"I will, Aggie," he said slowly. He bent forward presently, folded her close, kissed her, and then placing his hat on his head, went back to his work....

CHAPTER XVII

HARVEST TIME AND WHAT CAME WITH IT

Harvest time, harvest time! When the harvest time is, all worries have passed. When the harvest time is, all doubts, droughts, fears and tears are no more. When the golden grain falls upon the canvas; when the meadow larks, the robins and all the birds of the land sing the song of harvest time, the farmer is happy, is gay, and confident.

And harvest time was on in the country of our story.

Jean Baptiste pulled his new binder before the barn, jumped from the seat, and before he started to unhitch, he gazed out over a stretch of land which two years before, had been a mass of unbroken prairie, but was now a world of shocked grain. Thousands upon thousands of shocks stood over the field like a great army in the distance. His crop was good--the best. And no crops are like the crop on new land. Never, since the beginning of time had that soil tasted tamed plant life. It had seemed to appreciate the change, and the countless shocks before him were evidence to the fact.

From where he stood when he had unhitched, he gazed across country toward the southeast where lay his other land. Only a part of which he could see. As it rose in the distance he could see the white topped oats; and just beyond he could see the deep purple of the flaxseed blossoms. He sighed contentedly, unharnessed his horses, let them drink, and turned them toward the pasture. He was not tired; but he went to the side of the house which the sun did not strike, and sat him down. At the furthest side of the field he observed Bill and George as they shocked away to finish. He was at peace again, as he always was, and thereupon fell into deep thought.

"My crop of wheat will yield not less than thirty bushels to the acre,"

he whispered to himself. "And one hundred and thirty acres should then yield almost four thousand bushels. I should receive at least eighty cents the bushel, and that would approximate about three thousand dollars, with seed left to sow the land again." He paused in his meditation, and considered what even that alone would mean to him. He could pay the entire amount on the land he had purchased, and perhaps a thousand or two more from the flax crop. That would leave him owing but four hundred dollars on the land he had bought, and that amount he felt he would be able to squeeze out somewhere and have 520 acres clear!

He could not help being cheerful, perhaps somewhat vain over his prospects. He was now just twenty-three and appreciated that most of his life was yet before him. With, at the most, two or three more seasons like the present one, he could own the coveted thousand acres and the example would be completed.

That was the goal toward which he was working. If he or any other man of the black race could acquire one thousand acres of such land it would stand out with more credit to the Negro race than all the protestations of a world of agitators in so far as the individual was concerned.

"It is things accomplished," he often said to himself.

"It is what is actually accomplished that will get notice--and credit!

Damn excuses! The best an excuse can secure is dismissal, and positively that is no asset." He would then invariably think deeply into the conditions of his race, the race who protested loudly that they were being held down. Truly it was an intricate, delicate subject to try to solve with prolific thinkings. He compared them with the Jew--went away back to thousands of years before. Out of the past he could not solve it either. All had begun together. The Jew was hated, but was a merchant enjoying a large portion of the world commerce and success. The Negro was disliked because of his black skin--and sometimes seemingly for daring to be human.

At such times he would live over again the life that had been his before coming West. He thought of the multitudes in the employment of a great corporation who monopolized the sleeping car trade. Indeed this company after all was said, afforded great opportunities to the men. Not so much in what was collected in tips and in other devious ways, nor from the small salary, but from the great opportunity of observation that that particular form of travel afforded.

But so few made the proper effort to benefit themselves thereby. He continued to think along these lines until his thoughts came back to a point where in the past they were wont to come and stop. He could not in that moment understand why they had not been coming back to that selfsame point in recent months.... Since one cold day during the first month of that year.... He gave a start when he realized why, then sighed. It seemed too much for his thoughts just then. He regarded Bill and George at their task of trying to finish their work. Upon hearing a sound, he turned. Behind him stood Agnes.

"My, how you frightened me!" he cried.

She held in her hand a basket containing lunch for him and her brothers.

This she had brought every day, but he had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he had quite forgotten that she was coming on this day as well. As she stood quietly before him, she seemed rather shorter than she really was, also more slender, and appeared withal more girlish than usual. Her eyes twinkled and her heavy hair drawn together at the back of her head, hung over her shoulders. Her sunkist skin was a bit tanned; her arms almost to the elbows were bare, brown and were very round. And as Jean Baptiste regarded her there in the bright golden sunlight she appeared to him like the Virgin Mary.

"You are tired," he cried, and pointed to a crude bench that reposed against the sod house, which he had just left in his prolific thinking of a moment before.

"Sit down, please, and rest yourself," he commanded. She obeyed him modestly, with a smile still upon her pleasant face.

"I judge that Bill and George will finish in a few minutes, so I'll wait, that we may all dine together. You'll be so kind as to wait until then, will you not?" he asked graciously, and bowed.

"Until then, my lord," she smiled, coquettishly.

"Thanks!" he laughed, good humoredly. Suddenly she cried:

"Oh, isn't it beautiful!" And swept her hands toward the field of shocked wheat. He had been looking away, but as she spoke he turned and smiled with satisfaction.

"It is."

"Just lovely," she cried, her eyes sparkling.

"And all safe, that's the best part about it," he said.

"Grand. I'm so glad you have saved it," she said with feeling.

"Thank you."

"You have earned it."

"I hope so. Still I thank you."

"It will bring you lots of money."

"I am hoping it will."

"Oh, it will."

"I was thinking of it before you came up."

"I knew it."

"You knew it!"

"I saw you from a distance."

"Oh...."

"And I knew you were thinking."

"Oh, come now."

"Why shouldn't I? You're always thinking. The only time when you are not is when you are sleeping."

"You can say such wonderful things," he said, standing before her, the sun shining on his tanned features.

"Won't--ah--won't you be seated?" she invited. He colored unseen. She made room for him and he hesitatingly took a seat, at a conventional distance, on the bench beside her.

"Your other crops are fine, too," she said, sociably.

"I'm going over to look at them this afternoon."

"You should."

"Where is your father today?"