The Belgian Twins Page 5

  V

  DOING A MAN'S WORK

  When Jan and Marie awoke, their mother's bed was empty. "She's gone tomilk the cow," cried Marie. "Come, Jan, we will surprise her! When shecomes back from the pasture, we will have breakfast all ready."

  "You can," said Jan, as he struggled into his clothes, and twistedhimself nearly in two trying to do up the buttons in the back; "youcan, but I must do a man's work! I will go out and feed the pig andcatch old Pier and hitch him to the cart," he said importantly. "I mustfinish the wheat harvest to-day."

  "Ho!" said Marie. "You will spill the pig-feed all over yourself! Youare such a messy boy!"

  "I guess I can do it just as well as you can make coffee," said Janwith spirit. "You've never made coffee in your life!"

  "I've watched Mother do it lots of times," said Marie. "I'm sure I cando it just the same way."

  "All right, let's see you do it, then," said Jan. And he strode out ofthe room with his hands in his pockets, taking as long steps as hisshort legs would permit.

  When she was dressed and washed, Marie ran to the pump and filled thekettle. Then she stirred the embers of the fire in the kitchen and puton fresh coal. She set the kettle on to boil and only slopped a littlewater on her apron in doing so. Then she put the dishes on the table.

  Meanwhile she heard no sound from Jan. She went to the kitchen door andlooked out. Jan had already let out the fowls, and was just in the actof feeding the pig. He had climbed up on the fence around the pig-pen,and by dint of great effort had succeeded in lifting the heavy pail offeed to the top of it. He was now trying to let it down on the otherside and pour the contents into the trough, but the pig was greedy, andthe moment the pail came within reach, she stuck her nose and her forefeet into it. This added weight was too much for poor Jan; down wentthe pail with a crash into the trough, and Jan himself tumbled suddenlyforward, his feet flew out behind, and he was left hanging head down,like a jack knife, over the fence!

  It was just at this moment that Marie came to the door, and when shesaw Jan balancing on the fence and kicking out wildly with his feet,she screamed with laughter.

  Jan was screaming, too, but with pain and indignation. "Come here andpick me off this fence!" he roared. "It's cutting me in two! Oh,Mother! Mother!"

  Marie ran to the pigpen as fast as, she could go. She snatched an oldbox by the stable as she ran, and, placing it against the fence, seizedone of Jan's feet, which were still waving wildly in the air, andplanted it firmly on the box.

  "Oh! Oh!" laughed Marie, as Jan reached the ground once more. "If youcould only have seen yourself, Jan! You would have laughed, too!Instead of pouring the pig-feed on to yourself, you poured yourself onto the pig-feed!"

  "I don't see anything to laugh at," said Jan with dignity; "it mighthave happened to any man."

  "Anyway, you'll have to get the pail again," said Marie, wiping hereyes. "That greedy pig will bang it all to pieces, if you leave it inthe pen."

  "I can't reach it," said Jan.

  "Yes, you can," said Marie. "I'll hold your legs so you won't fall in,and you can fish for it with a stick." She ran for a stick to pokewith, while Jan bravely mounted the box again, and, firmly anchored byMarie's grasp upon his legs, he soon succeeded in rescuing the pail.

  "Anyway, I guess I've fed the pig just as well as you have made thecoffee," he said, as he handed it over to Marie.

  "Oh, my sakes!" cried Marie; "I forgot all about the coffee!" And sheran back to the kitchen, to find that the kettle had boiled over andput the fire out.

  Jan stuck hid head in the door, just as she got the bellows to startthe fire again. "What did I tell you!" he shouted, running out histongue derisively.

  "Scat!" said Marie, shaking the bellows at him, and Jan sauntered awaytoward the pasture with Pier's halter over his arm.

  Pier had been eating grass for two nights and a day without doing anywork, and it took Jan some time to catch him and put the halter overhis head. When at last he returned from the pasture, red and tired, buttriumphant, leading Pier, Marie and her mother had already finishedtheir breakfast.

  "Look what a man we have!" cried Mother Van Hove as Jan appeared. "Hehas caught Pier all by himself."

  "He lifted me clear off my feet when I put his halter on," said Janproudly, "but I hung on and he had to come!"

  "Marie," cried her mother, "our Jan has earned a good breakfast! Cookan egg for him, while I hitch Pier to the cart. Then, while he and Iwork in the field, you can put the house in order. There is only onemore load to bring in, and we can do that by ourselves."

  By noon the last of the wheat had been garnered, and this time Jandrove Pier home, while his mother sat on the load. In the afternoon thethree unloaded the wagon and stowed the grain away in the barn to bethreshed; and when the long day's work was over, and they had eatentheir simple supper of bread and milk, Mother Van Hove and the childrenwent together down the village street to see their neighbors and hearthe news, if there should be any.

  There were no daily papers in Meer, and now there were no young men togo to the city and bring back the gossip of the day, as there had usedto be. The women, with their babies on their arms, stood about in thestreet, talking quietly and sadly among themselves. On the doorsteps afew old men lingered together over their pipes. Already the bigger boyswere playing soldier, with paper caps on their heads, and sticks forguns. The smaller children were shouting and chasing each other throughthe little street of the village. Jan and Marie joined in a game ofblindman's buff, while Mother Van Hove stopped with the group of women.

  "If we only knew what to expect!" sighed the Burgomeister's wife, asshe shifted her baby from one arm to the other. "It seems as if weshould know better what to do. In a day or two I shall send my big boyLeon to the city for a paper. It is hard to wait quietly and knownothing."

  "Our good King and Queen doubtless know everything," said the wife ofBoer Maes. "They will do better for us than we could do for ourselves,even if we knew all that they do."

  "And there are our own brave men, besides," added Mother Van Hove. "Wemust not forget them! We are not yet at war. I pray God we may not be,and that we shall soon see them come marching home again to tell usthat the trouble, whatever it is, is over, and that we may go on livingin peace as we did before."

  "It seems a year since yesterday," said the Burgomeister's wife.

  "Work makes the time pass quickly," said Mother Van Hove cheerfully."Jan and I got in the last of our wheat to-day. He helped me like aman."

  "Who will thresh it for you?" asked the wife of Boer Maes.

  "I will thresh it myself, if need be," said Mother Van Hove withspirit. "My good man shall not come home and find the farm-work behindif I can help it." And with these brave words she said good-night tothe other women, called Jan and Marie, and turned once more down thestreet toward the little house on the edge of the village. Far acrossthe peaceful twilight fields came the sound of distant bells. "Hark!"said Mother Van Hove to the Twins--"the cathedral bells of Malines! Andthey are playing 'The Lion of Flanders!'"

  (three lines of music)

  sang the bells, and, standing upon the threshold of her little home,with head held proudly erect, Mother Van Hove lifted her voice andjoined the words to the melody. "They will never conquer him, the oldLion of Flanders, so long as he has claws!" she sang, and the Twins,looking up into her brave and inspired face, sang too.