Under the Country Sky Part 10

The loom stopped with a jerk as the weaver flashed round upon the head and shoulders protruding above the rafters. "Oh! I'm sorry! Did I disturb you?" cried Georgiana, fire in her voice. She did not look in the least sorry. "I thought you were out, too. And I'm just over your head. Of course you came up to----"

"No, I didn't," replied Mr. Jefferson. He ascended two steps more, looking curiously at the loom "I came up because I thought something extraordinary had happened up here and I ought to find out about it."

"Nothing extraordinary, merely something very ordinary. I do this whenever I have time and the coast is clear. You usually go out at this hour," she said accusingly.

"So I do. I came back just now, when I saw Miss Crofton and Mr. Stuart starting off alone, in hopes that you might consent to go with me. It's a great day. Won't you?"

"Thank you, no," the girl replied. "I'm behind with my work. These rugs are orders very much overdue. I've been rather delayed lately, since my machine is so noisy I can't work when anybody is on the second floor."

"Please never mind me," urged her visitor. "I can time my work to fit in with yours, if you need to make haste. But that must be a rather strenuous business. It's a very old affair, isn't it? Do you mind if I look at it? I never saw one of just that pattern."

"I mind very much," replied Georgiana crisply, moving off the bench and standing on the floor. "But that's no reason why you shouldn't examine the Monster if you like. That's what I call it. I'll run down and be back when you are through."

And this she would have done, but that he barred her way.

"But I won't," he said gravely, "if you prefer that I should not. Come back, please! I'm intruding, and I'll apologize and go."

The light from a dusty attic window fell full on her face as she stood, and he saw that in it which made him look again.

"Miss Warne," he said gently, "something is wrong, I'm afraid. Can't I be of use to you in some way? The reason I wanted to look at this loom was that I saw your last two strokes with the bar as I came up, and I recognized what a tremendous push you had to give. I'm something of a mechanic and I wondered if I couldn't do a bit of oiling, perhaps, to make it easier. I'm afraid it's tiring you unduly."

"I need to be tired," she said, low but vehemently. "I'm in a black mood, and the more I tire myself the quicker I shall get the better of it. Now you know. I suppose you never have black moods."

"Do I not? So black that I could grind myself under my own heel. Do you have them, too? I might have known by the look of you."

"You don't look as if you ever had them," she said rather curiously, her eyes on his quiet face.

"Ah, you can't always tell--luckily. It's pretty cold up here. Are you sure you wouldn't do better to take a run in the wind with me? You know somehow heavy tasks look lighter after a breath of outdoor air."

"So you know what heavy tasks are?" For the life of her she could not resist the question.

He looked steadily back at her, smiling a little. His eyes were very clear in their quiet scrutiny. She felt as if he saw much that she would prefer to conceal. "I have known a few that seemed to me fairly heavy at the time," he said. "Afterward, I was thankful to have had them--to prepare me for heavier ones."

"Oh--but they weren't the same dismal round----"

"Weren't they? Most tasks are. But I never had one quite like this. I am concerned for you, lest this prove too heavy. Now that I am here--do you really mind so very much if I look the machine over?"

She permitted it, and she did not run away as she had meant to do.

Presently he asked for a screw-driver and a can of oil, and when she had procured them he did a number of things to the c.u.mbersome loom, the result of which, when she attacked it once more, proved that he had relieved to a certain extent the hardest of her efforts.

"But it is still much too severe for any woman," he said seriously, standing, oil can in hand, a little lock of hair, shaken down by his labours, straying across his forehead. "Please tell me, and don't think me merely curious--is there no way in which you can add to your resources except this? You have a college training----"

"And no way whatever to make use of it," she exclaimed with some bitterness. "But I can weave, and I have a feeling for colour and form and can work out effects which find a market. Hand-woven rugs bring their price these days. Really, Mr. Jefferson, I am no subject for pity and----"

"You don't want it. Let me a.s.sure you that I don't feel a particle. To be young and strong and fit for hard work is no cause for pity. But--I have reason for persisting in my inquiry. You see, I happen to know of some one in need of such training as you undoubtedly have. Would you consider giving a few hours daily to one who needs a copyist and critic?"

Georgiana scanned his face with intent, incredulous eyes. Then, "Do you mean yourself?" she questioned.

"I mean myself. I hesitate to mention that I am the candidate, knowing that that admission must instantly create a prejudice against me." He was smiling a little. "But I state an actual fact. I have reached a point in my labours where I need a copyist. Do you think it possible that I may secure one without sending away for her?"

