"There are not many of them, Gertrude," he laughed.
"Enough for us, Frank; we do not need any more."
And they went through the garden hall, and admired the stately buffet and the hanging-lamp of polished brass, which swung over the great dining-table. They went into the drawing-room, and admired the pictures again which the sun lighted up so beautifully, and then they stopped, looked in each other's eyes and kissed each other.
"It is all just as I like it, Frank," said she, "plain and suitable, but nothing sham, no imitations. I hate pretence--everything ought to be genuine, as real and true as my love and your heart, you dear, good fellow.--Now everything is perfect in the house," she continued, picking up a thread from the carpet. "No one would recognize it; it is the most charming little house for miles around. And it did not cost nearly as much as Jenny's trousseau and wedding-journey."
They were standing in the open hall door, and the young man looked with brightening eyes across the garden to the outbuildings which had exchanged their leaky roofs for new shining blue slates.
"You are right, Gertrude, it is a pretty sight; we will sit here often. And to-morrow they will begin to build the new barns. They must be ready when we harvest the first rye."
"Frank," she asked, mischievously, "do you still think as you did a week after our wedding when we spoke about this for the first time, and you were really childish and absolutely would not take anything of that which is yours by every right human and divine? And you would have let the cows be rained on in their stalls and the farm-servants in their beds."
"No, Gertrude, not now," he replied.
"And why, you Iron-will?"
"Because we love each other, love each other unspeakably."