. She was vexed with him for staying out there. It made hervery nervous to hear him and not to see him; for, certainly, she told herself,she was not going out to look for him. When the supper bell rang and the boyscame trooping in to get seats at the first table, she forgot all about herannoyance and ran to greet the tallest of the crowd, in his conspicuous attire.She didn’t mind showing her embarrassment at all. She blushed and laughedexcitedly as she gave Emil her hand, and looked delightedly at the black velvetcoat that brought out his fair skin and fine blond head. Marie was incapable ofbeing lukewarm about anything that pleased her. She simply did not know how togive a half-hearted response. When she was delighted, she was as likely as notto stand on her tip-toes and clap her hands. If people laughed at her, shelaughed with them.

“Do the men wear clothes like that every day, in the street?” She caught Emilby his sleeve and turned him about. “Oh, I wish I lived where people worethings like that! Are the buttons real silver? Put on the hat, please. What aheavy thing! How do you ever wear it? Why don’t you tell us about thebull-fights?”

She wanted to wring all his experiences from him at once, without waiting amoment. Emil smiled tolerantly and stood looking down at her with his old,brooding gaze, while the French girls fluttered about him in their whitedresses and ribbons, and Alexandra watched the scene with pride. Several of theFrench girls, Marie knew, were hoping that Emil would take them to supper, andshe was relieved when he took only his sister. Marie caught Frank’s arm anddragged him to the same table, managing to get seats opposite the Bergsons, sothat she could hear what they were talking about. Alexandra made Emil tell Mrs.Xavier Chevalier, the mother of the twenty, about how he had seen a famousmatador killed in the bull-ring. Marie listened to every word, only taking hereyes from Emil to watch Frank’s plate and keep it filled. When Emil finishedhis account,—bloody enough to satisfy Mrs. Xavier and to make her feel thankfulthat she was not a matador,—Marie broke out with a volley of questions. How didthe women dress when they went to bull-fights? Did they wear mantillas? Didthey never wear hats?

After supper the young people played charades for the amusement of theirelders, who sat gossiping between their guesses. All the shops in Sainte-Agneswere closed at eight o’clock that night, so that the merchants and their clerkscould attend the fair. The auction was the liveliest part of the entertainment,for the French boys always lost their heads when they began to bid, satisfiedthat their extravagance was in a good cause. After all the pincushions and sofapillows and embroidered slippers were sold, Emil precipitated a panic by takingout one of his turquoise shirt studs, which every one had been admiring, andhanding it to the auctioneer. All the French girls clamored for it, and theirsweethearts bid against each other recklessly. Marie wanted it, too, and shekept making signals to Frank, which he took a sour pleasure in disregarding. Hedidn’t see the use of making a fuss over a fellow just because he was dressedlike a clown. When the turquoise went to Malvina Sauvage, the French banker’sdaughter, Marie shrugged her shoulders and betook herself to her little tent ofshawls, where she began to shuffle her cards by the light of a tallow candle,calling out, “Fortunes, fortunes!”

The young priest, Father Duchesne, went first to have his fortune read. Marietook his long white hand, looked at it, and then began to run off her cards. “Isee a long journey across water for you, Father. You will go to a town all cutup by water; built on islands, it seems to be, with rivers and green fields allabout. And you will visit an old lady with a white cap and gold hoops in herears, and you will be very happy there.”

“Mais, oui,” said the priest, with a melancholy smile. “C’est L’Isle-Adam, chezma mère. Vous êtes très savante, ma fille.” He patted her yellow turban,calling, “Venez donc, mes garçons! Il y a ici une véritable clairvoyante!”

Marie was clever at fortune-telling, indulging in a light irony that amused thecrowd. She told old Brunot, the miser, that he would lose all his money, marrya girl of sixteen, and live happily on a crust. Sholte, the fat Russian boy,who lived for his stomach, was to be disappointed in love, grow thin, and shoothimself from despondency. Amédée was to have twenty children, and nineteen ofthem were to be girls. Amédée slapped Frank on the back and asked him why hedidn’t see what the fortune-teller would promise him. But Frank shook off hisfriendly hand and grunted, “She tell my fortune long ago; bad enough!” Then hewithdrew to a corner and sat glowering at his wife.

Frank’s case was all the more painful because he had no one in particular tofix his jealousy upon. Sometimes he could have thanked the man who would bringhim evidence against his wife. He had discharged a good farm-boy, Jan Smirka,because he thought Marie was fond of him; but she had not seemed to miss Janwhen he was gone, and she had been just as kind to the next boy. The farm-handswould always do anything for Marie; Frank couldn’t find one so surly that hewould not make an effort to please her. At the bottom of his heart Frank knewwell enough that if he could once give up his grudge, his wife would come backto him. But he could never in the world do that. The grudge was fundamental.Perhaps he could not have given it up if he had tried. Perhaps he got moresatisfaction out of feeling himself abused than he would have got out of beingloved. If he could once have made Marie thoroughly unhappy, he might haverelented and raised her from the dust. But she had never humbled herself. Inthe first days of their love she had been his slave; she had admired himabandonedly. But the moment he began to bully her and to be unjust, she beganto draw away; at first in tearful amazement, then in quiet, unspoken disgust.The distance between them had widened and hardened. It no longer contracted andbrought them suddenly together. The spark of her life went somewhere else, andhe was always watching to surprise it. He knew that somewhere she must get afeeling to live upon, for she was not a woman who could live without loving. Hewanted to prove to himself the wrong he felt. What did she hide in her heart?Where did it go? Even Frank had his churlish delicacies; he never reminded herof how much she had once loved him. For that Marie was grateful to him.

While Marie was chattering to the French boys, Amédée called Emil to the backof the room and whispered to him that they were going to play a joke on thegirls. At eleven o’clock, Amédée was to go up to the switchboard in thevestibule and turn off the electric lights, and every boy would have a chanceto kiss his sweetheart before Father Duchesne could find his way up the stairsto turn the current on again. The only difficulty was the candle in Marie’stent; perhaps, as Emil had no sweetheart, he would oblige the boys by blowingout the candle. Emil said he would undertake to do that.

At five minutes to eleven he sauntered up to Marie’s booth, and the French boysdispersed to find their girls. He leaned over the card-table and gave himselfup to looking at her. “Do you think you could tell my fortune?” he murmured. Itwas the first word he had had alone with her for almost a year. “My luck hasn’tchanged any. It’s just the same.”

Marie had often wondered whether there was anyone else who could look histhoughts to you as Emil could. To-night, when she met his steady, powerfuleyes, it was impossible not to feel the sweetness of the dream he was dreaming;it reached her before she could shut it out, and hid itself in her heart. Shebegan to shuffle her cards furiously. “I’m angry with you, Emil,” she broke outwith petulance. “Why did you give them that lovely blue stone to sell? Youmight have known Frank wouldn’t buy it for me, and I wanted it awfully!”

Emil laughed shortly. “People who want such little things surely ought to havethem,” he said dryly. He thrust his hand into the pocket of his velvet trousersand brought out a handful of uncut turquoises, as big as marbles. Leaning overthe table he dropped them into her lap. “There, will those do? Be careful,don’t let any one see them. Now, I suppose you want me to go away and let youplay with them?”

Marie was gazing in rapture at the soft blue color of the stones. “Oh, Emil! Iseverything down there beautiful like these? How could you ever come away?”

At that instant Amédée laid hands on the switchboard. There was a shiver and agiggle, and every one looked toward the red blur that Marie’s candle made inthe dark. Immediately that, too, was gone. Little shrieks and currents of softlaughter ran up and down the dark hall. Marie started up,—directly into Emil’sarms. In the same instant she felt his lips. The veil that had hung uncertainlybetween them for so long was dissolved. Before she knew what she was doing, shehad committed herself to that kiss that was at once a boy’s and a man’s, astimid as it was tender; so like Emil and so unlike any one else in the world.Not until it was over did she realize what it meant. And Emil, who had so oftenimagined the shock of this first kiss, was surprised at its gentleness andnaturalness. It was like a sigh which they had breathed together; almostsorrowful, as if each were afraid of wakening something in the other.

When the lights came on again, everybody was laughing and shouting, and all theFrench girls were rosy and shining with mirth. Only Marie, in her little tentof shawls, was pale and quiet. Under her yellow turban the red coral pendantsswung against white cheeks. Frank was still staring at her, but he seemed tosee nothing. Years ago, he himself had had the power to take the blood from hercheeks like that. Perhaps he did not remember—perhaps he had never noticed!Emil was already at the other end of the hall, walking about with theshoulder-motion he had acquired among the Mexicans, studying the floor with hisintent, deep-set eyes. Marie began to take down and fold her shawls. She didnot glance up again. The young people drifted to the other end of the hallwhere the guitar was sounding. In a moment she heard Emil and Raoul singing:—

“Across the Rio Grand-e
There lies a sunny land-e,
My bright-eyed Mexico!”

Alexandra Bergson came up to the card booth. “Let me help you, Marie. You looktired.”

She placed her hand on Marie’s arm and felt her shiver. Marie stiffened underthat kind, calm hand. Alexandra drew back, perplexed and hurt.

There was about Alexandra something of the impervious calm of the fatalist,always disconcerting to very young people, who cannot feel that the heart livesat all unless it is still at the mercy of storms; unless its strings can screamto the touch of pain.

II

Signa’s wedding supper was over. The guests, and the tiresome little Norwegianpreacher who had performed the marriage ceremony, were saying good-night. OldIvar was hitching the horses to the wagon to take the wedding presents and thebride and groom up to their new home, on Alexandra’s north quarter. When Ivardrove up to the gate, Emil and Marie Shabata began to carry out the presents,and Alexandra went into her bedroom to bid Signa good-bye and to give her a fewwords of good counsel. She was surprised to find that the bride had changed herslippers for heavy shoes and was pinning up her skirts. At that moment Nelseappeared at the gate with the two milk cows that Alexandra had given Signa fora wedding present.

