Natalie laughed. “To tell the truth, Jimmy, I skipped some of the chapters that looked dry and educational. I saw the pictures of these mushrooms, and the little creatures of the wood, and I glanced at the opening words of the chapter. After that, I kept right on, and couldn’t stop.”
Mrs. James smiled and shook her head. “That is a bad habit to form – skipping things that seem dry and hard to do.”
Natalie heard the gentle rebuke but smiled as she read the woodcraft chapter to its end. Then, instead of repenting of the habit of “skipping,” she turned the pages of the book and read where she found another interesting chapter. This happened to be Section XVI on a Girl Scout’s Garden. She read this part way through and then had a brilliant idea.
“Jimmy! Janet Wardell says I ought to start a vegetable garden at once, and not only raise enough for us all to live on this summer, but have some to send to the city to sell to my friends.”
“I spoke to Rachel about that plan, Natalie, and she is of the same opinion: we really ought to garden and thus save cost of living.”
“You know, Jimmy, that Janet is crazy over the war-garden she had for two years, and she told me it was the most fun! Digging and seeding down the soil, and weeding or harvesting was as much fun as playing croquet or tennis, – and a lot more remunerative. But then Janet always was ambitious. We all say she should have been a boy instead of a girl – with her go-a-headness.”
“I don’t see why a boy should be accredited with all the ambitions, and energy, or activity of young folks!” protested Mrs. James. “Girls are just as able to carry on a successful career as a boy, – and that is one thing the Girl Scouts will teach the world in general, – there is no difference in the Mind, and the ambitions and work that that Mind produces, whether it be in boy or girl. So I’m glad Janet is so positive a force with you four girls: she will urge you to accomplish more than you would, if left to your own indolent devices.”
“I’ll grant you that, Jimmy, but let’s talk about the possibilities of a garden, without losing any more time. Do you think we might start in at once? To-morrow, say?”
“Of course we can! In fact, I wrote our next-door neighbor, Mr. Ames, to bring his plough and horse in the morning and turn over the soil so we could see what its condition is.”
“Goody! Then I will start right in and raise vegetables and by the time the girls come down, I ought to have some greens growing up to show them!” cried Natalie.
Mrs. James laughed. “I’m not so sure that seeds will grow so quickly as to show green tops in two weeks. You must remember that ploughing, cleaning out stones and old weeds, then raking and fertilizing the soil, will take several days. By the time the seeds are planted it will have taken a week. In ten days more, we shall have the girls with us. So our vegetables will be wonders if they pop up in ten days’ time.”
“Well – anyway – I can point out all that has been done in that time, and explain why the greens do not show themselves,” argued Natalie.
Mrs. James nodded, smilingly, to keep Natalie’s ambition alive. It was the first time in all the time she had known the girl that she had found her eagerly planning anything that was really constructive and beneficial to everyone. And especially would it prove beneficial to herself, for working in the open air, and digging in the ground, would be the best tonics she could have. And the slender, undersized, morbid girl needed just such tonic.
So Mrs. James laid aside her book and devoted the rest of the evening to the plans for a fine truck garden.
In half an hour the two had sketched a rough diagram for the garden, following the picture given in the Scout book. “All around the outside of the rows of vegetables, I want to plant flowers, so it will be artistic as well as useful,” said Natalie.
“If I were you, dear, I’d stick to the vegetables in the large garden, and plant flowers in the roundel and small beds about the house, where the color and perfume will reach us as we sit indoors or on the piazzas,” suggested Mrs. James.
“But the vegetable garden will look so plain and ugly with nothing but bean poles and brush for peas,” complained Natalie.
“Not so, Natalie. When the blossoms on the bean-vines wave in the breeze, and the gorgeous orange flowers bloom on the pumpkin and melon vines, or the peas send you their sweet scent, you will be glad you did as I suggest. Besides, we will need so many flowers about the house that it will take all the time and money we have to spare to take care of those beds.”
So Natalie was persuaded to try out Mrs. James’ ideas.
“How long will it take us to get the seeds to plant in our vegetable garden, Jimmy?” asked she later.
“I can telephone my order in to the seed store in the morning, and they can mail the package at once. We ought to have it in two days, at least,” answered Mrs. James.
“That will be time enough, won’t it? Because we have to plough and rake the beds first. Oh, I do hope that farmer won’t forget to come in the morning,” sighed Natalie, running to the door to look out at the night sky and see if there was any indication of rain for the morrow.
“The sky is clear and the stars are shining like beacons,” exclaimed she, turning to Mrs. James.
