"Is he clean?"
Aunt Phebe replied, "Why, I think the old man does the best he can, a lone man can't do as well as a woman, you know."
"Well, there's that ground room of mine he kin have if Plint is willin', and if he ain't, for that matter; for Plint himself arn't good for nothin' but fiddlin', and you see if I want bread I get it. I s'pose wimmen ought to be a leetle worth mindin', 'specially if they get their own bread," and a look of satisfaction crept over her face as if pleased with this thought.
"Well," said Aunt Phebe, "I would like to see the room, and also know the price of it; of course, you must have some pay for it, and then, if Matthias should be ill, or prove troublesome to you in any way, it will not be so hard for you."
"Oh, the pay, bless the Master, mam, I never get pay for anything hardly, not even the work I did up to Deacon Grover's for years! I jist wish I had that money in a chist in the cellar. He kep' it for me, he said, an' so he did, an' he keeps it yet, and—oh! but the room, come right along, this way, mam," and we followed her steps.
She led us out of the little door, which in the summer was covered with those dear old cypress vines my mother used to have, and though the lattice was made by her own hands of rude strips, when it was well covered with the cypress intergrown with the other vines, there was great beauty round that little door.
When Clara saw it, and I told her of its construction, and remarked on Aunt Peg's love for flowers, she said:
"Ah, Emily, it is typical of our nature! We do seem so rudely made in the winter of our ignorance, and through the lattice of our untutored thoughts the cold winds of different opinions blow and we are troubled. But when the summer of our better nature dawns, and the upturned soil catches seed, even though dropped by a careless hand, the vines of love will cover all our coldness, and the scarlet and white blossom of our beautiful thoughts appear among the leaves. Aunt Peg's earthly hand made the lattice, and the love of her undying soul planted the cypress seeds."
I thought of it this cold winter's day, and told Aunt Phebe, as we passed out of the door, how many flowers she had in summer and how pretty the vines were. Aunt Peg heard me, and smiled graciously. Then we went around to a side door, which opened into the ground room, as she called it.
Her house was on a bank, or at least its main part, and while a valley lay on one side, the ground rose upon the other. The door-sill of this room was, therefore, even with both the ground and the floor, and on either side of it were two windows, both door and windows facing the south. The sides and back of the room had no windows, the back partition being that which divided it from Aunt Peg's little cellar; and the east and west sides were hedged in by the bank which came sloping down from both front and back doors.