 A Real New England Girl by Anna I. Parsons 1. The Shower 2. Oxford County 3. The Stranger and the Girl 4. The Youth and the Girl 5. Pansy and Richard Go Trading 6. The Marvelous Storyteller 7. The Dinner 8. The The Minister Comes for Tea 9. Pansy's Father 10. Pansy and Her Mother 11. Poland Springs 12. The Birthday Cake 13. Ned Patterson Comes for a Visit 14. The Blue Berrying Party 15. The Beginning of Wisdom 16. The Tempted and the Penitent 17. The Concert 18. Stanley's Ride 19. The Bench by the Wayside 20. The Banker and the Widow 21. The Bag of Nuts 22. How They Kept Thanksgiving at Little Farm 23. Hardly a Merry Christimas 24. A Call Down and a Caller 25. The Pride of Mrs. Bradford 26. A Happy New Year 27. Amusement and Winter Sport 28. Kim 29. Richard, the Lion Hearted 30. A Tour of the White Mountains 31. Talking Over the Trip with Henry Bright 32. Thoughts That Lie Too Deep for Words 33. Economics 34. His Toast 35. The Busy Haunts of Man 36. Christmas in New York 37. The Last Night of Their Visit 38. The Language Understood by All 39. Sugaring Off 40. Correspondence 41. Commencement 42. Conclusion Afterward     |
The Shower "Lions roared the dreadful thunder, This rain a deluge showers." --Cherry All the morning great fleecy clouds banked the western sky, and gradually these adjusted themselves into the dark nimbus cloud, sure evidence that a storm was coming. Sharp streaks of lightning rent the sky as if the wrath of the Almighty were at high pitch and being visited upon the town of Paris. The thunder was almost deafening and reverberated through the hills like detonating guns of heavy artillery. Rain was falling in the distance, and hastened by the wind, the storm cloud swept eastward with indescribable rapidity until Pennessewasee Lake and Horse Hill had disappeared from view and all the plains land was lost in multitudinous drops At Little Farm there was great hurrying and bustle, for some choice hay, dried and cocked, was still in the field, and the problem of getting this housed before the storm broke was giving all hands much concern. A girl in a blue gingham dress hurriedly threw open a gate, and an instant later a huge load of hay, drawn by horses that reeked with foam, passed through and raced toward shelter. The girl ran after the load and disappeared with it through the barn door just as great drops of rain began pelting her curly head. Soon the storm broke in all the fury of a summer gale, roads were transformed into rivers, wind shrieked about the barn and played havoc with foliage and fruit, white birches at the edge of the forest twisted and quivered, bending their lofty heads to the ground. Lightning flashed in fearful proximity to the farm buildings, hardly three rods away, taking the top from a beautiful pine, and thundering in mad glee at the destruction wrought. A moment's lull, and again the fearful flash and crash that made stout hearts almost stop beating. The powerful horses, released from the rack where but a moment before they had done such efficient service, stood trembling in a shed, now and then uttering a low neigh appalling to human ears. After they had entered the barn, the girl's brother, a lad of fourteen years, climbed down from the load and joined her on a provender box, where they huddled together for some moments in absolute silence. Then, after a whispered colloquy, they moved quietly about, and again seated themselves, but this time at some distance apart. The big barn door had been left slightly open to permit light to enter, and as the boy and girl again seated themselves, a youth in rain coat and cap, carrying fishing tackle, entered through the narrow space. He dropped the rod and basket and removed his cap when he saw the girl and boy seated on what appeared to be a bench covered with a horse blanket. They eyed him keenly, but said nothing until he asked in a to them strange accent, "May I stay until the shower is over?" "Certainly," they replied in a chorus, "won't you take a seat?" As he attempted to do so, the boy and girl stood up, and the youth found himself prostrate on the barn floor, with the boy and girl laughing merrily. "That was intended for the hired man," said the girl, "and you came just in time to deprive him of the pleasure." The youth quickly scrambled to his feet and asked good naturedly, "Is that what you call a Down East trick?" "That's what we call a collapsible ambuscade," answered the girl, "but it doesn't often work out so well." "Come up from the village?," asked the boy. "No, I am Stanley Winthrop, and we have come to spend the summer at father's old home, just below here." "Oh," said the boy and girl. After a moment the girl added, "We know the farmer and his wife who live at the Winthrop place. Jerry Pike always has fine horses to drive." "My mother and sister and the servants are there now. We came from New York and arrived late yesterday afternoon." "Oh!" said they boy and girl. "Father is coming, and we are going to stay until September, and when we return this fall, I shall enter college." The expression on the girl's face changed to one of interest in the youth. She looked straight at him and asked quite softly, "You are going to college?" "Yes, to Columbia. I was honor man in my class at the preparatory school, and I hope to make a good record at Columbia." "It takes lots of money to go to college," said the girl thoughtfully. "Only a couple of thousand or so a year," said the youth. The girl almost gasped. "That is more than the farm and