That lady smiled for she understood why Natalie had gone to investigate the weather signals.
“Perhaps we ought to go to bed early, Natalie, so we can be up when Farmer Ames arrives,” hinted she.
“Why, what time do you think he will be here?”
“Farmers generally begin work at five, but he may not arrive until after his chores are attended to. I suppose we may look for him about seven o’clock.”
“Seven o’clock! Mercy, Jimmy, we won’t be awake then,” cried Natalie, surprised at such hours.
“Oh yes, we will, because everyone in the country goes to bed at nine and rises at five. We must begin the same habit.”
“Oh, oh! How outlandish! Why, we never think of bed in the city until eleven, – and later if we go to the theatre, you know.”
“That’s why everyone has pasty complexions and has to resort to rouge. If folks would keep decent hours they’d be healthier and deprive the doctors and druggists of an income. We will begin to live in the country as country people do, and then we will show city folks what we gain by such living,” replied Mrs. James, mildly but firmly.
So they prepared to retire that first night on Green Hill Farm, when the hands on the old grandfather’s clock pointed to eight-forty-five. Even Rachel laughed as she started up-stairs back of her young mistress, and after saying good-night, added: “Ef I onny could grow roses in m’ cheeks like-as-how you-all kin! But dey woulden show, nohow, on my black face!”
She laughed heartily at her joke and went to the small room over the kitchen, still shaking with laughter.
CHAPTER VI – NATALIE BEGINS HER PLANTING
The singing of the birds, nested in the old red maple tree that overshadowed the house on the side where Natalie’s room was, roused her from the most restful sleep she had had in months. No vibration of electricity such as one constantly hears and feels in the city, no shouting of folks in the streets, no milkman with his reckless banging of cans, no steamboat’s shrieks and wails such as one hears when living on the Drive, disturbed the peace and quietude of the night in the country.
“Oh my! I hope I haven’t overslept,” thought Natalie, as she sat up, wide awake. She looked at the clock on the table and could scarcely believe it was but five minutes of five.
“Why, it feels like eight to me!” she said to herself, as she sprang from bed and ran to sniff the delightful fresh air that gently waved the curtains in and out of the opened windows.
“I’m going to surprise Jimmy! I’ll be dressed and out in the garden before she wakes up,” giggled the girl, hastily catching up her bath-towel and soap, and running stealthily along the hall to the bathroom.
But her plans were not realized, because Mrs. James was up and down-stairs before Natalie ever heard the birds sing. She sat on the piazza sorting some bulbs and roots she had brought from the city in her trunk.
After Natalie was dressed, she tiptoed to Mrs. James’ door and turned the knob very quietly so the sleeper should not awake. But she found the bed empty and the room vacated.
Down-stairs she flew, and saw the side door open. She also got a whiff of muffins, and knew Rachel was up and preparing an early breakfast. Out of the door she went, and stood still when she found Mrs. James working on queer-looking roots.
“When did you get up?” asked she, taken aback.
“Oh, about quarter to five. When did you?” laughed Mrs. James.
“I woke ten minutes later, but I wanted to s’prise you in bed. I went in and found the room empty,” explained Natalie. “What sort of vegetables are those roots?”
“These are dahlia roots, and they will look fine at the fence-line, over there, that divides the field from our driveway. Do you see these dried sticks that come from each root? Those are last year’s plant-stalks. We leave them on during the winter months, so the roots won’t sprout until you plant them. Now I will cut them down quite close to the root before I put them in the ground.”
As she spoke, Mrs. James trimmed down the old stalks to within an inch of the root, then gathered up her apronful of bulbs and roots and stood ready to go down the steps.
“Do you wish to help, Natty? You can bring the spade and digging fork that Rachel placed outside the cellar door for me.”
Natalie ran for the tools and hurried after Mrs. James to the narrow flower bed that ran alongside the picket fence. A ten-inch grass-border separated this flower bed from the side door driveway, making the place for flowers quite secure from wheeltracks or unwary horses’ hoofs.
The dahlia roots were planted so that the tip edge of the old stalks barely showed above the soil. Then the bulbs were planted: lily bulbs, Egyptian iris, Nile Grass, and other plants which will come up every year after once being planted.
“There now! That is done and they are on the road to beautifying our grounds,” sighed Mrs. James, standing up and stretching her arm muscles.
“After all I’ve said, you were the first one to plant, anyway,” complained Natalie.
“Not in the vegetable garden! And flowers are not much account when one has to eat and live,” laughed Mrs. James.
A voice calling from the kitchen door, now diverted attention from the roots and bulbs. “I got dem muffins on de table an’ nice cereal ready to dish up,” announced Rachel.
