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 “Good God, Mother! What for!”

“Oh, I don’t know. Time to dream. “Time to—no, I suppose that isn’t true any more. I suppose the day is past when the genius came from the farm. Machinery has cut into his dreams. He used to sit for hours on the wagon seat, the reins slack in his hands, while the horses plodded into town. Now he whizzes by in a jitney. Patent binders, ploughs, reapers—he’s a mechanic. He hasn’t time to dream. I guess if Lincoln had lived to-day he’d have split his rails to the tune of a humming, snarling patent wood cutter, and in the evening he’d have whirled into town to get his books at the public library, and he’d have read them under the glare of the electric light bulb instead of lying flat in front of the flickering wood fire Well”

She lay back, looked up at him. “Dirk, why don’t you marry?”

“Why—there’s no one I want to marry.”

“No one who’s free, you mean?”

He stood up. “I mean no one.” He stooped and kissed her lightly. Her arms went round him close. Her hand with the thick gold wedding band on it pressed his head to her hard. “Sobig!” He was a baby again.

“You haven’t called me that in years.” He was laughing.

She reverted to the old game they had played when he was a child. “How big is my son! How big?” She was smiling, but her eyes were sombre.