Chapter XXXIV
John Douglas Speaks at Last
Anne was not without a feeble hope that something might come of it after all.
But nothing did. John Douglas came and took Janet driving, and walked home
from prayer-meeting with her, as he had been doing for twenty years, and as he
seemed likely to do for twenty years more. The summer waned. Anne taught her
school and wrote letters and studied a little. Her walks to and from school were
pleasant. She always went by way of the swamp; it was a lovely place—a boggy
soil, green with the greenest of mossy hillocks; a silvery brook meandered
through it and spruces stood erectly, their boughs a-trail with gray-green mosses,
their roots overgrown with all sorts of woodland lovelinesses.
Nevertheless, Anne found life in Valley Road a little monotonous. To be sure,
there was one diverting incident.
She had not seen the lank, tow-headed Samuel of the peppermints since the
evening of his call, save for chance meetings on the road. But one warm August
night he appeared, and solemnly seated himself on the rustic bench by the porch.
He wore his usual working habiliments, consisting of varipatched trousers, a
blue jean shirt, out at the elbows, and a ragged straw hat. He was chewing a
straw and he kept on chewing it while he looked solemnly at Anne. Anne laid
her book aside with a sigh and took up her doily. Conversation with Sam was
really out of the question.
After a long silence Sam suddenly spoke.
“I’m leaving over there,” he said abruptly, waving his straw in the direction of
the neighboring house.
“Oh, are you?” said Anne politely.
“Yep.”
“And where are you going now?”
“Wall, I’ve been thinking some of gitting a place of my own. There’s one
that’d suit me over at Millersville. But ef I rents it I’ll want a woman.”
“I suppose so,” said Anne vaguely.