All the time Myrtle was leanin' against ma, just like a cat, actin', I
thought. She did make me terrible mad sometimes. Grandpa couldn't see
through her. He petted her and went out and saddled a horse and put her
on it and led the horse around the lot for 'bout an hour, right in the
sun. And then she came in and began to honey around grandma and get
things. I saw the game was spoiled for me, and wanted the time to go by
so I could get away, or for somethin' to happen. Then about eleven
o'clock grandma came into the settin' room with apples to peel, and ma
helped her and they began to talk--and it was wonderful to listen, for
it was about Mitch and Zueline. Ma said she'd never seed such children,
such a boy as Mitch, that he would be a musician or a poet like
Longfellow when he grew up; that he was dreamin' all the time and
believed in fairy stories, and made everything real to hisself. Then she
said that Mitch thought so much of Zueline that it was enough to scare a
body; that if anything happened to her Mitch would go out of his head,
and if they was separated it would kill him, and she thought they would
be separated. That Mrs. Hasson thought of takin' a trip, and takin'
Zueline, but was keepin' it quiet. Grandma said it was silly for two
children to act that a way, or at least for Mitch to act that a way.
Zueline warn't doin' anything except just to be Zueline to Mitch--she
wasn't as much in love with Mitch as he was with her.
Then grandpa came in and said we'd all go to Bobtown the next day, that
his spring wagon was done and we'd go over and get it. It was an awful
ways, eighteen miles at least, and we'd have to start by six o'clock in
order to get there and get back, and take a lunch to eat on the way. I
suppose I had heard as much about Bobtown as any place in the world, but
never seen it. It was just in a straight line from the porch at
grandpa's, past Spotty Milt Stith's place, and just in the place between
the woods and where the sky came down beyond. So the next mornin' we was
off--grandpa and ma settin' in the front seat of the carriage; and me,
grandma and Myrtle in the back seat. And ma began right away to talk
about Petersburg, they agreed about hard drink and a lot of things.