ONE OF THE FAMILY.

Otago Witness, Issue 1813, 20 August 1886, Page 31

ONE OF THE FAMILY.

Farmer Kimball was in his strawberry patch, pulling up the weeds, when Lucy Keene came down the road that beautiful July morning, and he was just about to throw an armful of them over the fence as she came round the corner. The sun-bonnet she wore was exactly like the one he remembered to have seen her mother wear twenty-five years ago ; and he remembered, too, as he looked at this one, and the fresh, rosy face under it, how that one had made his heart flutter the first time he saw it, and he was so bewitched by it, or the face under it, that he had walked home with Hester Mason, and had had hard work to keep from proposing to her. He wondered now, and he wondered many times in the twenty-five years that had gone by since then, why he never did propose to her. He had meant to marry her some time, and he was sure she liked him in the old days ; but something had come between them, and she had married Robert Keene, and he had married his cousin Mary. As he had looked at Hester's daughter, this summer morning, the old fire stirred under the dust and ashes of twenty-five years, and he felt a little flame spring up in his heart. " Good morning, Lucy," he said, leaning over the fence. "Oh 1 " exclaimed Lucy, with a little jump, " I didn't see you, and you came near scaring me. Isn't it pleasant 1 " " Yes, it is pleasant," answered the farmer,

looking straight at her pretty face. " How's your mother ? " " Pretty well," answered Lucy. " Your strawberries arc doing splendidly, aren't they? We're so provoked about ours. The hens got into the garden, and mother says she don't think we'll have a pailful of berries in all." " I want to know I " exclaimed the farmer. ",Now, tell your mother that she's welcome to all she wants out of my patch. She can have 'em just as well as not. There's going to be a sight more'n we'll want, and I'd rather have 'em used than wasted." " I will teU her," answered Lucy ; " I know she'll be delighted at the chance. You know what a hand she is to make strawberry preserves." "Yes, I do," thinking of old times. "I remember she beat all the old housekeepers at that. They used to say that she had a knack of making strawberry jam that nobody else could get hold of." " She hasn't lost it yet," said Lucy. •" She'll be pleased to have you come to tea sometime and try some she made last year. She had unusually good luck."' " I'll do it," he replied. " Let me see — today's Wednesday. Tell her I'll come over on Saturday, if it's agreeable, and I reckon the berries '11 be ripe, so I can pick a pailful by that time. If they be, I'll bring some over." " Thank you," said Lucy. " I'll tell her to expect you to tea on Saturday, then." " Yes," answered the farmer. I'll be roun^ if nothing happens. Oh, I heard from Charley yesterday. He'll be home in a day or two, to stay." , " That'll be pleasant for you," said Lucy, stooping down to pick up a daisy. He could not see how rosy the face under the bewitching sun-bonnet grew all at once. If he had, it might have set him to thinking. " Yes, it will," said the farmer. " Charley's a good boy." " I think I'll have to be going," said Lucy. "We shall expect you to tea on Saturday, remember." " I won't disappoint you," said the farmer ; and then Lucy went on, and he went back to pulling weeds. " I s'pose it's -foolish to think of such a thing," he said to himself, " but I don't know as it's anybody's business but ours. If I see fit to marry Lucy and she's willin', I'm going to do it." From which you will see that the farmer's old fancy for the mother had suddenly been transferred to the daughter. Charley came home the neat day. " I s'pose I'll have to tell him what I've been thinking about," thought the farmer. "'d 'bout as soon take a horsewhipping, I declare. But there ain't any use in dreading it, and puttin' it off, as I know of." Accordingly, when they were sitting in the porch, after supper, the farmer began — " I've been thinking of getting a new housekeeper," he announced. " Won't Aunt Sarah stay ? " asked Charley. _ " I—lI — I mean a housekeeper of another kind," he said, wiping his face vigorously. Charley gave a whistle of surprise, and stared hard at his father. ■ "Who is' it to be, if I may ask such a question," he said. " Down the road," said the farmer, jerking his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the Widow Keene's. He couldn't muster up courage to say it was Lucy. " Aha ! that's the way the wind blows, is it 1 " laughed Charley. " I'm glad to hear it. You couldn't do better." " I'm glad to hear you say so," said Mr Kimball, much relieved. " I felt sure you'd like to have Lucy as — a member of the family." " I haven't any objections, if she hasn't." "So that's orer," said the farmer, as Charley strolled down the road in the early evening. " I wonder he never took a fancy to her. I s'pose folks'll say I'm an old fool, but I don't care." While he sat there Charley was telling Lucy that his father had keener eyes than he had given him credit for, for he seemed to understand how matters stood perfectly. And what he told her after that is none of your business or mine, though I will say that I feel sure it had nothing to do with Lucy's becoming " one of the family." About four o'clock on Saturday afternoon Mr Kimball, in his best coat, and with a pail of strawberries, knocked at Mrs Keene's door. " Good afternoon," said the widow, as she let him in, with a charming suspicion of a blush in her face. " Here's some berries," said he, awkwardly presenting his offering. / "Lucy said the hens had played the mischief with yours, and as I have plenty, why, you may just as well as not have as many of 'em as you need." " I'm a thousand times obliged to you." By that time the farmer had got to the sitting-room door. Who should he see there but Charley, seemingly very much at home, as he held worsted for Lucy to wind. " I managed to get an invitation to tea, too," laughed Charley. " You kept it very sly, but I wasn't to be cheated out of my share of strawberry preserves." Then Charley and Lucy looked at each, other and laughed, and the farmer felt his face grow red. " Just see what he's brought us," said the widow, displaying the berries. "If you'll help pick 'em, Lucy, we'll have a shortcake for tea. I remember how fond you used to be of strawberry shortcake years ago," and the widow smiled at the farmer till there was a dimple in each cheek. Her words brought vividly back to him his happiest experience of a quarter of a century previous. " I remember, too," he responded. Then Lucy and her mother went out. " I've spoken to her about being one of the family, and she's willing," said Charley. " I don't understand," said the farmer, in great bewilderment, growing hot, then cold. " Why, you know what you said the other night, when you told me you thought of getting her mother for housekeeper," explained Charley. " I supposed you understood, from what you said, that Lucy and I intended to be married. It's all «ettled." Mr Kimball sat speechless, What ha

