A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill | Page 8

"I'm going to be a farmer."
Miss Lady threw back her head and laughed:
"He wants to be a farmer And with the farmers stand The hay seed on
his forehead And a rake within his hand."
"Oh! Don Morley, one minute it's the Orient, the next it's literature, and
the next a farm; you don't know what you want!"
"Yes, I do, too," he caught her bridle and brought the horses close
together. "I know perfectly what I want, and so do you. Haven't I told
you four times a day for two weeks?"
She looked away to the far horizon where a bank of formidable clouds
was forming:
"Oh, we all think we want things one day and forget about them the
next. Life is made up of desires that seem big and vital one minute, and
little and absurd the next. I guess we get what's best for us in the end."
"I haven't so far!" Don said fiercely. "I've gotten what was worst for me

and I've made the worst of it."
They had turned into the lane now and were walking their horses up to
the stile where Jimpson was waiting to take them.
"Don't put my mare up," directed Donald. "I've got to ride back to town
to-night. There's rain in those clouds; I ought to be starting this
minute."
But his haste was evidently not imperative, for he followed Miss Lady
through the narrow winding paths, between a tangle of shrubs and vines,
into the old-fashioned flower garden. The spiraea was just putting out
its long, feathery plumes of white, and the lilacs nodded white and
purple in the breeze.
"Here's the first wild rose!" cried Miss Lady, darting to a corner of the
old stone wall; "the idea of its daring to come out so soon!"
He took the frail little blossom and smiled at it half quizzically: "It's
funny," he said awkwardly, "your giving me this. You know, it's what
you made me think of, the first time I saw you,--a wild rose. Didn't she,
Mike?"
Mike, who had been dreaming all afternoon on the porch, had gotten up
reluctantly as they passed and followed them. He had a slow, lopsided
gait, and his tongue dangled from the side of his mouth. It was
evidently a sacrifice for him to accompany them, but duty was duty.
"You angel dog! Come here to your Missus!" commanded Miss Lady,
as she and Donald dropped down in the old barrel-stave hammock, that
had swung beneath the lilacs since the Colonel was a boy.
But Mike ambled past her, and after snuggling up to Don with a great
show of intimacy lay down at his feet.
"I'm glad somebody loves me," Donald said.
"It's your riding boots, Mike likes. He never had a chance to taste tan

shoe polish before!"
"What do you like me for?"
"Me? Who said I did?"
"Don't you?"
"Oh, yes, I like tan boots, too. Why didn't you tell me my hair had
tumbled down again?"
"Because you are so beautiful, with it like that, Miss Lady--"
"Now, Don, if you begin again I shall go straight in the house. What
did you mean by saying you had gotten what was worst for you, and
you had made the worst of it?"
"Oh, the way I've been brought up. You see my sister took me when I
was a baby, and I guess I was an awful nuisance to her. She liked to
travel, and kept it up a good while even after Margery was born. I grew
up in hotels and on steamers and trains, going to school wherever we
happened to be staying long enough; sometimes in France, sometimes
in Switzerland, sometimes in America. I remember one Christmas
when I was about six, we were in a hotel in Paris. My nurse put me to
bed early so she could go out with her sweetheart, and told me there
wasn't any Santa Claus, so I wouldn't stay awake watching for him. I
hate that woman to this day! I can remember the big, lonesome room,
and the red curtains, and the crystal chandelier and the way I cried
because there wasn't any Santa Claus, and because I didn't have a
sweetheart!"
"Poor little chap! It was a mother you wanted."
"Perhaps. Sister was good to me. But she didn't understand me; she
never has. She has always given me too much of everything, advice
included."
"But since you have been grown, you've had lots of time to--to--take

things into your own hands."
"Well, I did for a while. I managed to squeeze through the university,
then I went into the shops and had a bully time for five months, but it
made no end of a row! Sister felt that after