Chapter 4

Mrs. Cranceford had met Pennington in the road, and on his horse, in the shade of a cottonwood tree, he had leaned against the carriage window to tell her of his interview with the Major. He had desperately appealed to the sympathy which one with so gentle a nature must feel for a dying man, and had implored her to intercede with her husband; but with compassionate firmness she had told him that no persuasion could move her husband from the only natural position he could take, and that she herself was forced to oppose the marriage.

The Major, with his hands behind him, was now walking up and down the short stretch of shade. "I don't wonder that the absurdity of it does not strike him," he said, "for he is a drowning sentimentalist, catching at a fantastic straw." He paused in his walk to look at his wife as if he expected to find on her face a commendation of this simile. She nodded, knowing what to do, and the Major continued, resuming his walk: "I say that I can't blame him so much, but Louise ought to have better sense. I'll swear I don't know where she gets her stubbornness. Oh, but there is no use worrying ourselves with a discussion of it. You may talk to her, but I have had my say."

Louise, meanwhile, was strolling along a shaded lane that led from the ferry. Iron weeds grew in the corners of the fence, and in one hand she carried a bunch of purple blooms; with the other hand she slowly swung her hat, holding the strings. A flock of sheep came pattering down the road. With her hat she struck at the leader, a stubborn dictator demanding the whole of the highway. His flock scampered off in a fright, leaving him doggedly eyeing the disputer of his progress. But now she was frightened, with such fierceness did the old ram lower his head and gaze at her, and she cried out, "Go on back, you good-for-nothing thing."

"He won't hurt you," a voice cried in the woods, just beyond the fence. "Walk right up to him."

An enormous young fellow came up to the fence and with climbing over broke the top rail. "Don't you see he's scared?"

"But he would have knocked me over if you hadn't come."

"No, he wouldn't; he was just trying to make friends with you."

"But I don't want such a friend."

Together they slowly walked along. With tenderness in his eyes he looked down upon her, and when he spoke, which he did from time to time, his voice was deep and heavy but with a mellowness in it. She addressed him as Mr. Taylor and asked him if he had been away. And he said that he had, but that was not a sufficient reason for the formality of Mister--his name was Jim. She looked up at him--and her eyes were so blue that they looked black--and admitted that his name had been Jim but that now it must be Mr. Taylor. She laughed at this but his face was serious.

"Why, I haven't called you Jim since----"

"Since I asked you to marry me."

"No, not since then. And now you know it wouldn't be right to call you Jim."

In his slowness of speech he floundered about, treading down the briars that grew along the edge of the road, walking with heavy tread but tenderly looking down upon her. "That ought not to make any difference," he said. "I knew you before you--before you knew anything, and now it doesn't sound right to hear you call me anything but Jim. It is true that the last time I saw you--seems a long time, but it wasn't more than a week ago--you said that you wouldn't marry me, and really the time seems so long that I didn't know but you might have changed your mind."

"No, not yet," she replied.

"But you might."

"No, I couldn't."

"Is it as bad as that?"

"It's worse; it would be impossible for me to change."

"I don't suppose you know why?"

"Yes, I do. I am going to be married."

"What!" He stopped, expecting her to obey his own prompting and halt also, but she walked on. With long strides he overtook her, passed her, stood in front of her. She stepped aside and passed on. But again he overtook her, but this time he did not seek to detain her.

"I can't believe it," he said, stripping the leaves from the thorn bushes and briars that came within touch of his swinging hand. "I don't believe that you would marry a man unless you loved him and who--who----"

"Somebody," she said.

"Please don't tantalize me in this way. Tell me all about it."

"You know Mr. Pennington----"

"Who, that poor fellow!" he cried. "You surely don't think of marrying him. Louise, don't joke with me. Why, he can't live more than three months."

Now she halted and there was anger in her eyes as she looked at him, and resentful rebuke was in her voice when she spoke. "And you, too, fix the length of time he is to live. Why do you all agree to give him three months? Is that all the time you are willing to allow him?"

He stepped back from her and stood fumbling with his great hands. "I didn't know that any one else had given him three months," he replied. "I based my estimate merely on my recollection of how he looked the last time I saw him. I am willing to allow him all the time he wants and far more than Nature seems willing to grant."

"No, you are not. You all want him to die."

"Don't say that, Louise. You know that I ain't that mean. But I acknowledge that I don't want you to marry him."

"What need you care? If I refuse to marry you what difference does it make to you whom I marry?"

"It makes this difference--that I would rather see you the wife of a man that can take care of you. Louise, they say that I'm slow about everything, and I reckon I am, but when a slow man loves he loves for all time."

"I don't believe it; don't believe that any man loves for all time."

"Louise, to hear you talk one might think that you have been grossly deceived, but I know you haven't, and that is what forces me to say that I don't understand you."

"You don't have to understand me. Nobody has asked you to."

She walked on and he strode beside her, stripping the leaves off the shrubs, looking down at her, worshipping her; and she, frail and whimsical, received with unconcern the giant's adoration.

"I told the Major that I loved you--"

"Told him before you did me, didn't you?" she broke in, glancing up at him.

"No, but on the same day. I knew he was my friend, and I didn't know but--"

"That he would order me to marry you?"

"No, not that, but I thought he might reason with you."

"That's just like a stupid man. He thinks that he can win a woman with reason."

He pondered a long time, seeming to feel that this bit of observation merited well-considered reply, and at last he said: "No, I didn't think that a woman could be won by something she didn't understand."

