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Ebook has 7909 lines and 268344 words, and 159 pages

And till they got to the post-office he seemed in a disagreeable kind of muse, which Fleda did not choose to break in upon. So the mile and a half was driven in sober silence.

"Shall I get out and go in, grandpa?" said Fleda when he drew up before the house.

"No, deary," said he in his usual kind tone; "you sit still. Holloa there!--Good-day, Mr. Sampion--have you got any thing for me?" The man disappeared and came out again.

"There's your paper, grandpa," said Fleda.

"Ay, and something else," said Mr. Ringgan: "I declare!--Miss Fleda Ringgan--care of E. Ringgan, Esq.'--There, dear, there it is."

"Paris!" exclaimed Fleda, as she clasped the letter and both her hands together. The butternuts and Mr Didenhover were forgotten at last. The letter could not be read in the jolting of the wagon, but, as Fleda said, it was all the pleasanter, for she had the expectation of it the whole way home.

"Where are we going now, grandpa?"

"To Queechy Run."

"That will give us a nice long ride. I am very glad. This has been a good day. With my letter and my bittersweet I have got enough, haven't I, grandpa?"

Queechy Run was a little village, a very little village, about half a mile from Mr. Ringgan's house. It boasted however a decent brick church of some size, a school-house, a lawyer's office, a grocery store, a dozen or two of dwelling-houses, and a post-office; though for some reason or other Mr. Ringgan always chose to have his letters come through the Sattlersville post-office, a mile and a half further off. At the door of the lawyer's office Mr. Ringgan again stopped, and again shouted "Holloa!"--

"Good-day, sir. Is Mr. Jolly within?"

"He is, sir."

"Will you ask him to be so good as to step here a moment? I cannot very well get out."

Mr. Jolly was a comfortable-looking little man, smooth and sleek, pleasant and plausible, reasonably honest too, as the world goes; a nice man to have to do with, the world went so easy with his affairs that you were sure he would make no unnecessary rubs in your own. He came now fresh and brisk to the side of the wagon, with that uncommon hilarity which people sometimes assume when they have a disagreeable matter on hand that must be spoken of.

"Good-morning, sir! Fine day, Mr. Jolly."

"Beautiful day, sir! Splendid season! How do you do, Mr. Ringgan?"

"Why, sir, I never was better in my life, barring this lameness, that disables me very much. I can't go about and see to things any more as I used to. However--we must expect evils at my time of life. I don't complain. I have a great deal to be thankful for."

"Yes, sir,--we have a great deal to be thankful for," said Mr. Jolly rather abstractedly, and patting the old mare with kind attention.

"Have you seen that fellow McGowan?" said Mr. Ringgan abruptly, and in a lower tone.

"I have seen him," said Mr. Jolly, coming back from the old mare to business.

"He's a hard customer I guess, ain't he?"

"He's as ugly a cur as ever was whelped!"

"What does he say?"

"Says he must have it."

"Did you tell him what I told you?"

"I told him, sir, that you had not got the returns from your farm that you expected this year, owing to one thing and 'nother; and that you couldn't make up the cash for him all at once; and that he would have to wait a spell, but that he'd be sure to get it in the long run. Nobody ever suffered by Mr. Ringgan yet, as I told him."

"Well?"

"Well, sir,--he was altogether refractible--he's as pig-headed a fellow as I ever see."

"What did he say?"

"He gave me names, and swore he wouldn't wait a day longer--said he'd waited already six months."

"He has so. I couldn't meet the last payment. There's a year's rent due now. I can't help it. There needn't have been an hour,--if I could go about and attend to things myself. I have been altogether disappointed in that Didenhover."

"I expect you have."

"What do you suppose he'll do, Mr. Jolly?--McGowan, I mean."

"I expect he'll do what the law'll let him, Mr. Ringgan; I don't know what'll hinder him."

"It's a worse turn than I thought my infirmities would ever play me," said the old gentleman after a short pause,--"first to lose the property altogether, and then not to be permitted to wear out what is left of life in the old place--there won't be much."

"So I told him, Mr. Ringgan. I put it to him. Says I, 'Mr. McGowan, it's a cruel hard business; there ain't a man in town that wouldn't leave Mr. Ringgan the shelter of his own roof as long as he wants any, and think it a pleasure,--if the rent was anyhow.'"

