HOW IT CAME ABOUT.

“Be sure to look us up when you come to the city.”

This invitation was extended with that delightful affectation of heartiness that a man can assume when he believes that the person invited will never avail himself of the courtesy. Fortunately for the purpose of this story, Master Philip Hayn, whom Mr. Tramlay had asked to call, was too young and too unaccustomed to the usages of polite society to regard the remark in any but its actual sense.

It would have seemed odd to any one knowing the two men and their respective stations in life. Tramlay was a New York merchant, well known and of fair standing in the iron trade; Hayn was son of the farmer at whose house the Tramlay family had passed the summer. When the Tramlays determined to exchange the late summer dust of the country for the early autumn dust of the city, it was Philip who drove the old-fashioned carryall that transported them from the farm to the railway-station. The head of the merchant’s family was attired like a{6} well-to-do business-man; Philip’s coat, vest, and trousers were remnants of three different suits, none of recent cut. The contrast was made sharper by the easy condescension of the older man and the rather awkward deference of Philip, and it moved Mrs. Tramlay to whisper, as her husband helped her aboard the train,—

“Suppose he were to take you at your word, Edgar?”

The merchant shrugged his shoulders slightly, and replied, “Worse men have called upon us, my dear, without being made to feel unwelcome.”

“I think ’twould be loads of fun,” remarked Miss Lucia Tramlay.

Then the three, followed by smaller members of the family, occupied as many seats near windows, and nodded smiling adieus as the train started.

Philip returned their salutations, except the smiles: somehow, the departure of all these people made him feel sober. He followed the train with his eyes until it was out of sight; then he stepped into the old carryall and drove briskly homeward, declining to rein up and converse with the several sidewalk-loungers who manifested a willingness to converse about the departed guests. When he reached the outer edge of the little village he allowed the horses to relapse into their normal gait, which was a slow walk; he let the reins hang loosely, he leaned forward until his elbows rested upon his knees and his hat-brim seemed inclined to scrape acquaintance with the dash-board, then he slowly repeated,—

“ ‘Be sure to look us up when you come to the city.’ You may be sure that I will.”{7}

The advent of the Tramlays at Hayn Farm had been productive of new sensations to all concerned. The younger members of the Tramlay family had at first opposed the plan of a summer on a farm: they had spent one season at Mount Desert, and part of another at Saratoga, and, as Lucia had been “out” a year, and had a sister who expected early admission to a metropolitan collection of rosebuds, against a summer in the country—the rude, common, real country—the protests had been earnest. But the head of the family had said he could not afford anything better; trade was dull, a man had to live within his income, etc. Besides, their mother’s health was not equal to a summer in society: they would find that statement a convenient excuse when explaining the family plans to their friends.

Arrived at Hayn Farm, the objections of the juvenile Tramlays quickly disappeared. Everything was new and strange; nothing was repellent, and much was interesting and amusing: what more could they have hoped for anywhere,—even in Paris? The farm was good and well managed, the rooms neat and comfortable though old-fashioned, and the people intelligent, though Miss Lucia pronounced them “awfully funny.” The head of the family was one of the many farmers who “took boarders” to give his own family an opportunity to see people somewhat unlike their own circle of acquaintances,—an opportunity which they seemed unlikely ever to find in any other way, had he been able to choose. The senior Hayn would have put into his spare rooms a union Theological Seminary professor{8} with his family, but, as no such person responded to his modest advertisement, he accepted an iron-merchant and family instead.

Strawberries were just ripening when the Tramlays appeared at Hayn Farm, and the little Tramlays were allowed to forage at will on the capacious old strawberry-bed; then came other berries, in the brambles of which they tore their clothes and colored their lips for hours at a time. Then cherries reddened on a dozen old trees which the children were never reminded had not been planted for their especial benefit. Then the successive yield of an orchard was theirs, so far as they could absorb it. Besides, there was a boat on a pond, and another on a little stream that emptied into the ocean not far away; and although the Hayn boys always seemed to have work to do, they frequently could be persuaded to accompany the children to keep them from drowning themselves.

For Mrs. Tramlay, who really was an invalid, there were long drives to be taken, over roads some of which were well shaded and others commanding fine views, and it was so restful to be able to drive without special preparation in the way of dress,—without, too, the necessity of scrutinizing each approaching vehicle for fear it might contain some acquaintance who ought to be recognized.

