THE BATTLE 
 INVISIBLE 
 
 ELEANOR- C-REED
 
 THE 
 
 AND OTHER STORIES 
 
 BY 
 
 ELEANOR C. REED 
 
 CHICAGO 
 
 A. C. McCLURG & CO. 
 1901
 
 COPYRIGHT 
 
 BY A. C. McCLURG & CO. 
 A. D. 1901
 
 DEDICATED TO MY SISTER 
 S. GROSS
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE - 7 
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 69 
 
 TRANSPLANTED 103 
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 155 
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS .... 277
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 Court was dismissed. The jury, after sit- 
 ting all night and nearly all day, had found the 
 prisoner not guilty. 
 
 Solomon Stone, once more a free man, 
 walked with an unsteady step and a haggard 
 face from the court room, and with his attorney 
 drove away. The throng of men that had at- 
 tended the trial from beginning to end, each a 
 self appointed judge, gathered in groups of 
 twos and threes on and about the court-house 
 steps, and discussed the case. Every face was 
 either stern or serious. There were many 
 emphatic gestures in the different clusters. 
 Some spoke in low confidential tones, others 
 argumentatively, while a few voices were loud 
 in anger and replete with threats. These were 
 the friends of Nathan Overton who had died, 
 they claimed, from the effects of a blow dealt 
 him on the head by Solomon Stone. 
 
 The two men were neighbors, and had quar- 
 reled over a blooded colt which both claimed. 
 Solomon sued Nathan for the possession of the 
 
 9
 
 10 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 animal, and the court decided in Nathan's favor. 
 Solomon appealed, and lost again. 
 
 A few weeks after the last trial, the men met 
 on the river bridge, which was just wide enough 
 for teams to pass one another if each kept on 
 his own side. Solomon was on his way home 
 from town, and Nathan was driving to town 
 with a load of corn. It is not known which 
 driver was out of his track, but they locked 
 wheels, and neither would give way and back up. 
 Finally Solomon, beside himself with anger, 
 whipped up his horses and, having the better 
 team and the stronger wagon, took Nathan's 
 wheel off. Nathan, white and shaking with 
 wrath, hurled an ear of corn at his enemy, the 
 butt end of which struck him in the mouth and 
 knocked out a tooth. It was then that 
 Solomon, enraged with pain and the sight of 
 blood, struck the blow with the heavy end of 
 his whip that ended the quarrel at once and 
 forever. Nathan dropped like a stone and lay 
 unconscious for hours. Solomon washed the 
 blood from his enemy's face, and, believing him 
 dead, drove back to town and gave himself up. 
 Nathan recovered consciousness, but died the 
 next day. 
 
 There was much conflicting testimony in 
 court. Some of the doctors contended that the
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 11 
 
 cause of Nathan Overton's death was heart dis- 
 ease brought on by the excitement of the 
 quarrel ; that the blow was a glancing one and 
 not sufficient to cause death. 
 
 It was also declared that Nathan's doctor had 
 warned him that his heart was seriously affected, 
 and that any undue excitement might be fatal to 
 him; which evidence, however, was stoutly 
 denied by the doctor himself. Nathan's wife 
 admitted on cross-examination that, a month 
 before Nathan's death, she had remarked to a 
 neighbor that she was going to try to persuade 
 him not to go to the polls during the election, 
 as she feared the excitement might have a bad 
 effect. 
 
 Some of Nathan Overton's friends said openly 
 that Solomon Stone's money was all that saved 
 him. Solomon had been obliged to mortgage 
 his farm, for which he had worked and saved 
 all his life, to get the means with which to 
 defend himself. He had been called rich by 
 the neighbors, because he owned a well stocked 
 farm of a hundred acres and owed no man a 
 cent. Now, at the age of sixty, the struggle 
 was before him of saving his hardly earned prop- 
 erty from the incumbrance that a moment of 
 uncontrolled passion had laid upon it. 
 
 At the age of thirty-two, Solomon Stone had
 
 12 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 fallen deeply in love with a young girl of seven- 
 teen, the daughter of a Congregational minister, 
 of whose church the young man was a member. 
 
 Louisa Claybourne was of the dark French 
 type. She was witty and beautiful, and had 
 been brought up with great care ; but she had a 
 vivid imagination and, unfortunately, an innate 
 tendency toward romance and adventure. 
 
 Her father, a serious student and an earnest 
 worker, essayed to correct the unhealthy trend 
 of his daughter's mind, by keeping her occupied 
 with the study of history and the bible; but 
 every now and then, in spite of his indefatigable 
 efforts, the springs of romance would bubble up 
 through the pages of Macaulay, Gibbon, and 
 Paul's Epistle to the Romans. 
 
 Louisa was universally loved for her kindness 
 of heart, sweet temper, and charming manner. 
 She was extremely emotional and, though un- 
 conscious of her gift, had the power to play 
 upon the emotions of others. Her eyes were of 
 the kind that speak ; that rise and fall with every 
 wave of feeling; that in the same moment can 
 sparkle with fun and melt with melancholy. 
 
 Louisa's father objected to Solomon Stone's 
 proposal of marriage on the ground that the 
 difference between their ages was too great. 
 The lover was in no way discouraged by this;
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 13 
 
 he felt sure that the objection, which was not 
 strong, could be overcome. Louisa, however, 
 was less complaisant. This was just the oppor- 
 tunity, it seemed to her, to feast her hungry 
 soul on the adventure she craved. Although 
 her suitor had never received anything but the 
 kindest treatment from her parents, she insisted 
 upon a secret rendezvous in the woods, a 
 clandestine correspondence, and finally, when 
 weary of these, a runaway marriage; all of 
 these things were most distasteful to her 
 straightforward, matter-of-fact lover and hus- 
 band. 
 
 Two years of humdrum, changeless life as a 
 farmer's wife were all that the visionary Louisa 
 could stand. When their little daughter, Char- 
 lotte Alvarella Cushman Stone, was seven 
 months old, the young mother ran away with a 
 third-rate landscape painter. Although he 
 ruined his best horse in doing it, Solomon Stone 
 overtook the elopers before they had reached 
 the nearest railway station, thrashed the would- 
 be destroyer of his wife into insensibility and, 
 without a single word of reproach to his weep- 
 ing Louisa, took her back to her father's house ; 
 the baby, whom she had taken away with her, 
 he carried back to his deserted home. 
 
 Louisa Stone's thirst for adventure was quite
 
 14 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 sated by this her first and last disgraceful 
 escapade. From that time on, she devoted her- 
 self to the care of her invalid mother until the 
 old lady died, and to the works of charity con- 
 nected with her father's church. 
 
 Many and strenuous were the efforts made 
 by friends and relatives of both families to bring 
 about a reconciliation between the estranged 
 pair, but without avail. Solomon was inexora- 
 ble; he would have none of her. 
 
 Fearing that the young woman would lose her 
 mind in consequence of the separation from her 
 baby, her father, the Rev. Alfred Claybourne, 
 succeeded, after much persuasion, in obtaining 
 Solomon's consent to let the young mother see 
 her child on specified days, amounting to six 
 times a year. Concealed by some tree or shrub, 
 Louisa would often stand for hours on dark 
 nights as near as she dared venture to her hus- 
 band's house, hoping to get a glimpse of the 
 little one through a window. At the sight of 
 her husband, she would flee like a frightened 
 deer. Although he had always treated her with 
 the utmost kindness, she now stood in terror 
 of him. Such was the life of Louisa Stone. 
 
 The wound in Solomon's heart had grown 
 callous and hardened his whole nature. He 
 charged his wrongs, not to the weakness of a
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 15 
 
 woman, but to the weakness of women. Every 
 daughter of Eve bore a share of the shame and 
 was voted frail, unstable, and faithless in blood 
 and bone. He never spoke to a woman, out- 
 side of his own family, if he could decently get 
 around it, and he gave up going to church for 
 no other reason than to avoid speaking to and 
 shaking hands with the numerous women of the 
 congregation. 
 
 Solomon's house had a veranda extending 
 across the front and down one side. He was 
 wont to sit on the side veranda on warm after- 
 noons and evenings ; it was his favorite retreat. 
 From here there was an unrestricted view of the 
 beautiful winding valley, the river and the 
 wooded hills beyond. It was here Solomon sat 
 with his apples and cider and read his weekly 
 papers; it was here he received his visitors; it 
 was here he rested his iron grey head against 
 the calico pillow and dozed in his easy chair; 
 it was here that his little Alva climbed upon his 
 knee when tired with play, and with slowly clos- 
 ing eyelids, fell asleep in his arms. 
 
 The Widow Bodkins owned the farm adjoin- 
 ing Solomon's on the east. She built a house 
 close to his, with a side veranda facing his 
 own, and moved into it. The widow's house 
 was small, not more than half so large as her
 
 16 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 neighbor's, and it cut off but little of the view; 
 but Solomon found it impossible longer to enjoy 
 gazing at the beautiful green valley with its 
 tracery of liquid silver, the woods and the purple 
 hills beyond, because the portly figure of the 
 Widow Bodkins, either real or imaginary, 
 always obtruded itself into the southeast corner 
 of the picture, try as he would to shut it out. 
 
 There was only a fence, two narrow strips of 
 grass, and a double row of gooseberry bushes 
 between the two houses. The widow was also 
 fond of sitting on her side veranda on warm 
 afternoons, for, although it faced the west, the 
 tall house of her neighbor cast a protecting 
 shade over it. 
 
 Whenever Salina Bodkins lifted her black 
 eyes from her knitting and looked over towards 
 Solomon Stone (a woman must look some- 
 where), he felt as if he had been shot at. They 
 never spoke to one another, and Solomon was 
 kept constantly in a state of irritation because, 
 every now and then in unguarded moments, the 
 widow would glance up suddenly and find his 
 eyes fixed upon her. When Salina first moved 
 into her new house, she saluted her neighbor at 
 different times, with just a touch of the old time 
 courtesy, but as he paid no attention to her by 
 even so much as a nod, she gave it up.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 17 
 
 "I'm curious to know what's back of all that," 
 she said one day to her cousin, Mary Bodkins. 
 Salina was charitable to faults and abnormal 
 conditions, because she made a study, in her 
 own crude way, of cause and effect. 
 
 "All the queer things we see in folks, Mary, 
 air shadows of other things we can't see till we 
 hunt 'em up. When the sunshine doubles up 
 and jumps into your face all of a sudden, an' 
 a'most puts your eyes out, you can just make 
 up your mind that there's a boy not far away 
 having fun with a piece o' lookin' glass." 
 
 "That's so, S'liny, I've allus noticed it," re- 
 plied Mary. "Nobody could wad up sunshine 
 an' throw it in folk's faces with their bare 
 hands." 
 
 Mary Bodkins was an old maid cousin of 
 Salina's, with whom she had lived for more than 
 twenty years. She was a tall, thin old woman 
 with a corpse-like face, and hands that were 
 suggestive of the claws of a bird. She had hip 
 disease and walked with a crutch. Mary had 
 unlimited faith in her cousin, and she rarely 
 ventured an opinion without first testing it in 
 Salina's mental moulds. 
 
 Early one morning, three weeks after the 
 Widow Bodkins had moved into her new house, 
 she heard the sound of a hammer and the rip-
 
 18 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 ping and splitting of boards. She got up and 
 peeped through the blinds to see what it meant. 
 Solomon Stone was tearing down his veranda. 
 He did it carefully, carried the boards around to 
 the opposite side of the house, and rebuilt it 
 there ; then he tore out and boarded up the only 
 window on the first floor looking toward the 
 widow's house. 
 
 Solomon's half sister, Lucinda Stone, had 
 lived with him and taken care of his child and 
 the house ever since his wife left him. Some 
 thought Lucinda did wrong to stay with her 
 brother and make everything so easy and 
 comfortable for him; it added, they opined, to 
 the difficulty of bringing about a reconciliation. 
 Lucinda knew her brother's feelings better than 
 any one else, she thought, and she felt sure that 
 a reunion between Solomon and Louisa could 
 never be effected, notwithstanding the young 
 wife's present irreproachable life (of which they 
 made much). Accordingly she could not see 
 that it was her duty to let the baby suffer for the 
 sake of an experiment, or to convince other 
 people that when her brother said anything he 
 meant it. 
 
 Solomon's daughter. Charlotte Alvarella 
 Cushman Stone, grew into a beautiful woman. 
 She had the dark, lustrous eyes and shining.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 19 
 
 black hair of her mother, and her keen vivacious 
 ways, with the inflexible will and calm but stub- 
 born determination of her father. A profound 
 affection existed between Solomon and his 
 daughter, and they were usually of one mind; 
 but when their wills were opposed and came in 
 contact, "fire flew," as Lucinda expressed it; 
 both were as unyielding as flint. 
 
 Lucinda Stone sat on the veranda crochet- 
 ing. Her niece sat on the steps at her feet. It 
 was a warm afternoon in June, and the air was 
 heavy with the odor of roses that blossomed 
 about the yard in the wildest confusion, and 
 almost covered the long, narrow veranda. Alva 
 was watching a honey bee that was crawling in 
 and out among the petals of a pink rose she 
 held in her fingers, but her thoughts were else- 
 where. 
 
 "Don't put that rose in your hair, Alva." 
 
 The girl looked up quickly into her aunt's 
 face with a shade of displeasure in her eyes. 
 
 "Why do you dislike to have me wear flowers, 
 Aunt Lucinda? I rarely touch one to put it 
 on that you do not, at least, look as if you would 
 rather I wouldn't. You certainly don't dislike, 
 roses, and I do love them so." 
 
 "No, my child, I like all kinds o' flowers: 
 nobody could like 'em better; but I think you
 
 20 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 wear too many. You've got two pink moss 
 roses with three buds in your hair now, and 
 three big white ones in your belt. Now, it 
 'pears to me, that you had ort to be more careful 
 what you wear, Alvarella. Your eyes are so big 
 and dark, and when you git your light dresses 
 on with ribbons and roses, it gives you such a 
 kind of a skittish look, that it a'most scares me. 
 an' you mus' remember, Alva, that 'pretty is as 
 pretty does.' ' 
 
 Lucinda really meant that her niece looked 
 alarmingly handsome, but she could not have 
 been induced to tell Alva that she looked any- 
 thing but "skittish" or "flippy." Lucinda 
 dreaded beauty as she would have dreaded a 
 plague. She believed that her brother's happi- 
 ness had been ruined by the beauty of Alva's 
 mother. 
 
 The young girl arose without replying, and 
 tied on her hat. The old lady watched her with 
 anxious eyes. 
 
 "So you've decided to go, have you, Alva?" 
 
 "Yes," replied her niece, closing her lips 
 firmly. 
 
 "But your father, child, think of your poor 
 father and what he said." 
 
 "If father could give any good reasons for 
 his objection, Aunt Lucinda, I certainly would
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 21 
 
 listen to him. I'm not blind, if I am in love; 
 but he can give none. Nathan Overton's name 
 is all the fault father can find in him; and as 
 Nathan was too young to put in an objection 
 when he was christened, I can't see any reason 
 in blaming him or making him suffer for what 
 he can't help. The Overtoils do not feel as 
 father thinks they do." 
 
 "But, my dear, wait a while an' think it over. 
 Marriage without a father's consent is such an 
 awful thing, Alva. Nathan's a good lookin' 
 enough young man, but you can't always go by 
 looks. You must remember, my child, that, 'It 
 ain't all gold that glitters.' ' Old adages were 
 dear to Lucinda's heart. The gainsaying, by later 
 thought, of any old adage, maxim, or proverb, 
 served only to endear it to her, and to increase 
 her efforts in the defense of it by more frequent 
 quotation. To her they were the very essence, 
 the cream of thought, and she was un- 
 consciously proud of the reflected brilliancy 
 they lent to her conversation. 
 
 Alva stood facing her aunt. She leaned 
 against a pillar of the veranda. She was wind- 
 ing her narrow pink hat string smoothly around 
 her forefinger. 
 
 "I know it, aunt, but it is not his looks. He 
 is good looking, though, isn't he, Aunt Lu-
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 cinda?" Alva smiled, and over her face swept 
 a flash of rosy warmth, which was instantly dis- 
 pelled by a look of sadness. 
 
 "I'm sorry to disobey father, but I can see 
 no other way, for he will never consent." With 
 an assuring smile, Alva stooped and kissed her 
 aunt's forehead. 
 
 "Have no fear, Aunt Lucinda, I have thought 
 of it a great deal, and I feel sure that I am 
 right. Father will see it some day." 
 
 "You hain't decided to marry him soon, have 
 you Alva? Do wait a year or two. You might 
 make it all right with your father if you'd wait 
 a while an' coax him." 
 
 "A year or two! and keep Nathan waiting all 
 that time, just for father's unreasonable stub- 
 bornness? No, indeed. I will not coax any 
 one, even my father, to allow me to do what I 
 know to be right. I am past eighteen, and I am 
 going to be Nathan Overton's wife, notwith- 
 standing that he bears his uncle's name. Now 
 don't you worry one bit about it, Aunt Lucinda ; 
 leave it all to me," and Alva, again kissing her 
 aunt tenderly, walked away down the path 
 towards the gate. The pink ribbons on her 
 broad straw hat hung down below her waist. 
 
 "Dear me, how over-conceited that girl is! 
 She thinks the hull world's goin' to turn round
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 23 
 
 jest to suit her. I wish she was more yieldin'. 
 She's jest like a man; there ain't no give to her. 
 What shall I say to Solomon when he comes? 
 Oh dear, oh dear!" 
 
 "What be you 'oh dearing' about now, Lu- 
 cindy Stone ? I b'lieve you'd turn the sunshine 
 down any day to find a dark cloud," and Salina 
 Bodkins walked laboriously up the steps and 
 seated herself in Solomon's easy chair. 
 
 "She went," replied Lucinda, in a choking 
 voice, "an' I declare I dunno what to do." 
 
 "Well, I knew she would," said Salina coolly. 
 "I knew the minute you told me that Solomon 
 had told her not to go, that she would go, and 
 what's more, she'll marry him, too." 
 
 "Yes," assented Lucinda with a sob, "she jes' 
 tole me she was goin' to ; that's what she's gone 
 to meet him for; to promise to marry him. She's 
 kep' him waitin' this three months, an' she says 
 she won't keep him waitin' no longer. Today 
 was the day sot for her to tell him." 
 
 "Well, your brother hain't managed Alva as I 
 should 'a' managed her if she'd 'a' been my girl. 
 You know, Lucindy, that when that child was 
 a leetle mite of a thing, if she was told not to 
 go into the garden, into the garden she went." 
 
 "Yes, I know it, S'liny; I know it perfec'ly 
 well. When she wa'n't quite three year old,
 
 24 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 Solomon took her out one day and showed her 
 the piny buds, and told her she mustn't pick off 
 a single one she hadn't happened to notice 
 'em afore an' if she did, he'd tie her up. Of all 
 things Alvarella abominated bein' tied up. 
 Well, would anybody believe what that child 
 did? As soon as her father had gone out to 
 his work, she took her little red tin cup, that 
 had printed on it in gilt letters, 'An Obedient 
 Child,' and picked off every one o' the piny buds. 
 When Solomon come in from his work an' sot 
 down to rest, Alva walked up to him an' poured 
 the buds into his hat; then she stood up an' 
 looked at him, right in the eye. She had the 
 empty cup in one hand and the rope in the 
 other, all ready to be tied up. Solomon was 
 that beat, he never said a word. He jes' quietly 
 hung up the rope and rocked her to sleep ; then 
 he threw the buds away back of the barn where 
 she wouldn't see 'em. 
 
 "Now, I learned a lesson from that, and when 
 the pansies bloomed, I tried a different plan. 
 I took her out and showed 'em to her, an' told 
 her she might pick 'em all off if she wanted to, 
 but if she did, they would die. She loved the 
 pansies, an' used to play around 'em and talk 
 to 'em by the hour, but she never pulled one 
 off. I picked a few one day to put on the tea-
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 25 
 
 table when I had company, an' she cried herself 
 'most sick about it. She followed me around a 
 good share of the afternoon, with a needle an' 
 thread, a beggin' of me to sew 'em on again so 
 they wouldn't die. 
 
 "You see, S'liny, men don't notice these little 
 things as women do. Alva was always jest as 
 sweet an' lovin' as any child could be when she 
 was managed right, but she won't be druv, an' 
 never would, an' it does seem to me that Solo- 
 mon had ort to know it. She wouldn't 'a' gone 
 this afternoon, I feel sure, if her father hadn't 
 threatened to turn her out o' doors if she did. 
 She's got her trunk all packed up, S'liny, all 
 packed up an' ready." Lucinda again gave way 
 to weeping, interspersed with broken expres- 
 sions of regret for past sorrows, and dread for 
 those which seemed lying in wait to pounce 
 upon her in the near future. Something about 
 "This vale of tears" attracted Salina's attention. 
 
 "Do you know, Lucindy Stone, that you're 
 doing all you can to make this world a vale of 
 tears instead of trying to make it a pleasant 
 place to live in? An' do you know that the 
 reason some folks never can see anything but 
 tears on this earth is because their own eyes are 
 so full of 'em? Most o' the trouble in this 
 world, Lucindy, is homemade. It's wonderful
 
 26 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 how the rough places do smooth out when we 
 take our hands off and let the Lord manage 
 things. You're tryin' to do His work, Lucindy 
 Stone, without being asked to." 
 
 Lucinda dried her eyes and looked at her 
 friend thoughtfully. "Mebbe you're right, 
 S'liny. I guess there ain't anything more I can 
 do." 
 
 "Yes," said Salina, after a moment's thought. 
 "I think there is one more thing you could do. 
 Help me carry Alva's trunk over to my spare 
 room, so if they have trouble to-night she can 
 walk right over to my house, and stay there till 
 she's married. I suppose it won't be long after 
 Nathan finds she's turned out. You see, Lu- 
 cindy, it would be inconvenient for Alva if her 
 father should take a notion to keep her clothes 
 and" 
 
 "How good an' thoughtful you be, Saliny, I 
 never would 'a' thought of it. It'll look a sight 
 better, too, for her to be over with you than to 
 go to the Overtons. If any one sees her to your 
 house, they might think she'd jest dropped in. 
 I think we'd better take it now, Saliny. 'A stitch 
 in time saves nine,' an' there ain't no tellin' what 
 Solomon '11 do when he finds out she went." 
 
 When her father returned, Alva was seated 
 on the veranda, crocheting. There had always
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 27 
 
 been maintained between the father and 
 daughter a vague code of politeness which they 
 had tacitly framed for themselves, and to which 
 they had always adhered under every trying 
 condition. Solomon walked up the steps 
 towards his daughter hat in hand. According 
 to her custom, Alva rose to her feet 'at his ap- 
 proach. Her face was pale, and there was a 
 determined look about the little square white 
 chin, but there was no trace of anger or 
 defiance. Solomon regarded her for a moment 
 in silence. 
 
 "Did you disobey me, Alvarella?" he asked at 
 last, in a low voice that shook with suppressed 
 emotion. 
 
 The young girl stood with one hand resting 
 on the back of her chair. She was in a nervous 
 tremor from head to foot, but she replied in a 
 calm voice and without removing her eyes from 
 her father's face. 
 
 "Yes, father, I did. I met Nathan, and" 
 
 "And what? What fool thing did you dare 
 to do ? Ungrateful wretch ! Child of a 
 renegade! Suckling of an adulteress!" He 
 had grasped his daughter by the wrist, and his 
 words were uttered in a hiss. 
 
 Alva sprang back, and with a painful wrench 
 freed her wrist. Her head was thrown back.
 
 28 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 her eyes were ablaze with anger, and not a 
 vestige of color remained in her face. 
 
 "It's a lie, father, she's not that, and you know 
 it. I've heard from your own lips that she was 
 not. Say what you like of me, but I will not 
 hear you say such things of mother. A shame 
 on you." 
 
 Solomon's arms dropped to his sides, and the 
 two stood regarding each other as if suddenly 
 transfixed. Something in her face reminded 
 the old man of the peony buds, and he saw 
 before him a little girl with these same eyes, 
 holding in one hand an empty tin cup and in the 
 other a long, slim rope. He knew now that 
 Alva had made up her mind to take the conse- 
 quences of her disobedience. 
 
 "I may as well tell you all now, father, while 
 we are talking. I promised this afternoon to 
 marry Nathan Overton, and I expect to be his 
 wife within a week with your consent if you 
 will give it, without it if you will not. If you 
 could show me any good reasons " 
 
 Her father cut her sentence short as if he had 
 not heard a word of what she was saying. 
 
 "I've had great hopes for you, Alvarella : 
 you're the only one I've got to care about, the 
 only one I've worked for all these long years. 
 It was for you I've sacrificed everything to save
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 29 
 
 the farm. Your mother went back on me, an' 
 now you're going to join hands with the enemy, 
 and mix my blood up, whether I will or no, with 
 a family that'd kill me if they dared." There 
 was a moment of dead silence. "I don't know 
 whether I killed old Nathan Overton or not ; 
 never shall know; but his folks all think I did. 
 I hear something some of them have said almost 
 every time I go to town. I think I did right 
 to hit him, 'cause he hit me first; but I had no 
 more intention o' killing him than he had o' 
 killing me. I've felt that trouble more than any 
 one knows of. It's not very pleasant to think 
 that mebbe you've flung a man head first into 
 eternity without giving him a minute to think 
 it over. Seems to me, Alvarella, I've had 
 about all I can stand ; an' yet you're going to 
 lower me to the very dust by joining hands 
 with my enemies." Solomon was speaking 
 calmly now. "You're safe in insulting me, 
 because you know I wouldn't strike a woman. 
 If you do it, Alvarella, I want to give you fair 
 warning, if you marry that man, you're no 
 longer my daughter, and I don't want you to 
 ever come near me whether I'm sick or well, and 
 I forbid you to call me father, or to show your- 
 self at my funeral when I'm dead. I shall be 
 Solomon Stone to you from your marriage day
 
 30 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 on, as I am to the rest of the world. Are you 
 going to do it?" 
 
 Alva's voice was low but firm. 
 
 "I am." 
 
 "Then you can go." She turned as if to go 
 into the house. He put his hands on her 
 shoulders and turned her about facing the road. 
 
 "Go out there. Out into the street. Out o' 
 my sight." He stretched one long shaking 
 arm towards the road. 
 
 Alva slowly picked up her hat that lay on the 
 floor and put it on. She slowly tied the strings 
 under her chin, carefully spreading out the bow 
 with her trembling fingers, keeping, the while, 
 her eyes on those of her father. Every trace of 
 anger and resentment had suddenly fled from 
 both faces, leaving them pale and drawn. 
 
 "Do you meant it father? Do you mean 
 to turn me out?" Alva spoke with difficulty. 
 
 "Yes, go, Alva, go quick," and he turned his 
 back to her. Her hand touched his arm with a 
 lingering sweep, and she walked with slow, 
 uneven steps towards the gate. She had a faint 
 hope that he would call her back. She glanced 
 back wistfully over her shoulder, half expecting 
 to see some sign, but he had gone into the 
 house, so Alva Stone closed her father's gate 
 with a touch that was both a caress and a fare- 
 well, and walked away.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 31 
 
 Salina Bodkins stood at her own gate. She 
 had been standing there ever since she saw 
 Soloman Stone drive home. 
 
 "Come here, Alva, you're to come in and stay 
 with me. I know what's happened, and you're 
 to stay right here with me till you're married. 
 Your Aunt Lucindy said so. Your trunk's up 
 stairs, an' your room's all ready." 
 
 At the mention of her Aunt Lucinda, tears 
 flowed down Alva's cheeks, but not a muscle of 
 her face moved. 
 
 "How good you are, Aunt Salina ! And poor 
 Aunt Lucinda, I didn't get to speak to her. She 
 don't even know I'm gone. She's getting 
 supper." Salina laid her arm about Alva's 
 shoulders, and they walked into the house. 
 
 Three days later, at four o'clock in the after- 
 noon, Nathan Overton and Alva Stone drove 
 away from Salina Bodkin's gate. Lucinda and 
 Salina stood side by side and watched the bright 
 new buggy as far as they could see it. How 
 pretty Alva looked in her pale blue cashmere 
 and white ribbons ! She turned occasionally 
 and waved her hand back at them, smiling. 
 
 "Now you stop cryin', Lucindy Stone. You'll 
 make yourself sick. Alva knows what she's 
 about." 
 
 "Yes. I mus' stop. Saliny, or I might git
 
 32 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 infermation in the eyes. Louisa bed it after 
 Solomon took the baby away from her. I've 
 hed 'most everything that anybody's ever heel, 
 but if I should git infermation, I have a feelin' 
 that I shouldn't never git over it. But I dunno 
 as it'd make much diff'rence, I guess I shouldn't 
 be missed. Alva's gone, an' she'll f'git all about 
 me in a little while, an' if I shouldn't never git to 
 see her again in this world, Saliny, tell her 
 Lucinda was unable to finish her farewell mes- 
 sage. She was sobbing violently. 
 
 "Oh, nonsense! I feel as if I could shake 
 you, Lucindy Stone. 'Never git to see her 
 again !' Lucindy, open your eyes if you can, and 
 look over there across the road." Lucinda 
 looked as well as she could through her swollen 
 lids. 
 
 "Do you see that red house over there, right 
 square in front of your face ?" 
 
 "Why of course I do, I ain't quite blind. Any- 
 body c'd see it that's got eyes. But what o' 
 that ?" Lucinda felt a little offended. 
 
 "Well then, I guess you can see Alva when- 
 ever you take the trouble to look out o' your 
 front winders." 
 
 "Why, what do you mean, S'liny? Alva ain't 
 goin' to" 
 
 "Yes, she is. Nathan's bought the farm.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 Alva told me to tell you 'bout it after they were 
 gone. Nathan paid cash for it, too, four thou- 
 sand dollars. The Saxes are going to move into 
 town next week, and Nathan and his wife are 
 going to set up housekeeping right in front of 
 your face 'n' eyes." Lucinda could hardly 
 believe her ears, at first; she gazed at Salina, 
 speechless. 
 
 "They bought it?" she asked at last. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "An' they're goin' to live right over there 
 acrost the road, in the Saxe house?" Lucinda 
 pointed towards the house, but she kept her 
 eyes on Salina's face. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "How glad I be, Saliny, for I can slip in an 
 'tend to her if she's sick er anything, an' when 
 Solomon's gone out to his work, I can jes run 
 over and help her a little bit now an' then about 
 her washin'. Alva, she don't git along very well 
 with washin'; she always rubs blisters on her 
 fingers the fus thing. 'Every dark cloud has a 
 silver linin', don't it, Saliny?" Lucinda's tear- 
 stained face was wreathed in smiles. 
 
 "Oh, Nathan won't let her wash, you can be 
 sure of that. He'll most likely hire old Polly 
 Downs to do it for her; she washes for his 
 mother." Lucinda looked disappointed. "Be-
 
 34 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 sides," continued Salina, "you're getting most 
 too far along in years to wash, Lucindy." 
 
 "Oh, I don't mind it the least bit, Saliny, I've 
 allus been use' to it, an' I'd a good deal ruther 
 'Wear out than rust out.' ' 
 
 "So would I, Lucindy, ever so much; but I 
 guess there's no danger of Why, ain't that 
 Solomon coming down the road on that grey 
 horse?" 
 
 "Yes, 'tis Solomon, sure enough. I mus' go 
 right to gittin' supper. He's been to town to 
 see about gettin' the mortgage distended to 
 three year more. I hope he's been able to git 
 it done. I'm sure I dunno what Solomon'd do 
 if they should close up on him now right on the 
 heels of Alva gittin' married. (You know, 
 S'liny, trouble never comes singlehanded.) 
 Lawyer Barnes is a good friend o' Solomon's 
 an' he's doin' all he can to git a three-year 
 distention. He was Solomon's lawyer, ye 
 know, when he had that trouble (Lucinda had 
 lowered her voice to a whisper), an' I tell you, 
 S'liny, 'A friend in need is a friend indeed.' ' 
 
 Four years had gone by since Nathan Over- 
 ton had moved with his bride into the Saxe 
 house. But for one drawback, they had been 
 four happy, prosperous years. Nathan had
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 35 
 
 hoped that, living so near together, the hard 
 feeling that existed between his wife and her 
 father would gradually melt away under the 
 softening influence of time. To the intense 
 disappointment of near relatives and friends, 
 the passing years wrought no change between 
 Solomon Stone and his daughter. They often 
 passed one another in the road as if neither 
 knew of the other's existence. 
 
 It was the middle of April. It had rained 
 intermittently for ten days. The ground was 
 sodden; rivulets were running here and there, 
 and the permanent streams had overflowed 
 their banks and inundated the low lands. Rain- 
 drops hung trembling on the swollen buds of 
 the apple trees, and dropped lazily down upon 
 the head of Solomon Stone as he hammered 
 away at the stakes of his tent in the orchard 
 close to the road. Salina and Mary Bodkins 
 stood on the porch watching him as he worked 
 in the rain. 
 
 "What in the world do you s'pose he's 
 workin' for in all this rain, S'liny ?" Salina did 
 not reply at once, and when her thoughts did 
 get to it, Mary had forgotten the question. 
 "I don't want to say just yet, Mary." 
 "Say what?" 
 "Why, what you just asked me. I've made
 
 36 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 up my mind, though, what it means, and I'm 
 goin' over to find out." Salina opened her 
 umbrella with that careful, dainty way a few 
 women have, gathered her clean starched dress 
 well up above the hem of her red petticoat, and 
 walked down the path beside the gooseberry 
 bushs till she could see the kitchen window of 
 the Stone house. The window was open, and 
 the short calico curtain was waving outside, 
 flapping like a wet sail. 
 
 "Something unusual is up, or Lucindy 
 wouldn't let that curtain fly out in the rain like 
 that," was Salina's mental verdict, as she 
 stepped high through the wet grass. 
 
 "Lucindy, Lucindy Stone !" The dripping 
 curtain was pulled in, and the upper half of 
 Lucindy's person was thrust out. 
 
 "O, S'liny," she gasped, "do come over here 
 quick. Somethin' awful's happened. The 
 mortgage has closed up on us, an' Solomon 
 declares he'll never sleep another night in this 
 house. We're a-movin'. We're goin' to move 
 right out to-day." Lucinda's voice was broken 
 and plaintive. Salina noticed how pale she 
 was, and how white her hair looked, framed in 
 by the dark casing and the wet, weather- 
 beaten clapboards. 
 
 "But you don't have to, Lucindy. I wouldn't 
 move in the rain to please anybody."
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 37 
 
 "No, we've got till August, but Solomon, he 
 won't stay in this house another night, he says, 
 and you know, S'liny, when Solomon says a 
 thing, he's set on it." 
 
 "Well, I'd let him be set on it. I'd let him 
 go out an' set on the fence, if he wanted to, if 
 I was in your place, Lucindy Stone, and I 
 wouldn't stir one step out o' that house till it 
 stops raining and dries up." 
 
 "But, S'liny, he's goin' to lock the house up 
 an' take the key down to Squire Simmons this 
 very night, so he says." 
 
 "Well, then, Lucindy, you come over and 
 stay with me till the weather clears up. 'Twon't 
 do for you to move into that tent; I see that's 
 what you're planning to do." 
 
 "Yes, that's where we're goin'. Solomon 
 says it'll be reel comf'table. I'll come over 
 bimeby, S'liny, an' git a cup o' tea. I feel purt' 
 nigh tuckered out. We've got all the things 
 packed up now that we can't use in the tent, 
 an' Lawyer Barnes is goin' to store 'em for us 
 in his new granary. You see, S'liny, th' 
 orchard, an' that's ten acres, wa'n't in the mort- 
 gage, an' jest as soon as Solomon can sell the 
 sheep an' horses, he's goin' to build a cottage 
 right out there under the apple trees where the 
 tent is."
 
 38 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "Well, it's a shame for a woman o' your age 
 to have to move into a tent, such weather as 
 this, and you complaining every little damp 
 spell with the rheumatism, too. You'd better 
 make up your mind to stay with me till the 
 house is built. It'd more than likely save you a 
 spell o' sickness." 
 
 "No, I feel it my duty to stay with Solomon, 
 S'liny; you see he'd feel kind o' forsook like all 
 alone in a wet tent." 
 
 Alva was greatly disturbed when she found 
 that her father and her Aunt Lucinda were 
 going to move out of their comfortable home 
 into a tent. She tried her best to persuade her 
 aunt to stay with Salina, but for once in her 
 life Lucinda was inflexible. 
 
 Solomon laid a few boards down here and 
 there in the tent; between these was fresh wet 
 grass. Some strips of rag carpet were hung up 
 between the two beds, and in front of Lucinda's 
 bed Solomon had spread down an old buffalo 
 robe. 
 
 Rain fell with lazy persistency during the 
 entire night. Solomon kept up a good fire in 
 the cook stove, and the tent, consequently, full 
 of steam from the drying canvas. A little 
 rivulet had broken through and was running
 
 THE BATTL,E INVISIBLE 39 
 
 across the floor between the beds. Solomon 
 lay watching it after he woke in the morning. 
 
 "Lucinda, you're coughing. Have you taken 
 cold ?" She made an effort to reply, but could 
 scarcely raise her voice above a whisper. 
 
 "No, I guess not, Solomon," she managed 
 to squeak out, "but I'm terrible hot, an' my 
 hair's jes' wringin' wet. Seems to me you've 
 got a terrible fire, Solomon." 
 
 Without replying, Solomon dressed and went 
 to his sister's bed. Before he touched her he 
 saw that she was feverish. He laid his hand on 
 her forehead. "You're sick, Lucinda. I'm 
 afraid it's sleeping in this wet tent. I guess I'd 
 'a' done better to have left you in the house till 
 it cleared up. I'll ride to town and get the 
 doctor to come over and see what ails you 
 before you get any worse." 
 
 Lucinda did her best to expostulate with 
 him, but her voice failed her. In less than five 
 minutes she heard his horse beating the soft 
 mud in a gallop up the road towards the village. 
 
 "Lucindy, Lucindy Stone." Salina pushed 
 back the wet curtain, and stood in the tent door. 
 She listened a moment. 
 
 "Air you alone, Lucindy?" Salina heard 
 something, mingled with the patter of the rain,
 
 40 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 that sounded like the first attempt of a young 
 rooster to crow. Lucinda was making the 
 effort of her life to speak in her natural voice. 
 
 "Jest exactly as I expected, Lucindy Stone ; 
 you're sick, an' no wonder." Salina stood 
 beside the bed with her hands on her hips. She 
 turned suddenly, after a moment's silent 
 thought, and went to the tent door. She put a 
 plump hand on each side of her mouth and 
 called: "Nathan, Nathan!" The young man 
 appeared in his doorway. Salina made a 
 sweeping inward motion with her arm that said 
 distinctly: "Come over here at once." 
 
 "Nathan, Lucindy's sick. She's got a high 
 fever, and her voice is like the croak of an old 
 crow. Can you carry her over to my house?" 
 Lucinda opened her lips to protest, but it was 
 of no use; she was helpless. 
 
 "Why, certainly I can, what's to hinder? 
 Roll her up in the blankets, Mrs. Bodkins, and 
 you walk along and hold your umbrella over 
 her. It isn't raining just now, but water is 
 dropping from the trees." 
 
 Solomon stood looking at the empty bed 
 when Salina again appeared at the tent door. 
 
 "I thought 'twas best, Mr. Stone," she was 
 saying ; "this is no place for a woman o' her age 
 even if she was well, which she's far from. You
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 41 
 
 know as well as I do, Mr. Stone, that your 
 sister has been in poor health, more or less, for 
 two year, an' it'll kill her to live in this wet tent. 
 There's no two ways about it." 
 
 Salina stopped for want of breath. She had 
 been talking with only a few slight pauses for 
 five minutes. She was a little nervous, for this 
 was the longest conversation she had ever 
 attempted with her next door neighbor, in all 
 the fifteen years that she had lived in the 
 shadow of his house. 
 
 Solomon had not yet spoken. He was look- 
 ing past his visitor away into the distance. 
 Salina flushed and bit her lips in vexation. She 
 began to wonder, when she saw the far away 
 look in his cold, grey eyes, if he had any inten- 
 tion of replying to her at all. When he did 
 finally turn his eyes upon her own, she felt as if 
 touched by an electric battery. His eyes 
 seemed to breathe and grow warm as they 
 calmly gazed into hers. She involuntarily took 
 a step backward, and rested her hand on the 
 back of a chair. In this short moment of soul 
 communion, the thought came to Salina like a 
 flash of light, that Solomon Stone was mis- 
 understood. 
 
 "I presume you're right, Mrs. Bodkins. This 
 is no place for a woman. I didn't think about
 
 42 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 her age. In fact, I didn't know till just now, 
 that she'd not been well for two years. She 
 never mentioned it to me." 
 
 Salina felt encouraged. Her face brightened. 
 She had made him speak. 
 
 "Won't you come over to my house, too, Mr. 
 Stone? Just for a few days, till this wet 
 weather's over. I've got plenty o' room. This 
 ain't a fit place for man or beast. Why, it's 
 soakin' wet, Mr. Stone. You might get some 
 terrible sickness like like typhoid fever, or th' 
 ager, or the hives." 
 
 "No, thank you, Mrs. Bodkins. This is 
 plenty good enough or me. If you'll let 
 Lucinda stay with you a few days, I'll pay you 
 well for it." 
 
 "Pay me ! Indeed you will not," said Salina, 
 bristling. She fairly swelled with indignation. 
 "I'm no better 'n I ought to be, Mr. Stone, but 
 I'm not quite mean enough to take pay for 
 letting a friend stay in my house a few days. 
 I didn't suppose you'd come when I asked ye, 
 because you' re so stubborn and contrary; but 
 if you change your mind, you're perfectly 
 welcome any minute." And with this she 
 walked away. She rather regretted, a moment 
 later, that she had been so frank, "Still," she
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 43 
 
 thought to herself, "Maybe he don't know he's 
 contrary, and it may set him to thinking." 
 
 It did set him to thinking. No woman had 
 ever before dared to criticize him to his face. 
 He sat in deep thought for some time. Then 
 he spoke low to himself. 
 
 "S'pose that's what they all think. Stubborn ! 
 Contrary ! Uh ! Well, it's all the same to me." 
 
 The curtain door of the tent was pushed 
 aside, and Alverella stood before her father. 
 She had a tired look, and her face and hair were 
 wet with rain. For a moment neither spoke. 
 He secretly admired her for daring to come. 
 
 "Solomon Stone, Nathan and I invite you to 
 stay with us until you get your house built. 
 You will be perfectly welcome. Will you 
 come?" Alva's voice was as always low and 
 sweet. The old man started as if stung. 
 
 "How dare you ask me this, Alva?" 
 
 "How dare I?" she repeated quickly, as she 
 gazed unflinchingly into his stern face. "I 
 dare, because your blood is in me." She waited 
 a moment for him to speak, but he remained 
 silent. 
 
 "When you left mother at grandfather's 
 twenty years ago, you gave her two hundred 
 dollars in money. (Solomon listened intently.)
 
 44 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 She has never used a cent of it. It has been 
 upon interest all these years. She says it is not 
 hers, but yours. She feels that she has no right 
 to it. Will you take it? She does not need 
 it. She wished me to ask you this." 
 
 "No, I will not. Tell her to make use of it, 
 for it is hers." 
 
 "Will you not take half of it, fath Solomon 
 Stone? It is mother's wish, and you could 
 make good use of it just now; you could build 
 at once." 
 
 "No, I will not." Alva took a step backward 
 when the last "no" was spoken, and the curtain 
 dropped between them. 
 
 Solomon tied the door open and sat gazing 
 out into a grey, chilly fog that was fast closing 
 in about the tent. He was deep in thought. 
 
 Solomon knew that Alva had no hope that he 
 would take the money. He could see it in her 
 face. He remembered that this was the second 
 time Louisa had offered him that money. Both 
 times he was in trouble. When he was arrested 
 for murder, she visited him in prison and 
 begged him to take it for defense. She insisted 
 that it belonged to him ; that she had forfeited 
 all right to it. He told her that she certainly 
 had, in a way, but that if he gave it to her, it
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 45 
 
 was hers. She left him that day feeling more 
 than ever heart-broken. 
 
 "What did he say? Oh, what did he say, 
 Alva? Did he say he would take it? Could 
 you coax him to take it?" 
 
 "He said just what I would have said in his 
 place, mother, 'no'." Alva pushed the heavy 
 hair back from her forehead with a weary 
 motion. "I knew before I went over there that 
 he would refuse the money and all offers of 
 assistance." 
 
 "Poor Solomon ! It's all my fault that you're 
 so hard and unhappy. It's my fault that you're 
 alone in that wet tent to-day," and gentle 
 Louisa Stone, whose fault was her weakness, 
 sat gazing with tearful eyes over towards the 
 white tent under the apple tree. "I wish he 
 would go in out of the wet. I can hardly see 
 him through the fog." 
 
 "Don't blame yourself so much, mother dear, 
 it isn't all your fault. Father's trouble made 
 a great difference with him." 
 
 "You wouldn't believe, Alva, what a good- 
 natured man he used to be, and he was good 
 company too," declared Louisa, between sobs; 
 "he used to sit and tell me stories by the hour ; 
 you know I was young then, and so fond of life 
 and excitement."
 
 46 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "Yes, mother, a seventeen year old wife is 
 young." 
 
 Three days and nights Solomon lived alone 
 in his wet tent; then the rain ceased and the 
 sun shone forth with welcome warmth. 
 
 Lucinda had rheumatic fever, the doctor said, 
 and the first of June found her still in bed. 
 
 Solomon had just come in from hoeing his 
 little patch of corn. He hung up his hoe in a 
 tree beside the tent, and pushed aside the cur- 
 tain door. A child two years old stood at his 
 table, eating. She had a piece of cold meat in 
 one hand and in the other a cooky which she 
 had taken from his table. Her head was 
 covered with a confused mass of silky, brown 
 curls that clung in little rings to her soft, white 
 neck. The two gazed at one another for a 
 moment in silence. The child was the first to 
 speak. 
 
 "Baby eat," said the little one, looking 
 down at her cooky from which one bite had 
 been taken. 
 
 "Yes, so I see. What do you want here?" 
 asked the astonished man, in a stern voice. 
 
 "Want here," repeated the child, with a 
 little quiver about her under lip. 
 
 "You're going to cry, are you ? You'd better 
 go home to your mother." Solomon's voice
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 47 
 
 softened a little, unconsciously, when he saw 
 two little tears that were not heavy enough to 
 roll down, lying just under the little one's eyes. 
 "What's the matter with ye, eh?" 
 
 "Gampa scol' baby." 
 
 "Who said I was your grandpa? I'm not 
 your grandpa." 
 
 "Not gampa," echoed the baby, with a 
 stifled sob. Solomon pulled the door curtain 
 aside and motioned her out. 
 
 "Come, you run home now." She laid her 
 cooky and piece of meat on the clean plate 
 Solomon had set out for himself, and started 
 for the door, repeating his last words, "Home 
 now. Home now." 
 
 He watched her until she had crossed the 
 road, and crawled under the gate into her own 
 yard. 
 
 "Guess she won't come over here again, the 
 brat. I shall have to tie the door shut after 
 this when I go out." He smiled nevertheless, 
 when he sat down to his dinner and saw the 
 prints of her fingers around the edge of his 
 plate, and that she had taken a bite out of each 
 cooky on the table. 
 
 The following day, while Solomon was eating 
 his dinner of bread and milk, cold meat and 
 cheese, two little dimpled hands pulled the door
 
 48 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 curtain apart, and a fair baby face was pressed 
 in at the opening. 
 
 "Ope door. Baby min !" demanded the 
 little visitor, pausing after each word and giving 
 to each the downward inflection. "Ope door. 
 Baby min" she repeated. 
 
 Solomon went on eating, and pretended not 
 to see her. She gazed at him a full minute 
 without moving or speaking ; then she dropped 
 flat upon the ground and crawled in under the 
 canvas. She walked slowly towards the table 
 as if not quite sure of a welcome, until the old 
 man turned suddenly and looked at her with a 
 frown. She stopped short and looked down at 
 her own fingers, with which she began twisting 
 and picking at the front of her apron. 
 
 "What did you come for?" demanded Solo- 
 mon in a stern voice. 
 
 "Come for," repeated the baby, her lips 
 quivering, as she raised her eyes, brimful of 
 tears, to her grandfather's face. 
 
