But he was cast away, an'
she never heerd nothin' about neither him nor the ship. He was waitin'
to git means, an' he did, privateerin' an' so; but I 'xpect he was
drownded," concluded Mrs. Fox, in a suitably plaintive tone.
And that was Aunt Dorcas's story.
CHAPTER II.
If anybody is curious to know why there should be mystery or secrecy
connected with Swan Day's meeting with Dorcas, or why they should meet
under a pear-tree, instead of her father's roof-tree, in a rational
way, it might be a sufficient answer, that there never was and never
will be anything direct and straightforward about Cupid or his doings.
But the real and more important reason was, that Colonel Fox did not
like Swan, and had said, in so many words, that "he wouldn't have
Swan Day a-hangin' round, no _how_!--that he was a poor kind of a
shote,--that he wished both him and his clutter well out o' town,--and
that he needn't think to make swans out of his geese, no _time_!"
In the first and last sentence, Colonel Fox indicated the ground of
his dislike to the handsome young store-keeper, and his dread that
Swan's eyes would somehow interfere with his own cherished plans of a
union between the Fox and Mower farms.
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