“Nothing in earnest, Mr. Higginson. I rather gave up even the hope of going on with it, after we went away.”
“You couldn’t give it up if it is in you,” he answered. “That’s one of the charms and blessings of the divine fire. If it ever does start a blaze in your soul’s shrine, it can never be put out. They can smother it down, and stamp on it, and cover it up with ashes of dead hopes, all that, but sure as anything, once the mind is relaxed and at peace with itself, the fire will burn again. You’re going back, I hear from Bab.”
Jean nodded.
“I’m the eldest, and the others are all in school. I’m needed.”
He smiled, looking down at the fire Justine had prepared for them on the wide hearth.
“That’s all right. Anything that tempers character while you’re young, is good for the whole system. I was born out west in Kansas, way back in pioneer days. I used to ride cattle for my father when I was only about ten. And, Lord Almighty, those nights on the plains taught my heart the song of life. I wouldn’t take back one single hour of them. We lived in a little dugout cabin, two rooms, that’s all, and my mother came of a fine old colonial family out of Colebrook, in your state. She made the trip with my father and two of us boys, Ned and myself. I can just remember walking ahead of the big wagon with my father, chopping down underbrush and trees for us to get through.”
“Wasn’t it dangerous?” asked Jean, eagerly.
“Dangerous? No! The Indians we met hadn’t learned yet that the white man was an enemy. We were treated well by them. I know after we got settled in the little house, baking day, two or three of them would stand outside the door, waiting while my mother baked bread, and cake and doughnuts and cookies, in New England style, just for all the world like a lot of hungry, curious boys, and she always gave them some.”
“Did you draw and paint them?”
He laughed, a round, hearty laugh that made Mrs. Crane smile over at them.