The Duke of Stockbridge | Page 4

"I dunno what 'n time I shall dew 'bout gittin in the crops," whimpered

Elnathan. "I can't dew it 'lone, nohow. Seems though my rheumatiz
wuz wuss 'n ever, this las' spell o' weather."
"There goes Abner Rathbun, and George Fennell," cried Perez. "Time
we were off. Good-bye mother. There! There! Don't you cry, mother.
We'll be back all right. Got your gun, Reub? Good-bye father. Come
on," and the boys were off.
In seeming sympathy with the sudden grief that has fallen on the
village, the bright promise of the morning has given place in the last
hour to one of those sudden rain storms to which a mountainous region
is always liable, and a cold drizzle is now falling. But that does not
hinder every one who has friends among the departing soldiers, or
sympathy with the cause represented, from gathering on the green to
witness the muster and march of the men. All the leading men and the
officials of the town and parish are there, including the two Indian
selectmen, Johannes Metoxin and Joseph Sauquesquot. Squire Edwards,
Deacon Nash, Squire Williams and Captain Josiah Jones,
brother-in-law of Squire Woodbridge, are going about among the
tearful groups, of one of which each soldier is a centre, reassuring and
encouraging both those who go, and those who stay, the ones with the
promise that their wives and children and parents shall be looked after
and cared for, the others with confident talk of victory and speedy
reunions.
Squire Edwards tells Elnathan, who with Mrs. Hamlin has come down
to the green, that he needn't fret about the mortgage on his house, and
Deacon Nash tells him that he'll see that his crops are saved, and
George Fennell, who, with his wife and daughter, stands by, is assured
by the Squire, that they shall have what they want from the store. There
is not a plough-boy among the minute men who is not honored today
with a cordial word or two, or at least a smile, from the magnates who
never before have recognized his existence.
And proud in her tears, to-day, is the girl who has a sweetheart among
the soldiers. Shy girls, who for fear of being laughed at, have kept a
secret of their inclinations, now grown suddenly bold, cry, as they talk
with their lovers, and refuse not the parting kiss. Desire Edwards, the

Squire's daughter, as she moves among the groups, and sees these
things, is stirred with envy and thinks she would give anything if she,
too, had a sweetheart to bid good-bye to. But she is only fifteen, and
Squire Edwards' daughter, moreover, to whom no rustic swain dares
pretend. Then she bethinks herself that one has timidly, enough, so
pretended. She knows that Elnathan Hamlin's son, Perez, is dreadfully
in love with her. He is better bred than the other boys, but after all he is
only a farmer's son, and while pleased with his conquest as a testimony
to her immature charms, she has looked down upon him as quite an
inferior order of being to herself. But just now he appears to her in the
desirable light of somebody to bid good-bye to, to the end that she may
be on a par with the other girls whom she so envies. So she looks about
for Perez.
And he, on his part, is looking about for her. That she, the Squire's
daughter, as far above him as a star, would care whether he went or
stayed, or would come to say good-bye to him, he had scarcely dared to
think. And yet how deeply has that thought, which he has scarcely
dared own, tinged all his other thinking! The martial glory that has so
dazzled his young imagination, how much of its glitter was but
reflected from a girl's eyes. As he looks about and not seeing her, says,
"She does not care, she will not come," the sword loses all its sheen,
and the nodding plume its charm, and his dreams of self-devotion all
their exhilaration.
"I came to bid you good-bye, Perez," says a voice behind him.
He wheels about, red, confused, blissful. Desire Edwards, dark and
sparkling as a gypsy, stands before him with her hand outstretched. He
takes it eagerly, timidly. The little white fingers press his big brown
ones. He does not feel them there; they seem to be clasping his heart.
He feels the ecstatic pressure there.
"Fall in," shouts Captain Woodbridge, for the Squire himself is their
captain.
There is a tumult of embraces and kisses all around. Reuben kissed his
mother.

"Will you kiss me, Desire?" said Perez, huskily, carried beyond himself,
scarcely knowing what he said, for if he had realized he never would
have dared.
Desire looked about, and saw all the