THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES IN MEMORY OF EDWIN CORLE PRESENTED BY JEAN CORLE Barnabetta Barnabetta By ) Helen R. iMartin Author of "Tillie: a Mennonite Maid," "The Crossways," etc. New York The Century Co. 1914 Copyright, 1914, by THE CENTURY Co. Copyright 1913. by SMITH PUBLISHING HOUSE Published, March, 1914 College Library CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I INTRODUCING THE DREARY FAMILY ... 3 II MR. DREARY CONFIDES IN THE SCHOOLMAS TER 15 III BARNABETTA RECEIVES A SHOCK .... 23 IV MR. DREARY PROPOSES 29 V THE STEPMOTHER ARRIVES 42 VI THE STEPMOTHER STARTS REFORMS ... 48 VII THE CONFLICT OF WILLS 56 VIII THE HEAD OF THE HOUSE ACTS .... 65 IX A DOMESTIC LULL 73 X MRS. DREARY DEALS WITH THE SITUATION . 80 XI A JAUNT TO TOWN 91 XII MRS. DREARY RESORTS TO HEROIC MEAS URES 102 XIII ABEL BUCHTER, EDUCATOR 110 XIV THE PRESIDENT OF STEVENS RECEIVES TWO LETTERS 118 XV BARNABETTA AND THE PRESIDENT OF STE VENS 126 XVI INTRODUCING MRS. WINTHROP 138 XVII THEODORA JORDAN 152 XVIII BARNABETTA AT COLLEGE 165 XIX BARNABETTA IS CALLED TO ACCOUNT . . 174 XX THE LURE OF THEODORA 184 XXI BARNABETTA AGAIN BREAKS THE RULES . 192 XXII HER EVOLUTION AT COLLEGE 201 XXIII HER SUMMER AT HOME .... .206 Contents CHAPTEB PAGE XXIV HER NEW OUTLOOK 215 XXV CONFIDENCES 221 XXVI HER RETURN TO STEVENS 225 XXVII BARRETTS QUANDARY 233 XXVIII A FUNERAL 241 XXIX MRS. WINTHROP'S TROUBLED REFLECTIONS . 248 XXX THEODORA ACTS 257 XXXI COMMENCEMENT DAY 261 XXXII BROTHER AND SISTER 270 XXXIII AT THE DANCE 275 XXXIV THE APPEAL TO THEODORA 281 XXXV AN AFTERNOON CALL AND AN ENCOUNTER . 288 XXXVI ENTER, MRS. DREARY 298 XXXVII BARRETT COMMITS HIMSELF 304 XXXVIII BARRETT'S STRUGGLE . 309 XXXIX HE TAKES THE PLUNGE 318 XL MRS. WINTHROP AND BARNABETTA . . . 327 XLI THE FATE OF WOMAN 334 Barnabetta Barnabetta CHAPTER I INTRODUCING THE DREARY FAMILY MRS. DREARY, a sentimentalist though the wife of a Pennsylvania "Dutchman," had named her daughter from a combination of her own and her husband's names, Barnaby and Etta Barna betta. It had been her last "pretty thought" before her death, which had followed almost immediately upon the birth of the baby-girl. Barnabetta, however, being the only feminine mem ber of the family, had, at a tender age, been called upon to bear heavier burdens than that of her gro tesque name. It was when she was only thirteen years old that her father decided to dismiss the housekeeper he had been obliged to employ since his wife's death, and take his little daughter from the village school to keep house for him and her two elder brothers, Jacob and Emanuel and this in spite of the fact that he was what was known in the village of Reinhartz Station as "well-fixed," having a com fortable bank-account which every year he was able to increase from his big, prosperous tin-shop that ad- 3 Barnabetta joined his dwelling-house. But the necessity his wife's death had imposed upon him, of "hiring," had been the most poignant phase of his affliction. "I hire a washwoman yet a while till you're more growed a 'ready, Barnabetta," he told the child. "But the rest part of the work you kin do now. I don't keep no hired girl now you 're thirteen a 'ready. ' ' However appalled the little girl may have felt at this decree, she did not demur. When Barnaby Dreary announced a decision, no one who knew him. ever attempted to move him from it. And certainly the outcome in this case justified him; for in place of the slatternly, wasteful housekeeping of the ' ' hired girl," Barnabetta soon learned to keep things tidy, to cook well, to manage thriftily ; and the weekly wages of the hired girl were saved for they assuredly did not pass to Barnabetta. That the young girl just budding into maidenhood grew thin and listless under the unceasing toil neces sary to achieve these results, could scarcely, in the eyes of a man like Barnaby Dreary, weigh against the results themselves. When, on one occasion, Barnabetta being then six teen years old, the village school-teacher, Abel Buch- ter, took the liberty of warning Mr. Dreary that his girl was growing up dumm x from overwork and from being denied all the "pleasure-seeking" i Stupid. 