thought of in the next five minutes could not be described. His brain worked with a speed and intensity to which it was quite ■unaccustomed. . " I—lI — I hope you'll be happy," he stammered at last, feeling that something was expected of himi and amiably desirous of maintaining, as far as he could, the genial and happy spirit of the occasion. " I'm sure we will," said Charley. " I hope you will, too." Pretty soon the widow came in. " The shortcake's baking," she said. " Lucy said she'd pick the berries and set the table, and sent me in to play lady and entertain the company." Charley watched his opportunity and slipped into the kitchen. The two more than middle-aged couple were thus left to entertain each other. The sly boy Cupid never had a better opportunity given him 1 The farmer had made up his mind again. If he couldn't have Lucy, he'd have her mother,' if he could get her. " Come to think it alLover," he told himself, " that was the best plan by all odds." He wondered how he could have been foolish enough to think of having a'girl of twenty-one or two. The idea was ridiculous. " What's the use of waiting 1 " thought he. " It might as well be settled now as any time." " Hester," he began, getting red again, " Charley and Lucy are going to get married. Why shouldn't we ? " * | Mr Kimball blurted out the question with startling emphasis. " Why, Mr Kimball," cried the widow, blushing so rosily that he thought she was prettier than her daughter. 1 " I came over on purpose to ask you," he said, telling a most outrageous fib. " I hope you haven't any objections." When Lucy came in, half an hour later, to say tea was ready, the farmer rose up, blushing like a girl, and jerked his thumb toward the widow ; then said, in a voice that shook a little — "That's your mother, Lucy; I mean she's Mrs Kimball, or going to be. It's all settled." " I s'pose I may kiss my father then," said Lucy, and plumped a kiss on the father's lips, who said she might give him another for her father-in-law while she was about it, if she'd no objections. " One will answer for both," said Lucy. Then the farmer gave his arm to the woman he had meant to marry five-and-twenty years ago, and led her out to tea. He has never regretted that matters turned out as they did. " Lucy can't be beat for a daughter," he tells himself ' " but I don't want any better wife than her mother makes."