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Red Wallflower

<h2 id="id02321" style="margin-top: 4em">CHAPTER XXVII.</h2> <h5 id="id02322"> ONIONS.</h5> It seemed very inexplicable to Esther that Pitt was never heard from. Not a scrap of a letter had they had from him since they came to New York. Mr. Dallas, the elder, had written once or twice, mostly on business, and said nothing about his son. That was all. Mrs. Dallas never wrote. Esther would have been yet more bewildered if she had known that the lady had been in New York two or three times, and not merely passing through, but staying to do shopping. Happily she had no suspicion of this. One day, late in the autumn, Christopher Bounder went over to Mrs. Blumenfeld's garden. It lay in pretty fall order, trim and clean; bushes pruned, canes tied up, vines laid down, leaves raked off; all the work done, up to the very day. Christopher bestowed an approving glance around him as he went among the beds; it was all right and ship-shape. Nobody was visible at the moment; and he passed on round the house to the rear, from whence he heard a great racket made by the voices of poultry. And there they were; as soon as he turned the corner he saw them: a large flock of hens and chickens, geese, ducks and turkeys, all wobbling and squabbling. In the midst of them stood the gardener's widow, with her hands in the pockets of a great canvas apron; or rather, with her hands in and out, for from the pockets, which were something enormous, she was fetching and distributing handfulls of oats and corn to her feathered beneficiaries. Christopher drew near, as near as he could, for the turkeys, and Mrs. Blumenfeld gave him a nod. 'Good morning, mum!' 'Good day to ye.' 'Them's a fine lot o' turkeys!' Christopher really had a good deal of education, and even knew some Latin; nevertheless, in common life, the instincts of his early habits prevailed, and he said 'Them' by preference. 'Ain't they!' rejoined Mrs. Blumenfeld. 'They had ought to be, for they've given me plague enough. Every spring I think it's the last turkeys I'll raise; and every winter, jes' as regular, I think it 'ud be well to set more turkey eggs next year than I did this'n. You see, a good fat roast turkey is what you can't beat—not in this country.' 'Nor can't equal in England, without you go to the game covers for it. They're for the market, I s'pose?' 'Wall, I calkilate to send some on 'em. I do kill a turkey once in a while for myself, but la, how long do ye think it takes me to eat up a turkey? I get sick of it afore I'm done.' 'You want company,' suggested Mr. Bounder. But to this the lady made no answer at all. She finished scattering her grain, and then turned to her visitor, ready for business. Christopher could not but look at her with great approbation. She was dressed much as Esther had seen her a few weeks before: a warm shawl wrapped and tied around the upper part of her person, bareheaded, hair in neat and tight order, and her hands in her capacious pockets. 'Now, I kin attend to ye,' she said, leaving the chickens and geese, which for the present were quiet, picking up their breakfast. But Mr. Bounder did not go immediately to business. 'That's a capital notion of an apron!' he said admiringly. 'Ain't it!' she answered. 'Oh, I'm great on notions. I believe in savin' yourself all the trouble you kin, provided you don't lose no time by it. There is folks, you know, that air soft-headed enough to think they kin git rid o' trouble by losin' their time. I ain't o' that sort.' 'I should say, you have none o' that sort o' people about you.' 'Wall, I don't—not ef I kin help it. Anyhow, ef I get 'em I contrive to lose 'em agin. But what was you wantin'?' 'I came to see if you could let us have our winter's onions? White onions, you know. It's all the sort we can do with, up at the house.' 'Onions!' said Mrs. Blumenfeld. 'Why hain't you riz your own onions, I want to know? You've got a garden.' 'That is true, mum,' said Christopher; 'but all the onions as was in it is gone.' 'Then you didn't plant enough.' 'And that's true too,' said Christopher; 'but I can't say as I takes any blame to myself for it.' 'Sakes alive, man! ain't you the gardener?' 'At your service, mum.' 'Wall, then, why, when you were about it, why didn't you sow your seeds accordin' to your needs?' 'I sowed all the seed I had.' 'All you had!' cried the little woman. 'That sounds kind o' shiftless; and I don't take you for that sort of a man neither, Mr. Bounder.' 'Much obleeged for your good opinion, mum.' 'Then why didn't you git more onion seed, du tell, when you knowed you hadn't enough?' 'As I said, mum, I am much obleeged for your good opinion, which I hope I deserve. There is reasons which must determine a man, upon occasion, to do what you would not approve—unless you also knowed the reasons.' This sounded oracular. The two stood and looked at one another. Christopher explained himself no further; however, Mrs. Blumenfeld's understanding appeared to improve. She looked first inquisitive, and then intelligent. 'That comes kind o' hard upon me, at the end,' she said with a somewhat humorous expression. 'You see, I've made a vow— You believe in vows, Mr. Bounder?' 'I do, mum,—of the right sort.' 'I don't make no other. Wall, I've made a vow to myself, you see. Look here; what do you call that saint o' your'n? up to your house.' 'I don't follow you, mum,' said Christopher, a good deal mystified. 'You know you've got a saint there, I s'pose. What's her name? that's what I want to know.' 'Do you mean Miss Esther?' 'Ah! that's it. I never heerd of a Saint Esther. There was an Esther in the Bible—I'll tell you! she was a Queen Esther; and that fits. Ain't she a kind o' a queen! But she's t'other thing too. Look here, Mr. Bounder; be you all saints up to your house?' 'Well, no, mum, not exactly; that's not altogether the description I'd give of some of us, if I was stating my opinion.' 'Don't you think you had ought to be that?' 