Page:So Big (1924).djvu/138

 and neat. She understood now Maartje Pool’s drab garments, harassed face, heavily swift feet, never at rest. The idea of flowers in bowls was abandoned by July. Had it not been for Roelf’s faithful tending, the flower beds themselves, planted with such hopes, would have perished for lack of care.

Roelf came often to the house. He found there a tranquillity and peace never known in the Pool place, with its hubbub and clatter. In order to make her house attractive Selina had actually rifled her precious little bank hoard—the four hundred and ninety-seven dollars left her by her father. She still had one of the clear white diamonds. She kept it sewed in the hem of an old flannel petticoat. Once she had shown it to Pervus.

“If I sell this maybe we could get enough money to drain and tile.”

Pervus took the stone, weighed it in his great palm, blinked as he always did when discussing a subject of which he was ignorant. “How much could you get for it? Fifty dollars, maybe. Five hundred is what I would need.”

“I’ve got that. I’ve got it in the bank!”

“Well, maybe next spring. Right now I got my hands full, and more.”

To Selina that seemed a short-sighted argument. But she was too newly married to stand her ground; too much in love; too ignorant still of farm conditions.

The can of white paint and the brush actually did