Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 June 1895 — Mrs. Agnew's Cherry Pie. [ARTICLE]

Mrs. Agnew's Cherry Pie.

The robins were singing in the jlumj boughed butternut trees that urooped over the sloping roof of the cottage; the roses were blossoming, find Mrs. Agnew sat sewing on the step, with the Maltese cat asleep on her dress. What a picture of home and peace and content it presented to Roger Blake as, footsore and wearied, he paused in the hot sunshine and lifted the wicket timidly. Aunt Clorin saw him—she was a veritable feminine Argus— and she came to the side kitchen door, waving a towel defiantly^ “Boy, go away!” she cried, shrilly. “What do you want, boy?” said Mrs, Agnew’s softer voice. Somehow Ls tones reassured Roger, and he advanced. “I want work, ma’am,” he said, wistfully. “I’m tired and I’m hungry.” • “A likely story I” said Aunt Clorin. “What is your name?” said Mrs. Agnew, softly; she had a brother of her own in the far West about this wanderer’s age. “Roger Blake, ma’am.” “What can you do?” “Anything, ma’am—from tending cows or splitting wood down to washing dishes or scrubbing floors.” Mrs. Agnew hesitated. Her last “help” had gone off in a rage because her week did not include two Sundays out. This seemed a sort of Interposition of Providence. “What do you say, Aunt Clorin?” she asked. “I say nonsense !*’ answered Aunt Clorin curtly. “It’s worth the trial,” said Mrs. Agnew. “Come in, Roger; we’ll keep you this night, at least, and if you do well, why, perhaps we may make a home for you.” Roger did more than “well;” he worked with a will which astonished even Aunt Clorin. “Bui for all that, I ha’n’t no faith In him,” said she, wagging her wise old head. “I never took in none o’ those charity chaps but what I wus sorry for it arterwards. Hezekiah Dean ran away to sea, and took your uncle’s best gold sleeve buttons with him, and Mury Ann Gibbs pawned my spoons, and—” “Nonsense 1" said Mrs. Agnew brightly. “Any one could tell by a look in Roger’s face that the spoons in this family are quite safe.” Roger sat on the back doorstep shelling peas that very afternoon, when Mrs. Agnew came to the door with a little forlorn chicken in her hands, whom the hard hearted hen mother had resolutel refused to own —a downy morsel of vitality, which Mrs. Agnew was resolved to “bring up by hand.” As she stood there the light flashed radiantly from a many faceted diamond ring that she wore. “Oh, ma’am!” cried Roger, “that looks like sunshine shut up! How it does sparkle! It must be worth a heap of money!’ ; “Yes,” said Mrs. Agnew; “each one of these stones is worth $50.” “That’s a great deal, ma'am,” said Roger soberly. “I wish I had $50.” “Why, what would you do with it?” “My little sister; she’s in the poorhouse; and if I could get a respectable home for her—” “You never told me about your sister before.” “Because it was no use complaining, ma’am. Do you think these will be quite peas enough, Mrs. Agnew?” “Plenty, Roger; but I’ll tell you what you may do. Go up the cherry tree, and get me some of the finest black-hearts you can find. Mr. Agnew is coming home to-morrow and he is fond of cherry pie.” “I’ll do that, ma’am, and glad of the chance,” said Roger, with eyes brightening. Mrs. Agnew thought of the little sister in the poorbouse when she took off her diamond ring that night and hung it over a big headed pin on the pin cushion.” “I’ll speak to Mr. Agnew about it,” she thought. “One might have a smart little girl quite useful about the place.” Roger drove off to the railway station the next morning, bright and early, to meet Mr. Agnew; and Mrs. Agnew, what between the making of cherry tarts and the arranging of white and red rosebuds in vases, was as busy as a dozen Lirds all at once. Her cheeks were as rel as clove pinks at last, and she came into the cold sitting room, where Aunt Clorinda was darning stockings, tying a ruffled white apron around her trim little waist. “Now I’ve just five minutes to rest in,”said Mrs. Agnew. As she spoke she looked down, as it chanced, on her forefinger, when the diamond ring sparkled, and, to her bewilderment, one of the five shining stones was gone. “What’s the matter?” asked Aunt Clorin.

