“There is no bringing him up to the tone of that study!” she meditated grimly. “He and I are hopeless drudges, but he is the happier of the two. Homer! I believe you really love to work!” she broke forth finally.
Homer snickered—a sudden spurt that left him very sober. His laugh always went out like a damp match.
“Yes’m, cert’nly, ma’am! Ef ’twant fur work, there wouldn’t be nuthin’ to live fur!”
He shambled off to the cellar with the ashpan, and in a few minutes, she could distinguish in the sounds rumbling and smothering in the depths beneath her feet the melancholy tune of his favorite ditty:
“On the banks of the Omaha—maha!
’Twas there we settled many a night.
As happy as the little bird that sparkled on our block
On the banks of the Omaha!”
Hetty raised the window and leaned out, gasping for breath. A garden lay behind the house and on one side of it. It was laid out in walks and borders, and was rather broad than deep. Beyond this were undefined clumps of trees that looked like an orchard. Roofs and chimneys and spires and lines of other trees, marking the course of streets, were emerging from the soaking mists. Five o’clock struck from a tower not far away, and then a church bell began to ring gently—a persuasive call to early prayers.
The warm, sweet, wet air that aroused her to look over the sill at a row of hyacinths in full bloom, the slow peal of the bell, the hush of the early morning, did not comfort her—but the soft moisture that filled her eyes drew heat and bitterness out of her heart. When she went up to awaken Hester she carried a spray of hyacinth bells, weighted with fragrant drops. Fine gems of rain sprinkled her hair, her cheeks were cool and damp, the scent of fresh earth and growing things clung to her skirts. She laid the flowers playfully against the heavy lids lifted peevishly at her call.