4 Introducing the Dreary Family natural to youth, he was told to "mind to his own business. ' ' ''Hard work keeps girls out of mischief and makes 'em hearty," Barnaby argued. ' ' But with as much in bank as you 're got, Barnaby, you have no need to work your girl that hard that you won't even leave her go out coastin' still, with the other young folks, till her evening dishes is through all, a 'ready. She used to be the smartest scholar I had and now, I tell you, she 's gettin ' dumm ! ' ' "She 'd oversleep breakfast time if I left her run evenings. ' ' "You leave Jacob and Emanuel go out every night." "Yes, well, they don't have to get up so early as what Barnabetta does. Look-a-here, Abel, don't you come tryin' to make up to our Barnabetta I ain't leavin' her keep comp'ny with no fellah! Us, we need her at home, me and the boys. Fur thirteen years I had to hire and pay wages, and do you think now when at last I got a girl old enough to house- keep fur me, I 'm a-goin' to leave her go git married right aways and me go back to hirin' yet? Well, I guess anyhow not! So you just leave our Barnabetta be, Abel!" Had Mr. Dreary not been a school-trustee of Bein- hartz Station, Abel would have delighted in defying him; for in spite of the life Barnabetta led, she was blooming out into a wondrous, flower-like girlhood. 5 Barnabetta Not that she was beautiful no one could have called her that. Her skin was dark, almost sallow; her figure slight, almost thin ; but from the softness of her meditative eyes and the sweetness of her mouth, to the dainty shapeliness of her foot, she was so wholly and utterly feminine, so appealingly womanly, that Abel, who had known her since her birth, found to his astonishment that no other maiden had ever seemed to him so lovely, so desirable, though all the buxom beauties of the village had long been throwing them selves at his head; for in spite of his tall length of lank leanness, Abel's slight superiority to his fellow- villagers, in education and in ideals, and his always wearing a collar and necktie, had ever made him, to the damsels of Eeinhartz, an object of romantic sen timent. "I always did think, Barnaby," Abel persisted, "that the reason Missus died for you was because you wouldn't ever hire for her or leave her go on company any. She just did n't have any more spunk left to get her strength back when Barnabetta was born." "Ach! Why, after our Jakey was born, Missus never no more spoke nothin' to me about goin' on comp'ny or pleasure-seekin '. " "Yes, for the good reason that till that time you had her so good trained a 'ready, she knew it was no use to ask anything off of you ! And now Barnabetta is getting just so indifferent like her mother she 6 Introducing the Dreary Family don't even want any young pleasures!" said Abel, who was smarting under his own failure to rouse the girl to any interest in himself. "And, mind you, Barnaby, when a young girl don't want pleasures, she 's getting awful dumm!" "Well, so long as she ain't too dumm to cook three good meals a day fur me and the boys, and keeps her good health and is contented not to run any with the other young folks nor with you, Abel why, to be sure, I don't see what I need to worry about.'* Barnabetta was fully aware, with a complete in difference to the fact, that Abel would like to "keep comp'ny" with her and that her father prohibited it. She was, therefore, faintly surprised one autumn afternoon as she moved about the kitchen "making supper," to overhear her father on the back porch urging Abel, who had strolled over with him from the tin-shop, to "come on in the kitchen and eat along." 1 ' It would mebby make more work for Barnabetta, ' ' Abel demurred, though evidently eager to accept the unwonted, indeed unaccountable, invitation. "What 's a couple more dishes to wash? Come on in! I want to speak somepin wery important to you then. Around five o'clock or so we eat and it 's near that now. ' ' "All right. Then I will once." Abel's schoolhouse was at the upper end of the one long, sloping street which comprised the village of Eeinhartz, while the other end of it was bounded by 7 Barnabetta the hotel and the post-office. The brick or frame houses standing between these two limits made, for the most part, some pretension to prettiness, especially those which stood back from the street. But they presented one uniform, inhospitable, uncompromising front of tightly locked shutters. A stranger walking through the village would at first glance have supposed it must be uninhabited; but the well-kept lawns and flower-beds would speedily have transformed this im pression into the conviction that the entire popula tion of the place was gone from home for