“And we’re ready for it, too!” declared Natalie.
During the morning meal, Mrs. James and her protégée talked of nothing but gardening, and the prospects of an early crop. To anyone experienced in farming, their confidence in harvesting vegetables within a fortnight would have been highly amusing. But no one was present to reflect as much as a smile on their ardor, so the planning went on.
It was not quite seven when Farmer Ames drove in at the side gate and passed the house. Natalie ran out to greet him and to make sure he had brought the plough in the farm wagon.
“Good-morning, Mr. Ames. How long will it be before you start the ploughing?” called Natalie, as the horse was stopped opposite the side door.
“Good-mornin’, miss. Is Mis’ James to home this mornin’?” asked the be-whiskered farmer, nodding an acknowledgment of Natalie’s greeting.
“Here I am, Mr. Ames. Both of us are ready to help in the gardening in whatever way you suggest,” said Mrs. James, appearing on the porch.
“Thar ain’t much to be helped, yit, but soon’s I git Bob ploughin’, you’se kin go over the sile and pick out any big stones that might turn up. Ef they ain’t taken out they will spile the growin’ of the plants by keepin’ out light and heat.”
Natalie exchanged looks with her companion. Neither one had ever thought of such a possibility.
“What shall I use for them – a rake?” asked Natalie.
“Rake – Nuthin’! all its teeth would crack off ef you tried to drag a big rock with it. Nop – one has to use plain old hands to pick up rocks and carry them to the side of the field.”
“Maybe we’d better wear gloves, Jimmy,” suggested Natalie in a whisper.
“Yes, indeed! I’m glad we brought some rubber gloves with us in case of need in the house. I never dreamed of using them for this,” returned Mrs. James.
She turned and went indoors for the gloves while Farmer Ames drove on to the barns. Natalie followed the wagon, because she felt she could not afford to lose a moment away from this valuable ally in the new plan of work.
“Mr. Ames, as soon as our garden is ploughed, can it be seeded?” asked she, when the farmer began to unhitch the horse.
“That depends. Ef your sile is rich and fertile, then you’se kin plant as soon as it is smoothed out. First the rocks must come out, then the ground is broken up fine, and last you must rake, over and over, until the earth is smooth as a table.”
“What plants ought I to choose first? You see it is so late in the season, I fear my garden will be backward,” said Natalie.
“Nah – don’t worry ’bout that, sis,” remarked the farmer. “Becus we had a cold wet spring and the ground never got warm enough fer seeds until ten days ago. Why, I diden even waste my time and money tryin’ out any seeds till last week. I will gain more in the end because the sun-rays are warm enough this month to show results in my planting. Ef I hed seeded all my vegetables in that cold spell in May they would hev laid dormant and, mebbe, rotted. So you don’t need to worry about its bein’ late this year. Some years that is true – we kin seed in early May, but not this time.”
“I’m so glad for that! Now I can race with other farmers around here and see who gets the best crops,” laughed Natalie.
“What’cha goin’ to plant down?” asked Mr. Ames, curious to hear how this city girl would begin.
“Oh, I was going to leave that to your judgment,” returned she naïvely.
“Ha, ha, ha!” was the farmer’s return to this answer. Then he added: “Wall now, I kin give you some young tomater plants and cabbiges an’ cauliflower slips. Them is allus hard to seed so I plants mine in a hot-bed in winter and raises enough to sell to the countryside fer plantin’ in the spring. I got some few dozen left what you are welcome to, ef you want ’em.”
“Oh, fine! I certainly do want them,” exclaimed Natalie. “Can I go to your house, now, and get them?”
“Better leave ’em planted ’til you wants to put ’em in your garden. They will wilt away ef you leave ’em out of sile fer a day er night. Besides, this stonin’ work will keep you busy to-day.”
Mrs. James now joined them, and handed Natalie a pair of rubber gloves. Farmer Ames stared at them in surprise for he had never seen anyone wear gloves while gardening – at least, not in Greenville.
As he drove Bob and the plough to the garden-space, Natalie and Mrs. James followed, talking eagerly of the plants promised them by the farmer.
“Mr. Ames, you forgot to tell me what seeds to plant first?” Natalie reminded him, as he rolled up his shirt sleeves, preparatory to steering the plough.