Alexandra began to laugh. “Why, Signa, you and Nelse are to ride home. I’llsend Ivar over with the cows in the morning.”

Signa hesitated and looked perplexed. When her husband called her, she pinnedher hat on resolutely. “I ta-ank I better do yust like he say,” she murmured inconfusion.

Alexandra and Marie accompanied Signa to the gate and saw the party set off,old Ivar driving ahead in the wagon and the bride and groom following on foot,each leading a cow. Emil burst into a laugh before they were out of hearing.

“Those two will get on,” said Alexandra as they turned back to the house. “Theyare not going to take any chances. They will feel safer with those cows intheir own stable. Marie, I am going to send for an old woman next. As soon as Iget the girls broken in, I marry them off.”

“I’ve no patience with Signa, marrying that grumpy fellow!” Marie declared. “Iwanted her to marry that nice Smirka boy who worked for us last winter. I thinkshe liked him, too.”

“Yes, I think she did,” Alexandra assented, “but I suppose she was too muchafraid of Nelse to marry any one else. Now that I think of it, most of my girlshave married men they were afraid of. I believe there is a good deal of the cowin most Swedish girls. You high-strung Bohemian can’t understand us. We’re aterribly practical people, and I guess we think a cross man makes a goodmanager.”

Marie shrugged her shoulders and turned to pin up a lock of hair that hadfallen on her neck. Somehow Alexandra had irritated her of late. Everybodyirritated her. She was tired of everybody. “I’m going home alone, Emil, so youneedn’t get your hat,” she said as she wound her scarf quickly about her head.“Good-night, Alexandra,” she called back in a strained voice, running down thegravel walk.

Emil followed with long strides until he overtook her. Then she began to walkslowly. It was a night of warm wind and faint starlight, and the fireflies wereglimmering over the wheat.

“Marie,” said Emil after they had walked for a while, “I wonder if you know howunhappy I am?”

Marie did not answer him. Her head, in its white scarf, drooped forward alittle.

Emil kicked a clod from the path and went on:—

“I wonder whether you are really shallow-hearted, like you seem? Sometimes Ithink one boy does just as well as another for you. It never seems to make muchdifference whether it is me or Raoul Marcel or Jan Smirka. Are you really likethat?”

“Perhaps I am. What do you want me to do? Sit round and cry all day? When I’vecried until I can’t cry any more, then—then I must do something else.”

“Are you sorry for me?” he persisted.

“No, I’m not. If I were big and free like you, I wouldn’t let anything make meunhappy. As old Napoleon Brunot said at the fair, I wouldn’t go lovering afterno woman. I’d take the first train and go off and have all the fun there is.”

“I tried that, but it didn’t do any good. Everything reminded me. The nicer theplace was, the more I wanted you.” They had come to the stile and Emil pointedto it persuasively. “Sit down a moment, I want to ask you something.” Marie satdown on the top step and Emil drew nearer. “Would you tell me something that’snone of my business if you thought it would help me out? Well, then, tell me,pleasetell me, why you ran away with Frank Shabata!”

Marie drew back. “Because I was in love with him,” she said firmly.

“Really?” he asked incredulously.

“Yes, indeed. Very much in love with him. I think I was the one who suggestedour running away. From the first it was more my fault than his.”

Emil turned away his face.

“And now,” Marie went on, “I’ve got to remember that. Frank is just the samenow as he was then, only then I would see him as I wanted him to be. I wouldhave my own way. And now I pay for it.”

“You don’t do all the paying.”

“That’s it. When one makes a mistake, there’s no telling where it will stop.But you can go away; you can leave all this behind you.”

“Not everything. I can’t leave you behind. Will you go away with me, Marie?”

Marie started up and stepped across the stile. “Emil! How wickedly you talk! Iam not that kind of a girl, and you know it. But what am I going to do if youkeep tormenting me like this!” she added plaintively.

“Marie, I won’t bother you any more if you will tell me just one thing. Stop aminute and look at me. No, nobody can see us. Everybody’s asleep. That was onlya firefly. Marie, stopand tell me!”

Emil overtook her and catching her by the shoulders shook her gently, as if hewere trying to awaken a sleepwalker.

Marie hid her face on his arm. “Don’t ask me anything more. I don’t knowanything except how miserable I am. And I thought it would be all right whenyou came back. Oh, Emil,” she clutched his sleeve and began to cry, “what am Ito do if you don’t go away? I can’t go, and one of us must. Can’t you see?”

Emil stood looking down at her, holding his shoulders stiff and stiffening thearm to which she clung. Her white dress looked gray in the darkness. She seemedlike a troubled spirit, like some shadow out of the earth, clinging to him andentreating him to give her peace. Behind her the fireflies were weaving in andout over the wheat. He put his hand on her bent head. “On my honor, Marie, ifyou will say you love me, I will go away.”

She lifted her face to his. “How could I help it? Didn’t you know?”

Emil was the one who trembled, through all his frame. After he left Marie ather gate, he wandered about the fields all night, till morning put out thefireflies and the stars.

III

One evening, a week after Signa’s wedding, Emil was kneeling before a box inthe sitting-room, packing his books. From time to time he rose and wanderedabout the house, picking up stray volumes and bringing them listlessly back tohis box. He was packing without enthusiasm. He was not very sanguine about hisfuture. Alexandra sat sewing by the table. She had helped him pack his trunk inthe afternoon. As Emil came and went by her chair with his books, he thought tohimself that it had not been so hard to leave his sister since he first wentaway to school. He was going directly to Omaha, to read law in the office of aSwedish lawyer until October, when he would enter the law school at Ann Arbor.They had planned that Alexandra was to come to Michigan—a long journey forher—at Christmas time, and spend several weeks with him. Nevertheless, he feltthat this leave-taking would be more final than his earlier ones had been; thatit meant a definite break with his old home and the beginning of somethingnew—he did not know what. His ideas about the future would not crystallize; themore he tried to think about it, the vaguer his conception of it became. Butone thing was clear, he told himself; it was high time that he made good toAlexandra, and that ought to be incentive enough to begin with.

As he went about gathering up his books he felt as if he were uprooting things.At last he threw himself down on the old slat lounge where he had slept when hewas little, and lay looking up at the familiar cracks in the ceiling.

“Tired, Emil?” his sister asked.

“Lazy,” he murmured, turning on his side and looking at her. He studiedAlexandra’s face for a long time in the lamplight. It had never occurred to himthat his sister was a handsome woman until Marie Shabata had told him so.Indeed, he had never thought of her as being a woman at all, only a sister. Ashe studied her bent head, he looked up at the picture of John Bergson above thelamp. “No,” he thought to himself, “she didn’t get it there. I suppose I ammore like that.”

“Alexandra,” he said suddenly, “that old walnut secretary you use for a deskwas father’s, wasn’t it?”

Alexandra went on stitching. “Yes. It was one of the first things he bought forthe old log house. It was a great extravagance in those days. But he wrote agreat many letters back to the old country. He had many friends there, and theywrote to him up to the time he died. No one ever blamed him for grandfather’sdisgrace. I can see him now, sitting there on Sundays, in his white shirt,writing pages and pages, so carefully. He wrote a fine, regular hand, almostlike engraving. Yours is something like his, when you take pains.”

“Grandfather was really crooked, was he?”

“He married an unscrupulous woman, and then—then I’m afraid he was reallycrooked. When we first came here father used to have dreams about making agreat fortune and going back to Sweden to pay back to the poor sailors themoney grandfather had lost.”

Emil stirred on the lounge. “I say, that would have been worth while, wouldn’tit? Father wasn’t a bit like Lou or Oscar, was he? I can’t remember much abouthim before he got sick.”

“Oh, not at all!” Alexandra dropped her sewing on her knee. “He had betteropportunities; not to make money, but to make something of himself. He was aquiet man, but he was very intelligent. You would have been proud of him,Emil.”

Alexandra felt that he would like to know there had been a man of his kin whomhe could admire. She knew that Emil was ashamed of Lou and Oscar, because theywere bigoted and self-satisfied. He never said much about them, but she couldfeel his disgust. His brothers had shown their disapproval of him ever since hefirst went away to school. The only thing that would have satisfied them wouldhave been his failure at the University. As it was, they resented every changein his speech, in his dress, in his point of view; though the latter they hadto conjecture, for Emil avoided talking to them about any but family matters.All his interests they treated as affectations.

Alexandra took up her sewing again. “I can remember father when he was quite ayoung man. He belonged to some kind of a musical society, a male chorus, inStockholm. I can remember going with mother to hear them sing. There must havebeen a hundred of them, and they all wore long black coats and white neckties.I was used to seeing father in a blue coat, a sort of jacket, and when Irecognized him on the platform, I was very proud. Do you remember that Swedishsong he taught you, about the ship boy?”

“Yes. I used to sing it to the Mexicans. They like anything different.” Emilpaused. “Father had a hard fight here, didn’t he?” he added thoughtfully.

“Yes, and he died in a dark time. Still, he had hope. He believed in the land.”

“And in you, I guess,” Emil said to himself. There was another period ofsilence; that warm, friendly silence, full of perfect understanding, in whichEmil and Alexandra had spent many of their happiest half-hours.

At last Emil said abruptly, “Lou and Oscar would be better off if they werepoor, wouldn’t they?”

Alexandra smiled. “Maybe. But their children wouldn’t. I have great hopes ofMilly.”

Emil shivered. “I don’t know. Seems to me it gets worse as it goes on. Theworst of the Swedes is that they’re never willing to find out how much theydon’t know. It was like that at the University. Always so pleased withthemselves! There’s no getting behind that conceited Swedish grin. TheBohemians and Germans were so different.”