the day on an excursion or a picnic. For in Reinhartz the kitchen was the only part of the house used during week-days. Parlors were entirely consecrated to the sacred Sab bath and to funerals. A few minutes after Mr. Dreary had come, with the school-teacher, into the kitchen where Barnabetta was working, the two grown sons of the family, Jacob and Emanuel, also arrived for the evening meal, Eman- uel, the elder, coming in from the tin-shop in which he was salesman, and Jacob having just returned from his day's work of driving the stage-coach twice over the eight miles between Reinhartz and Lebanon. The entire family now, with the exception of Barna betta, gathered with their guest about the supper- table which was, as always, laid in the kitchen, the adjoining well-furnished dining-room being, accord ing to the village custom, kept always closed and dark ened, although to have been without the adornment of 8 Introducing the Dreary Family a dining-room and "a dining-room suit" would greatly have lowered a family in the village social scale. Jacob and Emanuel looked as surprised as was Abel himself at finding him at their father's table, for they knew how warily the head of the house guarded their sister from any possible wooers. Barnabetta, moving about the table to wait upon the four men, listened with but vague attention to their talk. Her deliberate, graceful movements, the far-away gaze of her eyes, her slow, soft, infrequent speech, gave her that habitual air of detachment from her environment which had often brought from her father the reproach that she acted ''like a person with ether in her." "You don't take no interest," he would com plain. ""What is there to take an interest in?" the over worked girl would dully ask. Abel, helping himself from the pyramid of hot cakes Barnabetta had placed on the table, remarked, ' ' I certainly am guessing, Barnaby, what you 're want ing to speak to me then!" "It 's some important. I '11 tell you then." "Here, Barnabetta," Emanuel ordered, holding out the empty butter dish, "the butter 's all!" 2 "Hot cakes does, now, make the butter all awful quick a 'ready," Mr. Dreary shook his head ruefully, as Barnabetta carried the dish away to refill it. ' ' And 2 All gone. 9 Barnabetta butter comes so high, too ! Butter and eggs is raising every day!" "Yes," said Emanuel, "it would come cheaper to keep a cow and make our butter. ' ' "Who 'd milk and churn?" casually inquired Abel. ' ' Who ? ' ' repeated E manuel, puzzled. * ' Well, ain 't we got a female keepin ' house here ? What fur do you ask who?" Emanuel was a great overgrown youth whose easy place in his father's tin-shop was calculated to make him a confirmed loafer. He and his brother Jacob shared their father's view as to the clear intention of Providence in the creation of woman. "You don't think she 's got enough to do already, heh?" asked Abel, "cooking and washing and ironing and cleaning up for you three men-folks?" " Ach, Abel," laughed Jacob, biting into a huge slice of "molasses bread," "when you git married oncet, We won't hear you talkin' then all the time about a woman's overworkin' herself! Not when it 's fur you she does it!" "Barnabetta 's got it good towards what some has it," remarked Emanuel. "Yes, I guess anyhow!" affirmed Mr. Dreary. "Her Mom had always babies to tend as well as all the housework. Barnabetta can anyways always git her night's rest." "It 's wonderful good of you, Barnaby, to leave her sleep all night!" said Abel. 10 Introducing the Dreary Family Barnabetta, moving about the table with food and cups of coffee, showed no sign of paying any heed to the conversation. "A body 'd think, Abel, to hear you, that you was in favor of this here crazy talk you kin read in the noos- papers about women's wotin' yet!" declared Mr. Dreary. "Well, I don't see but what it would be a good thing," Abel courageously affirmed, though he knew that in the expression of such a radical sentiment he endangered his position, held for ten years, as district teacher of Reinhartz. "Why shouldn't females vote, Barnaby?" "Ach, Abel, now you 're just talkin' to show off!" expostulated Mr. Dreary. "To be sure, a woman 's all right in her place. There ain 't nothin ' nicer than a woman, I '11 give you that much, Abel. A woman, ' ' he conceded magnanimously, "is wery nice indeed in her place. But there I 'm fur stoppin'. What them English had ought to do with them wild Suffra- gettys is to