everything on it is worth," she said. "Some fellows get through for less. Father didn't go to college at all, and he is a lightning calculator. If he wants to multiply numbers of four or five figures each he does it instantly in his head, and will always give the correct result." "Is he a professor?" asked the girl. "No, he is a banker," replied the youth. "Is your sister going to college?" "No, Julia goes to a young ladies' school in New York. She is only fifteen, and says she does not care to go to college." "I am fifteen also." "You don't look so old as Julia." The youth carefully surveyed the girl from the top of her curly head to the coarse shoes and stockings she wore on her feet. "I was fifteen on the 30th day of June and Richard will be fourteen on the 15th day of August. We are both in High School. I have two years more and Richard has three years more." The youth surveyed the boy and girl critically. "You look to be of the same age," he observed. "Mother says Pansy is too active to grow," said the boy. "Well, my polo ponies are small, but there's lots of snap to them." Again the youth glanced at the trim little figure that gazed up at him with wide open eyes of clear blue. "Come into the house and see mother and Ruth," said the girl. "If we all run fast, we won't get very wet." The boy and girl led the way through the open space in the doorway, and the youth found, even with his longer legs, it was some task to keep pace with them in covering the few rods from the barn to the house. Across the pump platform and into the woodshed went the boy and girl, and from thence into the kitchen. A matronly woman, busily engaged in cooking dinner, looked up as the three entered. "Mother, this is Stanley Winthrop," said the girl. "He and his mother and sister and the hired girls are going to spend the summer at the Winthrop place. Isn't it nice that lovely big house is going to be occupied after having only Jerry Pike and his wife there for the last three years?" The woman looked intently at the youth, as if trying to call to mind faces of by-gone days. At the end of that long gaze, a smile lighted her face, and she extended a courteous greeting. "You are only a little like the Winthrops I used to know," she said. "Your hair and eyes are darker and your skin is whiter, and you haven't their long, slender build." "Mother is of Holland Dutch and Huguenot French stock," said the youth, "while father, as I guess you know, is of Puritan English descent, so I am a product of the melting pot." "You can put your cap and coat on the rack there, and take a seat in the next room," said the woman. Turning to the girl she said, "Pansy, are you wet? Go up stairs and put on dry shoes and stockings and a dry dress, and then you can set the table." The girl vanished, and the boy led the way into a large living room where he soon engaged the youth in a game of checkers. When the girl returned, she consulted with her mother, and then, approaching the youth, said quite decidedly, "You are to stay for dinner. Richard will show you where to wash." "Thank you Miss - Miss Pansy," he said with urbanity. As the boy and the youth were making their ablutions, the boy called out to his sister, "It just cracked over Singepole Mountain, Pansy." "Now the shower is surely over," said the girl, coming with a platter in her hand and gazing out of the window. Then she continued in explanation to the youth, "Every thunder shower we have ends with a fearful flash right up over Singepole into the zenith, and then it doesn't lightning any more; old Thor has used up all his electricity." At dinner the youth met the remaining members of the family -- a large brawny man, Mr. William Alden by name, whom the children addressed as Uncle Will, and a tall, graceful young woman, wearing eye-glasses, who was introduced as sister Ruth. Ruth, he learned, had graduated from college, and was assistant principal at the High School. Mrs. Bradford (for such was the family's name) said grace, and Mr. Alden helped every one to a bountiful supply of vegetables and meat. These the boy and girl ate with the greatest relish, and when every one else had finished, they continued, as if there were no limit to their capacity. "Pansy, are you going to eat any more?" asked the boy at length. "I think I will not, but if you want more, I will keep my pie until you are ready," she answered. When dinner was over, the table was quickly cleared, the dishes washed, and then the family all returned to the living room, the mother taking up some sewing, Ruth engaged in basket weaving, and the girl sat beside her brother on a small settee while they plied the youth with questions about the great city from whence he had come, occasionally astounding him with some remark that showed considerable knowledge of it. It was nearly five o'clock when he arose to go, and the boy and girl were urgent that he come soon again and tell them more of his life and travels. "I have had a very pleasant time, and thank you for it," he said, with a courtly bow to Mrs. Bradford as he backed out of the front door. They boy and girl stood at the window and watched him as he walked through the avenue of maples and disappeared over the hill above which they could see the chimneys and roof of his handsome summer home. A little later, Mrs. Bradford, looking into the kitchen, saw her two young offspring bowing profoundly to each other and remarking as they did so, "I have had a very pleasant time, and thank you for it." Click Here for Chapter 2 |