“Come, Emil, don’t go back on your own people. Father wasn’t conceited, UncleOtto wasn’t. Even Lou and Oscar weren’t when they were boys.”

Emil looked incredulous, but he did not dispute the point. He turned on hisback and lay still for a long time, his hands locked under his head, looking upat the ceiling. Alexandra knew that he was thinking of many things. She felt noanxiety about Emil. She had always believed in him, as she had believed in theland. He had been more like himself since he got back from Mexico; seemed gladto be at home, and talked to her as he used to do. She had no doubt that hiswandering fit was over, and that he would soon be settled in life.

“Alexandra,” said Emil suddenly, “do you remember the wild duck we saw down onthe river that time?”

His sister looked up. “I often think of her. It always seems to me she’s therestill, just like we saw her.”

“I know. It’s queer what things one remembers and what things one forgets.”Emil yawned and sat up. “Well, it’s time to turn in.” He rose, and going overto Alexandra stooped down and kissed her lightly on the cheek. “Good-night,sister. I think you did pretty well by us.”

Emil took up his lamp and went upstairs. Alexandra sat finishing his newnightshirt, that must go in the top tray of his trunk.

IV

The next morning Angélique, Amédée’s wife, was in the kitchen baking pies,assisted by old Mrs. Chevalier. Between the mixing-board and the stove stoodthe old cradle that had been Amédée’s, and in it was his black-eyed son. AsAngélique, flushed and excited, with flour on her hands, stopped to smile atthe baby, Emil Bergson rode up to the kitchen door on his mare and dismounted.

“’Médée is out in the field, Emil,” Angélique called as she ran across thekitchen to the oven. “He begins to cut his wheat to-day; the first wheat readyto cut anywhere about here. He bought a new header, you know, because all thewheat’s so short this year. I hope he can rent it to the neighbors, it cost somuch. He and his cousins bought a steam thresher on shares. You ought to go outand see that header work. I watched it an hour this morning, busy as I am withall the men to feed. He has a lot of hands, but he’s the only one that knowshow to drive the header or how to run the engine, so he has to be everywhere atonce. He’s sick, too, and ought to be in his bed.”

Emil bent over Hector Baptiste, trying to make him blink his round, bead-likeblack eyes. “Sick? What’s the matter with your daddy, kid? Been making him walkthe floor with you?”

Angélique sniffed. “Not much! We don’t have that kind of babies. It was hisfather that kept Baptiste awake. All night I had to be getting up and makingmustard plasters to put on his stomach. He had an awful colic. He said he feltbetter this morning, but I don’t think he ought to be out in the field,overheating himself.”

Angélique did not speak with much anxiety, not because she was indifferent, butbecause she felt so secure in their good fortune. Only good things could happento a rich, energetic, handsome young man like Amédée, with a new baby in thecradle and a new header in the field.

Emil stroked the black fuzz on Baptiste’s head. “I say, Angélique, one of’Médée’s grandmothers, ’way back, must have been a squaw. This kid looksexactly like the Indian babies.”

Angélique made a face at him, but old Mrs. Chevalier had been touched on a sorepoint, and she let out such a stream of fiery patoisthat Emil fled fromthe kitchen and mounted his mare.

Opening the pasture gate from the saddle, Emil rode across the field to theclearing where the thresher stood, driven by a stationary engine and fed fromthe header boxes. As Amédée was not on the engine, Emil rode on to thewheatfield, where he recognized, on the header, the slight, wiry figure of hisfriend, coatless, his white shirt puffed out by the wind, his straw hat stuckjauntily on the side of his head. The six big work-horses that drew, or ratherpushed, the header, went abreast at a rapid walk, and as they were still greenat the work they required a good deal of management on Amédée’s part;especially when they turned the corners, where they divided, three and three,and then swung round into line again with a movement that looked as complicatedas a wheel of artillery. Emil felt a new thrill of admiration for his friend,and with it the old pang of envy at the way in which Amédée could do with hismight what his hand found to do, and feel that, whatever it was, it was themost important thing in the world. “I’ll have to bring Alexandra up to see thisthing work,” Emil thought; “it’s splendid!”

When he saw Emil, Amédée waved to him and called to one of his twenty cousinsto take the reins. Stepping off the header without stopping it, he ran up toEmil who had dismounted. “Come along,” he called. “I have to go over to theengine for a minute. I gotta green man running it, and I gotta to keep an eyeon him.”

Emil thought the lad was unnaturally flushed and more excited than even thecares of managing a big farm at a critical time warranted. As they passedbehind a last year’s stack, Amédée clutched at his right side and sank down fora moment on the straw.

“Ouch! I got an awful pain in me, Emil. Something’s the matter with my insides,for sure.”

Emil felt his fiery cheek. “You ought to go straight to bed, ’Médée, andtelephone for the doctor; that’s what you ought to do.”

Amédée staggered up with a gesture of despair. “How can I? I got no time to besick. Three thousand dollars’ worth of new machinery to manage, and the wheatso ripe it will begin to shatter next week. My wheat’s short, but it’s gottagrand full berries. What’s he slowing down for? We haven’t got header boxesenough to feed the thresher, I guess.”

Amédée started hot-foot across the stubble, leaning a little to the right as heran, and waved to the engineer not to stop the engine.

Emil saw that this was no time to talk about his own affairs. He mounted hismare and rode on to Sainte-Agnes, to bid his friends there good-bye. He wentfirst to see Raoul Marcel, and found him innocently practising the “Gloria” forthe big confirmation service on Sunday while he polished the mirrors of hisfather’s saloon.

As Emil rode homewards at three o’clock in the afternoon, he saw Amédéestaggering out of the wheatfield, supported by two of his cousins. Emil stoppedand helped them put the boy to bed.

V

When Frank Shabata came in from work at five o’clock that evening, old MosesMarcel, Raoul’s father, telephoned him that Amédée had had a seizure in thewheatfield, and that Doctor Paradis was going to operate on him as soon as theHanover doctor got there to help. Frank dropped a word of this at the table,bolted his supper, and rode off to Sainte-Agnes, where there would besympathetic discussion of Amédée’s case at Marcel’s saloon.

As soon as Frank was gone, Marie telephoned Alexandra. It was a comfort to hearher friend’s voice. Yes, Alexandra knew what there was to be known aboutAmédée. Emil had been there when they carried him out of the field, and hadstayed with him until the doctors operated for appendicitis at five o’clock.They were afraid it was too late to do much good; it should have been donethree days ago. Amédée was in a very bad way. Emil had just come home, worn outand sick himself. She had given him some brandy and put him to bed.

Marie hung up the receiver. Poor Amédée’s illness had taken on a new meaning toher, now that she knew Emil had been with him. And it might so easily have beenthe other way—Emil who was ill and Amédée who was sad! Marie looked about thedusky sitting-room. She had seldom felt so utterly lonely. If Emil was asleep,there was not even a chance of his coming; and she could not go to Alexandrafor sympathy. She meant to tell Alexandra everything, as soon as Emil wentaway. Then whatever was left between them would be honest.

But she could not stay in the house this evening. Where should she go? Shewalked slowly down through the orchard, where the evening air was heavy withthe smell of wild cotton. The fresh, salty scent of the wild roses had givenway before this more powerful perfume of midsummer. Wherever thoseashes-of-rose balls hung on their milky stalks, the air about them wassaturated with their breath. The sky was still red in the west and the eveningstar hung directly over the Bergsons’ wind-mill. Marie crossed the fence at thewheatfield corner, and walked slowly along the path that led to Alexandra’s.She could not help feeling hurt that Emil had not come to tell her aboutAmédée. It seemed to her most unnatural that he should not have come. If shewere in trouble, certainly he was the one person in the world she would want tosee. Perhaps he wished her to understand that for her he was as good as gonealready.

Marie stole slowly, flutteringly, along the path, like a white night-moth outof the fields. The years seemed to stretch before her like the land; spring,summer, autumn, winter, spring; always the same patient fields, the patientlittle trees, the patient lives; always the same yearning, the same pulling atthe chain—until the instinct to live had torn itself and bled and weakened forthe last time, until the chain secured a dead woman, who might cautiously bereleased. Marie walked on, her face lifted toward the remote, inaccessibleevening star.

When she reached the stile she sat down and waited. How terrible it was to lovepeople when you could not really share their lives!

Yes, in so far as she was concerned, Emil was already gone. They couldn’t meetany more. There was nothing for them to say. They had spent the last penny oftheir small change; there was nothing left but gold. The day of love-tokens waspast. They had now only their hearts to give each other. And Emil being gone,what was her life to be like? In some ways, it would be easier. She would not,at least, live in perpetual fear. If Emil were once away and settled at work,she would not have the feeling that she was spoiling his life. With the memoryhe left her, she could be as rash as she chose. Nobody could be the worse forit but herself; and that, surely, did not matter. Her own case was clear. Whena girl had loved one man, and then loved another while that man was stillalive, everybody knew what to think of her. What happened to her was of littleconsequence, so long as she did not drag other people down with her. Emil onceaway, she could let everything else go and live a new life of perfect love.

Marie left the stile reluctantly. She had, after all, thought he might come.And how glad she ought to be, she told herself, that he was asleep. She leftthe path and went across the pasture. The moon was almost full. An owl washooting somewhere in the fields. She had scarcely thought about where she wasgoing when the pond glittered before her, where Emil had shot the ducks. Shestopped and looked at it. Yes, there would be a dirty way out of life, if onechose to take it. But she did not want to die. She wanted to live and dream—ahundred years, forever! As long as this sweetness welled up in her heart, aslong as her breast could hold this treasure of pain! She felt as the pond mustfeel when it held the moon like that; when it encircled and swelled with thatimage of gold.