 "There, there! Don't cry," admonished the 
 old man, his face softening; and spreading a 
 piece of bread he sprinkled sugar over it and 
 handed it to her. She began eating it with 
 avidity, the while keeping her tearful eyes fixed 
 on his face.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 49 
 
 "You'll choke yourself; you mustn't take 
 such big bites." She tried her best to reply by 
 saying "big bites," but her mouth was too full. 
 
 "Gampa up up. Take baby." She ap- 
 proached the old man, after she had crowded 
 the last bit of bread into her mouth, stepped 
 upon the rounds of his chair, and made an effort 
 to climb into his lap. She balanced for a 
 moment over his knee, struggling desperately; 
 then she settled back upon her feet, and gazed 
 into his face in wondering surprise. 
 
 "No, I can't take ye. I must go to work. 
 You must go home now." 
 
 "Home now." She repeated, with her 
 clear eyes fixed on his. 
 
 "You're a funny baby. You can't talk 
 much." 
 
 "Talk much," said the little one, with a 
 flattered expression. 
 
 The man gazed into the child's eyes for a 
 few moments without speaking; then as if com- 
 muning with his own soul, he said, in a subdued 
 voice: "She's her mother's child over and 
 over, but she has Louisa's eyes." 
 
 "Weza eyes," echoed the child, showing her 
 tiny white teeth in a smile. Solomon laughed 
 aloud.
 
 50 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "You parrot !" he exclaimed, as he caught the 
 baby up in his arms, and even more quickly 
 set her down. 
 
 "There, you run home now," he said, a little 
 sternly. 
 
 "Home now," echoed the baby, starting 
 straight for the door. Solomon drew aside the 
 curtain, and stood watching her until he saw 
 her crawl on hands and knees up the doorsteps 
 of her own home, and go in at the open door. 
 
 He sat thinking of the baby and how much 
 she resembled Alva; all but her eyes, they 
 were like Louisa's just as Louisa's had looked 
 the first time he saw her, at the Oakland 
 Grove picnic. Louisa was queen of flowers that 
 day; she wore a white dress and a crown of 
 wild roses. She got a rose thorn in one of her 
 fingers and the young men gathered around 
 her, all offering to pick it out for her. Solomon 
 was the farthest away of all, but she looked 
 right past the rest and offered her hand to him. 
 "Mr. Stone, will you try it?" said she. He 
 never forgot the look in her eyes. He told her 
 afterwards it was that one glance that sealed 
 his fate. 
 
 As he gazed into the baby's eyes, when she 
 was silently pleading to be taken up, the old
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 51 
 
 spell stole over him, as a dear memory is some- 
 times reawakened by the odor of a flower, or a 
 tone of forgotten music. 
 
 "Well, this is not hoeing down weeds," said 
 Solomon to himself, as, with a few quick blinks 
 of his eyelids, he shouldered his hoe, and 
 walked away to his little patch of corn. 
 
 All day and for days after, a girl in a white 
 dress and a crown of wild roses, followed him 
 everywhere. She moved before him with the 
 persistence of a shadow, as he stepped forward 
 from hill to hill of the tender, waving corn, 
 always holding out to him one little hand. 
 "Mr. Stone, will you try it?" At times she came 
 so near that he would stop suddenly lest he 
 strike the skirt of her dress with the hoe. 
 
 "Well, I guess I'm getting to be a blamed 
 fool," he said aloud, pressing the palm of his 
 hand to his hot forehead ; then, as if to shut out 
 the vision, he went on hoeing with all his might. 
 
 "I was a fool to look at her the other day, 
 when I met her in the road," he mumbled. 
 "Everybody says she's a good woman; leads a 
 good, useful life ; but I say she did wrong once, 
 and nobody can convince me " "Did you 
 ever do anything wrong, Solomon Stone ?" and 
 a low voice from, he knew not where, spoke to
 
 52 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 his soul. He turned and looked about him; 
 there was no one near. 
 
 "And I can never forgive her for that," he 
 continued, "I can never forgive " 
 
 "Our debts as we forgive our debtors." 
 
 Once more he straightened up and looked 
 about him. The hot sweat on his forehead 
 seemed suddenly cold. A ground squirrel 
 darted past him and whipped into a hole three 
 hills away. Solomon felt weak; he leaned 
 heavily on his hoe, and stood for a few minutes 
 in deep thought. Then, as if unable to bear any 
 longer the tension of silence, he spoke low to 
 himself: 
 
 "She asked me in her letter to forgive her 
 and let her come here and live with me in this 
 tent. She knows I've got nothing for her; that 
 I've lost everything; and yet she wants to come. 
 Now, what for? Just to make me give in, that's 
 all; just to show folks that I forgive her after 
 I said I wouldn't. No, I'll never " and he 
 struck the hoe forcefully into the ground, 
 "never so long as I live and have my senses 
 "Do you hope to be forgiven, Solomon Stone?" 
 
 Solomon started as if he had been struck in 
 the face, dropped the hoe, clapped his hands to 
 his head and started staggering towards the 
 tent.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 53 
 
 "Come in, Aunt Salina ; come right in. Why, 
 what's the matter? Is Aunt Luanda worse? 
 asked Alva, anxiously. 
 
 "No, but your father, Alva. He's took awful 
 sick. He's got a fit or a sunstroke, for he fell 
 down flat on his face just outside the tent door. 
 Nathan and I both run to him and lifted him 
 up on the bed, and there he lays and don't know 
 a thing." 
 
 By this time, the three women were hurrying 
 to the tent, Louisa several strides in advance. 
 
 "What do you think is the matter, Aunt 
 Salina?" 
 
 "I believe it's a sunstroke, Alva, for I never in 
 my life see a man work as that man has worked 
 this afternoon, and it's too hot for any one to 
 hoe corn today, let alone a man as old as he 
 is. Mary and I have been watching him from 
 the window, and that's how I come to see him 
 staggerin' along and finally fall down." 
 
 "I don't suppose he'll allow us to do anything 
 for him," said Alva, sadly. 
 
 "Oh, he don't know anything now, Alva, and 
 when he comes to, if he objects, why you've 
 done your duty, and that's all you can do." 
 
 "What is it, Nathan? What ails father?" 
 asked the young wife stepping toward her hus- 
 band who had just come out of the tent.
 
 54 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "I don't know, Alva, he seems overheated. 
 Keep cold water on his head. I'm going after 
 the doctor," and Nathan hurried away. 
 
 For more than a week, Solomon Stone was, 
 to all appearances, delirious. The first two 
 days he was not conscious of the real presence 
 of his wife, but only as he saw her in the corn 
 field with her black hair crowned with wild 
 roses, and her thin white dress waving in the 
 wind. He realized, at times, the illusion, but 
 in his weakness he clung to it. At other 
 moments he was conscious of the presence of 
 the real Louisa with white hair and black dress. 
 He closed his eyes and feigned sleep whenever 
 she bent over him, smoothed his brow or tucked 
 the sheet ever so softly about his shoulders. 
 He knew now that it was her breath he had 
 felt on his forehead, her cool fingers on his 
 wrist. He knew it was Alva who prepared the 
 broths and brought them to the tent door, the 
 strong arms of Nathan that lifted him about, 
 but he did not wish them to know that he knew 
 it, for he had no longer either the physical 
 power or the strength of will to protest. 
 
 It was Sunday afternoon. A light rain had 
 freshened the air, and an agreeable breeze 
 swayed gently the loose canvas. Solomon 
 listened to the birds as they sang and quarreled
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 55 
 
 in the branches that hung low over his head. 
 He could hear the whirr of their wings as they 
 flew from branch to branch, and the spasmodic 
 breathing of the cow as she grazed in the shade 
 close to the head of his bed. He could hear, 
 now and then, the soft swish of a woman's 
 dress. He lay with his face to the wall. These 
 were his thoughts : "Louisa thinks I'll forgive 
 her after this because she's done so much for 
 me. She'll be disappointed when she finds that 
 she's had all her trouble for nothing. They 
 think they'll down me now while I'm sick and 
 helpless. I'll show 'em they can't. Alva's 
 helping her mother along. They want to make 
 me give in. I hate to make Louisa feel bad; 
 she must be about tired out, but it's her own 
 fault. She ought to know by this time that 
 I meant it when I told her fifteen years ago, 
 when her father died, that I could never forget 
 nor forgive her." 
 
 "Forgive her, forgive her, forgive her," rang 
 in his dizzy brain, like a chant of far distant 
 music. His soul seemed to vibrate and swing 
 with the strains of it, "forgive her, forgive her,, 
 forgive her." 
 
 He moved uneasily as if irritated. A soft 
 hand touched his forehead, and a sweet calm 
 stole over him.
 
 56 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "This must come to an end," was the mental 
 resolution of the sick man. "It's all very well 
 to lie here and be cared for and petted like a 
 baby, but I've roughed it now for twenty years 
 without petting, and I'm going to rough it the 
 rest o' the way down the hill. 'Twon't be far 
 now. Strange how the touch of her hand 
 affects me after all she's done, and after so 
 many years. This must end now, while I can 
 end it." 
 
 Solomon spoke up in a natural voice : 
 "Lucindy, where are you?" He heard the 
 rustle of skirts, a soft step, then the sound of 
 some one running outside. 
 
 "Salina, oh, Salina!" and Louisa Stone sank 
 down panting on the door-step. "He's come 
 to. Can't you go right over? And whatever 
 you do, don't let him know I've been there ; he'd 
 be furious, I know he would. Go quickly, 
 Salina." 
 
 "Lucindy ain't quite well enough to come 
 over today, Mr. Stone, but I think she will be in 
 a few days." 
 
 "She's getting better, is she ?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, she's much better. Fever's all 
 gone, but she's weak. Can't stan' on her feet 
 to save her life. You're looking a good deal
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 57 
 
 better today, Mr. Stone. Guess ypu're goin' 
 to get right along now." 
 
 "How long have I been down here, Mrs. 
 Bodkins?" 
 
 "This is the tenth day ; but I calculate you'll 
 be up an' around in two or three days more." 
 
 "I guess I can go to sleep now, Mrs. Bod- 
 kins. I've been awake a long time." 
 
 "All right, Mr. Stone, I'll come over again 
 bimeby. 
 
 "Lucindy Stone, your brother is a different 
 man. I can't just tell what it is, but he's 
 changed. His face has lost a good deal of that 
 hard look. Not all of it, but some of it." 
 
 "Well, I hope he is," said Lucinda, in a 
 doubtful tone. "He ain't much of a han' to 
 change, as you know, S'liny, an' I'm afraid that 
 your 'wish is father to your thought.' ' 
 
 "No, it is not, Lucindy. I tell you there's 
 a change." Both sat silent for a few minutes, 
 each following her own line of thought. 
 
 "Lucindy, do you suppose he knows Louisa's 
 been there taking care of him ?" 
 
 "I don't b'lieve he does, S'liny. Louisa 
 thinks he don't, an' I believe he'd a sent her off 
 if he'd knowed she was there." 
 
 "I don't agree with you, Lucindy; I believe
 
 58 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 he knows she's been there. He's just as 
 raytional as I am this minute, and Louisa says 
 he has had no fever for three days. Old Polly 
 Downs told me last night that she didn't believe 
 he'd been out of his head half the time. Polly 
 ought to know for she's used to sickness, and 
 she's been there a good share of every day. 
 Another thing I'm sure of, Lucindy." Salina 
 sat gazing into the distance, lost in thought. 
 Lucinda sat waiting with her eyes fixed on 
 Salina; finally she spoke up a little impatiently. 
 
 "I'd reely like to know, S'liny, if you'd jest 
 as lives tell me, what it is you're so sure about. " 
 
 "I'm sure that your brother thinks the world 
 o' that baby. She came into the tent while I 
 was there, just a little while ago, with her little 
 dress skirt full of pink tea roses. She walked 
 right up to the bed, and laid them all, one by 
 one, around Solomon's head , as if she was 
 framing it. Then she held out one little finger 
 towards him and said, in her baby way: 
 'Gampa f'ower hurt baby.' 
 
 "Solomon didn't say a word, but I shall never 
 forget the look in his face, and if I ever told 
 the truth in my life, Lucindy Stone, his eyes 
 filled up with tears. He turned his face to the 
 wall, an' I just walked out an' come home to 
 spare his feelin's."
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 59 
 
 "Well, he must think a good deal of her, if 
 he shed tears jes' b'cause she pricked her finger. 
 I can't see through it, nohow. We're told to 
 prove all things an' hoi' fast that which is good, 
 S'liny, but I can't see, for my part how we're 
 ever goin' to prove that." 
 
 FW three days and nights, a fiercer battle 
 than was ever fought with powder and ball 
 raged in the heart of Solomon Stone. Two 
 powerful elements in his nature, that for weeks 
 had been drawing nearer and nearer together, 
 engaged at last in deadly combat. He lay 
 alone in his tent refusing all assistance ; neither 
 food nor medicine passed his lips. How 
 terrible the struggle had been was told by the 
 sunken eyes and the deepened lines in his 
 strong face. He stood in the tent door lean- 
 ing on the back of a chair. His voice was very 
 weak. 
 
 "Polly, I wish you'd move my chair out in 
 front of the tent, right in the middle of that 
 heavy tree shade. It's terribly hot in here; 
 there isn't a breath of air stirring." 
 
 "How'll that do, Mr. Stone?" 
 
 "Turn the chair the other way, Polly ; I don't 
 want to have to look back into the tent; I'm 
 tired enough o' that." 
 
 "How is this, Mr. Stone?"
 
 60 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "All right, now you can go home. I shall 
 be able to get back to bed alone." 
 
 Solomon had no sooner leaned back in his 
 chair than he saw Salina Bodkins coming 
 towards him carrying a bowl of broth. 
 
 "I really wish you wouldn't put yourself to 
 so much trouble, Mrs. Bodkins. It's too bad. 
 I've never done anything for you." 
 
 "It'd trouble me a great deal more not to 
 do anything for you, Mr. Stone, than to do a 
 little once in a while ; so you see, though it has 
 the look of kindness, it's mostly selfishness. 
 What are neighbors for, anyway, Mr. Stone, if 
 we're not to help one another?" 
 
 "Well," said Solomon, after a moments 
 thought, "I can't remember of ever doing any- 
 thing for my neighbors." 
 
 "Well, then, it's about time you did do some- 
 thing, Mr. Stone. We ain't put here to live for 
 ourselves alone. We're meant to help one 
 another whenever it's needful, but it takes some 
 folks a long time to find it out." Silence 
 reigned for a few moments. Solomon gazed 
 at the woman before him with a look of admira- 
 tion mingled with curiosity. No other woman 
 had ever dared so much. 
 
 "I guess you haven't a very good opinion o'
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 61 
 
 me, Mrs. Bodkins; I don't suppose any of the 
 neighbors have. I presume you all think I'm 
 a cold, hard-hearted man, an' I don't know but 
 I am. I've had enough to make me so." It 
 was the first time Solomon had ever spoken of 
 his trouble to any one but Alva. 
 
 "I can't say what the neighbors think, Mr. 
 Stone, I never pay much attention when my 
 neighbors find fault with one another, but I 
 know what I think." 
 
 "Well, what do you think, Mrs. Bodkins? I 
 should really like to know," and Solomon 
 looked up into her face, inquiringly. 
 
 "I think," said she, after a long pause, "that 
 you are not half so hard-hearted as you imagine 
 you are, and as you try to be. You think it 
 shows strength to be stubborn and unforgiving, 
 but it's a mistake; it shows weakness. The 
 meanest soul in the world can pity himself an' 
 nurse his trouble ; he gets a sort of enjoyment 
 out of it. It's awful easy, too ; it ain't necessary 
 to have any particular talent, nor anything but 
 the commonest brains; in fact, Mr. Stone, 
 it ain't necessary to have much of anything but a 
 selfish disposition." 
 
 Solomon sat silent, with firmly compressed 
 lips.
 
 62 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "I sometimes wonder, Mr. Stone, when I see 
 you around here alone, growing more gloomy 
 and sour every year, if it's going to take you the 
 whole of your lifetime to find out, that it takes 
 a better man to forgive than it does to hold a 
 grudge." 
 
 Salina's face flushed as she finished speaking. 
 
 "Now, I hope I hain't said too much, Mr. 
 Stone." 
 
 "No, Mrs. Bodkins. You've done right. I 
 like the truth, and I hate deceit." 
 
 A sound of wheels drew their attention to 
 the road. A cloud of dust was rolling by with 
 the doctor's gig in the midst of it. He drove 
 up to Nathan Overton's, hitched his horse, and 
 went in. 
 
 "Who's sick over there, Mrs. Bodkins?" 
 Salina gazed abstractedly at the Overton house 
 for a few moments without replying, then she 
 spoke as if to herself. 
 
 "I shouldn't wonder if she didn't get up 
 again. She's overdone, and she ain't strong 
 anyway." 
 
 "Whom do you mean, Louisa?" 
 
 "Yes, she's awful sick. I set up with her 
 all last night." 
 
 After Salina had gone, Solomon sat in deep
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 63 
 
 thought till the tree shadows stretched away 
 across the orchard and the western sky turned 
 red. The muscles in his face worked, and the 
 veins stood out on his forehead. His grey 
 head was bent and rested on one hand. A 
 light sound on the grass, like the sweep of a 
 sparrow's wing, and Baby Overtoil announced 
 that she had arrived. She walked slowly up 
 to Solomon, between his knees, and stepped 
 upon the rounds of his chair. 
 
 "Did you come over to see grandpa, baby?" 
 
 "Tee gampa." And a happy smile lit up 
 her face. The old man gazed for a moment 
 unrestrainedly into the clear innocent eyes 
 upturned to his, then he lifted the little one to 
 his knee. 
 
 "Baby, grandpa is a hard, cross old man. He 
 has been hard and cold for so many years, that 
 he came near forgetting how to love, and he 
 wonders how any one can love him, but I guess 
 they do I guess they do." 
 
 The child gazed into his misty eyes with a 
 look of unquestioning sympathy; then she 
 threw her arms around his neck and hugged 
 him with all her strength. The remaining 
 fragments of icy crust about Solomon Stone's 
 heart melted awav. Warm blood coursed
 
 64 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 through his veins with the speed of youth, as 
 the half-formed resolution in his mind became a 
 definite and fixed purpose. 
 
 "Baby, grandpa is going over to see 
 grandma, will baby help grandpa walk?" 
 
 "Gampa walk," she repeated, slipping down 
 from his lap. 
 
 "Get grandpa's cane, then. There it is 
 leaning up against the tent. Bring it here, 
 baby, bring it right here to grandpa, and don't 
 fall over the boards. Now, we'll go and see 
 grandma." 
 
 "Tee gamma." And grasping one of the 
 old man's fingers, she started forward with a 
 hard pull. 
 
 "Not quite so fast, little one; grandpa can't 
 walk very fast, he must go very slow, baby, very 
 slow." 
 
 When they reached the gate, the little girl 
 dropped down and crawled through under it, as 
 was her custom, and unlatched it from the 
 inside. The old man, pale and weak, walked 
 slowly through, questioning as he looked up the 
 long narrow path, whether his strength would 
 hold out till he reached the house. 
 
 Alva saw them coming and ran down to meet 
 them. Her face showed neither surprise nor 
 pleasure. No one could have told by her
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 65 
 
 expression that anything unusual was taking 
 place. 
 
 "Put your arm on my shoulder, father," said 
 she in a low, firm voice. The old man did as 
 she bade him, and the three moved slowly 
 towards the house. It was as if the four years 
 just passed had never been. 
 
 "S'liny, come here quick. There's something 
 or other the matter with Mary. She's dropped 
 her crutch an' fell down, an' I can't git to her 
 to save my life. You know I can't stan' on my 
 feet." Lucinda was propped up in a rocking 
 chair. She leaned over to one side and pounded 
 on the cellar door. 
 
 "Hurry up, S'liny; she's down on her knees 
 starin' out o' the winder, an' she won't answer 
 when I speak to her." 
 
 Salina rushed up the cellarway, panting. 
 She stopped in the middle of the room, looking 
 from the crutch that lay at her feet to Mary, 
 and back again. 
 
 She was alarmed, for Mary had not taken a 
 step without her crutch for twenty-five years. 
 Salina looked at Lucinda questioningly. 
 Lucinda spoke low, pointing to the crutch. 
 
 "She walked from it over to the winder." 
 
 "Without it?" 
 
 E
 
 66 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 
 
 "Yes, without it." 
 
 Salina turned pale. Mary still knelt at the 
 window and was gazing out as if transfixed. 
 Salina tried to speak naturally, but her voice 
 sounded a little weak. 
 
 "Mary, Mary Bodkins, what does ail you? 
 What be you a-doin' there ? 
 
 Mary kept her eyes glued to the window. 
 
 "S'liny, I wish you and Lucindy Stone would 
 come here and tell me if there's anything the 
 matter with me. Do I see Solomon Stone 
 walkin' up that path with Alva and the baby, or 
 don't I see him? If I don't, then I'm goin' to 
 be awful sick, an' you'd better send right 
 straight off for the doctor." 
 
 Before Mary had ceased speaking, two more 
 faces with wide open eyes and parted lips were 
 beside hers close to the window. 
 
 " 'Praise God from whom all blessin's flow.' ' 
 exclaimed Salina, raising her arms. Tears 
 streamed down three smiling faces, and two 
 handkerchiefs and the corner of Salina's 
 gingham apron were brought into use. 
 
 "Oh, I'm so glad and so thankful," exclaimed 
 Lucinda, between sobs, as she paced back and 
 forth with measured steps, gently wringing her 
 hands.
 
 THE BATTLE INVISIBLE 67 
 
 " 'All things come to them that wait,' as 
 Elder White said las' Sunday, Saliny, 'all things 
 come to them that wait.' ' 
 
 Salina and Mary were gazing at L,ucinda in 
 open mouthed amazement. 
 
 "L,ucindy Stone, you're a-walkin'. Set down 
 this minute. You know you can't bear your 
 weight on your feet." 
 
 Lucinda dropped into a chair. 
 
 "How true it is, Saliny," she went on, wiping 
 her red eyes, that 'All things work together for 
 good to them that love .' ' 
 
 "Why, of course they do, Lucindy Stone, I've 
 always told you so, but it does take some folks 
 forever to find it out."
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 69 

 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 Old John Tolbert knew exactly what he was 
 about when he sold his little farm, bought with 
 the money a five-acre lot in the edge of Pepper- 
 ton, fenced it, divided it in halves by running a 
 tight board fence through the middle from the 
 road back, and built on each half a snug little 
 three-room cottage for each of his two 
 daughters, Patience and Prudence. 
 
 There was enough money left after the 
 houses were finished and furnished to give 
 them two coats of paint or dig cellars under 
 them; to do both was out of the question. 
 After weeks of arguing, sparring, and calcula- 
 ting, the cause of the cellars won, much against 
 the will and pleasure of Patience, whose vanity 
 was her sister's bete noir. 
 
 On one of the lots there was a good well ; on 
 the other, two fine cherry trees. The old man's 
 will provided that whichever of the girls 
 occupied the well-less lot, should have the right 
 to draw water at her sister's curb ; accordingly, 
 a gate was cut in the fence beside the well. 
 
 71
 
 72 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 The day after the father's funeral the will was 
 read, giving Prudence the lot with the well, and 
 Patience the one with the cherry trees, stipula- 
 ting that Patience should allow her sister to 
 have, every season, half the cherries from the 
 tree in the corner. The winter following the 
 old man's death, the wind broke off the larger 
 part of the tree, and what was left yielded only 
 a quart or two of fruit each season. 
 
 "Whatever be you a-doin' up there, Prudence 
 Tolbert ? You'll fall and break yer neck." 
 
 "No, I sha'n't fall, nuther ; I'm hangin' onto a 
 limb." 
 
 "What be ye puttin' yer bunnit an' shawl up 
 there fur?" 
 
 "Why, I put it up to scare the birds away. I 
 sha'n't git a cherry this year ; they're a-eatin' of 
 'em jest as fast as they git ripe. I'm takin' it 
 down now; it don't do no good. I put 't up 
 airly this mornin' 'fore you was up, an' when I 
 come out after breakfus', there was a sassy robin 
 settin' right on the crown o' my bunnit singin' 
 ter split his throat. I throwed a club at 'im an' 
 most hit 'im, but he flew over inter your tree ; 
 that's him singin' now. I b'lieve he's jest 
 a-doin' of it to be sassy ; the little rascal, I'd like 
 ter wring his neck." And Prudence handed 
 down what looked like an immense rag doll to
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 73 
 
 \ 
 
 her sister, then felt her way cautiously down 
 from the fence under the tree. 
 
 "Why, yer bunnit rim's all broke off, 
 Prudence; how'd ye do it?" 
 
 "Why, I hit it with the club, I guess, when I 
 threw it at that nasty robin. Yes, it's spiled, 
 ain't it ? Now I shell hev ter wear my best one 
 whether 't rains or shines. Goodness me! but 
 it's hot up in that tree," and Prudence wiped 
 her damp face on the corner of her apron. 
 
 At the time of the father's death the girls 
 were thirty-five and unmarried. As Prudence 
 was supposed to be her sister's senior by fifteen 
 minutes, Patience had always accorded to her 
 the deference due to superior knowledge and 
 longer experience. 
 
 It was the middle of July. Prudence was 
 standing at the well. She had just drawn a 
 bucket of water. She straightened her tall, lean 
 figure, threw her nose into the air, and with 
 dilated nostrils gave a few quick sniffs. 
 
 "Goodness me! somethin's burnin'. I do 
 b'lieve it's Patience's raspberry jam. Patience ! 
 Patience Tolbert ! Where on airth be ye ?" and 
 Prudence, running into her sister's kitchen, 
 lifted the burning jam from the stove, then went 
 round to the front of the house, where she 
 found her, blissfully ignorant of the calamity.
 
 74 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 busy tying a rose bush to a stake she had just 
 driven into the ground. Prudence's black 
 eyes were snapping with excitement. She 
 towered above the bent figure, her face a 
 picture of scorn. 
 
 Patience rose slowly to her feet, looking 
 inquiringly into her sister's face. 
 
 "What is it, Prudence ? What's the What 
 hev I " her voice died in a murmur. Prudence 
 measured the rose bush, then her sister, with a 
 look of concentrated contempt, as if in doubt 
 which of the two were the more to be despised. 
 Her long sharp nose was drawn, and her thin 
 lips so compressed that only a blue line of each 
 was visible. 
 
 "If I was sech a fool as you be, Patience Tol- 
 bert, I'd go an' drown myself, that's what I'd 
 do." Then she turned, holding her skirts very 
 high, and strode through the unmown grass 
 back to the well, her heels parting company 
 with her low slippers at each step. 
 
 Patience stood still, looking after her, until 
 she had carried the pail of water into the house. 
 Patience was neither frightened, surprised, nor 
 hurt; she was only wondering what Prudence 
 was so "mad" about. 
 
 "I guess 't mus' be b'cause Miss Jennings 
 staid to supper with me las' night ; I noticed she
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 75 
 
 wouldn't speak when I was hangin' out the 
 clothes this mornin', an' I though 'twas b'cause 
 I got mine on the line first ; that allus did make 
 'er 'mad.' ' Then she stooped down to finish 
 tying up the rose bush. Suddenly, with a 
 frightened look, she sprang erect and sniffed the 
 air; then darted round the house and in at the 
 back door. 
 
 "Oh ! my jam, my jam ! It's burnin' up." 
 
 "Oh, no, it ain't, it's already burnt up," came 
 in a tantalizing voice from over the fence. 
 
 "If you'd ruther 'tend to rose bushes than yer 
 jam, why, ye kin do it 't ain't none o' my busi- 
 ness ; but I ain't goin' to divide mine with ye as 
 I did my black currant preserves last year, an' 
 ye needn't a-look for it." 
 
 Prudence had walked back to the well under 
 pretense of taking in the clean dish towels 
 which hung on a gooseberry bush beside the 
 gate, but really for the purpose of firing a few 
 more volleys into her sister's smoking kitchen. 
 She loved to force down the unwilling throats 
 of her friends, for their own good, the very 
 dregs of the benefits of experience. 
 
 "I ain't lookin' fer ye to divide ; your'n's too 
 thick anyway," murmured Patience, well aware 
 that her speech was a fatal stab to peace for a 
 week at least. She had carried the kettle out,
 
 76 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 set it on the ground in front of the kitchen door 
 and stood looking at it. 
 
 "There ain't no need o' takin' on so about it, 
 Prudence; I ain't so terrible fond o' raspberry 
 jam as I use ter be I'm goin' to make some out 
 o' gooseberries they're reel good when 
 comp'ny comes." 
 
 "But ye don't like 'em yerself ; ye sold all ye 
 had, last year." 
 
 "I know I did, but I I like 'em better 'n I 
 use' ter." 
 
 No sign of recognition passed between the 
 two sisters after this conversation until the 
 following Sunday. The presiding elder was 
 going to preach, and everybody who ever went 
 to meeting turned out. All sorts and condi- 
 tions of teams and vehicles from the surround- 
 ing country rilled the church grounds. The 
 Tolbert girls attended service at least once 
 every Sunday. In obedience to a suggestive 
 nod from the minister, Patience usually started 
 the hymns. Old Father Hartman, a gray- 
 haired, round-shouldered man with gold glasses 
 had done it formerly; but his voice was begin- 
 ning to tremble, for he was well past his three- 
 score years and ten. Besides he had such a 
 habit of dropping the last word of every line, 
 and beginning the next one before the rest of
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 77 
 
 the congregation could possibly catch breath, 
 that it annoyed the new minister. Brother Jones 
 from Boston, who was, in the opinion of some 
 of the older members, a shade too fastidious. 
 
 Patience had a clear, full, sweet, uncultivated 
 soprano voice, of which Prudence was very 
 proud, and as a result, the weekly sins (whether 
 real or imaginary) of Patience against her sister 
 were all swallowed up each Sunday morning, in 
 the clear, sweet tones of her singing voice. 
 
 The last ringing of the church bell for morn- 
 ing services had just begun when Prudence 
 closed her gate behind her and started for meet- 
 ing. She had picked a little bunch of spearmint 
 and rolled it up in her handkerchief to scent it. 
 She had seen from her window that Patience 
 had her bonnet and shawl on, and had started 
 towards the door before she herself had 
 ventured out. Her tall, prim figure rigidly 
 erect, she walked past her sister's gate with her 
 nose in the air, not so much as turning her head 
 to see if she was coming. Prudence had no 
 notion, however, of going in to meeting without 
 Patience. It would be sure to be remarked 
 upon everybody would know they had quar- 
 reled. Moreover, Prudence was not half so 
 angry as she wished to be ; she was short of fuel 
 for her wrath. It seemed to her undignified to
 
 78 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 let anger wear itself away; so she nursed it, 
 fanning the embers of resentment by carrying 
 on imaginary conversations with her sister, in 
 which Patience always grossly insulted and 
 abused her, until Prudence really came to 
 believe her own anger righteous. 
 
 Patience was in no hurry. She had stopped 
 to pick a few roses, knowing exactly the state 
 of her sister's mind and feelings. She knew 
 Prudence would invent some excuse to wait. 
 
 Prudence took off her gloves and untied one 
 of her shoes. "Feels loose," she mumbled to 
 herself, then she re-tied it. She didn't finish 
 until Patience had passed her a little. She 
 wanted to be sure that Patience should see the 
 shoe and the tying. By the time Prudence rose 
 up, her sister was a few feet ahead of her. 
 Patience halted to pull a "stick-tight" off her 
 dress skirt, so the two came into line and moved 
 on together. They walked in the middle of the 
 road because there was no sidewalk except near 
 the church, and the weeds beside the road were 
 dusty. Prudence held her dress well up in front 
 with one hand, and carried her hymn-book and 
 turkey-tail fan in the other. She wore a black 
 dress, a black straw bonnet trimmed with black 
 ribbon and a bunch of purple flowers. The 
 fringe on the bottom of her black silk cape
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 79 
 
 flapped briskly back and forth as she walked. 
 It seemed to Patience that it always flapped a 
 little more spitefully going to meeting than 
 on the way home ; it was an unerring reflection 
 of its wearer's moods. 
 
 Patience glanced furtively at her now and 
 then, the dimples in the corners of her mouth 
 deepening. She was not quite so tall as 
 Prudence, but fairer. She wore a brown Irish 
 poplin gown, a brown straw bonnet with yellow 
 roses, and a black silk shawl with wide knotted 
 fringe. It kept slipping off her shoulders ; but 
 she did not mind ; she rather liked the careless 
 effect. She carried a brown satin parasol which 
 had been her mother's and of which she was for 
 that reason very "choice." The handle was a 
 horse's head carved in ivory; the ornament on 
 top had also been of carved ivory, but it was 
 broken off close down to the silk. 
 
 As the two sisters walked up the meeting- 
 house steps, Prudence took a little nibble of the 
 dried sweet-flag root she always carried in her 
 pocket. Patience fell back a little behind her, 
 and fastened one of the pink roses she carried 
 to the bosom of her dress. She pretended to 
 herself to hope that Prudence would not notice 
 it. The consciousness of her own vanity, and 
 what the brothers and sisters might think of
 
 80 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 such a display, deepened the pink in her cheeks 
 as she walked up the aisle holding her chin a 
 trifle higher than was her wont. There was a 
 spice of defiance in her bearing a mute 
 defense of her love for the beautiful. 
 
 The hymn was announced with the usual nod 
 to Patience, and her voice rang out clear and 
 sweet: "Must I be carried to the skies on 
 flowery beds of ease." Everybody looked at 
 her. They had never heard her sing so well 
 before. Nobody knew why it was; she herself 
 did not know; but it was her unconscious 
 defense of the rose in her dress. The rigidity 
 of Prudence at once relaxed. After they had 
 reseated themselves, she moved nearer to 
 Patience until their arms touched; then she 
 smelt of the spearmint in her handkerchief, 
 gave a little sigh of contentment, and riveted 
 her eyes piously upon the minister. Patience 
 knew that in her sister's book of reckoning, her 
 sins were once more blotted out. 
 
 The text chosen was from Second Timothy, 
 the ninth verse : "In like manner also, that 
 women adorn themselves in modest apparel 
 * * * Not with braided hair, or gold, or 
 pearls, or costly array, but (which becometh 
 women professing godliness) with good works."
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 81 
 
 Patience was ill at ease throughout the ser- 
 vice. She felt that she was the particular target 
 for every dart hurled from the pulpit at the 
 vanity of her sex. If she had been decked with 
 garlands of roses from head to foot and stood 
 up for a flower sign, she could not have felt 
 more conspicuous. 
 
 After the service, everyone went directly out- 
 side, it was very warm in the church, and 
 stood on and about the wide steps talking and 
 shaking hands. 
 
 The men wiped their foreheads and fanned 
 themselves with their straw hats, and the 
 women drew their thin wraps about their 
 shoulders, for it was not fashionable in Pepper- 
 ton to go without any kind of a wrap, no matter 
 how hot the weather was. 
 
 When she thought no one was noticing her, 
 Patience drew her shawl closely about her 
 shoulders, then pulled the rose from the bosom 
 of her dress and dropped it by-her side. The 
 heat had made it droop a little; that was why, 
 she decided, that she did not wish to wear it 
 any longer. Brother Jones from Boston, as 
 he was usually called by the church members, 
 picked up the rose; after most of the congrega- 
 tion had dispersed, laid it against his vest and
 
 82 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 buttoned his coat over it. He knew it was 
 the one Patience had worn ; he saw her drop it. 
 He was fond of flowers, especially of roses. 
 
 "How did ye like the sermon?" asked 
 Prudence as they were walking homewards. 
 
 "Well enough," replied Patience a little 
 tartly, for she felt that there was something 
 of a challenge in the question. She failed to 
 consider, in her perturbed state, that her sister 
 rarely failed to ask the same question, the 
 sermon usually furnishing the topic of conversa- 
 tion on their homeward walk. 
 
 "Well, there ain't no need o' bein' so snappy," 
 replied Prudence, drawing herself up. She was 
 at least an inch taller when she was angry. It 
 seemed to have an elongating effect which she 
 couldn't help. "You wouldn't 'a' felt it so if 
 you hadn't been overdressed it's the hit bird 
 that allus flutters, an' you wouldn't 'a' had no 
 call to flutter, if you'd take yer elder sister's 
 advice an' dress as a woman o' your age, that 
 pretends ter be pious, had orter dress," and 
 Prudence swept majestically past her sister's 
 gate and went in at her own. She halted as she 
 reached the door-step, and looked at Patience, 
 who had stopped among her roses. 
 
 "I invited Brother Jones to tea tomorrer 
 afternoon I told 'im you'd be over to my
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 house. Bring yer crochet work along; it does 
 look so shiftless to set an' do nothin'." Then 
 she went into the house. 
 
 Patience looked a moment at the closed door 
 that had swallowed up the long, gaunt figure of 
 her sister. "I'll git my washin' out first, to- 
 morrer, that 's what I'll do, Prude Tolbert," and 
 she drew her lips into a little pucker, always 
 a sign of decision and determination. 
 
 The next morning at eight o'clock, Patience 
 was hanging out her clothes. She glanced 
 cautiously over the sheet she was pinning to 
 the line, and saw through her sister's window 
 that her tall form was bent over the steaming 
 suds and that the boiler was still on the stove. 
 Patience laughed behind the sheet, till she 
 dropped the clothes-pin she held in her mouth. 
 "Poor Prudence," she finally sighed, "I 
 wouldn't have such a temper for the world. But 
 she was allus so, father said she was born mad, 
 poor Prude ! It mus' be dretful uncomfortable 
 for 'er. There air times when she ain't mad, 
 but she wouldn't hev any one find it out fer 
 the world. She seems to enjoy feelin' that she's 
 bein' trod on." 
 
 Prudence finished her washing and left the 
 clothes in the rinse water. She met Patience 
 at the well when she went after the last pail of 
 water to pour over them.
 
 84 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 "You ain't got yer close out yet, Prudence ; 
 ye must hev a big wash today," remarked the 
 tantalizing Patience. 
 
 "Got done a good while ago all but the 
 towels. I ain't a goin' ter put 'em out till the 
 sun shines. Your'n won't look nohow. Your 
 close is lookin' dretful gray lately. Patience, 
 you'd orter rub 'em longer." 
 
 At twelve o'clock, feeling that by her seem- 
 ing indifference she had shorn Patience of her 
 laurels, Prudence hung out her clothes. 
 Patience came out with her basket to take in 
 the last of the thick pieces ; the rest were all dry. 
 
 "Seems to me it looks a little brighter 'n it 
 did," said Prudence, as she shook out a wet 
 pillow-case, looking inquiringly up at the sky. 
 
 "Yes, I dunno but 't does. How white your 
 close do look, Prudence. I b'lieve it's a good 
 thing to let 'em soak a spell in rench water." 
 
 Patience did not smile; she would not have 
 dared ; the dimples in her cheeks only deepened 
 a little. 
 
 "Ye got any cucumbers big enough to eat 
 yet, Patience?" 
 
 "No, an' I don't see any on the vines either ; 
 mine ain't done very well this year.' 
 
 "I picked four big ones off'm mine las' night ; 
 you kin hev one or two of 'em ; I sha'n't want 
 'em all."
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 85 
 
 It was three o'clock. Prudence had touched 
 up here and there her always immaculate sitting- 
 room after she finished her kitchen work; but 
 as she was every minute expecting Brother 
 Jones, she walked about, wiping imaginary 
 specks of dust from the furniture, smoothing 
 the tidies and giving a few extra little pats to 
 the cushion in the easy chair by the window 
 where she expected him to sit. The windows 
 and doors were all open, and a faint breeze 
 stirred gently the thin muslin curtains. 
 
 "Good afternoon, Brother Jones, come right 
 in an' take a chair, this chair, take this chair, 
 Brother Jones," and Prudence laid her hand on 
 the back of the big stuffed chair by the window. 
 
 "No, thank you, Sister Tolbert, I'll just sit 
 right down here in the doorway where it'll be 
 cool. Very warm, isn't it?" and he sat down 
 on a carpet-covered soap box that Prudence 
 used for a footstool. 
 
 Her sallow face rarely showed color; one 
 would never have supposed, from her looks, 
 that the blood ever ventured above her collar 
 bone ; but when the minister coolly seated him- 
 self on the soap box, her face actually turned 
 pink. For a man of his calling to take such a 
 seat in her house was too much for her ideas of 
 propriety. She inwardly rejoiced, however, that 
 he was ignorant of the truth, and she wondered
 
 86 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 if she was doing right in allowing him to remain 
 in ignorance. She resolved not to enlighten 
 him, and hoped that none of the church mem- 
 bers would ever find it out. While these 
 thoughts were passing through her mind, she 
 sat in the attitude of an intent listener, with her 
 hands folded primly in her lap. 
 
 "Do you not find it so, Sister Tolbert?" 
 
 Prudence had heard nothing but the ques- 
 tion, which clearly pointed to some previous 
 observation. 
 
 "Well, reely, brother, I I didn't quite ketch 
 yer meanin'," and she put on a studious expres- 
 sion, leaning a little forward. 
 
 "Why, that the weather is warmer than it 
 was at this time last year, Sister Tolbert." 
 
 "Yes, I dunno but 'tis. You're quite right, 
 brother, 'tis warmer 'n 'twas last year." 
 
 As the hour between three and four wore 
 away, Prudence gradually forgot the soap box, 
 and was talking quite in her accustomed strain. 
 She used a little different tone from ordinary 
 when speaking to ministers. She thought their 
 calling deserved it. She used the same tone in 
 class-meeting; some of the young scoffers of 
 Pepperton whom she had frequently chased out 
 of her watermelon patch, called it her Sunday 
 voice.
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 87 
 
 "I reely wish you'd hev a good ser'us talk 
 with 'er, Brother Jones," Prudence was saying 
 "It don't do no good for me to say anything, 
 she's so sot, Patience is. Now you noticed that 
 pink rose she wore pinned to 'er dress Sunday, 
 didn't ye ?" As at this moment Brother Jones 
 had the rose in his coat pocket, a wave of guilty 
 color swept over his face. But he meant to 
 be brave and say a word in defense of the absent, 
 erring sister. So he said, as he looked down at 
 his fingers, carefully matching the. ends to- 
 gether, "I I did notice the rose, and I must say 
 that I thought it looked it looked " very 
 pretty, he was going to say, but Prudence cut 
 him short 
 
 "Yes, yes, I intirely agree with you, Brother 
 Jones. Sech display, right in meetin', right in 
 the face of a minister, is not becomin' in a 
 woman o' her age an' perfession. I do wish 
 you'd go over to her house some day soon an' 
 pray an' wrestle with 'er an' convince 'er if ye 
 kin that she'd orter dress more modest. But 
 don't mention it afore me, brother. It 'ud only 
 ag'avate 'er; whenever I, her own sister, speak 
 to 'er on the subjick of 'er vanity " 
 
 The sentence was cut short by an apparition 
 in blue gingham and white embroidery in the 
 doorway. Patience, in a spirit of defiance, had
 
 88 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 picked a fresh pink rose and tucked it in her 
 belt. Prudence glanced at her, then signifi- 
 cantly at the minister, with a look that plainly 
 said, "There now, you see it's just as I told you, 
 she is determined to make herself pretty." 
 
 Patience sat in the rocker and crocheted, 
 leaving the conversation mostly to her sister 
 and the minister. Their subjects were prin- 
 cipally theological, the different modes of bap- 
 tism receiving the lion's share of attention. 
 Prudence, though a staunch Methodist, never 
 had believed in sprinkling. She considered it 
 a slipshod, cross lot, inexcusable way of eva- 
 ding the Lord's commands, adopted solely to 
 avoid getting wet all over. 
 
 At five o'clock Prudence went out into the 
 kitchen to make the tea. She put on her best 
 china and glass, her fine table cloth, and her 
 mother's pewter teapot, which was never used 
 except when company came ; she always kept it 
 wrapped up in tissue paper. She put on the 
 table some thin slices of cold ham, some little 
 cubes of cheese, bread and butter, tea, cake, 
 and raspberry jam. 
 
 "Tea's all ready now," said Prudence, as she 
 came back into the sitting-room. She noticed 
 that Patience bent over her work and was 
 blushing.
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 89 
 
 "He must 'a' spoke to 'er a'ready on the sub- 
 jick of 'er vanity," thought she. "The dear, 
 good man ! He means to do his duty, Brother 
 Jones does." 
 
 "Jest walk right out, Brother Jones," she 
 continued in a softened voice, "Come, Patience, 
 dear." 
 
 Less weighty topics were indulged in during 
 tea; the ways and means of providing a new 
 carpet for the pulpit floor ; charity families ; the 
 severe illness of one of the oldest and wealthiest 
 members, and the best way to raise potatoes. 
 Brother Jones was of the opinion that if we 
 expect to reap as we sow, we should plant the 
 largest, choicest potatoes. Prudence con- 
 sidered his method a needless waste, but as it 
 accorded otherwise with her religious creed and 
 the opinion of a minister, she decided on the 
 spot, that in future she would plant as she 
 would reap so far as her potatoes were con- 
 cerned. Further she unhappily did not con- 
 sider. Prudence noticed that her sister took no 
 jam when it was passed. She felt uncomforta- 
 ble at this, and passed it again, with no better 
 result. Finally she set it down beside her 
 sister's plate. But Patience was eating cheese 
 with her bread she didn't care for any jam. 
 
 Prudence was a shade more gentle to her
 
 90 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 sister during the week following. She felt that 
 she had taken an advantage of Patience, de- 
 ceived her; and although Prudence was bruising 
 to heal, she was sure that the end justified the 
 means. The consciousness of her own decep- 
 tion softened her. She had decided that when 
 the minister called on Patience she would take 
 no notice of it whatever. She did not wish to 
 irritate her erring sister while she was being 
 wrested from the toils of her besetting sin. 
 
 On the Wednesday afternoon following his 
 visit to Prudence, the minister called on 
 Patience. From a little opening in the blind. 
 Prudence kept watch. The houses were so 
 close together that she could hear their voices, 
 but was able to distinguish only a word now and 
 then. She could see her sister's profile against 
 the lace curtain another mark of her unholy 
 pride and she noticed that her face had grown 
 serious; Patience had stopped crocheting and 
 was leaning back in her chair. The minister 
 sat in the rocker, and she could see him move 
 gently back and forth, swaying the fringed tidy 
 that hung over the back of his chair. She 
 wished he would not rock while he talked to 
 Patience. It seemed to her that it must de- 
 tract somewhat from the seriousness of his 
 words.
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 91 
 
 "I do wonder how she'll take it ? I hope he'll 
 mention the lace curtains an' that long wool one 
 she's got hung up fer a bedroom door. I 
 wonder what poor father 'd say to see her good 
 bedroom door tucked away in the cellar behind 
 the purtater bin, and a curtain hung up in place 
 of it. But she's so sot, Patience is mebbe I'd 
 orter hinted to Brother Jones thet he'd better 
 not mention the pink rose an' the lace curtains 
 the same day. Then there's them two long side 
 curls she pins on most every afternoon I do 
 hope he'll notice 'em. I wonder if she's got 'em 
 on today." The anxious watcher pressed her 
 eyes as close to the crevice as her long nose 
 would permit. "Yes," said she, "she's got 
 on her curls, I do hope he'll notice 'em. 
 There, he's goin' away. I wonder 'f she's 
 insulted him. No, she's smilin' an' he's smilin', 
 too she's took it fust rate. Dear good man! 
 how perlite he is ! He takes off his hat an' bows 
 to 'er, jest the way Elder Brown o' Boston did 
 to me one day. I do hope the conference '11 
 send Brother Jones back here next year," and 
 with her hand on her heart she drew a long, deep 
 sigh.- 
 
 "I b'lieve I'll jest run over to Patience's with 
 one o' my fresh pies I'll jest hand 'er the pie 
 'n' come right home, er she might think I'd
 
 92 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 come over to spy 'round an' ask questions. 
 While she's takin' the pie off'm the tin an' 
 puttin' it on a plate, I'll jest notice if she's been 
 a-cryin'." 
 
 Patience, unaware of the plot to rescue her as 
 a brand from the burning, was unable to fathom 
 her sister's kindness in giving her the pie and 
 the cucumbers. 
 
 On Saturday the minister called again and 
 staid to tea. Prudence took up her post at the 
 window and listened, but the wind was blowing 
 and she could not hear their voices. 
 
 "I s'pose he thinks he kin git a better hold 
 on 'er by bein' sociable like an' stayin' to tea. 
 A'most all women'll stan' more when they're 
 servin' tea over their own table than anywhere 
 lse. I know I would. I know Brother Jones 
 'd hev a powerful influence over me at my own 
 table, if there wa'n't no one else' round to take 
 my mind off." 
 
