"Did you ever see her, Mother?"
"No, I never," said Kate, "and I hope I never shall. I know what
Nancy Ellen felt, because she told me all about it that time we
were up North. I'm trying with all my might to have a Christian
spirit. I swallowed Mrs. Peters, and never blinked, that anybody
saw; but I don't, I truly don't know from where I could muster
grace to treat a woman decently, who tried to do to my sister,
what I KNOW Mrs. Southey tried to do to Nancy Ellen. She planned
to break up my sister's home; that I know. Now that Nancy Ellen
is gone, I feel to-night as if I just couldn't endure to see Mrs.
Southey marry Robert."
"Bet she does it!" said Adam.
"Did you see her?" asked Kate.
"See her!" cried Adam. "I saw her half a dozen times in an hour.
She's in the heart of the town, nothing to do but dress and motor.
Never saw such a peach of a car. I couldn't help looking at it.
Gee, I wish I could get you one like that!"
"What did you think of her looks?" asked Kate.
"Might pretty!" said Adam, promptly. "Small, but not tiny; plump,
but not fat; pink, light curls, big baby blue eyes and a sort of
hesitating way about her, as if she were anxious to do the right
thing, but feared she might not, and wished somebody would take
care of her."
Kate threw out her hands with a rough exclamation. "I get the
picture!" she said. "It's a dead centre shot. THAT gets a man,
every time. No man cares a picayune about a woman who can take
care of herself, and help him with his job if he has a ghost of a
chance at a little pink and white clinger, who will suck the life
and talent out of him, like the parasite she is, while she makes
him believe he is on the job, taking care of her. You can rest
assured it will be settled before Christmas."
Kate had been right in her theories concerning the growing of blue
ribbon corn. At the County Fair in late September Adam exhibited
such heavy ears of evenly grained white and yellow corn that the
blue ribbon he carried home was not an award of the judges; it was
a concession to the just demands of the exhibit.
Then they began husking their annual crop. It had been one of the
country's best years for corn. The long, even, golden ears they
were stripping the husks from and stacking in heaps over the field
might profitably have been used for seed by any farmer. They had
divided the field in halves and Adam was husking one side, Kate
the other. She had a big shock open and kneeling beside it she
was busy stripping open the husks, and heaping up the yellow ears.
Behind her the shocks stood like rows of stationed sentinels;
above, the crisp October sunshine warmed the air to a delightful
degree; around the field, the fence rows were filled with purple
and rose coloured asters, and everywhere goldenrod, yellower than
the corn, was hanging in heavy heads of pollen-spraying bloom.