“Oh, I'd fix him. I'd take him down,” she replied with a knowing shake of her head.
“Poor Dick! He's in for a hard time,” replied Barney. “But nothing can change Dick. And I am awful glad he's coming to-day, in time for the raising, too.”
“The raising? Oh, yes. The McLeods'. Yes, I remember. And,” regretfully, “a big supper and a big spree afterwards in the new barn.”
“Are not you going?” inquired Barney.
“I don't know. They want me to go to help, but I don't think I'll go. I don't think father would like me to go, and,”—a pause—“anyway, I don't think I can get away.”
“Oh, pshaw! Get Old Nancy in. She can take care of the children for once. You would like the raising. It's great fun.”
“Oh! wouldn't I, though? It's fine to see them racing. They get so wild and yell so.”
“Well, come on then. You must come. They'll all be disappointed, if you don't. And Dick is coming that way, too. Alec Murray is to bring him on his way home from town.” Again Barney glanced keenly at her face, but he saw only puzzled uncertainty there.
“Well, I don't know. We'll see. At any rate, I must go now.”
“Wait,” cried Barney, “I'll go with you. We're having dinner early to-day.” He hung up the scythe in the thorn tree and threw the stone at the foot.
“I wish you would promise to come,” he said earnestly.
“Do you, really?” The blue eyes turned full upon him.
“Of course I do. It will be lots better fun if you are there.” The frank, boyish honesty of his tone seemed to disappoint the blue eyes. Together in silence they set off down the lane.
“Well,” she said, resuming their conversation, “I don't think I can go, but I'll see. You'll be playing for the dancing, I suppose?”
“No. I won't play if Dan is around, and I guess he'll be there. I may spell him a little perhaps.”
“Then you'll be dancing yourself. You're great at that, I know.”
“Me? Not much. It's Dick. Oh, he's a dandy! He's a bird! You ought to see him! I'll make him do the Highland Fling.”
“Oh, Dick, Dick!” she cried impatiently, “everything is Dick with you.”
Barney glanced at her, and after a moment's pause said, “Yes. I guess you're right. Everything is pretty much Dick with me. Next to my mother, Dick is the finest in all the world.”
At the crest of the hill they stood looking silently upon the scene spread out before them.
“There,” said Barney, “if I live to be a hundred years, I can't forget that,” and he waved his hand over the valley. Then he continued, “I tell you what, with the moon just over the pond there making a track of light across the pond—” She glanced shyly at him. The sombre eyes were looking far away.
“I know,” she said softly; “it must be lovely.”
Through the silence that followed there rose and fell with musical cadence a call long and clear, “Who-o-o-hoo.”
“That's mother,” said Barney, answering the call with a quick shout. “You'll be in time for dinner.”
“Dinner!” she cried with a gasp. “I'll have to get my buttermilk and other things and hurry home.” And she ran at full speed down the hill and into the mill yard, followed by Barney protesting that it was too hot to run.
“How are you, Mrs. Boyle?” she panted. “I'm in an awful hurry. I'm after father's buttermilk and that recipe, you know.”
Mrs. Boyle's eyes rested lovingly upon her flushed face.
“Indeed, there's no hurry, Margaret. Barney should not be letting you run.”
“Letting me!” she laughed defiantly. “Indeed, he had all he could do to keep up.”
“And that I had,” said Barney, “and, mother, tell her she must come to the raising.”
“And are you not going?” said the older woman.
“I don't think so. You know father—well, he wouldn't care for me to be at the dance.”
“Yes, yes, I know,” quickly replied Mrs. Boyle, “but you might just come with me and look quietly on. And, indeed, the change will be doing you good. I will just call for you, and speak to your father this afternoon.”
“Oh, I don't know, Mrs. Boyle. I hardly think I ought.”
“Hoots, lassie! Come away, then, into the milk-house.”
Back among the overhanging willows stood the little whitewashed log milkhouse, built over a little brook that gurgled clear and cool over the gravelly floor.
“What a lovely place,” said Margaret, stepping along the foot stones.
“Ay, it's clean and sweet,” said Mrs. Boyle. “And that is what you most need with the milk and butter.”
She took up an earthen jar from the gravelly bed and filled the girl's pail with buttermilk.
“Thank you, Mrs. Boyle. And now for that recipe for the scones.”
“Och, yes!” said Mrs. Boyle. “There's no recipe at all. It is just this way—” And she elucidated the mysteries of sconemaking.
“But they will not taste a bit like yours, I'm sure,” cried Margaret, in despair.
“Never you fear, lassie. You hurry away home now and get your dinner past, and we will call for you on our way.”
“Here, lassie,” she cried, “your father will like this. It is only churned th' day.” She rolled a pat of butter in a clean linen cloth, laid it between two rhubarb leaves and set it in a small basket.
“Good-bye,” said the girl as she kissed the dark cheek. “You're far too kind to me.”
“Poor lassie, poor lassie, I would I could be kinder. It's a good girl you are, and a brave one.”
“Not very brave, I fear,” replied the girl, as she quickly turned away and ran up the hill and out of sight.
“Poor motherless lassie,” said Mrs. Boyle, looking after her with loving eyes; “it's a heavy care she has, and the minister, poor man, he can't see it. Well, well, she has the promise.”
III
THE RAISING
The building of a bank-barn was a watershed in farm chronology. Toward that event or from it the years took their flight. For many summers the big boulders were gathered from the fields and piled in a long heap at the bottom of the lane on their way to their ultimate destination, the foundation of the bank-barn. During the winter, previous the “timber was got out.” From the forest trees, maple, beech or elm—for the pine was long since gone—the main sills, the plates, the posts and cross-beams were squared and hauled to the site of the new barn. Hither also the sand from the pit at the big hill, and the stone from the heap at the bottom of the lane, were drawn. And before the snow had quite gone the lighter lumber—flooring, scantling, sheeting and shingles—were marshalled to the scene of action. Then with the spring the masons and