 So the weeks went by, and the minister con- 
 tinued his calls. One day he called on 
 Prudence, but she had no opportunity to ask 
 him how he was succeeding and if he had any 
 hope of a final rescue, for Patience came with 
 him. 
 
 "What a turrible wrestle the poor man mus' 
 be a-havin' with 'er!" said Prudence to herself
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 93 
 
 as she lighted the lamp and sat down to read. 
 "I do hope he won't give 'er over to Satan." 
 
 Prudence always sat down to read after the 
 supper dishes were washed, and always went 
 directly to sleep with the book in her lap. The 
 result was, she had been all summer reading the 
 first two chapters of the Pilgrim's Progress. 
 She dreamed as she sat there snoring with her 
 mouth open and her lower jaw resting on her 
 breast, that there was some one knocking on 
 the door. She opened the door (in her dream) 
 and saw Patience standing on the steps, all 
 dressed in white from head to foot. On her 
 head she wore a wreath of white roses, and held 
 a bunch of the same kind in her hand ; then she 
 heard some more knocks that were less ethereal 
 than the first, and that caused her to shut her 
 mouth and open her eyes. 
 
 "Some one is a-knockin', I b'lieve," said she, 
 rising, the Pilgrim's Progress with her spectacles 
 inside sliding off her lap to the floor. She 
 cautiously parted the muslin curtains and 
 peeped out. 
 
 "Why, it's Brother Jones. The dear, good 
 man ! he's come to tell me 'bout Patience I do 
 hope Good evenin', Brother Jones, come right 
 in an' set down. I do b'lieve I must 'a' been 
 a-dozin' when you knocked the fus' time did
 
 94 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 you knock the fus' time, Brother Jones, er did 
 I dream it?" 
 
 "I knocked several times, Sister Tolbert, but 
 I felt sure you were at home, because there was 
 such a bright light in the room." 
 
 "Yes, yes, you're quite right, Brother Jones, 
 I'm to home," replied Prudence, in the con- 
 fusion of her sudden awakening. 
 
 "I came over this evening, Sister Tolbert, to 
 talk to you about about ' 
 
 "Yes, about my sister, about Patience, 
 Brother Jones, I do hope you ain't discouraged, 
 I do hope you've won 'er over I ain't ever 
 mentioned the subjick to 'er sence you took up 
 the work I've lef it all to you, Brother Jones, 
 all to your s'perior knowledge an' judgment." 
 
 "I feel, Sister Tolbert " began the minister. 
 
 "Mebbe I'd orter told ye beforehand, Brother 
 Jones, how stubborn Patience is. Our poor, 
 dear father was jes' so. Now Patience is no 
 more like mother an' me than a black sheep's 
 like a white one. I hope you ain't give 'er up, 
 Brother Jones." 
 
 "No sister, I haven't given her up I never 
 give anybody up, but I really feel a little guilty 
 in" 
 
 "Oh, there ain't no call fer ye to feel guilty, 
 dear brother, I'm sure you've done yer best,"
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 95 
 
 hastily interposed Prudence. "How d'ye think 
 it 'ud do to speak about it in class-meetin', an' 
 hev the brothers an' sisters talk to 'er reel 
 ser'ous about it ?" The face of the minister was 
 instantly suffused with an angry blush, but his 
 thorough and persistent schooling in self- 
 control came quickly to his rescue. 
 
 "It would never do, sister, it would never do 
 at all. Your sister is proud spirited, and it 
 would be sure to hurt her very much." 
 
 "But hurtin' is often the only way to cure, 
 Brother Jones, an' Patience is ' 
 
 "Do let me explain to you, Sister Tolbert," 
 spiritedly interrupted the minister, rising to his 
 feet and planting himself squarely in front of 
 her. 
 
 "I do not wish to have my position any 
 longer misunderstood, and especially by you. I 
 feel that I owe it to you, sister, that you of 
 all others, have a right to know." Then there 
 followed an embarrassing silence during which 
 Prudence drew herself up and seemed to freeze 
 stiff in her chair. Her purple lips paled and 
 she drew them in quite out of sight, keeping her 
 black eyes, unrelieved by a single wink, glued 
 to the minister's face. He shifted his position 
 a little, ran his ringers round between his throat 
 and collar, thrust his hands up to his thumbs
 
 96 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 into his trousers pockets, and looked intently 
 at one of the twisted stripes in her rag carpet. 
 There was something in his face that awed her. 
 He was a man of God, and she knew it. 
 
 "Sister Tolbert," he began, "I had fully made 
 up my mind, before you invited me to tea six 
 weeks ago yesterday, to call upon your sister 
 and have a talk with her, not about her apparel, 
 but herself. I have admired Sister Patience 
 ever since I have known her, but I must admit 
 that not until the day she wore the pink rose, 
 which so much offended you, did I become fully 
 conscious of how really pretty and sweet she is. 
 Far better, it appeared to me, to wear the 
 flowers God has made, than the rag ones 
 most women wear. In justice to myself, Sister 
 Tolbert, I must tell you that I have men- 
 tioned to her at different times the sinfulness 
 of of too much vanity, wishing to be true to 
 my calling and your injunction; but to tell the 
 truth, I can find no fault in Patience, Sister 
 Tolbert. I have this evening asked her to be 
 my wife, and I hope and pray that God may 
 make me more nearly worthy of her." 
 
 There was another silence in which the old- 
 fashioned "Seth Thomas" clock ticked louder 
 and more slowly. The minister caught him- 
 self counting the tick-tacks as they mowed
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 97 
 
 down the seconds. He roused himself and 
 spoke. Prudence gave a start as his voice broke 
 the roaring stillness. 
 
 "I hope and trust you will not oppose us, 
 Sister Tolbert. Give me your hand and say 
 you will not mar our happiness by opposition, 
 but that you will give us your prayers and 
 blessing." 
 
 He took her unwilling hand in his. It was 
 cold and stiff. Her sallow face had turned 
 ashen. 
 
 "I can't I can't do it," she gasped at last; 
 "You hev deceived me, Brother Jones, you hev 
 deceived me, an' Patience has deceived me. I 
 can't never fergit it, no, not as long as I live." 
 
 "I'm very sorry, Sister Tolbert, very sorry 
 indeed," and his fine face did not belie his 
 words. 
 
 "I shall pray for you, sister, and I hope that 
 you also will pray for me, and Patience, and 
 that God in his unerring wisdom and goodness 
 may direct us all." He held her hand a moment 
 longer as if waiting for a response. Then he 
 dropped it, bade her good night, and went 
 home. 
 
 Prudence rose and locked the door with a 
 snap before her departing guest had had time 
 to get off the door-step. Then she took some
 
 98 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 nails, went out to the well and nailed up the 
 gate. She hoped that Patience would hear and 
 understand. Patience heard, understood, and 
 smiled. 
 
 Prudence went straight to bed after she had 
 nailed up the gate, giving everything she 
 touched, even the pillows and the log-cabin 
 quilt, spiteful little jerks. She got into bed, 
 turned on her side, closed her eyes, and tried 
 her best to convince herself that she was going 
 directly to sleep it was not her fault if folks 
 would make fools of themselves. She had fully 
 made up her mind that she would never again 
 go into the church while Brother Jones oc- 
 cupied the pulpit. 
 
 "How mad Patience will be to find the gate 
 nailed up ! I wonder if she's got enough water 
 in the house to git breakfus' with." 
 
 The hours wore away, and not until the night 
 began to grow gray in the east did she fall into 
 a little troubled sleep. She dreamed that 
 Patience was dying of thirst, and she awoke 
 sobbing, with the picture of her imagination 
 before her eyes. After a few minutes she got 
 up, dressed herself, and slipped cautiously out 
 the back door, taking the hammer and chisel 
 with her; then with great care to make no noise, 
 she pulled out the nails she had driven into the 
 gate.
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 99 
 
 At no time during the six weeks that followed 
 preceding the date set for the marriage of the 
 minister and Patience, could Prudence be 
 induced to unbend even so much as to speak 
 to the prospective bride, whose marriage she 
 felt to be a crowning injury, and an insult to 
 an elder sister. 
 
 Brother Jones called on Prudence, but she 
 would have nothing to say to him. Her lips 
 seemed eternally sealed. 
 
 Patience wondered why she sat up so late 
 nights. She could see her light sometimes as 
 late as twelve o'clock. Prudence was sewing. 
 She was a good seamstress and took much pride 
 in her fine hemstitching and embroidery. 
 
 "It's not that I 'prove of a woman o' her age 
 an' perfession a-marryin'," she said to herself, as 
 she hemmed away at the dainty ruffle, "but a 
 woman had orter hev good underdose and 
 plenty of 'em on sech 'casions." 
 
 When she had finished the two complete 
 suits, she washed them; but how to get them 
 dry without her sister's knowledge, was a 
 puzzle. It was hard for Prudence to show any 
 slack in the tension of her feelings. 
 
 "If I dry 'em in the house they won't look 
 nohow I'll jest hev ter put 'em on the line ; I'll 
 jest hev to." So she did, hanging sheets over
 
 100 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 
 
 them. She ironed the two suits on Tuesday 
 and the task took her all day; she was so 
 particular about it. At ten o'clock she saw that 
 Patience had gone to bed. She slipped 
 cautiouly out, and went over to her sister's, 
 carrying a long white pasteboard box in her 
 arms; she raised the kitchen window, slid the 
 box through upon the table and went home. 
 Patience found it the next morning when she 
 went into the kitchen. It was the day before 
 the wedding. She knew to whom the box 
 belonged ; she had seen it often Prudence had 
 for years kept bits of laces and ribbons in it. 
 She opened the box, wondering. On the top, 
 pinned to the bosom of one of the nightgowns 
 was a note which read as follows: 
 
 "Dear Sister Patience: 
 
 "You ain't got no mother, so I hev 
 made these things fer you in her place. I hev 
 prayed most all nite fer you an' Brother Jones. 
 Mebbe it's all fer the best, you gettin' married, 
 fer if I should be took away, you wode be alone 
 in this cold world, an' I don't expect to live 
 long. 
 
 "Your Sister, Prudence."
 
 PATIENCE AND PRUDENCE 101 
 
 Patience ran weeping to the door of her 
 sister's kitchen; it was open and Prudence stood 
 at the table pouring out her breakfast coffee. 
 She looked old and worn. Her eyes seemed to 
 have settled back in her head, and there were 
 deep blue circles under them. The women 
 regarded one another a moment in silence, then 
 Patience broke into sobs and threw herself into 
 her sister's arms. 
 
 "I I do don't deserve such a good sister 
 as you be, Prudence, I I don't deserve you." 
 
 Prudence patted her on the back a moment 
 as if she were a child. Then she turned to the 
 stove the water in the teakettle was boiling 
 over. 
 
 "Now, don't be a fool, Patience Tolbert. Set 
 down here an' eat yer breakfus'. I guess you've 
 got enough to do today without cookin'," and 
 as Prudence turned to take the toast from the 
 oven, she furtively whipped away an offending 
 tear from the end of her nose. 
 
 When the minister and his wife returned from 
 their trip to Boston, they found in the parson- 
 age kitchen, among many other substantial 
 wedding gifts, three bottles of sweet pickles and 
 a jar of raspberry jam from Prudence.
 
 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 103
 
 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Mahetabel, come, yer breakfas' is all ready 
 on the table." 
 
 "Mother, I wish you wouldn't call me by that 
 hateful name!" 
 
 A tall, fair young girl in a fresh pink calico 
 and white apron came into the kitchen and 
 seated herself before the one plate on the table. 
 "It makes me wish I'd never had a grand- 
 mother." 
 
 "Well, you won't hev one much longer, child ; 
 Grandma's eighty-four year old tomorrow. 
 What would ye like to hev me call ye? 
 Mahetabel's yer name, an' I don't like to call ye 
 what ain't yer name." 
 
 "Call me Hetty; that's what all the girls at 
 school call me." 
 
 "Well, mebbe the girls to school know more 
 about it than yer mother that named ye," and 
 Mrs. Bryan rolled up the dish towels she had 
 just sprinkled, and set the teakettle on the front 
 part of the stove. 
 
 105
 
 106 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Mother, why don't you eat when I do? Do 
 you know the neighbors are talking about it? 
 Mabel Jones told me yesterday that Retta 
 Campbell told her that her Aunt Jennie said 
 that all that ailed you last summer was that you 
 starved yourself so I could outdress the other 
 girls and take singing lessons. I suppose she's 
 jealous because she can't learn to sing from a 
 regular teacher. The Joneses are as poor as 
 church mice," and Mahetabel tilted her thin 
 nose and gave her head a sneering toss as she 
 spread her toast. 
 
 "She says she's taking lessons from her 
 mother. Humph! Mrs. Jones has about as 
 much music in her voice as an old crow." 
 
 "You shouldn't oughter talk that way, 
 Mahetabel ; the poor woman's had a hard 
 
 "I won't answer you, mother, if you call me 
 Mahetabel," and the smooth forehead gathered 
 into little puckers between the brows. 
 
 "O I forgot, Mahet Hetty. Ye see it's 
 hard fer old folks to change. It'd be pretty 
 hard fer you to turn round all to once an' call 
 me father, now wouldn't it?" 
 
 Hetty did not reply; she was busy thinking. 
 
 "What do you eat, mother, after I've eaten? 
 I never leave anything on the table. Now this 
 morning I've got one piece of cheese, a boiled
 
 TRANSPLANTED 107 
 
 egg, and three pieces of toast, and I shall eat 
 every scrap of it; now what are you going to 
 eat ? It ain't pleasant for me to have the neigh- 
 bors making such remarks." 
 
 "No, Hetty, it ain't pleasant fer ye, I know 
 it ain't. I jest wish they'd 'tend to their own 
 affairs. Now don't you worry a bit about me, 
 Mahetabel Hetty, I mean fer I always 
 manage to have a bite o' something, if it ain't 
 jest what you have. A girl goin' to school 
 studyin' hard needs more t' eat than a body 
 that's stayin' about the house all day. Jennie 
 Mason had no call to say anything. I mind 
 well the time me an' Prudence Tolbert an' 
 Clar'sy went visitin' to her house one day on- 
 expected like, an' everything she had to set 
 before us was dry bread, boiled beets, an' tea, 
 an' it 'pears to me I've got jest as good a right 
 to pinch myself if I want to save a little extry 
 as other folks have." The stick of wood Mrs. 
 Bryan mechanically thrust into the stove 
 crackled and snapped in unison with her 
 feelings. 
 
 The girl was quite convinced, when she rose 
 from the table, tied on her hat and started down 
 the walk toward the gate, that she needed more 
 to eat than her mother, and that her mother 
 had a right to starve herself if she wished.
 
 108 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 Mrs. Bryan watched her daughter from the 
 kitchen window until she could see only the 
 bunch of red poppies in her hat, bobbing up and 
 down over the bright green hedge. Then she 
 turned to the table, set away the cup of sugar 
 and the little print of butter, drained the last 
 drop from the coffee pot into her daughter's 
 cup and stood before the kitchen stove drinking 
 it. Tears filled her eyes and she seemed to 
 swallow a lump with each sip of coffee. When 
 she had finished, she wiped her wet cheeks, 
 set the cup in the sink and began talking to her- 
 self a habit she had when alone. 
 
 "Mahetabel shall not go without things for 
 my fault, not if I can help it. I s'pose I hadn't 
 ought to 'a' done it, but who could let a brother 
 lose his home for two hundred dollars? I 
 couldn't. Why, I thought as much as could be 
 he'd pay it back Dick was always a good boy 
 an awful good boy, but no manager. He 
 knew the interest on that money was all I had 
 to live on, too, except the four dollars a month 
 father left me. Dear me, how comf'table we 
 could be if we had that extry twenty dollars a 
 year as we use' to hev. Mahetabel could have 
 everything she needs. Uncle John told me 
 Dick'd never pay it back, but I felt sure he'd pay
 
 TRANSPLANTED 109 
 
 me; mebbe he can't, poor feller. I guess he 
 would if he could, an' mebbe he don't re'lize how 
 I need it. Guess I'll write to Uncle John an' ask 
 him where Dick is ; I ain't had a letter from him 
 fer purt' nigh a year. I hope he ain't dis- 
 couraged, er sick. Dick's awful easy dis- 
 couraged. Poor Mahetabel! she sha'n't suffer 
 for it, she shall have her white dress trimmed 
 with embroidery jest as I promised her. I 
 dunno how I'll get it, though, unless I sell that 
 Chiny crepe shawl. (Prudence says Mis' Porter 
 wants it.) She shall have enough t' eat too, 
 poor child, she ain't to blame." 
 
 Mahetabel Bryan was seventeen, had always 
 had everything she wished, and had never been 
 allowed to find out from actual experience that 
 she was a "poor child." It never occurred to 
 her that she ought sometimes to help her 
 mother about the work, and she had never been 
 asked to help. Her mother had always been a 
 drudge, her father a farmer, and she the spoiled 
 pet of them both. The best of everything had 
 always been dealt out to the child as if it were 
 her due. 
 
 The neighbors had been greatly touched at 
 the girl's grief, the summer before, when Mrs. 
 Bryan lay very ill. Mahetabel had cried her-
 
 110 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 self into hysteria, moaning not "poor mother, 
 how she is suffering;" but, "what will become 
 of me if mother dies." 
 
 No girl in Pepperton dressed better than 
 Hetty Bryan. Her mother did all her sewing, 
 and spared herself no pains in ruffles, tucks, hand 
 embroideries and flounces. 
 
 Hetty was a handsome girl, tall and slender, 
 with clear, fair complexion, hazel eyes and 
 bright auburn curls that lay in pretty confusion 
 over her back and shoulders. She was a merci- 
 less coquette and was never quite so happy as 
 when wresting from some other girl a devoted 
 lover, and neglect of her studies on account of 
 these intrigues constantly made her fall behind 
 in her classes. She was not a general favorite 
 with the girls of the village, and the secrets con- 
 fided to her were mostly disagreeable things 
 about herself which they had "heard." To all 
 such information she would give her head an 
 independent toss and say she didn't care : this 
 was perfectly true. 
 
 With very young men and boys she was a 
 favorite, for no one could deny her beauty, 
 grace and fascinating manner. She had a 
 dominating spirit, to which most of her 
 associates yielded unconsciously. There was 
 not a boy in the village school who would not
 
 TRANSPLANTED 111 
 
 go out of his way to serve Hetty Bryan just for 
 the pleasure of seeing her smile. She had 
 learned her power early, and had used it to the 
 utmost. She labored under the delusion that 
 all the good things of the world were meant 
 for her. For any other girl to have an admirer 
 she felt to be an affront to her powers of con- 
 quest and at once set herself to work to adjust 
 things. Whether she liked or disliked the 
 young man in question made not the slightest 
 difference in her siege for his affections ; and, 
 to make matters worse, she had never yet failed 
 to accomplish her purpose. She had the rare 
 quality of being able to drop her friends and 
 pick them up according to her whim, without 
 being required to give any account of it. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan sat on a stool in front of the 
 kitchen stove, her elbow on her knee and her 
 forefinger buried in her cheek ; she was deep in 
 thought. 
 
 "Yes, that's jest how it come out. It come 
 over me all in a minute. L,ijy ust to say I was 
 the worst woman he ever see to find out things. 
 Why, I could tell the minute that man came in 
 the house the minute I set eyes on him when 
 he'd been into mischief, an' he was up to enough 
 of it, poor Lijy. "Twa'n't that he acted different ; 
 he didn't; it was jest as if some one had tole
 
 112 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 me, I was that sure of it. He'd explain an' 
 explain an' sometimes I'd pertend I believed 
 him jest to make him feel easy, but I knew all 
 the time I was right. Lijy was too good look- 
 in', there was the trouble, he was too good 
 lookin'. The women somehow always found it 
 out. He had wonderful handsome eyes, Lijy 
 had ; an' Mahetabel's is jest like 'em. 
 
 "When she was little, Mis' Barnes the poet 
 use' to say: 'How much your little daughter 
 favors her father, Mis' Bryan,' an' then she'd 
 pick her up an' hug and kiss her she took 
 pizen the day Lijy an' me was married, but she 
 didn't take enough." There was a cessation 
 in the monologue while Mrs. Bryan poked the 
 fire into an angry blaze. 
 
 "An 5 once when we was down to Hackman's 
 bush to a sugarin' off, she said (Lijy had jest 
 handed her a sasser o' snow) 'Mis' Bryan, I 
 don't see how you can keep your eyes off 'm 
 your husband, there's somethin' so appealin' in 
 his face an' manner.' I told her I could take 
 my eyes off'm him, but I didn't s'pose I'd ort to, 
 an' as to his manner I was glad he had better 
 manners 'n some folks I knew. I jes' thought 
 I'd give her a hint. The hussy! she made me 
 a lot o' trouble while she lived; but she's dead 
 now, poor thing. It worries me a little some-
 
 TRANSPLANTED 113 
 
 times to think they're up there together/' 
 Mrs. Bryan rose and again poked the blazing 
 fire vigorously "but the Lord '11 take care o' 
 my interest, I don't need to worry, the Lord '11 
 take care. Lijy was a good man, an awful good 
 man, but I do hope Mahetabel won't be 
 Dear me, I must make the buttonholes in them 
 piller cases b'fore I f'git it!" 
 
 As she passed through the little sitting-room 
 she stopped before a portrait of her dead hus- 
 band that hung in a large oval frame made of 
 shells. She gazed at it with a look of anxious 
 love, her hands tightly clasped on her breast. 
 
 "I do wonder if they're in the same spear 
 they say they's a good many of 'em. I hope 
 the Lord'll manage some way to put 'em in 
 different spears but laws a me ! I don't need to 
 worry." 
 
 As she settled herself in her low rocker by 
 the window her mind reverted to the gossip of 
 her neighbors. 
 
 "Yes," she repeated, "I know jest precisely 
 how it got out." The sewing and her hands 
 dropped together in her lap. 
 
 "Las' summer, when I was jes' gettin' over 
 my sick spell, Mahetabel, poor child, was clean 
 tuckered out with worryin', so I sent her over 
 to her grandma's to rest up a week, an' when
 
 114 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 there warn't no one here to cook fer but me, I 
 felt so weak an' gone like that I didn't cook 
 much ; I felt as if I'd ruther go without. On the 
 Friday b'fore Mahetabel come home, Em'ly 
 Tucker come over an' insisted on makin' me a 
 cup o' tea. I didn't want her to, 'cause I knew 
 they wa'n't a thing t' eat in that butt'ry but 
 some dry bread and cold potatoes. But she 
 would go, an' in about five minutes she come 
 back in an' said she couldn't make the fire burn ; 
 so she'd go home an' make it on her own stove. 
 I knew very well 'twas b'cause she couldn't find 
 nothin' t' eat, but I didn't let on what could I 
 say? Laws a massy! I was never so mortified 
 in all my life. In about an hour here she comes 
 with a great platter full o' fried chicken, 
 mashed potato, slaw, an' a pot o' tea. I didn't 
 reely know how hungry I was till I got a smell 
 o' that fried chicken. I commenced eatin' 
 ruther mincin' like, for I had told her when she 
 offered to make the tea for me that I hadn't 
 much appetite; but I couldn't hold out long 
 after I'd got a taste, an' I never stopped till I'd 
 et every scrap on that platter. It scart me 
 after I'd finished to think how much I'd et. I 
 was sorry I hadn't left some. Em'ly said she 
 was sorry she hadn't brought more. Em'ly's 
 a good girl, but she will talk an' everybody
 
 TRANSPLANTED 115 
 
 knows it. Yes, that's jest how it got out, an' 
 they've gone an' blamed that poor innocent 
 child. Now let me see." Mrs. Bryan half 
 closed her eyes and gazed out of the window. 
 
 "Em'ly said she'd stop in tomorrow after- 
 noon, on her way down to Burnham's, to look 
 at Mahetabel's pink lawn; she wants to make 
 one like it for Mattie Burnham that's goin' to 
 marry that young Blake feller." Then Mrs. 
 Bryan picked up her work and made two button- 
 holes without speaking a word, during which 
 time she solved a problem and determined upon 
 a line of action. 
 
 It was one o'clock when the pillow cases were 
 finished. Mrs. Bryan went out into the kitchen, 
 and into the buttery. A fresh egg lay in a 
 saucer; she took it in her hand and stroked it 
 thoughtfully. "No, I must use this for the 
 cookies," she said. And laying it back in the 
 saucer, she put on her green slat sunbonnet 
 and walked slowly toward the barn. She was 
 not an old woman, only forty-five ; but she 
 looked older. Her shoulders were bent, her 
 face had a pinched look, and her thin lips had 
 in them no tint of pink. Her sharp shoulder 
 blades showed through her thin brown calico. 
 Her dress was short and she flipped up the hem 
 with her heels as she walked.
 
 116 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 She got down on her knees and looked in the 
 nest under the manger. She thought she saw 
 an egg. She got down flat on her face and ran 
 her arm through between the boards to get it ; 
 but it was only a white feather. Then she 
 climbed up the ladder to the old hay loft, and 
 crawled through the little square hole cut in the 
 floor; but there were no eggs up there. She 
 backed through the hole and down the ladder, 
 feeling her way carefully. 
 
 "I guess I'll go an' fry me a piece o' that nice 
 side pork. That'll be a good deal better fer me 
 than an egg." 
 
 The next morning she was up bright and 
 early. Mahetabel had just seated herself at the 
 breakfast table. 
 
 "Why mother, what made you get breakfast 
 so early? It's half an hour earlier than usual." 
 
 "I know it's a little earlier, but I've got a 
 good deal to do today." Mrs. Bryan was 
 wiping the toast crumbs off the bright kitchen 
 stove. 
 
 "Mother, I wish you'd boil an egg hard an' 
 put in my dinner basket. I wish you'd always 
 put in a hard boiled egg when there ain't any 
 cold meat for my dinner Mother ! did you 
 hear? I said" 
 
 "Yes, Mahetabel, you can have one jes' as
 
 TRANSPLANTED 117 
 
 well as not," and she poured some boiling water 
 from the teakettle into a basin on the stove and 
 dropped the only egg into it. 
 
 "Mother, don't call me Mahetabel. I won't 
 answer when you do. I wish you'd cut another 
 slice o' bread. I want just enough to finish this 
 little piece o' honey." 
 
 "O, my dear child, what shall I do? There 
 ain't another scrap o' bread in the house I'm 
 jest goin' to bake I but let me bake ye a 
 pancake, Mahetabel Hetty I mean. I can have 
 one baked in five minutes." 
 
 "No, I can't wait; I shall have to run now, 
 I've got to go to the store and get a new copy 
 book b'fore school begins." 
 
 Hetty rather enjoyed the discomfiture of her 
 mother, for she thought there was no reason 
 why there should not always be plenty of bread. 
 It was, in her opinion, poor management. She 
 rose pettishly, threw her napkin down in a heap 
 on the table, took the last swallow of her coffee 
 standing beside her chair, then with her full red 
 lips in a pout, she tied on her hat and started 
 to school. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan wiped her eyes as she watched 
 her daughter from the kitchen window. Hetty's 
 thin white apron strings were flapping in the 
 wind, and she had to hold her hat on as she
 
 118 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 turned the corner, "Poor child, she's hungry. 
 She ain't to blame for bein' cross. I'll make a 
 roll or two when I bake the bread an' take it to 
 school for her. I must pitch into the work 
 now; I've got a sight to do this forenoon." 
 
 Mrs. Bryan built a good fire, then put on her 
 sunbonnet and went out to the barn. Two 
 speckled hens moved indifferently out of her 
 path as she walked along. 
 
 "I never see hens with such red combs that 
 didn't lay. I can't 'count fer it nohow. I 
 s'pose the cookies'll look all right, but they 
 won't taste good made without eggs, an' I want 
 her to eat one jes' to show her we don't starve 
 all the time if we be a little short now an' then. 
 O dear ! there ain't an egg in this nest, not one. 
 What shall I do? I guess I'll run over to 
 Prudence's an' see if I can't borrow Oh ! Oh ! 
 Laws a massy, how that hen scart me!" 
 screamed Mrs. Bryan, jumping and shaking her 
 skirts as an equally terrified hen, cackling 
 frantically, flew out from somewhere beneath 
 her petticoats. 
 
 "That hen's got a nest here somewhere," 
 gasped the woman, "she wouldn't make all that 
 fuss fer nothin' ; an' it ain't fur away, nuther. 
 Dear me, how she did scare me !" 
 
 The discovery of two new nests containing
 
 TRANSPLANTED 119 
 
 fifteen eggs was the reward Mrs. Bryan reaped 
 for her search. She carried them in her apron 
 and laid them away with the caressing touch of 
 a miser. 
 
 "Thirteen, an' two left in the nests. They'll 
 lay more, of course. I'll fry one an' eat it. I 
 shall feel more like work. An egg's a good 
 deal better fer me than pork. Salt pork ain't 
 very good anyway, after it's two year old." 
 
 At eleven o'clock the kitchen floor had been 
 scrubbed as white as soap, sand, water and hard 
 work could make it. A hot dried currant pie 
 steamed on the table beside two loaves of 
 bread, some rolls and a pan of cookies. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan's face was very red when she 
 hung up her kitchen apron and sat down a 
 minute to rest. She looked at the things on 
 the table with a smile of satisfaction. "I guess 
 Em'ly '11 be surprised when she sees what's on 
 that table. Starvin', humph! we'll show 'em 
 't we ain't starvin'. I hope the cookies are sweet 
 enough; I didn't dare use any more sugar, for 
 there ain't only a teacupful left for Mahetabel's 
 coffee, an' I can't get any more till the four 
 dollars comes. Dear, I hope I ain't robbed 
 Mahetabel's coffee. If I hadn't found them 
 eggs what would I 'a' done? How good the 
 Lord is to them that has faith. I never got into
 
 120 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 a tight place in my life that I wasn't helped out 
 of it some way onexpected. Well, I must go 
 right off if I git there b'fore school lets out fer 
 noon." 
 
 She brushed back her hair, put on her church 
 dress and bonnet, with its faded spray of purple 
 flowers, and a clean starched white apron. Mrs. 
 Bryan was never seen about the village, except- 
 ing on Sundays, without a clean, white apron, 
 and it was only in compliance with the wishes 
 of Mahetabel (who had observed that no one 
 else wore them) that she had left off wearing 
 them to meeting. As a compromise she wore 
 on Sundays, over her rusty alpaca, an apron 
 of black silk trimmed across the bottom with 
 two rows of black velvet ribbon. 
 
 It was a half mile to the schoolhouse and the 
 roads were very dusty. She hurried along so 
 as to get there before school was dismissed, 
 because she did not wish the scholars to know 
 of her errand, lest they blame Mahetabel. She 
 handed the little parcel containing a warm roll 
 and two cookies to the janitor who stood in 
 the door. She carried a large parcel under her 
 shawl. She had walked fast and drops of sweat 
 were coursing down her face and neck. 
 
 "Jes' han' it to her quiet like, Mr. Jameson, 
 jes' say somebody left it for her ye needn't
 
 TRANSPLANTED 121 
 
 tell who 'twas. Mahetabel wouldn't like it if 
 she knew I'd come so far jes' to " Then, as a 
 bulwark to protect her child, the most innocent 
 of lies sprang to her lips, lending a momentary 
 false dignity "but I was jest goin' by to the 
 postoffice, an' it wa'n't no trouble." 
 
 The janitor took the parcel, searching the 
 face grown old in middle age for traces of the 
 girlish beauty of twenty years before when he 
 had sued in vain for her love. But this is 
 another story. 
 
 "I didn't know you was janitor here, Mr. 
 Jameson." The rest of the sentence "if I had 
 I wouldn't have come" was left unsaid. "Ye 
 see Mahetabel never mentioned it." 
 
 "I jest come over to relieve Henry for a few 
 days, Jane, he's clean done up an' I didn't want 
 to see him lose his job he can't afford to, with 
 his five little children an' a sick wife on his 
 hands. So I swapped places with him for a 
 few days it's easy work round the greenhouse 
 he'll jest have to see to things, I got a man to 
 do all the hard work." 
 
 "It's awful good in ye, Joshua. Mahetabel 
 tol' me Henry was enjoyin' poor health." Jane 
 put her fingers over her mouth and coughed a 
 little, strained, company cough. 
 
 "You're lookin' pretty well, Jane," said
 
 122 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 Joshua, thinking at the moment how old and 
 worn she looked. Jane cleared her throat and 
 colored. 
 
 "I'm in hopes we're goin' to git rain purty 
 soon," he continued, "it's dretful dry, ain't it?" 
 and to relieve his own embarrassment Joshua 
 looked inquiringly up at the sky. Mrs. Bryan 
 looked up too, but there was not a cloud to be 
 seen. 
 
 "I guess I'd better be goin', Joshua; it might 
 rain b'fore I git home." 
 
 "O no, 'twon't, Jane, set down an' rest a spell. 
 You look clean tuckered out." 
 
 "No, thank ye, Joshua, I mus' be goin'." 
 
 Just as Mrs. Bryan turned to go down the 
 steps the doors of the lower rooms burst open 
 and the schoolhouse belched forth a howling, 
 shrieking, scuffling mob of boys, such as can 
 be found nowhere on earth but at the "letting 
 out" of a public school. Just as Mrs. Bryan 
 was about to pass through the gateway, a small 
 piece of brick struck her between the shoulders. 
 There was a snort of laughter followed by a 
 boy's unearthly yell, cut short into a gurgling 
 sound. 
 
 "Don't don't, Joshua, you're a-chokin' of 
 him. You didn't go to do it, did ye sonny? 
 Why it's Teddy Blodgett, poor child."
 
 TRANSPLANTED 123 
 
 "I I I " gasped the boy, with a very red 
 face, for Joshua had him by the collar "I I 
 I" 
 
 "Ye didn't go to do it, did ye, Teddy?" said 
 Mrs. Bryan bending over him in a motherly 
 fashion. 
 
 "Joe Mason t t tol' me " 
 
 "What did ye throw at the lady for, ye little 
 red-headed devil?" questioned Joshua, giving 
 his prisoner a backward jerk. 
 
 "I I I" 
 
 "Stop yer bawlin'," roared Joshua, "an' tell 
 what ye did it for. Ye ain't hurt." 
 
 The boy was yelling with fright, boring with 
 his dirty fists into his wet eyes, and the half 
 masticated bite of apple he had snatched from a 
 little girl was rolling down his wide open 
 mouth over his dirt-glazed coat front. 
 
 "What did ye say about Joe Mason, Ted? 
 He put ye up to it, did he ?" 
 
 "Huh?" questioned the boy looking up into 
 Joshua's face with round eyes that looked like 
 blue buttons. 
 
 "He told ye to do it, did he?" With a hope 
 of being able to fix the blame on some one else 
 by turning state's evidence, the boy immediately 
 ceased crying, and with an affirmative jerk of 
 his head, "Yes, he did, he he tol' me to do it,"
 
 124 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 said the culprit in a jerky voice sticking out his 
 thick lips. "He he's mad at Mis' Bryan 
 'cause Hetty mittened his brother Sam las' Sun- 
 day, an' he tol' me to hit her he he gimme 
 the piece o' brick." 
 
 "I'll tend to Joe Mason, Jane, he's big enough 
 to know better," said Joshua, releasing the boy, 
 who was glad to be free from the big hand at 
 the back of his neck. Teddy lost no time in 
 assuring the crowd of boys that stood about 
 with pocketed hands and interested faces, "that 
 he wasn't afraid of old Josh Jameson, nohow, 
 and that he didn't hurt him a bit ; he didn't dast." 
 The boys turned away in disgust that an affair 
 which at first had promised so much excitement 
 should end so tamely. They went away behind 
 the schoolhouse and discussed it, each boy tell- 
 ing of all the daring things he would have done 
 if he had been in Teddy's place, keeping the 
 while a good sharp lookout on the corner of 
 the schoolhouse lest his courage be put to a 
 test by the sudden appearance of the giant 
 Joshua. 
 
 "I s'pose I must go on down to the postoftke 
 now to bolster up that lie I told," whispered 
 Jane to herself. "Dear me! I hope Joshua 
 didn't hurt the poor little feller." 
 
 "No, there's no letter for you, Mrs. Bryan,
 
 TRANSPLANTED 125 
 
 not that I know of lemme see just wait a 
 minute. Kate ! is there a letter here for Mrs. 
 Jane Bryan? Look careful." 
 
 "O, don't go to so much trouble, Mr. Smith, 
 I I don't s'pose ' 
 
 "O, it's no trouble, Mrs. Bryan, that's what 
 we're here for, to serve the people. Which 
 way did you expect yer letter from, Mrs. Bryan, 
 East or West? Ye see there's a mail in from 
 the East in half an hour, and it might be your 
 letter's on that train; if you're in no particular 
 hurry you can just step right in the office here 
 and take a seat and wait till it comes." 
 
 Mrs. Bryan drummed nervously on the 
 counter with her fingers while the postmaster 
 gazed at her through the little square window. 
 He felt sorry for her, she looked so worried. 
 Mrs. Bryan was tempted to run out of the post- 
 office without another word, but she felt nailed 
 to the floor. She moved about a little that he 
 might not see how she was trembling. 
 
 "I I wa'n't sure I'd git a letter, Mr. Smith," 
 she stammered, picking at the fringe of her 
 shawl, "but I thought there might be one, an' 
 an'" 
 
 "Did you expect your letter from the East, 
 Mrs. Bryan, or from the West?" 
 
 "From from the West, I think," gasped the
 
 126 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 woman in desperation; her tongue was grow- 
 ing stiff in her dry throat. "O dear! mother 
 always ust to say a lie couldn't stan' alone but 
 always had to have two or three of its kind to 
 prop it up," thought Jane as she shifted from 
 one foot to the other. "O, I wish I was out o' 
 here, I had ort to 'a' knowed better." 
 
 "Here 'tis, father, here's Mrs. Bryan's letter. 
 It came from the West five days ago, but no- 
 body's called for it." 
 
 Jane Bryan gasped and put her hand to her 
 throat ; she could not conceal her astonishment. 
 "It's a mistake I guess it ain't fer me, Mr. 
 Smith; it it can't be for me," taking a step 
 backward, "it it can't be." 
 
 "Why, yes 'tis." Mr. Smith adjusted his 
 glasses and held the letter up to a level with his 
 eyes. "Yes 'tis, if your name's Jane Katherine 
 Bryan, it's for you. There's no other Jane 
 Bryan in Pepperton that I know of." Mr. Smith 
 had a way of holding his head very high and 
 looking at people from under his glasses. 
 
 "Yes, that's me." Jane took the letter, thrust 
 it into her pocket and hurried away, feeling as 
 if she had committed a theft. On the second 
 street from the postofifice there was a large 
 white house with green window blinds. It was 
 the largest house in Pepperton. Mrs. Bryan
 
 TRANSPLANTED 127 
 
 walked up the steps of this, to her, palatial home 
 with a feeling of trepidation. A little black-and- 
 tan dog lying on the door-mat barked threaten- 
 ingly as she approached the door, showing his 
 little teeth gleaming white between his black 
 lips. 
 
 "Why come right in, Mrs. Bryan, I hope the 
 dog didn't scare ye. Go 'way, Tipsy; go 'way, 
 you rascal." The dog dropped down resting 
 his head on his fore paws and blinked know- 
 ingly. He did not go away; he knew the 
 command would not be enforced. 
 
 "You look tired, Mrs. Bryan, sit down in this 
 rocker, it's real easy." 
 
 The visitor glanced at the delicate silk 
 upholstery and stood hesitating. 
 
 "I'm afraid that's a little low fer me, Mis' 
 Porter, ye see I'm taller 'n you be," and she 
 seated herself in a still lower chair with a leather 
 cushion. 
 
 "I brought over that black Chiny crepe shawl, 
 Mis' Porter; Prudence Tolbert tol' me you 
 wanted it, an an reely I hain't no use fer it ; 
 it's too good fer the rest o' my things 
 Prudence said you'd give me six dollars fer it, 
 Mis' Porter." 
 
 "Yes, I told Miss Tolbert I'd take the shawl 
 if you wanted to sell it for six dollars."
 
 128 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Yes, I'll take six dollars fer it, Mis' Porter, 
 an' here 'tis ; I brought it over." 
 
 Mrs. Porter moved uneasily, cleared her 
 throat hard and brushed an imaginary speck 
 from her bosom, which enormous bulk was 
 crowded up into a comfortable shelf for her 
 pink double chin. Her heavy blonde hair hung 
 in a loose knot at the nape of her neck. Her 
 voice was low and she had a purring way of 
 drawing out and blending her words which was 
 emphasized when she had anything disagreeable 
 to say. She had beautiful teeth and a chronic 
 smile. Mrs. Bryan sat gazing at her in silent 
 admiration. 
 
 "Really now, Mrs. Bryan, don't you think six 
 dollars a little too much for it?" asked Mrs. 
 Porter with a coaxing tone and a little more 
 smile, exactly as if she were trying to persuade 
 her guest to have another lump of sugar in her 
 tea. 
 
 "I don't need it you see, Mrs. Bryan, it's just 
 a fancy of mine," and she toyed with the gold 
 heart-slide on her watch chain. 
 
 "Well, niebbe 'tis mebbe six dollars is too 
 much, Mis' Porter I dunno but 'tis." 
 
 "What did it cost new, Mrs. Bryan?" 
 
 "Thirty dollars. My mother's brother 
 brought it all the way home from Chiny an'
 
 TRANSPLANTED 129 
 
 give it to mother fer a weddin' present, an' it's 
 never been on the back but jes' three times, 
 and them big embroidery chrysantheums in the 
 corners must 'a' been a sight o' work; but 
 mebbe six dollars is too much the Lord knows 
 I don't want too much," and Mrs. Bryan silently 
 congratulated herself on her narrow escape 
 from the sin of taking more than her just due. 
 "What would you think about right, Mis' 
 Porter?" 
 
 "Well, I should be willing to give five dollars. 
 It's a nice shawl." 
 
 "Very well, you may have it." Mrs. Bryan's 
 knees trembled when she walked down the 
 steps. The rich woman's voice was very 
 musical when she said, "Good afternoon." 
 Then the heavy door slammed. 
 
 With her five dollar bill tied up tightly in 
 a corner of her handkerchief Jane went to the 
 store and bought Mahetabel's white dress with 
 embroidery to trim, and hurried home over the 
 dusty road. 
 
 "O dear, how tired I be ! I'm all of a trimble ; 
 an' how my legs do ache. I hope Em'ly ain't 
 been here ; I'm later 'n I meant to be," said she, 
 as, laying her parcel with her bonnet and shawl 
 on a chair, she sat down to rest. "Now I've 
 
 got this money I can git a little more sugar 
 
 i
 
 130 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 when I hev to; sugar's gone up a cent an' a 
 half." Mrs. Bryan stroked her thin cheeks 
 reflectively. "I b'lieve I'll stop usin' sugar 
 myself; they say it's apt to bring on rheumatiz 
 in ole folks, an' I should hate dretful to git the 
 rheumatiz ; none o' my folks ever hed it. What 
 if Em'ly should come to the front door? dear 
 me, what if she should? She usually comes to 
 the back door. I must make her come in the 
 back way now; how can I manage it?" 
 
 She was silent for a few minutes, then she 
 rose, locked the front door, put the key under 
 the Bible on the table and went out into the 
 kitchen. She felt faint and hungry ; the cookies 
 looked tempting; she took one, went back into 
 the sitting-room and sat down to eat it. 
 
 "I don't like the feelin', somehow, of havin' 
 that key under the Bible." She rose and slipped 
 it under Hetty's old grammar. 
 
 "For massy sakes alive ! I forgot all about 
 that letter! I wonder if it is fer me." She 
 laid her cooky with one bite out of it on the 
 window sill, then opened and read her letter. It 
 was from her Uncle John and contained the 
 news that her brother Dick had sold his home, 
 taken the money and gone, some thought to 
 New Zealand, no one knew where. Uncle John 
 was very sorry for Jane and hoped she would
 
 TRANSPLANTED 131 
 
 not suffer for the want of the money; but he 
 could not refrain from reminding her every now 
 and then that he had told her just how it would 
 be, that Dick was a rascal and always had 
 been. 
 
 "Uncle John always was down on Dick," 
 murmured Jane, "because he don't git around 
 somehow to pay his debts. Dick has allus been 
 in debt an' I guess he allus will be, poor feller ! 
 he don't seem to know how to git along. I 
 thought when I opened the letter that jest as 
 like as not it was from Dick with the money in 
 it. How glad I would 'a' been. Gone to New 
 Zealand !" said Jane, folding the letter slowly, 
 "I guess that mus' be a long ways off. I must 
 ask Hetty where 'tis. I'll write to Uncle John 
 this very week an' tell him I'm gettin' along fust 
 rate without the money, fust rate ; an' I shall tell 
 him 't I ain't a mite afraid but what Dick '11 pay 
 me jes' as quick as he can. If he ever does pay 
 me, I'm goin' to try to buy that crepe shawl 
 back. How I did hate to let it go. I guess I 
 can buy it back Why, yes, Mis' Porter'll let 
 me have it back, I most know she will, she's 
 sech a nice woman, Mis' Porter is. She's dret- 
 ful sympathizin'. She always cries so when she 
 goes to funerals ; jest like one o' the mourners. 
 She never misses goin' to a funeral."
 
 132 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Hello, have ye got comp'ny, or talkin' to 
 yerself as usual?" and Emily Tucker with her 
 fat, freckled face, sandy hair and eyes to match, 
 looked in at the open window. 
 
 "Why, how di do, Em'ly? No, I ain't got no 
 comp'ny, come right in jest step round to the 
 back door, the front door's locked." 
 
 "Why can't ye unlock it? I hate to go past 
 them rose bushes, they tag my dress so." 
 
 "Why the front door's locked an'" Mrs. 
 Bryan bustled about looking eagerly for the 
 key; she felt in her pocket, looked on the mantel 
 and on the floor, "an' I can't that is I don't 
 see the key nowheres, Em'ly. I guess you'll 
 hev to come in the kitchen door." 
 
 Emily thrust her head in at the window. 
 
 "Why, I see it, Jane; it's right under that 
 book on the table." 
 
 Mrs. Bryan lifted up the Bible. 
 
 "No, the other one, with the gingham cover." 
 
 "Why, yes, here 'tis." 
 
 "What ye been buyin', Jane? More clothes 
 for Mahetabel? I'll guarantee it ain't anything 
 for yerself." 
 
 "Oh, I don't go out much," said Mrs. Bryan, 
 flushing, as she turned a low wooden rocker for 
 her visitor, "an' I've been promisin' Mahetabel 
 a new white dress this long while, an' I thought 
 I might as well git it an' be makin' of it."
 
 TRANSPLANTED 133 
 
 ' 'Pears to me you need a new dress yerself, 
 Jane. I was noticin' last Sunday how fady your 
 alpaccy is in front." 
 
 " Tis a little fady in front, but I'm goin' to 
 turn it an' put the back breadths in front." 
 
 "As long as you're going to rip it up you 
 might as well turn it wrong side out. Liza 
 Pepper turned hers and it looks most as good as 
 new." 
 
 "Well, ye see Em'ly" and Mrs. Bryan moved 
 uneasily, resting her cheek on her forefinger 
 "I did turn it three year ago, when Patience 
 Tolbert was married. I fixed it all over new 
 then. It'll look pretty well when I put the 
 back breadths in front." 
 
 "But what about the front width? have ye 
 got enough without that?" 
 
 "O no, it wouldn't be wide enough ; I'm goin' 
 to put that in the back." 
 
 "You like to look well in front, don't ye, 
 Jane? Most folks do. Now I'd ruther dear 
 me, what's that noise, Jane? Some one's 
 comin' up to the kitchen door. Mebbe it's a 
 peddler." 
 
 "Mebbe 'tis, Em'ly, mebbe 'tis." 
 
 Now if Emily Tucker had a weakness it was 
 for peddlers. She loved to look through their 
 trays, and was not satisfied until she had priced 
 and handled every article they contained. To
 
 134 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 her credit let it be said that she never turned 
 one away without buying something. 
 
 "Would you mind goin' to the door, Em'ly, 
 while I set the chairs back an' put away my 
 bunnit and shawl?" 
 
 Em'ly came back with a disappointed look on 
 her face it was only the hens on the door-step. 
 They had tipped over a pail of ashes. 
 
