Thus subdued from hilarity to kindness, the group of young men conducted their new friend to the Old Homestead and into the outer room, where the table was newly spread, and where uncle Nat stood with a huge brown cider pitcher in his hand from which he began to fill the gla.s.ses as the crowd of guests rushed in.

Aunt Hannah, having performed her duty among her female guests, was busy in the milk-room, cutting up pies, dividing pound-cake into sections, and slicing cards of gingerbread, while uncle Nat presided diligently at the cider-cask.

Thus it happened that the stranger was almost overlooked in the crowd, for he sat down in a corner of the room, where his new friend brought him in abundance of dainties from the table, for Mary was too busy even for a glance that way.

"How do you feel now? Stronger, I know by your mouth; there's color in the lips now," said the young man, who had taken a leading interest in the stranger from the first.

"Oh! yes, I am much stronger," answered the youth, with one of the sweetest smiles that ever beamed on a human face. "A little fresh water now, and you shall see if I haven't music in the old violin."

"Come this way. The water-trough is out by the back porch."

The youth took up his violin, saying very gently that he never left that behind him, and following the lead of his friend glided from the room.

After bathing his hands and face, leaving them pure and white as those of a girl, he went back to the porch, and seating himself in uncle Nat's arm-chair, drew forth his violin and began to tune it.

Uncle Nat was just returning the spigot to his cider barrel, after having filled the brown pitcher once more to the brim; but at the first sound of the violin, an instrument he had not heard for years, the spigot dropped to the floor, and out rushed the cider in a quick amber stream, overflowing the pitcher, dashing down to the floor, and rushing off in a tiny river the sloping edge of the porch. You could hear it creeping in a rich current through the plaintain leaves, while uncle Nat stood quite oblivious of the waste, listening like a great school boy to the violin.

An exclamation from Salina, who had just left her friends in the dressing-room, as she came forth and seized the pitcher, brought the good old man to his senses. Clapping his fat hand over the aperture, he drove the cider back in the cask, and looked right and left over his shoulder for the spigot, avoiding the scornful eyes of that exemplary female, who stood with the pitcher between her hands, over which the surplus moisture went dripping, like an antiquated Hebe defying an overgrown Ganymede.

"There!" exclaimed the strong-minded damsel, pointing toward the spigot with her foot, "there's at least two gallons of the best cider in the county gone to nothing. What do you think aunt Hannah will do for apple sauce, if you go on this way, making regular mill-dams out of her sweet cider?"

"Maybe we'd better say nothing about it," answered uncle Nat, making futile efforts to restrain the cider with one hand and reach the spigot with the other, "dear me, I can't reach it. Now, dear Miss Salina, if you only would."

"Dear Miss Salina!" The strong-minded one turned at the words, blushing till her face rivalled those fiery tresses. She sat down her pitcher, shook the drops from her fingers, and seizing the important bit of pine presented it to uncle Nathan.

All this time the young stranger had paused in tuning his violin, but when uncle Nat drew a deep breath, after repairing the mischief already done, out came a gush of music that made him start again, and threw the strong-minded woman into a fit of excitement, quite startling. She seized uncle Nat's moist hand and unconsciously--it must have been unconsciously--pressed it in her wiry fingers.

"Music! Did you ever hear such music, uncle Nathan! It's enough to set one off a-dancing."

"Well, why not?" answered uncle Nathan.

"Yes, why not?" replied the strong-minded one, "if the other young people dance, why shouldn't we?"

"Of course," said uncle Nat, wiping his hands on the roller towel.

"Why not? I shouldn't wonder if we astonish these youngsters."

"And aunt Hannah, too," chimed in Salina.

"Oh! I'd forgot her," said uncle Nat, looking wistfully toward the milk-room door, "I'm afraid it won't do, she'll think--but here they come, like a flock of blackbirds!"

True enough, the first full notes of the violin had drawn the crowd of girls from the chamber overhead, and down they came, laughing and racing through the kitchen, perfectly wild with delight.

