“No, nothing.”
The pair walked along on the side of the descending road silently for some moments. A farmer passed them, hauling a load of pumpkins up the hill, and exchanged a nod of salutation with Milton. This farmer remarked at his supper-table an hour later, to his wife: “I’d bet a yoke o’ oxen thet Milton Squires is a’makin’ up to the schewl-teacher. I seed ’em walkin’ togither daown th’ hill to-night, ’n’ he was a lookin’ at her like a bear at a sap-trough. It fairly made me grit my teeth to see him, with his broadcloth cloze, ’n’ his watch-chain, ’n’ his on-gainly ways.” To which his helpmeet acidulously responded: “Well, I dunnao’s she c’d dew much better. She’s gittin’ pooty well along, ’n’ fer all his ongainly ways, I don’t see but what he comes on, ‘baout’s well’s some o’ them thet runs him daown. A gal can’t jedge much by a man’s ways haow he’ll turn aout afterwards. I thought I’d got a prize.” Whereupon the honest yeoman chose silence as the better part.
The red sun was hanging in a purplish haze over the edge of the hill as the two descended, and the leaves from Farmer Perkins’s maples rustled softly under their feet. Milton drew near his subject:
“I’ve be’n gittin’ on in th’ world sence yeou fust knew me, hain’t I?”
“Yes, everybody says so.”
“’N’ yit everybody don’t knaow half of it. I ain’t no han’ to tell all I knaow. Ef some folks c’d guess th’ speckle-ations I be’n in, ‘n’ th’ cash I’ve got aout in mor’giges ’n’ sao on, it’d make ’em open their eyes. It’s th’ still saow thet gits th’ swill, as my mother use’ to say, ’n’ I’ve be’n still enough abaout it, I guess.”
His coarse chuckle jarred on the girl’s nerves, but the importance of placating him was uppermost in her mind, and she answered, as pleasantly as she could:
“I’m sure I’m glad, Milton. You have worked hard all your life, and you deserve it.”
“Yeh air glad, reely naow?”
“Why yes! Why shouldn’t I be? It always pleases me to hear of people’s prosperity.”