III

III

Walden Slater had drawn his rickety rocker back against the wall and he sat just outside the curtain of water that dripped from the eaves of the back piazza. He looked through the swinging silver hangings of rain soberly, his empty corncob pipe drooping disconsolately from his wide mouth. It was evident that he was deep in the concentration of difficult thought for his brows wrinkled and his head bowed still lower as he twiddled a small bit of wood in his hand and gazed blankly at the whirring rain. Dreeme stood in the back door and watched him. Behind the young doctor in the kitchen Deborah moved about, her small clear voice raised as she attempted unsuccessfully to converse with the reticent Mrs. Slater who paraded back and forth with dishes and answered her in grudging monosyllables. There was an excited quaver in Deborah’s voice that moved Dreeme, the note of a stifled excitement. They all had something on their minds. They were all concealing something from one another. The very atmosphere induced an ingrowing that was unhealthy and unnatural. Dreeme coughed loudly and shifted his position. Walden Slater did not stir. He still sat crouched in the rocker rolling the bit of wood between his stumpy fingers.

“I should think the rain would cheer you up,” remarked Dreeme.

Walden Slater turned his head slowly, inspected the young doctor with a blank eye, and then resumed his study of the rain.

“Won’t it be good for the crops?”

“Umph,” said Walden Slater. He twiddled his bit of wood and looked at the sky.

“I’m going to marry Deborah,” announced Dreeme.

Walden Slater turned deliberately around and stared at the young doctor. He looked first at his shoes, then his trousers, then his coat, and finally into the doctor’s face. His eyes were opaque mirrors. He cleared his throat. He said:

“Be you?”

His tone was mild and there was no surprise in his voice.

“I reckoned so,” he added after a moment.

“Any objections?” asked Dreeme.

Walden Slater watched the rain carefully.

“Do you ever whittle?” he inquired.

Dreeme laughed aloud.

“No,” he said. “I don’t even carry a knife.”

His mind flashed back to dour farmers seated morosely before the post office and general store whittling away at small pieces of wood, industriously carving nothing to pass away the endless time.

“No objections at all,” remarked Walden Slater mildly.

Both of them heard the humming of the Reverend George Burroughs as he came through the kitchen from the dining room, and Dreeme drew back with some distaste as the tall sallow figure pushed through the door to the back piazza.

“The Lord gives plenteously,” intoned the preacher as his black expressionless eyes roved from the faces of the two men to the gusts of rain that swept across the green foliage beyond the house.

“Lend me your knife,” requested Walden Slater, twiddling the bit of wood in his hand.

The Reverend George Burroughs extracted an old clasp-knife from his pocket and passed it over to the farmer. Walden Slater began to methodically whittle the bit of wood he held to a fine point. The tiny shavings fluttered to the floor.

“A fine rain makes a fine crop,” announced the preacher.

“A fine crop makes a fine profit,” added Dreeme, saying the first thing that popped into his mind.

“A fine knife makes a fine point,” declared Walden Slater. “This knife is dull.”

He handed it back without any thanks, and the preacher stowed it away in his pocket. Dreeme drifted back through the kitchen preparatory to returning to his study. The conversation was altogether too dull.