Strawberry Acres Part 27

Sally did not answer this question, so he repeated it, in the form of an accepted statement: "So I don't talk sense."

This certainly called loudly for an explanation, and Sally made it--in a way. "I think you know what I mean."

"I know what _I_ mean, but I didn't know it deserved that name."

"It's only--" Sally hesitated, then she went through with it, speaking hurriedly: "I don't want you to bother about me--doing things for me--except as you do them for us all. You--you--are getting--"

"Well, what am I getting? Out with it!"

"To seem--not like my old friend Jarvis Burnside. And--I'd rather have him back."

It was certainly out now. Jarvis drove on up the hill steadily, without any further questioning. It was precisely like Sally thus bravely to have shown him where he stood. It was a position clearly defined; he had stood on it so long that he ought surely to be able easily to go back to it.

But he had driven to the top of the hill and on for two miles down the road, had taken the turn to the left and pursued that road for another mile, so that he was nearly at his destination, before he spoke. When at last he did speak it was only to say, very quietly and cheerfully--at least, so it sounded:

"All right, Sally."

Then he turned in at an open gate, and in less than five minutes, with the hay-fork and tackle and ropes at their feet, he was turning out again.

The drive back was rather a silent one. Jarvis spoke often, and Sally replied, but it was about things to be seen along the wayside, or of the plans for the day. The trip was made rather faster than it had been done in coming, and the pace was excuse enough for there being no prolonged conversation on any subject. Jarvis was now an expert driver and by no means an over-cautious one, though he took no risks that he would have called by that name, when he was not alone. More than once his pa.s.senger held her breath, but realized afterward that she had been in no real danger. Then they were at home, and Sally was saying, "Thank you very much," as she jumped out, quite as if she had eagerly requested to be taken.

"You are entirely welcome," was his response, in such an odd tone that she looked round at him. He was smiling, but not at her--at the driveway before him, and she could not help noting that he did not appear to be at all crushed by anything that had occurred that morning. It struck her that he had never seemed a stronger or more attractive figure than he looked at this moment, sitting at the wheel with the bright July sunlight touching his brown cheek and clean-cut profile; his head, with its heavy crop of dark hair, bare and breeze-tossed; his powerful engine throbbing before him. Suddenly she wanted to say: "You don't mind, do you?" with a queer little feeling that he didn't mind quite enough! But the car was already off, and she went on into the house with a sense of not feeling quite so relieved as might have been expected at having brought about something she had been wishing for some time to accomplish, but hadn't known just how.

But she had no time left in which to do any thinking about her own affairs. As was easily to be discerned by the distant shoutings, Ferry's city guests had arrived, and had taken possession of the hayfield. From the kitchen window they could be seen, swarming about with rakes and pitchforks, like so many black spiders. There were many more of them than could possibly be used to any advantage, it seemed; but as about half of the distant figures appeared to be standing on their heads it might be taken for granted that employment of some sort could be had for everybody.

At noon the four girls captured Jake and his horses, filled the bottom of the hay-wagon with baskets and pails, and were borne up to the fields, where they were hailed with cheers. Under a tall elm, at one side of the scene of operations, they spread the lunch, and a motley crowd was presently encamped around it. Their entertainers thought they had never seen a happier lot of youngsters. They were of all sorts and sizes, but in one point they were alike: their ignorance of the country and their delight in this interesting and novel experience. They were very plainly all devoted friends of the young man who had brought them there, as could be seen in their every look at him.

"How long have you known Mr. Ferry?" Josephine asked of one slim, tall lad, with black hair drooping over a pair of sharp black eyes, his pale face full of animation.

"Oh, ever since he come down our street one day an' axed me 'bout a feller I knowed that jes' come back from the horspital. Chap got run over--Mr. Ferry was feared he wouldn't have no home to stay in when he got out o' horspital. No more he didn't--till then. After that day, he did, all right."

Josephine glanced toward the subject of these remarks and then back at the lad, who nodded. "Bet yer life 'twas him fixed it," he declared.

"There don't no kid go without some kind of a home, if he can fix things for 'em."

"You boys must think a good deal of him," suggested Josephine.

The boy's lips answered only "You bet!" But his face instantly became eloquent.

After lunch the first load of hay was pitched upon the wagon, Jarvis, Jake, and Ferry wielding the pitchforks, Sally driving, and a big boy at the bridle of the colt that had run away during the ploughing season and so could not be trusted entirely to Sally, although she begged to be allowed to manage him without help. He was not exactly a colt, after all, being four years old, but he was new in the traces of the work-horse and Jake kept an eye on him.

"You fellers pitch pretty well fer green hands," acknowledged Jake, when the load was nearly on. He was on the wagon with Sally, placing the forkfuls as they were pitched on. "Expected to see one or 'tother of you git winded and go set down under the ellum. 'Bout the third load'll git you, though, I calc'late."

The two contestants exchanged laughing glances under the forkfuls at the moment lifted above their heads. "This fellow's a Hercules for muscle," said Jarvis to Jake, "but I've discovered several places in my anatomy not so well developed as they might be. I'm going to get after them right away and train them up to the standard. Great Caesar, but it's a hot day!"

He stood up and wiped his perspiring brow.

"I think it's deliciously cool," remarked Sally from the top of the load.

"It's perfectly comfortable here," called Janet, from the fence near by, where the other three girls were perched.

