Bambi held up a bright-red cherry, named it Jarvis, pulled out its stem, cut out its heart, and finally plumped it into her mouth and chewed it viciously. Then she felt better. There was a cool morning breeze lifting the leaves of the big elms, and nodding the hollyhocks’ heads. The sound of late summer buzzing and humming, and bird songs, made the back porch a pleasant, placid spot—no place in which to keep rage hot.
Ardelia lumbered out, after a while, to sit near by, her slow movements and her beaming smile far from conducive to a state of excitement.
“Mighty purty out here, ain’t it?”
“Yes.”
“I reckon Massa Jarvis be mighty glad to be home, a-sittin’ here a-seedin’ cherries ‘longside ob you?”
“Jarvis never did anything so useful. As for being alongside of me, that doesn’t interest him at all.”
“Yo’re suttinly the onlovingest bride and groom I’ve eber seen. You ain’t neber lovin’ nor kissin’ nor nottin’, when I come aroun’."
“Mercy no, Ardelia!”
“I ‘low if I was married to such a han'som’ man, like Massa Jarvis, I’d be a lovin’ ob him all the time.”
“Suppose he wouldn’t let you?”
