The Best of Gene Stratton-Porter

  The Harvester lifted a graven face, down which the sweat of agony rolled, and his lips parted in a twitching smile. “Then this is where love beats the doctors, Carey!” he said.

  “It is where love has ventured what science dares not. Love didn’t do all of this. In the name of the Almighty, what did you give her, David?”

  “Life!” cried the Harvester. “Life! Come on, Ruth, come on! Out of the valley come to me! You are well now, Girl! It’s all over! The last trace of fever is gone, the last of the dull ache. Can you swallow just two more drops of bottled sunshine, Ruth?”

  The flickering lids slowly opened, and the big black eyes looked straight into the Harvester’s. He met them steadily, smiling encouragement.

  “Hang on to each breath, dear heart!” he urged. “The fever is gone. The pain is over! Long life and the love you crave are for you. You’ve only to keep breathing a few more hours and the battle is yours. Glorious Girl! Noble! You are doing finely! Ruth, do you know me?”

  Her lips moved.

  “Don’t try to speak,” said the Harvester. “Don’t waste breath on a word. Save the good oxygen to strengthen your tired body. But if you do know me, maybe you could smile, Ruth!”

  She could just smile, and that was all. Feeble, flickering, transient, but as it crossed the living face the Harvester lifted her hands and kissed them over and over, back, palm, and finger tips.

  “Now just one more drop, honey, and then a long rest. Will you try it again for me?”

  She assented, and the Harvester took the bottle from his pocket, poured the drop, and held the spoon to willing lips. The big eyes were on him with a question. Then they fell to the spoon. The Harvester understood.

  “Yes, it’s mine! It’s got sixty years of wonderful life in it, every one of them full of love and happiness for my dear Dream Girl. Can you take it, Ruth?”

  Her lips parted, the wine of life passed between. She smiled faintly, and her eyelids dropped shut, but presently they opened again.

  “David!”

  “My Dream Girl!”

  “Harvester?”

  “Yes!”

  “Medicine Man?”

  “Don’t, Ruth! Save every breath to help your heart.”

  “Life?”

  “Life it is, Girl!” exulted the Harvester. “Long life! Love! Home! The man you love! Every happiness that ever came to a girl! Nothing shall be denied you! Nothing shall be lacking! It’s all in your hands now, Ruth. We’ve all done everything we can; you must do the remainder. It’s your work to send every breath as deeply as you can. Doc, release another tank of air. Are her feet warm, Granny? Let the nurse take your place now. And, honey, go to sleep! I’ll keep watch for you. I’ll measure each breath you draw. If they shorten or weaken, I’ll wake you for more medicine. You can trust me! Always you can trust me, Ruth.”

  The Girl smiled and fell into a light, even slumber. Granny Moreland stumbled to the couch and rolled on it sobbing with nervous exhaustion. Doctor Carey called the nurse to take her place. Then he came to the Harvester’s side and whispered, “Let me, David!”

  The Harvester looked up with his queer grin, but he made no motion to arise.

  “Won’t you trust me, David? I’ll watch as if it were my own wife.”

  “I wouldn’t trust any man on earth, for the coming three hours,” replied the Harvester. “If I keep this up that long, she is safe. Go and rest until I call you.”

  He again bent over the Girl, one hand on her left wrist, the other over her heart, his eyes on her lips, watching the depth and strength of her every breath. Regularly he administered the medicine he was giving her. Sometimes she took it half asleep; again she gave him a smile that to the Harvester was the supreme thing of earth or Heaven. Toward the end of the long vigil, in exhaustion he slipped to the floor, and laid his head on the side of the bed, and for a second his hand relaxed and he fell asleep. The Girl awakened as his touch loosened and looking down she saw his huddled body. A second later the Harvester awoke with a guilty start to find her fingers twisted in the shock of hair on the top of his head.

  “Poor stranded Girl,” he muttered. “She’s clinging to me for life, and you can stake all you are worth she’s going to get it!”

