Edward Bellamy

“ One by one the lights went out in the houses, till the only ones left were in the windows of the Seminary, visible over the tree-tops a quarter of a mile away.
“The girls keep late hours,” thought Arthur. And from that he fell to thinking of Lina Maynard and the careless, almost insolent, grace of her manner, and that indifferent yet penetrating glance of hers. Where did she come from? Probably from California, or the far West; he had heard that the girls out there were of a bolder, more unconventional type than at the East. What a pity she did not fancy Amy! ”

“ The other girls wondered, but Lina Maynard's freaks always set the fashion, and Amy, to her astonishment and boundless delight, found herself the pet of the Seminary. The little blonde, Lina's sweetheart, alone rebelled against the new order of things and was furiously jealous, for which she was promptly snubbed by Lina, and Amy taken into her place. And meanwhile Lina caught herself several times wondering whether Arthur Steele was satisfied with the way she was keeping her pledge. ”

“ Steele's lot, and after a brief search identified the garden where she remembered seeing some particularly fine melons, when out walking a day or two previous. There they lay, just the other side the fence, faintly visible in the dim light She could not help congratulating herself, by the way, on the excellent behavior of her nerves, whose tense, fine-strung condition was a positive luxury, and she then and there understood how men might delight in desperate risks for the mere sake of the exalted and supreme sense of perfect self-possession that danger brings to some natures. ”

“ That explained its origin, and with a passing self-congratulation that she had made up her mind not to marry a man that snored, she began to crawl through the fence. When halfway through the thought struck her,—wasn't it like any other stealing, after all? This crawling between rails seemed dreadfully so. Her attitude, squeezed between two rails and half across the lower one, was neither graceful nor comfortable, and perhaps that fact shortened her scruples. ”

“ Steele also appeared in the garden, having found no one in the house on reaching home. He had learned on the street that Arthur had arrived, and came out beaming. It was good to see the hearty affection with which the two shook hands.
The transition of the son from the pupilage of childhood and youth to the independence of manhood is often trying to the filial relation. Neither party fully realizes that the old relation is at an end, or just what the new basis is, or when the change takes place. The absence of the son for two or three years at this period has often the best results. ”

“ It is to be feared that under his breath he applied some very ungentlemanly language to Lina Maynard and her clique, whose nonsenical ill-nature had hurt this little girl's feelings so sorely, and incidentally spoiled half the fun of his vacation.
“There, there, you need n't talk any more,” he finally said, rather rudely, half vexed with her, as helpful people are wont to be with those they can do nothing to help.
She looked up in grieved surprise, but before he could speak again, they came face to face with a party of girls coming from the direction of the Seminary. ”

“ In the faint moonlight he could just descry the dark shapes of the melons on the ground in front of him. The crickets were having a high time in the stubble around, and the night air drew sweet autumnal exhalations from the ground; for autumn begins by night a long time before it does by day. ”

“ The blonde seemed to voice the common sentiment when she said, resting her chin on Lina's knee, and gazing pensively at the wall:—
“Oh, dear! that comes of being girls. We might as well be good and done with it. We can't be bad so as to amount to anything.”
“Good or bad, we must eat,” said Nell Barber. “I must go and get the spread ready. I forgot all about it, Lina; but we came in just to invite you. Eleven sharp, remember. Three knocks, a pause, and another, you know. Come, girls.”
The brunette followed her, but Lina's little sweetheart remained. ”

“ In all her petted life she had never been held a moment against her will, and it needed not the added considerations that this man was a coarse, unknown boor, the place retired, the time midnight, and herself in the position of a criminal, to give her a feeling of abject terror so great as to amount to positive nausea, as she realized her utter powerlessness in his hands. ”

“ I came home on a vacation to-day, and was sitting up to watch father's melon-patch for the pure fun of it, expecting to catch some small boys, and when I caught you, I couldn't resist the temptation of a little farce. As for Amy, that only occurred to me at the last; and if you think it unfair, you may have your promise back. ”

“ He only thought of asking for one, although there were six, nor she apparently of answering differently.
“Lina Maynard. They are 'Sem.' girls.”
It was a dulled voice she spoke in, quite unlike her usual eager way of giving information. She, poor thing, was terribly afraid he would ask her why they did not seem acquainted with her, and it would have been a painful humiliation to have explained. Arthur was conscious that he no longer had exactly the same feeling of merely contemptuous annoyance toward Lina Maynard, on account of her treatment of Amy. ”