“Well, that is a matter of chice. Some likes to seed their radishes fust, an’ some get their lettuce in fust. Now I does it this way: lettuce grows so mighty fast that I figgers I lose time ef I put it down fust and let the other vegetables wait. So I drops in my beets, radishes, beans, peas, and sech like, an’ last of all I gets in the lettuce seed. I gen’ally uses my early plants from the hot-bed fer the fust crop in my truck-garden. I got some little beet plants, and a handful of radish plants what was weeded out of the over-crowded beds, that you may as well use now, and seed down the others you want. My man is going over all the beds to-day, and I will hev him save what you kin use in your garden.”
“Oh, how good you are! I never knew strangers in the country would act like your own family!” exclaimed Natalie. “In the city everyone thinks of getting the most out of you for what they have, that you might need.”
Both the adults laughed at this precocious denunciation of city dealers. Old Bob now began to plod along the edge of the garden-space with his master behind guiding the plough. Natalie walked beside the farmer and watched eagerly as the soil curled over and over when the blade of the plough cut it through and pushed it upwards.
Farmer Ames was feeling quite at home, now that he was working the ground, and he began to converse freely with his young companion.
“Yeh know, don’cha, thet the man what lived here fer ten years, er more, was what we call a gentleman farmer. He went at things after the rules given in some books from the Agricultural Department from Washerton, D. C. He even hed a feller come out from thar and make a test of the sile. The upshot of it all was, he got a pile of stuff from Noo York – powders, fertilizers, and such, an’ doctored the hull farm until we gaped at him.
“But, we all hed to confess that he raised the finest pertaters, and corn, and other truck of anyone fer many a mile around. I allus did say I’d foller his example, but somehow, thar’s so much work waitin’ to be done on a farm, that one never gits time to sit down to writin’. So I postponed it every year.”
“Why, this is awfully interesting, Mr. Ames. I never knew who the tenant was, but he must have had a good sensible education on how to run a farm, or he wouldn’t have known about these fertilizers.”
“Yeh, we-all ust to grin at him for fuddling about on the sile before he’d seed anythin’ – but golly! he got crops like-as-how we never saw raised before.”
“I could try the same methods,” said Natalie musingly.
“He worked over the sile every year, and never planted the same crops in the same places. He called it a sort of rotary process, and he tol’ me my crops would double ef I did it.”
“Did he mix in the doctorings every year, too?” asked Natalie.
“Sure! That’s why he sent little boxes of dirt to Washerton – to find out just what to use in certain qualities of sile.”
“Then I ought to do it, too, hadn’t I?” asked she.
“Not this year, ’cause he said the last year he did it, that now he could skip a year or two. But you’ve gotta mix in good fertilizer before you plant. Then you’se kin laff at all us old fogy farmers what stick to old-fashioned ways.”
Farmer Ames laughed heartily as if to encourage his young student, and to show how she might laugh after harvesting. Natalie gazed at him with a fascinated manner, for his lower lip had such a peculiar way of being sucked in under his upper teeth when he laughed. Not until Mrs. James explained this, by saying that Farmer Ames had no lower teeth, did she lose interest in this mannerism.
“I know all about the tools a farmer has to use in his work, Mr. Ames,” bragged Natalie.
“Oh, do yeh? Wall then, you kin get the rake and hoe, and fix up the sile where the plough is done turned it up.”
Natalie remembered the paragraph in “Scouting for Girls” and asked: “Shall I bring the spade, too?”
Just then, Mr. Ames stubbed his toe against a large stone that had been turned out of its bed. He grumbled forth: “Better git a pickaxe and crowbar.”
“My book didn’t mention crowbars and pickaxes, Mr. Ames, so I don’t know what they are,” ventured Natalie modestly.
“Every farmer has to have a pick and crow on hand in case he wants to dig fence-post holes, er move a rock – like the one I just hit.”
“Oh! But our fences are all made.”
“So are the rocks! But they ain’t moved. Better go over the ploughed dirt and find ’em, then git them outen the garden.”
Natalie began to hunt for stones, and as she found any, to carry them over to the fence where she threw them over in the adjoining field. This was not very exciting pastime, and her back began to ache horribly.
Mrs. James, who had lingered behind, now joined Natalie and exclaimed in surprise, “Why, I thought you said the old tenant was so particular with his garden? He should have removed all these stones, then.”
“This section was used fer pertaters an’ corn every other year, an’ some stones is good to drain the sile fer them sort of greens. But fer small truck like you’se plan to plant here, the stones has to get out.”
Mrs. James assisted Natalie in throwing out stones which turned up under the plough-blade, and when that section of the garden was finished, Mr. Ames mopped his warm brow and looked back over his work with satisfaction.
“Ef you’se want to plant corn over in that unused spot alongside the field, it will be a fine place to use. It is not been used fer years fer truck.”