"Uncle Nat, dear, dear, uncle Nat, is it really a violin? Will aunt Hannah let us dance to anything but singing?" cried a dozen voices; and uncle Nathan was at once surrounded by a rainbow of streaming ribbons and floating ringlets, while a host of merry eyes flashed their delight upon him.

"I don't know--I can't take it on myself to say," cried uncle Nathan, quite beside himself, "you must ask some one else. I haven't any objection in life"--

"Nor I," said Salina, "and that's two agin one, if Miss Hannah _does_ stand out. Come, I'll go with you. We'll say that I, and all the other young girls, have just made up our mouths to dance after a fiddle, and we mean to, that's all."

"Stop, stop a minute!" exclaimed uncle Nathan, spreading his hands, "maybe you'd better say nothing about it, but just go into the barn and begin. If sister Hannah has got a conscience agin dancing to a fiddle, you know, it ain't worth while to wake it up; but there's more ways of getting into a lot than by taking down the bars. Jest climb the fence, that's all."

How uncle Nathan ever came to give this worldly piece of advice is still a mystery. Some insinuated that the cider had sent its sparkles to his brain, and others thought the music had aroused some sleeping mischief there. Perhaps it was both. Perhaps too the bright eyes and ripe laughter around him had something to do with the matter.

At any rate the advice was too pleasant not to be taken. A telegraphic signal brought the young men from the out-room, and off the company fluttered in pairs toward the barn making the starlight melodious with their laughter.

CHAPTER XLIII.

A DANCE AFTER HUSKING

Merrily--merrily went the night The laugh rang out And a gleeful shout, Shook the autumn leaves in that starry light.

In their haste the young people had left the strange youth seated in the chair, in a dark end of the porch.

"Come," said uncle Nat, in his kindly fashion, "you and I will follow them."

"Thank you;" said the youth, rising, "it has been a long ride, and I was growing weary."

"Have you been sick?" said the old man, sorrowfully.

"It's hard!"

He paused. A strange thrill shot over him, as the hand of the youth touched his. "Come," he added, tenderly, leading the stranger on, "I have strength for us both."

The slender hand trembled in his clasp; the agitation was mutual; for through the young man's delicately organized frame ran a spark of joy that warmed him to the heart. They walked on together in silence, both thrilled with a strange sensation of pleasure, and drawn, as it were, by invisible influences toward each other.

"I'm afraid," said the youth, "I'm afraid my music will disappoint them. I know hardly any but sacred or sad airs."

His voice made all the blood in uncle Nathan's veins start again; it was music in itself, such music as brought back his youth, sad and ineffably sweet.

"Oh," answered uncle Nathan, drawing a deep, pleasant breath, "you must have a dancing tune or so, Yankee Doodle, Money-Musk, and Money-in-both-pockets, as like as not."

"Yankee Doodle, oh, yes, it was the first air I ever learned, how my poor father loved it--as for the rest--well, we shall see."

Uncle Nathan's chair had been placed near the door as it happened, away from the light which fell warmest in the centre of the barn.

Thus, during the whole evening, the young musician had been constantly surrounded by shadows that left his features mysteriously undefined.

Still, uncle Nathan hovered by; his warm heart yearned to sun itself near the youth.

When the stranger drew forth his bow, and, without a prelude, dashed into Yankee Doodle, uncle Nat sunk to a rustic bench, covered his face with both bands, and absolutely shivered under the floods of tenderness let into his soul with the music.

But no one heeded the old man; why should they? Couple after couple rushed up to the centre of the barn, gaily disputing for places beneath the rustic chandelier, while here and there a young fellow, more eager than the rest, broke into a double shuffle or cut a subdued pigeon-wing as an impromptu while the set was forming.

It was no wonder. The violin was absolutely showering down music. A thousand strings seemed to find voice beneath those slender fingers.

It set the young people off like birds in a thicket, down the outside, up, down the middle, swinging corners, oh, it is impossible for a pen to keep up with them, that is not naturally musical.

There they go, whirling, smiling, dancing higher and faster, flying with the music till they pause, flushed and panting, at the bottom of the set. Even now they cannot be still, but give each other a superfluous twirl, or go on in a promiscuous way, doing over again the dance in fragments, till their turn comes back.