"I must suspect you," she said slowly and with rising colour, "of manufacturing a need. It is very, very kind of you, Mr. Jefferson--but I think I must continue to weave my rugs."

"But I am not manufacturing a need," he insisted. "I declare to you that I have been on the point of consulting you for some time. If it had not been that your days seemed very full with your guest and your housewifery, I should have put it to you before now. I am in earnest, Miss Warne. Won't you, as a matter of everyday business, lend me your eyes and your hand--and your critical judgment? If you can't do it while Miss Crofton is here, may I engage your spare time after she goes?

Please don't deny me." He began to descend the stairs. "I won't stay for an answer," he said. "Think it over, will you? And please don't refuse until you have consulted your father."

"Why do you ask that?"

"Because I know he will look at it as any man would, without unreasonable prejudice against accepting a business proposition simply because it happens to come from a temporary member of the household. It takes a woman to bother about that."

With this straight shot he left her, laughing back at her as he descended in a way that went far toward disarming her, though she would not at once admit it. Instead, she went back to her loom, putting into the next section of weaving a quite unnecessary amount of force purely from tension of mind over the possibilities opened up by this most unexpected offer. There was no denying that it was precisely the sort of thing which she had often longed to do, and for which, she knew, as he had suggested, she was more than ordinarily well fitted. It was impossible, as she had said, not to suspect the lodger of creating a want to fit her need of earning money, yet there could be no doubt of the fact that any writer of books who draws upon all manner of collected notes and reference books for his material must be able to make valuable use of an a.s.sistant in a variety of ways.

Why should she not take him at his word? Well, she would think of it.

And meanwhile--suddenly--the black mood was gone!

CHAPTER X

STUART OBJECTS

That night, after Mr. Jefferson's unexpected proposal that she should a.s.sist him in his literary work, Georgiana, running out upon an errand in the business part of the village, encountered James Stuart. This had been a not infrequent happening in days past, but since Jeannette's arrival it had not once occurred. Stuart was much at the house, but not for a fortnight had Georgiana had ten minutes alone with him.

That he welcomed the chance as well as she was evident from his first word: "Great luck! At last I get you to myself for half a wink without a soul around. Where are you going? Wherever it is, you don't go back to the house till you've given me what I want."

"And what's that?" queried Georgiana.

Her tone was cool in spite of herself. She had missed the almost daily walks and talks with Stuart, glad as she had been to have him do his effectual part in helping her entertain her guests. And there had been, as she was obliged to confess to herself, a sense that if he had been very anxious not to lose altogether her society he would have managed, in spite of lack of ordinary opportunity, to bring about such meetings.

How much she could feel the absence of his companionship she had not dreamed until she had been tried.

After the friendly village fashion of intimate acquaintance he lightly grasped her arm in its covering of the scarlet-lined military cape she always wore on such walks, and turned her from her course toward a side street leading away, instead of toward, the centre she had been approaching. She protested, but he was laughingly determined and she yielded. It was good, undeniably good, to have Jimps by her side again, and hear his voice in his old eagerly devoted tones in her ear. That he was really overjoyed at coming upon her in a free hour it was impossible to doubt.

"My word! George, but you've kept me on short rations lately," he began accusingly. "One would think you had suddenly put me on a diet list.

Nothing but sweets, contrary to the usual prohibitions of the medical men for the husky male! Do you think I have no appet.i.te for the good substantial food? Parties and drives and candy-pulls, always with the lovely guest, and never an old-time hobn.o.b with my chum! What's the matter with you, George? What have I done?"

"But such sweets! And so soon they will be gone, and nothing for the hungry youth but plain bread and b.u.t.ter. How absurd of you to complain!"

"Bread and b.u.t.ter! Beefsteak and mushrooms, you mean; roast turkey and cranberry sauce! A fellow can live on them. But not on eternal honey and fudge--with my apologies to the lady."

"I should say so, Jimps. You're outrageous, and you don't mean it. I wouldn't walk another step with you if you did."

"She's undoubtedly the sweetest thing on earth," admitted Stuart. "There are times when I think I'd like to ask her to marry me on the spot--if she'd have me, which she wouldn't--me, a farmer! She dazzles me, bewitches me, makes me all but lose my head. And then I look at my chum, the girl I've known all my life, and I think--well, sugar is all right, but you can't get on without salt--and pepper--and ginger--and----"

"Jimps!" In spite of herself Georgiana was laughing infectiously, and Stuart joined her. "How absolutely ridiculous! I sound like a whole spice box, and nothing but the 'bitey' spices at that."

"That's what you are," declared James Stuart contentedly. "And when I'm with you I have no hankering after sugar. Mustard plasters for me; they're warming."