Julia The Apostate | Page 6

their beseeching letters had elicited only vague postal cards explaining nothing, but suggesting their presence at the farm, they became convinced of the necessity for action on their part, and went, more or less in the presumable spirit of the mountain in search of the fractious Prophet.
Tired and cross after four hours' travel on an incredibly hot 1st of April, they walked sternly up the board walk that led to the old-style porch, to be greeted by their cousin, who sat in snowy shirtsleeves, tilted back in his chair against the house, smoking his fat, dark cigar.
"Welcome home, girls--glad to see you!" he called cheerily. "Here they are, Jule! Now don't be afraid, but come right out and see them!"
"Why, bless your heart, Lorando, I'm not afraid," a familiar voice answered; and Aunt Julia appeared before them, cool in blue checked gingham, with an enveloping white apron and familiarly floury hands.
"I'm just beating up some biscuit for tea," she explained, "but I guess you can shake hands with me, girls "; and as she extended both arms hospitably they saw upon her floured left hand an unmistakable shining gold band.
"Aunt Jule!" they gasped together. "Are you--is it--"
"That's it exactly," said Cousin Lorando Bean. "She is. And I hope you'll congratulate her, girls, though nobody knows better than I what a good housekeeper you've lost! I'll tell you the facts of the matter, and you can judge for yourself. If ever two people were made for each other, those two are your Aunt Jule and me. We love the country, and we love this farm, and what's very important, we love the same way of living."
"That's quite true, Carrie--lyn," Aunt Julia interposed, the tears in her eyes, but a new decision in her voice.
"I like my tea at night, and so does your Cousin Lorando. And I should have wanted gravy on my potato if I lived to be a hundred. And, Carrie, I could not live without a cellar!
"And if you knew how nervous I got when that old dumb-waiter in the kitchen used to whistle for the things to be put on it! I used to hate it so--sometimes I'd wake up in the night and think I heard it! Once I lost my temper at it, and I answered it back: 'I haven't anything to go down, and I wouldn't give it to you if I had!'"
"Why, Aunt Jule!" they cried.
"And I tell you, Carrie, when you have cleaned house regularly, spring and fall, for forty years, ever since you were born, it makes an awful break to give it up! And I do love a good crayon portrait."
They looked at each other in silence.
"And when you have a set of furniture, it makes me nervous not to have it set together," Aunt Julia went on determinedly.
"And I will not have a woman smoking in my house!
"And oh, Carrie, if you knew how I suffered with that dirty darky girl!"
"But--but, Aunt Jule, why didn't you--"
"You see, Carrie and Lizzie, it was this way," said Mr. Bean soothingly.
"Your aunt and I got talking old times, and we found that we both felt about the same. And after we'd looked the old house over together a day or two, she couldn't seem to leave it, somehow, and she couldn't live in it alone, and I always wanted it.
"So I said, 'If you'll just step over to the parson's, across the street, with me, we'll fix this all right in about ten minutes. You've known me ever since I was a boy, and I've known you, and it's nobody's business but ours if we want to finish up together.' I may have said a few other things, too, but that's neither here nor there. And when she said what would the girls do, I told her that what with the full price of their interest in the farm, and her third that she could add to it--for a sort of wedding-present, you see--I didn't see but what you could well afford to take a trip to Europe and stay about as long as you liked--she said you wanted to do that more than anything; though why I don't know--Connecticut ought to be good enough for anybody!"
They sank upon the porch steps, sincerely overcome.
"I knew you'd like it when you came to know it all," said Aunt Julia placidly. "He's the kindest man--"
And to their excited eyes the very tidies on the geometrically arranged chairs, the bright rag rugs on the floor, the biscuits and preserves consecrated to their New England tea, yes, even the insistent shirt-sleeves of Cousin Lorando Bean, were lighted by a halo of content.

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