[CHAPTER XI.]
FLAXEN GROWS RESTLESS.
But as the excitement of getting back died out, poor Flaxen grew restless, moody, and unaccountable. Before, she had always been the same cheery, frank, boyish creature. As Bert said, "You know where to find her." Now she was full of strange tempers and moods. She would work most furiously for a time, and then suddenly fall dreaming, looking away out on the shimmering plain toward the east.
At Bert's instigation, a middle-aged widow had been hired, at a fabulous price, to come and do the most of the work for them, thus releasing Flaxen from the weight of the hard work, which perhaps was all the worse for her. Hard work might have prevented the unbearable, sleepless pain within. She hated the slatternly Mrs. Green at once for her meddling with her affairs, though the good woman meant no offence. She was jocose in the broad way of middle-aged persons, to whom a love-affair is legitimate food for raillery.
But Gearheart's keen eye was on Flaxen as well. He saw how eagerly she watched for the mail on Tuesdays and Fridays, and how she sought a quiet place at once in order to read and dream over her letters. She was restless a day or two before a certain letter came, with an eager, excited, expectant air. Then, after reading it, she was absent-minded, flighty in conversation, and at last listlessly uneasy, moving slowly about from one thing to another, in a kind of restless inability to take continued interest in anything.
All this, if it came to the attention of Anson at all, was laid to the schooling the girl had had.
"Of course it'll seem a little slow to you, Flaxie, but harvestin' is comin' on soon, an' then things'll be a little more lively."
But Gearheart was not so slow-witted. He had had sisters and girl cousins, and knew "the symptoms," as Mrs. Green would have put it. He noticed that when Flaxen read her letters to them there was one which she carefully omitted. He knew that this was the letter which meant the most to her. He saw how those letters affected her, and thought he had divined in what way.
One day when Flaxen, after reading her letters, sprang up and ran into her bedroom, her eyes filled with sudden tears, Gearheart crooked his finger at Ans, and they went out to the barn together.