The Third Violet | Page 3

kitchen and dove from time to time
into the cellar. They called to each other in happy voices.
Steps sounded on the line of stones that led from the door toward the
barn, and a shout came from the darkness. "Well, William, home again,
hey?" Hawker's grey father came stamping genially into the room. "I
thought maybe you got lost. I was comin' to hunt you," he said,
grinning, as they stood with gripped hands. "What made you so late?"
While Hawker confronted the supper the family sat about and
contemplated him with shining eyes. His sisters noted his tie and
propounded some questions concerning it. His mother watched to make
sure that he should consume a notable quantity of the preserved
cherries. "He used to be so fond of 'em when he was little," she said.
"Oh, Will," cried the younger sister, "do you remember Lil' Johnson?
Yeh? She's married. Married las' June."
"Is the boy's room all ready, mother?" asked the father.
"We fixed it this mornin'," she said.
"And do you remember Jeff Decker?" shouted the elder sister. "Well,
he's dead. Yep. Drowned, pickerel fishin'--poor feller!"
"Well, how are you gitting along, William?" asked the father. "Sell
many pictures?"

"An occasional one."
"Saw your illustrations in the May number of Perkinson's." The old
man paused for a moment, and then added, quite weakly, "Pretty good."
"How's everything about the place?"
"Oh, just about the same--'bout the same. The colt run away with me
last week, but didn't break nothin', though. I was scared, because I had
out the new buggy--we got a new buggy--but it didn't break nothin'. I'm
goin' to sell the oxen in the fall; I don't want to winter 'em. And then in
the spring I'll get a good hoss team. I rented th' back five-acre to John
Westfall. I had more'n I could handle with only one hired hand. Times
is pickin' up a little, but not much--not much."
"And we got a new school-teacher," said one of the girls.
"Will, you never noticed my new rocker," said the old mother, pointing.
"I set it right where I thought you'd see it, and you never took no notice.
Ain't it nice? Father bought it at Monticello for my birthday. I thought
you'd notice it first thing."
When Hawker had retired for the night, he raised a sash and sat by the
window smoking. The odour of the woods and the fields came sweetly
to his nostrils. The crickets chanted their hymn of the night. On the
black brow of the mountain he could see two long rows of twinkling
dots which marked the position of Hemlock Inn.
CHAPTER III.
Hawker had a writing friend named Hollanden. In New York
Hollanden had announced his resolution to spend the summer at
Hemlock Inn. "I don't like to see the world progressing," he had said; "I
shall go to Sullivan County for a time."
In the morning Hawker took his painting equipment, and after
manoeuvring in the fields until he had proved to himself that he had no
desire to go toward the inn, he went toward it. The time was only nine

o'clock, and he knew that he could not hope to see Hollanden before
eleven, as it was only through rumour that Hollanden was aware that
there was a sunrise and an early morning.
Hawker encamped in front of some fields of vivid yellow stubble on
which trees made olive shadows, and which was overhung by a
china-blue sky and sundry little white clouds. He fiddled away
perfunctorily at it. A spectator would have believed, probably, that he
was sketching the pines on the hill where shone the red porches of
Hemlock Inn.
Finally, a white-flannel young man walked into the landscape. Hawker
waved a brush. "Hi, Hollie, get out of the colour-scheme!"
At this cry the white-flannel young man looked down at his feet
apprehensively. Finally he came forward grinning. "Why, hello,
Hawker, old boy! Glad to find you here." He perched on a boulder and
began to study Hawker's canvas and the vivid yellow stubble with the
olive shadows. He wheeled his eyes from one to the other. "Say,
Hawker," he said suddenly, "why don't you marry Miss Fanhall?"
Hawker had a brush in his mouth, but he took it quickly out, and said,
"Marry Miss Fanhall? Who the devil is Miss Fanhall?"
Hollanden clasped both hands about his knee and looked thoughtfully
away. "Oh, she's a girl."
"She is?" said Hawker.
"Yes. She came to the inn last night with her sister-in-law and a small
tribe of young Fanhalls. There's six of them, I think."
"Two," said Hawker, "a boy and a girl."
"How do you--oh, you must have come up with them. Of course. Why,
then you saw her."
"Was that her?"