“One of my diamonds is gone I" Aunt Clorin looked sharply op; then resumed her work with a' significant sniff. “Aunt Clorin, what do you mean asked Mrs. Agnew. “Haven't I told you so all along!" And then Mrs. Agnew told her everything. “It’s as plain as daylight.” said Aunt Clorin. “Ain’t your boudoir on the ground floor? And what could be easier than for that lad to creep in at the winder,after you \Vent abed and asleep, and—” “But in that case, why didn't he take the whole ring?" "Because that was certain to be missed and made a fuss about the first thing. And don’t you see? he knowed people would think that one stone might have fallen out of itself, and nobody ‘to blame?” x Mrs. Agnew's face brightened. “Of course that is the way it happened. But where can it have dropped?" “Emily, are you a downright fool? A four-year-old child would have more common sense than you’ve got. After the talk you had together about it, and your telling him what the stone was worth.and his saying what he wanted so much money for, and the stone disappearing a-top of that, is there a doubt in the matter?" Mrs. Agnew fell once more into the slough of despond. “I’m not afraid,"she said pensively, “but I shall go and search among my things for all thut. It may have dropped out." “And the sky may fall, and we may all catch larks,” added Aunt Clorin, derisively, “but I ha’n’t much faith in it myseif.” “I never touched it, ma’am I” cried Boger, turning first pale and then a hot, vivid scarlet. “Oh, Mrs. Agnew. do you suspect me of being a thief?”

Soft hearted little Mrs. Agnew began to cry, while her husband stood looking gravely on, scarely knowing what to think. But Aunt Clorin came bravely to the rescue. “I wonder at you having the face to stand boldly there 1 To turn like a serpent on them that took you in when there wasn’t no other home for you! Give up the diamond at once, and we’ll let you go without the constable." “I have not got the diamond I” said Roger. “Just hear him lie?" groaned Aunt Clorin. “Henry,” to her nephew, “you’d better go after the constable right off. A diamond worth fifty dollars an’t to disappear in this sort o’ way, and no questions asked." “If you please," said the traveler, rather Avearlly, “I should like my breakfast first.” “Dear me?” cried Mrs. Agnew penitently, “to think that we should have neglected that!" And she flew into the kitchen to superintend the preparations for the nearly forgotten meal. “But that young jailbird’ll run away," said Auqt Clorin apprehensively. “I shall not run away," said Roger, gloomily. “I am no jailbird, and I have nothing to fear—no, nor to hope for now," ho added, with a sort of gasp in his throat, “since she believes that I am a thief.” “In the meantime,” said Mr. Agnew, who was apt to take a very common sense view of things, “you’d better sit down and have some breakfast." But Roger shook his head. “I couldn’t, sir, thank-ee; it would choke me.” The coffee steamed, clear and fragrant, on the table; the dainty slice of boiled ham and gold shaped omelet sent up also their appetizing incense; and Mrs. Agnew set on, with a heavy heart, the flake crusted cherry pie she had that very morning concocted with such happy anticipations. "Cherry pie, eh?” said Mr. Agnew. “The first I’ve seen this season. Just pass it this way, please." He plunged his knife into its depths with that satisfaction in the promise of a savory edible to mankind in general; while Aunt Clorinda, who kept a medicine chest, and believed implicitly in the unwholesomeness of everything that was specially good to eat, shook her head, and thought of laudanum and chalk mixture. “Hallo!" cried Mr. Agnew, sharply eyeing the triangular morsel of sweetness that he had conveyed to his own plate; “have you baked a drop of dew. Em? or what is it that sparkles so?” Mrs. Agnew gave a look, a little scream, and a dart. “Eh!" cried her husband. “Where's my cherry pie?” “It’s my diamond I" shrieked Mrs. Agnew. “It must have fallen in when I made it this morning. And I knew—l knew he never did it!” A hopeless confusion of “ito, ” but Mrs. Agnew had not time to bo grammatical. “Upon my word,” said Mr. Agnew, staring at Aunt Clorin, and both of them just beginning to comprehend matters a little, “it had like to have been an expensive cherry pie." Roger stayed. And little Ruth was brought from the cheerless nook in the poorhouse. And even Aunt Clorin is forced to acknowledge that “the house an’t fairly the same lonesome place it was afore those children came.” And Mr. Agnew n.ever will cat a piece of cherry pie without first examining his wife’s ring, although the stones have been strongly reset. “Because," says he, chuckling, “diamonds aren’t good for the digestion."