In the morning, when Emil came down-stairs, Alexandra met him in thesitting-room and put her hands on his shoulders. “Emil, I went to your room assoon as it was light, but you were sleeping so sound I hated to wake you. Therewas nothing you could do, so I let you sleep. They telephoned from Sainte-Agnesthat Amédée died at three o’clock this morning.”

VI

The Church has always held that life is for the living. On Saturday, while halfthe village of Sainte-Agnes was mourning for Amédée and preparing the funeralblack for his burial on Monday, the other half was busy with white dresses andwhite veils for the great confirmation service to-morrow, when the bishop wasto confirm a class of one hundred boys and girls. Father Duchesne divided histime between the living and the dead. All day Saturday the church was a sceneof bustling activity, a little hushed by the thought of Amédée. The choir werebusy rehearsing a mass of Rossini, which they had studied and practised forthis occasion. The women were trimming the altar, the boys and girls werebringing flowers.

On Sunday morning the bishop was to drive overland to Sainte-Agnes fromHanover, and Emil Bergson had been asked to take the place of one of Amédée’scousins in the cavalcade of forty French boys who were to ride across countryto meet the bishop’s carriage. At six o’clock on Sunday morning the boys met atthe church. As they stood holding their horses by the bridle, they talked inlow tones of their dead comrade. They kept repeating that Amédée had alwaysbeen a good boy, glancing toward the red brick church which had played so largea part in Amédée’s life, had been the scene of his most serious moments and ofhis happiest hours. He had played and wrestled and sung and courted under itsshadow. Only three weeks ago he had proudly carried his baby there to bechristened. They could not doubt that that invisible arm was still aboutAmédée; that through the church on earth he had passed to the churchtriumphant, the goal of the hopes and faith of so many hundred years.

When the word was given to mount, the young men rode at a walk out of thevillage; but once out among the wheatfields in the morning sun, their horsesand their own youth got the better of them. A wave of zeal and fiery enthusiasmswept over them. They longed for a Jerusalem to deliver. The thud of theirgalloping hoofs interrupted many a country breakfast and brought many a womanand child to the door of the farmhouses as they passed. Five miles east ofSainte-Agnes they met the bishop in his open carriage, attended by two priests.Like one man the boys swung off their hats in a broad salute, and bowed theirheads as the handsome old man lifted his two fingers in the episcopal blessing.The horsemen closed about the carriage like a guard, and whenever a restlesshorse broke from control and shot down the road ahead of the body, the bishoplaughed and rubbed his plump hands together. “What fine boys!” he said to hispriests. “The Church still has her cavalry.”

As the troop swept past the graveyard half a mile east of the town,—the firstframe church of the parish had stood there,—old Pierre Seguin was already outwith his pick and spade, digging Amédée’s grave. He knelt and uncovered as thebishop passed. The boys with one accord looked away from old Pierre to the redchurch on the hill, with the gold cross flaming on its steeple.

Mass was at eleven. While the church was filling, Emil Bergson waited outside,watching the wagons and buggies drive up the hill. After the bell began toring, he saw Frank Shabata ride up on horseback and tie his horse to thehitch-bar. Marie, then, was not coming. Emil turned and went into the church.Amédée’s was the only empty pew, and he sat down in it. Some of Amédée’scousins were there, dressed in black and weeping. When all the pews were full,the old men and boys packed the open space at the back of the church, kneelingon the floor. There was scarcely a family in town that was not represented inthe confirmation class, by a cousin, at least. The new communicants, with theirclear, reverent faces, were beautiful to look upon as they entered in a bodyand took the front benches reserved for them. Even before the Mass began, theair was charged with feeling. The choir had never sung so well and RaoulMarcel, in the “Gloria,” drew even the bishop’s eyes to the organ loft. For theoffertory he sang Gounod’s “Ave Maria,”—always spoken of in Sainte-Agnes as“the Ave Maria.”

Emil began to torture himself with questions about Marie. Was she ill? Had shequarreled with her husband? Was she too unhappy to find comfort even here? Hadshe, perhaps, thought that he would come to her? Was she waiting for him?Overtaxed by excitement and sorrow as he was, the rapture of the service tookhold upon his body and mind. As he listened to Raoul, he seemed to emerge fromthe conflicting emotions which had been whirling him about and sucking himunder. He felt as if a clear light broke upon his mind, and with it aconviction that good was, after all, stronger than evil, and that good waspossible to men. He seemed to discover that there was a kind of rapture inwhich he could love forever without faltering and without sin. He looked acrossthe heads of the people at Frank Shabata with calmness. That rapture was forthose who could feel it; for people who could not, it was non-existent. Hecoveted nothing that was Frank Shabata’s. The spirit he had met in music washis own. Frank Shabata had never found it; would never find it if he livedbeside it a thousand years; would have destroyed it if he had found it, asHerod slew the innocents, as Rome slew the martyrs.

San—cta Mari-i-i-a,

wailed Raoul from the organ loft;

O—ra pro no-o-bis!

And it did not occur to Emil that any one had ever reasoned thus before, thatmusic had ever before given a man this equivocal revelation.

The confirmation service followed the Mass. When it was over, the congregationthronged about the newly confirmed. The girls, and even the boys, were kissedand embraced and wept over. All the aunts and grandmothers wept with joy. Thehousewives had much ado to tear themselves away from the general rejoicing andhurry back to their kitchens. The country parishioners were staying in town fordinner, and nearly every house in Sainte-Agnes entertained visitors that day.Father Duchesne, the bishop, and the visiting priests dined with FabienSauvage, the banker. Emil and Frank Shabata were both guests of old MoiseMarcel. After dinner Frank and old Moise retired to the rear room of the saloonto play California Jack and drink their cognac, and Emil went over to thebanker’s with Raoul, who had been asked to sing for the bishop.

At three o’clock, Emil felt that he could stand it no longer. He slipped outunder cover of “The Holy City,” followed by Malvina’s wistful eye, and went tothe stable for his mare. He was at that height of excitement from whicheverything is foreshortened, from which life seems short and simple, death verynear, and the soul seems to soar like an eagle. As he rode past the graveyardhe looked at the brown hole in the earth where Amédée was to lie, and felt nohorror. That, too, was beautiful, that simple doorway into forgetfulness. Theheart, when it is too much alive, aches for that brown earth, and ecstasy hasno fear of death. It is the old and the poor and the maimed who shrink fromthat brown hole; its wooers are found among the young, the passionate, thegallant-hearted. It was not until he had passed the graveyard that Emilrealized where he was going. It was the hour for saying good-bye. It might bethe last time that he would see her alone, and today he could leave her withoutrancor, without bitterness.

Everywhere the grain stood ripe and the hot afternoon was full of the smell ofthe ripe wheat, like the smell of bread baking in an oven. The breath of thewheat and the sweet clover passed him like pleasant things in a dream. He couldfeel nothing but the sense of diminishing distance. It seemed to him that hismare was flying, or running on wheels, like a railway train. The sunlight,flashing on the window-glass of the big red barns, drove him wild with joy. Hewas like an arrow shot from the bow. His life poured itself out along the roadbefore him as he rode to the Shabata farm.

When Emil alighted at the Shabatas’ gate, his horse was in a lather. He tiedher in the stable and hurried to the house. It was empty. She might be at Mrs.Hiller’s or with Alexandra. But anything that reminded him of her would beenough, the orchard, the mulberry tree... When he reached the orchard the sunwas hanging low over the wheatfield. Long fingers of light reached through theapple branches as through a net; the orchard was riddled and shot with gold;light was the reality, the trees were merely interferences that reflected andrefracted light. Emil went softly down between the cherry trees toward thewheatfield. When he came to the corner, he stopped short and put his hand overhis mouth. Marie was lying on her side under the white mulberry tree, her facehalf hidden in the grass, her eyes closed, her hands lying limply where theyhad happened to fall. She had lived a day of her new life of perfect love, andit had left her like this. Her breast rose and fell faintly, as if she wereasleep. Emil threw himself down beside her and took her in his arms. The bloodcame back to her cheeks, her amber eyes opened slowly, and in them Emil saw hisown face and the orchard and the sun. “I was dreaming this,” she whispered,hiding her face against him, “don’t take my dream away!”

VII

When Frank Shabata got home that night, he found Emil’s mare in his stable.Such an impertinence amazed him. Like everybody else, Frank had had an excitingday. Since noon he had been drinking too much, and he was in a bad temper. Hetalked bitterly to himself while he put his own horse away, and as he went upthe path and saw that the house was dark he felt an added sense of injury. Heapproached quietly and listened on the doorstep. Hearing nothing, he opened thekitchen door and went softly from one room to another. Then he went through thehouse again, upstairs and down, with no better result. He sat down on thebottom step of the box stairway and tried to get his wits together. In thatunnatural quiet there was no sound but his own heavy breathing. Suddenly an owlbegan to hoot out in the fields. Frank lifted his head. An idea flashed intohis mind, and his sense of injury and outrage grew. He went into his bedroomand took his murderous 405 Winchester from the closet.

When Frank took up his gun and walked out of the house, he had not the faintestpurpose of doing anything with it. He did not believe that he had any realgrievance. But it gratified him to feel like a desperate man. He had got intothe habit of seeing himself always in desperate straits. His unhappytemperament was like a cage; he could never get out of it; and he felt thatother people, his wife in particular, must have put him there. It had nevermore than dimly occurred to Frank that he made his own unhappiness. Though hetook up his gun with dark projects in his mind, he would have been paralyzedwith fright had he known that there was the slightest probability of his evercarrying any of them out.

