THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH

by Ellen Glasgow

 To my sister Cary Glasgow McCormack In loving acknowledgment of help and sympathy through the years

CONTENTS

 BOOK FIRST

 JORDAN'S JOURNEY

 Chapter

 I. At Bottom's Ordinary II. In Which Destiny Wears the Comic Mask III. In Which Mr. Gay Arrives at His Journey's End IV. The Revercombs V. The Mill VI. Treats of the Ladies' Sphere VII. Gay Rushes Into a Quarrel and Secures a Kiss VIII. Shows Two Sides of a Quarrel IX. In Which Molly Flirts X. The Reverend Orlando Mullen Preaches a Sermon XI. A Flight and an Encounter XII. The Dream and the Real XIII. By the Mill-race XIV. Shows the Weakness in Strength XV. Shows the Tyranny of Weakness XVI. The Coming of Spring XVII. The Shade of Mr. Jonathan XVIII. The Shade of Reuben XIX. Treats of Contradictions XX. Life's Ironies XXI. In Which Pity Masquerades as Reason

 BOOK SECOND

 THE CROSS-ROADS

 Chapter

 I. In which Youth Shows a Little Seasoned II. The Desire of the Moth III Abel Hears Gossip and Sees a Vision IV. His Day of Freedom V. The Shaping of Molly VI. In Which Hearts Go Astray VII. A New Beginning to an Old Tragedy VIII. A Great Passion in a Humble Place IX. A Meeting in the Pasture X. Tangled Threads XI. The Ride to Piping Tree XII. One of Love's Victims XIII. What Life Teaches XIV. The Turn of the Wheel XV. Gay Discovers Himself XVI. The End

 Author's Note: The scene of this story is not the place of the same name in Virginia. 

BOOK FIRST

JORDAN'S JOURNEY

THE MILLER OF OLD CHURCH

CHAPTER I

AT BOTTOM'S ORDINARY

It was past four o'clock on a sunny October day, when a stranger, whohad ridden over the "corduroy" road between Applegate and Old Church, dismounted near the cross-roads before the small public house known toits frequenters as Bottom's Ordinary. Standing where the three roadsmeet at the old turnpike-gate of the county, the square brick building, which had declined through several generations from a chapel into atavern, had grown at last to resemble the smeared face of a clown undera steeple hat which was worn slightly awry. Originally covered withstucco, the walls had peeled year by year until the dull red of thebricks showed like blotches of paint under a thick coating of powder. Over the wide door two little oblong windows, holding four damagedpanes, blinked rakishly from a mat of ivy, which spread from the rottingeaves to the shingled roof, where the slim wooden spire bent under theweight of creeper and innumerable nesting sparrows in spring. Afterpointing heavenward for half a century, the steeple appeared to haveswerved suddenly from its purpose, and to invite now the attention ofthe wayfarer to the bar beneath. This cheerful room which sprouted, likesome grotesque wing, from the right side of the chapel, marked not onlya utilitarian triumph in architecture, but served, on market days toattract a larger congregation of the righteous than had ever stood upto sing the doxology in the adjoining place of worship. Good and badprospects were weighed here, weddings discussed, births and deathsrecorded in ever-green memories, and here, also, were reputationsdemolished and the owners of them hustled with scant ceremony away toperdition. 

From the open door of the bar on this particular October day, therestreamed the ruddy blaze of a fire newly kindled from knots of resinouspine. Against this pleasant background might be discerned now and thenthe shapeless silhouette of Betsey Bottom, the innkeeper, a soft andcapable soul, who, in attaching William Ming some ten years before, hadsuccessfully extinguished his identity without materially impairing herown. Bottom's Ordinary had always been ruled by a woman, and it wouldcontinue to be so, please God, however loudly a mere Ming might protestto the contrary. In the eyes of her neighbours, a female, right orwrong, was always a female, and this obvious fact, beyond and above anynatural two-sided jars of wedlock, sufficed in itself to establish Mrs. Ming as a conjugal martyr. Being an amiable body--peaceably disposed toevery living creature, with the exception of William--she had hastenedto the door to reprimand him for some trivial neglect of the grey mule, when her glance lighted upon the stranger, who had come a few minutesearlier by the Applegate road. As he was a fine looking man of fullhabit and some thirty years, her eyes lingered an instant on his facebefore she turned with the news to her slatternly negro maid who wassousing the floor with a bucket of soapsuds. 