“It looks awfully weedy. Maybe things won’t grow there,” ventured Natalie.
“Hoh, them’s only top-weeds what can be yanked out. The sile itself is good as any hereabouts.”
“Well, then, Mr. Ames,” said Mrs. James, “you’d better plough that section, too, for the corn or potatoes.”
So the rough part of the ground by the fence-line was ploughed up, but the quantity of stones found in the soil was appalling to Natalie. Mr. Ames chuckled at her expression.
“Don’t worry about seein’ so many, ’cuz you only has to pick out one stone at a time, you know. Ef you does this one at a time, widdout thinkin’ of how many there seem to be afore your eyes, you soon git them all out an’ away.”
“I see Mr. Ames is a good moralizer,” smiled Mrs. James.
He nodded his head, and then suggested that he visit the barnyard to see if any old compost was left about by the former tenant. If so, it would be a good time to dig it under in the ploughed soil.
“Oh, I want to go with Mr. Ames, Jimmy, to see just what compost he considers good,” exclaimed Natalie, dancing away.
Mrs. James watched her go and smiled. The tonic of being in the country and working on the farm was beginning to tell already. Before she resumed her task of picking up stones, however, the clarion voice of Rachel came from the kitchen porch.
“Hey, Mis’ James! I’se got lunch all ready to eat!”
As the lady was well-nigh starved because of the early breakfast and the work in the earth, she sighed in relief. Now she would have a spell in which to rest and gain courage to go on with the stoning. This showed that it was not interesting to Mrs. James, but she was determined to carry it through.
Natalie ran indoors soon after Mrs. James and went to the dining-room where the luncheon was served. She was so eager to tell what Farmer Ames told her that she hardly saw that Rachel had prepared her favorite dessert – berry tarts.
“Jimmy, Mr. Ames knows more about farming and soil than books! He says a mixed compost from the stables and barnyard makes the best of all fertilizers.”
“His logic sounds plausible, Natty, but we haven’t any such compost to use, and perhaps never will have if we wish to use it from our own barns,” said Mrs. James regretfully.
“But Mr. Ames said he could sell us some of that grade compost, if we needed any. He says he does not believe our soil needs fertilizing this year, as it is so rich already.”
“That is splendid news, as it will save us much time in seeding, too,” returned Mrs. James.
“I wanted to show him that I knew something about composts, so I told him about what I read in the book for Scouts last night: – that one could use a commercial fertilizer if one had no barnyard manure available. He looked at me amazed, and I explained that many farmers used four-parts bone-dust to one part muriate of potash and mixed it well. This would fertilize a square rod of land. I felt awfully proud of myself as I spoke, but he soon made me feel humble again, by saying, ‘Do you spread it out on top of the ground after the seed is in, Miss Natalie, or do you put it under the sile to het up the roots?’”
Mrs. James laughed and asked, “What could you say?”
“That’s just it – I didn’t know, Jimmy; so I made a guess at it. I replied: ‘Why, I mix it very carefully all through the soil’ – and Jimmy! I struck it right first time!” laughed she.
Mr. Ames had finished his dinner (so he called it) long before Natalie and her chaperone, and when they started to leave the house they found that he was hard at work removing the rest of the stones from the ploughed ground.
“Oh, I’m so glad of that, Jimmy!” cried Natalie, as she watched the farmer at work.
“Well, to tell the truth, Natalie, I’m not sorry to find that job taken from us,” laughed Mrs. James. “I found it most tiresome and with no encouragement from the stones.”
“Let’s do something else, Jimmy, and let Mr. Ames finish the stone-work,” suggested Natalie, quickly. Just then Rachel came out on the back steps of the kitchen porch.
“Mis’ James, Farmeh Ames say foh you-all to drive ole Bob back to his house en’ fetch a load of compos’ what he says is back of his barns. His man knows about it. Den you kin brung along dem leetle plants what is weeded out of his garden and keep ’em down cellar fer to-night.”
Natalie felt elated at this novel suggestion of work, thereby freeing them both from the irksome task of stoning the garden. And Mrs. James laughed as she pictured herself driving the farm-wagon on the county road where an endless stream of automobiles constantly passed.
But she was courageous, and soon the two were gayly chattering, as Bob stumbled and stamped along the macadam road. Above the clatter of loose wheels and rattling boards in the floor of the old wagon, the merry laughter of Natalie could be heard by the autoists, as they passed the “turn-out” from Green Hill Farm.
Having reached the Ames’s farm and found the handy-man who would load up the barnyard compost in the wagon for them, Natalie asked him many questions that had been interesting her.