 "I see you've been bakin', Jane. How nice 
 your bread an' cookies do look." 
 
 "Yes, I baked a little this mornin' b'fore I 
 went to the store. Take off yer bunnit, Em'ly, 
 an' I'll make a cup o' tea an' we'll have a bite." 
 
 Emily was in a hurry, she had said so ; but 
 eating was another of her weak points. She 
 never refused an invitation to eat. 
 
 "I reely ought to be goin', Jane," she pro- 
 tested weakly, at the same time laying aside 
 her bonnet, which was trimmed in front with 
 three short black ostrich tips that stubbornly 
 refused either to bend or to curl. 
 
 "It won't take more 'n ten minutes to make 
 some tea, Em'ly; you can be lookin' over 
 Mahetabel's pink dress while I set the table. 
 It's right there in the clothes press." 
 
 Mrs. Bryan set the table with care, putting 
 on her best china and fine napkins. She felt, 
 knowing the weakness of her guest, that she
 
 TRANSPLANTED 135 
 
 was preparing tea for the whole of Pepperton. 
 "Folks shall know we're not starvin', even if we 
 be a little short now and then," said Jane to 
 herself as she opened her last glass of currant 
 jam and drew the tea. 
 
 "How nice your cookies be, Jane. Cookies 
 is most always too sweet fer me, these is jest 
 right," said Emily, as they rose from the table. 
 
 "Here, you take this plate full home with ye, 
 Em'ly," said Jane, pinning a clean napkin 
 around a plate of cookies. 
 
 "O no, Jane, it '11 be robbin' you." 
 
 "Why, no 'twon't, guess I kin make more, 
 can't I ? There's more where these come from. 
 You take 'em right along, Em'ly." 
 
 "Thank ye, Jane; but dear me, I must eat 
 and run like the beggars ! Good-by." 
 
 "Good-by, Em'ly, come over agin, won't ye?" 
 
 "Yes, I will ; you come over real soon, Jane." 
 
 "Yes, I will, good-by." 
 
 Four years had gone by. Mahetabel Bryan 
 was about to be married to Oscar Wadham, the 
 son of the junior member of the firm of 
 "Wade & Wadham" of Glenwood. The father 
 of Oscar, wishing to start his son in business, 
 had promised, after six months' trial, to give 
 him on his wedding-day a half interest in the
 
 136 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 retail grocery store in Pepperton. The result 
 of the half year's trial had been most satis- 
 factory. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan's means were nearly exhausted, 
 but it did not trouble her so much now, for she 
 knew that she alone could live on next to noth- 
 ing ; she was used to it. With her little vegeta- 
 ble garden and her twenty hens she could, she 
 felt sure, keep the wolf from the door. 
 
 Jane had grown much thinner and older. The 
 four years just passed had bent her form and 
 sapped her blood. Her yellow-white hair was 
 combed smoothly back and twisted into a little 
 hard knot. She sat in her low chair by the 
 window, nervously clasping and unclasping her 
 thin ringers. There was a troubled look on her 
 face. Her daughter, grown handsomer, sat 
 before her rocking violently. The chestnut 
 curls were done up now in loose, wavy coils, 
 leaving the smooth, white neck exposed. The 
 beautiful face was disfigured by a frown. 
 
 "I don't see any sense, mother, in your acting 
 so about this old shell of a house and the 
 rubbishy furniture. You gave me the place, and 
 I have a deed of it ; now if Oscar and I are will- 
 ing to give you a room in our new house where 
 you'll be perfectly comfortable, I don't see why 
 you cling to this. It ought to be split up for
 
 TRANSPLANTED 137 
 
 kindling wood, along with all the furniture in 
 it. I hate the old thing." 
 
 "Yes, Hetty, I did give ye the place b'cause 
 I didn't like to have ye go to your husband with 
 empty hands, and, as you say, you have the 
 papers an' can do jest as you please with the 
 old house in spite o' me; but you know I tol' 
 you at the time, that I wanted to keep the house 
 as long as I lived. It's awful good in you an' 
 Oscar, Hetty, to offer me a room in your new 
 house, but somehow I can't tell how 'tis I 
 like the old things best. I shouldn't feel to 
 home with new furniture." A tear trickled 
 down and trembled on the mother's chin, but 
 she wiped it off quickly. Hetty did not see it. 
 
 "Well then, if you won't let it be torn down, 
 it'll have to be moved back between the corner 
 of the fence and the woodshed. Oscar says he 
 won't build here unless the old house can be 
 either torn down or moved back, and if we 
 have to buy elsewhere to build on, it will take 
 so much money for the ground that we shall not 
 be able to have much of a house. If we don't 
 have to pay out for the lots, we can have the 
 nicest house in Pepperton and the best 
 furnished, too, except the Porter's. Think how 
 unreasonable you are, mother; how you want 
 to spoil everything just for a whim. I never
 
 138 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 knew you to be so selfish. Seems to me you 
 don't regard my happiness at all, you just think 
 of yourself." 
 
 Mrs. Bryan was startled; she grasped the 
 arms of her chair and sat up straight. Her thin 
 cheeks flushed and there was a pained look in 
 her face. 
 
 "Why, Hetty, I I didn't know I was selfish, 
 I didn't know it, but mebbe I be the Lord 
 knows. He knows all hearts, Hetty, an' if 
 they's anything selfish in mine, I hope He'll 
 take it all out. I'm glad you tol' me, child, I 
 guess I be selfish. I want you to have a nice 
 home, Hetty, jest the one you've set your heart 
 on, so you an' Oscar can go on an' build yer 
 new house an' move the old one back in the 
 corner; an' I'll live in it jest as I do now an' 
 hev my own things that I'm use' to. I know I 
 couldn't never learn t' eat with silver forks, 
 Hetty, an' they ain't no use in tryinV Then 
 she turned her head and looked out of the 
 window toward the hills. 
 
 "Do you think I could keep the hens, Hetty? 
 Do you think Oscar'd care if I kep' 'em? It 
 wouldn't seem like home to me without the 
 hens." 
 
 "Why of course you can keep the hens, 
 mother, but they'll have to be shut up, an'
 
 TRANSPLANTED 139 
 
 there's too many for that little yard; you'd 
 better sell half of 'em or more." 
 
 "Very well, Hetty, I'll try an' git along with 
 ten. I guess that'll be as many as I can afford 
 to keep b'cause I shall have to buy feed fer 'em 
 if they're shet up." Mrs. Bryan reflected a few 
 moments in uneasy silence while Hetty's mind 
 was delving into the future. 
 
 "Will they hev to be shet up all the time, 
 Hetty?" 
 
 "What, mother, the hens?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Why, of course. Mrs. Porter always keeps 
 hers shut up; you can't have anything of a 
 decent yard with hens running over it. 
 
 "I told Oscar I didn't think you'd be un- 
 reasonable, mother, about moving the house ; 
 it won't look bad at all back there in the corner 
 b'cause it's painted red like the barn, and it'll 
 look just like a part of it." 
 
 "My front door'll come up pretty close to the 
 woodshed, won't it, Hetty?" 
 
 "Yes, but there'll be plenty of room to open 
 the door; Oscar measured it." 
 
 "I can't see the road from the front door can 
 I? nor the hills from the kitchen winder." 
 
 "You can if you go out on the steps, there's 
 nothing in the road to see, anyway ; it's a good
 
 140 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 deal pleasanter looking over towards the 
 grove." 
 
 "No, no, there ain't much to see in the road," 
 hesitatingly replied the mother; "but I always 
 did like to see when folks go by, or when any- 
 body's comin'. I s'pose it's foolish, an' mebbe 
 it's selfish too I dunno but 'tis. I don't need 
 to see the road, an' when I want to, I can go 
 out of doors." There was silence for a few 
 moments, broken only by an occasional rattle 
 of the loose windows. Mrs. Bryan drummed 
 softly on the chair arm with her fingers. She 
 was trying to imagine how it would seem to 
 have the front door face north instead of west ; 
 to look from her favorite window into the barn- 
 yard, and to have no roses to shed their 
 fragrance about her kitchen door. 
 
 "My settin'-room winder'll open on the barn- 
 yard, won't it, Hetty?" To be snatched from 
 her towering castles in the air to the barn-yard, 
 caused a frown to flit over the fair, young face. 
 The mother saw and hastened to dispel it. 
 
 "It'll be comp'ny fer me to watch the hens, 
 an' I can see to 'em better to be right there by 
 'em." She wanted to ask Hetty about the rose 
 bushes, but she was afraid of offending her, and 
 she had become so thoroughly convinced of her
 
 TRANSPLANTED 141 
 
 own innate selfishness, that she had firmly re- 
 solved to root it out at any cost. Consequently, 
 she decided to crucify self by saying nothing 
 about having the rose bushes dug up and trans- 
 planted beside her kitchen door. No doubt, 
 Hetty loved them as well as she, and the place 
 was hers ; she ought to have them if she wanted 
 them, and it would be mean and selfish to ask 
 for them. 
 
 Hetty walked out into the kitchen and seated 
 herself by the window. She wished to visit 
 undisturbed her castles in Spain. 
 
 "I wonder what Lijy 'd think of all this,'* 
 murmured Jane, as she gazed into the blue of 
 the distant hills she had learned to love so well. 
 " 'Pears to me I ain't never missed him so much 
 since he passed over. Poor Lijy! He built 
 this house with his own hands when we was 
 first married, an' he made some o' the furniture 
 too. He made the kitchen table, an' the sink, 
 an' the wash bench, an' the clothes chest, an' 
 he put a new rocker on this very chair I'm a 
 settin' in. It got broke off when we moved. 
 One o' the men 'twas Jake Rice, he's dead 
 now, poor feller set the chair down close to 
 the wagon wheel, when they was unloadin' right 
 in front the door, an' the horses backed a little,
 
 142 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 an' the wheel run right on to that rocker an' 
 broke it square off. 'Twas all the rockin' chair 
 we had." She leaned over to one side and 
 looked at the rocker that had never been 
 painted. The rest of the chair was brown, but 
 on the seat and arms the paint was nearly worn 
 off. The unpainted rocker was longer than the 
 other one. 
 
 "I told Lijy, jest as soon as he'd got it done, 
 that 'twas too long. I remember jest how he 
 looked when I tol' him he hadn't noticed it 
 I can see him yet with the color creepin' over 
 his cheeks, and when I saw how it plagued him, 
 I said, 'Oh, never mind, Lijy, nobody '11 ever 
 notice it ;' an' he said, 'no, nobody '11 ever notice 
 it, Jane,' then he kissed me an' we went out to 
 supper I had supper all ready. We had warm 
 biscuits an' honey that night I remember jest 
 how that honey tasted, an' how Lijy did praise 
 my biscuits. After supper Lijy put away his 
 tools they was all new then an' he was dretful 
 choice of 'em. He hung the saw, bright as a 
 new dollar, up behind the kitchen stove so it 
 wouldn't rust. I remember I thought at the 
 time how smart Lijy was. I never would 'a' 
 thought of hangin' a saw behind a kitchen stove 
 to keep it bright. He hung a coat over it, one
 
 TRANSPLANTED 143 
 
 he didn't wear much, an' when he took down 
 the saw to use it a week or two later, it was red 
 with rust. Neither of us thought of the steam 
 from the teakettle. Young folks has lots to 
 learn when they start a new home. 
 
 "We use' to have a good deal o' comp'ny in 
 them days, an' everybody noticed the new 
 rocker to the chair, an' most everybody spoke 
 about its bein' too long. We admitted that 
 'twas, and Lijy, with a side wink at me, would 
 always say, 'yes, 'tis a leetle too long, but it'll 
 never be noticed,' and they'd all agree with him. 
 
 "After they'd gone home Lijy'd laugh and 
 say to me, sez he, 'Jane, it's easy to lead folks 
 if ye've only got tack.' I don't jest know what 
 tack is, but Lijy did. Dear me, I shall never 
 forgit the day Mahetabel was born, right there 
 in that little bedroom. I never see a man so 
 tickled in all my life as Lijy was. He jest hung 
 over me and kissed me an' kissed " 
 
 "Mother, ain't we going to have any supper 
 to night? It's six o'clock." 
 
 "Why, for massy sakes alive! if I didn't 
 forgit all about your supper, Mahetabel," and 
 Mrs. Bryan bustled about the kitchen putting 
 the teakettle on the cold stove and then spread- 
 ing the table-cloth.
 
 144 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Mother, do you talk all the time when 
 there's no one in the house but yourself? Who 
 do you talk to?" 
 
 "I don't know I'm reely talkin', Mahetabel, 
 it seems as if I jest think out loud. Was I 
 talkin' jes' now?" 
 
 "Yes. You just called me Mahetabel, 
 mother; what made you? I thought you'd for- 
 gotten it." 
 
 "Why ye see Hetty, I was jest thinkin' 
 about when ye was little, an' yer pa was alive, 
 an' you was Mahetabel then." 
 
 "Well, mother!" said Hetty breaking into a 
 merry laugh, "when do you expect that water 
 to boil? You haven't lit the fire." 
 
 "Well, I dew declare!" said Mrs. Bryan 
 striking a match on a griddle. "I dunno what 
 ails me lately; I jest get to thinkin/ and clean 
 forgit where I be." 
 
 Hetty had gained her point ; she could afford 
 to laugh. She sat gazing out of the window 
 without speaking until the teakettle began to 
 hum and sing; she was wandering through her 
 castle halls. Mrs. Bryan was slicing some cold 
 boiled potatoes into some hot melted butter that 
 was sputtering in a frying-pan on the stove. 
 
 "We shall have next to the nicest house in 
 Pepperton, mother, and the very nicest yard.
 
 TRANSPLANTED 145 
 
 We shall have the house built near the corner, 
 so as to have most of the yard on one side, like 
 Judge Brown's house in Glenwood. I'm going 
 to have all those rose bushes dug up and have a 
 design in old hen and chickens in the front yard, 
 and all the rest just smooth green grass like 
 Judge Brown's." A thrill of gladness went 
 through the mother's heart, for which she 
 immediately upbraided herself, choking down 
 an exclamation of delight. She silently 
 ejaculated "Oh, how selfish I be! I won't ask 
 for 'em, I won't unless I find she don't want 
 'em." With her mind on the rose bushes, the 
 rest of Hetty's remark was a little vague. 
 
 "I think you're reel sensible, Hetty, in decid- 
 in' to let the hens and chickens run in the front 
 yard, it makes a place look so much more home- 
 like to see hens about, an' they do love to peck 
 at the green grass. They lay better, too, when 
 they're not shut up. I'm reel glad you've 
 changed yer mind. Now Prudence Tolbert's 
 got thirty hens an' why what be you laughin' 
 at, Hetty? Don't, child, it'll make ye sick. 
 You'll go off into hysterics sure's the world. 
 Your Aunt Clar'sy did once, jest from laughin' ; 
 she couldn't stop when she wanted to." 
 
 Mahetabel wiped her eyes. She rarely gave 
 way to fits of laughter, but the days of
 
 146 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 controversy about moving the house had made 
 her a little nervous ; her mother had never been 
 so stubborn, so unyielding. 
 
 "I'm not going to turn the hens loose in the 
 front yard, mother, they'd spoil everything. 
 You didn't understand. There's a plant called 
 'old hen and chickens.' I'm going to have a 
 figure made of it, some such as we saw in the 
 park at Glenwood. Don't you remember those 
 stars an' anchors an' things?" 
 
 Mrs. Bryan flushed and poked the fire with- 
 out replying; the kitchen stove had always 
 stood a dumb sponsor for all her mistakes and 
 mortifications. 
 
 The long New England winter had melted 
 away under the wooing breath of spring, and 
 Pepperton had blossomed into a bower of 
 lilacs and fruit flowers. The woods were damp 
 with recent rains, and the air was sweet with 
 the odor of violets. 
 
 Mahetabel and her young husband had 
 moved into their new house, which had turned 
 out to be the largest as well as the handsomest 
 in the village. The second story rooms, with 
 the exception of the windows, were unfurnished, 
 as the increased size of the house and numerous
 
 TRANSPLANTED 147 
 
 exterior decorations not counted upon in the 
 original plan had encroached seriously upon 
 the funds set aside for furniture; but with lace 
 curtains and shades at every window the home 
 was complete, to all external appearances. The 
 house was built with two wings and painted 
 white with bright green window blinds and a 
 red brick foundation. Four lightning rods with 
 burnished points, glass balls and gleaming 
 arrows flashed in the sunlight. A gardener 
 from Glenwopd was preparing a mound, where 
 the rose bushes had stood, to be decorated with 
 "old hen and chickens." 
 
 The little red house had been moved into a 
 back corner of the yard. Mrs. Bryan was busy 
 setting out the rose bushes beside her kitchen 
 door. She had just returned after an absence 
 of three days ; her mother had died suddenly "of 
 old age," and she had been to the funeral. 
 While she was away the gardener had dug up 
 the rose bushes and thrown them out back of 
 the barn. 
 
 "I'm afraid they won't live, Em'ly," said Mrs. 
 Bryan, as she patted the dirt down about the 
 roots with her old, brown hands. "Ye see the 
 gard'ner didn't know they was to be trans- 
 planted an' he's cut the roots most all off, then
 
 148 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 they've been layin' out there in the hot sun an r 
 wind till it 'pears like they're mos' dead. I 
 shell give 'em plenty o' water an' mebbe 
 
 "Why didn't Hetty see to it?" and there was 
 an unpleasant ring in Em'ly's voice. Mrs. 
 Bryan noticed it and replied quickly: 
 
 "Oh, Hetty didn't know it; she was busy 
 fixin' her pictures up ; she was dretful sorry. I 
 do hope I can make this yellow one live. It was 
 Lijy's favorite ; he planted it with his own hands 
 when it wa'n't more than three inches long." 
 
 "You can't git your kitchen door open, can 
 you, Jane? The house is too close in the 
 corner. What a shame !" 
 
 "No, I can't open the kitchen door but jest a 
 leetle ways it hits the fence; but I can open 
 the front door ye see, Em'ly; there's plenty 
 o' room t' open the front door," and Mrs. Bryan 
 smiled so radiantly that Emily felt for the 
 moment to chide herself for not having properly 
 appreciated the privilege of being able to open 
 her own front door. 
 
 "Well, I must go, Jane, good-by, I hope yer 
 rose bushes '11 live." 
 
 "Good-by, Em'ly, come over again. How 
 happy that child is with her new house; it 
 jes' tickles me to see her," said Mrs. Bryan as 
 she seated herself on a tilting wooden box that
 
 TRANSPLANTED 149 
 
 served her as a front door-step; the old steps 
 having fallen to pieces when the men pried them 
 up to move the house. "I've seen her at that 
 parlor winder three times today a loopin' up 
 that lace curtain an' there she's at it agin. I do 
 hope it'll last, sometimes it don't;" and Jane's 
 head sank slowly over to one side till her cheek 
 rested on the end of her forefinger. "Oscar's 
 mos' too good lookin' I wish he wa'n't quite 
 so good lookin' Lijy was good lookin', too, 
 poor Lijy. Joshua Jameson was a good, clever 
 feller, but he wa'n't nothin' like so good lookin' 
 as Lijy. 
 
 "Dear me suz, how I wish I could open that 
 kitchen door! I wonder if I couldn't hev a 
 little winder cut in it so I could see the hills. 
 Me 'n' Lijy walked all the way to them hills the 
 fus' Sunday after we was married. I wouldn't 
 b'lieve they was three mile away, but they be. 
 I said I knew 't I c'd walk tew 'em in ten min- 
 utes. Dear me suz ! How Lijy did laugh at 
 me that day ! I kin mos' see him yet." 
 
 The long, hot summer was past and Mrs. 
 Oscar Wadham's beautiful mound, the envy 
 of all Pepperton, lay under a blanket of snow. 
 A thin, lazy column of blue smoke rose from the 
 little red house in the corner, and an uneven
 
 150 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 fringe of icicles hung from the low roof. The 
 old woman sat beside the kitchen stove sewing 
 some braided rags into a floor mat. She was 
 just finishing it off. It was to be a Christmas 
 present for her daughter. 
 
 " 'Tain't anything very nice 'tain't good 
 'nough to put in the house, but she can lay it 
 on the side porch to wipe feet on ; it'll save her 
 new bristle carpet, an' then if they's a good mat 
 to wipe feet on, mebbe she won't hev to keep 
 newspaper spread down in front of all the chairs. 
 A carpet don't look as if 'twas made to walk 
 on that's got bunches o' roses an' vi'lets scat- 
 tered all over it. 
 
 "I dunno what to do about tearin' up this ole 
 red shawl. It'd make sech a pretty stripe to 
 finish off with. It's full o' little holes," and she 
 held it up toward the window and looked at it. 
 "Yes, it's awful full o' little holes, an' the fringe 
 is purt' nigh all wore off. Lijy use' ter like it. 
 Dear me suz! I dunno what to do about it." 
 She held it up to the light again. "It's all full 
 o' holes, an' it'll make sech a pretty finishin' off 
 stripe." She picked up the shears with a deter- 
 mined air, clipped the shawl and tore off a strip, 
 clipped again. But just as she was about to 
 tear off the second strip, the heavy plaster in
 
 TRANSPLANTED 151 
 
 the ceiling, that had been loosened when the 
 house was moved and had hung for weeks in a 
 threatening bulge, fell with a crash, striking 
 the old woman senseless to the floor. 
 
 Two days and nights she lay in an uncon- 
 scious stupor, during which time Mahetabel 
 never left her side, either to eat or sleep. She 
 was heart-broken. 
 
 "You mustn't cry so, Hetty, you'll make yer- 
 self sick." 
 
 "I can't help it, Aunt Em'ly, you don't know. 
 Nobody knows how careless I've been with 
 mother." Mahetabel's eyes were swollen with 
 weeping and loss of sleep. 
 
 "If she gets well" a great sob choked the 
 young woman's utterance "will she get well, 
 Aunt Em'ly? If she gets well, I shall move the 
 old house back just where it was before where 
 the mound is I don't want a mound I don't 
 care how it looks I'll turn the hens loose, too." 
 
 By the doctor's orders, Mahetabel was finally 
 forced to her own room, where she lay moaning 
 in troubled sleep and muttering broken words 
 of self condemnation during the entire night. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan's bed had been moved out into 
 the sitting-room, the bedroom was too small, 
 where she lay facing the kitchen door. Her
 
 152 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 sister, Clarissa Carley, had come to take care 
 of her. It was almost daylight. Clarissa had 
 just blown out the candle and set it away. 
 
 Mrs. Bryan opened her eyes, looked up 
 rationally and whispered ; Clarissa bent low over 
 her. 
 
 "What is it, Jane?" Clarissa was trembling. 
 She hoped her sister would not wake up "out 
 of her head ;" nothing terrified the nervous little 
 woman more than delirium. She thought it a 
 sure sign of approaching death. 
 
 "Sh h h ! don't talk so loud, Clar'sy, you'll 
 wake the baby." 
 
 Clarissa looked puzzled and before she had 
 time to collect her thoughts asked "what baby?" 
 
 Jane gave a little sneer. 
 
 "How silly you be, Clar'sy, why, my baby, of 
 course Mahetabel. She was moanin' all night 
 an' I want ye to let her sleep jest as long as she 
 will. I had a bad dream las' night, Clar'sy, I 
 thought is they anything the matter with me, 
 Clar'sy? My head feels queer; be I sick?" 
 
 "You ain't very well, Jane." 
 
 "I thought I wa'n't, my head feels queer 
 dretful queer." Then she closed her eyes as if 
 she were going to sleep. 
 
 "Clar'sy!" The sister returned to the bed. 
 
 "What is it, Jane?"
 
 TRANSPLANTED 153 
 
 "Is the house turned round?" 
 
 "No, the house's all right, Jane ; see if ye can't 
 sleep a little." Clarissa was anxious to put a 
 stop to the questions. 
 
 "No, Clar'sy, I don't want to sleep. I have 
 sech bad dreams. Every time I go to sleep, I 
 dream the house was washed away by a flood, 
 an' it lodged up in the corner o' the fence so I 
 couldn't open the kitchen door ; but the kitchen 
 door's wide open, ain't it ? I can see right out o' 
 doors. How nice an' green everything looks, 
 an' them yeller roses air all in bloom ain't they?" 
 
 Prudence Tolbert stepped cat-like into the 
 house. She had just run over before breakfast 
 to see how Mrs. Bryan was, and bring a glass of 
 her red currant jelly. Prudence was famous for 
 her jams and jellies. 
 
 "How is she?" whispered Prudence, setting 
 the jelly on the bureau. 
 
 "I think she's dyin'; she's beginnin' to see 
 things ; she says the kitchen door's wide open," 
 and Clarissa wiped her weak eyes. "I think we'd 
 better call Hetty and send for the doctor, don't 
 you, Prudence?" 
 
 Prudence bent over the woman, who seemed 
 in a deep sleep. She listened to her breathing 
 and touched the thin hands with the back of 
 her fingers.
 
 154 TRANSPLANTED 
 
 "Yes, I guess she's dyin', poor thing. Dear 
 me ! Clar'sy, her cap ain't on straight. I'll jes' 
 pull it roun' a leetle mite, careful," and she pro- 
 ceeded to straighten the cap and retie the 
 strings into a neat bow. Prudence was very 
 particular; she had always liked Mrs. Bryan and 
 she couldn't bear to think of her friend appear- 
 ing at the judgment with her cap on crooked. 
 
 "Now I'll slip over quick an' call Hetty. You 
 jes' stay right here by her, Clar'sy." 
 
 The sick woman lay all day and all night in a 
 trance-like sleep. Mahetabel, with a pale, sad 
 face and tearless eyes sat beside her mother, 
 stroking her thin hands and administering the 
 few little comforts she required. There was 
 now no outward show of grief; it had settled 
 down into her woman's heart, and in her sad 
 eyes burned the light of a new-born conscious- 
 ness. 
 
 Just as the golden morning sun had kissed to 
 tears the frost ferns on the little window panes, 
 the dying woman opened her eyes and looked 
 towards the kitchen door. A happy smile 
 spread over her face, the brightest, happiest 
 smile Mahetabel had ever seen her wear. 
 
 "Why, there's Lijy, standin' right in the 
 kitchen door! Leave the door open Ujy, 
 I want to see the hills."
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 155
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 They sat on the green hillside that over- 
 looked their humble home in the valley. The 
 long tree-shadows dappled the noisy brook that 
 swirled swiftly by, over white, mossy stones. 
 
 "How can you sit there and read, Mandy, 
 when there's so much to see and hear that's 
 real that's not made up out of nothing?" 
 Faith lay on the grass, with her folded hands 
 under the back of her head. She was listening, 
 with half closed eyes, to the low music of the 
 brook, the mingled tones of the cow bells down 
 in the valley, and the tinkle of approaching 
 sheep bells. 
 
 "Listen, Mandy, listen," she said. "That's 
 a new cow bell, as sure as the world. Or, 
 mebbe it's a new cow. Do you s'pose 'tis ?" 
 
 "I'm sure I don't know, and I'm sure I don't 
 care if it is. Now you listen to me a minute, 
 Faith, and do try to understand and appreciate 
 these last three verses. I'll read them over 
 twice." And Amanda read and reread the last 
 three stanzas of Tennyson's Brook. 
 
 157
 
 158 TOIvWVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Now, tell me honestly, Faith, can you see no 
 beauty and hear no music in that?" 
 
 "Why," replied the younger sister, pulling up 
 a handful of tender grass, "It's beautiful 
 enough, and I like the sound of it. If I had to 
 stay in the house all the time like Mary Conley, 
 I should like to read such things; it'd be like 
 looking at a picture of outdoors; but I'd a 
 good deal rather be out doors. I just hate that 
 old rag of a book of yours." 
 
 "Faith! I'm astonished. I'm glad no one 
 heard that remark but your sister. It's awful ; 
 I'm ashamed of you." 
 
 "Well, you've never been the same since 
 you've had that book. We don't have a bit of 
 fun any more. You used to play tag with me, 
 and lots of things. Now you read, read, read, 
 all the time, 'most, an' I'm as lonesome as lone- 
 some," Faith sobbed out. "I hate your old 
 book, so I do. I wish it'd git burnt up." 
 Amanda took one of her sister's hands and 
 stroked it. 
 
 "You don't understand, Faithie. I'm a 
 woman now; I'm past seventeen. You couldn't, 
 at least you oughtn't to expect me to enjoy 
 playing tag as I used to. I hunger after learn- 
 ing. I feel as if I shall die if I can't have it. 
 You're a child yet; only fourteen. You can't 
 understand my feelings."
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 159 
 
 Faith felt convicted; she did not understand 
 fully, but her heart yearned towards her sister, 
 and she also felt that she would be willing to 
 endure almost anything if she could understand, 
 and live again in the same world with Amanda. 
 
 "I would suffer any privation to get learning, 
 Faith," pursued Amanda. "I don't care for 
 the work of it. I'd rather die getting education 
 than to live without it; that's the truth." 
 
 "Then you're going to have it, Mandy, that's 
 what you are. I'll see to it myself," declared 
 Faith with vehemence. 
 
 "I want to graduate, Faith, graduate at a 
 high school." Amanda spoke the word 
 "graduate" as if it stood for the very acme of 
 learning, and were not to be mentioned by un- 
 initiated lips above a whisper. 
 
 "Then I should know just about everything 
 that's worth knowing; I could quote poetry by 
 the hour." 
 
 Faith gazed at her sister doubtfully. "Is that 
 what folks go to school an' graduate for? to 
 cote portry?" 
 
 "No, not for that alone. I could earn oceans 
 and oceans of money teaching school if I could 
 graduate. And Faith, when I think how awful 
 poor we are, and that I can never graduate, but 
 must live down there in that little grey shanty
 
 160 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 of a house, and cook, and wash, and scrub, and 
 churn till my life ends, I feel desperate. I don't 
 know but I shall jump into the creek some day 
 an' drown myself. It worries me." 
 
 "Oh, no you won't, Mandy," said Faith in 
 perfect seriousness, "you couldn't ; it ain't deep 
 enough. But if I was you, whenever I begun 
 to feel desprit, I'd put on one o' my old dresses. 
 If you should happen to jump in with your best 
 one on, it would never look starchy again, and 
 it'd most likely always smell of frogs and polly- 
 wogs." 
 
 "You see, Faith, I'm wasting my life. I have 
 a fine mind. Elder Garland said so to Aunt 
 Hannah ; I heard him ; and he said 't would be 
 a pity if I couldn't have a chance. Now, how 
 am I going to get it? There ain't any use in 
 our going to school any longer as we've been 
 going: you a day and I a day. One of us 
 ought to go every day. Now, which of us do 
 you think ought to go, Faith? Aunt Hannah 
 argues that our chances ought to be equal ; 
 that's why I am kept out of school every other 
 day. Now, you don't hunger after learning, 
 do you, Faith? You've never felt like drown- 
 ing yourself on account of it, have you ?" 
 
 Faith gazed at the dimpling water and 
 shook her head.
 
 TOL,UVER'S FOOL, 161 
 
 "You don't care to graduate, do you?" 
 
 Faith fixed her eyes on the hated copy of 
 Tennyson that lay in her sister's lap and frankly 
 admitted that she did not. 
 
 Drawing her lips into a line of determination, 
 she looked up at her sister through the tangled 
 curls of yellow hair that hung over her eyes 
 like the foretop of an unkempt colt. 
 
 "I'll 'range it for you, Mandy. I'll tell Daddy 
 and Aunt Hannah that I don't want to go to 
 school any more ; that I just won't. Then you 
 c'n go every day till you graduate an' can't 
 learn any more. I c'ri go, after you " 
 
 "Do you mean it, Paithie? Do you really 
 think you could do all the work and take care 
 of Wallie, too?" 
 
 "Yes, I can an' I will. If you want to go off 
 an' graduate an' learn how to cote portry, why 
 go. I may have some trouble with Wallie; 
 sometimes he runs .away, you know. But maybe 
 he won't run away any more. Don't you think 
 he's a little mite better than he used to be, 
 Mandy ? Uncle Dick thinks he is. Uncle Dick 
 says he's not half such an idiot as we think him. 
 He's very bright about some things, you know. 
 Say, Mandy! don't you think he's a little mite 
 better than he was? Poor little brother!" 
 
 "No, I think he's worse. Anyway, the foolish 
 K
 
 162 TOLIvIVER'S FOOL 
 
 things he does didn't seem so bad in a little 
 child. He's a big boy now, and people expect 
 more of him. I believe his fits are getting 
 worse, too. He had three last week." 
 
 "No, Mandy, only two." 
 
 "Yes, he had one, an awful one while you 
 were over to Aunt Hannah's." Amanda turned 
 suddenly and faced her sister. "I s'pose you'll 
 think I'm desperately wicked, Faith, but I can't 
 help it. The fact is I almost hate Wallie ; that's 
 the truth. He keeps me from school, and 
 every time any one comes in, he makes me so 
 ashamed. Last Sunday, when Mr. Curtice 
 called, Wallie acted the worst I ever knew him 
 to. I tried to get him to go out and play; I 
 offered him everything; but not a step would 
 he go. He felt in all Mr. Curtice's pockets and 
 turned them wrong side out; then he climbed 
 upon the bureau and crowed like a rooster. I 
 could have cried. He acted better after you 
 came home from meeting." 
 
 "Wallie knows you don't love him, Mandy. 
 Poor brother! It wasn't his fault that mother 
 dropped him. It might 'a' been you or I as 
 well as Wallie. I guess mother's glad we're 
 kind to her poor, little, hurt baby I know she 
 is." 
 
 "You don't know any such thing, Faith. 
 How absurd !"
 
 FOOL 163 
 
 "I tell you I do. I can feel her bending over 
 me sometimes when I'm going to sleep, and 
 sometimes she kisses me. I can feel it as plain 
 as anything. Then when I wash, I don't wash 
 that spot ; I wash all round it. When she kisses 
 me again, I wash off the old kiss and leave the 
 new one ; so I get my face washed all over after 
 awhile." 
 
 "Faith Tolliver ! What a little silly you are !" 
 
 Faith had risen and was wading slowly 
 through the brook. A few flirting minnows 
 nibbled warily at her toes; she watched them, 
 smiling. 
 
 "Come, hurry, Faith. Don't stop to play. It's 
 supper time now, and there comes Daddy. I'll 
 come just the minute I finish reading these last 
 six verses. Come, Faith, hurry, or I sha'n't 
 believe you can do all the work. You can't, 
 either, if you go on playing like a child." 
 
 "Oh, Mandy! Look at the clouds. Pure 
 white snow drifts, and pink ones and gold, 
 Oh, Mandy! Look at that big one; it's all on 
 fire and look at the " 
 
 "Faith ! Are you going to get supper, or 
 shall I have to go?" 
 
 For reply, the little girl stepped upon the 
 bank, shook out her skirts and bounded away, 
 her hair flying.
 
 164 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 Alexander Tolliver, with his wooden leg 
 stretched out before him, sat on the kitchen 
 lounge. His little daughter was obliged to 
 step over the leg as she walked back and forth 
 from the cupboard to the table. 
 
 "Uncle Dick offered to buy her books, did 
 you say, Faithful?" 
 
 "Yes, he offered that a long time ago. He 
 knows Mandy's got a fine mind ; everybody says 
 so." 
 
 "Who said so, Faithful ? Who do you mean 
 by everybody?" asked the old man, laying his 
 newspaper on the lounge beside him. 
 
 "Why Elder Garland said so, for one. Mandy 
 heard him. Everybody knows Mandy's got 
 a head for books an' I ain't got any at all; it's 
 just wasting time for me to go to school. I 
 don't care a mite for portry, an' never shall. 
 Mandy can earn oceans and oceans of money 
 after she gits through graduating, and then 
 she's going to learn me how to talk proper." 
 
 "Daddy's afeard you can't do all the work, 
 Faithful, an' take care o' little brother, too. 
 And brother must have good care. Come here, 
 Wallie, an' set on Daddy's lap." 
 
 "Yes I can do all the work too, Daddy. It'll 
 be easy. I'm stronger than I look." And
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 165 
 
 Faith picked up a pail of water that her father 
 had just brought in, and set it on the other end 
 of the bench, giving him a side glance. 
 
 "You've no idee how strong I be. Just feel 
 o' my arm." 
 
 "Yes, you've got a powerful arm, Faithful, 
 an' no mistake feels 'bout like the leg of a 
 spring chicken." Faith pouted, then laughed, 
 as she sawed off slices of bread, holding the 
 loaf against her breast. 
 
 Amanda came in with her books just as her 
 father and sister were sitting down to supper. 
 
 "So you're reely bent on goin' off to school, 
 be ye, Mandy?" The color in Amanda's 
 cheeks deepened. 
 
 "Why, Faith thinks she can get along with- 
 out me, Daddy, and everybody thinks I ought 
 to go to school." 
 
 "Everybody, eh? Wa'al, but how 'bout 
 Faithful goin' to school? Is she to grow up an' 
 know nothin'?" 
 
 The color in Amanda's cheeks again deep- 
 ened and spread. 
 
 "Faith is younger than I am, Daddy. She 
 can go after I get through." 
 
 "Wa'al, I don't see no objection to that plan, 
 if it suits Faithful, an' I guess it does. You c'n
 
 166 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 go, then, Mandy. I guess we'll git along some 
 way, but we'll miss ye, terrible." The old 
 man's eyes were misty. 
 
 Alexander Tolliver was married late in life 
 to a fair young girl less than half his age. 
 Faith was her living image. The newly mar- 
 ried couple had started in life with very little 
 means. A year or two later the bread win- 
 ner had met with an accident that cost him a 
 leg. Nevertheless, they had rented the little 
 farm in the valley, finally bought it, and 
 the struggle of their life had been to get it paid 
 for. Their second child, Wallace, when about 
 two years old, sprang, in play, from his mother's 
 arms, and, striking his head on an iron fender, 
 received an injury that nearly cost him his life, 
 and from which he had never fully recovered. 
 The young mother died six months later, blam- 
 ing herself to the last for the 'accident which 
 she felt fully convinced had irreparably dimmed 
 the bright intellect of her beautiful little son. 
 
 The crown of Faith's yellow head was buried 
 in the flank of a black cow. She had given 
 Wallie a cup of warm milk, and he was down 
 on his knees trying to drink it like a cat. 
 
 "Get up, Wallie, quick. Somebody's coming. 
 Get up, dear, please."
 
 TOL,LJVER'S FOOL, 167 
 
 "Good evening, Miss Faith." 
 
 "Good evening, Mr. Garland." 
 
 A young man leaned on the barn-yard fence, 
 hat in hand. His face was slightly flushed from 
 rapid walking, and he smiled pleasantly as he 
 wiped his damp forehead. Faith looked up at 
 him through her hair. 
 
 "Won't you come in, Mr. Garland? Daddy'll 
 be back pretty soon, he's just gone a little way 
 after a load of wood. There he comes over the 
 hill, now." 
 
 "No, thank you, Miss Faith. I stopped a 
 moment to speak to you, and to ask if you've 
 heard from Amanda yet." Caleb Garland 
 blushed as he spoke Amanda's name. He was 
 better acquainted with her tHan he was with 
 Faith. 
 
 "Yes, we had a letter from her yesterday. 
 She likes it ; she says she was never so happy in 
 her life." 
 
 "Good! I'm glad she likes it. I felt sure 
 she would, though. I know all about the Hazen 
 School, Miss Faith; I've been through it." 
 
 Faith had set her pail of milk down beside 
 her, and stood facing the young man. She 
 gazed at him with parted lips and fixed eyes. 
 
 "Did you," she stopped to swallow, "gradu- 
 ate, Mr. Garland?"
 
 168 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Yes, Miss Faith. I graduated at the Hazen 
 high school five years ago; before I entered 
 the University." 
 
 If there was a world between these two 
 young persons a moment before, there were 
 two worlds between them now. Faith gazed 
 at the young man as if he were miles away. 
 
 "I s'pose you can cote portry by the hour," 
 said she at last. 
 
 "Do you like poetry, Miss Faith?" 
 
 "No, I hate it." 
 
 "So do I. That is, I'm not so very fond of 
 it; I prefer good prose." 
 
 Both worlds were swept away. 
 
 All of that evening, as Faith hurried about 
 her work, she murmured between snatches of 
 song: "He hates portry, and so do I." 
 
 It was the last week in September. Amanda 
 had been at school three weeks, and she was 
 coming home for the first time to stay over 
 Sunday. Faith had finished her baking, washed 
 the windows and scrubbed the knotty floors of 
 the two rooms down stairs ; now she was sweep- 
 ing the dooryard out as far as the ground was 
 hard and grassless. Wallie, who was now 
 sixteen years of age, had climbed into a tree and
 
 TOLLIVER'S POOL 169 
 
 was shrieking and howling like an enraged wild 
 animal. Faith walked to the tree and looked 
 up. 
 
 "Wallie, won't you come down now? Mandy's 
 coming home by and by. Come down, like a 
 good boy, and put on your shoes and some 
 clean clothes." Faith's voice was soft and plead- 
 ing. The boy sat still with his lips in an 
 obstinate pout. 
 
 "Come, Wallie. Come down and put on 
 some clean clothes and play you're a boy, just 
 for this afternoon, and be sitting in a chair when 
 Mandy comes. It'll surprise her. You shake 
 hands with her when she comes in, and say, 
 'how are you/ just like a boy just like Tommy 
 Blake. If you will, Faithie will give you a warm 
 cooky and a lump of sugar, two cookies and 
 two lumps of sugar," added Faith, clapping her 
 hands in assumed merriment. 
 
 "No, won't. Won't be a boy. Won't be a 
 boy. Won't put clothes on. Wallie's a bad old 
 cat. Cross old cat." And he climbed higher 
 in the tree, clawed at the branches, and howled 
 more viciously than ever. 
 
 The thing that impressed one on seeing 
 Wallie the first time was that his eyes were 
 much too large for his little, pale face. Beauti-
 
 170 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 ful dark eyes they were so like his father's and 
 Amanda's but they were always wavering. He 
 seemed unable to fix them upon anything. 
 
 Mr. Benjamin Curtice had driven Amanda 
 home in his new top buggy. They sat in the 
 "front room" laughing and talking of their 
 common acquaintances in Hazen. 
 
 The day was bright, and as much of the sun- 
 shine as could get in through the little windows, 
 lay in squares on the clean, bare floor. Fresh 
 asparagus hung around the looking-glass, and 
 a tumbler of garden flowers stood on the table. 
 Amanda was giving an account of her first day 
 in school. Faith had hard work to keep her 
 merriment within the bounds of good taste ; she 
 thought it the most amusing experience she 
 had ever heard of. She was proud of her 
 sister's wit, and of her beauty. 
 
 Mr. Curtice, his head bent forward, was also 
 listening, with alternate smiles and laughter. 
 Amanda had a charming way of relating things. 
 They were all laughing gaily when Wallie came 
 in dressed in his best and dragging his old 
 clothes by a suspender. 
 
 The moment the boy discovered there was 
 company, he dropped the clothes and started 
 upon his usual round of exhibitions, beginning
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 171 
 
 with the forage of pockets, which were invaria- 
 bly turned wrong side out. 
 
 Intervention on the part of his sisters only 
 made matters worse. If the pockets contained 
 nothing that happened to please him, the un- 
 fortunate possessor of them was made to suffer 
 accordingly. There was only a card-case, a 
 purse, some toothpicks and a few letters in Mr. 
 Curtice's pockets. Wallie had no desire for 
 such things. He threw them down and walked 
 out of doors with a disgusted look on his face. 
 
 A few minutes later, while Mr. Curtice was 
 leaning forward to look at some pictures in an 
 album that lay on Amanda's lap, Wallie stepped 
 up cautiously from behind them and dropped 
 a hand full of burs inside the young man's 
 collar. 
 
 Amanda burst into tears of shame and vexa- 
 tion. Faith, with dilated nostrils and firmly 
 compressed lips, coaxingly pushed her brother 
 out of doors and played "pig" with him till 
 supper time. 
 
 What with the sobs of the girl by his side, 
 and the sand-burs under his collar, the visitor 
 was greatly distressed. He soothed Amanda 
 as best he could, assuring her that he rather 
 enjoyed the boy's pranks; that children would 
 be children, and he hoped she would not let it
 
 172 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 disturb her in the least. It soon occurred to 
 him, however, that he had agreed to meet a 
 friend at the Corners and must, accordingly, 
 take his leave at once. Amanda started the 
 conversation when she sat down to supper. 
 
 "Aunt Hannah came to see me this week, 
 father, and she among other things, we 
 talked about Wallie." 
 
 "Wa'al, what of it? What did 'mount to?" 
 asked the father, without raising his eyes from 
 his plate. 
 
 "She thinks it is your duty to put him into a 
 home for the weak-minded ; there's one at Well- 
 wood." Faith dropped her knife and fork and 
 looked at her sister with pain in her beautiful 
 eyes. 
 
 "Of course you didn't agree with her, Mandy. 
 I'm surprised at Aunt Hannah." 
 
 "No, not exactly; but I think we ought to 
 try it for a few months or a year, and if we 
 didn't like it we could take him away. What 
 do you say, father? You see it might benefit 
 the child, and he is such a care." 
 
 "Not much to you, Mandy," replied Faith in 
 a strained voice. 
 
 "Now, Faith, don't be foolish and sentimental. 
 We have some rights as young ladies, and I can 
 have no pleasure in home when we have such
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 173 
 
 scenes as we had this afternoon every time any 
 one comes in." 
 
 The old man cleared his throat and bent 
 lower over his plate, but said nothing. 
 
 "Besides, you can't have company, Faith; 
 neither can you go anywhere. You can't go 
 out of sight of the house, and it's not good for 
 you. Aunt Hannah says you'll never amount 
 to anything if you stay here cooped up with 
 that child all the time, with no one to talk to 
 but him. And you know" Faith could remain 
 silent no longer. 
 
 "It don't make one mite of difference to me, 
 Mandy, what Aunt Hannah thinks. Wallie 
 ain't her brother; he's mine; an' I'm going to 
 take care of him just as long as he lives, whether 
 I amount to anything or not. I'm sorry, very 
 sorry, you can't have any pleasure in coming 
 home." Faith's hand shook as she stirred her 
 tea. 
 
 "What do you think, father?" 
 
 "I think just as Faith does, Mandy. Wallie 
 b'longs t'us, an' not t'other folks. There ain't 
 no tellin' how they'd use him down there to that 
 Wellwood home. Mebbe he'd git enough t'eat, 
 an' mebbe he wouldn't; jes' as Faith says." 
 
 Amanda leaned back in her chair, and with 
 an ill-concealed effort to speak calmly, said:
 
 174 TOLIvIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "You think altogether of Wallie, father, and 
 not at all of us girls. Faith'll grow stupid." 
 
 "I won't," protested Faith, spiritedly, her 
 cheeks growing red. 
 
 "It is kinder hard on you girls, that's a fact. 
 I wonder what his mother'd say. I allus 
 wonder what she'd say." 
 
 "I know what she'd say," asserted the younger 
 sister, averting her face to hide her tears, "an' 
 I know what she'd do. If her poor, little, hurt 
 baby was sent away from home to live with 
 folks that didn't love him, she'd go along and 
 take care of him, and that's just what I shall do 
 if he's sent away." 
 
 The discussion ended here. Tolliver's fool, 
 as he was called by the boys in the neighbor- 
 hood, was not sent to the Wellwood Home. 
 
 Three years had gone since Amanda entered 
 the high school. She stood well in her classes, 
 and no scholar gave better promise of a brilliant 
 finish. 
 
 Faith sat under the big tree by the gate, 
 sewing. It was a bright June afternoon, and 
 the bees that swarmed about the blossom-laden 
 rose bush at her back, crawled unmolested over 
 her busy hands, and waded toppling through 
 her yellow hair. There was a sound of wheels 
 and she looked up. A white horse hitched to
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 175 
 
 an old-fashioned buggy was coming up the road. 
 An old woman with short iron grey curls and 
 a martyr expression, sat in the middle of the 
 seat flapping the loose lines. She clucked and 
 chirped alternately, with an occasional "git app, 
 Madge." The old mare showed her apprecia- 
 tion of these attentions by turning her ears back 
 now and again to catch the sound, but this ac- 
 tion had no perceptible effect upon her gait. 
 There seemed to be a tacit understanding be- 
 tween horse and driver that a certain amount of 
 urging should be gone through with as a matter 
 of form. 
 
 Faith walked to the gate and opened it when 
 she saw that her Aunt Hannah was coming in. 
 