"Thar's nobody on earth out thar but young Mr. Jonathan Gay come back toJordan's Journey, " she said. "I declar I'd know a Gay by his eyes if Iwar to meet him in so unlikely a place as Kingdom Come. He's talkin'to old Adam Doolittle now, " she added, for the information of the maid, who, being of a curious habit of mind, had raised herself on her kneesand was craning her neck toward the door, "I can see his lips movin', but he speaks so low I can't make out what he says. "

"Lemme git dar a minute, Miss Betsey, I'se got moughty sharp years, Iis. "

"They're no sharper than mine, I reckon, and I couldn't hear if I stoodan' listened forever. It's about the road most likely, for I see oldAdam a-pintin'. "

For a minute after dismounting the stranger looked dubiously at themottled face of the tavern. On his head the sunlight shone throughthe boughs of a giant mulberry tree near the well, and beyond this theVirginian forest, brilliant with its autumnal colours of red and copper, stretched to the village of Applegate, some ten or twelve miles to thenorth. 

Starting southward from the cross-roads, the character of the countryunderwent so sudden a transformation that it looked as if man, havingcontended here unsuccessfully with nature, had signed an ignominioustruce beneath the crumbling gateposts of the turnpike. Passing beyondthem a few steps out of the forest, one found a low hill, on whichthe reaped corn stood in stacks like weapons of a vanished army, whileacross the sunken road, the abandoned fields, overgrown with broomsedgeand life-everlasting, spread for several miles between "worm fences"which were half buried in brushwood. To the eyes of the stranger, freshfrom the trim landscapes of England, there was an aspect of desolationin the neglected roads, in the deserted fields, and in the dim greymarshes that showed beyond the low banks of the river. 

In the effort to shake off the depression this loneliness had broughton his spirits, he turned to an ancient countryman, wearing overallsof blue jeans, who dozed comfortably on the circular bench beneath themulberry tree. 

"Is there a nearer way to Jordan's Journey, or must I follow theturnpike?" he asked. 

"Hey? Young Adam, are you thar, suh?"

Young Adam, a dejected looking youth of fifty years, with a pair ofshort-sighted eyes that glanced over his shoulder as if in fear ofpursuit, shuffled round the trough of the well, and sat down on thebench at his parent's side. 

"He wants to know, pa, if thar's a short cut from the ornary over toJordan's Journey, " he repeated. 

Old Adam, who had sucked patiently at the stem of his pipe during theexplanation, withdrew it at the end, and thrust out his lower lip as achild does that has stopped crying before it intended to. 

"You can take a turn to the right at the blazed pine a half a mile on, "he replied, "but thar's the bars to be pulled down an' put up agin. "

"I jest come along thar, an' the bars was down, " said young Adam. 

"Well, they hadn't ought to have been, " retorted old Adam, indignantly. "Bars is bars whether they be public or private, an' the man that pulls'em down without puttin' 'em up agin, is a man that you'll find to beloose moraled in other matters. "

"It's the truth as sure as you speak it, Mr. Doolittle, " said a wiry, knocked-kneed farmer, with a hatchet-shaped face, who had sidled up tothe group. "It warn't no longer than yesterday that I was sayin' thesame words to the new minister, or rector as he tries to get us to callhim, about false doctrine an' evil practice. 'The difference betweensprinklin' and immersion ain't jest the difference between a few dripson the head an' goin' all under, Mr. Mullen, ' I said, 'but 'tis thewhole difference between the natur that's bent moral an' the natur thatain't. ' It follows as clear an' logical as night follows day--now, I axyou, don't it, Mr. Doolittle--that a man that's gone wrong on immersioncan't be trusted to keep his hands off the women?"

"I ain't sayin' all that, Solomon Hatch, " responded old Adam, in acharitable tone, "seein' that I've never made up my own mind quite clearon those two p'ints--but I do say, be he immersed or sprinkled, thatthe man who took down them bars without puttin' 'em up ain't a man to betrusted. "

"'Twarn't a man, 'twas a gal, " put in young Adam, "I seed MollyMerryweather goin' toward the low grounds as I come up. "

"Then it's most likely to have been she, " commented Solomon, "for she isa light-minded one, as is proper an' becomin' in a child of sin. "

The stranger looked up with a laugh from the moss-grown cattletrough beside which he was standing, and his eyes--of a peculiar darkblue--glanced merrily into the bleared ones of old Adam. 