  Then he gently relaxed her grip, gave her the last dose he felt necessary, yielded his place to Doctor Carey and staggered up the hill. As the sun peeped over Medicine Woods he stretched himself between the two mounds under the oak, and for a few minutes his body was rent with the awful, torn sobbing of a strong man. Belshazzar nosed the twisting figure and whined pitifully. A chattering little marsh wren tilted on a bush and scolded. A blue jay perched above and tried to decide whether there was cause for an alarm signal. A snake coming from the water to hunt birds ran close to him, and changing its course, went weaving away among the mosses. Gradually the pent forces spent themselves, and for hours the Harvester lay in the deep sleep of exhaustion, and stretched beside him, Belshazzar guarded with anxious dog eyes.

  Chapter 18

  The Better Man

  In the middle of the afternoon the Harvester arose and went into the lake, ate a hearty dinner, and then took up his watch again. For two days and nights he kept his place, until he had the Girl out of danger, and where careful nursing was all that was required to insure life and health. As he sat beside her the last day, his physical endurance strained to the breaking point, she laid her hand over his, and looked long and steadily into his eyes.

  “There are so many things I want to know,” she said.

  The Harvester’s firm fingers closed over hers. “Ruth, have you ever been sorry that you trusted me?”

  “Never!” said the Girl instantly.

  “Then suppose you keep it up,” said he. “Whatever it is that you want to know, don’t use an iota of strength to talk or to think about it now. Just say to yourself, he loves me well enough to do what is right, and I know that he will. All you have to do is to be patient until you grow stronger than you ever have been in your life, and then you shall have exactly what you want, Ruth. Sleep like a baby for a week or two. Then, slowly and gradually, we will build up such a constitution for you that you shall ride, drive, row, swim, dance, play, and have all that your girlhood has missed in fun and frolic, and all that your womanhood craves in love and companionship. Happiness has come at last, Ruth. Take it from me. Everything you crave is yours. The love you want, the home, and the life. As soon as you are strong enough, you shall know all about it. Your business is to drink stimulants and sleep now, dear.”

  “So tired of this bed!”

  “It won’t be long until you can lie on the couch and the veranda swing again.”

  “Glory!” said the Girl. “David, I must have been full of fever for a long time. I can’t remember everything.”

  “Don’t try, I tell you. Life is coming out right for you; that’s all you need know now.”

  “And for you, David?”

  “Whenever things are right for you, they are for me, Ruth.”

  “Don’t you ever think of yourself?”

  “Not when I am close you.”

  “Ah! Then I shall have to grow strong very soon and think of you.”

  The Harvester’s smile was pathetic. He was unspeakably tired again.

  “Never mind me!” he said. “Only get well.”

  “David, was there a little horse?”

  “There certainly was and is,” said the Harvester. “You had not named him yet, but in a few days I can lead him to the window.”

  “Was there something said about a boat?”

  “Two of them.”

  “Two?”

  “Yes. A row boat for you, and a launch that will take you all over the lake with only the exertion of steering on your part.”

  “David, I want my pendant and ring. I am so tired of lying here, I want to play with them.”

  “Where do you keep them, Ruth?”

  “In the willow teapot. I thought no one would look there.”

/>   The Harvester laughed and brought the little boxes. He had to open them, but the Girl put on the ring and asked him if he would not help her with the pendant. He slipped the thread around her neck and clasped it. With a sigh of satisfaction she took the ornament in one hand and closed her eyes. He thought she was falling asleep, but presently she looked at him.

  “You won’t allow them to take it from me?”

  “Indeed no! There is no reason on earth why you should not have that thread around your neck if you want it.”

  “I am going to sleep now. I want two things. May I have them?”

  “You may,” said the Harvester promptly, “provided they are not to eat.”

  “No,” said the Girl. “I’ve suffered and made others trouble. I won’t bother you by asking for anything more than is brought me. This is different. You are completely worn out. Your face frightens me, David, and white hairs that were not there a few days ago have come along your temples. I can see them.”

  “You gave me a mighty serious scare, Ruth.”