"Oh, you didn't. That was brilliant of you. But let us not spat with each other, Jim."

"I couldn't spat with you, Louise; I think too much of you for that, and I want to say right now that no matter if you do marry I'm going to keep on loving you just the same. I have loved you so long now that I don't know how to quit. People say that I am industrious, and they compliment me for keeping up my place so well, and for not going to town and loafing about of a Sunday and at night, but the truth is there ain't a dog in this county that's lazier than I am. During all these years my mind has been on you so strong that I have been driven to work."

She had thrown down her iron weed blossoms and had put her hands to her ears to shut out his words as if they were a reproach to her, but she heard him and thus replied: "It appears that I have been of some service at any rate."

"Yes, but now you are going to undo it all."

"I thought you said you were going to keep on loving me just the same."

"What! Do you want me to?" There was eagerness in his voice, and with hope tingling in his blood he remembered that a few moments before she had called him Jim. "Do you want me to?"

"I want you always to be my friend."

Under these words he drooped and there was no eagerness in his voice when he replied: "Friendship between a great big man and a little bit of a woman is nonsense. They must love or be nothing to each other."

They had now reached the road that led past the Major's house. She turned toward home. "Wait a moment," he said, halting. She stopped and looked back at him. "Did you hear what I said?"

"What about?"

"Hear what I said about a big man and a little woman?"

"No, what did you say?"

He fumbled with his hands and replied: "No matter what I said then. What I say now is good-bye."

"Good-bye."

She tripped along as if she were glad to be rid of him, but after a time she walked slower as if she were deeply musing. She heard the brisk trotting of a horse, and, looking up, recognized Gideon Batts, jogging toward her. He saw her, and, halting in the shade, he waited for her to come up, and as she drew near he cried out, "Helloa, young rabbit."

She wrinkled her Greek nose at him, but she liked his banter, and with assumed offense she replied: "Frog."

"None of that, my lady."

"Well, then, what made you call me a young rabbit?"

"Because your ears stick out."

"I don't care if they do."

"Neither does a young rabbit."

"I call you a frog because your eyes stick out and because you are so puffy."

"Slow, now, my lady, queen of the sunk lands. Oh, but they are laying for you at home and you are going to catch it. I'd hate to be in your fix."

"And I wouldn't be in yours."

"Easy, now. You allude to my looks, eh? Why, I have broken more than one heart."

"Why, I didn't know you had been married but once."

He winced. "Look here, you mustn't talk that way."

"But you began it. You called me a young rabbit."

"That's right, and now we will call it off. What a memory you've got. I gad, once joke with a woman and her impudence--which she mistakes for wit--leaps over all difference in ages. But they are laying for you at home and you are going to catch it. I laughed at them; told them it was nonsense to suppose that the smartest girl in the state was going to marry--"

"You've said enough. I don't need your championship."

"But you've got it and can't help yourself. Why, so far as brains are concerned, the average legislator can't hold a candle to you."

"That's no compliment."

"Slow. I was in the legislature."

"Yes, one term, I hear."

"Why did you hear one term?"

"Because they didn't send you back, I suppose."

"Easy. But I tell you that the Major and your mother are furious. Your mother said--"

"She said very little in your presence."

"Careful. She said a great deal. But I infer from your insinuation that she doesn't think very well of me."

"You ought to know."

"I do; I know that she is wrong in her estimate of me. And I also know that I am right in my estimate of her. She is the soul of gentleness and quiet dignity. But you like me, don't you?"

"I am ashamed to say that I like you in spite of my judgment."

"Easy. That's good, I must say. Ah, the influence I have upon people is somewhat varied. Upon a certain type of woman, the dignified lady of a passing generation, I exercise no particular influence, but I catch the over-bright young women in spite of themselves. The reason you think so much of me is because you are the brightest young woman I ever saw. And this puts me at a loss to understand why you are determined to marry that fellow Pennington. Wait a moment. I gad, if you go I'll ride along with you. Answer me one question: Is your love for him so great that you'll die if you don't marry him? Or is it that out of a perversity that you can't understand you are determined to throw away a life that could be made most useful? Louise, we have joked with each other ever since you were a child. In my waddling way I have romped with you, and I can scarcely realize that you are nearly twenty-four years old. Think of it, well advanced toward the age of discretion, and yet you are about to give yourself to a dying man. I don't know what to say."

"It seems not," she replied. And after a moment's pause she added: "If I am so well advanced toward the age of discretion I should be permitted to marry without the advice of an entire neighborhood."

She was now standing in the sun, looking up at him, her half-closed eyes glinting like blue-tempered steel.

"Is marriage wholly a matter of selfishness?" she asked.

"Slow. If you are putting that to me as a direct question I am, as a man who never shies at the truth, compelled to say that it is. But let me ask you if it is simply a matter of accommodation? If it is, why not send out a collection of handsome girls to marry an aggregation of cripples?"

Her eyes were wide open now and she was laughing. "No one could be serious with you, Mr. Gid."

"And no one could make you serious with yourself."

"Frog."

"Young rabbit."

She put her hands to her ears. "I would rather be a young rabbit than a frog."

"Wait a moment," he called as she turned away.

"Well."

"When you go home I wish you'd tell your mother that I talked to you seriously concerning the foolishness of your contemplated marriage. Will you do that much for your old playmate?"

She made a face at him and trippingly hastened away. He looked after her, shook his head, gathered up his bridle reins, and jogged off toward his home.