"I don't know," said Barby; "but they say there is never a nick that there aint a jog some place; so I guess it can be made out. I asked Mis' Plumfield, but she didn't know anybody that was out of work; nor Seth Plumfield. I'll tell you who does that is, if there is anybody Mis' Douglass. She keeps hold. of one end of most everybody's affairs, I tell her. Anyhow, she's a good hand to go to."
"I'll go there at once," said Fleda. "Do you know anything about making maple sugar, Barby?"
"That's the very thing," exclaimed Barby, ecstatically. "There's lots o' sugar-maples on the farm, and it's murder to let them go to loss; and they ha'n't done us a speck o' good ever since I come here. And in your grandfather's time, they used to make barrels and barrels. You and me and Hugh, and somebody else we'll have, we could clap to and make as much sugar and molasses in a week as would last us till spring come round again. There's no sense into it All we'd want would be to borrow a team some place. I had all that in my head long ago. If we could see the last of that man, Didenhover, oncet, I'd take hold of the plough myself, and see if I couldn't make a living out of it. I don't believe the world would go now, Fleda, if it wa'n't for women. I never see three men, yet, that didn't try me more than they were worth."
"Patience, Barby!" said Fleda, smiling. "Let us take things quietly."
"Well, I declare, I'm beat, to see how you take 'em," said
Barby, looking at her lovingly.
"Don't you know why, Barby?"
"I s'pose I do," said Barby, her face softening still more "or I can guess."
"Because I know that all these troublesome things will be managed in the best way, and by my best Friend, and I know that He will let none of them hurt me. I am sure of it isn't that enough to keep me quiet?"
Fleda's eyes were filling, and Barby looked away from them.
"Well, it beats me," she said, taking up her dish-cloth again, "why you should have anything to trouble you. I can understand wicked folks being plagued, but I can't see the sense of the good ones."