as
temporary aid gave feudal service on demand; but for the six months of
his family's residence each year house servants must be kept at any
price. He talked of his domain, and the Irish girl nodded, the rattles
whirring when she breathed, muffled in her breast, as if a snake were
crawling somewhere near.

"When my father came here," he said, "there wasn't any railroad, and
there were still Indians in the woods."

"Red Indians? Would they all be dead now? My brother Hyacinth is fair
departed his mind readin' of red Indians. Him is my twin."

"How many of you are there?"

"Twelve, your Honor," said Onnie, "an' me the first to go off, bein'
that I'm not so pretty a man would be marryin' me that day or this. An'
if herself is content, I am pleased entirely."

"You're a good cook," said Rawling, honestly. "How old are you?"

He had been puzzling about this; she was so wonderfully ugly that age
was difficult to conjecture. But she startled him.

"I'll be sixteen next Easter-time, your Honor."

"That's very young to leave home," he sympathized.

"Who'd be doin' the like of me any hurt? I'd trample the face off his
head," she laughed.

"I think you could. And now what do you think of my big son?"

The amazing Onnie gurgled like a child, clasping her hands.

"Sure, Mary herself bore the like among the Jew men, an' no one since
that day, or will forever. An' I must go to my cookin', or Master San
will have no dinner fit for him."

Rawling looked after her pink flannel petticoat, greatly touched and
pleased by this eulogy. Mrs. Rawling strolled out of the hall and
laughed at the narrative.

"She's appalling to look at, and she frightens the other girls, but
she's clean and teachable. If she likes San, she may not marry one of
the men--for a while."

"He'd be a bold man. She's as big as Jim Varian. If we run short of
hands, I'll send her up to a cutting. Where's San?"

"In the kitchen. He likes her. Heavens! if she'll only stay, Bob!"

Onnie stayed, and Mrs. Rawling was gratified by humble obedience and
excellent cookery. Sanford was gratified by her address, strange to him.
He was the property of his father's lumbermen, and their wives called
him everything from "heart's love" to "little cabbage," as their origin
might dictate; but no one had ever called him "Master San." He was San
to the whole valley, the first-born of the owner who gave their
children schools and stereopticon lectures in the union chapel,