As for the head of the family, who spent only Saturdays and Sundays with his family, he seemed to find congenial society in the head of the house,—a fact which at first gave his wife great uneasiness and annoyance.{9}

“Edgar,” Mrs. Tramlay would say, “you know Mr. Hayn is only a common farmer.”

“He’s respectable, and thoroughly understands his own business,” the husband replied,—“two reasons, either of which is good enough to make me like a man, unless he happens to be disagreeable. ‘Common farmer’! Why, I’m only a common iron-merchant, my dear.”

“That’s different,” protested Mrs. Tramlay.

“Is it? Well, don’t try to explain how, little woman: ’twill be sure to give you a three days’ headache.”

So Tramlay continued to devote hours to chat with his host, pressing high-priced cigars on him, and sharing the farmer’s pipes and tobacco in return. He found that Hayn, like any other farmer with brains, had done some hard thinking in the thousands of days when his hands were employed at common work, and that his views of affairs in general, outside of the iron trade, were at least as sound as Tramlay’s own, or those of any one whom Tramlay knew in the city.

The one irreconcilable member of the family was the elder daughter, Lucia. She was the oldest child, so she had her own way; she was pretty, so she had always been petted; she was twenty, so she knew everything that she thought worth knowing. She had long before reconstructed the world (in her own mind) just as it should be, from the stand-point that it ought to exist solely for her benefit. Not bad-tempered, on the contrary, cheerful and full of high spirits, she was nevertheless in perpetual protest{10} against everything that was not exactly as she would have it, and not all the manners that careful breeding could impart could restrain the unconscious insolence peculiar to young and self-satisfied natures. She would laugh loudly at table at Mrs. Hayn’s way of serving an omelet, tell Mrs. Hayn’s husband that his Sunday coat looked “so funny,” express her mind freely, before the whole household, at the horrid way in which the half-grown Hayn boys wore their hair, and had no hesitation in telling Philip Hayn, two years her senior, that when he came in from the field in his brown flannel shirt and gray felt hat he looked like an utter guy. But the Hayns were human, and, between pity and admiration, humanity long ago resolved to endure anything from a girl—if she is pretty.

Slowly the Hayns came to like their boarders; more slowly, but just as surely, the Tramlays learned to like their hosts. Mutual respect began at the extremes of both families. Mrs. Tramlay, being a mother and a housekeeper, became so interested in the feminine half of the family’s head that she ceased to criticise her husband’s interest in the old farmer. The Tramlay children wondered at, and then admired, the wisdom and skill of their country companions in matters not understood by city children. Last of all, Lucia found herself heartily respecting the farmer’s son, and forgetting his uncouth dress and his awkwardness of manner in her wonder at his general courtesy, and his superior knowledge in some directions where she supposed she had gone as far as possible. She had gone through a finishing-school{11} of the most approved New York type, yet Philip knew more of languages and history and science than she, when they chanced—never through her fault—to converse on such dry subjects; he knew more flowers than she had ever seen in a florist’s shop in the city; and once when she had attempted to decorate the rather bare walls of the farm-house parlor he corrected her taste with a skill which she was obliged to admit. There was nothing strange about it, except to Lucia; for city seminaries and country high schools use the same text-books, and magazines and newspapers that give attention to home decorations go everywhere; nevertheless, it seemed to Lucia that she had discovered a new order of being, and by the time she had been at Hayn Farm a month she found herself occasionally surprised into treating Philip almost as if he were a gentleman.

Philip’s interest in Lucia was of much quicker development. He had had no prejudices to overcome; besides, the eye is more easily approached and satisfied than the intellect, and Lucia had acceptably filled many an eye more exacting than the young farmer’s. There were pretty girls in homes near Hayn Farm, and more in the village near by, but none of them were——well, none were exactly like Lucia. Philip studied her face; it was neither Roman nor Grecian, and he was obliged to confess that the proportions of her features were not so good as those of some girls in the neighborhood. Her figure suggested neither perfect grace nor perfect strength; and yet whatever she did was gracefully done, and her attire, whether plain or costly, seemed part of{12} herself,—a peculiarity that he had never observed among girls born in the vicinity. He soon discovered that she did not know everything, but whatever she did know she talked of so glibly that he could not help enjoying the position of listener. She did not often show earnestness about anything that to him was more than trifling, but when she did go out of her customary mood for a moment or two she was saintly: he could think of no other word that would do it justice. He had not liked her manner to his own mother, for at first the girl treated that estimable woman as a servant, and did it in the manner which makes most servants detest most young ladies; but had she not afterward, with her own tiny fingers, made a new Sunday bonnet for Mrs. Hayn, and had not his mother, in genuine gratitude, kissed her? Should he bear malice for what his mother had forgiven?

