Truth to tell, Kate continued so cool to me, Peter's sprained ankle lasted so long, and Peggy could so well spare me from the little matrimonial tête-à-têtes that I interrupted, (I believe they didn't mind Kate!) that I took wonderfully to the chickens. Mrs. Tucker gave me rye-bread and milk of the best; "father" instructed me in the mysteries of cattle-driving; and Melindy, and Joe, and I, used to go strawberrying, or after "posies," almost every day. Melindy was a very pretty girl, and it was very good fun to see her blue eyes open and her red lips laugh over my European experiences. Really, I began to be of some importance at the farm-house, and to take airs upon myself, I suppose; but I was not conscious of the fact at the time.
After a week or two, Melindy and I began to have bad luck with the turkeys. I found two drenched and shivering, after a hail-and-thunder storm, and setting them in a basket on the cooking-stove hearth, went to help Melindy "dress her bow-pot," as she called arranging a vase of flowers, and when I came back the little turkeys were singed; they died a few hours after. Two more were trodden on by a great Shanghai rooster, who was so tall he could not see where he set his feet down; and of the remaining pair, one disappeared mysteriously,—supposed to be rats; and one falling into the duck-pond, Melindy began to dry it in her apron, and I went to help her; I thought, as I was rubbing the thing down with the apron, while she held it, that I had found one of her soft dimpled hands, and I gave the luckless turkey such a tender pressure that it uttered a miserable squeak and departed this life. Melindy all but cried. I laughed irresistibly. So there were no more turkeys. Peggy began to wonder what they should do for the proper Thanksgiving dinner, and Peter turned restlessly on his sofa, quite convinced that everything was going to rack and ruin because he had a sprained ankle.
"Can't we buy some young turkeys?" timidly suggested Peggy.
"Of course, if one knew who had them to sell," retorted Peter.
"I know," said I; "Mrs. Amzi Peters, up on the hill over Taunton, has got some."
"Who told you about Mrs. Peters's turkeys, Cousin Sam?" said Peggy, wondering.
"Melindy," said I, quite innocently.
Peter whistled, Peggy laughed, Kate darted a keen glance at me under her long lashes.
"I know the way there," said mademoiselle, in a suspiciously bland tone. "Can't you drive there with me, Cousin Sam, and get some more?"
"I shall be charmed," said I.
Peter rang the bell and ordered the horse to be ready in the single-seated wagon, after dinner. I was going right down to the farm-house to console Melindy, and take her a book she wanted to read, for no fine lady of all my New York acquaintance enjoyed a good book more than she did; but Cousin Kate asked me to wind some yarn for her, and was so brilliant, so amiable, so altogether charming, I quite forgot Melindy till dinner-time, and then, when that was over, there was a basket to be found, and we were off,—turkey-hunting! Down hill-sides overhung with tasselled chestnut-boughs; through pine-woods where neither horse nor wagon intruded any noise of hoof or wheel upon the odorous silence, as we rolled over the sand, past green meadows, and sloping orchards; over little bright brooks that chattered musically to the bobolinks on the fence-posts, and were echoed by those sacerdotal gentlemen in such liquid, bubbling, rollicking, uproarious bursts of singing as made one think of Anacreon's grasshopper
"Drunk with morning's dewy wine."
All these we passed, and at length drew up before Mrs. Peters's house. I had been here before, on a strawberrying stroll with Melindy,—(across lots it was not far,)—and having been asked in then, and entertained the lady with a recital of some foreign exploit, garnished for the occasion, of course she recognized me with clamorous hospitality.
"Why how do yew do, Mister Greene? I declare I ha'n't done a-thinkin' of that 'ere story you told us the day you was here, 'long o' Melindy." (Kate gave an ominous little cough.) "I was a-tellin' husband yesterday 't I never see sech a master hand for stories as you be. Well, yis, we hev got turkeys, young 'uns; but my stars! I don't know no more where they be than nothin'; they've strayed away into the woods, I guess, and I do'no' as the boys can skeer 'em up; besides, the boys is to school; h'm—yis! Where did you and Melindy go that day arter berries?"