'Perhaps we ought,' said Christopher, with wondering slow admission. 'I kin tell you. There ain't no question about it. Folks had ought to live up to their privileges; an' you've got a pattern there right afore your eyes. I hev no opinion of you, ef you ain't all better'n common folks. I'd be, I know, ef I lived a bit where she was.' 'It's different with a young lady,' Christopher began. 'Why is it different?' said the woman sharply. 'You and me, we've got as good right to be saints as she has, or anybody. I tell you I've made a vow. I ain't no saint, but I'm agoin' to sell her no onions.' 'Mum!' said Christopher, astounded. 'Nor nothin' else,' Mrs. Blumenfeld went on. 'How many d'ye want?' Mr. Bounder's wits were not quick enough to follow these sharp Yankee turns. Like the ships his countrymen build, he could not come about so quick. It is curious how the qualities of people's minds get into their shipbuilding and other handicraft. It was not till Mrs. Blumenfeld had repeated her question that he was able to answer it. 'I suppose, mum, a half a bushel wouldn't be no more'n enough to go through with.' 'Wall, I've got some,' the gardener's widow went on; 'the right sort; white, and as soft as cream, and as sweet as onions kin be. I'll send you up a bag of 'em.' 'But then I must be allowed to pay for 'em,' said Christopher. 'I tell you, I won't sell her nothin'—neither onions nor nothin' else.' 'Then, mum,—it's very handsome of you, mum; that I must say, and won't deny—but in that case I am afraid Miss Esther would prefer that I should get the onions somewheres else.' 'Jes' you hold your tongue about it, an' I'll send up the sass; and ef your Queen Esther says anything, you tell her it's all paid for. What else do you want that's my way?' While she spoke, Mrs. Blumenfeld was carefully detaching a root of celery from the rich loose soil which enveloped it, and shaking the white stalks free from their encumbrance, Mr. Bounder the while looking on approvingly, both at the celery, which was beautifully long and white and delicate, and at the condition of things generally on the ground, all of which his eye took in; although he was too much of a magnate in his own line to express the approval he felt. 'There!' said Mrs. Blumenfeld, eyeing her celery stalks; 'kin you beat that where you come from?' 'It's very fair,' said Christopher—'very fair. But England can beat the world, mum, in gardening and that. I suppose you can't expect it of a new country like this.' 'Can't expect what? to beat the world? You jes' wait a bit, till you see. You jes' only wait a bit.' 'What do you think of England and America going into partnership?' asked Mr. Bounder, bending to pick up a refuse stem that Mrs. Blumenfeld had rejected. 'Think we couldn't be a match for most things u-nited?' 'I find myself a match for most things, as it is,' returned the lady promptly. 'But you must want help sometimes?' said Christopher, with a sharp and somewhat sly glance at her. 'When I do, I git it,—or I do without it.' 'That's when you can't get the right kind.' 'Jes' so.' 'It ain't for a man properly to say what he can do or what he can't do; words is but breath, they say; and those as know a man can give a pretty good guess what he's good for; but, however, when he's speakin' to them as don't know him, perhaps it ain't no more but fair that he should be allowed to speak for himself. Now if I say that accordin' to the best o' my knowledge and belief, what I offer you is the right kind o' help, you won't think it's brag or bluster, I hope?' 'Why shouldn't I?' said the little woman. But Christopher thought the tone of the words was not discouraging. 'They does allays practise fence,' he thought to himself. 'Well, mum, if you hev ever been up to our place in the summer-time, you may hev seen our garden; and to a lady o' your experience I needn't to say no more.' 'Wall,' said Mrs. Blumenfeld, by way of conceding so much, 'I'll allow Colonel Gainsborough has a pretty fair gardener, ef he hes some furrin notions.' 'I'll bring them furrin notions to your help, mum,' said Mr. Bounder eagerly. 'I know my business as well as any man on this side or that side either. It's no boastin' to say that.' 'Sounds somethin' like it. But what'll the colonel do without you, or the colonel's garden? that's what I can't make out. Hev you and he hed a falling out?' And the speaker raised herself up straight and looked full at her visitor. 'There's nothin' like that possible!' said Mr. Bounder solemnly. 'The colonel ain't agoin' to do without me, my woman. No more can't I do with out the colonel, I may say. I've lived in the family now this twenty year; and as long as I can grow spinach they ain't agoin' to eat no other—without it's yours, mum,' Christopher added, with a change of tone; 'or yours and mine. You see, the grounds is so near, that goin' over to one ain't forsakin' the other; and the colonel, he hasn't really space and place for a man that can do what I can do.' 'An' what is it you propose?' 'That you should take me, mum, for your head man.' The two were standing now, quite still, looking into one another's eyes; a little sly audacity in those of Christopher, while a smile played about his lips that was both knowing and conciliating. Mrs. Blumenfeld eyed him gravely, with the calm air of one who was quite his match. Christopher could tell nothing from her face. 'I s'pose,' she said, 'you'll want ridiculous wages?' 'By no means, mum!' said Christopher, waving his hand. 'There never was nothin' ridiculous about you. I'll punch anybody's head that says it.' Mrs. Blumenfeld shook the last remnant of soil from the celery roots, and handed the bunch to Christopher. 'There,' she said; 'you may take them along with you—you'll want 'em for dinner. An' I'll send up the onions. An' the rest I'll think about. Good day to ye!' Christopher went home well content. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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