“County officer!” I snorted.  “Banker!  Me!”

“Ay dank so,” said Magnus.  “Or maybe lawyers and yudges.”

“Any girl I would have,” I said, “wouldn’t have me; and any girl that would have me, the devil wouldn’t have!”

“Anybody else say dat to me, I lick him,” he stated.

“There ain’t any farm girls out in this prairie,” I said; “and no town girl would come in here,” and I spread my hands out to show that I thought my house the worst place in the world, though I was really a little proud of it—­for wasn’t it mine? made with my own hands, mainly?

“Girls come where dey want to come,” said he, “in spite of—­”

“Of hell and high water,” I supplied, as he hesitated.

“So!” he answered, adopting my words, and afterward using them at a church social with some effect.  “In spite of Hell Slew and high water.  An’ if dey bane too soft in de hand to come, I bring you out a fine farm girl from Norvay.”

3

This idea furnished us meat for much joking, and then it grew almost earnest, as jokes will.  We finally settled down to a cousin of his, Christina Quale.  And whenever I bought anything for the house, which I did from time to time as I got money, we discussed the matter as to whether or not Christina would like it.  The first thing I bought was a fine silver-plated castor, with six bottles in it, to put in the middle of the table so that it could be turned around as the company helped themselves to salt, mustard, vinegar, red or black pepper; and the sixth thing I never could figure out until Grandma Thorndyke told me it was oil.  A castor was a sort of title of nobility, and this one always lifted me in the opinions of every one that sat down at my table.  Magnus said he was sure Christina would be tickled yust plumb to death with it.  Ah!  Christina was a wonderful legal fiction, as N.V. calls it.  How many times Virginia’s ears must have burned as we tenderly discussed the poor yellow-haired peasant girl far off there by the foaming fjords.

One trouble with all of us Vandemark Township settlers was that we had no money.  I had long since stopped going to church or to see anybody, because I was so beggarly-looking.  Going away from our farms to earn wages put back the development of the farms, and made the job of getting started so much slower.  It is so to-day in the new parts of the country, and something ought to be done about it.  With us it was hard to get work, even when we were forced to look for it.  I hated to work for Buck Gowdy, because there was that thing between us, whether he knew it or not; but when Magnus came to me one day after we had got our oats sowed, and said that Mr. Gowdy wanted hands, I decided that I would go over with Magnus and work out a while.

4

I was astonished, after we had walked the nine miles between the edge of the Gowdy tract and the headquarters, to see how much he had done.  There were square miles of land under plow, and the yards, barns, granaries and houses looked almost as much like a town as Monterey Centre.  We went straight to Gowdy’s office.  His overseer was talking with us, when Gowdy came in.