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Show IJieirM of Sii WmW am a Hill WMim PRKHARD WON i CopyftiOUT t& OOOBLEOAy, PAGC & CO. SYNOPSIS. i I s'ow 1 1 re. I of m v w. rl; ns a i-,. i. i.i-inr iiiut t.iiy a Ne,v l lmjl.iiul larni ! :'!. 1 insp.-et my farm Hml K.. In .' il.! at ll. rt I'. iiii. lo's. li. rl h,..s t . I'.nv ii earpenlrr ami a unncr, H.n.l I v u.t-r, ill,. , aviH-titer. .llnml.'s the io..iu -i , oi.l cliaiiKt'S iifo ss.u y on 1 1 I., .us,,. Ma,.. ',,"il'"''"S ploKIIlK'. 1 slurt t.i prunr l!:e .-.haul ir,-.-. llur,! i'ulr l.lnl.U 1.,..K- a.-rs arr.iin.l II, e twin Ilrctla,',-s Mrs i l.-mp! hir,-a Mis. I'IHIl; for nu- as a . li,'Ub,-fte,.i.,T. and aiiiHinn,-,s the coining I .1 a n,' I.o.u.i.t from Now York, a liall'-1 liall'-1 k ouiii; woman who needs Hie oouiui a:r. g City life looks all right from p g this distance, and it Is all right ff for a while. But after the glamour ijij 2 01 hurrying crowds and big build- 'k ' . ings and noise and excitement " f. has worn off there Isn't any place :j . ;V In the world more tiresome than ; jT a city especially In the spring- C-' time when things are beginning :!. 51 to sprout in the country. 1 CHAPTER VI Continued. "Madam." I cri d. "flo.l has sent yonl I shall p't my orchard cleaned '. up at last!" ' !.: akf.ist"' called Mrs. I'.ert. SI'.e ri'fu-.ed to c une dow n to Twin Kires with me that morning, so 1 t i;l.-d alone, L-ettin out more of th" lTii.-h from the or, hard all of the small etu:T. In fact, wlibh wasn't fit to save for fuel. In the afternoon sh" coi'SMiite.I to come. As I looked at her h:ids and then at mine. I realized how pale she was. "It's wr.mj for anybody to be so . pale as that." I thought, "to have to be so pale as that:" I was be-innln to pity her. ! When we reached the farm I took ' her around under the kitchen window . and showed her my seedbeds, where ; the asters were already frrowins madly, mad-ly, some other varieties were up. and the -weeds were busy, too; but in the present uncertainty of my horticultural know-ledu-e I didn't dare pull up anything. any-thing. I hadn't realized till that moment mo-ment that half the fun of having a new place is showing it to somebody ' else and telling how grand it is going ! to be. j "And where are you goin to put ! these babies when you set them out?" , she asked. j "That's just the point." I cried. "I , don't know. I want you to help me." I "I shouldn't dare advise you," she j smiled. "Well, let's ask Iliroshlse," said I. ) "Come on." I "Is be your pardoner? The name ! sounds quite un-IIiberuian." I scorned a reply, and we went around to the shed where all my belongings be-longings were stored, still unpacked. I got a hammer and opened the box ; containing pictures, drawing forth my two precious Japanese prints. I Then I led Miss Goodwin through the kitchen, in spite of her protests of propriety, through the fragrance of new- flooring, into the big south room, where Hard had nearly completed com-pleted his main work and was getting get-ting in the new door frames while his assistants were patching up the floor. She sat down on the new settle, while I climbed on a box and hung the pictures, one over each mantel. man-tel. Instantly the room assumed to my imagination something of its coming com-ing charm. Those two spots of color against the dingy wood panels dressed up the desolation wonderfully. wonder-fully. I hastily kicked some shavings and chi' " V'-to the fireplaces and applied ap-plied a .. ,'h. . "The hist fires on the twin hearths!" I cried. "In your honor!" The girl smiled into my face, and did not joke. "That is very nice." she said Then she rose and put out her hand. "Let me wish Twin FIron always plenty of wood and the happiness hap-piness which goes with it." We shook hands, while the fire crackled, and already the spot seemed to me like home. Then she looked up at the prints. "Now." she cned. "how Is honorable Iliroshige going to advise you? Here is a blue canal and a lavender sky in the west, and bright scarlet temple doors-ami nil the rest snow. Lavender and hnght scarlet is rather a daring color Bcheme, isn't It?" "Not if It's the right scarlet, I renl'led "But