 "Makin' white aprons, eh, Faithful? What 
 be ye makin' them on? Why, ain't this the 
 stuff 't yer aunt 'Lis'beth give yer fer a dress, 
 on yer las' birthday?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Why, you don't tell me ! You'd ruther hev 
 aprons than a dress, hey?" 
 
 "They ain't for me ; they're for Mandy. All 
 the girls at school wear white aprons and 
 Mandy hasn't one ; not one, and I don't need a 
 new white dress. I shouldn't wear it if I had it. 
 And what would be the use ? No one ever sees 
 me." 
 
 "Now that's jest what I'm a comin' to. You
 
 176 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 never see nobody, and never will, so long as 
 you're tied up with that poor boy. Now I think, 
 an' everybody thinks, Wallie ought to be sent 
 away to the Wellwood Hum. The continual 
 worrytin' about what might happen to you 
 when you're all 'lone with that boy, is jes' 
 breakin' of me down. 'Tain't nothin' else that's 
 gi'n me this rackin' agony in my left leg ; nothin' 
 else in the wide world; an' the misery in my 
 stummick is gettin' wuss 'n' wuss every day. I 
 feel jes's if I can't stan' it much longer." 
 
 "I'm sorry you feel so, Aunt Hannah, for 
 Wallie is not going to be sent away. We've 
 talked it over, and it's all settled." There was 
 a note in Faith's voice that was convincing, and 
 the subject was discussed no further. 
 
 Hannah Weaver was sixty-eight. She had 
 been, in her mind, tottering on the verge of the 
 grave for thirty years, always growing rapidly 
 worse. She delighted in conversations on dis- 
 eases and death. Nothing displeased her more 
 than to be told that she looked well. She had 
 a particular penchant for new diseases, and 
 especially for those with unpronounceable 
 names. 
 
 When there were no new and aristocratic 
 maladies stalking about, she would reluctantly 
 fall back upon the "misery" in her "stummick" 
 and the agony in her left leg.
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL, 177 
 
 "Wa'al, it ain't fer me to insist on it, Faithful, 
 if you 'n' yer Pa have settled it, an' I ain't goin' 
 tew. I sha'n't last much longer, nohow; I'm 
 failin' dretful fast. I've been thinkin' lately 
 that I'd ort to get everything ready, for there 
 ain't no knowin' " 
 
 "Why I thought you had everything ready, 
 Aunt Hannah. Your shroud's all made, isn't 
 it? And your lace cap, and your long, white 
 stockings, and " 
 
 "Yes, but they's a good many other things to 
 ten' to. I wish you'd see to it, Faithful, after 
 I'm dead an' gone, that there's something about 
 this, on my grave stun." And Hannah spread 
 her hands over as much as she could of her 
 ample bosom. "Not bein' able to find out what 
 the folks died with, robs me of all the pleasure 
 of visitin' graveyards." 
 
 Faith's eyes opened wide. 
 
 "You don't mean about your stomach your 
 misery, Aunt Hannah? You don't want any- 
 thing about that on your grave stone, do you?" 
 
 "Not exactly that. You needn't tell where 
 the pain was. I'd rather have folks stan' at my 
 grave an' wonder than to hev 'em know jest 
 where 'twas. Somethin' like this'd read well, 
 I think. 'She suffered all the pain that human 
 flesh is heir to.' Or, if they ain't room for all
 
 178 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 that, you might put on, just under the name an' 
 date, 'she was a great sufferer.' Or, if you like 
 it better, you might make it read, 'She bore her 
 suff'rin's like a martyr/ or, 'without a murmur/ 
 if you don't like the word 'martyr.' Or, 'she 
 bore 'em without complaint.' That would be 
 best of all, an' it's only five words : 'She/ one ; 
 'bore/ two ; 'them/ three ; 'without/ four ; 'com- 
 plaint/ five." Faith stiffened her lips and did 
 her best to maintain a serious expression. 
 
 "That'd never do, Aunt Hannah. Never do 
 in the world. You'll have to tell what you bore ; 
 folks might think 'twas children, an' you never 
 had any. I'll fix it though ; I'll write a verse for 
 you. I'll run in and get Daddy's pencil an' 
 write it now, so you can take it home with you." 
 Faith came back from the house walking very 
 slowly, and with regular motion. She was 
 evidently stepping off the poetry. Her struggle 
 with the muse had made wrinkles between her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Don't speak to me, Aunt Hannah, and I'd 
 rather you wouldn't even look at me." Hannah 
 turned her eyes towards the meadow and fixed 
 them upon a crow that sat pluming himself on 
 the branch of a dead tree. 
 
 "I've thought of one line already," remarked 
 the poet. "It ends with woe ; misery and woe."
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 179 
 
 The old lady smiled and her face depicted 
 perfect satisfaction with the first line. 
 
 "How does this sound, Aunt Hannah? I 
 think I've got it all in now, an' there's only two 
 lines." And raising her head, Faith read : 
 
 " She has gone from a world of misery and woe, 
 To a place she has always been dying to go." 
 
 "They ain't nothin' in 'bout the pain, Faith- 
 ful," observed Hannah, with a doubtful look. 
 
 "Well, I've got "misery" in it, and that's 
 about the same ; it really means more ; it might 
 be all kinds o' trouble. You couldn't have 
 much more in ; it has to be carved in the stone, 
 you know. It would cost too much." 
 
 "Wa'al, mebbe that'll do jest as 'tis, then. 
 Read it again, slow." 
 
 Faith's head, faintly seconded by the old 
 lady's, beat time to the rhythmic accent of the 
 lines as they were read. 
 
 "Beautiful, Faithful. I hope they'll put that 
 in the 'Argus' after I'm gone: You must see 
 to it. I sh'd think that'd tech anybody that's 
 got any feller feelin's. That portry'll bring out 
 the hankchiffs if anything will. That'll show 
 'em 't I didn't want this wicked world fer my 
 eternal abidin' place. You must go to school 
 some more, Faithful; you reely must."
 
 180 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 The young girl watched her aunt with an 
 abstracted gaze as she drove away. 
 
 "How that buggy top swops over to one 
 side," thought Faith. "I can remember when 
 there was a little square of glass in the back 
 curtain where the hole is, and there was green 
 fringe all around inside; and there was a little 
 looking-glass on the ladies' side, and a foot 
 cushion. I wish Aunt Hannah'd roll up that 
 curtain, and not let it hang out at the back, 
 flapping and swinging like a sheet on a line." 
 With a deep sigh the young girl reseated her- 
 self, picked up her sewing, and looked hard at 
 the point of her needle. 
 
 "I wish I could go to school," she said to her 
 needle. "I believe I will try to go after Mandy 
 comes home. She can take care of Wallie an' 
 Daddy, and let me go, at least a year. Every- 
 body thinks Wallie's better than he was, and I 
 need to go; I'm shamefully ignorant. Caleb 
 said something the other day about the Zulus. 
 I don't even know who they are, where they 
 live, or whether they're men or beasts." 
 
 It was Friday afternoon. Amanda had just 
 come home to stay over Sunday. 
 
 "I'm so glad you've got your dress, Mandy. 
 I don't believe I could have saved enough out
 
 TOLUVER'S POOL 181 
 
 of the butter and egg money in a year to get 
 you a decent one. I've been trying for three 
 months and how much do you think I have? 
 One dollar and twenty-eight cents. Now, that 
 you have your dress, how would it do for me 
 to use this money to get enough goods to make 
 a new waist to my white dress, so I could go to 
 school the day you graduate? Couldn't I? 
 Say, Mandy, couldn't I?" Faith gave her 
 sister a little push. 
 
 "That'll get my gloves," murmured Amanda. 
 She had not heard a word her sister had said 
 beyond the dollar and twenty-eight cents. 
 
 "What, Mandy? The dollar and twenty- 
 eight cents?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Do you have to have gloves, Mandy?" 
 
 "Certainly. All the girls have agreed to 
 wear gloves. You don't want the money for 
 anything, do you, Faith? If you do, I won't 
 take it." 
 
 "Why, no. I saved it for you." 
 
 "I hope I shall be able to get me a white 
 satin belt ribbon, too," continued Amanda. 
 "Maybe you can save enough for that by next 
 June. Do you think you can ? You don't need 
 to use butter for cooking. Miss Fanning uses 
 lard."
 
 182 TOLJJVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Yes, I know I can save enough. How much 
 will it cost?" asked the venturesome Faith. 
 
 "About seventy-five cents. You'd better 
 begin now, Faith, for you know you can't save 
 a cent in the winter." 
 
 "I know it. We ran behind last winter after 
 the heifer went dry. We had to do without 
 butter some of the time, an' when the hens 
 stopped laying, I tell you we were pretty slim 
 some days." Amanda laid her arm loosely 
 about her sister's shoulders. 
 
 "You're a dear girl, Faith. You save up 
 enough money to get me the belt ribbon, and 
 some lace for my neck and sleeves, and when 
 I get to teaching, I'll get you a white China 
 silk just like mine." Faith smiled and looked 
 happy. 
 
 "Wasn't it good of dear old Uncle Dick to 
 get you such a beautiful dress. Just think, 
 Mandy. White silk." Faith gave her head a 
 little jerk and her blue eyes sparkled. 
 
 "Yes, it was good of him, but it would have 
 been better if he had given me enough to make 
 a decent dress." 
 
 "Why, isn't there enough ?" 
 
 "There's not enough for an overskirt, I'm 
 afraid, and I'm dying to have one. All the girls 
 are havingthem. But maybe there'll be enough ; 
 I hope so."
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 183 
 
 "Won't it look nice without one?" 
 
 "It won't be fashionable." 
 
 "But, oh! it will look beautiful, Mandy; it 
 can't help it. Think of white silk. Oh, I wish 
 I could be with you when you graduate, and 
 see you standing up there to read your essay, 
 all dressed in white silk and ribbons. If I could 
 only look at you through some little crack and 
 have nobody see me." 
 
 "I shouldn't like you to do that, Faith, some 
 one would be sure to see you ; then I should die 
 with shame. I wish you had a pretty new dress, 
 dear, even a colored one, and then you could 
 come right in and sit through it all." 
 
 "Oh, I wish I had." And Faith clasped her 
 fingers tightly together in sympathy with the 
 intensity of the wish, then they fell apart and 
 lay limp in her lap. 
 
 "But I can't, and there's no use in even think- 
 ing about it." 
 
 "If you only hadn't taken the lace off your 
 blue gingham to trim handkerchiefs, you might 
 wear that with a new belt ribbon an' some new 
 ribbons for your hair." 
 
 Faith looked up with interest. 
 
 "Don't you think it would do as it is with 
 new ribbons? I could sit away back, you 
 know."
 
 184 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "No, Faith. Without the lace it looks just 
 like a common every-day dress. My class- 
 mates would be sure to find out you were there, 
 and ask to be introduced, and I ' 
 
 "But I wouldn't come near you nor speak to 
 you, and when you got up to read, I wouldn't 
 act a mite interested ; I'd look out of the window 
 as if" 
 
 "It wouldn't do, Faith. The Curtices will 
 all be there ; Ben knows you, and would be sure 
 to point you out to his folks as my sister, and 
 most likely he would wish to introduce you. 
 You couldn't refuse to be introduced; it would 
 be an insult to do so, and I should be ashamed 
 not of you, but of your dress. It would look 
 even worse there among all the pretty fresh new 
 dresses than it does here at home." 
 
 Faith buried her face in her sister's lap and 
 gave way to violent sobs, then she sprang up 
 suddenly with a laugh that was like a burst 
 of sunshine in the midst of an April storm. 
 
 "I know what I can do, Mandy. I can put 
 on Wallie's best clothes and go as a boy. 
 Nobody'd know me then ; I don't believe you'd 
 know me, yourself." 
 
 "Faith Tolliver! Are you losing your 
 senses? What would you do with your hair?" 
 
 "Tuck it under my cap."
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL, 185 
 
 "But you couldn't sit with your cap on. You 
 would be expected to take it off as you entered 
 the room. You'd have to cut your hair off." 
 
 "Well, I'd be willing to cut it off." 
 
 "That would be wicked, Faith ; your hair is so 
 long and beautiful. It would take years to 
 grow as long again." 
 
 "I don't care; I'll do it, if you'll let me. 
 Nobody ever sees me, anyway. Will you let 
 me, Mandy? Say, will you?" 
 
 Amanda was silent for a few moments during 
 which time Faith studied every line of her face. 
 
 "If the exercises were to be in the evening 
 and out of doors, Faith, you might manage to 
 avoid detection, for you do look well in Wallie's 
 clothes; but they are to be in broad daylight 
 and in the schoolhouse ; some one would be 
 sure to know you. Besides, I should be so 
 nervous that I believe it would make me sick. I 
 shouldn't be able to read in a natural voice, and 
 I doubt if I could stand on my legs if I knew you 
 were there in Oh dear! there comes Aunt 
 Hannah. Let's hide so she won't see us, and 
 then maybe she won't come in." Faith turned 
 her head and looked down the road. 
 
 "Oh, no, Mandy, don't let's. She's so good 
 to us. You know she just about half keeps 
 Miss Fanning in butter and eggs so you won't
 
 186 TOL-UVER'S FOOL, 
 
 have to work much for your board and have 
 more time to get your lessons. Don't you 
 think that's very kind?" 
 
 Amanda dropped back into her seat with a 
 sigh. 
 
 "Yes, I know it is, Faith. I suppose I'm un- 
 grateful, but you know how tiresome she is. I 
 can't bear to hear her grunt about her leg. 
 She's always just ready to die." 
 
 "Oh, I don't mind it a bit; I've got used to 
 it; I like to hear her talk. Be good to her 
 Mandy," pleaded Faith, in a low tone, as she 
 rose to open the gate. "Why, certainly," 
 replied the elder sister in a whisper, as she rose 
 to greet her aunt. 
 
 "How do you do, Aunt Hannah ?" said Faith, 
 with a broad smile, as she threw the gate wide 
 open. "You look tired out. You went all the 
 way to Hazen, didn't ye? Come right in and 
 sit down in the shade." 
 
 "Wa'al, I jes' be purt' nigh tuckered out, I 
 kin tell ye ; an' this left leg o' mine, is jest about 
 killin' of me," replied the old lady as she moved 
 along towards the settee at a hobble-and-hop 
 gait. 
 
 "Wouldn't you prefer to go into the house 
 and sit in the rocking-chair?" asked Amanda, 
 trying her best to look pleased.
 
 FOOL 187 
 
 "No, Mandy, I prefer to set here. I don't 
 b'lieve I could git to the house with my left leg 
 to save the hull country." 
 
 "Well, I'm sure no reasonable person would 
 expect you to go without it, aunt, so we will 
 try to content ourselves here. I hope you 
 didn't have to hobble like this when you 
 were in Hazen," remarked Amanda, with an 
 incredulous look and a side glance at her sister, 
 as she arranged a cushion for herself. 
 
 "Lan' sakes, no ! The spell didn't come on 
 till I'd got started hum, an' it's been gettin' wuss 
 every step of the way." Amanda tossed a 
 folded shawl into her aunt's lap. 
 
 "Put this to your back, aunt. That old settee 
 is too hollow to suit me." 
 
 "Thank ye, Mandy. This is more comf'table. 
 I begin to think't my back's goin' to gin out, 
 too, bimeby. Declare I do." 
 
 "Well, really ! I hope not, Aunt Hannah. I 
 don't see how you could get along without your 
 back," and Amanda smiled cynically as she 
 glanced at Faith with half closed eyes. 
 
 "Wa'al,! hope 'tain't nothin' ser'us,but lately, 
 'long about four o'clock in the afternoon, 
 (Amanda leaned her back against a tree and 
 closed her eyes) there's a numb feelin' creeps 
 up and down my spine, followed by a prickly
 
 188 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 sensashin, an' I didn't know but it might be that 
 new disease that Mary Ann Towsley died with. 
 The doctors is all in twitter 'bout it. They 
 dunno what to make on it. Her sickness begun 
 by jes' such a numbness and pricklin's I've got, 
 an' I'm sure I dunrio how soon Why, Ian' 
 sakes alive ! What in this world did I do with 
 that passel." Hannah sprang up briskly enough, 
 shook out her skirts, and started for the gate 
 without a limp. 
 
 "I do wonder if I've gone an' lost that passel 
 out o' the kirrige." 
 
 "Why, you put a parcel on the seat when you 
 got out. Was that the one?" asked Faith, 
 starting toward the gate. 
 
 "Why, yes, there 'tis now. What a scare 
 that did give me ! I thought jest as like as not 
 I'd gone an' lost it on the way hum. Oh 
 dear, oh dear! I shouldn't wonder if this 
 excitement'd start up the misery in my 
 stummick. Bring the passel here, Faithful, it's 
 for you, anyway." 
 
 "For me?" 
 
 "Yes. I see Richard in the city and he tole 
 me he'd bought a dress for Mandy to gradiate 
 in, an' I went and got you one jes' like it. I 
 think sisters had ort to be dressed alike." 
 
 "Oh, Aunt Hannah!" exclaimed Faith,
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 189 
 
 throwing her arms around the old lady's neck. 
 "What made you ? How did you come to think 
 of it? How did you know I was nearly dying 
 to go? Oh, Aunt Hannah! Dear Aunt 
 Hannah! I was never so happy in all my life, 
 that's the truth." 
 
 "Why, Faithful Tolliver! Leggo my neck. 
 You're a shuvin' my bunnit clean ofFm my 
 head, and you're towslin' my hair every which 
 way." 
 
 Faith straightened up, and the sight of her 
 aunt's bonnet hanging on one ear, threw her 
 into a fit of hysterical laughter. 
 
 Amanda rose, .straightened the bonnet and 
 retied the strings. 
 
 "You are very good, Aunt Hannah, and I 
 thank you with Faith. I'm sure she will never 
 forget your kindness." 
 
 "Why, I calc'lated all the while to git her a 
 dress to wear to the gradiatin' ; o' course I did, 
 an' o' course I'd a got you one if Dick hadn't. 
 Dear me suz, how tired I be !" 
 
 "Open the passel, Faithful, and see how you 
 like your dress." 
 
 Faith opened the parcel with flaming cheeks 
 and shaking fingers. 
 
 "Just exactly like mine," exclaimed Amanda, 
 caressing the roll of silk as one would a kitten.
 
 190 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "It's off'm the same piece. It's Chiny silk, an' 
 they say it'll wash an' dew up jes' like a hank- 
 chiff. Well, I mus' go on hum. If I stay out 
 after sundown, I'm sure to git a misery some- 
 wheres er other, an' then I don't git no sleep the 
 hull, endurin' night. If you'll open the gate, 
 Faithful, I'll see if I can manage to git to the 
 kirrige." 
 
 Faith opened the gate, and with the help of 
 both girls, the old lady did manage to get to 
 the "carriage," climb into it and drive way. 
 
 The following winter was the longest, 
 loneliest winter Faith had ever known. The 
 weather had been very dry, with but few of the 
 usual cheery, white storms to break the 
 monotony of the dull cold grey. Only a few 
 of the oldest inhabitants could remember ever 
 having seen such a sombre, monotonous stretch 
 of cold weather. 
 
 "Daddy, Aunt Hannah thinks we're going 
 to have a terrible drouth followed by a famine, 
 and she says she wouldn't be a mite surprised 
 if in another year there would be nothing to be 
 seen in this whole valley but dry bones." The 
 old man gave way to a hearty laugh that 
 brought Wallie in from the back yard.
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 191 
 
 "Don't count too much on what yer Aunt 
 Hannah perdicts, Faithful. Ye know every- 
 thing looks black in her eyes. She'd take 
 delight in a famine, Hannah would. What be 
 you worryin' 'bout a drouth for, Faithful ? You 
 shell hev enough t'eat as long as Daddy lives." 
 
 "I'm not really worrying. Come, supper's 
 ready, Daddy. But I was thinking about the 
 garden. It wouldn't do to plant things yet, 
 would it ? It's too too " 
 
 "Why, law no, child. The frost ain't out o' 
 the ground yet." 
 
 "I'm afraid Mandy can't wait then My, oh ! 
 but that teapot handle's hot She can't wait 
 for the peas to grow. You know I sold three 
 dollars worth last year. But her shoes are 
 about worn out now." There was silence. 
 Alexander was gazing out over the garden. 
 
 "You haven't the money to spare to get her 
 a pair now, have you, Daddy?" 
 
 "A pair of what ?" 
 
 "Shoes. Her's are worn out ; they're not fit 
 to be seen." 
 
 "You'll hev to take enough out o' that money 
 in the clock, if she has to hev 'em. I'm jest 
 about strapped fer money." 
 
 "I don't want to do that, Daddy. You'll
 
 192 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 never in the world get your new leg if we keep 
 taking money out for every little thing. Mandy 
 won't take it. This old leg hurts you, I know it 
 does." 
 
 "Oh, no, Faithful. I don't reely hurt me." 
 "But it's not comfortable," persisted Faith. 
 "No, it ain't very comf'table, but I c'n git 
 along with it a spell yet better'n Mandy c'n go 
 barefoot. I hate the squeak in this old thing 
 the wust of anything," declared the old man, as 
 he picked up his hat and went out, the old leg 
 sending forth an unmusical little squeak at each 
 step. 
 
 It was the middle of June. 
 
 Faith sat under the tree by the gate with her 
 back to the roses. She was engaged in sewing 
 lace around the edge of a handkerchief. It was 
 for Amanda's birthday. Now and then she 
 raised her head and looked down the road. 
 There was a wistful look in her eyes, and a 
 little droop at the corners of her mouth, but, 
 if she felt any anxiety, it was as yet so little 
 that she was not aware of it. . Suddenly a 
 deep flush swept over her face, but she did 
 not move. A tall young man with a dark 
 pleasant face stood still at the gate watching 
 her.
 
 TOLIvIVER'S FOOL 193 
 
 "I wonder what she's thinking of," he 
 mentally queried. "Too bad to break in upon 
 her thoughts." 
 
 "Oh, I know you are there, Caleb Garland. 
 I saw you. You might as well come in." 
 
 "Saw me," repeated the young man in- 
 credulously, as he lightly vaulted over the gate 
 and walked towards her. "I don't see how you 
 could: you didn't turn your head." Faith 
 laughed merrily and her eyes danced with 
 mischief. 
 
 "Why, I looked at you through my hair, out 
 of a corner of my eye ; this way :" and she acted 
 the part to show him the way she had done it. 
 Caleb, with eyes full of admiration looked down 
 at her, smiling. 
 
 "Encore ! Encore !" he cried, laughing. "Oh, 
 do it again, Faith, please do it again. It's the 
 best I ever saw." 
 
 Faith's cheeks turned almost as red as the 
 roses that hung 'over her shoulders. 
 
 "I sha'n't do any such thing. You're mak- 
 ing fun o' me. I can tell when folks make fun 
 of me," and she immediately became intensely 
 interested in her sewing. Her curved lips were 
 drawn into a straight line, but she had hard 
 work to keep the ends of the line from turning 
 upwards. Caleb threw himself down upon the 
 
 M
 
 194 TOLJyIVER'S FOOL, 
 
 grass in front of her, ran his fingers through his 
 hair, then raising his eyes to her face, resumed 
 his study of mock dignity. 
 
 "You can, can you?" 
 
 She made no reply, but there was a slight 
 dilation of the nostrils and her lips tightened a 
 little. 
 
 "Your intuition is remarkable, Faith. You 
 are a born actress." 
 
 The ends of the straight line got a good start 
 upwards, but were brought back with a jerk. 
 
 "Are you going to the commencement exer- 
 cises, Faith?" Offended dignity took instant 
 flight, and Faith's eyes sparkled with animation. 
 
 "Yes, I'm going. Are you?" 
 
 "Yes, if nothing happens to prevent." 
 
 "I meant that, too. If nothing happens to 
 prevent. I hope it won't rain. If it should 
 rain, I believe I sh'd die with disappointment. 
 Oh, no, I shouldn't" she hastily added, "but I 
 believe it'd break my heart. I've been looking 
 forward to it for four years, you know. Do 
 you believe that hearts ever really break, 
 Caleb?" 
 
 "Yes, I can think of something that I believe 
 would break my heart." 
 
 "But not about this?" 
 
 "No, not about this."
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 195 
 
 "You'd go right on living, though, wouldn't 
 you. Aunt Hannah does and her heart's been 
 broken seven times." 
 
 "Yes, I suppose I should, but I shouldn't 
 want to. I would much rather die." 
 
 "I hope you'll never be so disappointed as 
 all that," said Faith, with a glance of sympathy 
 into the upturned face. 
 
 "Would you pity me, Faith, if I were ? would 
 you be sorry for me?" 
 
 "Why, of course, but that wouldn't help you 
 any." Faith scowled a little, as she examined 
 the point of her needle. 
 
 "It would if you pitied me hard enough to 
 to" 
 
 "Oh! oh dear, how that hurts!" Faith 
 grasped her left thumb and looked at the nail, 
 her face drawn with pain. 
 
 "Why, what did you do ? Stick your finger?" 
 
 "No. I ran the needle away under my thumb 
 nail. Oh ! how it hurts !" 
 
 "Pound it for about half a minute as hard as 
 you can stand, with the scissors or something 
 here, my knife handle will do, and it'll take out 
 every bit of soreness. I've seen mother do it 
 hundreds of times. Here. Put your thumb 
 down on the seat, nail upwards, and I'll pound 
 it for you."
 
 196 TOLLIVER'S FOOL, 
 
 "No, thank you, I prefer to pound it myself. 
 You couldn't tell how much I could stand, could 
 you?" 
 
 "I could tell nearly." 
 
 "I can tell exactly." The young man watched 
 her face as she pounded away at the injured 
 thumb. 
 
 "Let me see," said he musingly. "Today is 
 is Wednesday. Is'n't it, Faith?" 
 
 Faith's lips tightened a little, but she was not 
 aware of it. She pounded her thumb so hard 
 that blood rushed to her cheeks. 
 
 "And tomorrow is Thursday," pursued the 
 young man, unaware that he was voicing his 
 calculation." 
 
 "Yes," interrupted Faith, handing him the 
 knife. "Tomorrow is Thursday, and the next 
 day is Friday. Thursday always comes after 
 Wednesday." 
 
 "Is is " 
 
 "No, she isn't coming this week. She is 
 next, though." 
 
 "How did you know what I was going to 
 ask ? Are you a mind-reader ?" 
 
 "Because you always ask that question." 
 
 "Do I?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Always?"
 
 FOOL 197 
 
 "Yes, always." 
 
 "Strange, isn't it?" 
 
 "No, I don't think that it is. I talk about the 
 things I think about, and I suppose other folks 
 do." 
 
 "Other folks don't," was the quick retort, 
 "they talk of everything else first ; at least some 
 folks do." 
 
 "Daddy has come. I must go in now and 
 get supper." Faith folded her work with 
 nervous haste. She did not know why, but a 
 vague feeling of alarm possessed her. 
 
 "That means," said the young man, striking 
 a crease in the crown of his soft hat, "Caleb 
 Garland, will you be good enough to go home?" 
 Faith laughed constrainedly. 
 
 Caleb had risen and was looking down at her. 
 
 "How pretty those red roses look behind 
 you, Faith," He meant, "how pretty you look 
 with those red roses behind you," but he hadn't 
 the courage to say it. 
 
 Caleb Garland was studying for the ministry 
 under the tutelage of his uncle, the Rev. Elisha 
 Garland, whose home was in Hazen. Caleb 
 lived with his parents on a small but valuable 
 fruit farm, situated on a bend of the Wellwood 
 river, three quarters of a mile from the Tolli- 
 vers, where they had recently taken up their
 
 198 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 residence. Two days of each week, Monday 
 and Wednesday, Caleb spent in study and 
 recitation with his uncle in Hazen. On his way 
 home, he was wont to loiter at the Tolliver 
 gate, under the big tree where he loved to 
 spend the hour between four and five in rest 
 and conversation with Faith. 
 
 That Caleb was in love with Amanda, Faith 
 had no doubt. That Amanda was in love with 
 Benjamin Curtice, she felt certain, and to her 
 dismay it had suddenly dawned upon her that 
 her own heart was fast getting beyond her con- 
 trol. Her cheeks burned with shame at the 
 thought, and she bravely resolved to crush her 
 love at any cost to herself. So she at once 
 began a process of self torture, than which no 
 better fertilizer for love is known, and the next 
 time Caleb Garland called at the Tolliver gate, 
 Faith was not to be seen. He took a seat under 
 the tree and waited; looking now and then 
 towards the house. Faith was busying herself 
 about the kitchen. She saw him come in at 
 the gate and seat himself under the tree, but she 
 would not allow herself the pleasure of a second 
 view of him. Something suggested to her that 
 she could easily look at him through the vines 
 that covered the kitchen window, without being 
 seen, but she refused herself even this meagre
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 199 
 
 pleasure. When at last she heard the gate 
 creak and swing shut, she sprang to the 
 window. He was just turning away and she 
 saw that there was disappointment in his face. 
 "I suppose," thought Faith, as she turned 
 sadly from the window, "That he enjoys talk- 
 ing with me because I'm Mandy's sister. I 
 understand some things now better than I did. 
 I know now why I kept that piece of paper that 
 he wrote my name on and the button off his 
 vest, and why I have taken to studying Mandy's 
 old books. Oh, yes, I know all about it now. 
 I was just going to be in love with him, and I'm 
 glad I found it out in in time." There was a 
 protesting throb of pain in her heart, but with 
 her head held high and her lips compressed she 
 began a search for hard work; it was not yet 
 time to get supper. She put on the kettle and 
 began mixing dyes to color the stocking yarn. 
 She usually had the winter stockings well under 
 way before June, but this year she had been 
 dilatory; she had preferred sitting under the 
 trees sewing lace on handkerchiefs to knitting 
 coarse socks. 
 
 When the liquid in the kettle was ready for 
 use, instead of using a stick to stir the yarn as 
 had always been their custom, she plunged her 
 hands into the dye, taking pains to color her
 
 200 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 wrists and arms as much as possible. She took 
 a morbid pleasure in it. She was thinking at 
 the time how white and delicate Amanda's 
 hands had grown, and also, that she would show 
 Caleb she didn't care how her own hands 
 looked, and she hoped that it would also serve 
 to convince him, in case he had any doubt about 
 it, that she cared nothing for him or for his 
 opinion. There was nothing for her to do, 
 anyway, but to stay at home and take care of 
 Wallie as long as she lived. Even if Caleb 
 loved her instead of her sister, she could ne.ver 
 marry him; so it was best as it was, and she 
 plunged her fair arms still deeper into the 
 purple dye. 
 
 The following afternoon, while on his way to 
 the Corners, Caleb halted at the Tolliver gate. 
 He could see a yellow head moving about over 
 the tops of the bushes. Faith thought she 
 looked very ugly with her curls twisted into a 
 knot and stuck through with a knitting-needle, 
 but she had never made a greater mistake. 
 Knowing that it was his time for study, she 
 was not looking for a call from her young man 
 friend at this hour. 
 
 She was hanging the dyed yarn on the garden 
 fence to dry when he walked up to the gate, and 
 she was just stooping to take another skein
 
 FOOL 201 
 
 from the basket when he stepped through the 
 bushes and stood beside her. Faith, a little 
 startled, straightened up, and a rich color swept 
 over her face. 
 
 "Why, Caleb Garland ! How did you get in 
 without squeaking the gate ?" she demanded. 
 
 "I jumped over it. Didn't you see me 
 coming?" 
 
 "No. How did you why, I thought don't 
 you have to get your lessons?" she stammered 
 out, shaking a skein of the wet yarn into a 
 tangle in a vain endeavor to hide her nervous- 
 ness. 
 
 "Yes, but I'm going to the Corners on an 
 errand. I saw you out here and I thought 
 I'd stop a minute, just to speak to you 
 and" 
 
 "Well, you see I'm very busy," she inter- 
 rupted, and shaking out another skein of yarn 
 she turned her back to him and spread it on 
 the fence. "I shall be busy all day, too," she 
 continued, "because Mandy's coming home to- 
 morrow; she changed her mind." Faith, turn- 
 ing, glanced into Caleb's face to note the 
 expected glow of pleasure, but there was no 
 sign of pleasure in his face; his lips paled 
 slightly and a pained look came into the dark, 
 expressive eyes but he drew himself up proudly.
 
 202 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "I'm sorry I troubled you, Faith. I beg your 
 pardon. I can take a hint, and I shall also 
 take my leave." He stood a moment with his 
 hat in his hand as if waiting for her to speak. 
 Faith wished to say something; to offer an 
 apology for her rudeness, but instead of doing 
 so, she shook out another skein of yarn and 
 hung it on the fence. She wondered why she 
 did it. She made up her mind, as she patted 
 and spread out the yarn, that she would ask his 
 pardon, but when she turned to do so, he had 
 gone. She leaned her forehead against a tree 
 and sobbed aloud, in an abandonment of grief. 
 
 "Oh, how my heart aches !" she moaned. "It 
 seems as if it would kill me, and I almost wish 
 it would." Her hands suddenly dropped from 
 her face over which crept an expression of per- 
 plexity and wonder. 
 
 "Yes, that's it; I understand it now; my heart 
 is breaking. That's why it pains me so. My 
 heart is breaking. Oh, how it hurts! If 
 Caleb feels like this about Mandy, I do pity 
 him. I wish I hadn't been cross to him." 
 
 It was Friday afternoon. Amanda had just 
 come home, and was seated at the kitchen 
 window. 
 
 "How nice and clean everything looks, Faith, 
 and you've got all the yarn dyed, too, hav'n't
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 203 
 
 you? But, Faith, for mercy's sake, don't ever 
 again put your hands into the dye; there's no 
 need of it. It makes you look a fright." 
 
 "Oh, I don't care; nobody ever sees me." 
 
 "Why, yes they do, too. Aunt Hannah said 
 that Caleb Garland came often to see you, and 
 I tell you, Faith Tolliver, there are few girls 
 who wouldn't be glad to see him coming any 
 day. He's handsome, well educated, has good 
 connections, good habits, and is well off. What 
 more could a girl ask ?" 
 
 "It's no such thing; he don't come to see 
 me !" replied Faith, with a flush of indignation. 
 "He just stops to rest a few minutes at the gate. 
 He's never been in the house once." 
 
 "Of course he wouldn't go into the house 
 when you're alone. It wouldn't be proper. 
 Certainly he comes to see you. There's no one 
 else here." 
 
 "I tell you he does not," cried Faith, 
 snappishly. "He comes to rest and ask about 
 you. He always asks when you're coming 
 home, and and lots of things about you." 
 
 "Does he?" asked Amanda, flushing with 
 pleasure, and, turning her head, she glanced at 
 herself in the glass. 
 
 Amanda and Faith walked out under the tree 
 by the gate.
 
 204 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "What time did you say he usually passes 
 Faith? or, rather, doesn't pass." 
 
 "About four o'clock, but this is Friday; he 
 doesn't go to Hazen on Fridays. I presume 
 he'll call though, because I told him you were 
 coming home." 
 
 "I do hope, Faith, that you can get that color 
 off before the graduating exercises, it looks, oh, 
 it looks" 
 
 "Oh, yes, long before. It's two weeks yet." 
 
 "I don't see what in the world possessed you 
 to put your hands into the dye, anyway; there 
 was no necessity for it." 
 
 "Oh, I felt kind of desprit that day;- 1 didn't 
 care." 
 
 "Desperate? You, desperate! Faith Tolli- 
 ver! What in the world made you desperate? 
 I didn't suppose anything could make you 
 
 "There, I told you, didn't I? interrupted 
 Faith, glad to divert attention from herself. 
 
 "Told me what?" 
 
 "That Caleb would come. There he is 
 coming towards the gate. Now be decent to 
 him, Mandy." 
 
 " 'Be decent to him !' What an insinuation ! 
 Of course I shall. Did you ever know me to 
 be otherwise? How do you do, Caleb. 
 Aren't you coming in?" asked Amanda with 
 one of her sweetest smiles. Amanda's smile
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 205 
 
 was the admiration and envy of her friends and 
 foes. 
 
 "Well, I don't know," replied the young 
 man, halting outside the gate, then, as if limited 
 for time, he looked at his watch, and gave a 
 quick glance at Faith, saying: 
 
 "You look very comfortable there in the 
 shade." 
 
 Faith felt that she ought to add a word as 
 their last parting had been rather strained, but 
 she was afraid of saying too much. 
 
 "We are comfortable," she ventured at last, 
 "but don't you think we look rather lonesome ?" 
 
 With a grateful smile for reply, he opened 
 the gate and stepped through. 
 
 "Don't disturb yourselves, girls, this is my 
 favorite place isn't it, Faith?" and Caleb threw 
 himself upon the grass and leaned his head 
 against a tree. Faith flushed and looked down 
 at her purple hands that lay idle in her lap. She 
 felt an impulse to cover them with her apron, 
 but she immediately decided that to do so 
 would look as if she cared. 
 
 While these thoughts were passing in her 
 mind, Amanda and Caleb became engaged 
 in conversation. Amanda had just expressed 
 herself as being shocked to hear that one of her 
 schoolmates was going to be married soon after 
 graduating.
 
 206 TOLLIVER'S FOOL, 
 
 "I don't see why you are shocked because a 
 girl is going to get married after she gradu- 
 ates," observed Caleb, with a languid air. "All 
 girls get married, don't they ? Minnie Severs is 
 also going to be married after she graduates. 
 It seems to be the fashion." 
 
 "Yes, it does," replied Amanda, "but Minnie 
 is old enough to get married; she's about my 
 age ; but Mabel is a child ; she's just the age of 
 Faith. Fancy Faith getting married!" Both 
 turned their eyes upon Faith, who sat a little 
 apart with her back to the rose bush. She raised 
 her eyes for a moment and looked from the one 
 to the other in silence. 
 
 "Faith shall not think of marrying for five 
 years yet, if I have anything to say about it," 
 continued Amanda. 
 
 "You're wasting your time in discussing me," 
 declared Faith, with more warmth than she 
 wished to show, "for I'm never going to be 
 married." 
 
 "What, never?" asked her sister, elevating 
 her eyebrows. 
 
 "No, never! Never as long as I live." Caleb 
 gave her a penetrating look and her glance fell. 
 
 "Don't talk so foolishly, Faith. Of course 
 you'll marry when you're old enough," urged 
 Amanda.
 
 TOLIvIVER'S FOOL 207 
 
 "I tell you I never will. It's the fashion for 
 girls to graduate and then marry," retorted 
 Faith, hotly. "You just said so. My mind is 
 made up about marrying, and I shan't change 
 it to please you or anyone else. It isn't likely 
 that I shall ever get a chance, but I shall not 
 marry if I do." Caleb saw, as she glanced up 
 with a flash of her eyes, that they were glassy 
 with tears, and that her lips were tremulous. He 
 adroitly turned the conversation, the while 
 wondering what could be the cause of the sud- 
 den change in her manner, and if by word or 
 look she had discovered his secret and wished 
 to forwarn him. 
 
 "Speaking of marriage," observed Caleb, "re- 
 minds me. Prof. Gordon is engaged to Cora 
 Brainard. He is the manager of the 'Argus,' 
 you know." 
 
 "That old man!" ejaculated Amanda, with a 
 toss of her young head. 
 
 "I suppose they would like to be alone," 
 thought Faith, as she rose from her seat and 
 started towards the house. Amanda's eyes, 
 with a dreamy expression, followed her sister as 
 she walked away. 
 
 "Faith is a dear girl. I can't imagine what 
 made her so cross just now. Doesn't her hair 
 look pretty in the sun?"
 
 208 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 "She doesn't mean all she says, does she?" 
 There was appeal in the young man's eyes as 
 he raised them to Amanda's face. 
 
 "Yes, I think she means it. Faith never says 
 what she doesn't mean. I hope she'll change 
 her mind, though." 
 
 "Do you think she will? That is is she in- 
 clined to change her mind?" 
 
 "No. If she has ever changed her mind 
 about anything, I can't remember it. I know 
 she would, however, if she were convinced that 
 she was in the wrong, for she's not unreason- 
 able nor stubborn, only firm when she believes 
 she's right." 
 
 "Has her resolution to remain single any- 
 thing to do with your brother?" 
 
 "Yes, it has all to do with it. She thinks she 
 ought to devote her life to the care of Wallie, 
 and that she couldn't do it if she married. She 
 fancies that mother wishes her to, and neither 
 father or I can argue her out of it. Faith 
 adores Wallie. She'll stop anything to amuse 
 him." 
 
 "And he? Does he appreciate it?" 
 
 "No, indeed. He doesn't appreciate any- 
 thing. There she comes." 
 
 Faith had come out of the house and stood 
 in the sun shading her eyes with her hand.
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 209 
 
 "Supper is almost ready, Mandy. Won't you 
 come in and have some with us, Caleb?" She 
 was smiling, and the sun brought out the rich 
 gold in her yellow brown hair. Amanda smiled 
 into the young man's admiring eyes. 
 
 "She's pretty, isn't she, Caleb?" 
 
 "She's more than that, a hundred times more. 
 She's beautiful, and growing more so every 
 day." 
 
 "Yes, and good, too," declared Amanda. 
 
 "Yes, and good, too," he repeated. Faith 
 turned suddenly without another word and 
 walked back into the house. She walked more 
 proudly than usual the yellow head was held 
 higher, because she was hurt. 
 
 "He's so taken up with Mandy he couldn't 
 even see me; didn't answer me when I invited 
 him to have supper with us," she thought, as, 
 with a choking sensation in her throat, she 
 drew the tea and sliced the bread. 
 
 "Wallie eats at the table now, does he, 
 Faith?" Amanda had come in and seated her- 
 self in the rocking-chair close to the vine-cov- 
 ered window. 
 
 "Yes, he does. Who told you?" 
 
 "Why, you did. You wrote me about it. 
 Don't you remember?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, so I did." 
 
 N
 
 210 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 "How does he behave?" 
 
 "Just like anybody else. He doesn't talk 
 much, though." 
 
 "Good thing, I should say. I never could 
 bear to hear him talk. Does he eat with his 
 ringers?" 
 
 "No, he eats just like anybody else; he has 
 eaten at the table ever since the time he ate 
 dinner with the Courtland boys. Poor boy, 
 he's working so hard today helping Mr. Nathan 
 put up a lightning rod, but I don't suppose he 
 knows what it's for." 
 
 "I'm not so sure about that, Faith. He 
 knows more than he appears to ; he's very keen 
 about some things." 
 
 "Yes, I know he is. And did you ever no- 
 tice, Mandy, that he knows some things he 
 never learned that he never could have 
 learned from any of us? For none of us knew 
 enough to teach him." 
 
 "Yes, I've noticed it. It's unaccountable. 
 I never could make it out." 
 
 "I can. It's plain enough to me," said Faith 
 as she poured the hot water into the teapot. 
 
 "Well! Would you be good enough to en- 
 lighten me, Madam Minerva, to give me one 
 little measure from your storehouse of wis- 
 dom?" Amanda's cheeks dimpled.
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 211 
 
 "God knows," replied the younger sister, 
 seriously, "that Wallie can't reason things out 
 as we do, so out of pity for him, he gives him a 
 few things 'out of hand,' as it were already 
 reasoned out." 
 
 "What a strange idea, Faith. Do you sup- 
 pose the Almighty would pay so much atten- 
 tion as all that to a fool ?" 
 
 "Why, certainly. Don't the bible say that 
 not even a little sparrow can fall to the ground 
 without His notice? Daddy says he was 
 brighter than any of us before he got hurt. 
 And you oughtn't to call him a fool, Mandy. I 
 don't see how anybody can look at Wallie's big, 
 beautiful eyes and call him a fool." 
 
 "Oh, I didn't mean any harm, Faith, only, 
 you know, everybody calls him our 'fool;' be- 
 hind our backs, of course." 
 
 "Everybody doesn't," asserted Faith, with an 
 indignant flash of her eyes. "Only heartless 
 people or people who never take time to think." 
 
 "I should like to know what has come over 
 you, Faith; you're so ill-tempered. So I'm 
 either heartless, or never think. Which is it, 
 little sister?" Faith made no reply. 
 
 "Oh, never mind," admonished Amanda, 
 mockingly, "you needn't answer me; it isn't 
 worth while. To settle it, we'll say that I am
 
 212 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 both heartless and unthinking. Now, we'll 
 talk about something else. I'm heartbroken 
 about my dress, Faith. It makes me faint to 
 think of it." 
 
 "Why, what's the matter? Did Miss Fan- 
 ning spoil it in the making?" 
 
 "No, it's all right what there is of it, but it 
 is just as I feared ; there was not enough for an 
 overskirt. All the girls are having them ; 
 they're the latest thing, and my dress is just a 
 plain straight skirt, the same as they wore last 
 year. I could cry about it. Every one of the 
 girls but Mary Powers and me are having over- 
 skirts. I declare, I'd rather have a common 
 white muslin dress with an overskirt than a 
 white silk without one. I don't see why Uncle 
 Dick didn't get a little more while he was 
 about it; he might at least have asked me how 
 much I wanted. There's no need of his being 
 so stingy, as much money as he has." 
 
 "Why, Mandy Tolliver ! After his giving you 
 that beautiful dress. You ought to be 
 ashamed." 
 
 "Well, there isn't enough. Why didn't he 
 ask how much it would take ?" 
 
 "I don't suppose Uncle Dick thought any- 
 thing about an overskirt, mebbe he never saw 
 one. What are they like?"
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 213 
 
 "Come on up stairs and I'll show you. I 
 brought my dress home so you could see it." 
 
 "After supper, Mandy; father's coming in 
 now, and there comes Wallie, just as warm and 
 tired as he can be, poor boy." 
 
 "He's washing himself, Faith," whispered 
 Amanda, peeping through the vines. "How 
 have you taught him that?" 
 
 "I never taught him ; I couldn't ; I tried hard 
 enough; but he has washed himself before 
 every meal, whether he needed it or not, ever 
 since he worked at Mr. Garland's and saw the 
 men wash. I think that shows how much bet- 
 ter example is than anything we can say. He 
 has never played pig since that day." 
 
 "Hush, Faith. If he should hear you it might 
 make him think of it." 
 
 "Now," said the younger sister, after supper 
 was over and she had seated herself on the edge 
 of Amanda's bed, "tell me what an overskirt is 
 like. I never saw one. I'm curious, and if it 
 wouldn't take too much, mebbe I have enough 
 silk left to make you one." 
 
 "Oh, Faith, dear! How much have you?" 
 
 "A little over two yards." Amanda turned 
 away with a sigh of disappointment. 
 
 "That would be just about half enough, 
 Faith. I'll show you what they are like. Give 
 me your skirt."
 
 214 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 Amanda put her sister's silk skirt on over her 
 own, and looped it up here and there with the 
 bows of pink ribbon that Hannah Weaver had 
 given Faith to wear with her new dress. Faith 
 clapped her hands with delight. 
 
 "Oh, Mandy, it's beautiful, beautiful! It 
 makes you look just like a picture ; and it's the 
 overskirt that does it. Oh, Mandy, if we could 
 only have overskirts! How much will it take 
 for two? I've got about two yards and an 
 eighth." 
 
 "It would take four yards for each overskirt. 
 There's no use in talking about it; it's a waste 
 of time." And Amanda, throwing the skirts 
 over a chair, gave way to tears; an unusual 
 thing for her. 
 
 Faith was deeply moved. Tears often filled 
 her own eyes, but to see her sister weep was an- 
 other thing. She sat up straight, and with tear- 
 less eyes looked at the limp little skirts hanging 
 over the chair-back, then at her sobbing sister. 
 She was weighing the hopes she had cherished 
 for four years against the tears of Amanda. An 
 expression settled on her face that seemed to 
 rob it of some of its natural sweetness ; to have 
 a straightening effect in the curves of her lips. 
 She gave her weeping sister a little push. 
 
 "Come, Mandy, get up; you'll make your
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 215 
 
 headache. I know what we can do ; I've got it 
 all fixed. Come, get up ; you're f rowsling your 
 hair ; I tell you I've got it all planned." Faith's 
 voice had in it no note of sympathy, only the 
 cold tone of decision and determination. 
 Amanda rose and seated herself in the little 
 rocking-chair, her face a picture of distress. 
 
 "Well, how have you g g got it fixed, I 
 should like to know? How are we going to 
 b b buy six yards of silk and get two over- 
 skirts made out o' nothing?" 
 
 "We're not going to buy any silk nor get any 
 overskirts made. You're going to wear my 
 skirt for an overskirt, just as it's fixed now, with 
 the ribbons an' all, and I'm not going." 
 