"I ain't so blind yet as not to know a Gay when I see one, " said thelabourer, with a sly chuckle. "If I hadn't closed the eyes of old Mr. Jonathan when he was found dead over yonder by the Poplar Spring, I'd assoon as not take my Bible oath that he'd come young agin an' was ridin'along back to Jordan's Journey. "

"Do you believe down here that my uncle killed himself?" asked the youngman, with a furtive displeasure in his voice, as if he alluded to adisagreeable subject in response to some pressure of duty. 

"'Tis as it may be, suh, I can't answer for that. To this day if you getSolomon Hatch or Betsey Bottom, (axin' her pardon for puttin' her last), started on the subject they'll contend till they're blue in the facethat 'twas naught done but pure murder. However, I'm too old at my timeof life to take up with any opinion that ain't pleasant to thinkon, an', when all's said an' done, pure murder ain't a peaceable, comfortable kind of thing to believe in when thar's only one Justice ofthe Peace an' he bed-ridden since Christmas. When you ax me to pin myfaith on any p'int, be it for this world or the next, my first questionconsarnin' it is whether that particular p'int happens to be pleasant. 'Tis that little small argyment of mine that has confounded Mr. Mullenmore than once, when he meets me on equal ground outside the pulpit. 'Mebbe 'tis an' mebbe 'tisn't, ' as I remarked sociably to him about thematter of eternal damnation, 'but you can't deny, can you, suh, bein'outside the pulpit an' bound to speak the truth like the rest of us, that you sleep a long sight easier in yo' bed when you say to yo'selfthat mebbe 'tisn't?'"

"You see pa's old, an' he won't harbour any belief at his time oflife that don't let him rest comfortable, " remarked young Adam, in anapologetic aside. "It's that weakness of his that keeps him from bein' athorough goin' good Christian. "

"That strange young clergyman has stirred us all up about thedoctrines, " said Solomon Hatch. "He's opened Old Church agin, an' heworks terrible hard to make us feel that we'd rather be sprinkled on thehead than go under all over. A nice-mannered man he is, with a prettyface, an' some folks hold it to be a pity that we can't change our ideasabout baptism and become Episcopals in our hearts, jest to oblige him. The women have, mostly, bein' an accommodatin' sex in the main, with theexception of Mrs. Mallory, the blacksmith's mother, who declars she'drather give up eternal damnation any day than immersion. "

"I ain't goin' so fur as that, " rejoined old Adam, "an' mo'over, whenit comes to the p'int, I've never found any uncommon comfort in eitherconviction in time of trouble. I go to Mr. Mullen's church regular everySunday, seein' the Baptist one is ten miles off an' the road heavy, butin my opinion he's a bit too zealous to turn over the notions of theprophets an' set up his own. He's at the age when a man knows everythingon earth an' generally knows it wrong. "

"You see pa had been settin' on the anxious bench for forty years, "explained young Adam, "an' when Mr. Mullen came, he took it away fromunder him, so to speak, while he was still settin' on it. "

"'Twas my proper place, " said old Adam resentfully, "when it comes tocrops or the weather I am firm fixed enough in my belief, but in mattersof religion I hold with the onsartain. "

"Only his powerful belief in the Devil an' all his works keeps him frombein' a heathen, " observed young Adam in awe-stricken pride. "Even Mr. Mullen can't move him, he's so terrible set. "

"Well, he ain't my Redeemer, though doubtless he'd be cast down if hewas to hear as I'd said so, " chuckled the elder. "The over earnest, likethe women folk, are better not handled at all or handled techily. I'mnear blind as it is, but ain't that the man yonder leadin' his horse outof the Applegate road?"

"'Taint the rector, but the miller, " responded his son. "He's bringin'over Mrs. Bottom's sack of meal on the back of his grey mare. "

"Ah, he's one of the folks that's gone over neck an' crop to theEpiscopals, " said Solomon Hatch. "His folks have been Presbyterians overat Piping Tree sence the time of Noah, but he recites the Creed now asloud as he used to sing the doxology. I declar his voice boomed out soin my ears last Sunday that I was obleeged to put up my hands to keep'em from splittin'. Have you ever marked, Mr. Doolittle, havin' had theexperience of ninety years, that when a man once takes up with a heresy, he shouts a heap louder than them that was born an' baptised in it? Itseems as if they can't desert the ancient ways without defying 'em aswell. "

"'Tis so, 'tis so, " admitted old Adam, wagging his head, "but AbelRevercomb was al'ays the sort that could measure nothin' less than abushel. The pity with big-natured folk is that they plough up a mountainand trip at last over a pea-vine!"