The young man merely admired and respected Lucia: of that he was very sure. Regard more tender he would have blamed himself for, first, because love implied matrimony, which he did not intend to venture into until he had seen more of the world and perhaps gone to college; secondly, because he did not imagine that any such sentiment would be reciprocated. He came of a family that through generations of hard experience had learned to count the cost of everything, even the affections, like most of the better country-people in the older States. He had also an aversion to marriage between persons of different classes. Lucia was to him an acquaintance,—not even a friend,—whom he highly esteemed; that was all.{13}

His father thought differently, and one day when the two were in the woodland belonging to the farm, loading a wagon with wood to be stored near the house for winter use, the old man said, abruptly,—

“I hope you’re not growin’ too fond of that young woman, Phil?”

“No danger,” the youth answered, promptly, though as he raised his head his eyes did not meet his father’s.

“You seem to know who I mean, anyhow,” said the old man, after throwing another stick of wood upon the wagon.

“Not much trouble to do that,” Phil replied. “There’s only one young woman.”

The father laughed softly; the son blushed violently. Then the father sighed.

“That’s one of the signs.”

“What’s a sign?—sign of what?” said Phil, affecting wonder not quite skilfully.

“When ‘there’s only one young woman’ it’s a sign the young man who thinks so is likely to consider her the only one worth thinkin’ about.”

“Oh, pshaw!” exclaimed Phil, attacking the wood-pile with great industry.

“Easy, old boy; ’twasn’t the wood-pile that said it. Brace up your head; you’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. Besides, your old father can see through the back of your head, anyhow: he’s been practisin’ at it ever since you were born.”

Phil seated himself on the wood-pile, looked in the direction where his father was not, and said,—

“I like Lucia very much. She’s a new face; she’s{14} different from the girls about here. She’s somebody new to talk to, and she can talk about something beside crops, and cows, and who is sick, and last Sunday’s sermon, and next month’s sewing-society. That’s all.”

“Yes,” said the old man. “It doesn’t seem much, does it? Enough to have made millions of bad matches, though, and spoiled millions of good ones.”

Phil was silent for a moment; then he said, with a laugh,—

“Father, I believe you’re as bad as old Mrs. Tripsey, whom mother’s always laughing at because she thinks a man’s in love if he sees her daughter home from prayer-meeting.”

“P’r’aps so, my boy,—p’r’aps,—and maybe as bad as you, for every time there’s a bad thunder-storm you’re afraid the lightning’ll strike the barn. Do you know why? It’s because your finest colt is there. Do you see?”

Phil did not reply, so the old man continued:

“I’ll make it clearer to you. You’re my finest colt; there’s more lightnings in a girl’s eyes than I ever saw in the sky, you don’t know when it’s going to strike, and when it hits you you’re gone before you know it.”

“Much obliged. I’ll see to it that I keep myself well insulated,” said Phil.

Nevertheless, Phil studied Lucia whenever he had opportunity,—studied her face when she read, her fingers when they busied themselves with fancy work, her manner with different persons, as it changed according to her idea of the deservings of{15} those with whom she talked. At church he regarded her intently from the beginning of the service to its end, analyzing such portions of prayer, hymn, or sermon as did not seem to meet her views. He even allowed his gaze to follow her when she looked more than an instant at other young women, in the ignorance of his masculine heart wondering which of the features of these damsels specially interested her; his mother could have told him that Lucia was merely looking at bonnets and other articles of attire, instead of at their wearers. He wondered what she thought; he told himself where her character was at fault, and how it might be improved. In short, he had ample mental leisure, and she was the newest and consequently the least understood of his various subjects of contemplation.

It is impossible to devote a great deal of thought to any subject without becoming deeply interested, even if it be unsightly, tiresome, and insignificant. Lucia was none of these, for she was a pretty girl. It is equally impossible to see a familiar subject of thought in the act of disappearance without a personal sense of impending loneliness, and a wild desire to snatch it back or at least go in search of it. Therefore Philip Hayn needed not to be in love, or even to think himself so, to be conscious of a great vacancy in his mind as the train bore the Tramlay family rapidly toward their city home, and to determine that he would avail himself of the invitation which the head of the family had extended.