“I’ve noticed it sometimes,” replied Jerry, looking at her quickly.
It was unseasonably warm, and he drove the canoe on to a sandy shore in the shade of the bank. He had confessed to himself that at times, even in their juvenile badgering, Nan baffled him. From the beginning of their acquaintance he had noted abrupt changes of mood that puzzled him. Occasionally, in the midst of the aimless banter in which they engaged, she would cease to respond and a far-away look would come into her violet eyes. One of these moods was upon her now.
“Do you remember the shanty-boat people down along the river? I used to think it would be fun to live like that. I still feel that way sometimes.”
“Oh,” he answered indulgently, “I guess everybody has a spell of that now and then, when you just want to sort of loaf along, and fish a little when you’re hungry, and trust to luck for a handout at some back door when you’re too lazy to bait the hook. That feeling gets hold of me lots of times; but I shake it off pretty soon. You don’t get anywhere loafing; the people that get along have got to hustle. Cecil says we can’t just mark time in this world. We either go ahead or slide back.”
“Well, I’m a slider—if you can slide without ever getting up very far!”
“Look here,” he said, drawing in the paddle and fixing his eyes upon her intently, “you said something like that the first night Cecil took me up to see you, and you’ve got a touch of it again; but it’s the wrong talk. I’m going to hand it to you straight, because I guess I’ve got more nerve than anybody else you know: you haven’t got a kick coming, and you want to cut all that talk. Uncle Tim gets cross sometimes, but you don’t want to worry about that too much. He used to be meaner than fleas at the store sometimes, but the boys never worried about it. He’s all sound inside, and if he riles you the best thing to do is to forget it. You can’t please him all the time, but you can most of the time, and it’s up to you to do it. Now, tell me to jump in the river if you want to, but it was in my system and I had to get it out.”
“Oh, I know I ought to be grateful; but I’m wrong some way.”
“You’re all right,” he declared. “Your trouble is you don’t have enough to do. You ought to get interested in something—something that would keep you busy and whistling all the time.”
“I don’t have enough to do; I know that,” she assented.
“Well, you ought to go in good and strong for something; that’s the only ticket. Let’s get out and climb the bank and walk awhile.”