"Well--well!" said the old gentleman, with a mixture of dignity and bitterness,--"it doesn't much matter. My head will find a shelter somehow, above ground or under it. The Lord will provide.--Whey! stand still, can't ye! what ails the fool? The creature's seen years enough to be steady," he added with a miserable attempt at his usual cheerful laugh.

Fleda had turned away her head and tried not to hear when the lowered tones of the speakers seemed to say that she was one too many in the company. But she could not help catching a few bits of the conversation, and a few bits were generally enough for Fleda's wit to work upon; she had a singular knack at putting loose ends of talk together. If more had been wanting, the tones of her grandfather's voice would have filled up every gap in the meaning of the scattered words that came to her ear. Her heart sank fast as the dialogue went on, and she needed no commentary or explanation to interpret the bitter little laugh with which it closed. It was a chill upon all the rosy joys and hopes of a most joyful and hopeful little nature.

The old mare was in motion again, but Fleda no longer cared or had the curiosity to ask where they were going. The bittersweet lay listlessly in her lap; her letter, clasped to her breast, was not thought of; and tears were quietly running one after the other down her cheeks and falling on her sleeve; she dared not lift her handkerchief nor turn her face towards her grandfather lest they should catch his eye. Her grandfather?--could it be possible that he must be turned out of his old home in his old age? could it be possible? Mr. Jolly seemed to think it might be, and her grandfather seemed to think it must. Leave the old house! But where would he go?--Son or daughter he had none left; resources be could have none, or this need not happen. Work he could not; be dependent upon the charity of any kin or friend she knew he would never; she remembered hearing him once say he could better bear to go to the almshouse than do any such thing. And then, if they went, he would have his pleasant room no more where the sun shone in so cheerfully, and they must leave the dear old kitchen where they had been so happy, and the meadows and hills would belong to somebody else; and she would gather her stores of buttercups and chestnuts under the loved old trees never again. But these things were nothing, though the image of them made the tears come hot and fast, these were nothing in her mind to the knowledge or the dread of the effect the change would have upon Mr. Ringgan. Fleda knew him and knew it would not be slight. Whiter his head could not be, more bowed it well might, and her own bowed in anticipation as her childish fears and imaginings ran on into the possible future. Of McGowan's tender mercies she had no hope. She had seen him once, and being unconsciously even more of a physiognomist than most children are, that one sight of him was enough to verify all Mr. Jolly had said. The remembrance of his hard sinister face sealed her fears. Nothing but evil could come of having to do with such a man. It was however still not so much any foreboding of the future that moved Fleda's tears as the sense of her grandfather's present pain,--the quick answer of her gentle nature to every sorrow that touched him. His griefs were doubly hers. Both from his openness of character and her penetration, they could rarely be felt unshared; and she shared them always in more than due measure.

In beautiful harmony, while the child had forgotten herself in keen sympathy with her grandfather's sorrows, he on the other hand had half lost sight of them in caring for her. Again, and this time not before any house but in a wild piece of woodland, the little wagon came to a stop.

"Ain't there some holly berries that I see yonder?" said Mr. Ringgan,--"there, through those white birch stems? That's what you were wanting, Fleda, ain't it? Give your bittersweet to me while you go get some,--and here, take this knife dear, you can't break it. Don't cut yourself."

"Why you've got enough to dress up the front room chimney," said he. "That'll be the best thing you can do with 'em, won't it?"

"The front room chimney! No, indeed I won't, grandpa. I don't want 'em where nobody can see them, and you know we are never in there now it is cold weather."

"Well, dear! anyhow you like to have it. But you ha'n't a jar in the house big enough for them, have you?"

"O I'll manage--I've got an old broken pitcher without a handle, grandpa, that'll do very well."

"A broken pitcher! that isn't a very elegant vase," said he.

"O you wouldn't know it is a pitcher when I have fixed it. I'll cover up all the broken part with green, you know. Are we going home now, grandpa?"

"No, I want to stop a minute at uncle Joshua's."

Uncle Joshua was a brother-in-law of Mr. Ringgan, a substantial farmer and very well to do in the world! He was found not in the house but abroad in the field with his men, loading an enormous basket-wagon with corn-stalks. At Mr. Ringgan's shout he got over the fence and came to the wagon-side. His face showed sense and shrewdness, but nothing of the open nobility of mien which nature had stamped upon that of his brother.

"Fine morning, eh?" said he. "I'm getting in my corn stalks."

"So I see," said Mr. Ringgan. "How do you find the new way of curing them answer?"

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