Then we went out into the garden, arm in arm, for Mrs. Bradford’s footing seemed insecure upon the cobbled walk, and she turned to me at once as naturally as if I were a neighbour’s daughter.  Together we grew enthusiastic over the tufts of white violets, early hyacinths, and narcissi, or equally so over the mere buds of things.  For it is the rotary promise that is the inspiration of a garden; it is this that lures us on from year to year, and softens the sharp punctuation of birthdays.

Was there anything in her garden that I had not?  She would be so pleased to exchange plants with me, and had I any of the new cactus Dahlias, and so on, until we reached the walk’s end, and turned about under a veteran cherry tree that showered us with its almond-scented petals.

Then Mrs. Bradford relaxed completely, and pulling down a branch, buried her face in the blossoms, drawing long breaths.

“I’ve kept away from the garden all day,” she said, “because I had some sewing to finish, so those unfortunate Hornblower children might begin the spring term at school to-morrow; and when I once smell the cherry flowers, my very bones ache to be out doors, and I’m not good for a thing but to potter about the garden from now on, until the strawberries show red, and everything settles down for summer.  It’s always been the same, since I was a little girl, and used to watch the cherry blooms up through the top sash of the schoolhouse windows, when they had screened the lower part to keep us from idling, and it’s lasted all through my married life.  The Squire and I always went on a May picnic by ourselves, until the year he died, though the neighbours all reckoned us feeble-minded.”

The “Sweating of the Corn,” I almost said aloud.

“I’ve reasoned with myself every spring all through the between years, until now I’ve made up my mind it’s something that’s meant to be, and I’m going to give in to it.  Sit down here under the trees, my dear, and Esther Nichols will bring us some tea and fresh cider cake.  Yes, I see that you look surprised to have afternoon tea offered on Pine Ridge, but I got the habit from the English grandmother that reared me, and I’ve always counted it a better hospitality than the customary home-made cordials and syrups that, between ourselves, make one stomach-sick.  Yes, there comes Esther now; she always knows my wants.  She and her husband are distant cousins of the Bradfords, and my helpers indoors and out, for I am too old to manage farm hands, especially now that they are mostly Slavs, and it makes Horace feel happier to have kinsfolk here than if I trusted to transient service.”

So we sipped the well-made breakfast tea beneath the cherry blossoms as I told her about my boys and Miss Lavinia’s expected visit.  When father called for me I left reluctantly, feeling as if nobody need be without a family, when one becomes necessary, for in addition to an aunt in Lavinia Dorman I had found a sort of spirit grandmother there in the remote and peaceful highlands,—­a woman at once simple and restful, yet withal having no narrowness or crudity to cramp or jar.