have such a whippin'-post fur 'em. That would soon stop their carryin'-on! That 's what I 'd have if I was in power over there. In a month's time it would stop 'em a 'ready!" "Yes, well, but," Abel said, "England, it 's a civil ized nation, Barnaby. ' ' "Them Suffragettys don't act much civilized!" scoffed Emanuel. "No, nor I don't call a nation much civilized where 11 Barnabetta holds to Free Trade and Repy-sock-racy ! ' ' maintained Mr. Dreary. "Ach," said Abel, "you 're all ver-huddled! You mean reciprocity and " ''Will you have more coffee, Abel?" Barnabetta 's lifeless voice here inquired at his side. "I 've had an ample sufficiency, Barnabetta," Abel softly answered, a gleam in his eyes as he looked up into her face. ' ' Thank you kindly, Barnabetta. ' ' "That 'sail right, Abel." She moved away, and Abel, to cover his agitation, made a perfunctory remark to Jacob at his left. "Many passengers to-day on your 'bus, Jake?" "Ach, middling few." "Roads good?" "Middling. I 'm wonderful bothered, though, with them automobiles they go over the bridge so hoggish, they 're damagin' it and one of these here days that there bridge is a-goin' to bust in!" "Here, Barnabetta," Emanuel again ordered his sister, holding towards her an empty saucer, "bring me another helpin' of that there rice puddin'." "It 's all," said Barnabetta. "I only made one helping 'round and you 've all had." "I 'm afraid, Barnabetta," said Abel regretfully, "mebby me being here unexpected, I eat your help ing, heh?" "That's all right, Abel." " I 'm awful sorry, Barnabetta ! ' ' 12 Introducing the Dreary Family "It makes nothin'," said her father. "She kin do with molasses bread or whatever. ' ' "Say, Barnabetta," Jacob announced, "you 're to iron my Sunday pants right aways then till you 've eat your supper a 'ready. ' ' ' ' Goin ' to see your girl, Jacob ? ' ' asked Abel. "Whether I am?" Jacob repeated the question. "Well, then, if I am?" he demanded defiantly. "It ain't anything to me, I 'm sure," answered Abel. "Only if it 's that Suse Darmstetter you fetched from the meeting Sabbath evening, she won't ever iron your Sunday pants for you!" "You leave me manage my wife myself, Abel!" ' ' You 're welcome to. But if it 's Suse Darmstetter, Jake, she '11 manage you." "I '11 take care of that there all right, Abel. I guess it would take more 'n Suse Darmstetter to henpeck one of us Drearys ! ' ' "Yes, us Drearys ain't so easy henpecked!" Mr. Dreary retorted derisively, his robust frame and fat face, with its suggestion of meanness in the small, closely set eyes, a sufficient corroboration of his state ment. "Jacob," said Barnabetta 's low voice as she stood at her brother's side to fill his glass with water, "did you fetch me that ten-cent magazine along I asked you to get me in Lebanon?" "Naw! What do you take me fur, Barnabetta, 13 Barnabetta askin' me to waste my time in town runnin' after such a magazine yet ! ' ' "You ain't to spend any fur such foolishness, Bar nabetta," her father objected. "Nor to waste your time with such magazines." "I knowed Pop would n't leave you have it," added Jacob. Barnabetta moved away without answering. Abel made a mental memorandum of an errand he would do next time he went to town he would buy a dozen magazines and slip them secretly into Barnabetta 's hands. "Now, Abel," Mr. Dreary said, pushing back his chair and rising, "if you 're done, come on out on the back porch oncet. Emanuel, ' ' he admonished his stal wart son as authoritatively as he would have spoken to a child, "you hurry on over to the shop; I can't come till I speak somepin particular to Abel. ' ' Emanuel, heavy and indolent, rose to obey. Jacob, also rising, sent a curious glance after his father and the village teacher as together they moved out to the back porch. "Don't forget my pants, Barnabetta," he reminded his sister as he, too, left the room. Barnabetta seated herself at the cluttered table to take her supper in solitude. Her absent, dreamy eyes showed no least interest in the mysterious confidence- meeting that was going on on the back porch between her father and Abel Buchter. 