For a moment she was speechless; then a smile dawned in her eyes, as she suddenly understood why her greeting had not been returned when passing by earlier in the afternoon. Quickly recovering her wits, however, she stepped forward, and as she held the gate open for her new-found neighbor to pass through, she cried, “Oh, I am so glad I met you, and know that we are near neighbors. Mother will be very pleased to meet you, I am sure, and will soon run over to see you.”
But no reply was forthcoming, and Nathalie, her patience at a boiling point, hurried on, inwardly vowing that she was never going to speak to that cantankerous old woman again, for had she not done her best to apologize for an unintentional slight? As she reached the veranda with its magic seven pillars her eyes gleamed humorously, as she suddenly realized how funny she must have appeared, hobbling along with that old woman. What a funny way she had of sniffing, and that old black poke-bonnet. Then she wondered if the rest of their neighbors were as peculiar and queer as the old lady in the little red house.
CHAPTER X
THE SWEET-PEA LADIES
Nathalie, with girlish eagerness, hurried into the house, and was soon telling her mother about her “adventure day,” as she called it, dwelling at length upon her experiences at the Sweet Pea Tea-House, and, with some show of resentment, on her encounter with their neighbor in the little red house.
Mrs. Page became intensely interested in the Sweet-Pea ladies, as her daughter designated them, but cautioned her against cherishing any resentment at the rudeness of the little old lady in black, as, naturally, she was offended that her overtures of friendliness had been slighted by the city folks. She and Nathalie would go very shortly and call upon her; she did not doubt but that her apologies would be accepted, and that the unpleasant incident would be forgotten.
The next morning, while Nathalie was gathering some lettuce in the garden near the barn, she met Sam, the tow-headed young farm-hand, who looked after the place, and who, with his buxom young wife, lived in a small white house a short distance down the road. He was a thick-set, sturdy, young fellow, with a broad, good-natured face, from which white-lashed, piglike blue eyes peered bashfully out above his shiny red cheeks. When he met any of the city folks, as he called the inhabitants of Seven Pillars, he would grin bashfully, and slowly drag off his old straw hat in a greeting, growing very red from embarrassed shyness if called upon to engage in conversation with any of them.
But Nathalie, who had had to depend upon Sam for a certain amount of necessary knowledge in relation to the house and garden, had not only grown to depend upon him in many ways, but had become quite friendly with him. She had learned that he was a level-headed, well-meaning young man and that his eyes could twinkle responsively, even if he was somewhat slow of tongue.
As he began to show Nathalie how to select the heads with the soundest hearts, she told him how she had been caught in the thunderstorm the afternoon before and the kindness of the inmates of the Sweet Pea Tea-House.
“Sure, Miss, they be nice ladies,” assented Sam. “I’ve knowed them this long time. They were born in that old house, but when the old man Whipple growed rich—some relative or t’other left him a pile o’ money—they went skylarking down to Boston—thought we country folks weren’t smart enough fur them, I reckon. But when the old man’s luck went agin him and he died, them gals come home to roost. I feel right sorry for them, for the Lord knows they don’t have no stuffin’s to their turkey these days. Too bad about the tea-house er goin’ to shucks, for sure it use ter bring in er penny er two in the sellin’ o’ them posies.