"I'd like to wring his neck," said Martin, grinning. "But since it
turned out like this for me I'll forgive him. I don't care how many
Amandas he marries if he leaves me mine."
At that point little Charlie, tiptoeing to the open door of Martin's
room, saw something which caused him to widen his eyes, clap a hand
over his mouth to smother an exclamation, and turn quickly down the
stairs.
"Jiminy pats, Mom!" he cried excitedly as he entered the kitchen, "our
Mart's holdin' Amanda's hand and she's kissin' him on the face! I seen
it and heard it! Jiminy pats!"
The small boy wondered what ailed his mother, why she was not properly
shocked. Why did she gather him into her arms and whisper something
that sounded exactly like, "Thank God!"
"It's all right," she told him. "You mustn't tell; that's their
secret."
"Oh, is it all right? Then I won't tell. Mart says I can keep a secret
good."
But Martin and Amanda decided to take the mother into the happy secret.
"Look at my face," the girl said. "I can't hide my happiness. We might
as well tell it."
"Mother!" Martin's voice rang through the house. At the sound a happy,
white-capped woman wiped her eyes again on the corner of her gingham
apron and mounted the stairs to give her blessing to her boy and the
girl who had crowned him with her woman's love.
The announcement of the troth was received with gladness at the Reist
farmhouse. Mrs. Reist was happy in her daughter's joy and lived again
in memory that hour when the same miracle had been wrought for her.
"Say," asked Philip, "I hope you two don't think you're springing a
surprise? A person blind in one eye and not seeing out of the other
could see which way the wind was blowing."
"Oh, Phil!" Amanda replied, but there was only love in her voice.
"It must be nice to be so happy like you are," said Millie.
"Yes, it must be," Uncle Amos nodded his head in affirmation. He looked
at the hired girl, who did not appear to notice him. "I just wish I was
twenty years younger," he added.
A week later Amanda and Martin were sitting in one of the big rooms of
the Reist farmhouse. Through the open door came the sound of Millie and
Mrs. Reist in conversation, with an occasional deeper note in Uncle
Amos's slow, contented voice.
"Do you know," said Martin, "I was never much of a hand to remember
poetry, but there's one verse I read at school that keeps coming to me
since I know you are going to marry me. That verse about 'A perfect woman, nobly planned
To warn, to comfort, and command.'"