14 CHAPTER II ME. DREARY CONFIDES IN THE SCHOOLMASTER SEATED in two huge rocking-chairs, in the seduc tive, warm September twilight, Mr. Dreary and Abel contemplated a wide area of vegetable gardens behind the village houses, while the elder man pro ceeded to open up his soul to the younger. ''It come over me, here a couple weeks back, Abel, that I feel fur gettin' married. I feel fur it somepin wonderful ! ' ' "Married! You, yet! Well, if you ain't! At your age, Barnaby!" "I ain't just so old neither! Fifty-five. What 's fifty-five?" "Who 's the wonderful fortunate lady?" Abel in quired with heavy sarcasm. ' ' I ain 't picked out one yet. ' ' ' ' What ? By gosh ! What started you up, then, to think about getting married ? ' ' "Two things," answered Barnaby, counting them off on his fingers ; "first, seein' our Jacob runnin' with Suse Darmstetter; second, the trouble I got keepin' you and other fellahs from makin' up to our Barna- 15 Barnabetta betta. If I had a wife oncet, Barnabetta she could keep comp 'ny and git married with you or whoever. ' ' ' ' Then did you want to tell me this evening I could go ahead and keep company with Barnabetta?" Abel chokingly inquired. "Not so fast!" Barnaby hastily checked his eager ness. "I tole you I ain't any lady picked out yet, did n 't I ? You 're not to make up to Barnabetta till I 'm settled a 'ready, mind you! Anyways, she 's full young yet only seventeen and wery childish. ' ' "What do you want off of me, then?" Abel asked doggedly. "To help me pick out some lady, Abel, that would suit." "Yes; you 're so well acquainted over in Ephrata, I conceited mebby you 'd know some party over there that might suit me pretty good. I don't want to choose some one here where I am raised. ' ' "I know a-plenty that might suit you. But how about you suiting?" ' ' Ach, don't git funny ! Now leave me tell you what I do want. I want you to give me an interduction to some rich lady. A lady that owns some property, Abel, or some stocks, mebby. And one that ain't got no other beau, fur I 'm too old to try to cut out an other fellah." "But what would such a lady marry you fur, Bar naby?" 16 Mr. Dreary Confides in the Schoolmaster "I ain't particular that she 's such a wonderful good-looker, Abel, so long as she 's a good housekeeper and has money." "Yes, well, but," commented Abel thoughtfully, "how will Jacob and Emanuel like it?" "I ain't concerned if they like it." "And what do you expect Barnabetta to do with such a stepmother?" "Didn't I tell you that after I 'm all settled nice, Barnabetta she kin go git married? Not till I 'm settled, though, mind you!" "But how do you expect Barnabetta and the step mother will hit it off till Barnabetta gets married ? ' ' " Ach, that 's neither here nor there ! Do you know any such a lady fur me, Abel ? ' ' "I think mebby I could pick you out one." "I conceited that mebby you could. That 's why I spoke." "There 's a party at Reading might suit," said Abel thoughtfully. "Is there?" said Barnaby eagerly. "How well- fixed is she?" "Well, here last Saturday I was at Reading and the Secretary of the Young "Women's Christian Associa tion gave me an interduction to a lady that 's just what you 're looking for, Barnaby." "Now you don't mean it! Mebby you 're guyin' me, heh?" ' ' No, I ain 't. And, lucky for you, this lady of which 17 Barnabetta I referred to, is after just what you 're after a well- fixed gentleman. ' ' "That ain't what I 'm after," said Barnaby face tiously. "Say, Abel, did she tell you she was lookin' out fur a well-fixed gentleman ? ' ' "The Secretary of the Y. W., etcetery, she told me. The lady had come there to the Y. W. and told them that, being now tired of living alone, she wanted to get settled. Well, they didn't rightly understand what she meant (some of those city-folks are just that slow !) and they got her a good place for such ' general house work.' But to be sure that ain't what she meant by 'settled'! Why, she 's got a thousand dollars a year in her own right !" "Hi!" Barnaby exploded, looking apoplectic un der the shock of such a dazzling bait. "A thousand dollars a year yet ! ' ' "That's what!" "Go ahead!" exclaimed the prospective bridegroom. "So the lady explained to Miss Evans, the Secre tary, that she didn't want to hire out, she wanted to get settled. And Miss Evans asked her, ' Settled how, where, why, when?' and would you believe it, Bar naby, it took the lady a while yet to make Miss Evans understand she wanted an interduction to a gentle man that would like to get married? Well, you see, Miss Evans she knew me this while back already and she plagues me, still, when I go to town, why I don't get married. So she interduced me to the lady." 18 Mr. Dreary Confides in the Schoolmaster "And why," demanded Barnaby in