Frank went slowly down to the orchard gate, stopped and stood for a moment lostin thought. He retraced his steps and looked through the barn and the hayloft.Then he went out to the road, where he took the foot-path along the outside ofthe orchard hedge. The hedge was twice as tall as Frank himself, and so densethat one could see through it only by peering closely between the leaves. Hecould see the empty path a long way in the moonlight. His mind traveled aheadto the stile, which he always thought of as haunted by Emil Bergson. But whyhad he left his horse?

At the wheatfield corner, where the orchard hedge ended and the path led acrossthe pasture to the Bergsons’, Frank stopped. In the warm, breathless night airhe heard a murmuring sound, perfectly inarticulate, as low as the sound ofwater coming from a spring, where there is no fall, and where there are nostones to fret it. Frank strained his ears. It ceased. He held his breath andbegan to tremble. Resting the butt of his gun on the ground, he parted themulberry leaves softly with his fingers and peered through the hedge at thedark figures on the grass, in the shadow of the mulberry tree. It seemed to himthat they must feel his eyes, that they must hear him breathing. But they didnot. Frank, who had always wanted to see things blacker than they were, foronce wanted to believe less than he saw. The woman lying in the shadow might soeasily be one of the Bergsons’ farm-girls.... Again the murmur, like waterwelling out of the ground. This time he heard it more distinctly, and his bloodwas quicker than his brain. He began to act, just as a man who falls into thefire begins to act. The gun sprang to his shoulder, he sighted mechanically andfired three times without stopping, stopped without knowing why. Either he shuthis eyes or he had vertigo. He did not see anything while he was firing. Hethought he heard a cry simultaneous with the second report, but he was notsure. He peered again through the hedge, at the two dark figures under thetree. They had fallen a little apart from each other, and were perfectlystill—No, not quite; in a white patch of light, where the moon shone throughthe branches, a man’s hand was plucking spasmodically at the grass.

Suddenly the woman stirred and uttered a cry, then another, and another. Shewas living! She was dragging herself toward the hedge! Frank dropped his gunand ran back along the path, shaking, stumbling, gasping. He had never imaginedsuch horror. The cries followed him. They grew fainter and thicker, as if shewere choking. He dropped on his knees beside the hedge and crouched like arabbit, listening; fainter, fainter; a sound like a whine; again—amoan—another—silence. Frank scrambled to his feet and ran on, groaning andpraying. From habit he went toward the house, where he was used to beingsoothed when he had worked himself into a frenzy, but at the sight of theblack, open door, he started back. He knew that he had murdered somebody, thata woman was bleeding and moaning in the orchard, but he had not realized beforethat it was his wife. The gate stared him in the face. He threw his hands overhis head. Which way to turn? He lifted his tormented face and looked at thesky. “Holy Mother of God, not to suffer! She was a good girl—not to suffer!”

Frank had been wont to see himself in dramatic situations; but now, when hestood by the windmill, in the bright space between the barn and the house,facing his own black doorway, he did not see himself at all. He stood like thehare when the dogs are approaching from all sides. And he ran like a hare, backand forth about that moonlit space, before he could make up his mind to go intothe dark stable for a horse. The thought of going into a doorway was terribleto him. He caught Emil’s horse by the bit and led it out. He could not havebuckled a bridle on his own. After two or three attempts, he lifted himselfinto the saddle and started for Hanover. If he could catch the one o’clocktrain, he had money enough to get as far as Omaha.

While he was thinking dully of this in some less sensitized part of his brain,his acuter faculties were going over and over the cries he had heard in theorchard. Terror was the only thing that kept him from going back to her, terrorthat she might still be she, that she might still be suffering. A woman,mutilated and bleeding in his orchard—it was because it was a woman that he wasso afraid. It was inconceivable that he should have hurt a woman. He wouldrather be eaten by wild beasts than see her move on the ground as she had movedin the orchard. Why had she been so careless? She knew he was like a crazy manwhen he was angry. She had more than once taken that gun away from him and heldit, when he was angry with other people. Once it had gone off while they werestruggling over it. She was never afraid. But, when she knew him, why hadn’tshe been more careful? Didn’t she have all summer before her to love EmilBergson in, without taking such chances? Probably she had met the Smirka boy,too, down there in the orchard. He didn’t care. She could have met all the menon the Divide there, and welcome, if only she hadn’t brought this horror onhim.

There was a wrench in Frank’s mind. He did not honestly believe that of her. Heknew that he was doing her wrong. He stopped his horse to admit this to himselfthe more directly, to think it out the more clearly. He knew that he was toblame. For three years he had been trying to break her spirit. She had a way ofmaking the best of things that seemed to him a sentimental affectation. Hewanted his wife to resent that he was wasting his best years among these stupidand unappreciative people; but she had seemed to find the people quite goodenough. If he ever got rich he meant to buy her pretty clothes and take her toCalifornia in a Pullman car, and treat her like a lady; but in the mean time hewanted her to feel that life was as ugly and as unjust as he felt it. He hadtried to make her life ugly. He had refused to share any of the littlepleasures she was so plucky about making for herself. She could be gay aboutthe least thing in the world; but she must be gay! When she first came to him,her faith in him, her adoration—Frank struck the mare with his fist. Why hadMarie made him do this thing; why had she brought this upon him? He wasoverwhelmed by sickening misfortune. All at once he heard her cries again—hehad forgotten for a moment. “Maria,” he sobbed aloud, “Maria!”

When Frank was halfway to Hanover, the motion of his horse brought on a violentattack of nausea. After it had passed, he rode on again, but he could think ofnothing except his physical weakness and his desire to be comforted by hiswife. He wanted to get into his own bed. Had his wife been at home, he wouldhave turned and gone back to her meekly enough.

VIII

When old Ivar climbed down from his loft at four o’clock the next morning, hecame upon Emil’s mare, jaded and lather-stained, her bridle broken, chewing thescattered tufts of hay outside the stable door. The old man was thrown into afright at once. He put the mare in her stall, threw her a measure of oats, andthen set out as fast as his bow-legs could carry him on the path to the nearestneighbor.

“Something is wrong with that boy. Some misfortune has come upon us. He wouldnever have used her so, in his right senses. It is not his way to abuse hismare,” the old man kept muttering, as he scuttled through the short, wetpasture grass on his bare feet.

While Ivar was hurrying across the fields, the first long rays of the sun werereaching down between the orchard boughs to those two dew-drenched figures. Thestory of what had happened was written plainly on the orchard grass, and on thewhite mulberries that had fallen in the night and were covered with dark stain.For Emil the chapter had been short. He was shot in the heart, and had rolledover on his back and died. His face was turned up to the sky and his brows weredrawn in a frown, as if he had realized that something had befallen him. Butfor Marie Shabata it had not been so easy. One ball had torn through her rightlung, another had shattered the carotid artery. She must have started up andgone toward the hedge, leaving a trail of blood. There she had fallen and bled.From that spot there was another trail, heavier than the first, where she musthave dragged herself back to Emil’s body. Once there, she seemed not to havestruggled any more. She had lifted her head to her lover’s breast, taken hishand in both her own, and bled quietly to death. She was lying on her rightside in an easy and natural position, her cheek on Emil’s shoulder. On her facethere was a look of ineffable content. Her lips were parted a little; her eyeswere lightly closed, as if in a day-dream or a light slumber. After she laydown there, she seemed not to have moved an eyelash. The hand she held wascovered with dark stains, where she had kissed it.

But the stained, slippery grass, the darkened mulberries, told only half thestory. Above Marie and Emil, two white butterflies from Frank’s alfalfa-fieldwere fluttering in and out among the interlacing shadows; diving and soaring,now close together, now far apart; and in the long grass by the fence the lastwild roses of the year opened their pink hearts to die.

When Ivar reached the path by the hedge, he saw Shabata’s rifle lying in theway. He turned and peered through the branches, falling upon his knees as ifhis legs had been mowed from under him. “Merciful God!” he groaned.

Alexandra, too, had risen early that morning, because of her anxiety aboutEmil. She was in Emil’s room upstairs when, from the window, she saw Ivarcoming along the path that led from the Shabatas’. He was running like a spentman, tottering and lurching from side to side. Ivar never drank, and Alexandrathought at once that one of his spells had come upon him, and that he must bein a very bad way indeed. She ran downstairs and hurried out to meet him, tohide his infirmity from the eyes of her household. The old man fell in the roadat her feet and caught her hand, over which he bowed his shaggy head.“Mistress, mistress,” he sobbed, “it has fallen! Sin and death for the youngones! God have mercy upon us!”

PART V.
Alexandra

I

Ivar was sitting at a cobbler’s bench in the barn, mending harness by the lightof a lantern and repeating to himself the 101st Psalm. It was only five o’clockof a mid-October day, but a storm had come up in the afternoon, bringing blackclouds, a cold wind and torrents of rain. The old man wore his buffalo-skincoat, and occasionally stopped to warm his fingers at the lantern. Suddenly awoman burst into the shed, as if she had been blown in, accompanied by a showerof rain-drops. It was Signa, wrapped in a man’s overcoat and wearing a pair ofboots over her shoes. In time of trouble Signa had come back to stay with hermistress, for she was the only one of the maids from whom Alexandra wouldaccept much personal service. It was three months now since the news of theterrible thing that had happened in Frank Shabata’s orchard had first run likea fire over the Divide. Signa and Nelse were staying on with Alexandra untilwinter.

“Ivar,” Signa exclaimed as she wiped the rain from her face, “do you know whereshe is?”

The old man put down his cobbler’s knife. “Who, the mistress?”

“Yes. She went away about three o’clock. I happened to look out of the windowand saw her going across the fields in her thin dress and sun-hat. And now thisstorm has come on. I thought she was going to Mrs. Hiller’s, and I telephonedas soon as the thunder stopped, but she had not been there. I’m afraid she isout somewhere and will get her death of cold.”

