“Not till you want to go.”
“I’ll buy my own land, then, and set up for myself as soon as my lady-love is old enough,” he said soberly. And then he crossed the room to where Margret sat covered with confusion.
The news of Parker’s return spread quickly through the neighborhood, and the next day brought Polly and Jeanie to hear the truth of the report which Carter had not been slow to scatter abroad. Polly fairly hugged Parker in the exuberance of her joy at his return, and though she maintained that there was no one good enough for Nancy, she was mightily pleased when she was told of what she called Parker’s luck. Jeanie was relieved to be free to give her news of Archie, though she insisted that it was all Agnes’s fault, and that her brother had been obliged to go elsewhere for consolation when Agnes jilted him. It was plain to those who in years after met the Rev. and Mrs. Archie M’Clean, that the good man had been unable to withstand the widow’s subtle flattery, which she was well versed in using, but which was no part of Agnes’s art of pleasing, though in all cases it will win a man whose bump of self-esteem is a match for Archie’s.
It was in October that Parker and Agnes took possession of their little home, and there was a great housewarming, which those for miles around attended. They were all there, the friends who had stood shoulder to shoulder with the young couple when they first started to win their way in the wilderness—Dod Hunter and his strapping sons, the M’Cleans, all but Archie, Jeanie and David Campbell, Dr. Flint, Jimmy O’Neill, and last, but not least, Polly, who was the life of the occasion, and, it is reported, nearly persuaded the minister to dance an Irish jig, so “delutherin’” was she, but it was Carter who told this, and its accuracy may be judged accordingly. Carter, be it said, vied with Polly in his lively efforts to make every one have a good time.
And when the fun and feasting had become a thing of the past, one evening Parker and Agnes climbed the hill that overlooked O’Neill’s clearing. Hand in hand they stood looking at the sunset, Agnes very serious, feeling a little the weight of her new responsibilities.
“What are you thinking of?” she asked her husband.
“I have been thinking of the years to come. We are pioneers, Agnes, but we have a great future before us. We are soon to be a state; even now the wilderness begins to blossom like the rose. Those dangers of the early days will never be ours. We shall grow and enlarge our borders and open the way for others, who will strike farther and farther west. We have crossed our mountains, dear, and the way is plain before us.” Such was the man’s thought. “And of what was my wife thinking?”
“Of our home; of whether I shall ever disappoint you, and whether I shall learn to be like my mother, so strong, so helpful, so patient; if I could but be to you what she is to my father.”
“You are now, my brave little lass,” said Parker, drawing her close. “You are all that, strong, and helpful, and patient, and when we are an old, old couple, I shall say to you, as your father so often says to your mother, ‘Ye are my ain hand’s morrow.’”