"Well, I be. Hit's been a right smart o' while since I been able to do a lick o' work. We sure do have a heap to thank you fer. Be Decatur Irwin as glad to lose his foot as I be to git my laig back?" she queried whimsically; "I reckon not."

"I reckon not, too, but with him it was a case of losing his life or his foot, while with you it was only a question of walking about, or being bedridden for the next twenty years."

"They be ignorant, them Irwins, an' she's more'n that, fer she's a fool.

She come round yest'day wantin' to borry a hoe to fix up her gyarden patch, an' she 'lowed ef you'n Ca.s.s had only lef' him be, he'd 'a' come through all right, fer hit war a-gettin' better the day you-uns took hit off. I told her yas, he'd 'a' come cl'ar through to the nex' world, like Farwell done. When the misery left him, he up an' died, an' Lord knows whar he went."

"I'll get him an artificial foot as soon as he is able to wear one.

He'll get on very well with a peg under his knee until then. What's Hoyle doing with the mule?"

"He's rid'n' him fer Ca.s.s. She's tryin' to get the ground ready fer a c.r.a.p. Hit's all we can do. Our women nevah war used to do such work neither, but she would try."

"What's that? Is she ploughing?" he asked sharply, and strode away.

"I reckon she don't want ye there, Doctah," the widow called after him, but he walked on.

The land lay in a warm hollow completely surrounded by hills. It had been many years cleared, and the mellow soil was free from stumps and roots. When Thryng arrived, three furrows had been run rather crookedly the length of the patch, and Ca.s.sandra stood surveying them ruefully, flushed and troubled, holding to the handles of the small plough and struggling to set it straight for the next furrow.

The noise of the fall behind them covered his approach, and ere she was aware he was at her side. Placing his two hands over hers which clung stubbornly to the handles of the plough, he possessed himself of them.

Laughingly he turned her about after the short tussle, and looked down into her warm, flushed face. Still holding her hands, he pulled her away from the plough to the gra.s.sy edge of the field, leaving Hoyle waiting astride the mule.

"Whoa, mule. Stand still thar," he shrilled, as the beast sought to cross the bit of ploughed ground to reach the gra.s.s beyond.

"Let him eat a minute, Hoyle," said David. "Let him eat until I come.

Now, Miss Ca.s.sandra, what does this mean? Do you think you can plough all that land? Is that it?"

"I must."

"You must not."

"There is no one else now. I must." He could feel her hands quiver in his, as he forcibly held them, and knew from her panting breath how her heart was beating. She held her head high, nevertheless, and looked bravely back into his eyes.

"You must let me--" he paused. Intuitively he knew he must not say as yet what he would. "Let me direct you a little. You have been most kind to me--and--it is my place; I am a doctor, you know."

"If I were sick or hurt, I would give heed to you, I would do anything you say; but I'm not, and this is laid on me to do. Leave go my hands, Doctor Thryng."

"If you'll sit down here a moment and talk this thing out with me, I will. Now tell me first of all, why is this laid on you?"

"Frale is gone and it must be done, or we will have no crop, and then we must sell the animals, and then go down and live like poor white trash." Her low, pa.s.sive monotone sounded like a moan of sorrow.

"You must hire some one to do this heavy work."

"Every one is working his own patch now, and--no, I have no money to hire with. I reckon I've thought it all over every way, Doctor." She looked sadly down at her hands and then up at the mountain top. "I know you think this is no work for a girl to do, and you are right. Our women never have done such. Only in the war times my Grandmother Caswell did it, and I can now. A girl can do what she must. I have no way to turn but to live as my people have lived before me. I thought once I might do different, go to school and keep separate--but--" She spread out her hands with a hopeless gesture, and rose to resume her work.

"Give me a moment longer. I'm not through yet. That's right, now listen.

I see the truth of what you say, and I came down this morning to make a proposition to your mother--not for your sake only--don't be afraid, for my own as well; but I didn't make it because I hadn't time. She told me what you were doing, and I hurried off to stop you. Don't speak yet, let me finish. I feel I have the right, because I know--I know I was sent here just now for a purpose--guided to come here." He paused to allow his words to have their full weight. Whether she would perceive his meaning remained to be seen.

"I understand." She spoke quietly. "Doctor Hoyle sent you to be helped like he was--and you have been right kind to more than us. You've helped that many it seems like you were sent here for we-all as well as for your own sake, but that can't help me now, Doctor; it--"

"Ah, yes it can. I'm far from well yet. I shall be, but I must stay on for a long time, and I want some interest here. I want to see things of my own growing. The ground up around my little cabin is stony and very poor, and I want to rent this little farm of yours. Listen--I'll pay enough so you need not sell your cattle, and you--you can go on with your weaving. You can work in the house again as you have always done.

