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Jeminy rehearsed again the story of long, long ago, while the bright eyes closed, and the tired head drooped lower and lower; while the autumn moon rose up above the hills, and the haywagon rumbled along the road, to the sound of laughter and cries. But Thomas Frye and Anna Barly were no longer seated in the hay, watching the harvest in.
Wicket, whose little cottage, at the edge of the village, on the way to Milford, had belonged to Eben Wicket for nearly fifty years. Now it belonged to the widow of Eben's son, John. Mr. Jeminy remembered John Wicket as a boy in school. He was a rogue; his head was already so full of mischief, that it was impossible to teach him anything.
But that was not entirely his fault, for they came to school with such questions as: "How far is a thousand miles?" "It is the distance between youth and age," said Mr. Jeminy. Then the children would start to laugh. "A thousand miles," he would begin. . . . By the time he had explained it, they were interested in something else.
While Juliet, at his feet, played with her dolls, Mr. Jeminy gave himself up to reflection. He thought: "The little insects which run about my garden paths at home, and eat what I had intended for myself, are not more lonely than I am. For here, within the walls of my mind, there is only myself. And you, Anna Barly, you cannot give poor Thomas Frye what he wishes.
"Then," said Aaron Bade, "we'd admire to have you stay with us, if it's agreeable to you." Mr. Jeminy looked about him at the homely kitchen, with its brown crockery set away neatly on the shelves. "If I stay with you," he said, "I should like to work in the fields, and help with the sowing and the harvesting." "So you may," said Aaron Bade. Mr. Jeminy looked at Margaret.
At last only two were left to dispute the letters in asparagus, elephant, constancy, and philosophical. Then Mr. Jeminy gathered the children about him. "The year is over," he said, "and you are free to play again. But do not forget over the summer what you learned with so much difficulty during the winter.
Therefore, as she ladled out potatoes, two to a plate, she seemed, to look at her, busier than ever; and far from being grateful, might have been used to favors every day of her life, whereas all the while she was saying ecstatically to herself, "Lord, make me humble." For she saw in Mr. Jeminy all she had fancied as a girl, and lost hope in as a woman.
He would have liked to keep it. . . . Then he could have said, "Well, at least, I took all this dirt from under the desks." The truth is that Mr. Jeminy was not a very good teacher.
Wicket planted her rows of corn, is left to grow its mouthful of hay, to sell to Mr. Frye." "Ah," said Mr. Tomkins wisely, "that's it. Well, Mrs. Wicket, now. Still," he added, "he'll have a lot of nettles in that hay." "The rich," Mr. Jeminy continued, "quarrel with the poor, and the poor, by way of answer, with rich and poor alike.
And she turned back to her pots and pans, a faint smile causing her mouth to curl down at one end, and up at the other. Mr. Jeminy awoke in the afternoon. It was the nature of this kind and simple man to accept without question the hospitality of people he had never seen before; for he felt friendly toward every one.
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