“I’m weedin’ this strawb’ry-patch,” puffed Gladys-Marie, looking up very flushed in the face. “What’re you doing?”
“I am—ah—I am doing just nothing,” admitted Mr. Verplanck, suddenly aware that it was a trivial occupation. “But I should like to weed very much if I——”
“You’d spoil yer clothes,” said Gladys-Marie, briefly; “’nn’ besides, what’d she say t’ you?”
Mr. Verplanck stopped regarding his spotless white flannels and regarded Gladys-Marie somewhat sharply; then—“She can’t say anything,” he returned. “She shut me out of the kitchen because she was making angel-food; and whatever I may do in revenge—— I say, Gladys-Marie, if I were to change my clothes, you know?”
“There’s a pair o’ Mister Michael’s overalls in the closet under the stairs,” Gladys-Marie relented. “But you’re s’ much taller—— Ain’t he the handsome figger of a man, though?” she murmured to Marmaduke as Knollys disappeared within the house. “An’ t’ think o’ him cramped up in a hotel! My eye! he’d ought a have the whole world t’ run around in!”
And Marmaduke blinked assent as he swept his yellow tail majestically among the tall grasses.
“Y’ see,” said Gladys-Marie, when she had turned over her trowel to Knollys, “this is Lady Elinore’s strawb’ry-patch, ’n’ while she’s away I gotta keep it goin’ fer her. D’ye ever notice, Mister Verplanck, how much more ye feel like doin’ fer other folks w’en y’re in the country? In the city it’s ev’ry kid fer ’imself, ’n’ a rush t’ get the main graft first. But in th’ country, seems like there’s time fer other people, s’ much time that yerself kind a fergits its kickin’.”
Again Mr. Verplanck glanced penetratingly at her, the plain conscientious person; but the curve of a pink ear was all that he could see. The rest of Gladys-Marie seemed to have been absorbed by the strawberry-bed.
“I guess I never told you about George—the swell middy I’m engaged to?” From the green leaves the friendly voice went on unself-consciously. “He’s gotta serve another year yet, an’ honest, Mister Verplanck, before I come to th’ country I took on worse ’n any Deserted at th’ Altar, over the dee-lay. I was thinkin’ all th’ time about me clothes, ’n’ how we c’d board for a year er two, George ’n’ me, so’s t’ put on a little more style, y’ know. But now—well, I tell y’ on the straight, since I got this country habit, style kinda strikes me like movin’ picters at a vaudyville. I’m s’ keen on the main show, I ain’t no time t’ waste on it. So George ’n’ I’re goin’ t’ be married next June, out here; ’n’ we’re goin’ to have a House!”
When she said that, Gladys-Marie looked up with a smile that did things to Knollys’s throat. A House!