Ivar put on his cap and took up the lantern. “Ja, ja, we willsee. I will hitch the boy’s mare to the cart and go.”

Signa followed him across the wagon-shed to the horses’ stable. She wasshivering with cold and excitement. “Where do you suppose she can be, Ivar?”

The old man lifted a set of single harness carefully from its peg. “How shouldI know?”

“But you think she is at the graveyard, don’t you?” Signa persisted. “So do I.Oh, I wish she would be more like herself! I can’t believe it’s AlexandraBergson come to this, with no head about anything. I have to tell her when toeat and when to go to bed.”

“Patience, patience, sister,” muttered Ivar as he settled the bit in thehorse’s mouth. “When the eyes of the flesh are shut, the eyes of the spirit areopen. She will have a message from those who are gone, and that will bring herpeace. Until then we must bear with her. You and I are the only ones who haveweight with her. She trusts us.”

“How awful it’s been these last three months.” Signa held the lantern so thathe could see to buckle the straps. “It don’t seem right that we must all be somiserable. Why do we all have to be punished? Seems to me like good times wouldnever come again.”

Ivar expressed himself in a deep sigh, but said nothing. He stooped and took asandburr from his toe.

“Ivar,” Signa asked suddenly, “will you tell me why you go barefoot? All thetime I lived here in the house I wanted to ask you. Is it for a penance, orwhat?”

“No, sister. It is for the indulgence of the body. From my youth up I have hada strong, rebellious body, and have been subject to every kind of temptation.Even in age my temptations are prolonged. It was necessary to make someallowances; and the feet, as I understand it, are free members. There is nodivine prohibition for them in the Ten Commandments. The hands, the tongue, theeyes, the heart, all the bodily desires we are commanded to subdue; but thefeet are free members. I indulge them without harm to any one, even totrampling in filth when my desires are low. They are quickly cleaned again.”

Signa did not laugh. She looked thoughtful as she followed Ivar out to thewagon-shed and held the shafts up for him, while he backed in the mare andbuckled the hold-backs. “You have been a good friend to the mistress, Ivar,”she murmured.

“And you, God be with you,” replied Ivar as he clambered into the cart and putthe lantern under the oilcloth lap-cover. “Now for a ducking, my girl,” he saidto the mare, gathering up the reins.

As they emerged from the shed, a stream of water, running off the thatch,struck the mare on the neck. She tossed her head indignantly, then struck outbravely on the soft ground, slipping back again and again as she climbed thehill to the main road. Between the rain and the darkness Ivar could see verylittle, so he let Emil’s mare have the rein, keeping her head in the rightdirection. When the ground was level, he turned her out of the dirt road uponthe sod, where she was able to trot without slipping.

Before Ivar reached the graveyard, three miles from the house, the storm hadspent itself, and the downpour had died into a soft, dripping rain. The sky andthe land were a dark smoke color, and seemed to be coming together, like twowaves. When Ivar stopped at the gate and swung out his lantern, a white figurerose from beside John Bergson’s white stone.

The old man sprang to the ground and shuffled toward the gate calling,“Mistress, mistress!”

Alexandra hurried to meet him and put her hand on his shoulder. “Tyst!Ivar. There’s nothing to be worried about. I’m sorry if I’ve scared you all. Ididn’t notice the storm till it was on me, and I couldn’t walk against it. I’mglad you’ve come. I am so tired I didn’t know how I’d ever get home.”

Ivar swung the lantern up so that it shone in her face. “Gud!You areenough to frighten us, mistress. You look like a drowned woman. How could youdo such a thing!”

Groaning and mumbling he led her out of the gate and helped her into the cart,wrapping her in the dry blankets on which he had been sitting.

Alexandra smiled at his solicitude. “Not much use in that, Ivar. You will onlyshut the wet in. I don’t feel so cold now; but I’m heavy and numb. I’m glad youcame.”

Ivar turned the mare and urged her into a sliding trot. Her feet sent back acontinual spatter of mud.

Alexandra spoke to the old man as they jogged along through the sullen graytwilight of the storm. “Ivar, I think it has done me good to get cold clearthrough like this, once. I don’t believe I shall suffer so much any more. Whenyou get so near the dead, they seem more real than the living. Worldly thoughtsleave one. Ever since Emil died, I’ve suffered so when it rained. Now that I’vebeen out in it with him, I shan’t dread it. After you once get cold clearthrough, the feeling of the rain on you is sweet. It seems to bring backfeelings you had when you were a baby. It carries you back into the dark,before you were born; you can’t see things, but they come to you, somehow, andyou know them and aren’t afraid of them. Maybe it’s like that with the dead. Ifthey feel anything at all, it’s the old things, before they were born, thatcomfort people like the feeling of their own bed does when they are little.”

“Mistress,” said Ivar reproachfully, “those are bad thoughts. The dead are inParadise.”

Then he hung his head, for he did not believe that Emil was in Paradise.

When they got home, Signa had a fire burning in the sitting-room stove. Sheundressed Alexandra and gave her a hot footbath, while Ivar made ginger tea inthe kitchen. When Alexandra was in bed, wrapped in hot blankets, Ivar came inwith his tea and saw that she drank it. Signa asked permission to sleep on theslat lounge outside her door. Alexandra endured their attentions patiently, butshe was glad when they put out the lamp and left her. As she lay alone in thedark, it occurred to her for the first time that perhaps she was actually tiredof life. All the physical operations of life seemed difficult and painful. Shelonged to be free from her own body, which ached and was so heavy. And longingitself was heavy: she yearned to be free of that.

As she lay with her eyes closed, she had again, more vividly than for manyyears, the old illusion of her girlhood, of being lifted and carried lightly bysome one very strong. He was with her a long while this time, and carried hervery far, and in his arms she felt free from pain. When he laid her down on herbed again, she opened her eyes, and, for the first time in her life, she sawhim, saw him clearly, though the room was dark, and his face was covered. Hewas standing in the doorway of her room. His white cloak was thrown over hisface, and his head was bent a little forward. His shoulders seemed as strong asthe foundations of the world. His right arm, bared from the elbow, was dark andgleaming, like bronze, and she knew at once that it was the arm of themightiest of all lovers. She knew at last for whom it was she had waited, andwhere he would carry her. That, she told herself, was very well. Then she wentto sleep.

Alexandra wakened in the morning with nothing worse than a hard cold and astiff shoulder. She kept her bed for several days, and it was during that timethat she formed a resolution to go to Lincoln to see Frank Shabata. Ever sinceshe last saw him in the courtroom, Frank’s haggard face and wild eyes hadhaunted her. The trial had lasted only three days. Frank had given himself upto the police in Omaha and pleaded guilty of killing without malice and withoutpremeditation. The gun was, of course, against him, and the judge had given himthe full sentence,—ten years. He had now been in the State Penitentiary for amonth.

Frank was the only one, Alexandra told herself, for whom anything could bedone. He had been less in the wrong than any of them, and he was paying theheaviest penalty. She often felt that she herself had been more to blame thanpoor Frank. From the time the Shabatas had first moved to the neighboring farm,she had omitted no opportunity of throwing Marie and Emil together. Because sheknew Frank was surly about doing little things to help his wife, she was alwayssending Emil over to spade or plant or carpenter for Marie. She was glad tohave Emil see as much as possible of an intelligent, city-bred girl like theirneighbor; she noticed that it improved his manners. She knew that Emil was fondof Marie, but it had never occurred to her that Emil’s feeling might bedifferent from her own. She wondered at herself now, but she had never thoughtof danger in that direction. If Marie had been unmarried,—oh, yes! Then shewould have kept her eyes open. But the mere fact that she was Shabata’s wife,for Alexandra, settled everything. That she was beautiful, impulsive, barelytwo years older than Emil, these facts had had no weight with Alexandra. Emilwas a good boy, and only bad boys ran after married women.

Now, Alexandra could in a measure realize that Marie was, after all, Marie; notmerely a “married woman.” Sometimes, when Alexandra thought of her, it was withan aching tenderness. The moment she had reached them in the orchard thatmorning, everything was clear to her. There was something about those two lyingin the grass, something in the way Marie had settled her cheek on Emil’sshoulder, that told her everything. She wondered then how they could havehelped loving each other; how she could have helped knowing that they must.Emil’s cold, frowning face, the girl’s content—Alexandra had felt awe of them,even in the first shock of her grief.

The idleness of those days in bed, the relaxation of body which attended them,enabled Alexandra to think more calmly than she had done since Emil’s death.She and Frank, she told herself, were left out of that group of friends who hadbeen overwhelmed by disaster. She must certainly see Frank Shabata. Even in thecourtroom her heart had grieved for him. He was in a strange country, he had nokinsmen or friends, and in a moment he had ruined his life. Being what he was,she felt, Frank could not have acted otherwise. She could understand hisbehavior more easily than she could understand Marie’s. Yes, she must go toLincoln to see Frank Shabata.

The day after Emil’s funeral, Alexandra had written to Carl Linstrum; a singlepage of notepaper, a bare statement of what had happened. She was not a womanwho could write much about such a thing, and about her own feelings she couldnever write very freely. She knew that Carl was away from post-offices,prospecting somewhere in the interior. Before he started he had written herwhere he expected to go, but her ideas about Alaska were vague. As the weekswent by and she heard nothing from him, it seemed to Alexandra that her heartgrew hard against Carl. She began to wonder whether she would not do better tofinish her life alone. What was left of life seemed unimportant.