Jake grinned. He had been grinning more or less all day. This "haying it" with a field full of boys and young ladies was a new and interesting experience for Mr. Kelly.

At this moment a diversion arose. Two of the guests, disputing for the possession of a pitchfork, both naturally preferring it to a rake for bunching up from the winrows--being raked by Bob with a horse-rake--had decided to settle the matter, street fashion, with their fists. They were pretty evenly matched and a rough-and-tumble fight ensued. Ferry stopped to watch the bout and see that fair play was enforced. Everybody else stopped work also, and stood looking that way. Jake Kelly, perhaps the most interested spectator in the field, slid down from the load and strolled toward the affair, still grinning. Jarvis, with the precaution of a glance around at the wagon, on the top of which perched Sally, took a few steps in the same direction. It was hot, and he was glad of a moment's respite from his labours. He did not see that the lad at the bridle of the "colt" had relaxed his hold.

Suddenly one of the lads in the affair of the pitchfork got in a bit of unfair work--unfair according to the standards Ferry had introduced among these young friends of his. A protesting yell from at least a dozen throats instantly called the fighters' attention to this fact, and Ferry himself called out, "No fouls, Bates!"

At the yells the "colt" plunged, carrying his mate with him. Sally, though unprepared, hung on gallantly to the lines, trying hard to pull the pair to a standstill. The ground was uneven, and not free from an occasional stone. The wagon had not gone its own length before a shriek from the girls on the fence had brought Jarvis, Jake, and Ferry to the right-about, and all three rushed for the horses' heads. But they were too late to prevent the accident which is always liable to happen in a hayfield, particularly when the driver is a novice. The right front wheel swerved into a hollow, the wagon tipped, the "colt" plunged again. Sally slipped, and tried to throw herself down in safety upon the top of the load, but it slid with her, and in an instant the spectators and the three dashing to the rescue saw the whole load go like a green mountain to the ground, covering Sally from sight.

Now a forkful of hay is light, but a load of the fragrant stuff is very heavy and very smothery, and it depends entirely upon where the victim lands under such an avalanche whether the matter is serious or otherwise.

For a minute n.o.body could be sure just where the slender, blue-clad figure might be, for it made no outcry. The hearts of them all were in their throats for a minute, as the men tore at the hay with their hands, Jarvis thundering at the tall lad, who seized upon a pitchfork, "Don't touch it with that, you fool!"

He was blaming himself savagely as he worked for leaving the girl for an instant, under such conditions. Ferry was calling, "Don't be frightened, we'll have you out in a minute!" Jake was grunting, "Hope the little gal ain't far under--hope to mercy she ain't!" and Josephine, Janet, and Constance were trying to get a chance to help, though the most they could do was to keep clear of the desperately working arms of the men.

It was Jarvis who, with a hoa.r.s.e e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n of thankfulness, came first upon a fold of the blue skirt. Sally had not been under the heaviest part of the load, and doubtless it was only the smother of the hay which kept her from calling out--if the fall itself had not hurt her. In a minute more they had her out, very red and choky, her eyes blinded with dust, her curls full of hay-seed; and she was lying on a soft mound of the fragrant stuff, the girls fanning her, Ferry bringing her lemonade from the pail, and Jarvis watching her with his heart in his eyes--only, fortunately, considering the conversation of the morning, her own eyes were too full of sticks to see.

"You're not hurt anywhere, dear?" one or other of the girls asked her, at close intervals, and Sally shook her head each time, until at length she was able to clear her throat enough to murmur: "Only my feelings, as Jake said. It was so--silly--of me!"

"It was much worse than silly--of us," vowed Donald Ferry, his fine, freckled face a deep Indian-red with heat and anxiety, his breath still a trifle laboured with the furious exertion of the rescue.

But in a very short time she was all right again, and sitting up on her hay throne, watching the wrecked load being pitched back upon the wagon.

The horses had not escaped, for a dozen boys had set after them, headed by the tall youth, and the boot-blacks and news-boys had proved themselves decidedly more efficient at stopping runaways than at making symmetrical hay-c.o.c.ks.

"If you have any regard for my pride," said Sally suddenly, when the load was half replaced, "you'll let me drive down to the barn."

The three men stopped and looked at her.

"That's mighty plucky of you, Miss Sally," declared Donald Ferry, "but--if you have any regard for _our_ feelings--" and he let an eloquent shake of the head finish his sentence for him.

Jarvis said nothing. But a certain peculiar set of his jaw, as he went on with his pitching, spoke volumes.

As for Jake Kelly--"Wall, I want to know!" said he. Then he laughed outright. "I calc'late, miss," said he, "ef you ride on that thar'

load o' hay again to-day it'll be because them two's rendered incompetent o' action! An' they don't look to me much 'sif paralysis would set in yit awhile!"

CHAPTER XV

ON AN AUGUST EVENING

"Oh, dear--who's this coming?--just as we've settled down to accomplish something!"

"It's the Chases. Girls--we simply can't stop work to entertain them!"

"We don't need to stop--this sort of work."

They bent over their sewing--all but Sally, who with inward reluctance got to her feet as the Chases' big car rolled up the driveway and approached the porch, where the four girls were sitting, busy with some extremely important matters. But of course the work had to be put down for a little when Dorothy Chase actually set foot on the porch.