 "Well, you are going," asserted Mandy, 
 straightening up. 
 
 "No, I'm not. I've been thinking it over, 
 and I've made up my mind that it would be bet- 
 ter for one of us to go well dressed than for 
 both of us to go poorly dressed." 
 
 "We shouldn't be poorly dressed, only out of 
 fashion." 
 
 "Well, out of fashion, then. You've got to 
 be there, and I haven't." 
 
 "But, Faith, you've been counting on it so 
 long! I hate to disappoint you." 
 
 "Yes, I know I've been counting on it, but
 
 216 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 why couldn't you dress up afterwards and read 
 it here? You could stand up on the kitchen 
 table, I could sit in the front room and look at 
 you from away off, and I could imagine the 
 house full of people." 
 
 Faith swung one foot and gazed at a burly 
 knot in the floor. Already she had, in her imag- 
 ination, a large and appreciative audience in 
 the front room, and Amanda, in her white dress, 
 standing on the kitchen table. 
 
 "Faith Tolliver! Do you mean it?" 
 
 "Why, certainly I do. What do you suppose 
 I'm talking for? There is no use for you to say 
 anything, for I've made up my mind." So it 
 was settled, as things usually were when Faith 
 announced that she "had made up her mind." 
 After the sisters went to bed that night Faith 
 covered her head with the bed clothes, and 
 sweetened with her tears the bitterest disap- 
 pointment that she had ever known. 
 
 It was early Monday morning. A fringe of 
 golden light had just appeared in the east, as 
 Amanda and Faith walked out to the road. The 
 grass was wet with a heavy dew, and the sweet 
 spirit of a new-born day pervaded the air. 
 
 "I do feel so mean about taking your skirt, 
 Faith. I believe you'd go and wear it yourself 
 if I just wouldn't take it."
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 217 
 
 "No. I've made up my mind, now, Mandy, 
 and I sha'n't change it. You might just as well 
 keep the skirt till you come home. I shall not 
 want it, and you may need it again." 
 
 "Very well, Faith, I'll be careful with it. Now 
 don't forget the roses." 
 
 "No, I won't. Good-by." 
 
 "Good-by. Oh, Faith! Don't make my 
 aprons so stiff as you did the last time, and, say, 
 Faith." Amanda walked back a few steps. "Do 
 you remember the day we sat upon the hillside 
 by the brook and I told you how I longed to go 
 to school and graduate?" 
 
 "Yes, I remember it. I remember just how 
 the clouds looked that day, and I remember the 
 sound of the bells and the brook. I've never 
 been a little girl since ; that day was the last." 
 
 "Now, I'm going to have my wish, Faith," 
 pursued Amanda, deaf to her sister's reminis- 
 cence. "I'm so glad and so happy." 
 
 "So'm I," said Faith, smiling. "I kind of wish 
 I could graduate, too, Mandy." 
 
 "Do you, Faith? Well, maybe you can. 
 Good-by till after." 
 
 "Yes, good-by till after." 
 
 "Don't forget to send the roses, Faith. Mary 
 Powers is going to send a big bunch of pure 
 white ones up to me, and I'm going to send
 
 218 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 some red ones up to her. Don't tell anyone ; 
 we wouldn't have the others know it for the 
 world 'n' all." 
 
 "No, I won't; you needn't be afraid." 
 
 The commencement day came at last with 
 lagging feet; each hour of the preceding week 
 having been called upon to render an account 
 of its minutes. 
 
 "I guess I'll ride to Hazen on hoss back, 
 Faithful, if you're goin' with yer aunt in the 
 kirridge. I've got Nate Courtland to come 
 over and stay with Wallie. He'll be as happy 
 as a pig in high clover every minute o' the time. 
 Give me the posies if you want me to take 'em." 
 
 Faith watched her father ride away, then she 
 walked aimlessly about the two little rooms. 
 She was not in her usually pacific frame of 
 mind. 
 
 "Oh, dear!" she burst out at last, wringing 
 her hands, "what shall I tell Aunt Hannah when 
 she comes? She'd never forgive Mandy if she 
 knew she'd be sure to blame her, and Mandy 
 isn't a mite to blame; I just made her take it; 
 she couldn't help herself. I wish my head ached 
 harder it does ache a little, really. There an- 
 other pain shot through my temple. I b'lieve 
 my head is honestly going to ache. Mebbe it's 
 because I stayed awake nearly all night, think-
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 219 
 
 ing. Oh, goody, there comes Caleb I most 
 wish I had my skirt." 
 
 "Why, what's the matter, Faith? You don't 
 look are you quite well?" Faith pushed a 
 chair towards her visitor. "No, thank you, I 
 prefer a door-step to a rocking-chair, anytime. 
 Are you well this morning, Faith?" 
 
 "No, I'm not well. I'm not well at all. Do I 
 look pale?" An amused look passed over the 
 young man's face. 
 
 "No, I can't say that you look pale, your 
 cheeks are more flushed than usual, in fact, but 
 you look worried." 
 
 "Don't folks ever have headache when their 
 cheeks are red?" Caleb smiled and then laughed 
 outright. 
 
 "Yes, sometimes, if they are feverish," he re- 
 plied. 
 
 "If you laugh at me, Caleb Garland, I'll never 
 speak to you," declared Faith, with a pout that 
 was half smile. 
 
 "Well, I shouldn't wonder if you had a spell 
 of headache coming on you look like it; but 
 it may come too late to suit your purpose." 
 
 "You're just as unkind as you can be. I'll 
 never again as long as I live tell you " 
 
 "You haven't told me anything. Why don't 
 you trust me, Faith? Tell me all about it, and
 
 220 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 let me help you. You don't wish to go to Hazen 
 today, and you are trying to be ill. Eh? Now 
 be honest." 
 
 "I can't go, Caleb. It's impossible." 
 
 "Does Mandy expect you?" 
 
 "No. She knows I can't come." 
 
 "Then what's the matter with simply staying 
 at home?" 
 
 "Oh, it isn't Mandy I care about; it's Aunt 
 Hannah ; she's the trouble. She's the one I don't 
 know how to manage. She's coming after me, 
 and when she finds I can't go, she'll blame 
 Mandy, and Mandy isn't to blame." 
 
 "What deep and terrible plot have you and 
 Mandy been concocting against a defenseless 
 old woman, and into which plot I am to be 
 drawn as accessory before the fact? I hope 
 there's no bloodshed in it, Faith ; I hope you're 
 not going to kill her pet cat or her canary bird. 
 The sight of innocent blood always unnerves 
 me. Don't sit with your head down like that, 
 Faith. Look at me; I'm going now. Good- 
 by." 
 
 Faith heard him rise and step down upon the 
 gravel walk. She raised her eyes, but not 
 her head, and smiled sweetly. 
 
 "Don't worry any more about your Aunt 
 Hannah ; she won't come after you." With this,
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 221 
 
 the young man walked to the gate, mounted his 
 horse and rode away. 
 
 Gazing down the road, Faith saw the rider 
 disappear in the grove; and long after he was 
 out of sight her eyes clung to the vacancy un- 
 der the arch of green trees that clasped hands 
 over the roadway leading through the sparse 
 wood. This natural gateway was called the 
 "Green Arch." 
 
 "I suppose," thought she, rising to go into 
 the house, "that it's because I'm Mandy's sis- 
 ter. It must be." Faith felt much relieved in 
 the belief that her Aunt Hannah would be likely 
 to drive directly to Hazen, and she felt even 
 more relieved since she had convinced herself 
 that she was really not very well; that she al- 
 most had a headache. 
 
 The day was a long, lonely one for Faith. 
 Feeling disinclined to engage in any everyday 
 work, she got the rag bag, tore a great pile of 
 strips and began the braided rug she had for 
 years been trying to find time to make. She sat 
 on the kitchen porch with her basket and ball, 
 sewing diligently all day. When Caleb rode up 
 to the gate late in the afternoon and dis- 
 mounted she was still at work. 
 
 "Hello, Faith. How's your headache?"
 
 222 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Oh, I'm so glad you've come, Caleb. I was 
 getting so dreadfully dreadfully " 
 
 "Lonesome?" 
 
 "No. Anxious to hear about Mandy." Caleb 
 looked a little crestfallen. "How did she look? 
 How was her essay? What did Aunt Hannah 
 say? Sit down in this chair; I'll fix it so it won't 
 rock. There, now, tell me all about it." 
 
 "Shall I hold your ball, Faith ? See ! It's try- 
 ing to get away." 
 
 "If you like. Now, how did she " 
 
 "She looked beautiful, and her essay was the 
 best of the four." Faith gave a little scream of 
 delight. 
 
 "She took the blue ribbon and no mistake," 
 continued Caleb. 
 
 "What blue ribbon?" Faith's eyes dilated. 
 
 "Oh, it's only a saying when people, or rather 
 horses and things come out take first prize. 
 She got the dictionary on her essay, and Miss 
 Cutler got a copy of Mrs. Hemans, as second 
 prize. Some one sent Mandy an immense 
 bunch of white roses. It was handed her by 
 one of the ushers just as she finished reading." 
 
 Enthusiasm died out of the listener's face, 
 and she fixed her eyes upon the restive black 
 horse at the gate. He pricked his ears forward 
 now and then, and, standing like a statue,
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 223 
 
 gazed at the two on the kitchen porch, then 
 round and round the post he swung, winding 
 and unwinding his halter. 
 
 "She was very much surprised," continued 
 Caleb, "for flowers are rarely given at the Ha- 
 zen school. At first she thought it couldn't be 
 meant for her, and she wasn't going to take it. 
 She shook her head and spoke low to the usher. 
 He turned up the card and showed her the 
 name hers, of course, then she took it, laid 
 her blushing face against it, and smiled sweetly 
 at the audience. How they cheered her! She 
 did it all so gracefully. Oh, the boys in town 
 are all losing their heads about her." A hot 
 flush overspread Faith's face; her eyes were 
 still fixed on the horse. 
 
 "How pretty and black Prince looks!" she 
 observed. "How he shines! How red his nos- 
 trils look inside ! As if they were painted." 
 Caleb turned his eyes toward the horse. 
 
 "Yes, he is sleek, just now." There was a 
 moment's silence. The morning-glory vines 
 rustled softly, and the paling sunlight slanted 
 across the porch. 
 
 "I wish I could graduate, Caleb." 
 
 "Do you intend going to school, now that 
 Mandy is through? I your father said some- 
 thing about it once to mother."
 
 224 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "I shall try to, but I'm afraid Mandy will not 
 be able to get along with Wallie Mandy can't 
 manage him very well ; he doesn't care about 
 her; he won't mind her at all. I'm going to 
 learn from Mandy, if I can't go to school." 
 
 "She's coming home to live after school is 
 out, is she?" Caleb spoke doubtfully. 
 
 "Why, certainly. Where else could she go? 
 She may feel lonesome for awhile, but I'm go- 
 ing to make it as easy for her as I can so she'll 
 like to stay. She can read as much as she 
 likes." 
 
 "I don't see how anyone could feel lonesome 
 here. I never do, for example." Caleb smiled 
 mischievously, and Faith blushed. 
 
 "You're easily amused ; Mandy isn't. Oh, 
 dear, how this thread knots." So they talked 
 on without saying much of anything, till Han- 
 nah Weaver drove up to the gate and Caleb 
 rode off towards home. Hannah watched him 
 as his horse sped away. 
 
 "Wa'al, I dew declare !" said she, gazing after 
 him. "I don't see nothin' the matter with 
 them feet. Mebbe 'twas a tack or somethin'. 
 'Pears to me it's got well quick." 
 
 "What, Aunt Hannah? What about his 
 feet?" 
 
 "You poor child ! You've jes' been sufferin'
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 225 
 
 terrible, hain't you ? I druv straight hum from 
 Hazen and got my yarbs. I'll straighten ye up 
 in less'n no time. I'll give you a good dose of 
 boneset I've got sech a sight of it an' some 
 leptander. Then I'll put a bag o' hops on yer 
 stummick, an' a mustard plaster on the back o' 
 yer neck." The old lady threw off her cape 
 and began picking at the knot in her bonnet 
 strings. 
 
 "I won't be no time a-doing o' it," she con- 
 tinued, "an' by bed time you won't know 't you 
 ever had a headache." 
 
 "But, Aunt Hannah, I really don't think I 
 need it. Mustard plasters, you know, make me 
 crazy." 
 
 "I know they be pretty bad when the mus- 
 tard's fresh like this, but with all the pain 
 you've got in your head, you won't skeersely 
 notice the mustard." 
 
 "But, Aunt Hannah! D don't make it. 
 You see, I'm better. I don't need it. It'd be 
 too bad to waste the mustard." In spite of ex- 
 postulations, Hannah poured out the mustard 
 and took down the vinegar bottle. 
 
 "I tell you, Aunt Hannah, I'm well. My head 
 don't ache a bit." 
 
 "Not the least mite? Don't ye feel even the 
 
 tracks of it?" 
 o
 
 226 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "No. I'm perfectly well. Put away the mus- 
 tard." 
 
 "But you'd better drink a cupful o' this 
 boneset tea, Faithful. It's too bad to waste 
 it, an' it 'pears to me they's a kind of a yallerish 
 look to yer eyes. I shouldn't wonder a mite if 
 you was comin' down with the yaller janders. 
 Headaches is often- the forerunners of terrible 
 diseases." 
 
 "Do my eyes look yellow? I hadn't noticed 
 it." 
 
 "Yes, it 'pears to me they do, jest a little 
 mite." 
 
 Seeing that there was no way out of it, Faith 
 took the cup and drained it to the last drop. 
 
 "Now sit down and rest, Aunt Hannah. You 
 must be tired." 
 
 "Well, I jes' be tired. I've worrited an' wor- 
 rited the hull blessed day. I wouldn't 'a' gone a 
 step to Hazen if it hadn't 'a' been for young Mr. 
 Garland. He come over an' tole me you wa'n't 
 a-goin' 'cause you'd got the headache, an' I 
 was bound to come over here an' doctor ye up 
 I didn't care no great 'bout goin', nohow 
 but he stood out 't I mus' go; he said 
 Mandy'd be dretfully disappointed if I didn't 
 guess he thinks a sight o' Mandy, he was so 
 terrible sot on my goin' an' he went out with
 
 TOIvLIVER'S FOOL 227 
 
 all his fine clothes on an' hitched Madge up to 
 the kirridge for me. Even then I told him 't I 
 didn't feel right goin' off and leavin' you to 
 home sick, an' 't I b'lieved I wouldn't go after 
 all. He seemed dretfully disapp'inted an' said 
 't he'd calc'lated to ride to town with me an' 
 lead his hoss behind 'cause he was a leetle mite 
 lame in one foot. The poor feller looked jes's if 
 he didn't know what to dew, 'n' I went jes' so'st 
 he c'd ride along with me. But I guess they 
 wa'n't much the matter with his hoss' foot after 
 all the way he cantered off jes' now. You've 
 begun yer rug, hain't ye, Faithful?" 
 
 "Yes, I began it this morning. Don't you 
 think I've worked pretty fast?" 
 
 "Yes, you must 'a' worked dretful fast to git 
 all this done. You're goin' to put it right in 
 front o' the door, hain't ye? It'll show from 
 the road when the door's open, if you put it 
 right in front o' the door." 
 
 "No. I don't want to cover up these knots. 
 I'm going to put it in front of Daddy's bed." 
 
 "Don't want to cover up these knots, hey? 
 Why laws a me, I sh'd think you'd want tew." 
 
 "No. You see they look like faces, Aunt 
 Hannah. Mandy and I named them years and 
 years ago, and they seem like old friends. This 
 one is Hannibal. We called him Hannibal
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 because we never could scrub his face white 
 Hannibal was a black man and we named that 
 one Milton, because don't you see, his eyes 
 are closed, and Milton was a blind poet. He 
 wrote beautiful poetry." 
 
 "Oh, yes. I've heerd about him," observed 
 Hannah. "He wrote some poetry 'bout a par- 
 adise 't got lost, didn't he? That's what Mis' 
 Blackmore's daughter Sary sets 'round an' 
 reads on purt' nigh the hull time an' lets her 
 ma do the work. I guess he wa'n't much, that 
 Mr. Milton. 'Pears to me 't writin' portry's 
 putty small bisiness for a full grown man." 
 "But he was blind, Aunt Hannah." 
 "Wa'al, mebbe he wa'n't to blame, then. I 
 don't want to jedge him. If I sh'd lose both 
 eyes, mebbe I shouldn't do no better'n he done. 
 But it 'pears to me he might 'a' learned to knit. 
 Dear me suz ! It's been dretful hot today, hain't 
 it? I never see sech hot weather in all my 
 born days. I shouldn't wonder a mite if it'd 
 breed some new disease. I met Dr. Carley to- 
 day an' I ast him if he'd heerd of any new ones. 
 He laffed, an' said 't he guessed they'd hev to 
 hunt some more new feathers for th' ole birds ; 
 that they hadn't nothin' new hatched out yet 
 this summer. Laws a me ! I mos' dropped that
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 229 
 
 sasser. I guess I'd better set it away an' not 
 be playin' with it. I'll leave some o' my boneset, 
 Faithful, an' if you should ever hev another 
 sech a turn as you've had today, make a cup full 
 of the tea real strong an' drink it right down." 
 
 It was Sunday. Faith, as usual, had accom- 
 panied Aunt Hannah to the afternoon services 
 held in the schoolhouse at the Corners. Just 
 as they were ready to start for home, Hannah 
 happened to discover a crack in the rear axle- 
 tree of her carriage. Two of the elders of the 
 church decided, after a careful examination, 
 that it was not a fresh break ; that it had every 
 appearance of having been cracked a good 
 while. Faith asserted stoutly that it was there 
 years and years ago : that she and her sister 
 had used to stick chicken feathers into it and 
 play they were Indians on the war-path. Han- 
 nah opined that if this were true, nothing but 
 a miracle had preserved her life all these years, 
 and she would neither get into the carriage her- 
 self nor allow Faith to do so. 
 
 "It'd be temptin' Providence to get inter that 
 kirridge, knowin' what we do ; an' if we sh'd get 
 in an' start fer hum, I shouldn't even hope to 
 git there alive." So Hannah drove the three
 
 230 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 miles home walking beside the carriage, while 
 Caleb, leading Prince by a long halter, followed 
 loiteringly with Faith. 
 
 There had been a heavy rain early in the 
 morning, and the road was hard-beaten and 
 clean. Wild roses lifted their sweet faces here 
 and there along the wayside; a bright-eyed 
 squirrel rose on his haunches and, snuffing, 
 peered cautiously at the small caravan, while 
 his mate, in a spirit of daring, raced recklessly 
 along the top rail of the stake-and-rider fence. 
 At the sound of footsteps a mother bird skulked 
 through the grass, and, with jealous fear, 
 spread her warm breast lovingly over her pre- 
 cious eggs. 
 
 "By the way, Faith, there's to be a dance at 
 Judge Curtice's Friday night; Allen is going 
 away, you know, to finish his law course, and 
 they're going to give him a grand ball as a send 
 off. There are over two hundred invitations 
 out. Mandy's going, I hear." 
 
 "Mandy going? You're going, too, I sup- 
 pose." 
 
 "Yes, just to look on; I never dance." 
 
 "Mandy doesn't dance, either," observed 
 Faith. "She doesn't know how." 
 
 "Oh, yes she does, pardon me, Mandy's a 
 good dancer."
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 231 
 
 "Why, I didn't know she had ever danced in 
 her life." Faith's eyes were wide open. 
 
 "She learned last winter of Prof. Kavanaugh, 
 who boarded at Miss Fanning's. Miss Foster 
 played the piano for them, and they practiced 
 every evening except Wednesdays and Fridays. 
 Oh, yes," continued the speaker, after a mo- 
 ment's pause, "Mandy, as a society girl, is quite 
 up-to-date." 
 
 "Oh, how I should like to see her dance." 
 
 "That's just what I was going to suggest. I 
 have an invitation, and I shall feel honored if 
 you will go with me." 
 
 "But I have no invitation." 
 
 "Haven't I just invited you?" 
 
 "Yes, but but you are only invited your- 
 self." 
 
 "I am invited to come and bring a lady; any 
 lady I choose, who will be good enough to ac- 
 cept me as an escort." He opened the invita- 
 tion and handed it to her. 
 
 " 'Yourself and lady,' " read Faith. "Yes, I 
 see. The one who gives the invitation leaves 
 the lady question for the one invited to decide." 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 "Are you sure Mandy's going?" 
 
 "No, but Ben told me he had invited her, and 
 that she had accepted the invitation."
 
 232 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Did he invite her just the same as he in- 
 vited you?" 
 
 "No. He invited her just the same as I invite 
 you. If she goes she will go with him." 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 Caleb watched her in silence, noting the rapid 
 change of expression, as, carried away by her 
 imagination, she whirls light as down amidst 
 a throng of fairy dancers, her fair, young face 
 warming like a rare flower just opening to the 
 wooing of the sun. 
 
 "Should you like to go, Faith?" Faith 
 started, blushing deeply. 
 
 "I should like to go, Caleb, but it would be 
 impossible. I mustn't dream of such things. 
 School should come before parties. I should 
 feel out of place at a ball." 
 
 Faith stepped inside the gate and watched 
 Caleb as he rode away. Prince's steel shoes 
 threw back flashes of sunlight as his nimble feet 
 beat a rolling tattoo on the hard road. 
 
 The following day a letter came fromMandy, 
 telling of the ball, and all about her essay, omit- 
 ting none of the compliments she had received, 
 on both her dress and her composition. A look 
 of pain settled on Faith's face as she read the 
 last page of the hurriedly written letter : 
 
 "I suppose I must come home after the ball,
 
 TOL,L,IVER'S FOOL 233 
 
 but oh, dear, Faith, I would almost as soon 
 die. I look forward to it with a shudder. 
 Everything is so still at home, nothing but the 
 mooing of cattle, the barking of dogs, the 
 cackle of hens, and the continual tinkle of bells. 
 I want to be with you, Faith, but how I can 
 endure the old humdrum life of drudgery, I 
 don't know. I almost wish sometimes that I 
 had never left it, but had allowed myself to 
 grow old, like moss on a log that has no 
 thought or wish for anything but decayed 
 wood. I cry myself to sleep almost every 
 night, as the time draws near for my living en- 
 tombment. Prof. Bemis, dear old man, is go- 
 ing to try to get me a school next year, but he 
 says it is impossible to get one this year. 
 
 "In haste, your loving sister, Mandy." 
 
 The castles Faith had for four years been 
 building, with her sister in the home life as 
 foundation for them all, tottered and fell. She 
 poured the tea in silence that evening, then 
 walked over to the window. 
 
 "Don't Daddy's little girl want any supper? 
 Pour yourself some tea 'fore it gits cold, Faith- 
 ful." Faith poured out the tea and made a 
 heroic attempt to stifle, with chunks of bread, 
 the sobs that bubbled up in her throat. 
 
 "I shouldn't s'pose you'd git lonesome now,
 
 234 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 Faithful, when Mandy's comin' home so soon. 
 Here, take some apple sass an' put on yer bread. 
 You're eatin' of it dry." 
 
 It was nine o'clock on a bright moonlight 
 night. Faith rose from the kitchen lounge, 
 tiptoed into the front room and up to her 
 father's bed. He was sleeping soundly. His 
 wooden leg lay on the floor. She turned the 
 kitchen lamp low, and went softly out of doors. 
 Wallie was in the wood yard. She opened the 
 gate and walked in. The boy started and raised 
 the ax as her shadow crept upon the logs be- 
 fore him. She sprang backward with upthrown 
 arms. 
 
 "Don't, Wallie. It's Faith. You wouldn't 
 strike me. Did I scare you, dear?" The boy, 
 pale and trembling, let the ax fall at his side 
 and sank down upon a log. Faith took a seat 
 beside him, and endeavored to distract his at- 
 tention. 
 
 "Did you make all these chips, Wallie?" She 
 moved some of the chips with the toe of her 
 shoe. "Don't, Wallie," she pleaded, laying her 
 hand on his arm. "Put down the ax. Daddy 
 has gone to sleep, and I don't want you to wake 
 him. Look here, Wallie. Don't chop, dear, 
 please don't, or sister will go away and leave
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 235 
 
 you." Wallie laid down the ax and gazed at 
 her. 
 
 "Look here, Wallie. Look at sister. Did 
 you ever see anyone dance, Wallie ? Look here, 
 brother, and see sister dance." 
 
 Faith picked up her skirts and danced on tip- 
 toe over the chip yard, keeping time with her 
 head to imaginary music. Wallie watched in- 
 tently, not the dancer, but her long, slim 
 shadow as it gyrated about him, bending and 
 swaying like a sapling in the wind. Now it 
 whirled tall and straight with limp arms ex- 
 tended and soft hair flying, then, distorted and 
 broken, like a monster in torment, it moved 
 writhingly from end to end of the log pile. 
 The boy watched it with increasing interest. 
 Faith stopped suddenly, panting, and laid her 
 hand on her brother's arm. 
 
 "Do you like it, Wallie? Do you like to see 
 sister dance?" The boy gave a double nod, 
 which was, in his vernacular, an assurance that 
 he was delighted. 
 
 "Mandy can dance, Wallie ; Mandy can dance 
 beautiful. Do you want to go with sister and 
 see Mandy dance?" Another double nod con- 
 vinced Faith that her sample dance had had the 
 desired effect.
 
 236 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "You stay right here, then, brother, till sister 
 changes her clothes. Sister's going to play 
 boy with you, Wallie. Do you remember the 
 time we played boy and went after the cows?" 
 Wallie almost smiled as he remembered Faith 
 in coat and trousers riding the spotted cow 
 home from the pasture, one bright moonlight 
 night. Not that he saw anything ludicrous in 
 it, but it was different from the ordinary, and it 
 pleased him. 
 
 "Come, Wallie, I'm ready now," whispered 
 Faith, as she walked cautiously over the treach- 
 erous chips. She had on a dark blue knicker- 
 bocker suit of Wallie's that he had outgrown, 
 and her fluffy yellow hair was tucked under a 
 round cap; all but the end of one mischievous 
 curl that played in truant fashion over the back 
 of her coat collar. 
 
 "Do I look like a boy, Wallie? I look just 
 exactly like a boy, don't I?" Faith thrust her 
 hands into her pockets and threw herself into 
 a dare-devil attitude, in an unconscious en- 
 deavor to down her own doubts. 
 
 Wallie grunted and shook his head. 
 
 "I tell you I do," asserted the young mas- 
 querader, setting her foot down hard. "I look 
 just exactly like a boy ; nobody could tell I was 
 a girl." Then, in a coaxing tone, "I look just
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOIv 237 
 
 like a boy, don't I, Wallie?" The boy had 
 sense enough to nod this time the question was 
 put to him, but he scanned with doubtful eyes 
 the fair face and the slim, white neck. These 
 were the striking points of difference, and, 
 though unable to differentiate minutely, he 
 could not help noticing them after her brave as- 
 sertion. 
 
 "Come on, Wallie; we must hurry. The 
 dance begins at eight o'clock, and it's nine now. 
 We'll ride Sam; both of us." 
 
 Judge Curtice's house was situated on an 
 abrupt rise of ground a mile from the city lim- 
 its. A long flight of stone steps led up to the 
 barn from the rear, and from the front of the 
 house there was a gradual slope down to the 
 swiftly flowing Wellwood, whose sunlit waters 
 winked through the foliage that bordered its 
 banks. The great house on the hill was almost 
 hidden by trees and ornamental shrubbery ; only 
 small patches of white twinkled here and there 
 through the swaying branches. Tonight, the 
 night of the ball, the Curtice house formed a 
 picture of merrymaking. Japanese lanterns 
 hung from all the trees, outlined the arch over 
 the driveway entrance, and a blaze of soft lamp- 
 light streamed from every window. Laughter, 
 chatter and song mingled with the music, and
 
 238 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 from the second story windows clouds of pink 
 and white and blue and red could be seen sway- 
 ing and whirling in arms of black. Wallie stood 
 in a corner of the second floor veranda peeping 
 into the ballroom. Two of the veranda win- 
 dows were open, but the one in the corner 
 where Wallie stood, had the shutters closed. 
 
 "Wallie! Wallie!" called Faith, in an explo- 
 sive whisper. "Do you see her? Is she danc- 
 ing?" Wallie heard Faith, but he was too ab- 
 sorbed in watching the dancers to reply. 
 
 "Wallie! Wallie! Help me quick. I shall 
 die if I can't see her." At this the boy sprang 
 down, and, taking a chair from the lower ve- 
 randa, he stood upon it and boosted his sister 
 up until she could touch the railing with her 
 fingers. 
 
 "I can't, Wallie; don't you see I can't? Just 
 a little higher." The boy lifted his burden until 
 her knees rested on his shoulders, then her feet. 
 It was easy. She climbed over the railing with 
 the calm excitement and cool determination 
 men feel who storm a city's walls in the face of 
 smoking guns. 
 
 For one blissful minute Faith saw her sister 
 whirling in the waltz, then she lost sight of 
 her; there were so many white dresses, but 
 none, in the eyes of Faith, so beautiful as
 
 FOOL 239 
 
 Amanda's. Amanda wore a white rose in her 
 hair. Faith watched for the dark hair and the 
 rose. 
 
 "There she comes! Oh, see her, Wallie! 
 Just look at her. See her whirl! Oh, look at 
 her little feet! Look, Wallie, look!" There 
 was no need to thus urge Wallie ; he was look- 
 ing with both eyes, and he was also doing his 
 best, by holding his mouth wide open, to press 
 that member into service as an extra organ of 
 vision. 
 
 When the music died away, Faith felt as if 
 she had been suddenly let down to earth after 
 floating on waves of air. How heavy she felt ! 
 
 "Step back, Wallie. Back, quick. Some of 
 'em are coming to the windows to get cool. 
 But I guess they're not using this one. Stand 
 still and don't breathe." Wallie did his best to 
 stop breathing, but he found it impracticable; 
 his heart was thumping wildly with excitement. 
 He glared at the windows trembling. 
 
 Faith had never heard of sane people walk- 
 ing out of windows; but, as in a dream, imme- 
 diately following the fear of it, the seemingly 
 impossible happened. The windows flew open 
 as if by magic, and then two or three couples 
 walked out of them. 
 
 Wallie leaped over the railing and disap-
 
 240 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 peared in the shrubbery. Faith made a move 
 as if to follow him, but an instant's hesitation, 
 as she peered with light-blinded eyes down into 
 what seemed a black abyss, and a firm hand 
 grasped her arm. 
 
 "See here, bub, you'd better go down the 
 stairway. You might break your legs jumping 
 off there in the dark." Faith sat on the veranda 
 railing swinging her feet with seemingly per- 
 fect indifference, her heart beating wildly. She 
 heard the girls whispering. 
 
 "It's a girl," said a high-pitched voice. "It's 
 a girl dressed up in boy's clothes. Just look 
 at that sweet little curl, will you, and and her 
 hands." 
 
 Then there was a mumble of lower voices. 
 
 "I tell you it ith a girl. I'm going to find out. 
 Mithter Garland, bring the boy here, we want 
 to thpeak to him. He may be a printhe in dith- 
 guithe." The girl spoke with a little lisp. 
 Faith's eyes flashed. 
 
 "Mith Tolliver ! Come out here. We have a 
 printhe in dithguithe. Thee if you can't per- 
 thuade him to make himthelf known !" Another 
 couple stepped through the window. "Take 
 this seat, Miss Tolliver," Faith heard some one 
 say. The captive, whose arm was still held in 
 a grip that felt like steel, broke into a cold sweat.
 
 FOOL 241 
 
 "Climb over here, my young man, and be in- 
 troduced to the ladies." Then bending low 
 over Faith, so that she could feel his breath 
 on her forehead, the young man continued his 
 expostulations. 
 
 "You really mustn't jump down there, you 
 know, I sha'n't let you. You might hurt your- 
 self. Come and let me introduce you as a prince ; 
 just for fun; nobody'll hurt you; then I'll let 
 you down the stairway, and, on the way down, 
 you'll have a chance to see the house and deco- 
 rations. They're fine." 
 
 Faith, driven to the verge of desperation, 
 and filled with determination to convince the 
 company, if possible, that she was not a girl, by 
 leaping, as no girl would dare to do, made a 
 desperate effort to free her arm. Failing in 
 this, she burst forth : 
 
 "I won't! Leggo o' me, will ye? You 
 you " The fingers relaxed a little, and, as 
 she wrenched herself free, she raised her eyes 
 in a flash of wrath. Caleb caught a glimpse of 
 them, but not soon enough to prevent a reck- 
 less leap to the ground. 
 
 Persuasion to remain until after refreshments 
 were served were unavailing. Within five 
 minutes after the disappearance of the "Prince," 
 Caleb, hat in hand, stood before his hostess in
 
 242 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 the wide hall. The music, mingled with the 
 low voices of the promenaders, and the chatter 
 and laughter of the sitters, filled his ears with 
 a dizzying sound, and the heavy odor of cut 
 flowers gave him a feeling of faintness. He 
 longed to be away from the sound of revelry 
 and the sight of butterflies. It was his first ball, 
 and he had already decided that it should be his 
 last. He searched the grounds thoroughly, but 
 Faith was not to be found. 
 
 After leaping from the veranda, Wallie, with- 
 out a thought of his sister, had mounted the 
 horse and rode home, strong in the belief that 
 he had barely escaped being murdered. 
 
 Faith, weak and faint with the pain of a 
 sprained ankle, had managed, by the use of a 
 stick, to reach the second crossing of the Well- 
 wood, a mile from Hazen, where she sat on the 
 river bank resting, and wondering if she would 
 be able to reach home before daylight. She 
 was winding her handkerchief tightly around 
 the injured ankle, when the sound of a gallop- 
 ing horse caused her to lift her head, alarmed ; 
 and looking up to the hilltop she saw, against 
 the star-studded grey of night, the dark sil- 
 houette of a horse and rider. 
 
 "Oh, for mercy's sake !" groaned the terrified 
 girl. "What shall I do now? Dear Lord, help
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 243 
 
 me ! If I don't look up, maybe he won't notice 
 me much; he seems in a hurry, and of course 
 he'll think I'm a boy. If I let him see that I'm 
 lame, naturally he'll offer to help me, and I 
 can't walk without limping. I'll stand still. I 
 shall have to. I can be throwing stones into 
 the river. He'd think it strange if I stood here 
 at this hour, idle." 
 
 Arrived at these mental deductions, Faith 
 gathered up a few stones of convenient size, and 
 just as Caleb's horse plunged into the ford (the 
 bridge was unsafe for horses) she began to 
 whistle "Old Bob Gridley" and sent a flat stone 
 skimming through the air, barely missing the 
 rider's head. 
 
 "Hello!" said the young man, as, dismount- 
 ing he hung the bridle rein over his arm and 
 stepped towards the young masquerader, who 
 had squared herself to throw another stone. 
 The nervous strain Caleb had undergone for 
 nearly an hour had so changed his voice, that 
 Faith did not recognize it in his one word of 
 salutation. 
 
 "Hello!" she replied, in a voice unusually 
 heavy for a boy's, and keeping her eyes fixed 
 on the river, she resumed, with apparent perfect 
 sang-froid, the, "Ho, I ho, and ho, Bob Gridley, 
 ho."
 
 244 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "What a pretty boy she makes !" thought the 
 young man, as he stood watching Faith throw 
 stones into the river, without winning even so 
 much as a glance in return. 
 
 "She knows me, of course," thought he. 
 "She's just carrying the joke on." Believing 
 she was not hurt as he had before feared, he felt 
 greatly relieved. 
 
 Faith, in a panic of fear lest she be recog- 
 nized, and her escapade become a scandal, 
 determined to play her role to the end. The 
 moon had gone under a cloud, and as she turned 
 her head to see if her tormentor had gone, only 
 the outlines of a man holding a horse could she 
 discern in the darkness. She was terrified by 
 his continued presence, and in agony with her 
 ankle. She prayed frantically for a moment, 
 then she faced about suddenly in a frenzy of 
 pain and fear, like a beast at bay, and taking a 
 step toward the dark shadow, she burst forth: 
 
 "Why don't you go on about your business ? 
 What do you stand there watching me for? 
 I'll hit you with a stone. I'll I'll " The 
 moon slid out from behind its dark cover, and 
 the foam flecked horse and his rider stood 
 revealed. 
 
 "Caleb!" she faltered, staggering towards 
 him. He sprang forward, and stooping, broke 
 her fall with one outstretched arm.
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 245 
 
 "Are you better, Faith?" he asked a few 
 minutes later. 
 
 "Yes, I'm all right. Why? Did I faint?" 
 
 "Well, I believe that is about what you did. 
 You were going to fall, and I caught you." 
 They were sitting on the ground. She moved 
 away from his encircling arm. 
 
 "It was my ankle," she stammered. "It hurts 
 terribly. I didn't know it was you. I didn't 
 know who you were." 
 
 "You hurt your ankle then, did you? I 
 feared that, and am thankful it's no worse." 
 
 "I tried to scare you away," she rattled on, 
 in an aimless fashion. "I I was afraid. I 
 didn't want him you, I mean, to see me this 
 way." Faith's nerves were severely shaken. 
 
 "You tried to scare me away by threatening 
 to hit me with a stone, did you ? I doubt if you 
 could hit me with a stone, Faith." She was 
 gazing towards the river. 
 
 "I wanted you to think I was a boy; one of 
 the bad city boys, you know, so you would be 
 afraid and go away.'' 
 
 "But I'm a boy, myself. I shouldn't be afraid 
 of a boy. I should be much more afraid of a 
 girl." 
 
 "What are you here for, Caleb? Are you 
 just going home from the ball?"
 
 246 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "If I were, would I be going east?" 
 
 "Did you come after me? Have you been to 
 our house? How did you get here so soon?" 
 
 "Yes, I came after you. I went to your 
 house first; I didn't know where to go. Fast 
 riding was the cause of my getting here so soon. 
 We will sit quietly a few minutes, Faith, and 
 then we'll start home. You are nervous. How 
 you are trembling!" He took one of her hands, 
 but she drew it away seeming to have use for 
 it. She pushed her cap back from her forehead. 
 
 "It was good of you to come after me, Caleb, 
 but I wish you'd go; I really do." 
 
 "Really?" 
 
 "Yes, really. You don't understand. Do 
 you think they knew me?" 
 
 "I think Ben and Mandy did. I hardly think 
 anyone else recognized you." 
 
 "I could have got away all right if you hadn't 
 held me. What made you hang on so? You 
 hurt my arm. Oh, I was angry." 
 
 "I was afraid you'd injure yourself. I didn't 
 know you till you looked up. I'm sorry I hurt 
 you." 
 
 "Did I look up? I didn't mean to." 
 
 "Yes. Didn't you know it ?" 
 
 "I was afraid I did; I wasn't sure."
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 247 
 
 "Did you know when you jumped that you 
 were going to land on a brick pavement?" 
 
 "No, but it wouldn't have made any differ- 
 ence; I was scared nearly to death. I wish 
 you'd go on home, Caleb." 
 
 "Don't be foolish, Faith. You're going to 
 ride my horse." 
 
 "No, I'm going to walk. You said one day 
 that your horse wouldn't carry double." 
 
 "He will tonight; he'll have to. You can't 
 walk, Faith. It's nonsense to think of it. I 
 will not leave you to walk, so don't entertain 
 the thought for a moment." 
 
 "You will not?" 
 
 "No, I will not. If it is your costume, I tell 
 you frankly, I never saw you look better. You 
 are the jauntiest, prettiest boy I ever laid my 
 eyes on." 
 
 Faith's eyes filled. 
 
 "How would you like to have me see you in 
 girls' clothes; I should like to know?" Caleb 
 had hard work to suppress a smile, but he main- 
 tained a serious and rather severe expression. 
 
 "If you ever do see me so, I shall try to be 
 sensible. At least I shall endeavor not to be 
 silly." His tone was cutting. Faith sprang 
 up. The few minutes of rest had stiffened her
 
 248 TOUwIVER'S FOOL 
 
 ankle, and the pain, whenever she attempted the 
 least use of it, was severe, but she lifted her head 
 proudly. 
 
 "I am going to ride just as you advise, Mr. 
 Garland. Not because of what you said, but 
 because I can't walk. I shall never speak to 
 you again, though." As she stepped towards 
 the horse, again she reeled and would have 
 fallen, but for Caleb's timely arm. 
 
 "Why didn't you let me sit behind you, 
 Caleb? That's the way I always ride with 
 Daddy. This way isn't isn't easy. I'm in 
 your way, too." 
 
 "I couldn't hold you if you sat behind me. I 
 shouldn't dare let you ride behind me; you 
 might faint and fall off. I'm sorry you're un- 
 comfortable. I'm glad, though, that you've 
 changed your mind. I'm pleased to find that 
 you do sometimes change it." 
 
 "Changed my mind about what?" 
 
 "About speaking to me." 
 
 "Oh !" There was a long silence, then Faith 
 moved uneasily. 
 
 "You don't need to hold me," she said, with 
 a note of irritation in her voice. "I can ride 
 a horse; I could ride alone." 
 
 "Would you prefer to ride alone ?" 
 
 "I shouldn't like to have you walk. I don't
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 249 
 
 wish to ride alone but but I should think 
 you'd need both arms to guide the horse. Look : 
 he's going crooked." 
 
 "But he's following the path." 
 
 There was silence for a few minutes. 
 
 "How dark it is !" observed Faith. Her voice 
 shook a little. 
 
 "Yes, it is rather dark just now." 
 
 "Oh, what is that ahead? What are we 
 going into, Caleb ? Is it water ?" 
 
 "There is no cause for alarm; it's only some 
 tall grass." 
 
 "I'm not alarmed. Isn't that some one 
 coming over yonder? I'm sure it is. It's a 
 man and he's coming towards us." 
 
 "No. It's only a dead tree. It isn't coming, 
 it's standing perfectly still." There was a long 
 silence. A warm drop trembled for a moment 
 on the point of Faith's chin, then fell upon 
 Caleb's wrist. The arm about her tightened. 
 He bent his head until his cheek touched her 
 hair. 
 
 "What makes you cry, Faith? Why do you 
 feel so? What can I do to please you? You 
 don't trust me at all. Shall I get off and walk?" 
 
 "No. I wouldn't let you." 
 
 "Then why do you feel bad?" 
 
 "Because I went. I wish I'd staid at home
 
 250 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 where I belong. I ought to have known 
 better; but I was so anxious to see Mandy 
 dance. Then I'm sorry because I put these 
 on, and I I " She hesitated. 
 
 "Go on. What else?" 
 
 "I don't want you to hold me. You oughtn't 
 to put your arms around me. I can sit alone." 
 
 "Is that all?" 
 
 "I should think it was enough." 
 
 "Surely, it is. If you will allow me to begin 
 with your last complaint, being the only one 
 for which I am responsible, I will say : if I didn't 
 hold you, you would fall, if you should happen 
 to faint, and Prince might step on 
 
 "I'm not going to faint." 
 
 "You can't be sure of that. You've fainted 
 twice, you know." 
 
 "I didn't," she protested, poutingly. "I didn't 
 faint the last time. I knew where I was all the 
 time; I was only dizzy." 
 
 "People have been known to fall from dizzi- 
 ness," observed Caleb. The horse was walking 
 slowly through the tall grass, with a step that 
 was elastic and sure. Caleb, as if impelled by 
 an irresistible force, suddenly dropped the 
 reins over the saddle and clasped Faith in his 
 arms.
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 251 
 
 "Oh, don't be angry, Faith. Please don't be 
 angry. I love you. You are the only girl I ever 
 held in my arms, and the only one I ever cared 
 to hold. I have loved you for two years, Faith. 
 Think of it! Oh, you don't know what you 
 have been to me. Can't you love me, just a 
 little, dear? Ever so little?" There was no 
 reply. Faith made no effort to free herself. She 
 could feel the violent throbbing of his heart. 
 She tried to speak, but her voice, for the 
 moment, refused to obey. 
 
 "If you cannot, Faith ; if you feel that you do 
 not love me, even a little, tell me so frankly. 
 Have no fear of hurting me." Still she was 
 silent. 
 
 "Say this, Faith: say it after me it may do 
 me good. 'I would rather you did not hold me 
 in your arms, Caleb, because I do not love you, 
 and I feel sure I never can love you, even a 
 little.' Say it, Faith. Then I'll get off and 
 let you ride alone, if you wish it." 
 
 "I can't Caleb," she faltered at last, "I can't 
 say it, because " 
 
 "Because what, dear?" The arms closed 
 more firmly about her, and his warm breath was 
 on her cheek. 
 
 "Because it wouldn't be true."
 
 252 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 The moon came out again bright and clear 
 just as the riders reached the summit of the 
 hill; the highest point between Hazen and the 
 Corners. 
 
 "You mustn't do that again, Caleb. You 
 positively mustn't." 
 
 "Mustn't do what, Faith? Mustn't kiss 
 you?" 
 
 "You mustn't so much," she replied, half 
 offended. 
 
 "So much ? Why, I've kissed you only once, 
 dear, only once." 
 
 "Yes, but you made it last almost all the way 
 up the hill." 
 
 "I shall kiss you like that every hour in the 
 day after we are married." 
 
 "Then you'll never do anything else." They 
 both laughed a little. 
 
 "Show me the way you think lovers ought to 
 kiss one another, Faith. Perhaps I don't know 
 the proper way; but I'm willing to be taught." 
 
 "Indeed, I will not. I don't know, either," 
 she replied, blushing deeply. "What road is 
 that we're coming to, Caleb? Isn't this Cuth- 
 bert's mill? 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Why, what in the world made you come this 
 way? It's a mile farther."
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 253 
 
 "Is it?" asked the young lover, with an air of 
 innocence. 
 
 "You know it is. I believe you did it on 
 purpose." 
 
 "I confess that I'm not in a particular hurry. 
 How is your ankle?" 
 
 "I had forgotten it ; but since you have made 
 me think of it, it is painful." 
 
 "Forget it, then. You see Prince is carrying 
 double without the slightest objection." 
 
 "Yes." They were silent for a few moments. 
 "I was never so astonished in my life, Caleb." 
 Faith's voice was just above a whisper. 
 
 "Astonished at what, darling? Because 
 Prince carries double? He's a good friend of 
 mine." Faith caught her breath and a rush of 
 blood warmed her cheeks. No one but her 
 mother had ever called her "darling," and that 
 was like a dim, almost-forgotten dream. 
 
 "At why at what you told me a while 
 ago," she faltered. 
 
 "Astonished that I love you?" 
 
 "Yes, very much indeed." 
 
 "No one else who knows you would be in the 
 least astonished, I'm sure. Why, I have fancied 
 you knew it, Faith. I felt it so deeply that it 
 seemed to me you must see it. I thought, the
 
 254 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 day you colored the yarn, that you had found 
 me out and were angry with me." 
 
 "Oh no. That was the day I found myself 
 out," declared Faith, with regretable haste. 
 
 "Faith ! Was it really? Oh, if I had known 
 it! 
 
 "It was the day I found out that I had 
 better 'tend to my work," she added, in an 
 attempt to modify her declaration. 
 
 "Don't try to rob me, Faith. Tell me you 
 love me; you haven't said so yet." 
 
 "But I've just the same; I let you kiss me, 
 and I wouldn't have " 
 
 "I know you wouldn't, dear. It's just the 
 same; of course; but it would make me very, 
 very happy to hear you say it. You will say 
 it some day, won't you, Faith ?" 
 
 "Maybe if " 
 
 "If what, dear?" 
 
 "If I find that I really do," she replied with a 
 teasing smile. 
 
 "You're not sure, then? he asked anxiously. 
 
 "Oh, Caleb ! Don't you know me yet ?" He 
 could see the soul of love in her dear eyes as she 
 gazed a little reproachfully into his, and he was 
 satisfied. 
 
 About ten days after the Curtice ball, Faith 
 received a letter from Amanda saying that she
 
 FOOL 255 
 
 was coming home on the following Sunday 
 and would bring a friend with her. 
 
 "Have everything in the best of order," she 
 wrote, "have father put his coat on, and above 
 all, keep Wallie out of sight. It would be nice 
 to have something dainty for a little lunch. We 
 shall not stay long, and, Faith, I have some- 
 thing very important to tell you." A look of 
 pain came into Faith's face. 
 
 Faith did not go to meeting the next Sunday ; 
 she sat at the window watching for Mandy and 
 her friend. They drove up to the gate at last 
 Amanda and Benjamin Curtice. 
 
