"Nary the ghost of a signal!"he said."Now we come to Sunday before last.I only intimated,vaguely,that a hint of where I stood would be a comfort--and played Jonah.The whale swallowed me at a gulp,and for all my inches,never batted an eye.You see,a few days before I showed her a letter from my brother Jerry,because I thought it might interest her.There was something in it to which I had paid little or no attention,about my going to the city and beginning work in his law office;to cap that,evidently you had mentioned before her our prize piece of family tinware.There was a culmination like a thunder clap in a January sky.She said everything that was on her mind about a man of my size and ability doing the work I am,and then she said I must change my occupation before I came again.""And for answer you've split the echoes with some shrill,abominable air,and plowed,before her very eyes,for a week!"Then Laddie laughed.
"Do you know,"he said;"that's a good one on me!It never occurred to me that she would not be familiar with that air,and understand its application.Do you mean to crush me further by telling me that all my perfectly lovely vocalizing and whistling was lost?""It was a dem irritating,challenging sort of thing,"said Mr.
Pryor."I listened to it by the hour,myself,trying to make out exactly what it did mean.It seemed to combine defiance with pleading,and through and over all ran a note of glee that was really quite charming.""You have quoted a part of it,literally,"said Laddie."`A note of glee'--the cry of a glad heart,at peace with all the world,busy with congenial work.""I shouldn't have thought you'd have been so particularly joyful.""Oh,the joy was in the music,"said Laddie."That was a whistle to keep up my courage.The joy was in the song,not in me!Last week was black enough for me to satisfy the most exacting pessimist.""I wish you might have seen the figure you cut!That fine team,flower bedecked,and the continuous concert!""But I did!"cried Laddie."We have mirrors.That song can't be beaten.I know this team is all right,and I'm not dwarfed or disfigured.That was the pageant of summer passing in review.
It represented the tilling of the soil;the sowing of seed,garnering to come later.You buy corn and wheat,don't you?
They are vastly necessary.Much more so than the settling of quarrels that never should have taken place.Do you think your daughter found the spectacle at all moving?""Damn you,sir,what I should do,is to lay this whip across your shoulders!"cried Mr.Pryor.
But if you will believe it,he was laughing again.
"I prefer that you don't,"said Laddie,"or on Ranger either.
See how he likes being gentled."
Then he straightened and drew a deep breath.
"Mr.Pryor,"he said,"as man to man,I have got this to say to you--and you may use your own discretion about repeating it to your daughter:I can offer her six feet of as sound manhood as you can find on God's footstool.I never in my whole life have had enough impure blood in my body to make even one tiny eruption on my skin.I never have been ill a day in my life.I never have touched a woman save as I lifted and cared for my mother,and hers,or my sisters.As to my family and education she can judge for herself.I offer her the first and only love of my heart.She objects to farming,because she says it is dirty,offensive work.There are parts of it that are dirty.Thank God,it only soils the body,and that can be washed.To delve and to dive into,and to study and to brood over the bigger half of the law business of any city is to steep your brain in,and smirch your soul with,such dirt as I would die before I'd make an occupation of touching.Will you kindly tell her that word for word,and that I asked you to?"Mr.Pryor was standing before I saw him rise.He said those awful words again,but between them he cried:"You're right!
It's the truth!It's the eternal truth!"
"It IS the truth,"said Laddie."I've only to visit the offices,and examine the business of those of my family living by law,to KNOW that it's the truth.Of course there's another side!There are times when there are great opportunities to do good;I recognize that.To some these may seem to overbalance that to which I object.If they do,all right.I am merely deciding for myself.Once and for all,for me it is land.It is born in me to love it,to handle it easily,to get the best results from stock.I am going to take the Merriweather place adjoining ours on the west,and yours on the south.I intend to lease it for ten years,with purchase privilege at the end,so that if I make of it what I plan,my work will not be lost to me.I had thought to fix up the place and begin farming.If Miss Pryor has any use whatever for me,and prefers stock,that is all right with me.
I'll go into the same business she finds suitable for you.I can start in a small way and develop.I can afford a maid for her from the beginning,but I couldn't clothe her as she has been accustomed to being dressed,for some time.I would do my best,however.I know what store my mother sets by being well gowned.
And as a husband,I can offer your daughter as loving consideration as woman ever received at the hands of man.
