During this flow of time Big Medicine had feasted his eyes on the bright curls and brighter eyes of Carrie Golding, till his heart had become tender and happy as a child's. They rarely conversed more than for him to say, "Miss Carrie, look there," or for her to call out, "Please, Mr.

Cook, hand me down this bolt of muslin." But Big Medicine was content.

It was June the 8th, about ten o'clock in the morning, and Big Medicine was slowly making his way from his comfortable bachelor's cabin to the corner brick. A peculiar smile was on his face, his heart was fluttering strangely, and all on account of a little circ.u.mstance of the preceding day, now fresh in his memory. Great boy that he was, he was poring ever a single sweet smile Carrie Golding had given him!

The mail hack stood at the post-office door, whence Mr. Golding was coming with a letter in his hand. Big Medicine stopped and looked up at the window. There stood Carrie. She was looking hopefully toward her father. Big Medicine smiled and murmured:

"Ther's wher I fust seed the gal--bless her sweet soul!" There was a whole world of sincere happiness in the tones of his voice.

Mr. Golding pa.s.sed him hastily, his green spectacles on his nose, and a great excitement flashing from his face. Big Medicine gazed wonderingly after his partner till he saw him run up stairs to Carrie's room. Then he thought he heard Carrie cry out joyfully, but it may have been the wind.

When an hour had pa.s.sed Mr. Golding and Carrie came down dressed for travelling. How strangely, wondrously beautiful the girl now looked! Mr.

Golding was as nervous as an old woman. He rubbed his thin white hands together rapidly and said:

"Mr. Cook, I have glorious news this morning!"

"And what mought it be?" asked Big Medicine, as a damp chilliness crept over him, and his face grew pinched and almost as white as his shirt bosom.

"Krofton & Kelly, the bankers, have resumed payment, and I'll get all my money! It _is_ glorious news, is it not, my friend?"

Big Medicine was silent. He tried to speak, but his mouth was dry and powerless. A mist drifted across his eyes. He hardly realized where he was or what was said, but he knew all.

"I have concluded to give you this house and all my interest in this store. You must not refuse. I haven't time to make the transfer now, but I'll not neglect it. Carrie and I must hasten at once to Cincinnati. The hack is waiting; so good bye, my dear friend, G.o.d bless you!" Mr.

Golding wrung his partner's cold, limp hand, without noticing how fearfully haggard that Roman face had suddenly grown.

"Good bye, Mr. Cook," said Carrie in her sweet, sincere way. "I'm real sorry to leave you and the dear old house--but--but--good bye, Mr. Cook.

Come to see us in Cincinnati. Good bye." She gave him her hand also.

He smiled a wan, flickering smile, like the last flare of a fire whose fuel is exhausted. Carrie's woman's heart sank under that look, though she knew not wherefore.

The hack pa.s.sed round the curve of the road.

They were gone!

Big Medicine stood alone in the door of the corner brick. He looked back over his shoulders at the well filled shelves and muttered:

"She ain't here, and what do I want of the derned old store?"

The wind rustled the elm leaves and tossed the brown locks of the man over his great forehead; the blue birds sang on the roof; the dust rose in little columns along the street; and, high over head, in the yellow mist of the fine June weather, sailed a great blue heron, going to the lakes. Big Medicine felt like one deserted in the wilderness. He stood there a while, then closed and locked the door and went into the woods.

A month pa.s.sed before he returned. Jimtown wondered and wondered. But when he did return his neighbors could not get a word out of him. He was silent, moody, listless. Where had he been? Only hunting for Mr. Golding and Carrie. He found them, after a long search, in a splendid residence on the heights just out of Cincinnati. Mr. Golding greeted him cordially, but somehow Big Medicine felt as though he were shaking hands with some one over an insurmountable barrier. That was not the Mr.

Golding he had known.

"Carrie is out in the garden. She will be glad to see you. Go along the hall there. You will see the gate."

Mr. Golding waved his hand after the manner of a very rich man, and a patronizing tone would creep into his voice. Somehow Big Medicine looked terribly uncouth.

With a hesitating step and a heart full of unreal sensations, Big Medicine opened the little gate and strode into the flower garden.

Suddenly a vision, such as his fancy had never pictured, burst on his dazzled eyes. Flowers and vines and statues and fountains; on every hand rich colors; perfumes so mixed and intensified that his senses almost gave way; long winding walks; fairy-like bowers and music. He paused and listened. A heavy voice, rich and manly, singing a ballad--some popular love song--to the sweet accompaniment of a violin, and blended through it all, like a silvery thread, the low sweet voice of Carrie Golding.

