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The Garden Doctor 



Part VIII. 



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Chapter XV (Continued) 



THE lettuce-border was a gay, fresh 

 green, for whenever we wanted 

 it for salad we pulled intervening 

 plants so that the continuity of 

 the border would be undisturbed; there 

 was a row of stocky little marigolds, of 

 prosperous looking cornflowers, poppies 

 that had spread into a soft mat of filmy 

 gray green foliage; buds there were, but 

 they still held their heads down; little 

 hard, dark red buttons of coreopsis were be- 

 ginning to show. The roses hadn't done 

 much; they were leafing out in a faint, 

 ineffectual way. It must have been too 

 late when I planted them. The zinnias and 

 the marigolds had been my salvation. 

 They could move with as much ease and 

 alacrity as a New York family born and 

 raised in apartments. Wherever was a gap, 

 wherever something "had happened," 

 wherever was barrenness or blankness from 

 any cause, I would dig up a zinnia and it 

 would fill the breach; or, if it didn't suit 

 because of the color (my zinnias were all in 

 shades of pink), then I would dig up a 

 marigold and plant that there instead. 



In spite of Mrs. Tarbox's mandate, I did 

 make the garden more comfortable as to 

 color. Two hills of squash had been taken 

 by the enemy; but the third, which seemed 

 impregnable, was making a handsome 

 mound. So I dug up clumps of blue corn- 

 flowers and set them at the four corners, 

 making the squash the centre, and it bid 

 fair to look very decorative. Whenever a 

 plant was worrying its neighbors, I dug it 

 up and put it where it wouldn't. Of course, 

 it's undeniably better to do this beforehand 

 and let each begin life in precisely the right 

 place. But if one doesn't know enough for 

 this, what else can one do? 



So now I dug some more zinnias, tucked 

 them into lonesome-looking places in the 

 front garden, soaked the bed and shaded it 

 carefully. 



The Reverend Richard appeared sooner 

 than we thought. 



That very evening, as we sat on our door- 

 step consuming our bread-and-milk, 

 Richard appeared, framed between the 

 smaller lilac bush and the apple-tree, as 

 suddenly as if a curtain had been raised. 

 There he was — clericals, hat and stick, the 

 lock of hair falling over on his spectacles' 

 rim, just as it did the last time I had seen 

 him, three years before. The immaculate 

 black of his trousers was dusty and his 



Continued from page ig, August number 



square toed shoes also bore traces of the 

 Enderby river road. Evidently he had 

 walked up from the station. He pulled 

 out an immaculate handkerchief and wiped 

 his forehead. 



"I am looking — "he began doubtfully; 

 then he stopped abruptly — "My word 

 but you're gotten well!" he said, and he 

 looked at me with sudden interest and at 

 Clarky with genuine admiration. 



Clarky certainly had grown good to look 

 upon these days. Her cheeks had tanned 

 until they were the color of apricots; she 

 wore a white blouse, as she always did, 

 open at the throat, which showed the lovely 

 line of neck and chin, and her hair was in 

 two thick braids like an Indian squaw's. 

 I liked to look at her myself, and I didn't 

 wonder that Richard's eye lightened as he 

 saw her framed in the doorway. Presently 

 she vanished, reappearing a moment later 

 with a refilled pitcher and another bowl. 



Richard fetched a bench from below the 

 lilac bush, and we resumed our repast. 



Richard beamed at the landscape; then 

 he beamed at us ; he said it was as lovely a 

 spot as one would wish to find this side of 

 Paradise. Then he told us the town news, 

 which somehow seemed a bit irrelevant, 

 as we listened to the thrushes and con- 

 sumed the childish supper. 



"What does this make you think of, 

 Richard? " I asked after a pause. 



"Pilgrim, refreshed at the house of 

 Mercy?" he inquired. 



"Farther back — six-year-old reading. " 



He looked at the house, at us, at the 

 little table and the three bowls of varying 

 sizes, then laughed a boy-like and unclerical 

 chuckle. "The 'Three Bears'?" he said. 



Clarky was right about Richard. 



He liked it. He stayed until I began to 

 fear he would break his neck or at least his 

 spectacles in finding his way down the hill, 

 for there was a blind turn you take and 

 an unwary step would send you crashing 

 violently down a steep place like the wicked 

 stepmother in the fairy-tale. I had to lend 

 him our one little lantern. He was staying 

 the night at Mrs. Tarbox's; he purposed 

 prospecting on our hill for sites for apple 

 and nut orchards. He would come to- 

 morrow and " spy out the land, " he said. 



Chapter XVI 



"D ICHARD, as I said, liked it. He stayed 

 AV by the doorstep that first evening 

 watching the sky and listening to the 

 thrushes until they stopped singing and the 



51 



dusk fell and the crickets began their 

 steadily insistent " Go in! Go in! Go in!" 

 which ought to have sent him down the 

 hill to Mrs. Tarbox's. But it didn't. 



Instead, he came indoors to our crackling 

 wood fire which made the hemlock branches 

 cast queer, nickering shadows on the walls, 

 and flashed from his large lensed spectacles. 

 He sat on the floor by the fire, regard- 

 less of his clericals, long arms clasped 

 about his knees and told us his plans, also 

 the theories which were responsible for the 

 plans. 



I took the invalid's privilege of the 

 window seat and cushions for I was tired. 

 Clarky sat opposite Richard on the other 

 side of the fireplace, her back toward me, 

 but her back looked interested. She leaned 

 forward, chin on her hand, and listened as 

 if it were a medical lecture and she were 

 taking notes. 



Richard was terribly in earnest. He 

 always was over his theories. He talked 

 farming conditions to Clarky as if her 

 soul's salvation depended upon his getting ■ 

 his idea "across to her," as the playwrights 

 say. 



At last I woke up to what he was saying. 

 "Here?" I broke in. "A pastorate up 

 here?" 



"Precisely," he answered, turning the 

 gleaming spectacles upon me. "The most 

 important problem in the country is the 

 industrial problem; the only part of this 

 I understand is where it touches agriculture. 

 Therefore it behooves me to establish myself 

 where the problem is agricultural. No- 

 where is the agricultural problem in sorer 

 need of intelligent solution than in New 

 England." 



"But the salary, Richard! There are 

 plenty of anaemic and paralytic churches. 

 There's a brick one over the hill, really 

 good architecture and an old orchard 

 beside, and the country may be good for 

 fruit raising, but the salary! Four or 

 five hundred a year — something like that, 

 Mrs. Tarbox told me — no one could 

 possibly live on that!" 



"But there's the interesting part, my 

 dear Caroline," said Richard mildly, "I 

 shall then have precisely the problem the 

 farmers of the neighborhood face without 

 the aid of that stipend. It will be enlight- 

 ening to find if one is adequate." 



Then he expounded his theory. He said 

 the idea of a clergyman insulated from the 

 problems of the community was unsocial- 

 istic, undemocratic, it was also unapostolic; 