"Up in the pine-lot, ma'am. You think you can't let us have the turkeys?"
"Dew tell ef you went up there! It's near about the sightliest place I ever see. Well, no,—I don't see how's to ketch them turkeys. Miss Bemont, she't lives over on Woodchuck Hill, she's got a lot o' little turkeys in a coop; I guess you'd better go 'long over there, an' ef you can't get none o' her'n, by that time our boys'll be to hum, an' I'll set 'em arter our'n; they'll buckle right to; it's good sport huntin' little turkeys; an' I guess you'll hev to stop, comin' home, so's to let me know ef you'll hev 'em."
Off we drove. I stood in mortal fear of Mrs. Peters's tongue,—and Kate's comments; but she did not make any; she was even more charming than before. Presently we came to the pine-lot, where Melindy and I had been, and I drew the reins. I wanted to see Kate's enjoyment of a scene that Kensett or Church should have made immortal long ago:—a wide stretch of hill and valley, quivering with cornfields, rolled away in pasture lands, thick with sturdy woods, or dotted over with old apple-trees, whose dense leaves caught the slant sunshine, glowing on their tops, and deepening to a dark, velvety green below, and far, far away, on the broad blue sky, the lurid splendors of a thunder-cloud, capped with pearly summits, tower upon tower, sharply defined against the pure ether, while in its purple base forked lightnings sped to and fro, and revealed depths of waiting tempest that could not yet descend. Kate looked on, and over the superb picture.
"How magnificent!" was all she said, in a deep, low tone, her dark cheek flushing with the words. Melindy and I had looked off there together. "It's real good land to farm," had been the sweet little rustic's comment. How charming are nature and simplicity!
Presently we came to Mrs. Bemont's, a brown house in a cluster of maples; the door-yard full of chickens, turkeys, ducks, and geese. Kate took the reins, and I knocked. Mrs. Bemont herself appeared, wiping her red, puckered hands on a long brown towel.
"Can you let me have some of your young turkeys, ma'am?" said I, insinuatingly.
"Well, I do'no';—want to eat 'em or raise 'em?"
"Both, I believe," was my meek answer.
"I do'no' 'bout lettin' on 'em go; 'ta'n't no gret good to sell 'em after all the risks is over; they git their own livin' pretty much now, an' they'll be wuth twice as much by'm'by."
"I suppose so; but Mrs. Smith's turkeys have all died, and she likes to raise them."
"Dew tell, ef you han't come from Miss Peter Smith's! Well, she'd oughter do gret things with that 'ere meetin'-'us o' her'n for the chickens; it's kinder genteel-lookin', and I spose they've got means; they've got ability. Gentility without ability I do despise; but where 't'a'n't so, 't'a'n't no matter; but I'xpect it don't ensure the faowls none, doos it?"
"I rather think not," said I, laughing; "that is the reason we want some of yours."
"Well, I should think you could hev some on 'em. What be you calc'latin' to give?"
"Whatever you say. I do not know at all the market price."
"Good land! 't'a'n't never no use to try to dicker with city folks; they a'n't use to't. I'xpect you can hev 'em for two York shillin' apiece."
"But how will you catch them?"
"Oh, I'll ketch 'em, easy!"
She went into the house and reappeared presently with a pan of Indian meal and water, called the chickens, and in a moment they were all crowding in and over the unexpected supper.
"Now you jes' take a bit o' string an' tie that 'ere turkey's legs together; 'twon't stir, I'll ensure it!"
Strange to say, the innocent creature stood still and eat, while I tied it up; all unconscious till it tumbled neck and heels into the pan, producing a start and scatter of brief duration. Kate had left the wagon, and was shaking with laughter over this extraordinary goodness on the turkeys' part, and before long our basket was full of struggling, kicking, squeaking things, "werry promiscuous," in Mr. Weller's phrase. Mrs. Bemont was paid, and while she was giving