第65章 CHAPTER V(2)

"Does he want them for his horse's rubbed back?" asked Gregory, new to up- country life.

"No," said Tant Sannie, indignantly; "we're going to sit up!" and she walked off in triumph with the candles.

Nevertheless, when all the rest of the house had retired, when the long candle was lighted, when the coffee-kettle was filled, when she sat in the elbow-chair, with her lover on a chair close beside her, and when the vigil of the night was fairly begun, she began to find it wearisome. The young man looked chilly, and said nothing.

"Won't you put your feet on my stove?" said Tant Sannie.

"No thank you, aunt," said the young man, and both lapsed into silence.

At last Tant Sannie, afraid of going to sleep, tapped a strong cup of coffee for herself and handed another to her lover. This visibly revived both.

"How long were you married, cousin?"

"Ten months, aunt."

"How old was your baby?"

"Three days when it died."

"It's very hard when we must give our husbands and wives to the Lord," said Tant Sannie.

"Very," said the young man; "but it's the Lord's will."

"Yes," said Tant Sannie, and sighed.

"She was such a good wife, aunt: I've known her break a churn-stick over a maid's head for only letting dust come on a milk cloth."

Tant Sannie felt a twinge of jealousy. She had never broken a churn-stick on a maid's head.

"I hope your wife made a good end," she said.

"Oh, beautiful, aunt: she said up a psalm and two hymns and a half before she died."

"Did she leave any messages?" asked Tant Sannie.

"No," said the young man; "but the night before she died I was lying at the foot of her bed; I felt her foot kick me.

"'Piet,' she said.

"'Annie, my heart,' said I.

"'My little baby that died yesterday has been here, and it stood over the wagon-box,' she said.

"'What did it say?' I asked.

"'It said that if I died you must marry a fat woman.'

"'I will,' I said, and I went to sleep again. Presently she woke me.

"'The little baby has been here again, and it says you must marry a woman over thirty, and who's had two husbands.'

"I didn't go to sleep after that for a long time, aunt; but when I did she woke me.

"'The baby has been here again,' she said, 'and it says you mustn't marry a woman with a mole.' I told her I wouldn't; and the next day she died."

"That was a vision from the Redeemer," said Tant Sannie.

The young man nodded his head mournfully. He thought of a younger sister of his wife's who was not fat, and who had a mole, and of whom his wife had always been jealous, and he wished the little baby had liked better staying in heaven than coming and standing over the wagon-chest.

"I suppose that's why you came to me," said Tant Sannie.

"Yes, aunt. And pa said I ought to get married before shearing-time. It is bad if there's no one to see after things then; and the maids waste such a lot of fat."

"When do you want to get married?"

"Next month, aunt," said the young man in a tone of hopeless resignation.

"May I kiss you, aunt?"

"Fie! fie!" said Tant Sannie, and then gave him a resounding kiss. Come, draw your chair a little closer," she said, and their elbows now touching, they sat on through the night.

The next morning at dawn, as Em passed through Tant Sannie's bedroom, she found the Boer-woman pulling off her boots preparatory to climbing into bed.

"Where is Piet Vander Walt?"

"Just gone," said Tant Sannie; "and I am going to marry him this day four weeks. I am dead sleepy," she added; "the stupid thing doesn't know how to talk love-talk at all," and she climbed into the four-poster, clothes and all, and drew the quilt up to her chin.

...

On the day preceding Tant Sannie's wedding, Gregory Rose sat in the blazing sun on the stone wall behind his daub-and-wattle house. It was warm, but he was intently watching a small buggy that was being recklessly driven over the bushes in the direction of the farmhouse. Gregory never stirred till it had vanished; then, finding the stones hot, he slipped down and walked into the house. He kicked the little pail that lay in the doorway, and sent it into one corner; that did him good. Then he sat down on the box, and began cutting letters out of a piece of newspaper. Finding that the snippings littered the floor, he picked them up and began scribbling on his blotting-paper. He tried the effect of different initials before the name Rose: G. Rose, E. Rose, L. Rose, Rose, L.L., L.L. Rose. When he had covered the sheet, he looked at it discontentedly a little while, then suddenly began to write a letter:

"Beloved Sister, "It is a long while since I last wrote to you, but I have had no time.