Prairie Folks | Page 5

the roadside.
Mrs. Ripley was in a frightful mood about it, but she held herself in
check for several days. At last she burst forth:
"Ethan Ripley, I can't stand that thing any longer, and I ain't goin' to,
that's all! You've got to go and paint that thing out, or I will. I'm just
about crazy with it."
"But, mother, I promised "----
"I don't care what you promised, it's got to be painted out. I've got the
nightmare now, seem' it. I'm goin' to send f'r a pail o' red paint, and I'm
goin' to paint that out if it takes the last breath I've got to do it."
"I'll tend to it, mother, if you won't hurry me"----

"I can't stand it another day. It makes me boil every time I look out the
winder."
Uncle Ethan hitched up his team and drove gloomily off to town, where
he tried to find the agent. He lived in some other part of the county,
however, and so the old man gave up and bought a pot of red paint, not
daring to go back to his desperate wife without it.
"Goin' to paint y'r new barn?" inquired the merchant, with friendly
interest.
Uncle Ethan turned with guilty sharpness; but the merchant's face was
grave and kindly.
"Yes, I thought I'd touch it up a little--don't cost much."
"It pays--always," the merchant said emphatically.
"Will it--stick jest as well put on evenings?" inquired Uncle Ethan,
hesitatingly.
"Yes--won't make any difference. Why? Ain't goin' to have"----
"Waal,--I kind o' thought I'd do it odd times night an' mornin.'--kind o'
odd times"----
He seemed oddly confused about it, and the merchant looked after him
anxiously as he drove away.
After supper that night he went out to the barn, and Mrs. Ripley heard
him sawing and hammering. Then the noise ceased, and he came in and
sat down in his usual place.
"What y' ben makin'?" she inquired. Tewksbury had gone to bed. She
sat darning a stocking.
"I jest thought I'd git the stagin' ready f'r paintin'," he said, evasively.
"Waal! I'll be glad when it's covered up." When she got ready for bed,

he was still seated in his chair, and after she had dozed off two or three
times she began to wonder why he didn't come. When the clock struck
ten, and she realized that he had not stirred, she began to get impatient.
"Come, are y' goin' to sit there all night?" There was no reply. She rose
up in bed and looked about the room. The broad moon flooded it with
light, so that she could see he was not asleep in his chair, as she had
supposed. There was something ominous in his disappearance.
"Ethan! Ethan Ripley, where are yeh?" There was no reply to her sharp
call. She rose and distractedly looked about among the furniture, as if
he might somehow be a cat and be hiding in a corner somewhere. Then
she went upstairs where the boy slept, her hard little heels making a
curious tunking noise on the bare boards. The moon fell across the
sleeping boy like a robe of silver. He was alone.
She began to be alarmed. Her eyes widened in fear. All sorts of vague
horrors sprang unbidden into her brain. She still had the mist of sleep in
her brain.
She hurried down the stairs and out into the fragrant night. The
katydids were singing in infinite peace under the solemn splendor of
the moon. The cattle sniffed and sighed, jangling their bells now and
then, and the chickens in the coops stirred uneasily as if overheated.
The old woman stood there in her bare feet and long nightgown,
horror-stricken. The ghastly story of a man who had hung himself in
his barn because his wife deserted him came into her mind and stayed
there with frightful persistency. Her throat filled chokingly.
She felt a wild rush of loneliness. She had a sudden realization of how
dear that gaunt old figure was, with its grizzled face and ready smile.
Her breath came quick and quicker, and she was at the point of bursting
into a wild cry to Tewksbury, when she heard a strange noise. It came
from the barn, a creaking noise. She looked that way, and saw in the
shadowed side a deeper shadow moving to and fro. A revulsion to
astonishment and anger took place in her.
"Land o' Bungay! If he ain't paintin' that barn, like a perfect old idiot, in
the night."

Uncle Ethan, working desperately, did not hear her feet pattering down
the path, and was startled by her shrill voice.
"Well, Ethan Ripley, whaddy y' think you're doin' now?"
He made two or three slapping passes with the brush, and then snapped,