"There's no word I know in any language big enough to thank you
for this, Mother," she said. "The best I can do is make each day
as nearly a perfect expression of what I feel as possible."
Mrs. Bates drew away her hand and used it to wipe her eyes; but
she said with her usual terse perversity: "My, Kate! You're most
as wordy as Agatha. I'm no glibtonguer, but I bet you ten dollars
it will hustle you some to be any gladder than I am."
Kate laughed and gave up the thanks question.
"To-morrow we must get some onions in," she said. "Have you made
any plans about the farm work for this year yet?"
"No," said Mrs. Bates. "I was going to leave that till I decided
whether I'd come after you this spring or wait until next. Since
I decided to come now, I'll just leave your farm to you. Handle
it as you please."
"Mother, what will the other children say?" implored Kate.
"Humph! You are about as well acquainted with them as I am. Take
a shot at it yourself. If it will avoid a fuss, we might just say
you had to come to stay with me, and run the farm for me, and let
them get used to your being here, and bossing things by degrees;
like the man that cut his dog's tail off an inch at a time, so it
wouldn't hurt so bad."
"But by inches, or 'at one fell swoop,' it's going to hurt," said
Kate.
"Sometimes it seems to me," said Mrs. Bates, "that the more we get
HURT in this world the decenter it makes us. All the boys were
hurt enough when Pa went, but every man of them has been a BIGGER,
BETTER man since. Instead of competing as they always did, Adam
and Andrew and the older, beforehandeder ones, took hold and
helped the younger as you told them to, and it's done the whole
family a world of good. One thing is funny. To hear Mary talk
now, you'd think she engineered that plan herself. The boys are
all thankful, and so are the girls. I leave it to you. Tell them
or let them guess it by degrees, it's all one to me."
"Tell me about Nancy Ellen and Robert," said Kate.
"Robert stands head in Hartley. He gets bigger and broader every
year. He is better looking than a man has any business to be; and
I hear the Hartley ladies give him plenty of encouragement in
being stuck on himself, but I think he is true to Nancy Ellen, and
his heart is all in his work. No children. That's a burning
shame! Both of them feel it. In a way, and strictly between you
and me, Nancy Ellen is a disappointment to me, an' I doubt if she
ain't been a mite of a one to him. He had a right to expect a
good deal of Nancy Ellen. She had such a good brain, and good
body, and purty face. I may miss my guess, but it always strikes
me that she falls SHORT of what he expected of her. He's coined
money, but she hasn't spent it in the ways he would. Likely I
shouldn't say it, but he strikes me as being just a leetle mite
too good for her."