The poor fellow held his breath till the song was done.

Two steps forward and Big Medicine towered above the lovers.

Carrie sprang to her feet with a startled cry; then, recognizing the intruder, she held out her little hand and welcomed him. Turning to her lover she said:

"Henry, this is Mr. Cook, lately papa's partner in Indiana."

The lover was a true gentleman, so he took the big hard hand of the visitor and said he was glad to see him.

Big Medicine stood for a few moments holding a hand of each of the lovers. Presently a tremor took possession of his burly frame. He did not speak a word. His breast swelled and his face grew awfully white.

He put Carrie's hand in that of her lover and turned away. As he did so a tear, a great bitter drop, rolled down his haggard cheek. A few long strides and Big Medicine was gone.

Shrilly piped the blue birds, plaintively sang the peewees, sweetly through the elms and burr oaks by the corner brick blew the fresh summer wind, as, just at sunset, Big Medicine once more stood in front of the old building with his eyes fixed on the vacant, staring window.

It was scarcely a minute that he stood there, but long enough for a tender outline of the circ.u.mstances of the past year to rise in his memory.

A rustling at the broken lattice, a sudden thrill through the iron frame of the watching man, a glimpse of a sweet face--no, it was only a fancy.

The house was still, and old and desolate. It stared at him like a death's head.

Big Medicine raised his eyes toward heaven, which was now golden and flashing resplendently with sunset glories. High up, as if almost touching the calm sky, a great blue heron was toiling heavily westward.

Taking the course chosen by the lone bird, Big Medicine went away, and the places that knew him once know him no more forever.

THE VENUS OF BALHINCH.

When I returned from Europe with a finished education, I found that my fortune also was finished in the most approved modern style, so I left New York and drifted westward in search of employment. At length I came to Indiana, and, having not even a cent left, and mustering but one presentable suit of clothes, I looked about me in a hungry, half desperate sort of way, till I pounced upon the school in Balhinch. Now Balhinch is not a town, nor a cross-road place, nor a post-office--it is simply a neighborhood in the southwestern corner of Union Township, Montgomery County--a neighborhood _sui generis_, stowed away in the breaks of Sugar Creek, containing as good, quiet, law-abiding folk as can be found anywhere outside of Switzerland. My school was a small one in numbers, but the pupils ranged from four to six feet three in alt.i.tude, and well proportioned. The most advanced cla.s.s had thumbed along pretty well through the spelling book. I need not take up your time with the school, however, for it has nothing at all to do with my story, excepting merely to explain how I came to be in Balhinch, in the State of Indiana.

My first sight of Susie Adair was on Sunday at the Methodist prayer meeting. I was sitting with my back to a window and facing the door of the log meeting house when she entered. It was July--a hot glary day, but a steady wind blew cool and sweet from the southwest, bringing in all sorts of woodland odors. The gra.s.shoppers were chirruping in the little timothy field hard by, and over in a bit of woodland pasture a swarm of blue jays were worrying a crow, keeping up an incessant squeaking and chattering. The dumpy little cla.s.s leader--the only little man in Balhinch--had just begun to give out the hymn

"Love is the sweetest bud that blows, Its beauties never die, On earth among the saints it grows And ripens in the sky," &c.,

when Susie came in. Ben Crane was sitting by me. He nudged me with his elbow and whispered:

"How's that 'ere for poorty?"

I made him no answer, but remained staring at the girl till long after she had taken her seat. Nature plays strange tricks. Susie, the daughter of farmer Adair, was as beautiful in the face as any angel could be, and her form was as perfect as that of the Cnidian Venus. Her motion when she walked was music, and as she sat in statuesque repose, the undulations of her queenly form were those of perfect ease, grace and strength. Her hands were small and taper, a little browned from exposure, as was also her face. Her hair was the real cla.s.sic gold, and her grey eyes were riant with health and content. When her red lips parted to sing, they discovered small even teeth, as white as ivory. I can give you no idea of her. Physically she was perfection's self in the mould of a Venus of the grandest type. Her head, too, was an intellectual one (though feminine), in the best sense of the word. The first thought that flashed across my mind was embodied in the words--_A Venus_--and I still think of her as the best model I ever saw.

"How's that for poorty?" repeated Crane.

"Who is she!" I replied interrogatively.

"She's my jewlarker," said he.

"Your what?"

"My sweetheart."

"What is her name?"