  “I know,” said the Girl. “Forgive me. I didn’t mean to. I want you to leave me to Doctor Harmon and the nurse and go sleep a week. Then I will be ready for the swing, and to hear some more about the trees and birds.”

  “I can keep it up if you really need me, but if you don’t I am sleepy. So, if you feel safe, I think I will go.”

  “Oh I am safe enough,” said the Girl. “It isn’t that. I’m so lonely. I’ve made up my mind not to grieve for mother, but I miss her so now. I feel so friendless.”

  “But, honey,” said the Harvester, “you mustn’t do that! Don’t you see how all of us love you? Here is Granny shutting up her house and living here, just to be with you. The nurse will do anything you say. Here is the man you know best, and think so much of, staying in the cabin, and so happy to give you all his time, and anything else you will have, dear. And the Careys come every day, and will do their best to comfort you, and always I am here for you to fall back on.”

  “Yes, I’m falling right now,” said the Girl. “I almost wish I had the fever again. No one has touched me for days. I feel as if every one was afraid of me.”

  The Harvester was puzzled.

  “Well, Ruth, I’m doing the best I know,” he said. “What is it you want?”

  “Nothing!” answered the Girl with slightly dejected inflection. “Say good-bye to me, and go sleep your week. I’ll be very good, and then you shall take me a drive up the hill when you awaken. Won’t that be fine?”

  “Say good-bye to me!” She felt a “little lonely!” They all acted as if they were “afraid” of her. The Harvester indulged in a flashing mental review and arrived at a decision. He knelt beside the bed, took both slender, cool hands and covered them with kisses. Then he slid a hand under the pillow and raised the tired head.

  “If I am to say good-bye, I have to do it in my own way, Ruth,” he said.

  Thereupon he began at the tumbled mass of hair and kissed from her forehead to her lips, kisses warm and tender.

  “Now you go to sleep, and grow strong enough by the time I come back to tell me whom you love,” he said, and went from the room without waiting for any reply.

  With short intervals for food and dips in the lake the Harvester very nearly slept the week. When he finally felt himself again, he bathed, shaved, dressed freshly, and went to see the Girl. He had to touch her to be sure she was real. She was extremely weak and tremulous, but her face and hands were fuller, her colour was good, she was ravenously hungry. Doctor Harmon said she was a little tryant, and the nurse that she was plain cross. The first thing the Harvester noticed was that the dull blue look in the depth of the dark eyes was gone. They were clear, dusky wells, with shining lights at the bottom.

  “Well I never would have believed it!” he cried. “Doctor Harmon, you are a great physician! You have made her all over new, and in a few more days she will be on the veranda. This is great!”

  “Do I appear so much better to you, Harvester?” asked the Girl.

  “Has no one thought to show you,” cried the Harvester. “Here, let me!”

  He stepped to her dressing table, picked up a mirror, and held it before her so that she could see herself.

  “Seems to me I am dreadfully white and thin yet!”

  “If you had seen what I saw ten days ago, my Girl, you would think you appear like a pink, rosy angel now, or a wonderful dream.”

  “Truly, do I in the least resemble a dream, David?”

  “You are a dream. The loveliest one a man ever had. With three months of right care and exercise you’ll be the beautiful woman nature intended. I’m so proud of you. You are being so brave! Just lie there in patience a few more days, and out you come again to life; and life that will thrill your being with joy.”

  “All right,” said the Girl, “I will. David are you attending to your herbs?”

  “Not for a few weeks.”

  “You are very much behind?”

  “No. Nothing important. I don’t make enough to count on what is ready now. I can soon gather jimson leaves and seed to fill orders, the hemlock is about right to take the fruit, the mustard is yet in pod, and the saffron and wormseed can be attended later. I can catch up in two days.”

  “What about—about the big bed on the hill?”

  The Harvester experienced an inward thrill of delight. She was so impressed with the value of the ginseng she would not mention it, even before the man she loved—no more than that—“adored”— “worshipped!” He smiled at her in understanding.

  “I’ll have to take a peep at that and report,” he said.

  “Are you rested now?”

  “Indeed yes!”

