The Brimming Cup

She was interrupted here by a great explosive laugh from Vincent. It was

his comment on her speech to them, and for a time he made no other,

eyeing her appreciatively as she and Mr. Welles talked garden together,

and from time to time chuckling to himself. She gave him once a sidelong

amused glance, evidently liking his capacity to laugh at seeing the

ground cut away from under his feet, evidently quite aware that he was

still thinking about that, and not at all about Mr. Welles and

tulip-beds. Welles was relieved at this. Apparently she was going to

"take" Vincent the right way. Some ladies were frightfully rubbed the

wrong way by that strange great laugh of Vincent's. And what she knew

about gardening! And not only about gardening in general, but about his

own garden. He was astounded at her knowledge apparently of every inch

of the quadrangle of soil back of his house, and at the revelations she

made to him of what could lie sleeping under a mysterious blank surface

of earth. Why, a piece of old ground was like a person. You had to know

it, to have any idea of all that was hidden in its bosom, good and bad.

"There never was such a place for pigweed as the lower end of your

vegetable lot," she told him; "you'll have to get up nights to fight it

if there is plenty of rain this summer." And again, "Be careful about

not digging too close to the east wall of your terrace. There is a

border of peonies there, splendid pink ones, and you're likely to break

off the shoots. They don't show so early as the red ones near the walk,

that get more sun."

"Did you ever use to live in that house?" he asked her, respectful of

her mastery of its secrets.

She laughed. "No, oh no. We've lived right here all the eleven years of

our life in Vermont. But there's another side to the local wireless

information-bureau that let me know all about you before you ever got

here. We all know all about everybody and everything, you know. If you

live in the country you're really married to humanity, for better or for

worse, not just on speaking terms with it, as you are in the city. Why,

I know about your garden because I have stood a thousand, thousand times

leaning on my hoe in my own garden, discussing those peonies with old

Mrs. Belham who lived there before you." This seemed to bring up some

picture into her mind at which she looked for a moment, turning from it

to the man beside her, with a warmth in her voice which went to his

heart. "It's been forlorn having that dear little old house empty and

cold. I can't tell you how glad I am you have come to warm it, and

live in it."