I learned much from the rough, untutored men with whom I was in daily association. They were men whose rules of conduct were governed by individual choice, unhampered by conventions. They were so direct and honest, so unfailingly kind and gentle toward any weaker thing, and so simple and responsive, that I liked and trusted them from the first. All but old Bohm, the man from whom we were buying. He was such a totally different type that he seemed a man apart. The son of a German father and an Irish mother, he had inherited a nature too complex and contradictory to be easily fathomed.
Mrs. Bohm, with her white, calm face and gentle voice, attracted me, but her husband aroused in both Owen and me an instinctive distrust. He was good nature personified, a most companionable person, with his easy, contagious laugh, his amusing stories, quick wit, and breezy air of good fellowship. He could quote Burns, Scott, and other poets by the hour, and fiddle away on his violin, until we were nearly moved to tears. He was almost too good-natured; he didn’t quite ring true. I noticed that while he always referred or spoke to his wife affectionately, as “my old mammy,” her attitude toward him was rather impersonal. She called him “James” with quiet dignity, but seldom talked with him, and appeared to take very little interest.
On the side of a hill, some distance from the house, was an old root cellar, used, according to Bohm, for storing potatoes, turnips, and other vegetables for winter. It was most inconveniently located; there were hillsides much nearer, and considering that the cellar under the house was always used for such purposes, it seemed strange that another should be needed so far away. I was possessed with a desire to explore it. It suggested hidden treasures and Indian relics, which I was collecting. One day I was poised on the top of the cellar step, about to descend into its mysterious depths.
Old Bohm appeared. “Was you lookin’ for something’?” he asked, somewhat out of breath.
“Oh, no,” I replied, going down a few steps. “I was just exploring, and thought I would investigate this old root cellar.”
“I thought that was what you was goin’ to do, and I hurried up to tell you to be awful careful of rattlesnakes; there’s a pile of ’em ’round these here old cellars.” Bohm spoke with apparent solicitude.
“Heavens! I wouldn’t go down there for anything!” I exclaimed,—and I got out of the cellarway as quickly as possible.
Old Bohm looked down the steps at the strong, closed door of heavy boards.
“Oh, maybe it would be all right. You could listen for ’em and jump, if you heard ’em rattle,” he remarked, casually.
I shook my head. “Not much; I don’t want to hear them rattle,” and I started toward the house.