quick suspicion, "didn't you take such a chance when it come your way?" ' The woman 's old enough to be my mother ! She 's your age, Barnaby. If I can get Barnabetta, you 're welcome to the old party!" "When kin you give me an interduction to her, Abel?" "Take you over to Beading Saturday evening if you want. I '11 'phone to Reading to Miss Evans to tell the lady she can expect us if you '11 pay for the telephone." ' ' Ach, yes, if I must. ' ' "All right then." "You didn't tell me yet what 's the lady's name?" "Miss Miller 's her name." "Miller. Miller 's a common name, ain't? There 's Millers here in Eeinhartz a 'ready. Say, Abel, don't you think that between this and Saturday some other fellah will mebby be makin' up to her? I tell you I 'm too old to go cuttin' out anybody." "But mebby when you see her, you won't feel for getting married to her. ' ' ' ' Them thousand dollars a year would make a body overlook a good bit, Abel. ' ' "But look-a-here, Barnaby, do you expect she 's a- goin' to pour her thousand dollars right into your paws? It 's hers. Times are some changed since you had a wife. I hardly believe this lady would think 19 Barnabetta that just because she kep' your house for you and went by your name, you 'd a right to take her money off of her. On the contrary, she 'd expect you to spend on her, so long as she worked for you. That 's how it goes these days, Barnaby. You '11 mebby get awful fooled if you don't look out !" "When a woman 's married it 's her husband's place to handle the money," Barnaby affirmed con clusively. "All right. If you think you can manage it that way." "I certainly ain't afraid I can't manage my own wife," Barnaby retorted scornfully. "All right, if you think. I '11 take you over then Saturday and give you an interduction to her. The rest is up to you. You can see what you can do." "I guess," said Barnaby hesitatingly, "you '11 ex pect me to pay the twenty-five cents car-fare over for you too?" "That wouldn't be any more 'n right." "Well, if I must." "Say, Barnaby, you better have a boquet along with you for the lady, ' ' Abel advised. "A boquet? Wouldn't that look some soft, Abel?" ' ' I guess she 'd expect you to look soft, seeing what you 're after. ' ' "But it 's too late in the season fur a boquet; there ain't no flowers bloomin' now." 20 Mr. Dreary Confides in the Schoolmaster "There 's hot-houses in town, ain't there?" "Whether there 's hot-houses? Yes, well, but! Flowers out of a hot-house I never bought yet." "You better fetch some along," Abel strongly ad vised. "It will help a good bit." "You think?" "Yes, I think." "Well, then, if I must," sighed Barnaby. "Now, then, ' ' he added, slowly rising from his chair, ' ' I guess I '11 have to be gittin' over to the shop. Say, Abel!" "Heh?" "Don't you go on in to Barnabetta now! I ain't leavin' her keep comp'ny till I 'm sure of this here lady. Pass me your promise, Abel." Abel hesitated. But realizing that in dealing with Barnaby Dreary, discretion was the better part of valor, he reluctantly gave the promise. As the younger man walked pensively through the quiet village street to the hotel where he lived, he wondered whether, if the spinster who wanted to "get settled" proved to be "such a blamed fool" as to marry stingy, fat old Barnaby Dreary, Barnabetta 's situation under the circumstances would have the happy effect of making her turn to him. He hardly dared hope that it would, so passively unresponsive she always was to his ardor. "To be sure, she 's only a child yet, as her Pop says, and full young to think about getting married though other girls of her age do think about it. Bar- 21 Barnabetta nabetta 's an awful queer girl. I don't rightly know her. Nobody does, I guess. Sometimes I think she 's got her own secret thoughts behind that dumm way she has ! I wish, though, she had a little more spunk than what she 's got! She wouldn't have to take all she takes. Now, here this evening, why couldn't she say to Jacob, 'If you couldn't bring me a ten-cent maga zine, I can't iron your pants.' But no, she '11 go iron his blamed pants ! Well, to be sure if she did n 't, her Pop would get so harsh, I guess mebby it 's the easiest way out for her just to do what they tell her. And when there 's a stepmother there yet, no doubt it '11 go harder than ever for Barnabetta. Then mebby she will take notice to me a little. Land sakes, would n 't she know something different if ever 7 had the chance to take care of her!" concluded Abel warmly. 