 After a half hour of rambling conversation, 
 in which no one felt at ease, Mr. Curtice, having 
 indicated to Amanda's father that he would like 
 a little private conversation with him, was 
 invited out to the barn to see the colts. Faith 
 sat watching her sister with troubled eyes. 
 They had had a few words in private upstairs : 
 the secret was out. 
 
 "Come on out to the gate, Faith. I don't 
 like sitting here. How do you ever get your 
 hair up that way? It's very stylish and 
 becoming. I wonder if I could do mine so." 
 
 "Oh, I just give it a twist or two and stick 
 the pins in, that's all." 
 
 "Now, I'll go on. Let me see, what was I
 
 256 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 telling you? Oh, yes, now I know, about my 
 ring. How do you like it? It's a solitaire." 
 
 "Oh, it's beautiful, Mandy, but I thought you 
 said it was a diamond." 
 
 "It is a diamond, Faith. Any precious stone 
 set alone is called a solitaire. I thought you 
 knew that much." 
 
 "How could you expect me to know? I 
 never saw a diamond, and I never heard of a 
 solitaire ; I thought it was some kind of a stone. 
 I don't pretend to know much, and I never 
 expect to now." 
 
 "Why do you say, 'now,' Faith ? Tell me what 
 you mean by 'now?' ' 
 
 "Why, I thought you were coming home to 
 live after you graduated, and that we should 
 have the same good times together we used 
 to have. I thought I could learn lots of things 
 from you without going to school; you said I 
 could. Now, I shall never know anything. It's 
 an awful grief to me to have to give up your 
 coming on account of your company, too. It 
 takes the the well, the life out of everything. 
 I'm jealous of Ben. He hasn't any business to 
 take you away from us." And letting restraint 
 go, tears streamed down her uncovered face. 
 
 "I didn't suppose you capable of jealousy. 
 Faith ; I'm disappointed. I never could be con-
 
 FOOL 257 
 
 tented here in this little weather-worn house, 
 with no carpets and not a decent piece of 
 furniture. I should be wretched. I hate the 
 old things." 
 
 "Then you'd better not come back; certainly 
 not ; if that's the way you feel. Mandy." Faith 
 wiped her cheeks, straightened up, and her 
 tears ceased to flow. 
 
 "To tell you the honest truth," pursued the 
 elder sister, "I'd rather stay single a few years 
 yet if I had a pretty home to live in and money 
 to buy nice clothes and books. I'm fond of 
 Ben, in a way, and he adores me says he can't 
 live without me, and all that, you know. I 
 could live without him and not half try." Faith 
 turned pale and leaned her head against the 
 tree. 
 
 "Faith, are you sick? You're as white as 
 marble. Don't look that way. You look 
 frozen." 
 
 "And yet you are going to marry him, 
 Mandy? Tell me this: Does Ben think you 
 love him? Do you pretend that you do?" 
 Faith's eyes, as she gazed into those of her 
 sister, carried such a weight of innocent accusa- 
 tion, that Amanda shrank under it and turned 
 her head away without replying.
 
 258 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 "Don't do it, Mandy. Oh, don't. It's 
 wicked. You'll get punished, you will, Mandy." 
 
 "Don't be silly, Faith. A great many marry 
 without" a sound of voices arrested Amanda's 
 speech. 
 
 "There they come. Father is going to 
 object; I can see it in the way he moves, but it 
 will make no difference; I'm of age." 
 
 "Mandy! You wouldn't" 
 
 "Yes I would." Stubborn determination 
 hardened Amanda's face, and there was an un- 
 lovely glitter in her eyes when she looked up, 
 at her father's approach. Faith sighed, and 
 folded her hands passively. 
 
 Alexander had taken off his coat and rolled 
 his shirt sleeves up above his elbows. This 
 was a thing he rarely failed to do when excited, 
 agitated or deeply interested. Hannah had 
 often told Amanda and Faith that she lost all 
 enjoyment in their mother's funeral through 
 not daring to take her eyes off her brother, 
 lest he pull off his coat and roll up his sleeves ; 
 and she stoutly declared that if she could have 
 had a dollar for every time she prevented him 
 doing so by stepping on his toes, she could 
 have paid the funeral expenses twice over and 
 had enough left to buy a very decent grave 
 "stun."
 
 FOOL 259 
 
 "So you're thinkin' 'bout goin' off an' leavin' 
 us, be ye, Mandy?" Alexander's words were 
 thrown out as if he did not like the taste of 
 them. "I've been calc'latin' on your comin' 
 home to give yer sister a chance ; that was the 
 bargain, wa'n't it?" Then turning to his 
 younger daughter, "Go inter the house, Faith- 
 ful, and set a 'piece' on the table if you're goin' 
 to; I want ter hev a little talk with yer sister 
 alone." This was said with a sweeping glance 
 over the young man at his side, who walked 
 away, industriously chewing a straw. 
 
 Faith, giving her sister a glance of admoni- 
 tion tempered with sympathy, walked slowly 
 toward the house. With her hand on the 
 kitchen door latch, she paused, glancing back 
 at the two under the tree. Amanda was look- 
 ing down at her white hands that lay clenched 
 in her lap. Her father stood with folded arms, 
 looking down at her. There was a look of 
 trouble and anxiety in Faith's eyes, when, a half 
 hour later her father came in alone, and she 
 sank into a chair. 
 
 "Oh, Daddy! They're gone. What made 
 you let them go ? Oh, what made you ?" 
 
 "Wa'al, Mandy sassed me, 'n' I told her 't I 
 guessed we c'd git along without her. This 
 house ain't good 'nough fer her sence she's been
 
 260 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 to the city; she wants carpits and picters an' 
 things, so I jes' told her right out plain she 
 might go an' stay if she wanted to, she was 
 gittin' too dam fine fer us. I vow, I never see 
 sech a sassy girl." 
 
 "Oh, Daddy! You quarreled with Mandy?" 
 
 "Wa'al, I guess you kin call it that if you 
 want tew ; it wa'n't nothin' else. She's ashamed 
 of her brother ; she said so right out an' out, and 
 she's ashamed o' me too. I've seen it stickin' 
 out a good while, but I hain't said nothin'. She 
 don't want me to say much when her comp'ny 
 comes. She tole me so once. S'pose I don't 
 talk proper 'nough to suit her. It's hurt my 
 feelin's terrible, but I've kep' it to myself. 
 Didn't hev nobody to send me to school when 
 I was a boy m' father died had to work ter 
 take care o' mother an' Dick." A cough 
 grappled with a sob in the old man's throat as 
 he bent to hide the struggle, and lay a stick of 
 wood on the dead ashes. 
 
 "She don't never want ter set eyes on her 
 home agin. She said so." 
 
 "Mandy didn't mean it, Daddy; she was 
 angry." 
 
 "We've worked like 'Sam Hill' to send her 
 to school," continued the old man, "an' this's
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 261 
 
 what we git for it." With his fingers Alex- 
 ander combed his iron grey beard that hung 
 from his chin in the shape of a whisk broom. 
 
 They sat on opposite sides of the table. Faith 
 ate crumbs that choked her, and her father, in 
 an unconscious endeavor to show that his 
 appetite was not affected by the quarrel, ate, 
 or rather swallowed in great gulps, four pieces 
 of cake, then he put on his hat and went out to 
 the barn. Faith sat a long time at the table, 
 brushing crumbs into little heaps on the clean 
 table-cloth, and gazing out over the wood pile. 
 
 "I guess he thought the cake was bread. 
 Poor Daddy. He didn't touch his tea. I shall 
 have to throw it out. Do you want it, Wallie ?" 
 The boy settled the question of the tea without 
 a word and helped himself to the largest piece 
 of cake. 
 
 "Wallie, don't take so much into your mouth 
 at once. Daddy doesn't do that way; nor Mr. 
 Nathan, nor Uncle Dick. Uncle Dick is coming 
 to see us next Sunday. You watch him when 
 he comes, and try to do as he does. Will you, 
 dear?" 
 
 "No, I won't" declared the boy with a pout. 
 
 "Wallie, do you want to make sister cry?" 
 He shook his head vigorously.
 
 262 TOLrLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 Faith in tears was the one thing that could 
 move Wallie. She had brought him into sub- 
 jection many times by simulated sobs, but he 
 had learned to distinguish between the false and 
 the true. 
 
 "Wallie, you make Faith very unhappy 
 because you don't try to act like other people. 
 Won't you try? just to please sister." The 
 boy shook his head, and, taking another piece 
 of cake, crammed the whole of it into his mouth 
 and swallowed it, blinking. Faith burst into 
 tears, and wept as if quite discouraged. Wallie's 
 eyes filled with tears and he pushed Faith's 
 bowed head. 
 
 "Stop, sister, stop ! Wallie won't eat any 
 more cake," he blubbered. And as Faith 
 raised her head, he held a piece of the cake to 
 her lips. "Sister eat it. Wallie'll be good boy 
 won't eat cake any more." Faith smiled. 
 
 "That isn't what sister meant, dear. Put the 
 cake back ; Faith doesn't want it. Listen, and 
 try to understand. You may eat cake, but don't 
 fill your mouth so full." 
 
 "Like Uncle Dick," suggested the boy. 
 
 "Yes, like Uncle Dick. Sister's very sad, 
 Wallie. Mandy is never coming home to live 
 any more. She's going to get married. We
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 263 
 
 shall have to live here without her, always. Just 
 you, and Daddy, and I. Faith can't ever get 
 married. She'll have to stay here till she gets 
 old and let everybody else get married and be 
 happy. She forgot for a few days forgot her 
 duty, and thought she might be happy, too. But 
 she remembers now that it's impossible. So 
 she has just made up her mind to stay here with 
 you and Daddy, in mother's place. Caleb will 
 marry some other girl " She choked here 
 and fresh tears coursed down her cheeks. 
 "Sister can't ever go to school any more, either, 
 Wallie, and that's another reason why she can't 
 get married. Girls who can't be educated 
 shouldn't get married." Thus Faith sought 
 relief in word expression, while Wallie swooped 
 flies off the table with his hand. 
 
 "Don't Wallie. Don't pull the flies to pieces. 
 It's cruel." He stopped instantly. Faith 
 smiled. "You do love sister, don't you, 
 Wallie?" For reply, the boy took her in his 
 arms and kissed her cheek. 
 
 "I know he's getting better I just know it; 
 I don't care what Mandy says. What if he 
 should get well or nearly well? what if he 
 should. I'd go to school first and graduate 
 and then " A smile that was like sunshine in
 
 264 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 mist overspread her face, and as she cleared the 
 table she hummed, in a low voice, a cradle song. 
 It is so easy for the young to hope. 
 
 Amanda's wedding cards were out. Hannah 
 had just fetched them from the postoffice at the 
 Corners. 
 
 "Are you going, Aunt Hannah ?" 
 
 "No. I ain't goin'." Hannah threw out her 
 words as if they were uncomfortably hot. She 
 had seated herself, with unusual emphasis, in a 
 straight back chair. She was particularly 
 partial to rocking chairs, but this morning she 
 was not in a rocking mood. She shut her snuff 
 box with a snap. The stiff little iron grey curls 
 that hung on her cheeks jigged about spitefully 
 as if at one with her in feeling. 
 
 "I like weddin's," she continued; "they ain't 
 nothin' I like better 'nless it's a fust-class 
 funeral, but I ain't goin' on no such invitation as 
 she has sent me." 
 
 "Why, didn't you get one like this, Aunt 
 Hannah?" 
 
 "Yes, but I got a letter from her yistiddy." 
 
 "What in the world did she say ? Was it 
 unkind?" 
 
 "She tole me what to wear and what to say 
 when folks spoke to me. I ain't use ter that.
 
 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 265 
 
 Guess I know what to say's well 's the next one. 
 They can't nobody git ahead o' me when it 
 comes to talkin'. That's my strongest pint. 
 Hezekier use' ter say 't I beat all the women he 
 ever see. He said 't I c'd talk him inter the 
 headache an' out again afore most women c'd 
 turn 'round. She tole me to wear my brown 
 silk, and she said she wished I'd cut the cape 
 off, 'cause 'twas out o' fashion." 
 
 In Hannah's eyes, this was the crowning 
 insult to her best dress. Amanda had suggested 
 various other changes. 
 
 "Why, they's four yards o' fringe on that 
 cape, an' eight yards o' gimp trimmin'. I see 
 myself a cuttin' of it off. It's the handsomest 
 part o' the hull dress. It took Miss Sykes two 
 days to make that cape." 
 
 "Who is Miss Sykes, Aunt Hannah?" 
 
 "She was Mis' Blackmore's second cousin. 
 She passed away, poor thing, some'rs about 
 eight year ago this comin' fall. She died with 
 consumption. Commonest kind of disease," 
 observed Hannah, in a contemptuous whisper. 
 "I sh'd hate dretfully to die with it." 
 
 "What else did Mandy " 
 
 "Oh, yes. She tole me 't I would be doin' 
 her a favor to say nothn' 'bout the misery in 
 my stummick. She said that when folks ast how
 
 266 TOLLIVER'S FOOL 
 
 I was, they didn't want ter know, an' they 
 didn't expect me to go an' tell 'em. She said 
 'twas allus best to say you was well whether 
 you was or not. Now I ain't goin' to do no 
 sech thing. When folks ask me how I be, I'm 
 goin' to tell 'em the truth. No, I ain't goin' to 
 the weddin', Faithful, I ain't goin' a step." 
 
 Faith walked out to the gate with her Aunt 
 Hannah, where they sat for half an hour in 
 earnest conversation. Faith had done the most 
 of the talking; Hannah's part in it having been 
 almost entirely of an exclamatory nature. 
 
 "Wa'al, when's this wonderful pussen a 
 comin'?" Hannah's nose was in the air, and 
 her tone was incredulous. 
 
 "He's here now. Caleb, with Daddy's and 
 my consent, wrote to him about it two weeks 
 ago, but he couldn't come then. He's here 
 now on his vacation. He thinks all Wallie's 
 trouble is caused by a pressure on the brain, 
 where the indenture is that could be relieved 
 by such an operation as I have described to 
 you; trephining they call it. His father- 
 young Dr. Gaylord's father is an eminent 
 surgeon he has performed some wonderful 
 cures and Wallie will be in his care. I shall go 
 along, of course. Now, what do you think 
 about it, Aunt Hannah?"
 
 TOLWVER'S FOOL 267 
 
 "Wa'al, I don't b'lieve the Lord ever 
 calc'lated to hev us saw holes in folkses heads 
 to git sense intew 'em. That ain't the way He 
 does. I don't b'lieve in no sech doin's, an I ain't 
 goin' to say 't I dew." 
 
 Fortunately, Caleb's friend, the young Dr. 
 Gaylord, won Wallie's heart with little effort. 
 They went together, hunting, fishing and swim- 
 ming, and when, after a fortnight's stay, the 
 young doctor was ready to go home, Wallie 
 was not only willing but anxious to go with 
 him. 
 
 Three weeks later, a letter from Boston 
 brought the good news that Wallie was out of 
 danger from the operation, and that the im- 
 provement in his mental condition was great. 
 
 "You wouldn't know him, Daddy," wrote 
 Faith. "He is so white, and he talks much 
 more than he ever did before. He does ask 
 such odd questions ! Oh, how I love him, 
 Daddy ! my own, dear brother. And how I love 
 God for giving him back to us. I long to have 
 you see him and to have all the neighbors see 
 his beautiful, intelligent face and particularly 
 those who have called him our 'Fool.' God 
 forgive them. He smiled at me today, and it 
 made me so happy I cried. I hid my face in 
 the bed clothes, and he smoothed my hair. I
 
 268 TOLLJVER'S FOOL 
 
 think he must love me, don't you think so? I 
 have written to Caleb thanking him for his 
 kindness, and I wish you would thank him too, 
 for it was he suggested the operation and in- 
 sisted upon it until we were almost offended 
 with him. And, Daddy, here is something you 
 do not know: Caleb sent for the doctor to come 
 to see Wallie. He did not come for a vaca- 
 tion as we supposed, and Caleb obligated him- 
 self to pay the bills, but don't tell him we found 
 it out. Now, we can pay our own bills, thank 
 the Lord and dear old Uncle Dick. Wallie is 
 looking at me now. He says it is medicine 
 time, and it is; just four o'clock. He has the 
 doctor's watch and he has already learned to 
 tell the time, and only think, Daddy, we have 
 been here but seven weeks yesterday. You 
 asked me about the fits. I thought I had told 
 you. He has had no sign of a fit since the 
 operation, and the doctor says he will never 
 have any more. I'm so glad Aunt Hannah at 
 last is coming to live with us. With love to 
 her and to all. 
 
 "Your happy daughter, 
 
 "Faithful Evalyn Tolliver." 
 
 A long, wet winter had passed, and Faith 
 again sat in the sunshine among the roses.
 
 TOLIJVER'S FOOL 269 
 
 Caleb sat by her side, and Prince, the proudest, 
 sleekest six-year-old in the county, waltzed 
 with impatient nodding around the hitching 
 post. Wallie sat on the door-step with his chin 
 resting in one hand. 
 
 "What's he doing, Faith?" 
 
 "He's reading in my old first reader. This 
 is the second time he has read it through. Don't 
 you think he is doing well ?" 
 
 "How could he help it with such a teacher? 
 What a handsome boy Wallie is! He looks 
 well in his new suit." 
 
 "Yes, my brother is handsome, isn't he? 
 Everybody says so." Faith was fond of saying 
 "my brother." Her eyes followed Wallie as he 
 rose, slipped the reader into his pocket and 
 started out towards the barn, whistling as he 
 walked along. 
 
 "He learned that from you, Caleb." 
 
 "What, whistling?" 
 
 "No, jumping." Wallie glanced back 
 innocently after he had overleapt the gate, to 
 see if his feat had been remarked. 
 
 For years Wallie seemed a little queer at 
 times, but nature's kind hands were slowly but 
 surely gathering up the lost threads that had so 
 long lain loose in the fine fabric of his mind. 
 
 "I never saw you look so happy, Faith, and
 
 270 TOLUVER'S FOOL 
 
 it rejoices my heart, but I am, like all men, 
 selfish; and I cannot help wishing that you 
 loved me well enough to give up your idea of 
 graduating and make me happy, too. You 
 could go on studying as you are you could 
 have an instructor if you wished. I haven't a 
 very attractive future to offer you, it is true : I 
 shall soon be preaching at Pemberton Brook in 
 a little church not much bigger than a mouse 
 trap, and I shall have to go there every Sunday 
 rain or shine. I thought I wouldn't mention 
 this again, but as I tell you, I'm selfish: I 
 should like to be happy." Caleb looked very 
 forlorn. "I know, too, how futile it is to urge 
 you, for your heart is set on the form of 
 graduating; you've made up your mind, and 
 that settles it, I suppose." Caleb spoke with 
 some bitterness. Faith smiled quizzically, but 
 Caleb was not looking at her; he was examin- 
 ing the handle of his umbrella ; one of the rivets 
 in the name plate had become loosened, and he 
 was trying to press it back with his thumb nail. 
 
 "You certainly wouldn't wish me to change 
 my mind after I've got it all made up, Caleb." 
 
 "Indeed I would," was the quick reply. "It 
 would do you good; you're just a little too 
 too"
 
 FOOL 271 
 
 "Stubborn?" 
 
 "N no determined, I think is the word." 
 
 "I tell you, you do not wish me to change 
 my mind, Caleb. Because I've changed it once ; 
 I changed it last night after you went home. If 
 I should change it again, you'd have to ride all 
 alone to that little 'mouse trap of a ' 
 
 "Caleb ! How you scared me. You were so 
 quick," stammered Faith blushing. "No one 
 could see us out here; the shrubbery's too 
 thick. Aunt Hannah ? Oh, she's busy getting 
 supper she hardly ever looks out of the 
 window, anyway." 
 
 Faith's cheeks were blazing with color, as a 
 moment later, Caleb backed towards the gate, 
 laughing, and she turned to go into the house. 
 
 "It's the very last time I shall ever reprove 
 you for haste, Caleb Garland, so now! You 
 needn't come over tomorrow; I shall not be at 
 home." And with her golden head held high, 
 she moved slowly towards the house, glancing 
 back over her shoulder now and again, at the 
 tall, willowy form of her lover, riding at an 
 easy canter towards the woods. She waited 
 on the kitchen porch until he was about to pass 
 under the Green Arch, when she raised her 
 handkerchief over her head and let it flutter for
 
 272 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 
 
 a moment like a tiny white bird held by the leg. 
 He turned just in time to see a twinkle of it, 
 and smiling, raised his hat as he disappeared 
 into the dusky woods. A happier face and a 
 lighter heart never passed under the Green 
 Arch. 
 
 " 'Pears to me, Faithful, 't you'd ort ter hev a 
 leetle somethin' or other 'round yer shoulders 
 when you set out after sundown. What a 
 jumper young Mr. Garland is !" 
 
 "A jumper?" 
 
 "Yes. I've been sewin' there by the winder 
 and I see him jump over the fence. Why laws 
 a me, he never even teched it. That's jest the 
 way yer Uncle Hezekier use' ter c'd jump afore 
 we was married." The accusation in the 
 emphasized "we" did not escape Faith, and the 
 dimples in her cheeks deepened, but she said 
 nothing, as she had already decided to tell Aunt 
 Hannah all about it after supper. 
 
 They sat talking on the door-step. The full 
 moon shone in their faces with a clear silver 
 light. Faith had just paused after telling her 
 secret. A cricket somewhere under the porch 
 sang an interlude, then Hannah burst forth. 
 
 "Wa'al, for massy's sakes alive ! You don't 
 tell! I never heerd o' the like in all my born 
 days. It jes' seems to me 's if I can't stan' it
 
 TOLLJVER'S FOOL, 273 
 
 nohow. The idee! In six weeks, did ye say? 
 Why, laws a me! That's dretful soon. An' 
 you're goin' on studyin' to home after you're 
 married. I hain't a word to say agin it, though ; 
 not a single word. He's jest the likeliest feller 
 't I know of. He makes me think o' Hezekier 
 every time I see him jump over the fence." 
 Hannah wiped off with her apron the tears 
 that were streaming down her face. They sat, 
 silent, for a few minutes. Already Hannah's 
 provident nature had begun action in the new 
 field that lay open before her. The cricket 
 went on with his song, and Tiger rubbed his 
 smooth sides against Faith's arm, pleading with 
 soft purring for his meed of attention. 
 
 "Do you like that red star quilt o' mine, 
 Faithful? Er would you ruther the basket 
 pattern? You kin hev jest whichever one you 
 like best, an' you kin hev jest as many yarbs 
 as you need; I'll jest divide with ye. I've got 
 more leptander 'n I kin ever use. You can hev 
 half I've got. You kin have some saffron, too, 
 an' some catnip. I hain't got much catnip, but 
 you kin hev all I've got. I gin a'most all I had 
 to Mis' Blackmore's niece when her twins was 
 born. I'll gether a lot o' fresh when I go down 
 to Pemberton again. They's lots there." 
 There was another silence. Tiger, emboldened
 
 274 TOL,LIVER'S FOOL 
 
 by Faith's gently smoothing his fur, had coiled 
 himself up in her lap for a doze. 
 
 "I s'pose you'll 'stand up' in white, Faithful." 
 Faith nodded, adding: "I suppose so, but I 
 hadn't thought about it." 
 
 "What would you think ud look best for 
 me to wear?" Hannah spoke with hesita- 
 tion. Her brown silk had received one severe 
 snub, and the fear of another weakened her 
 voice, though her own faith in her best dress 
 had weathered the storm of abuse and remained 
 unshaken. Faith looked up quickly. 
 
 "Why, wear your brown silk, of course." 
 
 "Jest as 'tis, Faithful? with the shoulder 
 cape?" This was the "tug of war," and the 
 poor old woman choked with apprehension. 
 
 "Why, certainly with the cape on. And you 
 must wear your lace collar, and your cameo 
 breastpin, and your gold chain, with the seal 
 pencil." 
 
 "Yes, I guess that'll look jest about as well 's 
 anything 't I've got," she replied, with bridled 
 acquiescence. As she turned her head, the 
 moon shone full in her face ; it was a picture of 
 content ; her beloved finery was vindicated, and 
 would once more shine at a wedding. The 
 leaves rustled softly as they sat, silent. Hannah 
 spoke in a low tone.
 
 TOLUVER'S FOOL 275 
 
 "Mine's a'most jest the color of a new one 
 Mrs. Bridgman had on to meetin', one day, two 
 three weeks ago." 
 
 "What, Aunt Hannah?" 
 
 "My brown silk dress. I say it's a'most jest 
 the color o' one Mis' Bridgman wears." 
 
 "Mrs. Bridgman wears black now, poor 
 thing," observed Faith. "You know she lost 
 her son last week. He was one of Mandy's 
 teachers." 
 
 "Oh, yes. He was one of the p'ofessers I 
 heerd you an' Mandy an' Ben talkin' 'bout 
 'tother day, that died settin' up in his chair. 
 What was it Mandy said he died with in his 
 hands, Faithful? 
 
 "The curriculum, Aunt Hannah. He died 
 sitting at his desk with the curriculum in his 
 hands." 
 
 "Poor dear man, how he must 'a' suffered! 
 My han's has felt kinder queer lately 'pears 
 to be a kind of wa'al I dunno's I kin jes' tell 
 but when I fust wake up in the morin', they's a 
 kind of a What'd you say, Faithful? What 
 be you smilin' for?" 
 
 "Why, I said I hadn't heard you complain for 
 a long time of the misery in your stomach, or 
 the agony in your left leg. I guess they must 
 have got well, haven't they?" For a moment
 
 276 TOLUVER'S FOOL, 
 
 Hannah seemed a little disconcerted at the 
 observation of her niece, then she said: 
 
 "I've had so much to do an' to think about 
 an' to ten' to sence I've been stayin' over here, 
 't I've neglected myself shameful. I'll go right 
 straight off and make me some penerile tea an' 
 drink it."
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 277
 
 "Dear me, there's a fly! first one I've seen 
 this spring. Merandy, I wish you'd come in 
 here an' ketch this fly. There he is, a-settin' 
 on that tidy." 
 
 Tabitha Perkins was a widow. She sat by 
 the window, felling the seams of a nightgown. 
 She was a tall, thin, dignified woman of fifty, 
 with a face that would have been comely had it 
 been less severe. She thought more about her 
 enemies than about her friends; more about 
 the cruelty and injustice of mankind than 
 about the mercy and goodness of God. She 
 had dressed since she was forty in either grey 
 or black. She wore her silvery brown hair in 
 three long curls on either side, with the re- 
 mainder twisted into a knot, high on the crown 
 of her head. A broad tortoise shell comb sur- 
 mounted the knot. 
 
 Tabitha was painfully industrious and obtru- 
 sively neat. It had even been said that she 
 scoured the nail heads in the board fence in 
 front of her house, and that she had five 
 
 279
 
 280 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 different dish cloths in daily use. She denied 
 stoutly ever having scoured the nail heads, but 
 owned up frankly to the five dish cloths. They 
 were all marked neatly in a corner with red 
 thread and hung in a row over the sink. On 
 the first one were the letters "M. P. & P."- 
 milk pail and pans ; on the next one, "G. W."- 
 glass ware; on the next, "C. & S." cups and 
 saucers; the next, "A. O. D. & C." all other 
 dishes and cutlery ; and the last one in the row, 
 which was a size larger than the others, was 
 marked "I. W. & S." iron ware and stove. 
 
 Miranda Jenkins was a niece of the widow 
 Perkins, the orphan child of her only brother. 
 She was about twenty-four and had lived with 
 her aunt since she was five years old. She was 
 almost dwarfish in size, with a white, freckled 
 face, large, yellowish grey eyes, and an abund- 
 ance of red hair. She gave one, at a passing 
 -glance, the impression of being mostly eyes and 
 hair, and it was not until after recovering from 
 the peculiar shock produced by so much eyes 
 and hair, that one saw her pleasant, passive face 
 and pretty, childish lips emerging, as it seemed, 
 from a shadow. 
 
 Miranda Jenkins rarely gave expression to 
 her thoughts. The widow Perkins, in her en-
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 281 
 
 deavor to improve upon the maxim that young 
 people should be seen and not heard, had taught 
 her niece that she should be neither seen nor 
 heard. If asked her opinion on any subject, 
 Miranda's - reply was almost invariably, "I 
 dunno, what do you think ?" 
 
 The people of the village rarely took the 
 trouble to address any remarks to her now 
 beyond the customary, "how di do," many con- 
 sidering her dull. Only the few who knew her 
 intimately, and had noticed the unspoken 
 philosophy and originality of her ways, gave her 
 credit for ordinary intelligence. 
 
 Mrs. Perkins watched her niece with untiring 
 vigilance lest she drift into slovenly habits. Un- 
 cleanliness, in Tabitha's unwritten creed, was 
 almost the unpardonable sin. She would 
 pounce upon the girl at unexpected moments, 
 snatch the dish cloth from her hands, and 
 examine the embroidered letters in the corner 
 to make sure that the blood of her ancestors 
 was not being disgraced by a Jenkins forming 
 untidy habits. 
 
 Both women wore felt shoes about the house 
 because leather ones were wearing on the 
 carpet; consequently their footsteps were as 
 noiseless as those of a cat.
 
 282 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 There were four rooms in the little one story 
 cottage besides the kitchen, parlor, sitting- 
 room and two bedrooms. The parlor was 
 furnished with a bright Brussels carpet, with 
 large, sprawling figures, plain muslin curtains, 
 a set of black haircloth furniture, and a small 
 marble center table. The principal ornaments 
 were a straw-and-bead "air-castle" hanging 
 from the ceiling, a hair wreath in a frame, a 
 large picture of Washington on horseback, and 
 some Wax pond lilies under a glass globe on 
 the table. 
 
 In the sitting-room was a striped rag carpet, 
 flag-bottom chairs, and numerous home-made 
 rugs of braided rags. 
 
 Miranda came in from the kitchen with a little 
 hitch in her step ; one leg was shorter than the 
 other. 
 
 "Where is the fly, Aunt Tabby?" 
 
 "Why, right there on the back o' the rockin' 
 chair. Now be sure you git him, Merandy; 
 flies do make a house look so untidy, an' it puts 
 me all on aige to see one." 
 
 "Yes'm," murmured the girl. Miranda drew 
 back her arm and took aim. With a swoop that 
 whirled her half round, her hand skimmed the 
 back of the chair. She opened her fist 
 one finger at a time, while her intended victim
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 283 
 
 sat on the edge of the pink china lamp shade, 
 rubbing his head with his forelegs in a con- 
 gratulatory fashion. 
 
 "Did ye git him, Mirandy" asked her aunt 
 without looking up. 
 
 "No, he got away." 
 
 "You're too slow, child, you're too mortal 
 slow. Now, where is that fly ? I s'pose I'll hev 
 to ketch him myself. Oh, there he is on the 
 lamp shade; I see him. Now, don't you come 
 near or you'll scare him." 
 
 Miranda, with her arms behind her, backed 
 up against the wall and stood still. Tabitha 
 laid down her work and stepped cautiously 
 toward the small, wary intruder, her long arm 
 extended. 
 
 "Now you watch me, Merandy; you'll see 't 
 you've got to be quick to ketch a fly." 
 
 She made a nice calculation, brought her 
 hand down with a sweeping stroke, and the 
 pink lamp shade lay in a thousand fragments at 
 her feet. 
 
 "Did ye git him, Aunt Tabby?" asked the 
 girl, stepping forward without a change in the 
 expression of her face. 
 
 "Of course I did," she snapped out, giving 
 her niece a withering look. "Seems to me you 
 couldn't V fastened that shade on very well,
 
 284 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 Merandy. Go git that blue one and wash it, 
 an' sweep up these pieces." 
 
 "Why, don't ye know you put the shade on 
 yerself while I was cleanin' There must 'a' 
 been two flies, Aunt Tabby, fer there's one now 
 settin' right on top o' your comb. Hold reel 
 still an' I'll be quick an' see if I can't ketch 
 him;" and Miranda drew back her arm. 
 
 "No, never mind the fly, Merandy, go out an' 
 ten' to yer beans; 'pears to me I smell 'em 
 burnin'." 
 
 "O, no ye don't, I ain't put 'em on yet, they're 
 soakin'." 
 
 "Well, then, put 'em on or they won't git 
 done fer dinner." 
 
 Tabitha picked up her work and resumed her 
 sewing. She always sewed as if her life de- 
 pended upon it, rarely taking time to glance 
 out of the window, excepting when she unreeled 
 and bit off a new thread, when she could glance 
 up and down the road without losing any time. 
 The needle came up with a little more of a jerk 
 than usual after the fly hunt, but it soon sub- 
 sided into the regular, even motion. 
 
 Mrs. Perkins had a way of giving herself 
 "stents," and she would do her stent if she had 
 to sit up half the night. 
 
 "Why, there comes Mary Blake. I wonder
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 285 
 
 what she wants. I hope her mother ain't got 
 another turn, she jest hed one last week." 
 
 Tabitha bit off her thread and set the spool 
 back on the window sill. The door was wide 
 open. 
 
 The child stood on the step, rapping with her 
 soft knuckles on the door post without making 
 as much noise as the pecking of a fledgling. 
 She stepped about, lifting one foot then the 
 other; the sun shining on the stone step had 
 heated it, so that it burned her bare feet. 
 Tabitha could see the edge of her blue dress 
 and she wondered why she didn't come in ; she 
 had no idea the child was knocking. 
 
 "Come in, Mary, what ye standin' there fer?" 
 
 The little girl edged slowly in, with one finger 
 between her lips, and slid sidewise into the first 
 chair she came to. Her black eyes shone like 
 polished ebony under her pink sunbonnet, and 
 she kept them fixed in an apprehensive gaze on 
 Tabitha's face. Her little brown toes hung 
 about four inches from the floor; one of them 
 had a dirty rag wound round it. 
 
 "How's yer ma, Mary?" The child cleared 
 her throat a little, and blushed, but made no 
 reply. Tabitha took a few more stitches and 
 looked up again. 
 
 "Is she pretty well?"
 
 286 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 No reply. Tabitha took a few more stitches. 
 "You've got a sore toe, ain't ye, Mary?" 
 
 The little girl glanced down at the injured 
 member, then back to the woman's face as if 
 her eyes were drawn there by a magnetism too 
 strong to overcome. 
 
 Tabitha went on sewing, forgetting the child's 
 presence until she looked up to reel off another 
 thread. 
 
 "Yer ma ain't got another turn, has shej 
 Mary? She's pretty well, ain't she?" 
 
 There was an almost imperceptible nod of the 
 pink sunbonnet; Tabitha thought she saw the 
 strings move a little, then a double sigh, almost 
 a sob, shook the child's frame. 
 
 "Here's an empty spool fer ye, Mary, come 
 an' git it if ye want it. I must go in the bed- 
 room now an' git a new spool; I'll be right 
 back," she added, soothingly; but when she re- 
 turned, her visitor and the empty spool had 
 disappeared. 
 
 "I do wonder what the child wanted. I guess 
 I'll go over and see. 'Twon't take me more 
 than fifteen minutes, an' I can finish my stent 
 b'fore candle light if I do leave it a few minutes. 
 I can toe off that stockin' as I walk along." 
 
 Tabitha walked down the road with slow, 
 measured steps, looking up only when she knit
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 287 
 
 a needle out. When she reached Mrs. Blake's 
 gate, she rolled up her work and put it in her 
 knitting bag that hung at her side. 
 
 Mrs. Blake was weeding the garden. Tabitha 
 thought the onion bed came too near the front 
 door, and she was just thinking when Mrs. 
 Blake looked up, that if she were obliged to 
 use her front yard for a vegetable garden, she 
 would have sown lettuce, or sage, or parsley 
 close to the door, and put the onions as far 
 away as possible. 
 
 "Why, how di do, Mis' Perkins? I hope ye 
 ain't come over to tell me you an' Mirandy can't 
 come to the sewin' bee, you're sech a fast " 
 
 "What sewin' bee ? I ain't heard o' no sewin' 
 bee." 
 
 "Why, I sent Mary over to ask ye," said Mrs. 
 Blake, wiping her warm, dusty face on a corner 
 of her apron. "You know I intended to hev it 
 last week, but I had a turn. It's tomorrer after- 
 noon, Mis' Perkins. Didn't Mary ask ye?" 
 
 "No, she come over, but she never said a 
 word. We'll come though; we can come jes' 
 as well's not. Yer lettuce is comin' up, ain't it?" 
 
 "Yes, it's a new kind o' lettuce; I got the 
 seed o' Mr. Jameson; you can have some seed 
 this fall if ye want it, Mis' Perkins. They say 
 the leaves grow most as big as cabbage leaves."
 
 288 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "Yes, I sh'd like to git some, mine's the little 
 kind, but it comes airly. I've got some most 
 big enough t'eat a'ready." 
 
 "Why laws a me, that is airly !" 
 
 "Couldn't you bring cake to the sewin' bee 
 jes' as well as any thing, Mis' Perkins? Mis' 
 Tolbert's goin' to bring jelly and currant jam, 
 an' Mis' Jones is goin' to bring preserve 
 peaches an' cheese, an' Em'ly's goin' to bring 
 tongue an' pickles, an' I'm goin' to furnish the 
 hot rolls and tea. I lef the cake fer you, 'cause 
 you're so good on cake, Mis' Perkins." 
 
 "Why, I'd jest as liv's bring cake as anything ; 
 yes, I'll bring cake." 
 
 Tabitha stood holding her skirts up almost 
 to her knees; there was something about the 
 very presence of Mrs. Blake that made her feel 
 like holding up her skirts. "Well, I mus' be 
 goin', Mis' Blake, good afternoon." 
 
 "Good afternoon, Mis' Perkins, now I shell 
 look fer you an' Merandy airly." 
 
 "Yes, we'll come airly." 
 
 As soon as the gate swung shut, Tabitha took 
 out her knitting and moved like an automaton 
 along the narrow path beside the road leading 
 to her own gate. 
 
 "Merandy, be you sure you washed these 
 tumblers with the G. W. cloth? Seems to me
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 289 
 
 I see a speck on this one." They had just set 
 down to supper. 
 
 "Yes'm, I did, I'm sure." 
 
 "I guess that speck's in the glass then; it 
 mus' be." She held it up toward the window, 
 lowered her glasses from the top of her head 
 and inspected it closely. "Yes, it's in the glass. 
 You mus' be careful, Merandy." 
 
 "Yes'm." 
 
 They had for supper a small dish of cold 
 boiled beans, bread and butter, gooseberry pre- 
 serves and tea. 
 
 Miranda, when she heard of the sewing bee, 
 was like a pea on a griddle. A bright red spot 
 glowed on each cheek. The charity balls of 
 Pepperton were the sewing bees and quiltings. 
 Sometimes the young men came in the evening, 
 when there were plays, such as "Snap and kiss 
 'em," "Button, button," "Drop the handker- 
 chief," etc., but never at Mrs. Blakes ; her house 
 was too small. 
 
 "What shall I wear, Aunt Tabby?" 
 
 "Why, your black silk, of course." The "of 
 course" was brought out as if the respectability 
 of the Jenkinses had been brought into ques- 
 tion. 
 
 Miranda had never worn her black silk. It 
 
 had been made up for her (out of an old one 
 
 s
 
 290 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 that had been her mother's) for more than 
 three months and she had never had an op- 
 portunity to wear it in reality, though she had 
 many times worn it in her dreams. In her 
 dreams, it had been by turns, torn beyond 
 repair, stolen, and burned up; and the night 
 before it had, in the twinkling of an eye, turned 
 into a pair of broadcloth pantaloons. 
 
 Miranda was so worried when she woke up 
 that she lit her candle, opened the large bottom 
 drawer in her bureau, unpinned the sheet her 
 dress was wrapped in, and examined it to make 
 sure it was a dress. When she saw the two 
 sleeves with ruffles of lace in the wrists crossed 
 reverently on the bosom, and the row of jet 
 buttons that glittered in the candle light, she 
 crept back into bed satisfied. 
 
 "Merandy, don't be a-settin' there with idle 
 hands. If you're done eatin' you better peel 
 them cold boiled potatoes to fry fer breakfast, 
 an' when you've got that done, sift the flour 
 for the cake ; it's got to be baked tonight so it'll 
 be cold fer tomorrer. I've got to go right to 
 my sewin' or I sha'n't git my stent done." 
 
 Tabitha made, according to her theory, every 
 motion count. Her hand flew up from the 
 limp muslin with marvelous speed and almost 
 mechanical regularity. One would have thought
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 291 
 
 to see her work, that something must have 
 happened to all of her nightgowns at once, and 
 that she was obliged to finish this one before 
 she could possibly go to bed. 
 
 Tabitha Perkins always sat up straight; it 
 was not natural for her to bend either physically 
 or metaphorically. In her effort to resist the 
 pressure of age, she bore herself at fifty more 
 erectly, if not more gracefully, than she had 
 done at thirty. 
 
 She was at heart, and always had been, a 
 Methodist, though for twenty years she had 
 been a regular attendant at the Baptist church. 
 
 At the age of twenty-eight, Tabitha Perkins 
 became a widow. Two years later she began 
 receiving the attentions of an old lover whom 
 she had, by parental authority, been forced to 
 discard on account of his wild ways and in- 
 attention to business, and who had, since her 
 marriage, reformed and become a pillar of the 
 church. 
 
 Jonathan Allen had loved the tall, graceful 
 Tabitha Jenkins with all his better self, and 
 when he returned from one of his vagabond 
 trips to Boston, resolved that it should be the 
 last, he was bitterly disappointed to find that 
 Tabitha's engagement to his hated rival, 
 Richard Perkins, had just been announced.
 
 292 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 On the last evening of the protracted meet- 
 ings in the winter following Tabitha's marriage, 
 Jonathan Allen rose from his seat behind the 
 stove, and, with an air of defiance and an im- 
 patient jerk of his broad shoulders, as if he 
 would shake off some restraining influence, 
 "went forward" to the surprise of everybody, 
 and knelt at the mourners' bench. 
 
 Whatever it was that took place, he rose a 
 changed man, and on the first opportunity 
 joined the Methodist church of which Tabitha 
 and her husband had long been members. 
 
 At the age of thirty (two years after her hus- 
 band's death) the widow put off all outward 
 show of grief, and when she appeared at meet- 
 ing one Sunday morning early in September, 
 dressed in violet lawn and white ribbons, at 
 least one good brother voted her more charm- 
 ing than ever. 
 
 The following Sunday Jonathan walked home 
 with her from class-meeting and on the next 
 Sunday evening, when they came walking into 
 meeting together, the sisters gave one another 
 knowing looks and whispered behind their 
 hymn books. Every one of them had known 
 all along just how it would be. They were all 
 glad too, good souls (with the exception of two
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 293 
 
 or three mothers with grown daughters of their 
 own), for they had long known of Jonathan's 
 love for Tabitha, and the sight of his face every 
 Sunday for five years, when brother and sister 
 Perkins walked into meeting, had kept their 
 pity on edge. 
 
 When the snows of winter came on, Jonathan 
 and Tabitha were living in that delicious chaotic 
 state of love's uncertainty, between the ecstatic 
 joy of absolute belief and shivering shadows of 
 doubt, verging on an understanding. 
 
 One bitter cold Sunday night between Christ- 
 mas and New Year, Jonathan Allen, accom- 
 panied by the minister, Elder Crane, and one 
 of the trustees, Carlos Doolittle, was wading 
 through the deep snow past the house of the 
 young widow Perkins. They had been out to 
 pay a visit to one of their oldest brothers, who 
 lay at death's door with paralysis. On account 
 of the deep snow, there was no service at the 
 church on this Sunday evening. 
 
 Jonathan's heart beat faster and the hot blood 
 of youth rushed wildly through his veins as 
 they came up even with Tabitha's little white 
 cottage and saw a light shining in her bedroom 
 window. 
 
 "Why, I wonder what Sister Perkins is up
 
 294 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 so late for," said the minister. "It must be near 
 eleven o'clock/' (In Pepperton nine o'clock 
 was considered bed time.) 
 
 "I hope there's nothin' wrong, I hope she's 
 well. Mebbe mebbe we'd better mebbe 
 one of us 'd better " said Elder Crane, casting 
 a significant look at Jonathan "mebbe you'd 
 better just walk up to the door and see if any- 
 body's sick, Brother Allen." 
 
 Jonathan, with a set face and white lips, had 
 faced about and stood staring at the lighted 
 window where, on the lowered shade, was 
 clearly outlined the dark silhouette of the 
 woman he loved, knitting as if her life or that 
 of some one else depended upon it. 
 
 The three men stood in line, knee deep in 
 snow, staring blankly at the dark picture. As 
 if of one mind, each man drew out his watch ; 
 it was ten minutes before eleven. The watches 
 snapped in unison and were replaced in their 
 pockets. 
 
 The minister's eyes were raised for a moment 
 to the heavensand he murmured in a low, hoarse 
 voice, tremulous with emotion, "May the Lord 
 have mercy." 
 
 Jonathan was glad the snow was deep; it 
 gave him an excuse for staggering. The wind 
 was blowing hard, beating their cold, wet faces
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 295 
 
 with sharp, cutting snow. The three men parted 
 without exchanging a word as to what they had 
 seen. Jonathan wiped the frozen tears from 
 his face as he entered his own gate. He could 
 hardly see the path through his ice-bound 
 lashes. His mother, who kept house for him, 
 was in bed; he closed the door softly so as not 
 to wake her. 
 
 "Did ye shet the entry door when ye come in, 
 Johnny?" came in a piping voice from the bed- 
 room. 
 
 "Yes, mother." 
 
 "I wish you'd see if I wound the clock, 
 Johnny." 
 
 "Yes, mother." 
 
 "An' put a few more sticks o' wood in the 
 stove." 
 
 "Yes, mother." 
 
 "It's a dretful cold night, ain't it?" 
 
 "Pretty cold." 
 
 "How did ye find old Father Smith, Johnny?" 
 
 "Very bad, mother." 
 
 "Ain't he no better?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 There was a deep sigh in the bedroom 
 followed by an audible groan and a few 
 whispered words. 
 
 "Johnny."
 
 296 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "What is it, mother?" 
 
 "Do you think them pertaters '11 freeze?" 
 
 "No, I don't." The note of irritation in the 
 reply to Mrs. Allen's last question seemed to 
 have a soothing effect, for the bed squeaked out 
 the information that she was turning over. 
 
 For two hours Jonathan sat silent and almost 
 immovable before the fire. There was only one 
 thing to be done, he decided. He must have a 
 serious talk with Tabitha; for no longer ago 
 than that very Sunday morning she had spoken 
 in class-meeting, saying : "What a blessed thing 
 it is to have a clean conscience before God." 
 "Good Heaven !" he thought, "and I was about 
 to ask her to be my wife. How can she be such 
 a hypocrite? She don't look it, an' she don't 
 act it usu'ly, I can't git it through my brain 
 nohow Why, Tabithy I'd 'a' staked my life 
 on Tabithy;" and a fresh flood of tears rolled 
 down his cheeks. 
 
 "I was told las' summer that she knit on Sun- 
 days but I didn't b'lieve it an' I can't skeercely 
 b'lieve it now when I see it with m'own eyes. I 
 can never ask her to be my wife now, unless 
 unless she repents." 
 
 It was on this provision that Jonathan hung 
 his hopes, as he took the nearly burned out 
 candle and walked up the narrow stairway to
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 297 
 
 his cheerless room. Some water in a tumbler 
 that stood on his table was frozen solid and 
 bulged up in the middle. 
 
 "Yes, I must have a real serious talk with 
 Tabithy," said Jonathan, as he wet his fingers 
 and pinched the charred smoking wick of his 
 candle then crept into bed. "I don't b'lieve the 
 poor girl realizes that she's a breakin' the 
 Sabbath." And then Tabitha, all unconscious 
 of the burden on her lover's heart, was carried, 
 with all her sins, to the throne of grace in 
 earnest prayer. 
 
 Jonathan had a serious talk with Tabitha, 
 which ended more seriously than he had an- 
 ticipated. 
 
 She was most exasperating in her obstinacy, 
 and would neither admit nor deny knitting on 
 Sundays. She told him she thought she was 
 old enough to judge for herself as to what was 
 right and she "wouldn't be dictated to by 
 nobody." The interview ended, finally, by her 
 ordering him out of doors. 
 
