CHAPTER XXII
“THERE ARE SOME THINGS WE HAVE TO SETTLE FOR OURSELVES”
John’s being away from home those first days of Hugh’s illness—he had gone to Colebyville to dispose of Patsie’s body and secure a new team to finish harvesting—kept him from getting the run of the affairs of the sickroom, and enabled Elizabeth to assume the care of the invalid in her own way. An idea once fixed in John Hunter’s head was fixed, and having accepted the plan of Doctor Morgan that Elizabeth was to be in sole charge of care and medicine, he went his way without thrusting his suggestions upon her, and Elizabeth, having learned not to discuss things with him, did not speak of her work nor of anything connected with the invalid. In fact, as soon as John entered the sickroom she went out, as one of the best ways she knew of to avoid accidents of conversation. John came to Hugh’s bedside but little, supposing that he needed rest, and willing to sacrifice his all to the comfort of the pale invalid. With the tears of a woman in his heart if not in his eyes, John watched from afar the face of the man he had been the unconscious means of injuring, and tiptoed about the outer rooms with a fear of death which only John could feel. Another thing kept him out of the sickroom: impressed with the idea that his carelessness in the purchase of the first team had led up to this trouble, he had gone to the other extreme in replacing them, and had paid three hundred and twenty-five dollars for one of the best and most thoroughly proven teams in the country. There were no available funds and he had been obliged to give a note for them; this must in time come to Hugh’s notice, and John had a distinct remembrance of a former note, and did not wish to repeat the experience. Luther, who came often to see Hugh, had spoken to John of Patsie’s death in Elizabeth’s presence, and after the first pained expression of surprise and grief, Elizabeth had never mentioned it again. John had noticed also that Elizabeth had never asked the price of the last team, nor seemed to take any interest in them, and he hoped by the same means to avoid confessing to Hugh.
John Hunter was glad at this time to escape discussions of an unpleasant nature; he was more broken by the accident than he ever admitted; he accused himself more bitterly than any one would ever accuse him; he had broken up a working team, he had killed his best horse, and he had been all but responsible for the death of his best friend, and when John Hunter’s own misdeeds hit hard enough, he would face things squarely, and no matter how hard he worked to avoid owning up to others, would acknowledge to himself that he was in the wrong. Hugh’s white face grew whiter each day and accused him enough without further words. To escape it, John worked busily, and there was need of work, for the rapidly drying fields required his entire attention during the day, and he left Hugh to his wife’s care, glad to do so.
There were times, however, when John was alone with Hugh, and at such times, because he was full of self-blame and humiliation, he listened to what Hugh said with a peculiar attention. Hugh saw that John worried himself half sick over his misfortune, and reached out the hand of love and fellowship for which John hungered at this time. He talked of his possible death as if it were but a journey, which always convulsed John’s face with child-like emotions. He talked of the farm work, and kept close track of what was done. He knew that John had had to go into debt for the team, and he wanted John to tell him, without being asked, that a note had been given. When he did not, Hugh passed the matter over without reference and with a sigh. Hugh Noland was not criticising John Hunter or any of his actions these days, but Hugh studied John and found his weaknesses, and tried to give him such help as he thought possible. Hugh had long days to think, and he began to yearn over this man to whom he had been a sort of traitor. He saw John’s wilfulness with Elizabeth—heard many things without being able to avoid hearing them, being pinned to his bed—he saw where John’s irritability lost good help during the busy season and left double duty for faithful Jake, his supercilious attitude toward Luther, and his illy concealed contempt for the farmers about them, and one of his ways of keeping his mind off John’s wife was to keep it on John and John’s needs. Hugh kept Luther with him whenever Luther could be spared from his home in the evenings, and he spoke to John of Luther with growing affection. When he grew stronger, he discussed farm work and farmers with John in a way that savoured of interest in their problems; he asked Nathan and Silas and Carter and Bob Warren in and talked to them of fertilizers and drainage, and when John insisted that those things were in the future, he said:
“Yes, but they will come up in our time; you see I come from a place where those things were already a necessity to the farmers. I am a farmer myself now and I think about those things.”
Hugh knew that his consideration of fertilizers was superfluous in a country that was hardly past the sod-corn stage, but he longed to dignify this work to John Hunter, since John would give his formative years here and be unable to do other things if he ever made money enough to get away, as he hoped. Hugh had had enough work in the agricultural department of an eastern university before he had come to Kansas, to make it possible for him to interest these men in the future development of their state. Doctor Morgan, who had been rather unwilling that serious subjects should be discussed in the sickroom, asked curiously one day:
“What the devil do you want to prate such nonsense as that to these folks for? They won’t need any kind of fertilizers in this country for twenty years. You’d better be resting instead of shooting such useless stuff as that at them.”