22 CHAPTER III BARNABETTA RECEIVES A SHOCK BARNABETTA, sitting in the kitchen a few hours later, darning and mending some clothing of her father's and brothers', by the light of a lamp on the table, did not glance up as her father, at nine o 'clock, having closed the tin-shop, came over to the house and walked into the kitchen. Had she looked up, she might have been moved to some surprise at the un wonted aspect of embarrassment he wore as, roving aimlessly about the kitchen, he tried to get up courage to tell his daughter something which it was proving not at all easy to tell. He himself was scarcely less surprised than Barnabetta would have been, at find ing himself abashed before his own child whom he had bullied all her life. But Barnabetta, bending over her sewing, saw nothing of his perturbation, oblivious, as usual, to everything about her. The deadening monotony of her external world had dulled her very senses to it. She moved through her daily, unchang ing routine like a wound-up machine, all the force and fire of her fervent soul turned inward to feed upon itself and thereby either destroy itself or a 23 Barnabetta far-off possibility indeed lift itself far above the common range. "I got to speak somepin to you, Barnabetta," Mr. Dreary at last took the plunge as, pausing in his rest less pacing of the floor, he sat down heavily in front of his daughter. Barnabetta 's sewing dropped into her lap and she raised absent eyes to his. "It '11 surprise you some mebby, what I got to say. Leastways it surprised Abel Buchter. ' ' Barnabetta waited placidly. "Abel he thinks I 'm some old to be thinkin' of it. But I 'm only fifty-five. What 's fifty-five?" Barnabetta manifested no interest in the conun drum. "Well," said her father stoutly, "I 'm gettin' mar ried, mebby." And now the girl showed signs of life. Her gaze came back from afar and fixed itself, with a puzzled contraction between the brows, upon her father 's face. "What did you say, Pop?" "I said mebby I 'm gettin' married oncet." Barnabetta looked at him, speechless. "I can't give you no particulars yet, Barnabetta. This here 's only to prepare you a little. ' ' The girl, still inarticulate, continued to look at him. "You see," he said encouragingly, "when I 'm nice settled, you kin keep comp'ny with Abel or whoever. There 's plenty ivants to set up with you." 24 Barnabetta Receives a Shock Barnabetta, regarding him as though just making his acquaintance, made no comment. "Abel Buchter he wanted to keep eomp'ny with you this good while a 'ready. I tole him to-night I 'd give him dare to set up with you when I was all set tled. Not till, though ! To be sure, after I 'm settled you kin easy be spared." "Pop," Barnabetta at last spoke, "so kind-hearted as what Abel is, I 'd be sorry for you to give him false hopes ; for I will not keep comp 'ny with him. ' ' It was Mr. Dreary's turn now to stare in astonish ment. Scarcely within his memory had he ever heard his daughter assert herself to the point of affirming, "I will not." "What have you agin Abel Buchter?" "Nothing. But I won't keep eomp'ny with any man. ' ' "Ach, that 's just talk. You never kep' eomp'ny yet, so you don't know nothin' about it. Oncet Abel has set up with you a couple of times, you '11 be as man-crazy as the rest of the girls. ' ' "I will never marry," Barnabetta serenely stated, but in a tone of finality that sounded strange to her father's ears, accustomed to her unvarying acquies cence to his word. "Such foolish talk!" he said impatiently. "What makes you conceit that, I 'd like to know, heh?" "I don't like men-folks. They kreistle 1 me." i Disgust. 25 Barnabetta "Hah? Ach, well, you '11 soon get over that fool ishness ! You will have to. Fur oncet I fetch a wife here to housekeep fur me, to be sure you '11 have to soon go and git married, Barnabetta." " 'Why'! Do I need two to keep my house?" "Do you mean," the girl asked slowly, a long, ear nest gaze upon her father's face, "that you will not keep me here when you bring home a wife ? ' ' "Well, fur a year mebby, till you 've picked out a man. Not longer. What would you do here ? There ain't work here fur two; and you 're growed up you have to work." "There 's plenty of work for two, Pop." "You do it all." "I don't think you will find any one else that can or will." "Foolishness!" he scoffed. "But, Pop," she asked, a dazed look coming into her eyes, "where