"My goodness me!" exclaimed 'Phemie, "let's retain a little sentiment, Lyd! We can't eat 'em--no; but they're sweet and restful to look at. I'm going to have moon-flowers and morning-glories, too," and she recklessly expended more pennies for those seeds.

Their train was waiting when they reached the station and the sisters boarded it in some excitement. 'Phemie's gaiety increased the nearer they approached to Bridleburg, which was their goal. She was a plump, rosy girl, with broad, thick plaits of light-brown hair ("mola.s.ses-color"

she called it in contempt) which she had begun to "do up" only upon going to work. She had a quick blue eye, a laughing mouth, rather wide, but fine; a nose that an enemy--had laughing, good-natured Euphemia Bray owned one--might have called "slightly snubbed," and her figure was just coming into womanhood.

Lydia's appearance was entirely different. They did not look much like sisters, to state the truth.

The older girl was tall, straight as a dart, with a dignity of carriage beyond her years, dark hair that waved very prettily and required little dressing, and a clear, colorless complexion. Her eyes were very dark gray, her nose high and well chiseled, like Aunt Jane's. She was more of a Phelps. Aunt Jane declared Lyddy resembled Dr. Apollo, or "Polly,"

Phelps more than had either of his own children.

The train pa.s.sed through a dun and sodden country. The late thaw and the rains had swept the snow from these lowlands; the unfilled fields were brown and bare.

Here and there, however, rye and wheat sprouted green and promising, and in the distance a hedge of water-maples along the river bank seemed standing in a purple mist, for their young leaves were already pushing into the light.

"There will be p.u.s.s.y-willows," exclaimed 'Phemie, "and hepaticas in the woods. Think of _that_, Lyddy Bray!"

"And the house will be as damp as the tomb--and not a stick of wood cut--and no stoves," returned the older girl.

"Oh, dear, me! you're such an old grump!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed 'Phemie. "Why try to cross bridges before you come to them?"

"Lucky for you, Miss, that I _do_ think ahead," retorted Lyddy with some sharpness.

There was a grade before the train climbed into Bridleburg. Back of the straggling old town the mountain ridge sloped up, a green and brown wall, breaking the wind from the north and west, thus partially sheltering the town. There was what farmers call "early land" about Bridleburg, and some trucking was carried on.

But the town itself was much behind the times--being one of those old-fashioned New England settlements left uncontaminated by the mill interests and not yet awakened by the summer visitor, so rife now in most of the quiet villages of the six Pilgrim States.

The rambling wooden structure with its long, unroofed platform, which served Bridleburg as a station, showed plainly what the railroad company thought of the town. Many villages of less population along the line boasted modern station buildings, gra.s.s plots, and hedges. All that surrounded Bridleburg's barrack-like depot was a plaza of bare, rolled cinders.

On this were drawn up the two 'buses from the rival hotels--the "New Brick Hotel," built just after the Civil War, and the Eagle House. Their respective drivers called languidly for customers as the pa.s.sengers disembarked from the train.

Most of these were traveling men, or townspeople. It was only mid-forenoon and Lyddy did not wish to spend either time or money at the local hostelries, so she shook her head firmly at the 'bus drivers.

"We want to get settled by night at Hillcrest--if we can," she told 'Phemie. "Let's see if your baggage and freight are here, first of all."

She waited until the station agent was at leisure and learned that all their goods--a small, one-horse load--had arrived.

"You two girls goin' up to the old Polly Phelps house?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the agent, who was a "native son" and knew all about the "old doctor," as Dr.

Apollo Phelps had been known throughout two counties and on both sides of the mountain ridge.

"Why, it ain't fit for a stray cat to live in, I don't believe--that house ain't," he added. "More'n twenty year since the old doctor died, and it's been shut up ever since.

"What! you his grandchildren? Sho! Mis' Bray--I remember. She was the old doctor's daughter by his secon' wife. Ya-as.

"Well, if I was you, I'd go to Pritchett's house to stop first. Can't be that the old house is fit to live in, an' Pritchett is your nighest neighbor."

"Thank you," Lyddy said, quietly. "And can you tell me whom we could get to transport our goods--and ourselves--to the top of the ridge?"

"Huh? Why! I seen Pritchett's long-laiged boy in town jest now--Lucas Pritchett. He ain't got away yet," responded the station agent.

"I ventur' to say you'll find him up Market Street a piece--at Birch's store, or the post-office. This train brung in the mail.

"If he's goin' up light he oughter be willin' to help you out cheap. It's a six-mile tug, you know; you wouldn't wanter walk it."

He pointed up the mountainside. Far, far toward the summit of the ridge, nestling in a background of brown and green, was a splash of vivid white.

"That's Pritchett's," vouchsafed the station agent. "If Dr. Polly Phelps'

house had a coat of whitewash you could see it, too--jest to the right and above Pritchett's. Highest house on the ridge, it is, and a mighty purty site, to my notion."

CHAPTER V

LUCAS PRITCHETT

The Bray girls walked up the village street, which opened directly out of the square. It might have been a quarter of a mile in length, the red brick courthouse facing them at the far end, flanked by the two hotels.

When "court sat" Bridleburg was a livelier town than at present.

On either hand were alternately rows of one, or two-story "blocks" of stores and offices, or roomy old homesteads set in the midst of their own wide, terraced lawns.

There were a few pleasant-looking people on the walks and most of these turned again to look curiously after the Bray girls. Strangers--save in court week--were a novelty in Bridleburg, that was sure.

Market Street was wide and maple-shaded. Here and there before the stores were "hitching racks"--long wooden bars with iron rings set every few feet--to which a few horses, or teams, were hitched. Many of the vehicles were buckboards, much appreciated in the hill country; but there were farm wagons, as well. It was for one of these latter the Bray girls were in search. The station agent had described Lucas Pritchett's rig.

"There it is," gasped the quick-eyed 'Phemie, "Oh, Lyd! _do_ look at those ponies. They're as ragged-looking as an old cowhide trunk."

"And that wagon," sighed Lyddy. "Shall we ride in it? We'll be a sight going through the village."

"We'd better wait and see if he'll take us," remarked 'Phemie. "But I should worry about what people here think of us!"

As she spoke a lanky fellow, with a lean and sallow face, lounged out of the post-office and across the walk to the heads of the disreputable-looking ponies. He wore a long snuff-colored overcoat that might have been in the family for two or three generations, and his overalls were stuck into the tops of leg-boots.

"That's Lucas--sure," whispered 'Phemie.

But she hung back, just the same, and let her sister do the talking.

And the first effect of Lyddy's speech upon Lucas Pritchett was most disconcerting.

"Good morning!" Lyddy said, smiling upon the lanky young farmer. "You are Mr. Lucas Pritchett, I presume?"

He made no audible reply, although his lips moved and they saw his very prominent Adam's apple rise and fall convulsively. A wave of red suddenly washed up over his face like a big breaker rolling up a sea-beach; and each individual freckle at once took on a vividness of aspect that was fairly startling to the beholder.

"You _are_ Mr. Pritchett?" repeated Lyddy, hearing a sudden half-strangled giggle from 'Phemie, who was behind her.

"Ya-as--I be," finally acknowledged the bashful Lucas, that Adam's apple going up and down again like the slide on a trombone.

"You are going home without much of a load; aren't you, Mr. Pritchett?"

pursued Lyddy, with a glance into the empty wagon-body.

"Ya-as--I be," repeated Lucas, with another gulp, trying to look at both girls at once and succeeding only in looking cross-eyed.