In Apple-Blossom Time | Page 7

eyes with an affectionate gaze. "However, what you say goes, little girl. You look as if you were goin' to recite--'Woodman, spare that tree.' Consider the tree spared for the present."
The automobile drew up at the house and in high good-humor the master jumped out and removed Geraldine's bag to the steps of the narrow piazza. A woman's face could be seen appearing and disappearing at the window, and Pete, the driver, looked with furtive curiosity at the guest as she stepped to the porch without touching the host's outstretched hand.
Rufus threw open the door. "Where are you, Ma?" he shouted, and a thin, wrinkled old woman came into the corridor nervously wiping her hands on her apron.
Geraldine looked at her eagerly.
"Well, you have to take us as you find us, little girl," remarked Rufus, scowling at his parent. "Ma hasn't even taken off her apron to welcome you."
At this Mrs. Carder fumbled at her apron strings, but Geraldine advanced to her and put out her hand.
"I like aprons," she said; and the old woman took the hand for a loose, brief shake.
"I'm very glad to see you, Miss Melody," she said timidly. "I'm glad it has been a pretty day."
"Show her her room, Ma, and then perhaps she'd like some tea. City folks, you know, must have their tea."
Geraldine followed her hostess with alacrity as she went up the narrow stairway; glad there was an upstairs; and a room of her own, and a woman to speak to.
She was ushered into a barely furnished chamber; a bowl and pitcher on the small wash-stand seemed to indicate that modern improvements had not penetrated to the Carder farm.
"I s'pose you'll find country livin' a great change for you," said Mrs. Carder, pulling up the window shade. Geraldine wondered how in this beautiful state could have been found such a treeless tract of land. She remembered the threatened fate of the elm. Perhaps there had been other destruction. "My son never seemed to take any interest in puttin' in water here."
The girl met the wrinkled face. The apprehension in the old eyes under Carder's scowl had given place to curiosity.
"I have come to help you," said Geraldine, "I must get used to fewer conveniences."
"It's nice of you to say that," said the old woman, "Rufus don't want you to work much, though."
"But of course I shall," returned the girl quickly. "I'm much better able to work than you are."
"Oh, I've got a wet sink this year," said Mrs. Carder. "I told Rufus I just had to have it. I was gettin' too old to haul water."
"I should think so!" exclaimed Geraldine indignantly. "Mr. Carder is well off. He shouldn't allow you to work any more the rest of your life."
Mrs. Carder smiled and shook her head, revealing her own need of dentistry. "I'm stronger than I look. I s'pose if I was taken out of harness I might be like one o' these horses that drops down when the shafts don't hold him up any longer."
Geraldine regarded her compassionately. "I've heard--my stepmother told me it was very hard for you to get help out here. I suppose it is lonely for maids."
The old woman regarded her strangely, and her withered lips compressed.
"I don't mind loneliness," went on Geraldine eagerly. She had thrown her hat on the bed and the gold of her hair shone in the mean little room. "I love to be alone. I long to be."
"That ain't natural," observed Mrs. Carder, regarding her earnest, self-forgetful loveliness. "Rufus told me you was a beauty," she went on reflectively. "Your father was the handsomest man I ever saw."
"You knew him, then," said Geraldine eagerly.
"He was out here a number o' times. Rufus seemed to be his favorite man o' business, as you might say."
"Oh, Mrs. Carder, tell me all you can about his visits here." The girl's heart began to beat faster and she drew the clean, dried-up old woman down upon the edge of the bed beside her. Why should her father choose this dreadful place, this impossible man as a refuge? It could only have been as a last resort for him, just as it now was for her.
"I was always away at school after his marriage," she went on. "I saw so little of him."
Mrs. Carder looked uneasy.
"I saw nothin' of him except at a meal sometimes. He and my son was always shut up in Rufus's office."
"Did he seem--seem unhappy, Mrs. Carder?"
"Well--yes. He was a sort of an absent-minded man. Perhaps that was his way. Really, I don't know a thing about their business, Miss Melody." The addition was made in sudden panic because the girl had grasped both the wrinkled hands and was gazing searchingly into the old woman's face as if she would wring information out