Sometime, when your mother is stronger, you can take up your life again and go to school--as you meant to live--can't you?"

"That can never be now. If you take the farm or not, I must bide on here in the old way. I must take up the life my mother lived and my grandmother, and hers before her. It is mine, forever, to live it that way--or die."

"Why do you talk so?"

"G.o.d knows, but I can't tell you. Thank you, suh. I will be right glad to rent you the farm. I'd a heap rather you had it than any one else I ever knew, for we care more for it than you would guess, but for the rest--no. I must bide and work till I die; only maybe I can save little Hoyle and give him a chance to learn something, for he never could work--being like he is."

Thryng's eyes danced with joy as he regarded her. "Hoyle is not going to be always as he is, and he shall have the chance to learn something also. Look up, Miss Ca.s.sandra, look squarely into my eyes and laugh. Be happy, Miss Ca.s.sandra, and laugh. I say it."

She laughed softly then. She could not help it.

"Wasn't that what the 'Voices' were saying last night when you followed?"

"Yes, yes. They seemed like they were calling, 'Hope, hope,' but they were not the real 'Voices.' You made it."

"Yes, I made it; and I was truly calling that to you. And you replied; you came to me."

"Ah, but that is different from the 'Voices' she heard."

"But if they called the truth to you--what then?"

"Doctah, there is no longer any hope for me. G.o.d called me and let me cut off all hope, once. I did it, and now, only death can change it."

"If I believe you, you must believe me. We won't talk of it any more.

I'm hungry. Your mother was churning up there; let's go and get some b.u.t.termilk, and settle the business of the rent. You've run three good furrows and I'll run three more beside them--my first, remember, in all my life. Then we'll plant that strip to sunflowers. Come, Hoyle, tie the mule and follow us."

So David carried his way. They walked merrily back to the house, chattering of his plans and what he would raise. He knew nothing whatever of the sort of crops to be raised, and she was navely gay at his expense, a mood he was overjoyed to awaken in her. He vowed that merely to walk over ploughed ground made a man stronger.

On the porch he sat and drank his b.u.t.termilk and, placing his paper on the step, drew up a contract for rent. Then Ca.s.sandra went to her weaving, and he and Hoyle returned to the field, where with much labor he succeeded in turning three furrows beside Ca.s.sandra's, rather crooked and uncertain ones, it is true, but quite as good as hers, as Hoyle reluctantly admitted, which served to give David a higher respect for farmers in general and ploughmen especially.

CHAPTER XIII

IN WHICH DAVID DISCOVERS Ca.s.sANDRA'S TROUBLE

After turning his furrows, David told Hoyle to ride the mule to the stable, then he sat himself on the fence, and meditated. He bethought him that in the paper he had drawn up he had made no provision for the use of the mule. He wiped his forehead and rubbed the perspiration from his hair, and coughed a little after his exertion, glad at heart to find himself so well off.

He would come and plough a little every day. Then he began to calculate the number of days it would take him to finish the patch, measuring the distance covered by the six furrows with his eye, and comparing it with the whole. He laughed to find that, at the rate of six furrows a day, the task would take him well on into the summer. Plainly he must find a ploughman.

Then the laying out of the ground! Why should he not have a vineyard up on the farther hill slope? He never could have any fruit from it, but what of that! Even if he went away and never returned, he would know it to be adding its beauty to this wonderful dream. Who could know what the future held for him--what this little spot might mean to him in the days to come? That he would go out, fully recovered and strong to play his part in life, he never doubted. Might not this idyl be a part of it? He thought of the girl sitting at her loom, swaying as she threw her shuttle with the rhythm of a poem, and weaving--weaving his life and his heart into her web, unknown to herself--weaving a thread of joy through it all which as yet she could not see. He knocked the ashes from his pipe and stood a moment gazing about him.

Yes, he really must have a vineyard, and a bit of pasture somewhere, and a field of clover. What grew best there he little knew, so he decided to go up and consult the widow.

There were other things also to claim his thoughts. Over toward "Wild Cat Hole" there was a woman who needed his care; and he must not become so absorbed in his pastoral romance as to forget Hoyle. He was looking actually haggard these last few days, and his mother said he would not eat. It might be that he needed more than the casual care he was giving him. Possibly he could take him to Doctor Hoyle's hospital for radical treatment later in the season, when his crops were well started. He smiled as he thought of his crops, then laughed outright, and strolled back to the house, weary and hungry, and happy as a boy.