"If you had been more of a match-maker," Sulie said, "you might have managed. But you always think that such things are on the knees of the gods. Why didn't you bring them together?"
"I tried," Nancy confessed. "But Eve--I hate to say it, Sulie. Eve was determined."
The two old-fashioned women, making mental estimates of this modern feminine product, found themselves indignant. "To think that any girl could----"
It was lunch time, and Anne came in. She had Diogenes under her arm. "He will come across the road to meet me. And I am afraid of the automobiles. When he brings the white duck and all of the little Diogenes with him he obstructs traffic. He stopped a touring car the other day, and the men swore at him, and Diogenes swore back."
She laughed and set the old drake on his feet. "May I have a slice of bread for him, Mother Nancy?"
Diogenes, having been towed by his beloved mistress out-of-doors, was appeased with the slice of bread. He was a patriarch now, with a lovely mate and a line of waddling offspring to claim his devotion. But not an inch did he swerve from his loyalty to Anne. She had brought him with her from Bower's, and he lived in the barn with his family. Twice a day, however, he made a pilgrimage to the Crossroads school. It was these excursions which Anne deprecated.
"He comes in when I ring for recess and distracts the children. He waddles straight up to my desk--and he is such an old dear."
She laughed, and the two women laughed with her. She was their heart-warming comrade. She brought into their lonely lives something vivid and sparkling, at which they drank for their soul's refreshment.
Nancy spoke of Rodman Warfield. "We want him here for Christmas and the holidays. Do you think he can come?"
Anne flashed her radiance at them. "I don't think. I know. Mother Nancy, you're an angel."
"Richard is coming, of course. It will be just a family party. Not many young people for you, my dear. Just--Richard."
There was holly and crow's-foot up in the hills, and David and Anne hitched big Ben to a cart and went after it. It was a winter of snow, and in the depths of the woods there was a great stillness. David chopped a tall cedar and his blows echoed and reëchoed in the white spaces. The holly berries that dropped from the cut branches were like drops of blood on the shining crust.