Arthur had still another coadjutor in his management of affairs, in the person of Dorothy. Throughout the summer and autumn the girl rode with him every morning during the hours before breakfast, and, in her queer, half childish, half womanly way, she instructed him mightily in many things. Her habits of close observation had given her a large and accurate knowledge of plantation affairs which was invaluable to him, covering as it did many points of detail left unmentioned by Meaux and Bannister.
But his interest in the girl was chiefly psychological. The contradiction he observed between her absolutely child-like simplicity and the strangely sage and old way she had of thinking now and then, interested him beyond measure. Her honesty was phenomenal—her truthfulness astonishing.
One morning as the two rode together through the corn they came upon a watermelon three fourths grown. Instantly the girl slipped to the ground with the request:—
“Lend me your knife, please.”
He handed her the knife wondering what she would do with it. After an effort to open it she handed it back, saying: “Won’t you please open it? Knives are not fit for women’s use. Our thumb nails are not strong enough to open them. But we use them, anyhow. That’s because women’s masters are not severe enough with them.”
Receiving the knife again, with a blade opened, the girl stooped and quickly scratched Arthur’s initials “A. B.,” upon the melon.
“I’ve observed you do that before, Dorothy,” said Arthur as the girl again mounted Chestnut, without assistance. “Why do you do it?”
“To keep the servants from stealing the melon,” she replied. “Everybody does that. I wonder if it’s right.”
“But how can that keep a negro from taking the melon some dark night after it is ripe and secretly eating it?”
“Oh, that’s because of their ignorance. They are very ignorant—much more so than you think, Cousin Arthur. I may call you ‘Cousin Arthur,’ may I not? You see I always called your uncle ‘Uncle Robert,’ and if your uncle was my uncle, of course you and I are cousins. Besides I like to call you ‘Cousin Arthur.’ ”