Madelon | Page 7

by a flight of stone steps. It fairly looked down, like any
spirit of a younger age, upon the older house, which might have been
regarded in a way as its progenitor.
The smoke was coming out of the kitchen chimney in the ell. Lot
Gordon looked across. Burr was clearing the snow from the stone steps
over the terraces. There had never been any lack of energy and industry
in Burr to account for his flagging fortunes. He arose betimes every
morning. Lot, standing well behind the dimity curtain, watched him
flinging the snow aside like spray, his handsome face glowing like a
rose.
"I suppose he is going to the party at the tavern to-night," Lot
murmured. Suddenly his face took on a piteous, wistful look like a
woman's; tears stood in his blue eyes. He doubled over with a violent
fit of coughing, then went back to his chair and his book.
This party had been the talk of the village for several weeks. It was to
be an unusually large one. People were coming from all the towns

roundabout. Burr Gordon had been one of the ringleaders of the
enterprise. All day long he worked over the preparations, dragging out
evergreen garlands from under the snow in the woods, cutting hemlock
boughs, and trimming the ball-room in the tavern. Towards night he
heard a piece of news which threatened to bring everything to a
standstill. The dusk was thickening fast; Burr and the two young men
who were working with him were hurrying to finish the decorations
before candlelight when Richard Hautville came in. Burr started when
he saw him. He looked so like his sister in the dim light that he thought
for a moment she was there.
Richard did not notice him at all. He hustled by him roughly and
approached the other two young men. "Louis can't fiddle to-night," he
announced, curtly. The young men stared at him in dismay.
"What's the trouble?" asked Burr.
"He's hurt his arm," replied Richard; but he still addressed the other two,
and made as if he were not answering Burr.
"Broke it?" asked one of the others.
"No; sprained it. He was clearing the snow off the barn roof and the
ladder fell. It's all black-and-blue, and he can't lift it enough to fiddle
to-night."
The three young men looked at each other.
"What's going to be done?" said one.
"I don't know," said Burr. "There's Davy Barrett, over to the Four
Corners--I suppose we might get him if we sent right over."
"You can't get him," said Richard Hautville, still addressing the other
two, as if they had spoken. "Louis said you couldn't. His wife's got the
typhus-fever, and he's up nights watching with her--won't let anybody
else. You can't get him."

"We can't have a ball without a fiddler," one young man said, soberly.
"Maybe Madelon would lilt for the dancing," Burr Gordon said; and
then he colored furiously, as if he had startled himself in saying it.
The boy turned on him. "Maybe you think my sister will lilt for you to
dance, Burr Gordon!" cried he, and his face blazed white in Burr's eyes,
and he shook his slender brown fist.
"Nobody wants your sister to lilt if she isn't willing to," Burr returned,
in a hard voice; and he snatched up a hemlock bough, and went away
with it to the other side of the ball-room.
"My sister won't lilt for you, and you can have your ball the best way
you can!" shouted the boy, his angry eyes following Burr. Then he
went out of the ball-room with a leap, and slammed the door so that the
tavern trembled.
The young men chuckled. "Injun blood is up," said one.
"You'll be scalped, Burr," called the other.
Burr came over to them with an angry stride. "Oh, quit fooling!" said
he, impatiently. "What's going to be done?"
"Nothing can be done; we shall have to give the ball up for to-night
unless you can get Madelon Hautville to lilt for the dancing," returned
one, and the other nodded assent. "That's the state of the case," said he.
Burr scraped a foot impatiently on the waxed floor. "Go and ask her
yourself, Daniel Plympton," said he. "I don't see why it has all got to
come on to me."
"Can't," replied Daniel Plympton, with a laugh. "Remember the falling
out Eugene and I had at the house-raising? I ain't going to his house to
ask his sister to lilt for my dancing."
"You, then, Abner Little," said Burr, peremptorily, to the other young
man. He had a fair, nervous face, and he was screwing his forehead

anxiously over the situation.
"Can't nohow, Burr," said he. "I've got to drive four miles home, and
milk, and