can I go?" ' ' I tole you you 're to git married. ' ' 4 ' But I said I would not do that. I will not marry. ' ' "What else kin you do? You know well enough," he reproached her, "you ain't enough educated to git the lower school to teach. ' ' "No, I ain't educated. I ain't anything but your housekeeper. ' ' "Yes, you- 're too dumm to do anything but git married. Abel he says, too, you 're dumm." 26 Barnabetta Receives a Shock "He says?" "Yes, often a 'ready." "There 's one thing I could do," she said hesitat ingly, looking more and more dazed at this sudden and unexpected crumbling of her world from under her, "I could hire out if you and Jacob and Emanuel wouldn't have a shamed face to leave me do that." ' ' That would make too much talk with me as well fixed as what I am yet ! No, there ain 't nothing you kin do but git married." "I will not do that." "Ach, well," he concluded, rising abruptly, "you '11 git over such a crazy notion. Anyways, the lady ain 't said 'Yes' yet. Time enough when she 's here oncet, fur to settle your case. ' ' He took a lamp from the mantelpiece, lighted it and went upstairs to his room. Barnabetta remained long over her sewing, too stirred out of her customary orbit to think of sleeping. She was confused with the new ideas so suddenly forcd upon her. What, she wondered, could be the inducement to any woman to marry her father ? Why did women want to marry anyway? The life of her native village made marriage appear to her like the gateway to a bondage far heavier and more hopeless than that under which she herself had always lived. Over and over again had she seen the bloom and brightness of a bride fade in a few years to the hag gard dullness of the overworked, over-prolific slave 27 Barnabetta of matrimony ; and though she had never in all her life asserted her own will, yet there was, deep down in her buried soul, a smoldering force that had concentrated upon one resolve no man should ever take her for his wife. Barnabetta had never had any "rights," she had never claimed any; but an unshakable con viction possessed her born of she knew not what that she did have an inalienable right to refuse to give her soul and body into the keeping of a man. The bare thought of it was so horrible to her that she had come to think of men as of a lower and coarser order of creation. She could work for them, serve them ; but never, while she had any shred of right to herself, should one of them come nearer. She felt a vague pity for her prospective stepmother. ' ' She '11 have it harder than what I have it ; for Pop will be her husband!" To-night as she faced the realization that the three brawny men for whom for more than five years she had expended all her girlhood's vitality, would, as soon as they no longer needed her, begrudge her a place in their home, her wonder at the strange selfish ness of the sex, only added strength to her deeply rooted resolution that never should a male creature bind her life to his in the indissoluble bonds of matri mony ; for in Barnabetta 's primitive world people still married for life. 28 CHAPTER IV MR. DREARY PROPOSES HALF-PAST eight of the following Saturday evening found Mr. Dreary, somewhat to his consternation, stranded alone with Miss Miller, the lady who desired to ''get settled" seated beside her on a sofa in her own neat little parlor ; for Abel Buch- ter, having brought him to the spinster's house and performed the ceremony of introduction, had imme diately, and in Mr. Dreary's opinion, ignominiously, departed, leaving him high and dry in the lady 's hands to settle his case as best he might. So long as he had been fortified by Abel's savoir-faire in meeting the peculiar situation into which he had gotten himself, he had felt confident enough. But now, abandoned to his fate, his soul trembled not, as might be sup posed, in awe of the fair one herself, but in the fear that the rich prize (her income) brought thus within his reach, might yet, by some inadvertency on his part, escape him. He looked perfectly unnatural to-night in his ' ' Sun day clothes"; he wore them too seldom to have ac quired the habit of them; and the little "boquet" of six carnations which he had stiffly carried on entering, 29 Barnabetta clenched in one hand like a pistol, had lent him an air more aggressive than conciliatory. The carnations did indeed stand for a battle waged with Abel and the florist, for Mr. Dreary had stoutly resisted Abel's ipse