home.
It was the next day after this had been done; and Diana was sitting again in the elm shadow at the door of the lean-to. Not idly this time; for a pan of peas was in her lap, and her fingers were busy with shelling them. Still her eyes were very much more busy with the lovely light and shade on meadow and hill; her glances went up and down, from her pan to the sunny landscape. Mrs. Starling, bustling about as usual within the house and never looking out, presently hearing the gate latch, called out – "Who's that?"
"Joe Bartlett, mother," Diana answered without moving.
It was not the gate that led to the flower patch and the front door. That was some distance off. Another little brown gate under the elm-tree opened directly in front of the lean-to door; and the patch between was all in fleckered sunlight and shadow, like the doorway where Diana sat.
The little gate opening now admitted a visitor who was in appearance the very typical Yankee of the story books. Long in the limbs, loose in the joints, angular, ungainly, he came up the walk with a movement that would tempt one to think he had not got accustomed to his inches and did not yet know quite what to do with them all. He had a long face, red in colour; in expression a mixture of honest frankness, carelessness, and good humour.
"Mornin'!" said he as he came near. "How's your folks, this forenoon?"
"Quite well – all there are of us, Joe," said Diana, shelling her peas as she looked up at him. "How's your mother?"
"Well, she's pretty smart. Mother seems to be allays just about so. I never see the beat of her for keepin' along. You've had quite a spell o' nursin' folks, hain't you, down this way? Must ha' upset you quite considerable."
"We didn't have the worst of the upsetting."
"That's a fact. Well, she's gone, ain't she?"
"Who, Eliza Delamater? Yes; gone yesterday."
"And you hain't nobody else on hand, have ye?"
"No. Why?"
"Mother's took a lonesome fit. She says it's quite a spell that you hain't ben down our way; and I guess that's so, ain't it?"
"I couldn't help it, Joe. I have had other things to do."
"Well, don't you think to-day's a good sort for a visit?"
"To-day?" said Diana, shelling her peas very fast.
"You see, it's pretty silent down to our place. That is, when I ain't to hum; and I can't be there much o' the time, 'cept when I'm asleep in my bed. I'm off as soon as I've done the chores in the mornin'; and I can't get hum nohow sooner than to do up the chores in the evenin'; and the old lady has it pretty much her own way as to conversation the rest o' the time. She can talk to what she likes; but there ain't nothin' as can make a remark back to her."
"It's too bad, Joe!"
"Fact!" said Joe seriously; all the rest had been said with a smile; "but you know mother. Come! put on your bonnit and run down and set with her a spell. She's took a notion to have ye; and I know she'll be watchin' till you come."
"Then I must go. I guess I can arrange it, Joe."
"Well, I'll get along, then, where I had ought to be. Mis' Starling cuttin' her hay?"
"Yes, this week and more."
"It's turnin' out a handsome swath; but it had ought to be all down now. Well, good day! Hurry up, now, for down yonder."
Diana brought in her pan of peas.
"Mother, where's Josiah Davis?"
"Where should he be? He's up in the hill lot, cuttin' hay. That grass is all in flower; it had ought to been cut a week ago; but Josiah always has one of his hands behind him."
"And he won't be in till noon. I must harness the waggon myself."
"If you can catch the horse," said her mother. "He's turned out in the lot. It's a poor job, at this time o' day."
"I'll try and make a good job of it," said Diana. So she took her sun-bonnet and went out to the barn. The old horse was not far off, for the "lot" in this case meant simply the small field in which the barn and the barnyard were enclosed; but being a wary old animal, with a good deal of experience of life, he had come to know that a halter and a pan of corn generally meant hard work near at hand, and was won't to be shy of such allurements. Diana could sometimes do better than anybody else with old Prince; they were on good terms; and Prince had sense enough to take notice that she never followed the plough, and was therefore a safer venture than his other flatterers. With the corn and the halter Diana now sought the corner where Prince was standing whisking his tail in the shade of a tree. But it was a warm morning; and seeing her approach, Prince quietly walked off into the sun on the other side of the tree, and went on to another shady resting-place some distance away. Diana followed, speaking to him; but Prince repeated his ungallant manoeuvre; and from tree to tree across the sunny field Diana trudged after him, until she was hot and tired. Perhaps Prince's philosophy came in play at last, warning him that this game could not go on for ever, and would certainly end in his discomfiture some time; for, with no apparent reason for his change of tactics, he stood still at length under the tree farthest from the barn, and suffered himself to be made captive. Diana got the halter on, and, flushed and excited with the chase, led him back over the lot and out to the road, where Josiah had very culpably left the little waggon standing in the shade of the elm, close by the lean-to gate. Just as she got there, Diana saw a stranger who had his hand on the gate, but who left it now and came forward to speak to her.
Diana stood by the thills of the waggon, horse in hand, but, to tell the truth, forgetting both. The stranger was unlike anything often seen in Pleasant Valley. He wore the dark-blue uniform of an army officer; there was a stripe of gold down the seam of his pantaloons and a gold bar across his shoulders, and his cap was a soldier's cap. But it was not on his head just now; it had come off since he quitted the gate; and the step with which he drew near was the very contrast to Joe Bartlett's lounging pace; this was measured, clean, compact, and firm, withal as light and even as that of an antelope. His hair showed the regulation cut; and Diana saw with the same glance a pair of light, brilliant, hazel eyes and a finely trimmed mustache. She stood flushed and still, halter in hand, with her sun-bonnet pushed a little back for air. The stranger smiled just a little.
"May I ask how far I am from a place called Elmfield?"
"It is" – Diana's thoughts wandered, – "It is five miles."
"I ought not to need to ask – but I have been so long away. – Do you know how or where I can get a horse, or any conveyance, to bring me there? I have ridden beyond this, and met with an accident."
Diana hesitated. "Is it Lieut. Knowlton?" she said.
"Ah, you know me?" said he. "I forgot that Pleasant Valley knows me better than I know Pleasant Valley. I did not count on finding a friend here." His eye glanced at the little brown house.
"Everybody knows Elmfield," said Diana; "and I guessed – "
"From my dress?" said Mr. Knowlton, following the direction of her look. "This was accident too. But which of my friends ought I to know here, that I don't know? Pardon me, – but is this horse to be put to the waggon or taken away from it?"
"O, I was going to put him in."
"Allow me" – said the young man, taking the halter from Diana's willing hands; "but where is the harnessing
