Julius is romantic, too, for a man, and says he doesn't want any flowers used in connection with his wedding except the sweet, early spring ones that favor Marcella so much. We have a yard full of them and so mother told them this morning that they better come over and gather them, knowing that young folks enjoy picking flowers together and they will stay fresh for several days if you put a little salt in the water.
It was the most beautiful morning you ever saw, with birds and peach blossoms and the smell of plowed ground all making curious feelings inside of you. Marcella, being a musician, noticed the birds, and Julius, being an artist, noticed the peach blossoms, but Mr. Macdonald, being just a man, noticed Miss Cis. She would walk along without noticing him and take a seat in the farthest corner away from him, but anyhow she seemed to do the work, which taught me a lesson; that if you're trying to get a man to notice you it is the best plan not to notice them except when they ain't looking.
They sat down on the porch and rested a while after they came while the narcissuses (narcissi they called them, which sounds stuck up to me) smelled very sweet from the yard. Julius remarked he wished they had made Rufe come along with them so he could have said poetry out of Keats, as it was just the kind of day to make you feel Keatsy; and pretty soon he and Marcella got on to their favorite subject, "The Ruby Yacht," which they say is a piece of poetry from Persia. They talked and talked, which made me very sleepy and pretty soon I noticed that Mr. Macdonald was getting sleepy too. He leaned over to Miss Cis and said, kinder whispery:
"I don't understand poetry, do you?"
"No, I don't," she answered back, with a smile on her face which I knew she meant to be "congenial." I knew this was a story, for she talks about "The Ruby Yacht" as much as anybody when he ain't around, but I didn't blame her for telling one in a case like this.
"I never could discover what the deuced Ruby Yacht was about, in the first place," he said.
"It looks like, from the name," I said speaking up, "that it would be about a red ship," but before I could get any further they began to laugh and tell my remark to Julius and Marcella, which was mortifying. This broke up the poetry talk and they began gathering the flowers, Miss Cis and Mr. Macdonald picking in pairs, by which I knew they were getting affinityfied.
After they had picked till their backs were tired Mammy Lou came out on the porch bringing a waiter with some of her best white cake and a bottle of her year-before-last-before-that's wine setting on it and her finest ruffled cap, very proud. She was curious to see the young man "Miss Cis was settin' up to, to see whether the match was a fittin' one or not." She took a good look at him, then called Miss Cis into the hall to speak her opinion.
"He'll do," I heard her saying, while Miss Cis was telling her to "s-s-sh, Mr. MacDonald would hear her."
"He'll do," mammy kept on, not paying any attention to what was told her, like she always don't. "He must be all right, for bein' a frien' o' Mr. Juliuses would pass 'im.' But, honey, he is tolerable po-faced, which ain't no good sign in marryin'. If thar's anybody better experienced in that business than me and King Solomon I'd like to see the whites o' ther eyes; an' I tell you every time, if you want to get a good-natured, wood-cuttin', baby-tendin' husban' choose one that's fat in the face!"