"Why, at your age," she turned slightly to the
flapper, "I'd been married two years, and your father was crawling about
under my feet as I did the housework."
She was still looking intently ahead to make her vision alive.
"What a time of years, and how different! Sixty years ago--why, it seems
farther back than Noah's ark. The log cabins in the little clearings,
and people marrying when they wanted to--always early, and working hard
and raising big families. I was the only girl, but I had nine brothers.
And Jim, your father's father, my dear, I remember the very moment he
began to take notice of me, coming out of the log church one Sabbath. He
only looked at me, that was all, and I had to pretend I didn't know.
Then he came nights and sat in front of the big open fire, with all of
us, at first. But after a little, the others would climb up the ladder
to the loft and leave us, and we'd maybe eat a mince pie that I'd
made--I was a good cook at sixteen--and there would be a pitcher of
cider, and outside, the wind would be driving the snow against the tiny
windowpanes--I can hear that sound now, and the sputtering of the
backlog, and Jim--oh, well!" She waved the scene back.
"When we were married, Jim had his eighty acres all cleared, a yoke of
nice fat steers, a cow, two pigs, and a couple of sheep; not much, but
it seemed enough then. The furniture was home-made, the table-ware was
tin plates and pewter spoons and horn-handled knives, and a set of real
china that Pa and Ma gave us--that was for company--and a feather-bed
and patch-work quilts I'd made, and a long-barrelled rifle, and the best
coon-dog, Jim said, in the whole of York State.
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