And it was as plain as a
pikestaff that he was here to lay down the political law to me. He would
do it smilingly and patiently, but firmly. He would use all the leverage
of his place, his power, his personal appearance, to crush the
presumptuous uprising against his authority.
I confess my spirits rose at the thought. What in this world is more
enthralling than the meeting of an unknown adversary upon the open
field, and jousting him a tourney. I felt like some modern Robin Hood
facing the panoplied authority of the King's man.
And what a place and time it was for a combat--in the quietude of the
summer afternoon, no sound anywhere breaking the still warmth and
sweetness except the buzzing of bees in the clematis at the end of the
porch--and all about the green countryside, woods and fields and old
fences--and the brown road leading its venturesome way across a distant
hill toward the town.
After explaining who he was--I told him I had recognized him on
sight--we opened with a volley of small shot. We peppered one another
with harmless comments on the weather and the state of the crops. He
advanced cabbages and I countered with sugar-beets. I am quite aware
that there are good tacticians who deprecate the use of skirmish lines
and the desultory fire of the musketry of small talk.
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