Considered as a Yankee, Jonathan’s only fault is that when he does a job he likes to have a very special tool to do it with. Often it is so special that I have never heard its name before and then I consider he is going too far. He merely thinks I haven’t gone far enough. Perhaps such matters must always remain matters of opinion. But even with this handicap we did begin to catch up, and we could have done this a good deal faster if it had not been for the pump.
The pump was a clear case of new wine in an old bottle. It was large and very strong. [pg 057] The people who worked it were strong too. But the walls and floor to which it was attached were not strong at all. And so, one night, when Jonathan wanted a walk I was obliged instead to suggest the pump.
“What’s the matter there?”
“Why, it seems to have pulled clear of its moorings. You look at it.”
He looked, with that expression of meditative resourcefulness peculiar to the true Yankee countenance. “H’m—needs new wood there,—and there; that stuff’ll never hold.” And so the old bottle was patched with new skin at the points of strain, and in the zest of reconstruction Jonathan almost forgot to regret the walk. “We’ll have it to-morrow night,” he said: “the moon will be better.”
The next evening I met him below the turn of the road. “Wonderful night it’s going to be,” he said, as he pushed his wheel up the last hill.
“Yes—” I said, a little uneasily. I was thinking of the kitchen pump. Finally I brought myself to face it.
“There seems to be some trouble—with the pump,” I said apologetically. I felt that it was my fault, though I knew it wasn’t.
“More trouble? What sort of trouble?”
“Oh, it wheezes and makes funny sucking noises, and the water spits and spits, and then bursts out, and then doesn’t come at all. It sounds a little like a cat with a bone in its throat.”