II

Late in the afternoon of a brilliant October day, Alexandra Bergson, dressed ina black suit and traveling-hat, alighted at the Burlington depot in Lincoln.She drove to the Lindell Hotel, where she had stayed two years ago when shecame up for Emil’s Commencement. In spite of her usual air of sureness andself-possession, Alexandra felt ill at ease in hotels, and she was glad, whenshe went to the clerk’s desk to register, that there were not many people inthe lobby. She had her supper early, wearing her hat and black jacket down tothe dining-room and carrying her handbag. After supper she went out for a walk.

It was growing dark when she reached the university campus. She did not go intothe grounds, but walked slowly up and down the stone walk outside the long ironfence, looking through at the young men who were running from one building toanother, at the lights shining from the armory and the library. A squad ofcadets were going through their drill behind the armory, and the commands oftheir young officer rang out at regular intervals, so sharp and quick thatAlexandra could not understand them. Two stalwart girls came down the librarysteps and out through one of the iron gates. As they passed her, Alexandra waspleased to hear them speaking Bohemian to each other. Every few moments a boywould come running down the flagged walk and dash out into the street as if hewere rushing to announce some wonder to the world. Alexandra felt a greattenderness for them all. She wished one of them would stop and speak to her.She wished she could ask them whether they had known Emil.

As she lingered by the south gate she actually did encounter one of the boys.He had on his drill cap and was swinging his books at the end of a long strap.It was dark by this time; he did not see her and ran against her. He snatchedoff his cap and stood bareheaded and panting. “I’m awfully sorry,” he said in abright, clear voice, with a rising inflection, as if he expected her to saysomething.

“Oh, it was my fault!” said Alexandra eagerly. “Are you an old student here,may I ask?”

“No, ma’am. I’m a Freshie, just off the farm. Cherry County. Were you huntingsomebody?”

“No, thank you. That is—” Alexandra wanted to detain him. “That is, I wouldlike to find some of my brother’s friends. He graduated two years ago.”

“Then you’d have to try the Seniors, wouldn’t you? Let’s see; I don’t know anyof them yet, but there’ll be sure to be some of them around the library. Thatred building, right there,” he pointed.

“Thank you, I’ll try there,” said Alexandra lingeringly.

“Oh, that’s all right! Good-night.” The lad clapped his cap on his head and ranstraight down Eleventh Street. Alexandra looked after him wistfully.

She walked back to her hotel unreasonably comforted. “What a nice voice thatboy had, and how polite he was. I know Emil was always like that to women.” Andagain, after she had undressed and was standing in her nightgown, brushing herlong, heavy hair by the electric light, she remembered him and said to herself,“I don’t think I ever heard a nicer voice than that boy had. I hope he will geton well here. Cherry County; that’s where the hay is so fine, and the coyotescan scratch down to water.”

At nine o’clock the next morning Alexandra presented herself at the warden’soffice in the State Penitentiary. The warden was a German, a ruddy,cheerful-looking man who had formerly been a harness-maker. Alexandra had aletter to him from the German banker in Hanover. As he glanced at the letter,Mr. Schwartz put away his pipe.

“That big Bohemian, is it? Sure, he’s gettin’ along fine,” said Mr. Schwartzcheerfully.

“I am glad to hear that. I was afraid he might be quarrelsome and get himselfinto more trouble. Mr. Schwartz, if you have time, I would like to tell you alittle about Frank Shabata, and why I am interested in him.”

The warden listened genially while she told him briefly something of Frank’shistory and character, but he did not seem to find anything unusual in heraccount.

“Sure, I’ll keep an eye on him. We’ll take care of him all right,” he said,rising. “You can talk to him here, while I go to see to things in the kitchen.I’ll have him sent in. He ought to be done washing out his cell by this time.We have to keep ’em clean, you know.”

The warden paused at the door, speaking back over his shoulder to a pale youngman in convicts’ clothes who was seated at a desk in the corner, writing in abig ledger.

“Bertie, when 1037 is brought in, you just step out and give this lady a chanceto talk.”

The young man bowed his head and bent over his ledger again.

When Mr. Schwartz disappeared, Alexandra thrust her black-edged handkerchiefnervously into her handbag. Coming out on the streetcar she had not had theleast dread of meeting Frank. But since she had been here the sounds and smellsin the corridor, the look of the men in convicts’ clothes who passed the glassdoor of the warden’s office, affected her unpleasantly.

The warden’s clock ticked, the young convict’s pen scratched busily in the bigbook, and his sharp shoulders were shaken every few seconds by a loose coughwhich he tried to smother. It was easy to see that he was a sick man. Alexandralooked at him timidly, but he did not once raise his eyes. He wore a whiteshirt under his striped jacket, a high collar, and a necktie, very carefullytied. His hands were thin and white and well cared for, and he had a seal ringon his little finger. When he heard steps approaching in the corridor, he rose,blotted his book, put his pen in the rack, and left the room without raisinghis eyes. Through the door he opened a guard came in, bringing Frank Shabata.

“You the lady that wanted to talk to 1037? Here he is. Be on your goodbehavior, now. He can set down, lady,” seeing that Alexandra remained standing.“Push that white button when you’re through with him, and I’ll come.”

The guard went out and Alexandra and Frank were left alone.

Alexandra tried not to see his hideous clothes. She tried to look straight intohis face, which she could scarcely believe was his. It was already bleached toa chalky gray. His lips were colorless, his fine teeth looked yellowish. Heglanced at Alexandra sullenly, blinked as if he had come from a dark place, andone eyebrow twitched continually. She felt at once that this interview was aterrible ordeal to him. His shaved head, showing the conformation of his skull,gave him a criminal look which he had not had during the trial.

Alexandra held out her hand. “Frank,” she said, her eyes filling suddenly, “Ihope you’ll let me be friendly with you. I understand how you did it. I don’tfeel hard toward you. They were more to blame than you.”

Frank jerked a dirty blue handkerchief from his trousers pocket. He had begunto cry. He turned away from Alexandra. “I never did mean to do not’ing to datwoman,” he muttered. “I never mean to do not’ing to dat boy. I ain’t hadnot’ing ag’in’ dat boy. I always like dat boy fine. An’ then I find him—” Hestopped. The feeling went out of his face and eyes. He dropped into a chair andsat looking stolidly at the floor, his hands hanging loosely between his knees,the handkerchief lying across his striped leg. He seemed to have stirred up inhis mind a disgust that had paralyzed his faculties.

“I haven’t come up here to blame you, Frank. I think they were more to blamethan you.” Alexandra, too, felt benumbed.

Frank looked up suddenly and stared out of the office window. “I guess datplace all go to hell what I work so hard on,” he said with a slow, bittersmile. “I not care a damn.” He stopped and rubbed the palm of his hand over thelight bristles on his head with annoyance. “I no can t’ink without my hair,” hecomplained. “I forget English. We not talk here, except swear.”

Alexandra was bewildered. Frank seemed to have undergone a change ofpersonality. There was scarcely anything by which she could recognize herhandsome Bohemian neighbor. He seemed, somehow, not altogether human. She didnot know what to say to him.

“You do not feel hard to me, Frank?” she asked at last.

Frank clenched his fist and broke out in excitement. “I not feel hard at nowoman. I tell you I not that kind-a man. I never hit my wife. No, never I hurther when she devil me something awful!” He struck his fist down on the warden’sdesk so hard that he afterward stroked it absently. A pale pink crept over hisneck and face. “Two, t’ree years I know dat woman don’ care no more ’bout me,Alexandra Bergson. I know she after some other man. I know her, oo-oo! An’ Iain’t never hurt her. I never would-a done dat, if I ain’t had dat gun along. Idon’ know what in hell make me take dat gun. She always say I ain’t no man tocarry gun. If she been in dat house, where she ought-a been—But das a foolishtalk.”

Frank rubbed his head and stopped suddenly, as he had stopped before. Alexandrafelt that there was something strange in the way he chilled off, as ifsomething came up in him that extinguished his power of feeling or thinking.

“Yes, Frank,” she said kindly. “I know you never meant to hurt Marie.”

Frank smiled at her queerly. His eyes filled slowly with tears. “You know, Imost forgit dat woman’s name. She ain’t got no name for me no more. I neverhate my wife, but dat woman what make me do dat—Honest to God, but I hate her!I no man to fight. I don’ want to kill no boy and no woman. I not care how manymen she take under dat tree. I no care for not’ing but dat fine boy I kill,Alexandra Bergson. I guess I go crazy sure ’nough.”

Alexandra remembered the little yellow cane she had found in Frank’sclothes-closet. She thought of how he had come to this country a gay youngfellow, so attractive that the prettiest Bohemian girl in Omaha had run awaywith him. It seemed unreasonable that life should have landed him in such aplace as this. She blamed Marie bitterly. And why, with her happy, affectionatenature, should she have brought destruction and sorrow to all who had lovedher, even to poor old Joe Tovesky, the uncle who used to carry her about soproudly when she was a little girl? That was the strangest thing of all. Wasthere, then, something wrong in being warm-hearted and impulsive like that?Alexandra hated to think so. But there was Emil, in the Norwegian graveyard athome, and here was Frank Shabata. Alexandra rose and took him by the hand.

“Frank Shabata, I am never going to stop trying until I get you pardoned. I’llnever give the Governor any peace. I know I can get you out of this place.”

Frank looked at her distrustfully, but he gathered confidence from her face.“Alexandra,” he said earnestly, “if I git out-a here, I not trouble dis countryno more. I go back where I come from; see my mother.”

Alexandra tried to withdraw her hand, but Frank held on to it nervously. He putout his finger and absently touched a button on her black jacket. “Alexandra,”he said in a low tone, looking steadily at the button, “you ain’ t’ink I usedat girl awful bad before—”

“No, Frank. We won’t talk about that,” Alexandra said, pressing his hand. “Ican’t help Emil now, so I’m going to do what I can for you. You know I don’t goaway from home often, and I came up here on purpose to tell you this.”

