Waterloo came in at this point and demanded again that the mules be shown him, so father and Rufe set out for the stables.
"Shall we walk around and look at things, too?" I asked Cousin Eunice as we filed out on to the back porch. It is a habit with us two to steal away for a quiet little talk the first few hours we are together and take stock of each other's happenings since we met last.
"No," she answered, looking at me steadily. "The orchard and vineyard are more beautiful in the afternoon. We'll walk all over the place then. Besides, I have a notion that you'll want to tell me things which will sound better in the afternoon sunshine."
"Not a thing," I denied, and wondered how a discussion of poetic fancies at the breakfast table could make her so sentimental.
"Then you are wasting some mighty valuable time," she replied. "Most normal girls of your age are brimful of plans and ideas." She would have said secrets, as she intended to, but Mammy Lou hove in sight just then with a big pan of butter-beans for me to shell for dinner.
Rufe had stopped her at the kitchen door with the usual query, "Well, Mammy, you're not married again?"
"Naw, sir," she had admitted, with a self-conscious smile, "although I did have a boa'der all the spring."
Waterloo protested against even this slight pause in their progress toward the stables, so with an amused smile Rufe forbore to continue the conversation, but passed on and Mammy Lou ambled in our direction just in time to hear part of Cousin Eunice's remark to me.
"Law, Miss Eunice, you can't git nothin' out o' her," she said disgustedly, as she set the pan of beans down and began to fan herself with her apron. "She's plen'y old enough, the Lord knows, to be takin' notice, although Mis' Mary don't think so. I heerd you-all talkin' 'bout certain ages at the breakfas' table, but I can tell you she ain't at it. She don't look at nary one of 'em twicet; an' when the shore-nuff age of Eve has come to a girl she begins eyin' ever' man she meets to see if he's got a missin' rib that'll match with hern!"