“I know what I’ll do, Baltie: I’ll go straight up to Jabe Raulsbury’s and make him come down and take care of you. Good-bye, dear; I won’t be any time at all ’cause I’ll go right across the fields,” and giving the horse a final encouraging stroke, she caught up her umbrella which had meantime been resting handle uppermost up in a mud-puddle, and scrambling up the bank which had been poor Baltie’s undoing, disappeared beneath the tumble-down fence and was off across the pasture heedless of all obstacles.
Jabe Raulsbury’s farm had once been part of Riveredge, but one by one his broad acres had been sold so that now only a small section of the original farmstead remained to him, and this was a constant eyesore to his neighbors, owing to its neglected condition, for beautiful homes had been erected all about it upon the acres he had sold at such a large profit. Several good offers had been made him for his property by those who would gladly have bought the land simply to have improved their own places and thus add to the attraction of that section of Riveredge. But no; not another foot of his farm would Jabe Raulsbury sell, and if ever dog-in-the-manger was fully demonstrated it was by this parsimonious irascible man whom no one respected and many heartily despised.
This wild, wet afternoon he was seated upon a stool just within the shelter of his barn sorting over a pile of turnips which lay upon the floor near him. He was not an attractive figure, to say the least, as he bent over the work. Cadaverous, simply because he was too parsimonious to provide sufficient nourishing food to meet the demands of such a huge body. Unkempt, grizzled auburn hair and grizzled auburn beard, the latter sparse enough to disclose the sinister mouth. Eyes about the color of green gooseberries and with about as much expression.
As he sat there tossing into the baskets before him the sorted-out turnips, he became aware of rapidly approaching footsteps, and raised his head just as a small figure came hurrying around the corner of the barn, for the scramble up the steep bank, and rapid walk across the wet pastures, had set Jean’s heart a-beating, and that, coupled with her indignation, caused her to pant. She had gone first to the house, but had there learned from Mrs. Raulsbury, a timid, nervous, woefully-dominated individual, who looked and acted as though she scarcely dared call her soul her own, that “Jabe was down yonder in the far-barn sortin’ turnips.” So down to the “far-barn” went Jean.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Raulsbury,” she began, her heart, it must be confessed, adding, rather than lessening its number of beats, at confronting the forbidding expression of the individual with whom she was passing the time of day.
“Huh!” grunted Jabe Raulsbury, giving her one searching look from between his narrowing eyelids, and then resuming his work. Most children would have been discouraged and dropped the conversation then and there. Jean’s lips took on a firmer curve.
“I guess after all it isn’t a good afternoon, is it? It is a pretty wet, horrid one, and not a very nice one to be out in, is it?”
“Wul, why don’t ye go home then?” was the gruff retort.
“Because I have an important matter to ’tend to. I was on my way to visit Amy Fletcher; her cat is sick! he was hurt dreadfully yesterday; she thinks somebody must have tried to shoot him and missed him, for his shoulder is all torn. If anybody did do such a thing to Bunny they’d ought to be ashamed of it, for he’s a dear. If I knew who had done it I’d—I’d—.”
“Wal, what would ye do to ’em, heh?” and a wicked, tantalizing grin overspread Jabe Raulsbury’s face.