  “You are dreadfully thin.”

  “I always am. I’ll pick up a little when I get back to work.”

  “David, I want you to go to work now.”

  “Can you spare me?”

  “Haven’t we done well these last few days?”

  “I can’t tell you how well.”

  “Then please go gather everything you need to fill orders except the big bed, and by that time maybe you could take another week off, and I could go to the hill top and on the lake. I’m so anxious to put my feet on the earth. They feel so dead.”

  “Are your feet well rubbed to draw down the circulation?”

  “They are rubbed shiny and almost skinned, David. No one ever had better care, of that I am sure. Go gather what you should have.”

  “All right,” said the Harvester.

  He arose and as he started to leave the room he took one last look at the Girl to see if he could detect anything he could suggest for her comfort, and read a message in her eyes. Instantly there was an answering flash in his.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” he said. “I just noticed discorea villosa has the finest rattle boxes formed. I’ve been waiting to show you. And the hop tree has its castanets all green and gold. In a few more weeks it will begin to play for you. I’ll bring you some.”

  Soon he returned with the queer seed formations, and as he bent above her, with his back to Doctor Harmon, he whispered, “What is it?”

  Her lips barely formed the one word, “Hurry!”

  The Harvester straightened.

  “All comfortable, Ruth?” he asked casually.

  “Yes.”

  “You understand, of course, that there is not the slightest necessity for my going to work if you really want me for anything, even if it’s nothing more than to have me within calling distance, in case you SHOULD want something. The whole lot I can gather now won’t amount to twenty dollars. It’s merely a matter of pride with me to have what is called for. I’d much rather remain, if you can use me in any way at all.”

  “Twenty dollars is considerable, when expenses are as heavy as now. And it’s worth more than any money to you not to fail when orders come. I have learned that, and David, I don’t want you to either. You must fill all demands as usual. I wouldn’t forgive myself this w
inter if you should be forced to send orders only partly filled because I fell ill and hindered you. Please go and gather all you possibly will need of everything you take at this season, only remember!”

  “There is no danger of my forgetting. If you are going to send me away to work, you will allow me to kiss your hand before I go, fair lady?”

  He did it fervently.

  “One word with you, Harmon,” he said as he left the room.

  Doctor Harmon arose and followed him to the gold garden, and together they stood beside the molten hedge of sunflowers, coneflowers, elecampane, and jewel flower.

  “I merely want to mention that this is your inning,” said the Harvester. “Find out if you are essential to the Girl’s happiness as soon as you can, and the day she tells me so, I will file her petition and take a trip to the city to study some little chemical quirks that bother me. That’s all.”

  The Harvester went to the dry-house for bags and clipping shears, and the doctor returned to the sunshine room.

  “Ruth,” he said, “do you know that the Harvester is the squarest man I ever met?”

  “Is he?” asked the Girl.

  “He is! He certainly is!”

  “You must remember that I have little acquaintance with men,” said she. “You are the first one I ever knew, and the only one except him.”

  “Well I try to be square,” said Doctor Harmon, “but that is where Langston has me beaten a mile. I have to try. He doesn’t. He was born that way.”

  The Girl began to laugh.

  “His environment is so different,” she said. “Perhaps if he were in a big city, he would have to try also.”

  “Won’t do!” said the doctor. “He chose his location. So did I. He is a stronger physical man than I ever was or ever will be. The struggle that bound him to the woods and to research, that made him the master of forces that give back life, when a man like Carey says it is the end, proves him a master. The tumult in his soul must have been like a cyclone in his forest, when he turned his back on the world and stuck to the woods. Carey told me about it. Some day you must hear. It’s a story a woman ought to know in order to arrive at proper values. You never will understand the man until you know that he is clean where most of us are blackened with ugly sins we have no right on God’s footstool to commit and not so much reason as he. Every man should be as he is, but very few are. Carey says Langston’s mother was a wonderful element in the formation of his character; but all mothers are anxious, and none of them can build with no foundation and no soul timber. She had material for a man to her hand, or she couldn’t have made one.”