“Whar’s dat bucket? Whar’s dat bucket? Here it is done sun up an’ my cows aint milked yit!”
Aunt Chloe floundered round in a hurry, peering among the butter bowls and pans on the bench, in search of her milk bucket.
“I’se ransacked dis place an’ it kyant be paraded,” she said, placing her hands on her ample hips to pant and wonder. Meanwhile she could hear the impatient lowing of the cows and the hungry bleating of the calves from their separate pens. Presently her thick lips broadened into a knowing smile.
“Laws ter gracious! If Miss Dorothy aint kyard my las’ ling’rin basket an’ bucket to dem cherry trees. She ’lowed to beat de birds dar. Do she spec me to milk in my han’? I’m gwine down dar an’ git dat.”
Here she broke off with a second laugh, and with a natural affection in the midst of her hilarity, which had its tender touch with it.
“I’se lyin’! I’d do nuthin’ ob de sort. If she’d wanted me ter climb dem trees myself I’d done it even if I’d knowed I’d fall out and bust my ole haid.”
Again Aunt Chloe looked about her for something which would do service for a milkpail. Out in the sun stood the big cedar churn, just where she had placed it the night before that it might catch the fresh morning air and sunshine. At sight of it she looked relieved.
“Well! dis here doan leak, and aint milk got to go in it arter all?” So shouldering the awkward substitute, she hurried to the “cup pen” with the thought: “Lemme make ’aste an’ git thro’, I’se gwine ter he’p Miss Dorothy put up dem brandy cherries.”
Down in the orchard Dorothy was picking cherries to fill the last bucket whose loss had caused Aunt Chloe’s mind such vexation, and whose substitute—the churn—was now causing her a vast deal more, as the cow refused to recognize any new airs, and so moved away from its vicinity as fast as she set it beside her.
Presently Dorothy heard the sound of a horse’s tread, at the same time a voice called out:
“Oh, little boy, is this the road to Georgetown?”
Elliott Harding had drawn in rein, and was looking up through the leaves.
“How mean of you!” she stammered, her face flushing. “What made you come this way?”
He only laughed, and did not dare admit that Aunt Chloe had been the traitor, but got down, hitched his horse, and went nearer. Dorothy was very lovely as she stood there in the gently swaying tree, one arm holding to a big limb, while the other one was reaching out for a bunch of cherries. Her white sunbonnet with its long streamers swayed over her shoulders. Her plenteous hair, inclined to float, had come unplaited at the ends and fell in shimmering gold waves about her blue gingham dress. Nothing more fragrant with innocent beauty had Elliott ever seen, as her lithe, slim arms let loose their hold to climb down. She was excited and trembling as she put out her hands and took both his strong ones that he might help her to the ground.
“I suppose it is tomboyish to climb trees,” she commenced, in a confused sort of way. “But, the birds eat the cherries almost as fast as they ripen, and I wanted to save some nice ones for your cocktails.”
A look of embarrassment had been deepening in Dorothy’s face. Her voice sounded tearful, and looking at her he saw that her lips quivered and her nostrils dilated, and at once comprehended that the frank confession was prompted by embarrassment rather than gayety. Remembering her diffidence at times with him, he quickly reassured her, feeling brutal for having chaffed her.
“It is all right to climb if you wish,” he said. “I admire your spirit of independence as well as your fearlessness. You are a wholesome-minded girl; you will never be tempted to do anything unbecoming.”
As he stood idly tapping the leaves with his whip, a strange softening came over him against which he strove. He wanted to find some excuse to get on his horse and ride away without another word. He looked off toward the path along which he had come. At the turn of it was Aunt Chloe’s cabin, half hidden by a jungle of vines and stalks of great sunflowers. Festoons of white and purple morning-glories ran over the windows to the sapling porch around which a trellis of gourd vines swung their long-necked, grotesque fruit. Flaming hollyhocks and other bits of brilliant bloom gave evidence of the warm native taste that distinguished the negro of the old regime. The sun flaring with blinding brilliancy against the white-washed fence made him turn back to the shade where he could see only Dorothy’s blue eyes, with just that mingling of love and pain in them; the sweet mouth a little tremulous, the color coming and going in the soft cheeks.
“And a cocktail with the cherry will be perfect.” He had almost forgotten to take up the conversation where she had left off. “But your dear labor has brought a questionable reward. You will remember the cherry was the one thing lacking to make me yours?”
“Oh, yes!” her face lightening with a sudden recollection. “Now you do belong to us.”
“If ‘us’ means you, I grant you that I have been fairly and squarely won.”
Dropping his whip, Elliott leaned over and took Dorothy’s face between his hands bringing it close to his own, their hearts and lips together for one delicious moment.
“Dorothy, we belong to each other,” he said, gazing straight into her eyes.
She had been beautiful to him always, but loveliest now with the look of love thrilling her as he felt her tapering wrists close around his neck.
“It seems as though I have loved you all my life, Elliott.”
“Oh, if in loving me, the sweetness of you, the youth, the happiness should be wasted! Shall I always make you happy, I often ask myself. I want to know this, Dorothy, for I hope to make you my wife.”
At the word “wife,” delicate vibrations glided through her, deepening into pulsations that were all a wonder and a wild delight, throbbing with the vigor of love and youth that drenched her soul with a rapturous sense.
“Oh, Elliott! Elliott! You are mine. All mine.”