The warden at the glass door looked in inquiringly. Alexandra nodded, and hecame in and touched the white button on his desk. The guard appeared, and witha sinking heart Alexandra saw Frank led away down the corridor. After a fewwords with Mr. Schwartz, she left the prison and made her way to thestreet-car. She had refused with horror the warden’s cordial invitation to “gothrough the institution.” As the car lurched over its uneven roadbed, backtoward Lincoln, Alexandra thought of how she and Frank had been wrecked by thesame storm and of how, although she could come out into the sunlight, she hadnot much more left in her life than he. She remembered some lines from a poemshe had liked in her schooldays:—

Henceforth the world will only be
A wider prison-house to me,—

and sighed. A disgust of life weighed upon her heart; some such feeling as hadtwice frozen Frank Shabata’s features while they talked together. She wishedshe were back on the Divide.

When Alexandra entered her hotel, the clerk held up one finger and beckoned toher. As she approached his desk, he handed her a telegram. Alexandra took theyellow envelope and looked at it in perplexity, then stepped into the elevatorwithout opening it. As she walked down the corridor toward her room, shereflected that she was, in a manner, immune from evil tidings. On reaching herroom she locked the door, and sitting down on a chair by the dresser, openedthe telegram. It was from Hanover, and it read:—

Arrived Hanover last night. Shall wait here until you come. Please hurry.

CARLLINSTRUM.

Alexandra put her head down on the dresser and burst into tears.

III

The next afternoon Carl and Alexandra were walking across the fields from Mrs.Hiller’s. Alexandra had left Lincoln after midnight, and Carl had met her atthe Hanover station early in the morning. After they reached home, Alexandrahad gone over to Mrs. Hiller’s to leave a little present she had bought for herin the city. They stayed at the old lady’s door but a moment, and then came outto spend the rest of the afternoon in the sunny fields.

Alexandra had taken off her black traveling suit and put on a white dress;partly because she saw that her black clothes made Carl uncomfortable andpartly because she felt oppressed by them herself. They seemed a little likethe prison where she had worn them yesterday, and to be out of place in theopen fields. Carl had changed very little. His cheeks were browner and fuller.He looked less like a tired scholar than when he went away a year ago, but noone, even now, would have taken him for a man of business. His soft, lustrousblack eyes, his whimsical smile, would be less against him in the Klondike thanon the Divide. There are always dreamers on the frontier.

Carl and Alexandra had been talking since morning. Her letter had never reachedhim. He had first learned of her misfortune from a San Francisco paper, fourweeks old, which he had picked up in a saloon, and which contained a briefaccount of Frank Shabata’s trial. When he put down the paper, he had alreadymade up his mind that he could reach Alexandra as quickly as a letter could;and ever since he had been on the way; day and night, by the fastest boats andtrains he could catch. His steamer had been held back two days by roughweather.

As they came out of Mrs. Hiller’s garden they took up their talk again wherethey had left it.

“But could you come away like that, Carl, without arranging things? Could youjust walk off and leave your business?” Alexandra asked.

Carl laughed. “Prudent Alexandra! You see, my dear, I happen to have an honestpartner. I trust him with everything. In fact, it’s been his enterprise fromthe beginning, you know. I’m in it only because he took me in. I’ll have to goback in the spring. Perhaps you will want to go with me then. We haven’t turnedup millions yet, but we’ve got a start that’s worth following. But this winterI’d like to spend with you. You won’t feel that we ought to wait longer, onEmil’s account, will you, Alexandra?”

Alexandra shook her head. “No, Carl; I don’t feel that way about it. And surelyyou needn’t mind anything Lou and Oscar say now. They are much angrier with meabout Emil, now, than about you. They say it was all my fault. That I ruinedhim by sending him to college.”

“No, I don’t care a button for Lou or Oscar. The moment I knew you were introuble, the moment I thought you might need me, it all looked different.You’ve always been a triumphant kind of person.” Carl hesitated, lookingsidewise at her strong, full figure. “But you do need me now, Alexandra?”

She put her hand on his arm. “I needed you terribly when it happened, Carl. Icried for you at night. Then everything seemed to get hard inside of me, and Ithought perhaps I should never care for you again. But when I got your telegramyesterday, then—then it was just as it used to be. You are all I have in theworld, you know.”

Carl pressed her hand in silence. They were passing the Shabatas’ empty housenow, but they avoided the orchard path and took one that led over by thepasture pond.

“Can you understand it, Carl?” Alexandra murmured. “I have had nobody but Ivarand Signa to talk to. Do talk to me. Can you understand it? Could you havebelieved that of Marie Tovesky? I would have been cut to pieces, little bylittle, before I would have betrayed her trust in me!”

Carl looked at the shining spot of water before them. “Maybe she was cut topieces, too, Alexandra. I am sure she tried hard; they both did. That was whyEmil went to Mexico, of course. And he was going away again, you tell me,though he had only been home three weeks. You remember that Sunday when I wentwith Emil up to the French Church fair? I thought that day there was some kindof feeling, something unusual, between them. I meant to talk to you about it.But on my way back I met Lou and Oscar and got so angry that I forgoteverything else. You mustn’t be hard on them, Alexandra. Sit down here by thepond a minute. I want to tell you something.”

They sat down on the grass-tufted bank and Carl told her how he had seen Emiland Marie out by the pond that morning, more than a year ago, and how young andcharming and full of grace they had seemed to him. “It happens like that in theworld sometimes, Alexandra,” he added earnestly. “I’ve seen it before. Thereare women who spread ruin around them through no fault of theirs, just by beingtoo beautiful, too full of life and love. They can’t help it. People come tothem as people go to a warm fire in winter. I used to feel that in her when shewas a little girl. Do you remember how all the Bohemians crowded round her inthe store that day, when she gave Emil her candy? You remember those yellowsparks in her eyes?”

Alexandra sighed. “Yes. People couldn’t help loving her. Poor Frank does, evennow, I think; though he’s got himself in such a tangle that for a long time hislove has been bitterer than his hate. But if you saw there was anything wrong,you ought to have told me, Carl.”

Carl took her hand and smiled patiently. “My dear, it was something one felt inthe air, as you feel the spring coming, or a storm in summer. I didn’tseeanything. Simply, when I was with those two young things, I felt myblood go quicker, I felt—how shall I say it?—an acceleration of life. After Igot away, it was all too delicate, too intangible, to write about.”

Alexandra looked at him mournfully. “I try to be more liberal about such thingsthan I used to be. I try to realize that we are not all made alike. Only, whycouldn’t it have been Raoul Marcel, or Jan Smirka? Why did it have to be myboy?”

“Because he was the best there was, I suppose. They were both the best you hadhere.”

The sun was dropping low in the west when the two friends rose and took thepath again. The straw-stacks were throwing long shadows, the owls were flyinghome to the prairie-dog town. When they came to the corner where the pasturesjoined, Alexandra’s twelve young colts were galloping in a drove over the browof the hill.

“Carl,” said Alexandra, “I should like to go up there with you in the spring. Ihaven’t been on the water since we crossed the ocean, when I was a little girl.After we first came out here I used to dream sometimes about the shipyard wherefather worked, and a little sort of inlet, full of masts.” Alexandra paused.After a moment’s thought she said, “But you would never ask me to go away forgood, would you?”

“Of course not, my dearest. I think I know how you feel about this country aswell as you do yourself.” Carl took her hand in both his own and pressed ittenderly.

“Yes, I still feel that way, though Emil is gone. When I was on the train thismorning, and we got near Hanover, I felt something like I did when I drove backwith Emil from the river that time, in the dry year. I was glad to come back toit. I’ve lived here a long time. There is great peace here, Carl, andfreedom.... I thought when I came out of that prison, where poor Frank is, thatI should never feel free again. But I do, here.” Alexandra took a deep breathand looked off into the red west.

“You belong to the land,” Carl murmured, “as you have always said. Now morethan ever.”

“Yes, now more than ever. You remember what you once said about the graveyard,and the old story writing itself over? Only it is we who write it, with thebest we have.”

They paused on the last ridge of the pasture, overlooking the house and thewindmill and the stables that marked the site of John Bergson’s homestead. Onevery side the brown waves of the earth rolled away to meet the sky.

“Lou and Oscar can’t see those things,” said Alexandra suddenly. “Suppose I dowill my land to their children, what difference will that make? The landbelongs to the future, Carl; that’s the way it seems to me. How many of thenames on the county clerk’s plat will be there in fifty years? I might as welltry to will the sunset over there to my brother’s children. We come and go, butthe land is always here. And the people who love it and understand it are thepeople who own it—for a little while.”

Carl looked at her wonderingly. She was still gazing into the west, and in herface there was that exalted serenity that sometimes came to her at moments ofdeep feeling. The level rays of the sinking sun shone in her clear eyes.

“Why are you thinking of such things now, Alexandra?”

“I had a dream before I went to Lincoln—But I will tell you about thatafterward, after we are married. It will never come true, now, in the way Ithought it might.” She took Carl’s arm and they walked toward the gate. “Howmany times we have walked this path together, Carl. How many times we will walkit again! Does it seem to you like coming back to your own place? Do you feelat peace with the world here? I think we shall be very happy. I haven’t anyfears. I think when friends marry, they are safe. We don’t suffer like—thoseyoung ones.” Alexandra ended with a sigh.

They had reached the gate. Before Carl opened it, he drew Alexandra to him andkissed her softly, on her lips and on her eyes.

She leaned heavily on his shoulder. “I am tired,” she murmured. “I have beenvery lonely, Carl.”

They went into the house together, leaving the Divide behind them, under theevening star. Fortunate country, that is one day to receive hearts likeAlexandra’s into its bosom, to give them out again in the yellow wheat, in therustling corn, in the shining eyes of youth!

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