ETCHINGS: THE HUSKING BEE
(R. L. Ketchum: For Short Stories.)
The great farm-house is ablaze with lights twinkling from every room. Long tables groan beneath the loads of good things the busy housewife has been days preparing.
From the barn come merry voices; joyous laughter.
Let us stand, unobserved, in the open door.
What a happy, merry lot of young folks—stalwart, handsome young men and healthy maidens!
They are ranged around the walls with rapidly-diminishing piles of corn before them, which they husk and throw upon the golden heap which is growing up rapidly in the center.
Ah! That young man has found a red ear in his pile! He leaps to his feet and dashes at one of the prettiest girls! A short chase—a struggle—a resounding smack—and it is over. He has kissed her—maybe on her collar, or her back hair; but that doesn’t matter; she counts it all the same.
How happy they all seem.
But no. Over there in a dark corner sits a tall, powerful, handsome young fellow all alone. He speaks to nobody unless addressed, and then his answers are short and sullen.
Ever and anon he casts a piercing glance at a young man of about his own age who sits at the end of the row opposite, chatting with a pretty young girl. His face darkens. There is murder in his eye. He is in love, perhaps, and jealous.
The bell rings for supper just as the husking is done, and the huskers jump up and scamper pell-mell toward the house, but the tall, handsome young man remains seated and drops his face in his hands with something that sounds like a sob.
For a long time he sits thus alone, then a light, hurried step is heard and a sweet-voiced girl asks:
“Joe, what’s the matter? Had trouble with Mary? You haven’t spoken to her to-night, hardly. Sick? Better come into supper. It will do you good, maybe.”
“No, Sis, it ain’t that.”
“Tell me, Joe,” says his sister kindly.
“Well,” he answers, “I’ve got on my thin pants ... I rid Dobbin over ... thar wuz a nail or a chafe in th’ saddle....”
And the stalwart young hayseed Adonis broke down and shed a drenching shower of salt and bitter tears.