“Ach, I guess he was no different from others, only he’s dead so abody shouldn’t talk about him.”
Amanda sighed and turned to her mother. “Mother, I’m going up to put on an old dress and when Phil comes we’re going over to the woods for arbutus.”
“All right.”
But the aunt did not consider it all right. “Why don’t you help cut carpet rags?” she asked. “That would be more sense than runnin’ out after flowers that wither right aways.”
“If we find any, Millie is going to take them to market to-morrow and sell them. Some people asked for them last week. It’s rather early but we may find some on the sunny side of the woods.”
“Oh,” the woman was mollified, “if you’re goin’ to sell ’em that’s different. Ain’t it funny anybody buys flowers? But then some people don’t know how to spend their money and will buy anything, just so it’s buyin’!”
But Amanda was off to the wide stairs, beyond the sound of the haranguing voice.
“Glory!” she said to herself when she reached her room. “If my red hair didn’t bristle! What a life we’d have if Mother were like that! If I ever think I have nothing to be thankful for I’m going to remember that!”
A little while later she went down the stairs, out through the yard and down the country road to meet her brother. She listened for his whistle. In childhood he had begun the habit of whistling a strain from the old song, “Soldier’s Farewell” and, like many habits of early years, it had clung to him. So when Amanda heard the plaintive melody, “How can I leave thee, how can I from thee part,” she knew that her brother was either arriving or leaving.
As she walked down the road in the April sunshine the old whistle floated to her. She hastened her steps and in a bend in the road came face to face with the boy.