“ The young man had sense and sentiment enough to feel that the place he held in the esteem of his native community was a thing to feel more just pride in than any station he could win in the city, and as he walked along hand-shaking with old friends on this side and that, it was about his idea of a triumphal entry. ”

“ Arthur muttered something between an oath and a grunt, expressing the emphasis of the one and the disgust of the other.
“I tell Amy it is foolish to mind their airs, but I 'm really afraid it spoils the poor girl's happiness.”
“Why don't you send her away to boarding-school, if it is so serious a matter as that?”
“We can't afford it,” said his mother, whereto Arthur promptly replied: —
“I 'll pay her expenses. I 'm making a good deal more money than I know what to do with, and I 'd really like the chance of doing a little good.” ”

“ So it had fared with Arthur and his father.
“You've got a splendid lot of watermelons,” said the former, as they arrived at the upper end of the ample garden in their tour of inspection.
“Yes,” replied Mr. Steele, with a shrug; “only thus far they've been stolen a little faster than they 've ripened.”
“What made you plant them so near the fence?”
“That was my blunder; but you see the soil is just the thing, better than lower down.”
“Why don't you buy a bulldog?”
“I think it's more Christian to shoot a man outright than to set one of those devils on him. ”

“ Steele, coming up and taking Arthur off for a promenade up the broad path.
“How pretty Amy has grown,” said he, glancing with a pleased smile at the girl as she looked up at her father. “I suppose the young men are making sheep's eyes at her already.”
“It does n't do them any good if they are,” said Mrs. Steele, decisively. “She's only sixteen and a little girl yet, and has sense enough to know it.” “What had she been crying for when I arrived? I saw her eyes were as red as the currants.”
“Oh, dear!” replied Mrs. Steele, with a sigh of vexation, “it was her troubles at the Seminary. ”

“ The distinction may arise from a feeling that, so long as crops remain rooted to the ground, they are nature's, not man's, and that nature can't be regarded as forming business contracts with some individuals to the exclusion of others, or in fact as acceding to any of our human distinctions of meum and tuum, however useful we find them. ”

“ She's the light of the house. Besides that, if it comes to objections, I 've my notions about boarding-schools, and I 'd trust no girl of mine at one that wasn't within sight of her home. No, she'll have to keep on here and bear it as she can, though it's pretty hard, I know. The trouble to-night was, that Lina Maynard, who is one of the older girls, has invited nearly everybody at the Seminary except Amy to a birthday party to-morrow. Little minx, I could shake her. And the worst of it is, Amy thinks there 's nobody like Lina Maynard. ”

“ It ought to count for something, for, if it does n't hinder the act, at least it spoils the fun of it. Here was a melon at her feet; should she take it? That was a bigger one further on, and her imperious conscientiousness compelled her to go ten steps further into the enemy's country to get it, for now that she was committed to the undertaking, she was bound to do the best she could. ”

“ You 're always wanting to pay somebody's expenses, or make somebody a present. It's really unsafe, when you 're around, to indicate that one is n't perfectly contented. But you caught me up too quickly. ”

“ The watermelon patch was located close to this fence, and thus in full view and temptingly accessible from the road.
Undoubtedly the human conscience, and especially the boyish article, recognizes a broad difference between the theft of growing crops—of apples on the trees, for instance, or corn on the stalk, or melons in the field—and that of other species of property. ”

“ They do really wicked things, hook apples, and carry off people's gates and signs, and screw up tutors' doors in the night, and have fights with what he calls 'townies,'—I don't know exactly what they are,—and everything. ”

“ A night in the lock-up makes folks wonderful civil. Now I'll jest trouble ye to come along to the police office,” and he walked her along by the arm toward the house.
As the horrible degradation to which she was exposed flashed upon Lina, the last remnant of her self-control gave way, and, hanging back with all her might against his hand, she burst into sobs.
“Oh, don't, don't! It will kill me. I'll tell you my name. It's Lina Maynard. My father is a rich merchant in New York, Broadway, No. ”

“ Some fellers allers has luck. Many 's the time he 'n' I 've been in swim-min' and hookin' apples together when we wuz little chaps,” pursued Bill, in a tone implying a mild reproach at the deceitfulness of an analogy that after such fair promise in early life had failed to complete itself in their later fortunes. ”