 Tabitha continued to go to meeting, but now 
 a cold wave of disapproval swept over her each 
 time she crossed the well-worn threshold of the 
 little church, over which she had walked with 
 uncertain baby steps, clinging to her mother's 
 finger, longer ago than she could remember;
 
 298 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 over which she had stepped with white slippered 
 feet as a bride, and over which she had trailed 
 her first garments of mourning in the wake of 
 her husband's coffin. 
 
 Two weeks after her quarrel with Jonathan, 
 at the Wednesday evening prayer-meeting, the 
 climax came. Tabitha neither prayed nor spoke ; 
 a feeling that the brothers and sisters had lost 
 faith in her kept her silent. 
 
 Just before the meeting should have closed, 
 there was an embarrassing silence as deep and 
 awful as if the whole Methodist church had 
 been stranded. A few were kind enough to 
 cough a little to relieve the strain. 
 
 One of the sisters, who was by nature vision- 
 ary, declared afterwards that she saw a dark 
 cloud come down from somewhere about the 
 stove pipe hole and hang just over Tabitha's 
 head. But few believed her; they thought, as 
 no one else saw it, that she must have imagined 
 it. 
 
 Finally the minister rose, and said, in low 
 measured words, rendered more impressive by 
 the preceding silence : 
 
 "If there is any one present who has a con- 
 fession to make or er has anything to repent 
 of any secret sins, the brothers and sisters will 
 be glad to listen to her confession ; and may the 
 Lord help us to be honest."
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 299 
 
 He was slowly rubbing the palms of his hands 
 together, and his eyes were fixed on the ceiling 
 over the door, as if he thought it just possible 
 that a few secret sins might show themselves 
 through the plastering. 
 
 A few of the more charitable members 
 glanced surreptitiously toward Tabitha, silently 
 praying, "The Lord help her;" a few others 
 who knew not charity, glared at her openly. 
 
 Jonathan's white face was bowed and covered 
 with his trembling hands. After another 
 minute or two of silence, the sinner rose to her 
 feet; her tall body swayed a little as if she 
 would fall, then she rested her hand on the 
 door of her pew, stood firmly, and turned so as 
 to face most of them. 
 
 "I know what you mean," she began in a 
 voice, tremulous with indignation, "I know 
 perfec'ly well you mean me, an' if I want to knit 
 on Sunday I'm a goin' to do it, an' I sh'd like to 
 see anybody stop me. I know pretty well who's 
 to the bottom o' this, too," with a sneering 
 glance at poor Jonathan, who would have died 
 for her at that very moment "but I ain't got 
 no secret sins that I know of" there were 
 groans from several quarters "an' I ain't got 
 nothing' pertic'lar to repent of, nuther; but it 
 'pears to me that there's some others here that
 
 300 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 ought to lead off in repentin'." She choked up 
 a little here and put her fingers to her white 
 lips, then she continued in a calmer, more 
 natural voice. "I mean whoever 'twas that 
 hired poor ole Grandfather Buckley, that's over 
 seventy year old , to shovel a path for 'em 
 through the snow, to walk to meetin' in, fer fifty 
 cents, an' let him freeze a-doin' of it fer want o' 
 clothes to keep him warm. Them's the one's 
 that ought to confess an' repent it seems to 
 me." Then with a majestic sweep and with her 
 nose in the air, she walked out of the church. 
 
 There was another silence, then the people 
 rose, and the minister pronounced the 
 benediction. 
 
 "I don't see fer my part what she can be 
 alludin' to," remarked Sister Crabapple as she 
 stepped out into the aisle. "I see the ole man 
 this mornin' an' he had on a good overcoat an' 
 a nice, new pair o' warm mittens." Sister Crab- 
 apple had a way of drawing her lips when she 
 spoke, as if she had just tasted of something 
 very puckery. 
 
 "God's ways is past findin' out," remarked 
 another sister, shooting wide of the mark but 
 feeling that she ought to say something. 
 
 "Well, it 'pears to me, brothers and sisters," 
 said Sister Doolittle, in a weak, cracked voice
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 301 
 
 (she hesitated, twisting a loose thread in the 
 finger end of her cotton glove), "that mebbe 
 we'd ought to examine our own eyes before we 
 look for motes in other folkses. This is the 
 only fault we have ever found in Sister Perkins." 
 
 "Quite right, Sister Doolittle, quite right," 
 said the minister, shaking her hand warmly; 
 then he made a few remarks on charity, and the 
 people dispersed. 
 
 Numerous attempts were made by the minis- 
 ter and prominent members of the church to 
 draw Tabitha into a confession or explanation 
 of her conduct, without success. They could 
 do nothing with her, as she would not discuss 
 the matter at all. She had an effectual way of 
 shutting people up ; of ending undesirable con- 
 versation. The next week she withdrew from 
 the church. 
 
 Twenty years had gone by and neither 
 Jonathan nor Tabitha had married. Jonathan 
 had many times tried to speak to Tabitha, but 
 she always appeared to be looking intently at 
 something over and beyond him. 
 
 "I don't want to speak to folks that think I'm 
 a hypocrite," she had replied to Miranda when 
 asked why she had not bowed when Mr. Allen 
 raised his hat and spoke to her at the Fourth of 
 July celebration.
 
 302 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 Tabitha and Miranda were all ready for the 
 sewing bee. 
 
 "Merandy, I guess we'd better take my sewin' 
 machine fixtures over to Mis' Blake. The chil- 
 dren's lost all o' her'n. We can git along so 
 much faster if we can use her machine. Ma- 
 chine sewin's good enough fer them children's 
 clothes." 
 
 Miranda's hands were shaking with excite- 
 ment. She had on her black silk, her mother's 
 gold watch and chain, and a breastpin and ear- 
 rings of cameo that had been in the Jenkins 
 family for two centuries and which she had 
 never before been allowed to wear. 
 
 Tabitha wore her black silk, a broad 
 crocheted collar, and breastpin and earrings 
 made of hair of her dead ancestors. The ear- 
 rings were long, just escaping her shoulders. 
 Tabitha always remarked, when any one spoke 
 of the beauty and wonderful work in her 
 jewelry, that every hair in it was pure Jenkins. 
 
 When Tabitha and Miranda arrived at Mrs. 
 Blake's, the sitting-room was already half full 
 of women of all ages, and a buzz of voices 
 greeted each new comer as the door opened to 
 admit her. 
 
 Emily Tucker was just taking off her things 
 in Mrs. Blake's stuffy little bedroom when
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 303 
 
 Tabitha and Miranda entered. She was a 
 spinster of forty-five, short, stout, freckled and 
 fair. People called her good-hearted. With 
 all her faults (some thought she was afflicted 
 with more than should fall to the lot of one 
 woman), Emily was good natured. She was a 
 walking bureau of information (having a gift 
 for scenting out family secrets), and the best 
 news circulator in the village. She nudged 
 Tabitha and whispered : 
 
 "The Blodgett woman's here." 
 
 "That Blodgett woman" had been in Pepper- 
 ton but a few weeks. She had moved into town 
 from a little farm in the country, where her hus- 
 band had died three years before, hoping to be 
 able to make a living for herself and little son 
 Teddy, by keeping boarders. She had suc- 
 ceeded finally in getting two, the singing 
 teacher and her brother's son from Glenwood, 
 Jonas Pelton. 
 
 "Well, what if she is here? what of it?" asked 
 Tabitha, who saw by Emily's face that she had 
 a piece of news. 
 
 "Why, ain't you heard?" and Emily's eyes, 
 that at times had the look of polished brass, 
 opened wide with surprise. 
 
 "No, I ain't heard nothin'." 
 
 "Why, they do say that Jonathan Allen "
 
 304 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 Emily tiptoed to the door and looked up and 
 down the hall to make sure that no one was 
 coming "is a goin' to marry her," she con- 
 tinued in an explosive whisper. 
 
 If the widow's face turned grey, Emily could 
 not see it, for the window shade was down. 
 Tabitha stood without a flinch before the glass 
 and went on arranging her side curls. 
 
 "Well, guess he's got a right to if he wants 
 to guess nobody'll object." Then she turned 
 boldly and faced Emily. "Is my collar on 
 straight, Em'ly? Seems to me it's jest a leetle 
 to one side." Emily assured her it was on 
 straight then they walked down stairs to the 
 sitting-room. Tabitha's knees threatened to 
 give way as she walked down the steps, but 
 she bore herself bravely. 
 
 It was half past two before the guests had 
 all arrived, and the cutting, basting, and sewing 
 were in full swing. 
 
 "Why, I never heard o' such a thing in all 
 my life !" ejaculated Eliza Pepper who sat close 
 to the window. Miranda declared afterwards 
 that she was looking straight at Eliza when she 
 spoke, and that she could see the lilac bush out- 
 side right through her nose, it was that thin. 
 
 "Nor I," said Mattie Burnham who lived and 
 kept the millinery store in the rooms over the 
 postoffice.
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 305 
 
 "Why, what is it, Miss Rice, an' how is it 
 managed?" asked Mrs. Blake, who stood in the 
 middle of the room with her hands on her hips. 
 
 Miss Rice was a spinster from Boston who 
 was visiting the Crabapples. When Miss Rice 
 laughed, her face looked exactly as if she were 
 going to cry. 
 
 "Why, if any one wants to get married he 
 goes to the office they have a regular office 
 you see," said Miss Rice, looking over her 
 spectacles, "and makes a deposit, I don't know 
 how much, and they arrange a meeting with 
 some woman they have on the list (if it's a man 
 that applies) and if they like one another when 
 they meet, they get married; if they don't like 
 one another, why, they try some one else, an' 
 is this sleeve all ready to sew up, Mrs. 
 Blodgett?" 
 
 "Yes, it is all ready." 
 
 "An' so on till they find one that does suit." 
 
 "Why, laws a me ! An' did you say they 
 was a comin' here, Miss Rice?" asked Susan 
 Grey, a little old maid of sixty, who wore her 
 iron grey hair in stiff little curls that just es- 
 caped her shoulders. They floated over her 
 yellow cheeks as she bent over her sewing. Her 
 head was never quite still; its shaking was the 
 
 result of a nervous disease. 
 T
 
 306 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "No, I didn't say they were comin' here, Miss 
 Grey, I said I shouldn't wonder if they came 
 here soliciting, because there are so many un- 
 married women in Pepperton." 
 
 "I guess there air more now than there will 
 be after a while," said Mrs. Cole, the butcher's 
 wife, looking significantly at Mrs. Blodgett. All 
 Mrs. Cole had to keep her upper lip from falling 
 in when she smiled, was her eye teeth. 
 
 "O dear ! Mis' Perkins, you've cut yer finger, 
 hain't ye?" Tabitha was cutting out some 
 aprons for the children. 
 
 "Not much, jest a little," said Tabitha wind- 
 ing a rag round her finger. 
 
 "Why, you look dretful pale, Tabitha," said 
 Miss Pepper. 
 
 "Why yes, you're as white as chalk," said 
 Miss Grey. "You better lay down a spell." 
 
 "O no, ladies, there ain't no 'casion to lay 
 down, I feel perfec'ly well," and Tabitha re- 
 sumed her place at the cutting table. 
 
 "Well," said Miss Tucker, biting off a long 
 basting thread, "I guess them matrimonial 
 agents wouldn't git much to do if they did come 
 here." She spoke guardedly, as if not quite 
 decided, glancing about the room to see if her 
 words met with approval. 
 
 "No indeed! no indeed!" and "I should say
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 307 
 
 not," came from different quarters of the room, 
 and there was a flashing of mature glances sug- 
 gestive of a sword combat. 
 
 "What did you say they called it, Miss Rice ?" 
 asked Mrs. Blodgett in her quiet way. 
 
 "A Matrimonial Bureau." 
 
 "Well, I never!" said Mrs. Elder Crane as 
 she was called. She was the Baptist minister's 
 wife and a very pretty woman with a mouth that 
 made one think of prunes. It was the only 
 observation she made until they were seated at 
 the supper table, when she asked Miss Rice if 
 she would be kind enough to pass the peaches. 
 The word peaches left a pretty expression on 
 her lips. 
 
 "Mis' Blake, I'm ready to use the machine 
 now, an' there ain't any band on it ; ain't ye got 
 no band ?" and Tabitha sat up straight, waiting. 
 
 "Why bless me !" said Mrs. Blake feeling for 
 the band. "Why, of course I've got a band, 
 'twas there this morning O dear, them boys !" 
 She darted out of doors, returning in a few 
 minutes with the band in her hand. She was 
 warm and panting. 
 
 "Why, how tuckered out you do look, Mis' 
 Blake, have ye been runnin' " and, "Where did 
 you find it?" asked two or three in a breath. 
 
 "Why, Johnny had it on the dog fer a har-
 
 308 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 ness, an' I had to run a'most to the schoolhouse 
 b'fore I could ketch him." Mrs. Blake sank 
 down into the nearest chair and fanned herself 
 with her apron. 
 
 "Why, for massy sakes, Miss Tolbert, you've 
 got this wedth in upside down no ye ain't yes 
 ye have, it's upside down, sure's the world." It 
 was Mrs. Farley who spoke. She had a weak 
 high pitched voice and walked with crutches; 
 they stood up in a corner of the room. 
 
 Prudence would have blushed if she could ; 
 she felt like it, but it was impossible; she had 
 one of those unchangeable bilious complexions. 
 Everybody was surprised, for Prudence had 
 never before been known to make a mistake in 
 sewing, and she had no patience with the mis- 
 takes of others. 
 
 "Why, so I have ; I'll fix it," and she did in 
 the shortest time possible. 
 
 After the cutting and basting were well 
 under way, conversation, until supper was 
 ready, was mostly drowned in the almost steady 
 hum of the sewing machine. 
 
 It was nearly dark when Tabitha and Miranda 
 reached their own gate. They were looking 
 on the ground as if they had lost something. 
 
 "I never in my life see any one as careless
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 309 
 
 as you be, Merandy. Now you go over to Mis' 
 Blake's the first thing in the morning, jest as 
 soon as it's light enough to see, an' hunt -fer 
 that hemmer an' feller. They must 'a' slipped 
 out o' paper on the way home, if you're sure you 
 put 'em in; be you sure, Merandy?" 
 
 "Yes 'm, I'm sure, Aunt Tabby," said the 
 girl with a doleful face and tearful eyes, con- 
 tinuing to search the ground about her feet. 
 
 "We might as well go in, I s'pose; it's too 
 dark to find anything now. I wish you'd make 
 a cup o' tea, Merandy, jest as soon's you git 
 yer dress changed, I declare I couldn't drink 
 that tea o' Mis' Blake's. Did you notice how 
 dirty her teapot cover was? You didn't! well, 
 I don't see how you could help it. Prudence 
 noticed it an' she didn't drink a drop o' her tea, 
 nuther. What was you and Malviny Farley 
 talkin' about when you set over on the lounge 
 together behind me?" 
 
 "O, I dunno How'd you like that cur- 
 rant " 
 
 "Why don't ye tell me what ye was talkin' 
 about ? You used my name an' an' Mis' Blod- 
 gett's I heard part of it you might as well 
 tell me." 
 
 "Why why Malviny said Jonathan Allen
 
 310 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 was goin' to marry Mis' Blodgett, but her 
 mother thought you'd make him a good deal 
 better wife. I ast how she knew he was goin' 
 to marry her, an' she said 'twas all over town. 
 But I don't b'lieve it an' I told her so." 
 
 Tabitha was examining one of her thin silver 
 teaspoons. 
 
 "Well, I should say he's got a right to marry 
 whoever he wants to it ain't likely any man's 
 goin' to ask a woman to marry him that won't 
 speak to him." 
 
 "I wish you hed a spoke to him when he 
 bowed to you so perlite at the picnic," said the 
 girl deprecatingly. 
 
 "Why, Merandy Jenkins! ain't you ashamed 
 o' yourself? I see myself speakin' to a man 
 that's put me down b'fore the hull town as a 
 hypocrite." Miranda rose suddenly and Tabi- 
 tha thought the yellow in her eyes looked like 
 sparks of fire. She was pale and trembling. 
 
 "Mebbe he didn't, you ain't sure he did; I 
 don't b'lieve he did, nuther, he ain't that kind 
 of a man; and even if he did, he wa'n't to 
 blame; anybody 'd think the same that didn't 
 know jest how it was. You would yourself. 
 You'd ort to explain to him, that's what you'd 
 ort to do ; you ain't actin' like a Christian, Aunt 
 Tabby, that's what you ain't."
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 311 
 
 Tabitha was amazed at the reproof, but more 
 amazed that it came from her demure little 
 niece who had never before dared to hint that 
 her aunt was not impeccable. To the girl's sur- 
 prise, Tabitha made no reply to this sudden and 
 unusual outburst, nor did she ever refer to it 
 afterwards. 
 
 The following morning Miranda made a 
 thorough but unsuccessful search for the miss- 
 ing hemmer and feller. 
 
 It was the Monday morning after the sewing 
 bee. Miranda had finished her washing and 
 was just putting away the tubs after scrubbing 
 the kitchen floor. Tabitha sat by the window 
 in the sitting-room making the last buttonhole 
 in her nightgown when there came a com- 
 manding rap on the door. She rose and opened 
 it ; a strange young man stood on the door-step. 
 
 "Good morning, madam," said he, lifting his 
 hat, "is this Mrs. Perkins?" 
 
 Tabitha saw at a glance that he was not a 
 Pepperton man. 
 
 "Good mornin','' said she, standing as stiff 
 as a ramrod with the door only half open, "yes, 
 I'm Mis' Perkins." 
 
 "Well," said the man, wiping his damp fore- 
 head, "I understood, Mrs. Perkins, that you had
 
 312 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 the misfortune to lose your feller and I 
 thought mebbe you might " Tabitha had 
 turned white. 
 
 "If you're one o' them matrimonial agents, 
 sir," said she, interrupting him, "you needn't 
 come around here. I ain't lost no feller yet 't 
 I know of hain't had none to lose fer twenty 
 year, an' I don't want none, nuther," and she 
 slammed the door in his face. 
 
 The young man looked puzzled for a moment, 
 then laughed good naturedly, walked around 
 to the kitchen door and rapped softly. Miranda 
 opened the door. She had just cut her finger 
 and was trying with one hand to wind a rag 
 round it ; blood was coursing down her wrist. 
 
 "Miss, would you mind givin' me a drink o'- 
 why, good gracious ! how you've cut yer finger, 
 hain't ye ? Let me help ye. You can't half do it 
 up wi' one hand. Gimme the rag," and before 
 Miranda had time to refuse or accept the 
 proffered service, this young man, upon whom 
 she had never set eyes before, was dexterously 
 winding up her finger and giving advice about 
 the care of it, as if he had known her all her life. 
 
 "You'll have to be careful an' not take cold 
 in it, Miss, or the very devil'll be to pay." 
 
 Miranda jumped a little when he said "devil." 
 
 "Did I hurt ye?"
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 313 
 
 "No, are ye done?" said she with a sigh. 
 There was a note of regret in her voice. 
 
 "Yes, I guess it'll do now." They looked into 
 one anothers' eyes for a moment with the inno- 
 cent gaze of two stranger babies ; then he took 
 her hand again, examining his work, as if in 
 the hope of finding something amiss. 
 
 "It it don't fell too tight, does it, Miss?" 
 
 "N no, I guess not ;" then they both blushed 
 and he let go her hand. Miranda could not 
 remember that a young man had ever before 
 touched her hand except in a handshake. She 
 was thinking of it as she stood before him look- 
 ing down at her wet apron. 
 
 "You ain't used to having folks kind to ye, air 
 ye, Miss?" said he, as he sat down on a chair 
 near the door and laid his hat on the floor 
 beside him. He was about twenty-five, tall and 
 slender, with a smooth face and keen dark eyes. 
 Miranda's face brightened up as if she were 
 going to smile. 
 
 "O, I dunno, I guess so. Be you dry?" 
 
 "Yes I b'lieve I am." 
 
 She filled a glass from the water pail and 
 brought it to him. 
 
 "Is that yer mother in there, Miss?" he asked 
 handing her the empty glass. 
 
 "No, it's m' a'nt."
 
 314 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "Is she crazy?" 
 
 "I dunno, guess not, why?" 
 
 "Why, she flew at me like a mad cat 'cause I 
 wanted to sell her a new feller I heard she'd 
 lost the one we sold her with the machine, Mis' 
 Blake told me." 
 
 "Did you sell her the machine?" 
 
 "Father did. We're in business together, my 
 name is Pelton Jonas Pelton." 
 
 "O, I guess I know what made her mad," 
 said the girl after a moment's reflection, during 
 which the young man's eyes never left her face. 
 "She must a thought you wanted her to marry." 
 
 "Marry! Thunderation !" Miranda gave a 
 little start and opened her eyes wide. 
 
 "D don't swear, Mr. Jonas a Mr. Pelton. 
 She she must 'a' thought you was one o' them 
 matrimonial agents from Boston." 
 
 "One o' them what from Boston?" 
 
 "Matrimonial agents, but don't speak so 
 loud, she might hear ye." 
 
 "Giminee crickets. I don't want to marry 
 her, no sir-ee. I'd ruther marry you, Miss- 
 Miss say now, Miss, tell a feller what yer name 
 is, won't ye?" 
 
 "Miranda Katherine Jenkins," said the girl 
 with a serious face, making him a low courtesy. 
 
 "How old be ye?"
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 315 
 
 "Mos' twenty-four." 
 
 "You're jest about a year younger 'n me 
 then," said Jonas, reflectively stroking his bare 
 chin. 
 
 "You've got the finest eyes I ever see, 
 Merandy; but you're lame, ain't ye? What's 
 the matter with yer leg?" 
 
 "I dunno nothin', I guess little too short, 
 that's all." 
 
 "Why don't ye have yer shoe fixed so ye 
 won't limp?" 
 
 "Why, I couldn't, could I?" 
 
 "Course ye could, give it to me, I'll git it 
 fixed fer ye. How much too short is yer leg?" 
 
 ' 'Bout an inch, I guess." 
 
 "Give me yer shoe." Miranda liked his 
 kindly authoritative tone; it gave her a feeling 
 of protection. She went into the bedroom and 
 brought out her left shoe. Jones slipped it into 
 his coat pocket. 
 
 "I'll bring it back tomorrow night." Then 
 he walked slowly over to the window and back 
 to the girl. "Say, Merandy, s'pose I was one o' 
 them matrimonial agents and sh'd ask you now 
 you wouldn't think o' marryin' a fellow like 
 me, would ye? I ain't good lookin' 'nough?" 
 Miranda was thinking at that very moment that 
 he was the handsomest man she had ever seen.
 
 316 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "I dunno," she replied with a confused blush, 
 turning her face a little away. "I won't tell till 
 ye ask me. I think you're awful good lookin' 
 though, Jonas," then she looked down at the toe 
 of her felt slipper. 
 
 "Do ye now, reely, Merandy?" Jonas slipped 
 his hands into his trousers pockets, "Well I de- 
 clare, if that ain't queer ! Say now, Mirandy, I 
 think you're the nicest girl I ever see. You 
 ain't all tongue like most of 'em," and he put 
 his arm about Miranda's waist. She drew back, 
 coloring deeply. "When I come tomorrow 
 night, I'm goin' to ask ye something, an' I 
 want you to think about it all day so you can 
 say yes or no on the spot an' no foolin'. I'm 
 honest an' I've got a little money laid by. Will 
 ye think 't over?" 
 
 "Yes" 
 
 "May I kiss ye, Merandy?" Jonas bent over 
 her till she felt his warm breath on her forehead. 
 
 "No," said the girl, springing quickly from 
 him, her face and neck crimson, "Wait till 
 till after tomorrow night." 
 
 "Very well, Merandy, I guess you're right 
 about it. Good-by, I mus' be goin'." As Jonas 
 stepped out at the door, Tabitha's big yellow 
 cat crowded past him into the kitchen. 
 
 "Do ye want yer breakfast, Dickey, poor
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 317 
 
 Dickey." Miranda picked the cat up in her 
 arms and gave him a hard hug laying her hot 
 cheek on his soft fur. Just then Tabitha opened 
 the door. 
 
 "Why, who be you talkin' to, Merandy?" she 
 asked, peering about the kitchen. "I was sure 
 I heard ye talkin' to some one." 
 
 "Why I was jes' speakin' to the cat, Aunt 
 Tabby." 
 
 Miranda kept her promise faithfully and 
 "thought 't over" all night as well as all day. 
 Tabitha, as was her custom, went on the Tues- 
 day evening following to the Baptist prayer- 
 meeting. Just after she had gone, Jonas ap- 
 peared at the kitchen door. Miranda had 
 slipped on her prettiest blue gingham with 
 ruffles of starched lace in the neck and sleeves. 
 
 "Put 't on, Merandy, put 't on," said Jonas, 
 handing her the shoe. She went into the bed- 
 room, put on her shoe, and came out walking 
 awkwardly, but without the least limp. The 
 sole had been thickened. 
 
 "There, I told ye, you're all right now, Me- 
 randy, an' the prettiest girl in town." Me- 
 randa smiled till she showed her white teeth. 
 
 "My, oh my! what pretty teeth you've got, 
 Merandy. You must laugh oftener an' show 
 'em." Then he sat silent, his face growing
 
 318 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 serious. At last he said, as he rolled his soft 
 hat rim. 
 
 "Have ye been a thinkin' 't over, Merandy?" 
 The girl turned her face away ; he could see the 
 little red rings of hair clinging to the back of 
 her white neck. 
 
 "Yes, Jonas, I've been a-thinkin' 't over." 
 
 He took the hand with the cut finger and held 
 it between both his own. 
 
 "If I sh'd ask ye to marry me, Merandy 
 hang it, that ain't fair ! I do ask ye, is it yes er 
 no, an' no foolin'. I'll take good care o' ye, 
 little one, ye needn't be afraid if ye like me." 
 
 "I dunno, Jonas." She was so in the habit 
 of saying she didn't know. Jonas dropped her 
 hand and reached for his hat. She grasped him 
 by the sleeve. 
 
 "Don't go, Jonas, please don't go. I'd like 
 to marry ye, an' mebbe I will, I like ye dretful 
 well" she couldn't say love "I like ye the best 
 in the world but I couldn't leave Aunt Tabby 
 here all 'lone when she's so heart-broke." 
 Miranda's eyes were full of tears. "She don't 
 show it much, but I know she is. She took me, 
 Jonas, when I was little, an' give me a home, or 
 I'd 'a' gone to the poorhouse." 
 
 "Do you care anything about that cross old 
 cat, Merandy? Tabby's a good name for her, 
 I'll be darned if it ain't."
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 319 
 
 "She ain't a cross ole cat," said Miranda 
 bristling, "she's good, awful good, but she's 
 been bad treated; folks has lied about her." 
 And then she went on and told Jonas all about 
 her aunt's trouble in the church, and about 
 Jonathan Allen. 
 
 "She's awful unhappy now 'cause he's goin' 
 to marry that Blodgett woman." 
 
 Jonas smiled. "He is, is he?" 
 
 "Yes, and she's never told the hull truth 
 about that knittin', and she'd never let me tell 
 it; now I jest feel as if I'd ort to. It ain't right." 
 
 "Course it ain't right," reiterated Jonas with 
 an angry jerk of his head, "it's what I call 
 blamed mean, 's what I call it. Do you think 
 she'd marry Jonathan now if he asked her?" 
 
 "Why, I know she would, but he won't ask 
 'er; he thinks she knits on Sundays, but she 
 don't, and she never did but jest them two times 
 I tole you 'bout." 
 
 "Lemme see," said Jones stroking his bare 
 upper lip, "how'd you say it was ? Tell it agin, 
 Merandy, I want to git it right in my mind." 
 
 "Why, old Grandfather Buckley poor ole 
 man, I can see him yet, I was eight year old 
 then come here one Sunday night a'most 
 froze ; one of his fingers was froze, Aunt Tabby 
 said, and she made him some hot tea 'n' toast
 
 320 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 an' boiled him an egg; then she went and cut 
 out the ankles of a pair o' my stockin's an' set up 
 most all night a-knittin' thumbs an' hands onto 
 'em. Then she put new lining in the sleeves of 
 Uncle Dick's overcoat an' give it to him. It 
 took her most all night. She didn't ondress at 
 all, she just laid down on the lounge a while 
 before she got breakfast." 
 
 "Whatwashedoin'?" 
 
 "Why, she put him to bed with some hot 
 bricks round him. Th' ole man cried, he was 
 that glad. When he went away after breakfas' 
 she told him not to say anything 'bout it ; that's 
 the way she always does. That was the night 
 Jonathan an' the preacher went by an' seen 
 her." 
 
 "An' they all think she's a hypocrite, do they? 
 an' Jonathan along wi' the rest, eh?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, I call that a gol darn'd shame !" Jonas 
 flushed with anger at the injustice. "I guess we 
 can fix it though, Merandy, if you'll be real 
 smart an' hold yer tongue." 
 
 "O Jonas, how?" Miranda sprang to her 
 feet clapping her hands. Jonas sprang up too 
 and caught her in his arms. She struggled a 
 little to free herself, then stood still looking 
 down at the floor. 
 
 "Let me go, Jonas, please let me go."
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 321 
 
 "Well, will ye marry if if " 
 
 "If we can fix it all right with Aunt Tabby 
 an' Jonathan?" 
 
 "Yes, o' course." 
 
 "Yes, I will, Jonas," and she raised her head 
 and looked him full in the face. Jonas put his 
 finger under her chin and gave her a quick kiss 
 square on the lips. 
 
 "O Jonas !" said she freeing herself, a 
 troubled look coming into her eyes. "What if 
 you couldn't fix it after all, an' you've kissed 
 me. Aunt Tabby always said " 
 
 "Oh, bother Aunt Tabby, we can fix it, course 
 we can fix it. If she ain't a married Tabby inside 
 of a year, I'll eat the greaser." 
 
 "What, what greaser, Jonas?" 
 
 "Why, the pancake greaser, you little 
 simpleton." 
 
 Miranda made up a little face, "Oh! I 
 wouldn't, Jonas, if I was you; it wouldn't be 
 good." Jonas looked at her a moment 
 quizzically, then burst into a roar of laughter. 
 
 "You don't know much, do ye, Merandy? 
 But you suit me all the better ; you ain't full o' 
 nonsense like the Glenwood girls ; you say jest 
 what you mean, an' expect other folks to do 
 the same, don't ye? Have ye never been to 
 school, Merandy?"
 
 322 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 "No, not a day." 
 
 "Can't ye read and write?" 
 
 "Course I can ; Aunt Tabby learnt me. I can 
 read an' write an' cipher, an' I know history all 
 through, I can answer every question in the 
 book," said the girl, straightening up. "Ask me 
 some." 
 
 Jonas was awe-stricken at the extent of 
 Miranda's learning. He gazed at her in silent 
 admiration, but was unable to recall any ques- 
 tions in history as she sat before him prim and 
 straight, and with a look on her face of supreme 
 self-confidence awaiting examination. "Did you 
 ever study grammar, Merandy?" 
 
 "Naw!" replied the girl disdainfully, "did 
 you?" 
 
 "No, it ain't much good, ye can't use it." 
 
 "No, ye can't use it. Is it anything like- 
 like 'rithmetic, Jonas?" 
 
 "No, not a bit ; it's just as different as can be." 
 Jonas gazed at the girl reflectively. 
 
 "That 'counts for it then, if you've never been 
 among other girls." 
 
 "'Counts fer what?" 
 
 "Why, that you b'lieve I mean everything I 
 say." 
 
 "Don't ye, Jonas?" Miranda's lips turned 
 white. 
 
 "Why, not everything, I joke sometimes; I
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 323 
 
 was joking just now 'bout the greaser; I 
 wouldn't eat a greaser, you couldn't hire me 
 to." Then he noticed how white she was, and 
 he gathered her in his arms ; her head fell over 
 on his shoulder. 
 
 "Great Caesar! Merandy, what's the matter? 
 I meant what I said about marryin' ye, course I 
 did, I wouldn't joke about such a thing as that." 
 He kissed her white lips tenderly and she made 
 no objection. 
 
 "I'm glad, Jonas," she said, smiling faintly. 
 
 "Now set down here, little girl, an' I'll tell 
 ye some news. That Blodgett woman you 
 spoke about, is my aunt she's my father's 
 sister. I'm living at her house now, been there 
 mos' three weeks. She's an awful good woman. 
 I know Jonathan Allen a little, too, I've been 
 down to see him about getting a place to work 
 in his mill sewing machine business don't pay. 
 No, it don't pay; folks round here'd ruther sew 
 the old way. I think I'll git a place in the mill 
 about the first of the month. I guess we can fix 
 it so it'll be all right between yer aunt an' Mr. 
 Allen ; I feel sure we can, 'cause if he's the man 
 I think he is, and understands how it reely was, 
 why" 
 
 "O Jonas, do you mean it?" and Miranda 
 smiled with delight showing her white teeth.
 
 324 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 She stopped suddenly and pouted, striking him 
 a violent blow on the arm with her handker- 
 chief. 
 
 "You mustn't, Jonas, we ain't married yet/' 
 
 "Can't help it, Merandy, I'll do it every time 
 I see them pretty white teeth." Miranda smiled 
 again, she couldn't help it, Jonas was so funny ; 
 but she clapped her handkerchief over her 
 mouth so he couldn't see her teeth. Then there 
 was a little scuffle. 
 
 "I won't marry ye, Jonas, if ye don't behave 
 better," said the girl, with a smile in her eye and 
 a pout on her lips. 
 
 "O yes, ye will," said Jonas, lifting the candle 
 toward the clock. "Good gracious, Merandy ! 
 I mus' go this minute, it's mos' nine o'clock." 
 
 "Yes, you mus' go, Jonas, Aunt Tabby '11 be 
 here in ten minutes." 
 
 "Good night, dear; now hold yer tongue." 
 
 "Yes, I will, Jonas," and she gave him a little 
 push toward the door. 
 
 Rumors about Jonathan and the Widow Blod- 
 gett flew about, after the sewing bee, like 
 feathers in the wind. Every move either of 
 them made was construed, by well-meaning 
 neighbors, into preparations for the wedding. 
 Whether they would live in his or her house
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 325 
 
 after marriage, was the subject of much dis- 
 cussion. Some thought they would live in her 
 house because it was nearer the mill, others 
 thought they would be more likely to live in his 
 house because it was larger; still others poohed 
 at both these ideas, feeling sure Jonathan would 
 build; some one had seen him one day in 
 conversation with old Ezra Wheeler, who owned 
 half interest in the sawmill. 
 
 Tabitha remarked at one time, when asked 
 her opinion on the subject, that she didn't see 
 as it made any difference which house they 
 lived in. 
 
 There were a good many dead roses on the 
 bushes that almost covered Tabitha's little white 
 gate, and she had gone out with a basket and 
 pair of old shears to cut them off. 
 
 "What a sight o' buds there air on these 
 bushes ! Seems to me they're redder 'n they use' 
 to be, too. Don't you think so, Merandy?" 
 
 "Oh, I dunno, Aunt Tabby, mebbe they be." 
 
 "An' seems to me I never see sweet pea vines 
 so full o' blossoms, Merandy, did you?" 
 
 "I dunno, I guess not. There's more pink 
 ones this year than last, ever so many more." 
 
 "Yes, I dunno but there is," replied Tabitha
 
 326 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 looking over toward the sweet peas that had 
 transformed the grey garden fence into a wall 
 of flowers, 
 
 It was Monday afternoon. The day before, 
 the Baptist minister had preached a powerful 
 sermon on Christian charity and the sin of 
 harboring grievances. 
 
 Tabitha walked home thinking seriously of 
 her trouble with Jonathan. She had always 
 supposed that she had a right to nurse her 
 grievance, as she had been wrongly accused, 
 and that she was committing a sin in doing so 
 had never entered her mind. 
 
 She went to sleep on Sunday night, thinking 
 it over, and dreamed that she and her old lover 
 had become reconciled and that she had 
 promised finally to assist at his wedding, and to 
 bake the bride's cake. She told Jonathan, in 
 her dream, all about what started the stories of 
 her working on Sunday; how she had mis- 
 counted the days, and when two or three of 
 the neighbors went by to meeting one Sun- 
 day morning, she was out scrubbing the kitchen 
 door-step ; and when they went home after ser- 
 vices, she sat at the window knitting; then on 
 Monday morning, she had dressed up and 
 started to meeting, and not until she passed the 
 schoolhouse and saw through the open windows
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 327 
 
 the children in their seats, did she awake to a 
 knowledge of her mistake. She soon heard that 
 some were talking about it, but she never 
 offered any explanation because she thought the 
 people of the village ought to have enough faith 
 in her, as long as she had lived among them, to 
 know it was a mistake. 
 
 Her explanation had been perfectly satis- 
 factory to Jonathan, in her dream, and when 
 she woke up, they were the best of friends. 
 
 The influence of the dream was still upon her 
 as she stood clipping off the dead roses. 
 
 "Here, Merandy, take these in the house an' 
 burn 'em up." The girl took the basket half 
 full of dead roses and went into the house. 
 
 Tabitha stepped upon a large stone that lay 
 beside the gate, close to the fence, and looked 
 over toward the flour mill. She could see about 
 half of the wheel, and the sparkle of the water 
 in the sunshine as it fell from the slowly turning 
 paddles. She put up one hand to shade her 
 eyes. 
 
 She wondered if Jonathan was at the mill. 
 Her dream was so very real ; she could feel his 
 presence; it was hard to believe that she had 
 not had a long talk with him. She wondered 
 if she could see his office window if she stepped 
 upon the second board of the fence. She looked
 
 328 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 back toward the house to see if Miranda had 
 gone in, then she stepped up. 
 
 She could see more than half of the window. 
 She thought at first that she could see a face 
 near the window. She looked with all her 
 might, but it was too far away ; she could not be 
 sure. 
 
 Some one with a grey team drove up to the 
 mill door and began unloading some bags. 
 
 "I guess 't mus' be wheat," thought Tabitha, 
 "that man lifts them bags as if they was pretty 
 heavy; yes, I guess it's wheat, it mus' be. 
 Jonathan ought to have a good home, yes he 
 ought to hev " She turned her head suddenly 
 toward the gate as if she heard something, then 
 she got down from the fence with the quickest 
 move she had made in years, her face turning 
 pale. 
 
 "Why, for massy sakes !" said Tabitha, shrink- 
 ing behind a rose bush, "there comes a man an' 
 I b'lieve it's Jonathan. What shall I do?" 
 
 She had no time to do anything before he 
 opened the gate and stepped in. The thought 
 that he must have seen her on the fence gazing 
 over towards his mill, brought color to her 
 cheeks. She noticed, notwithstanding her 
 agitation, as he turned to latch the gate, that 
 his hair was more white than grey, and that
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 329 
 
 there was a light sifting of flour over the 
 shoulders of his black coat. She even took time 
 to wonder how she could notice such things at 
 such a moment and if she were awake or dream- 
 ing. She knew she was not dreaming when he 
 said, "Good morning, Sister Perkins," for he 
 had always called her by her Christian name, 
 and she was not pleased with the change. 
 
 "Good mornin', Jonathan," she responded 
 with a defiant emphasis on the name, "step right 
 this way if ye please an' take a seat; there's 
 some chairs under that low apple tree." 
 
 Quivering in every limb she led the way. Her 
 tall figure was proudly erect, though she was 
 conscious of a weakening faith in her own power 
 of self control, for her trembling hands and the 
 nervous twitching of her lips defied her. 
 
 "Jes' take that arm chair, Jonathan, I'll set 
 right here on the settee." She was less than 
 half a head taller than Jonathan, but the differ- 
 ence today was more pronounced ; the scorn she 
 felt for her own growing weakness added to her 
 height. 
 
 "Pretty warm day, ain't it?" said Tabitha, 
 folding her arms to hide her trembling hands. 
 Jonathan admitted that it was warm, as he wiped 
 his damp forehead. 
 
 "Dretful dusty, too," she remarked, looking
 
 330 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 down at his grey boots. He agreed, also, that 
 it was very dusty, then he fell to examining the 
 lining of his hat, as if searching for an escaped 
 idea. 
 
 In order to convince her visitor of her perfect 
 coolness, in case he had any doubt about it, 
 Tabitha coughed. 
 
 All doubt was instantly removed. In the 
 sympathy he felt for her embarrassment, Jona- 
 than became master of his own, and he looked 
 her full in the face. 
 
 "Tabithy," he began, "I've felt for a good 
 while that we ain't livin' right. I dunno how 
 you feel about it, but that's the way I feel. I've 
 been thinkin' on it most all the while for a week 
 past (Tabitha wondered as the old bitter feeling 
 began to well up in her heart, if he had come 
 again after twenty years on the same errand 
 as before, to try to induce her to confess), an' 
 the more I think on it," he continued, "the more 
 I think you ain't been treated right, Tabithy." 
 
 He was looking straight into her eyes now, 
 and all that was noble in him shone forth. His 
 words were measured and far apart, as if each 
 one cost him an effort, and Tabitha saw that 
 his eyes were misty with tears. 
 
 "I've come here today t'ask yer forgiveness
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 331 
 
 fer not trustin' ye instead of tryin' to git ye to 
 confess to what ye wa'n't guilty of." 
 
 She gave him a questioning look. 
 
 "Oh I know what I'm talkin' about, Tabithy. 
 I know you was doin' God's service that Sun- 
 day night, and I b'lieve you had some good 
 reason the summer b'fore too. I didn't treat 
 ye right an' I ask ye to forgive me." 
 
 Up to this, she had not spoken ; she had made 
 several attempts but the words seemed to stick 
 somewhere in her throat. 
 
 " 'Twas all my fault, I can see it now," he con- 
 tinued, after waiting a moment for her to speak. 
 His self accusation loosened her tongue. 
 
 "No, it wa'n't, Jonathan; I didn't do right 
 nuther ; I hadn't ort to a turned ye out o' doors 
 'twa'n't Christian like, an' I've been a thinkin' 
 a good deal about it lately, too. I'm reel glad 
 ye come over. 'Tain't right to live this way; 
 I know it ain't." 
 
 "You forgive me then, Tabithy?" 
 
 "Yes, Jonathan, an I want you to to 
 forgive me." Tears were coursing down her 
 cheeks and the hard lines in her face had melted 
 away. 
 
 "I do, Tabithy, with all my heart," and they 
 shook hands. Then they drifted into talking
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 of old times, and finally she alluded, in a delicate 
 way, to his approaching marriage. She hoped 
 he would be happy in the change he was about 
 to make, and have a good comfortable home. 
 She spoke quite naturally, for she had fully 
 made up her mind to it, and also that she herself 
 would die as she was, the Widow Perkins. She 
 was nervously opening and closing her spectacle 
 case as she spoke. She really wished him well, 
 and she looked up into his face to show him that 
 she meant what she said, and to her surprise he 
 was smiling as if amused. 
 
 "So you've heard that too, have ye, Tabithy? 
 I guess it's gone the rounds," and he gave way 
 to a low, scarce audible "Ha, ha, ha !" 
 
 "You didn't b'lieve it, did ye?" and he looked 
 up at her from under his heavy iron grey brows 
 with a twinkle of the old time mischief in his 
 eyes. Strangers were never sure whether 
 Jonathan was in jest or earnest. 
 
 "Why why ain't it so?" she gasped. "Ain't 
 you an' Mis' Blodgett goin' to git married, 
 Jonathan?" She was trembling violently now, 
 and to save her life she could not still the twitch- 
 ing of her lips. 
 
 Jonathan seated himself beside her on the 
 settee and took one of her trembling hands as 
 if he owned it.
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 333 
 
 "No, Tabithy, I'm not goin' to marry Mrs. 
 Blodgett 't I know of. I don't know how she 
 feels about marryin' me. I ain't never asked 
 her. She's a good woman, Mis' Blodgett is, 
 but I don't want to marry her, an' I don't think 
 sfre wants to marry me. Look a' here, Tabithy," 
 and with the characteristic daring of his youth, 
 Jonathan put his arm around her waist, "I told 
 you years ago, didn't I, the time I come home 
 and found you engaged to Dick, that no woman 
 but you'd ever be my wife, an' I ain't changed 
 my mind yet if I be fifty-five years old. I want 
 you to remember, Tabithy, that if Jonathan 
 Allen ever goes to his own weddin', Tabitha 
 Perkins '11 not be far away." 
 
 So they talked on and on till the sun turned 
 red and slid down below the horizon, casting a 
 ruddy glow over the western sky. 
 
 The following week Tabitha received visits 
 from the Methodist minister and all the leading 
 members of the church, and two weeks later she 
 once more became a member of the church of 
 her choice. 
 
 Jonas and Miranda "went forward" the same 
 evening and both were converted before leav- 
 ing the mourners' bench. 
 
 Tabitha looked happy in spite of her effort to
 
 334 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 look as usual ; the hard lines refused to be rein- 
 stated. She feared it was not quite right to 
 be happy in this vale of tears. She drew a deep 
 sigh now and then from a sense of duty, for the 
 benefit of suffering humanity as a whole, but the 
 sad look accompanying these expressions of 
 sympathy, found no resting place in her face. 
 
 "Why, she looks ten years younger, Jonas," 
 said Miranda, "I never see the like." 
 
 Jonas was standing in the middle of the 
 kitchen floor with his hands in his trousers 
 pockets. 
 
 "Well I do declare, if that don't jes' beat all !" 
 
 "What, Jonas?" 
 
 "Why, a woman a-stickin' to a man all them 
 years. Now do you think, Merandy (and 
 Jonas gave her an appealing look), that you like 
 me as well as as she does him?" 
 
 Miranda smiled and said, "Oh, I dunno, 
 Jonas." 
 
 It was late in September, but the weather was 
 still warm. It had rained hard nearly all night, 
 and the green grass under the apple trees was 
 almost covered with brown and yellow leaves. 
 The sun shining on the little pools of water 
 under Tabitha's sitting-room window, cast danc- 
 ing shadows on the ceiling, and dazzled her eyes.
 
 THE WIDOW PERKINS 335 
 
 "Dear me, how bright the sun is! Seems to 
 me I never see such a pretty mornin', did you, 
 Merandy?" 
 
 "No, I dunno's I ever did. Where is that 
 robin, Aunt Tabby? I sh'd think he'd be tired 
 out; he's been a-singin' all the mornin'." 
 
 Miranda stood in the open door and Tabitha 
 sat by the window, sewing. 
 
 "There he is settin' on the gate post," said 
 Tabitha. She stopped sewing and gazed lov- 
 ingly at the bird. 
 
 "O yes, I see him now. Seems to me he sings 
 the sweetest of any robin I ever heard." 
 
 "Yes, he he's got a sweet voice, wonderful 
 sweet," and Tabitha, with a less violent motion, 
 resumed her sewing. 
 
 Miranda looked up at the sky. There were a 
 few fleecy clouds like straying sheep scattered 
 over the clear blue. A drop of water from the 
 roof fell on her parted lips ; she drank it in with 
 a smile and without giving utterance to the 
 thought that brought an added flush to her 
 cheeks. 
 
 "I guess the rain's all over, Aunt Tabby." 
 
 "Yes, I guess 'tis," and Tabitha reeled off a 
 fresh thread. "Let me see, what was I a-sayin' 
 a minute ago ? Oh yes, besides savin' expense, 
 ye see, Merandy, it'd save goin' through the
 
 336 THE WIDOW PERKINS 
 
 mess of bakin' twice, an' it is sech mussy work. 
 Dear me, how this thread knots! I never see 
 anything like it. 
 
 "There ! now this makes six for you, Merandy, 
 an ? I guess that '11 do." 
 
 It was nearly supper time. There was a 
 strong odor of spices about the house of Widow 
 Perkins ; a little of it had crept into the immacu- 
 late parlor, and the calm, pictured face of George 
 Washington, sitting on his horse over the 
 mantel, looked as if he had noticed it, and 
 understood. 
 
 "How nice they do look, Aunt Tabby!" 
 
 "Yes, they air nice, every one of 'em. I was 
 dretful 'fraid when you put in that last stick 
 o' wood, that you'd burn the fruit cake ; it's so 
 hard to bake fruit cake without burnin' it. Now 
 Til make the tea, Mirandy, an' set the table 
 while you wash up the bake dishes." 
 
 "How good that silver cake smells, Aunt 
 Tabby, but some how I I don't feel hungry, I 
 don't b'lieve I shell want much supper." 
 
 "No, I don't s'pose either of us '11 eat much 
 after bakin' so many rich cakes, but why, for 
 massy sakes alive, Merandy Jenkins, if you ain't 
 a-washin' them plates with the I. W. & S. cloth !"
 
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