"Tut! tut! tut! this is too bad! too bad! We must fill up this gulley somehow, Cousin Ma'y Anna. Other folks' victuals are the best physic I know for that sort of work. Miss Nancy would cry her eyes out if I was to go home with the story that little Molly Burwell had coughed her bones pretty near as bare as barrel-staves, and I didn't try to cover them up again. A week in my peach-orchard and watermelon-patch, with quarts of cream and Miss Nancy's breakfasts, dinners, and suppers—is what she wants. Get her bonnet, and stick a tooth-brush and a pocket-handkerchief into a bandbox, Chloe, for I'm going to take her home with me, right straight off."
My mother shook her head smilingly at the thought of the week's visit.
"The child coughs so badly at night that I don't like to have her away from me, Cousin 'Ratio. But change of air, even for a day, would do her good. Her father and I will come for her about sundown."
Thus it happened, that, decked in a clean pink calico frock and white muslin apron, I was hoisted to my perch in the high gig beside Cousin 'Ratio, and set off to spend a whole day at Cold Comfort.
The name was so out of keeping with Cousin 'Ratio's kind, red face and funny ways, and the warm, sweet-smelling day, that I couldn't help asking him on the way "why he called his house such a shivery name?"
The gig swayed and creaked under his laugh.
"That was just the reason my grandmother gave for naming it. You see, the house stands on the top of a hill, and all the winds from three counties get at it in winter. The house my grandfather put up was of wood, and none too tight in the joints, and the poor old lady, his wife—my step-grandmother she was—had rheumatism, and suffered a heap all the year 'round. So, nothing would do but it must be 'Cold Comfort,' and Cold Comfort it has been ever since. We Gateses have a way of giving in to our wives in 'most everything. Everything that's reasonable, I mean. And we don't pick out unreasonable girls for wives."
The fat, sleek horse was taking his own lazy pace in a mile of shady road, cut through the heart of a pine forest. The ground was brown and soft with pine needles, and the high gig swung and creaked a sort of drowsy tune. Cousin 'Ratio tapped the wheel nearest him with his whip, and fell into talk with himself, rather than with the child under his elbow.
"Now, there's Miss Nancy! There's been a heap of fun poked at me, first and last, for building my house in the shape I did. Though, for the life of me, I can't see why I should be obleeged to live in a four-square box because every other man-Jack in Pow'tan County builds his in that way. Miss Nancy was always mighty nervous from the time she was a child; I knew it when I married her. Fact is, she says to me: 'Cap'n Gates, I'm as nervous as a witch, and I'm afraid you'll get out of patience with me sometimes, and I wouldn't blame you if you did.' And, says I,—my hand right on my heart,—'Miss Nancy Miller! if you'll take me as I am, I'll be proud and happy to take you as you are, nerves and all!' says I. 'The proudest man in the State of Virginia,' says I. 'Call it a bargain.'
"And she did—bless her soul! It was the best bargain that ever I made, or ever expect to make, too. Some men marry Temper, and some Extravagant Notions, and some Vanity, and some Jealous, Suspicious Dispositions, and some, again, Stinginess—Good gracious! there's no end to the disagreeable things men do marry! I married Nerves! and with them, the best and sweetest and, to my way of thinking, the prettiest woman in the County and State, and the Universe, and I've been thankful for it every day and every hour since—God bless her!"