it's not the color I'm going to copy. Neither is it the moon Bridges in this other temple garde n. Its tbe simplicity. Out here south of this room is my lawn and garden. Now I want it to be a real garden, but I don't want it to dwarf the land-" land-" e I don't want it to look as if Td bought a half acre of Italy and deposited it in the middle of Massachusetts, Massachu-setts, either. I've never seen a picture pic-ture of a real Japanese garden yet ' Zt didn't look as much like . nntu-, nntu-, Japanese landscape as a garden "wan my garden to be an extension of my south room which, will some how frame the real landscape beyond." be-yond." J We went through the glass door, ami I showed her where the grape ar-! ar-! bur was to be, at the western side of j I ho lawn, and how a lane of holly-i holly-i hocks would lead to It from the pergola per-gola end. screening the kitchen windows win-dows and the yet-to-be-bullt hotbeds. "Now." said I. "I'm going to build I a' rambler rose trellis along the south: i there's your red against the lavender of the far hills at sunset! Hut how-shall how-shall the trellis be designed, and where shall the sundial be, and where the tlower beds?" j The girl clapped her hands. "Oh. the fun of planning it all out from the beginning!" she cried "My. but I envy you." "House don't envy: advise." said I. "(Hi. I can't. I don't know anything any-thing about gardens." "Hut you know what you like! IVopie always say that when they are ignorant, don't they?" I "l'on't be nasty." she replied, running run-ning down the plank from the terrace to the lawn, ami walking out to the center. "I'd have the sundial right )f3 I f "mm I Led Miss Goodwin Through the Kitchen. In the middle; where it gets all the sun." she said, "because It seems to me a dial ought to be in the natural focus point of the light. Then I'd ring it with flowers. s(,me low, a few fairly tail, all bright colors, or maybe white, and' the beds not too regular. Then, right in line with the door, I'd have an arch in the trellis so you could see through iuto the farm. Oh. I know! I'd have the trellis all arches, with a bigger one in the center, cen-ter, and it would look like a Uoman aqueduct of roses!" "A Roman aqueduct of roses," 1 repeated, re-peated, my imagination fired by the picture, "walking across the end of my green lawn, with the farm and the far hills glimpsed beneath! 'Koine's ghost since her decease.' Miss Goodwin, you are a wonder! But can you build it?" "No," she sighed, "I can only give you the derivation of 'aqueduct' and 'rose.' " "Comfc," said I, "we will consult Hard Cider." "Heavens!" she laughed. "Is that anything like Dutch courage?" Hard grunted, and came with us to the line of stakes w here the rose trellis was to be. I sketched roughly the idea I wanted a reproduction in simple j trellis work, as it were, of High bridge, New York. Hard pondered a moment, and then departed for the shed, returning with several pieces of trellis lumber, a spade, some tools, a small roll of chicken w ire and a stepladder, all on a wheelbarrow. At his direction, I dug a post hole and soon had the first arch of my aqueduct. "And now," I said to the girl at my side, "shall we see if we can build the next arch?" Again she clapped her hands delightedly, delight-edly, and ran with me around the house for the tools and lumber. " let her dig the first post hole, though as evident that the effort tired her, and then I took the spade away, while she marked off the trellis strips into the proper lengths and sawed them up, placing each strip across the wheelbarrow wheelbar-row and holding it in place first with a hand which looked quite inadequate even for that small task, and, when the hand failed, with her foot. She laughed as she put her foot on the wheelbarrow, hitching her skirt up where it bound her knee. "The new skirts weren't made for carpenters," she said, as she Jabbed away with the saw. 1 darted a glance at the display of trim ankles, and resumed my digging dig-ging In the post holes. This was a new ami disturbing distraction in agricultural agricul-tural toll! The post holes were soon dug, and while I held the posts, ste adjusted