More Jonathan Papers | Page 8

occasional overflowing of a pail too long neglected. The syrup was made, and bottled, and distributed to friends, and was the pride of the household through the year.
* * * * *
"This time I will go early," I said to Jonathan; "they say the late running is never quite so good."
It was early March when I got up there this time--early March after a winter whose rigor had known practically no break. Again Jonathan could not come, but Cousin Janet could, and we met at the little station, where Hiram was waiting with Kit and the surrey. The sun was warm, but the air was keen and the woods hardly showed spring at all yet, even in that first token of it, the slight thickening of their millions of little tips, through the swelling of the buds. The city trees already showed this, but the country ones still kept their wintry penciling of vanishing lines.
Spring was in the road, however. "There ain't no bottom to this road now, it's just dropped clean out," remarked a fellow teamster as we wallowed along companionably through the woods. But, somehow, we reached the farm. Again we bored our holes, and again I was thrilled as the first bright drops slipped out and jeweled the ends of the spouts. I watched Janet. She was interested but calm, classing herself at once with Hiram and Jonathan. We unearthed last year's oven and dug out its inner depths--leaves and dirt and apples and ashes--it was like excavating through the seven Troys to get to bottom. We brought down the big pan, now clothed in the honors of a season's use, and cleaned off the cobwebs incident to a year's sojourn in the attic. By sunset we had a panful of sap boiling merrily and already taking on a distinctly golden tinge. We tasted it. It was very syrupy. Letting the fire die down, we went in to get supper in the utmost content of spirit.
"It's so much simpler than last year," I said, as we sat over our cozy "tea,"--"having the pan and the oven ready-made, and all--"
"You don't suppose anything could happen to it while we're in here?" suggested Janet. "Shan't I just run out and see?"
"No, sit still. What could happen? The fire's going out."
"Yes, I know." But her voice was uncertain.
"You see, I've been all through it once," I reassured her.
As we rose, Janet said, "Let's go out before we do the dishes." And to humor her I agreed. We lighted the lantern and stepped out on the back porch. It was quite dark, and as we looked off toward the fireplace we saw gleams of red.
"How funny!" I murmured. "I didn't think there was so much fire left."
We felt our way over, through the yielding mud of the orchard, and as I raised the lantern we stared in dazed astonishment. The pan was a blackened mass, lit up by winking red eyes of fire. I held the lantern more closely. I seized a stick and poked--the crisp black stuff broke and crumbled into an empty and blackening pan. A curious odor arose.
"It couldn't have!" gasped Janet.
"It couldn't--but it has!" I said.
It was a matter for tears, or rage, or laughter. And laughter won. When we recovered a little we took up the black shell of carbon that had once been syrup-froth; we laid it gently beside the oven, for a keepsake. Then we poured water in the pan, and steam rose hissing to the stars.
"Does it leak?" faltered Janet.
"Leak!" I said. I was on my knees now, watching the water stream through the parted seam of the pan bottom, down into the ashes below.
"The question is," I went on as I got up, "did it boil away because it leaked, or did it leak because it boiled away?"
"I don't see that it matters much," said Janet. She was showing symptoms of depression at this point.
"It matters a great deal," I said. "Because, you see, we've got to tell Jonathan, and it makes all the difference how we put it."
"I see," said Janet; then she added, experimentally, "Why tell Jonathan?"
"Why, Janet, you know better! I wouldn't miss telling Jonathan for anything. What is Jonathan for!"
"Well--of course," she conceded. "Let's do dishes."
We sat before the fire that evening and I read while Janet knitted. Between my eyes and the printed page there kept rising a vision--a vision of black crust, with winking red embers smoldering along its broken edges. I found it distracting in the extreme.{~HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~}
At some time unknown, out of the blind depths of the night, I was awakened by a voice:--
"It's beginning to rain. I think I'll just go out and empty what's near the house."
"Janet!" I murmured, "don't be absurd."
"But it will dilute all that sap."
"There isn't any sap to