"I guess I'll go back with you," said Ezekiel. "We will take Swiss with us; two men and a dog ought to be enough for a little snowstorm like this."
"You won't find it a little one," said Hiram, "when you get out in the road, but I guess the three on us can pull through."
Ezekiel went upstairs with the wood and Hiram resumed his seat before the kitchen fire.
"What did I tell you?" said Hiram to Mandy. "'Zeke's going back with me. She has writ him to come over and see her. Now you see if you don't lose your apple."
"I didn't bet," said Mandy; "but what was that other thing you were going to tell me that was no secret?"
"Oh, that's about another couple," said Hiram. "Tilly James is engaged."
"Well, it's about time," said Mandy. "Which one of them?"
"Samuel Hill," replied Hiram, "and she managed it fust rate. You know the boys have been flocking round her for more than a year. Old Ben James, her pa, told me he'd got to put in a new hitchin' post. You see, there has been Robert Wood and 'Manuel Howe and Arthur Scates and Cobb's twins and Ben Bates and Sam Hill, but Samuel was the cutest one of the lot."
"Why, what did he do that was bright?" asked Mandy.
"Well," replied Hiram, "you see, Tilly sot down and writ invites to all the boys that had been sparkin' 'round her to come to see her the same night. She gave these invites to her brother Bill to deliver. Well, Sam Hill met him, found out what he was about, and kinder surmised what it all meant. Wall, the night came 'round and Sam Hill was the only one that turned up at the time app'inted. After talkin' about the weather, last year's crops, and spring plantin', Sam just braced up and proposed, and Tilly accepted him on the spot."