the level against them, our hands and faces close together, and we both kicked the dirt in with our feet. Then I climbed on the stepladder and leveled the top piece, which I nailed down. Then, j while I was cutting a semicircle out of i the wire, for the arch, she nailed the trellis strips across the piers, grasping the hammer halfway up to the head, and frowning earnestly as she tapped with little, short, jablike blows. She was so Intent on this task that I laughed aloud. "What are you laughing at?" said she. "You." said I. "You drive a nail as if it were an abstruse problem In differential dif-ferential calculus." "It Is, for me," she answered, quite soberly. "I don't suppose I've driven a dozen nails in my life only tacks In the plaster to hang pictures on. And it's very Important to drive them right, because this Is a rose trellis." "When I first came here." said I. "I was pretty clumsy with my hands, too. I'd lost my technique, as you might say. 1 remember one afternoon when I was trimming the orchard that I didn't think a single thought beyond the Immediate problem earh branch presented. And yet It was inimeu'-stimulating. inimeu'-stimulating. Personally, I believe thai the educational value of manual dex terlty has only begun to be appreciated." appreci-ated." - Miss Goodwin marked off the plac for the next strip, and started nailing. At the last blow she relaxed her frown. "Maybe," she said. "No, probably. P.ut the manual work. It seems to me, has got to be connected up In some way with well, with higher things. I can't think of a word for It, because my head Is so full of tiie ty' group. Y'ou, for Instance, were sawing your own orchard, and you were working for better fruit, and more beautiful trees, and a lovely home. Y'ou saw the work In its higher relations, its relations rela-tions to the beauty of living." "And your naihr?" I asked. "I see the aqueduct of roses," she smiled. "You will see them, I trust," said I, "Y'ou shall see them. Y'ou must stay till they bloom." Her brow suddenly clouded, and she shook her head. "I I shall have tc go back to the Ts,' " she said. "But I shall know the roses are here. Y'ou must send me a picture of them." Somehow I was less enthusiastic over the next arch, but her spirits soon canv back, and she sawed the next bat t of stripping with greater precl-sioijand precl-sioijand skill in the use of the saw and a more reckless show of stocking. "See!'' she cried, "how mucti I'm improving! im-proving! I didn't splinter any of the ends this time!" "Fine." said I. "You can tackle the firewood in the orchard soon!" "Hooray!" cried the girl, as the fourth was finished. "How we are getting get-ting on!" "I could never have done it alone." said I. "You have really been a great help." "Oh. I hope so!" she exclaimed. "1 haven't had so much fun in years." We looked into the vegetable garden, gar-den, and saw that Mike had gone, and Joe, too. My watch and the lengthening length-ening shadows warned me it was approaching ap-proaching six. Hot and pleasantly tired, we packed up the tools on the barrow, and wheeled them to the shed. "Now shall we go and hear the hermit?" her-mit?" I asked. She nodded, and we went down through the orchard, past the pool where the iris buds were already showing show-ing a spike of greenish white, through the maples, anil into the pines. There we stood, side by side, in the quiet hush of coming sunset, and waited for the fairy horn. A song sparrow was singing out by the road, and the thin, sweet flutings of a Peabody came from the pasture. But the thrush was silent. "Please sing. Mr. Thrush!" she pleaded, plead-ed, looking at me after she spoke, with a wistful little smile of apology for her foolishness. "I want so to hear him again," she said. "We don't hear thrushes in New Y'ork, nor smell pine trees, nor feel this sweet, cool silence. Oh. the good pines!" fl?5i5;luiiiWinH1T51Kinli:iHiJi;lia:iK51" s ;t S Just how far will this state x of affairs go before Bachelor g John forgets himself, takes Stel- H. 1 la in his arms, gives her a cave- g man hug and kiss and rushes H her off to the parson to have 3 the knot tied tight? : f! (TO BE CONTINUED.) |