AFTER HARVEST.

All through those four or five weeks, at every opportunity, the partners planned the future of their waif. In the harvest-field, when they had a moment together, one would say to the other:

"We'll let her stay two years if she likes it, eh?"

"Certainly; she needn't come back till she wants to. We may be rich enough to sell out then, and move back ourselves. I'm gittin' tired o' this prairie myself. If we could sell, we'd put her through a whole course o' sprouts."

"You bet! Sell when you can find a buyer. I'll sign the deed."

"All right."

And then they would go to work again toiling and planning for the future. Every day during August these men worked with the energy of demons, up early in the morning and out late at night, harvesting their crop. All day the header clattered to and fro with Bert or Ans astride the rudder, a cloud of dust rolling up from the ground, out of which the painted flanges of the reel flashed like sword-strokes. All day, and day after day; while the gulls sailed and soared in the hazy air and the larks piped from the dun grass, these human beings, covered with grime and sweat, worked in heat and parching wind. And never for an hour did they forget their little waif and her needs. And she did her part in the house. She rose as early as they and worked almost as late. It was miraculous, they admitted.

One night toward the last of the harvest they were returning along the road from a neighboring farm, where they had been to head some late wheat. The tired horses with down-hung heads and swinging traces were walking sullenly but swiftly along the homeward road, the wagon rumbling sleepily; the stars were coming out in the east, while yet the rose and amethyst of the fallen sun lighted the western sky. Through the air, growing moist, came the sound of reapers still going. Men were shouting blithely, while voices of women and children came from the cabins, where yellow lights began to twinkle.

Anson and Bert, blackened with dust and perspiration and weary to the point of listlessness, sat with elbows on knees, talking in low, slow tones on the never-failing topic, crops and profits. Their voices chimed with the sound of the wagon.

"There's the light," broke out Ans, rousing himself and the team; "Flaxen's got supper all ready for us. She's a regular little Trojan, that girl is. They ain't many girls o' fourteen that 'u'd stay there contented all day alone an' keep all the whole business in apple-pie order. She'll get her pay some day."

"We'll try to pay her; but say, ol' man, ain't it about time to open up our plans to her?" "Wal, yes; it is. You kind o' start the thing to-night, an' we'll have it over with."

As they drove up, Flaxen came to the door. "Hello, boys! What makes ye so late?"

"Finishin' up a field, babe. All done."

She clapped her hands and danced up and down.

"Goody! all done at last. Well, yank them horses out o' their harnesses an' come to biscuits. They're jest sizzlin' hot."

"All right. We'll be there in about two jerks of a lamb's tail in fly-time. Bert, grab a tug; I'm hungry as a wolf."

It was about the first of September and the nights were getting cool, and the steaming supper seemed like a feast to the chilled and stiffened men coming in a little later and sitting down with the sound of the girl's cheery voice in their ears. The tea was hot; so were the biscuits. The pyramid of hot mashed potato had a lump of half-melted butter in the hollow top, and there were canned peaches and canned salmon.

"Yes: we're about finished up harvestin'," said Bert, as they settled themselves at the table, "an' it's about time to talk about gittin' you off to school."

"Don't worry about that. It ain't no great job, I reckon. I can git ready in about seventeen jiffies, stop-watch time."

"Not if you are goin' away off to some city in the East—"

"Yes: but I ain't, y' see."

"Oh, yes, you are. Bert an' I've be'n talkin' it all over f'r the last three weeks. We're goin' to send you back to St. Peter to the seminary."

"I guess not, pap. I'd like to know what you think you're a-doin' sendin' me 'way back there. Boomtown's good enough fer me."

"There, there, Flaxie; don't git mad. Y' see, we think they ain't anythin' good enough for you. Nothin' too good for a girl that stays to home an' cooks f'r two old cusses—"

"You ain't cusses! You're jest as good as you can be; but I ain't a-goin'—there!"

"Why not?"

"'Cause I ain't; that's why."

"Why, don't y' wan' to go back there where the people have nice houses, an' where they's a good—"

"Well, I don't know enough; that's why. I ain't goin' back to no seminary to be laughed at 'cause I don't know beans."

"But you do," laughed Bert, with an attempt to lighten the gloom—"you know canned beans."

"They'd laff at me, I know, an' call me a little Norsk." She was ready to cry.

"I'll bet they won't, not when they see our new dress an' our new gold watch—dress jest the color o' crow's-foot grass, watch thirty carats fine. I'd laugh to see 'em callin' my babe names then!"

And so by bribing, coaxing, and lying they finally obtained her tearful consent. They might not have succeeded even then had it not been for a young lady in Boomtown who was going back to the same school, and who offered to take her in charge. But there was hardly a day that she did not fling herself down into a chair and cry out:

"I jest ain't goin'. I'm all right here, an' I don't see why you can't let me stay here. I ain't made no fuss. Seems as if you thought it was fun f'r me to go 'way off there where I don't know anythin' an' where I don't know anybody."

But having come to a conclusion, the men were relentless. They hired sewing-girls, and skirmished back and forth between Boomtown and the farm like mad. Their steady zeal made up for her moody and fitful enthusiasm. However, she grew more resigned to the idea as the days wore on toward the departure, though her fits of dark and unusual musing were alarming to Anson, who feared a desperate retreat at the last moment.

He took her over to see Miss Holt one day, but not before he had prepared the way.

"I s'pose things are in purty good shape around this seminary?" he asked.

"Oh, yes, indeed. There are three large buildings; libraries, picture-galleries, and music-rooms. The boarding-halls are carpeted and the parlors are really elegant."

"Uh-hum!" commented Anson. "Well, now, I'm goin' to bring my girl over to see you, an' I guess it 'u'd be jest as well if you didn't mention these fineries an' things. Y' see, she's afraid of all such things. It 'u'd be better to tell her that things weren't very gorgeous there—about like the graded school in Boomtown, say. She ain't used to these music-halls an' things. Kind o' make her think St. Peter ain't no great shakes, anyhow."

"I see," laughed the quick-witted girl. And she succeeded in removing a good deal of Flaxen's dread of the seminary.

"Wal, babe, to-morrow," said Anson, as they were eating supper, and he was astonished to see her break out in weeping.

"Why don't you keep harpin' away on that the whole while?" she exclaimed. "Can't you leave me alone a minute? Seems to me you're jest crazy to git rid o' me." "Oh, we are," put in Bert. "We're jest lickin' our chops to git back to sour flapjacks an' soggy bread. Jest seems as though we couldn't wait till to-morrow noon, to begin doing our own cookin' again."

This cleared the air a little, and they spent the rest of the evening without saying very much directly upon the departure. The two men sat up late after Flaxen had gone to bed. There was the trunk and valise which would not let them forget even for a moment what was coming on the morrow. Every time Anson looked at her he sighed and tried to swallow the lump in his throat.

"Say, Bert, let's let her stay if she wants to," he said suddenly after they had been in silence for a long time.

"Don't make a cussed fool of yourself, Ans," growled Bert, who saw that heroic measures were necessary. "Go to bed an' don't you say another word; we've got to take our medicine like men."