LITMIR.BIZ

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They walked hand in hand in a delicious garden where it was always autumn; together and alone they entered upon the long retarded romance of their commonplace and uneventful lives.

      At last that great supper was over, everything had been eaten; the enormous roast goose had dwindled to a very skeleton. Mr. Sieppe had reduced the calf's head to a mere skull; a row of empty champagne bottles—“dead soldiers,” as the facetious waiter had called them—lined the mantelpiece. Nothing of the stewed prunes remained but the juice, which was given to Owgooste and the twins. The platters were as clean as if they had been washed; crumbs of bread, potato parings, nutshells, and bits of cake littered the table; coffee and ice-cream stains and spots of congealed gravy marked the position of each plate. It was a devastation, a pillage; the table presented the appearance of an abandoned battlefield.

      “Ouf,” cried Mrs. Sieppe, pushing back, “I haf eatun und eatun, ach, Gott, how I haf eatun!”

      “Ah, dot kaf's het,” murmured her husband, passing his tongue over his lips.

      The facetious waiter had disappeared. He and Maria Macapa foregathered in the kitchen. They drew up to the washboard of the sink, feasting off the remnants of the supper, slices of goose, the remains of the lobster salad, and half a bottle of champagne. They were obliged to drink the latter from teacups.

      “Here's how,” said the waiter gallantly, as he raised his tea-cup, bowing to Maria across the sink. “Hark,” he added, “they're singing inside.”

      The company had left the table and had assembled about the melodeon, where Selina was seated. At first they attempted some of the popular songs of the day, but were obliged to give over as none of them knew any of the words beyond the first line of the chorus. Finally they pitched upon “Nearer, My God, to Thee,” as the only song which they all knew. Selina sang the “alto,” very much off the key; Marcus intoned the bass, scowling fiercely, his chin drawn into his collar. They sang in very slow time. The song became a dirge, a lamentable, prolonged wail of distress:

      “Nee-rah, my Gahd, to Thee,

      Nee-rah to Thee-ah.”

      At the end of the song, Uncle Oelbermann put on his hat without a word of warning. Instantly there was a hush. The guests rose.

      “Not going so soon, Uncle Oelbermann?” protested Trina, politely. He only nodded. Marcus sprang forward to help him with his overcoat. Mr. Sieppe came up and the two men shook hands.

      Then Uncle Oelbermann delivered himself of an oracular phrase. No doubt he had been meditating it during the supper. Addressing Mr. Sieppe, he said:

      “You have not lost a daughter, but have gained a son.”

      These were the only words he had spoken the entire evening. He departed; the company was profoundly impressed.

      About twenty minutes later, when Marcus Schouler was entertaining the guests by eating almonds, shells and all, Mr. Sieppe started to his feet, watch in hand.

      “Haf-bast elevun,” he shouted. “Attention! Der dime haf arrive, shtop eferyting. We depart.”

      This was a signal for tremendous confusion. Mr. Sieppe immediately threw off his previous air of relaxation, the calf's head was forgotten, he was once again the leader of vast enterprises.

      “To me, to me,” he cried. “Mommer, der tervins, Owgooste.” He marshalled his tribe together, with tremendous commanding gestures. The sleeping twins were suddenly shaken into a dazed consciousness; Owgooste, whom the almond-eating of Marcus Schouler had petrified with admiration, was smacked to a realization of his surroundings.

      Old Grannis, with a certain delicacy that was one of his characteristics, felt instinctively that the guests—the mere outsiders—should depart before the family began its leave-taking of Trina. He withdrew unobtrusively, after a hasty good-night to the bride and groom. The rest followed almost immediately.

      “Well, Mr. Sieppe,” exclaimed Marcus, “we won't see each other for some time.” Marcus had given up his first intention of joining in the Sieppe migration. He spoke in a large way of certain affairs that would keep him in San Francisco till the fall. Of late he had entertained ambitions of a ranch life, he would breed cattle, he had a little money and was only looking for some one “to go in with.” He dreamed of a cowboy's life and saw himself in an entrancing vision involving silver spurs and untamed bronchos. He told himself that Trina had cast him off, that his best friend had “played him for a sucker,” that the “proper caper” was to withdraw from the world entirely.

      “If you hear of anybody down there,” he went on, speaking to Mr. Sieppe, “that wants to go in for ranching, why just let me know.”

      “Soh, soh,” answered Mr. Sieppe abstractedly, peering about for Owgooste's cap.

      Marcus bade the Sieppes farewell. He and Heise went out together. One heard them, as they descended the stairs, discussing the possibility of Frenna's place being still open.

      Then Miss Baker departed after kissing Trina on both cheeks. Selina went with her. There was only the family left.

      Trina watched them go, one by one, with an increasing feeling of uneasiness and vague apprehension. Soon they would all be gone.

      “Well, Trina,” exclaimed Mr. Sieppe, “goot-py; perhaps you gome visit us somedime.”

      Mrs. Sieppe began crying again.

      “Ach, Trina, ven shall I efer see you again?”

      Tears came to Trina's eyes in spite of herself. She put her arms around her mother.

      “Oh, sometime, sometime,” she cried. The twins and Owgooste clung to Trina's skirts, fretting and whimpering.

      McTeague was miserable. He stood apart from the group, in a corner. None of them seemed to think of him; he was not of them.

      “Write to me very often, mamma, and tell me about everything—about August and the twins.”

      “It is dime,” cried Mr. Sieppe, nervously. “Goot-py, Trina. Mommer, Owgooste, say goot-py, den we must go. Goot-py, Trina.” He kissed her. Owgooste and the twins were lifted up. “Gome, gome,” insisted Mr. Sieppe, moving toward the door.

      “Goot-py, Trina,” exclaimed Mrs. Sieppe, crying harder than ever. “Doktor—where is der doktor—Doktor, pe goot to her, eh? pe vairy goot, eh, won't you? Zum day, Dokter, you vill haf a daughter, den you know berhaps how I feel, yes.”

      They were standing at the door by this time. Mr. Sieppe, half way down the stairs, kept calling “Gome, gome, we miss der drain.”

      Mrs. Sieppe released Trina and started down the hall, the twins and Owgooste following. Trina stood in the doorway, looking after them through her tears. They were going, going. When would she ever see them again? She was to be left alone with this man to whom she had just been married. A sudden vague terror seized her; she left McTeague and ran down the hall and caught her mother around the neck.

      “I don't WANT you to go,” she whispered in her mother's ear, sobbing. “Oh, mamma, I—I'm 'fraid.”

      “Ach, Trina, you preak my heart. Don't gry, poor leetle girl.” She rocked Trina in her arms as though she were a child again. “Poor leetle scairt girl, don' gry—soh—soh—soh, dere's nuttun to pe 'fraid oaf. Dere, go to your hoasban'. Listen, popper's galling again; go den; goot-by.”

      She loosened Trina's arms and started down the stairs. Trina leaned over the banisters, straining her eyes after her mother.

      “What is ut, Trina?”

      “Oh, good-by, good-by.”

      “Gome, gome, we miss der drain.”

      “Mamma, oh, mamma!”

      “What is ut, Trina?”

      “Good-by.”

      “Goot-py, leetle daughter.”

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