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"I left it at the spring-house, and when I went back it was gone." "So that was it!" he answered. And then he explained that just about the time they expected their supper they saw a man carry a basket stealthily through the snow to the deer park. It was twilight, but they watched him from the window, and he put the basket through the barbed-wire fence and then crawled after it.
I remember wishing I'd taught school, as I was educated to; woman wasn't made to live alone, and most school-teachers get married. Miss Patty did not say much. She was holding her chin high and looking rather angry and determined. At the spring-house I gave her the basket and took an armful of fire-wood myself. I knew Mr. Dick would never think of it until the fire was out.
And presently, when I had closed one of his eyes, his skill went all to pieces, and he made a mad rush at me. As he went by I struck him so hard that he fell heavily and lay motionless. Young Harvey ran into the spring-house and filled his hat as I bent over my cousin. I unbuttoned his waistcoat and felt his heart, and rejoiced to find it beating; we poured cold water over his face and wrists.
I wanted Jessamine Hynds consigned to the grave from which she had been too long kept. I wanted her to sleep in the brown bosom of the earth, with the impartial grass to cover her, and roses to blow over her by and by, when summer should have come back to South Carolina. Achmet led the way, and presently we were in the spring-house.
As she turned away after carefully fastening the spring-house door, the cat darted under her feet; and Betty stumbled and the milk streamed down the front of her dress and spattered her shoes and if there was anything Betty liked, it was to have her shoes very neat. "Oh, Kitty! I hate your running under my feet that way all the time." Betty was almost in tears.
"Are you you one of his agents that is, spies, and was it you that insulted me by wanting to buy Elmnest just because it was poor and old?" I demanded, with the color in my cheeks. "I am not his spy or his agent, and do you want to come down to the spring-house and cook these wild-mustard shoots for our dinner, or shall I go at our old garden with the prospect of an empty stomach at sunset?"
"Well," she resumed, after taking breath, "no news is good news, these days. Down Whitely Creek way, towards Strickersville, there's fever, they say; Richard Rudd talks o' buildin' higher up the hill, you know it's low and swampy about the old house, but Sarah, she says it'll be a mortal long ways to the spring-house, and so betwixt and between them I dunno how it'll turn out. Dear me!
Big Tom's plantation has an openwork stable, an ill-put-together frame house, with two rooms and a kitchen, and a veranda in front, a loft, and a spring-house in the rear. Chickens and other animals have free run of the premises. Some fish-rods hung in the porch, and hunter's gear depended on hooks in the passage-way to the kitchen.
I stood there in the storm, with the shawl flapping, thanking heaven I was a single woman, and about ready to go back and tell Mr. Moody what I thought of him when I looked toward the spring-house. At first I thought it was afire, then I saw that the light was coming from the windows. Somebody was inside, with a big fire and all the lights going.
They forgot all about war's alarms, stood their rifles up against the side of the spring-house, washed their dust-grimed faces and hands in the pure water, dried them with their handkerchiefs, and prepared to enjoy their meal. How good the buttermilk tasted along with the cornpone. The fresh milk was also sampled, and some of the butter spread upon their bread.
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