From the gloom and brightness of the Applegate road there emerged thelarge figure of a young man, who led a handsome grey mare by the halter. As he moved against the coloured screen of the leaves something of thebeauty of the desolate landscape showed in his face--the look of almostautumnal sadness that one finds, occasionally, in the eyes of theimaginative rustic. He wore a pair of sheepskin leggins into which theends of his corduroy trousers were stuffed slightly below the knees. Hishead was bare, and from the open neck of his blue flannel shirt, fadedfrom many washings, the muscles in his throat stood out like cords inthe red-brown flesh. From his uncovered dark hair to his heavy boots, hewas powdered with the white dust of his mill, the smell of which floatedto the group under the mulberry tree as he passed up the walk to thetavern. 

"I lay he seed Molly Merryweather comin' up from the low grounds, "remarked Solomon, when the young man had moved out of earshot. 

"Thar's truth spoken for once, if only by accident, " retorted old Adam. "Yonder comes Reuben Merryweather's wagon now, laden with fodder. Isthar anybody settin' on it, young Adam? My eyes is too po' to make out. "

"Molly Merryweather, who else?" responded the younger. 

The wagon approached slowly, piled high with fodder and drawn by a pairof old oxen. In the centre of the load a girl was sitting, with a pinksunbonnet on her shoulders, and the light wind, which drove in gustsfrom the river, blowing the bunch of clustering brown curls on her neck. She was a small vivid creature, with a sunburned colour and changeableblue eyes that shone almost green in the sunlight. 

"Terr'ble light minded as you can tell to look at her, " said SolomonHatch, "she's soft enough, so my wife says, where sick folks an'children an' animals are consarned, but she acts as if men warborn without common feelin's of natur an' didn't come inside theCommandments. It's beyond me how a kind-hearted woman can be sounmerciful to an entire sex. "

"Had it been otherwise 'twould have been downright disproof of God'sprovidence and the bond of matrimony, " responded old Adam. 

"True, true, Mr. Doolittle, " admitted Solomon, somewhat abashed. "Tharain't any in these parts as can equal you on the Scriptures, as I'vesaid over an' over agin. It's good luck for the Almighty that He has gotyou on His side, so to speak, to help Him confound His enemies. "

"Thar're two sides to that, I reckon, seein' I confound not only Hisenemies, but His sarvents. Sech is the shot an' shell of my logic thatthe righteous fall before it as fast as the wicked--faster even I mightsay if I war speakin' particular. Have you marked how skeery Mr. Mullenhas growed about meetin' my eyes over the rail of the pulpit? Why, 'twasonly yesterday that I brought my guns to bear on the resurrection ofthe body, an' blowed it to atoms in his presence. 'Now thar's ReubenMerryweather who buried one leg at Manassas, Mr. Mullen, ' I said aspleasant an' natchel as if I warn't about to confound him, 'an' what I'dlike to have made clear an' easy to me, suh, is what use the Almighty isgoin' to make of that odd leg on the Day of Jedgment? Will he add anew one onto Reuben, ' I axed, 'when, as plain as logic will have it, it won't be a resurrection, but a creation, or will he start that lega-trampin' by itself all the way from Manassas to jine the other at OldChurch?' The parson had been holdin' pretty free all the mornin' withnobody daring to contradict him, and a man more taken aback by the powerof logic my sight never lit on. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle, ' was all hesaid, never a word mo'. 'Spare me, Mr. Doolittle. '"

"Ah, a tough customer you are, " commented Solomon, "an' what answer didyou make to that, suh?"

Old Adam's pipe returned to his mouth, and he puffed slowly a minute. "'Twas a cry for mercy, Solomon, so I spared him, " he responded. 

The wagon had reached the well, and without stopping, the largewhite-and-red oxen moved on into the turnpike. Bending from her highseat, Molly Merryweather smiled at the miller, who made a single stridetoward her. Then her glance passed to the stranger, and for an instantshe held his gaze with a pair of eyes that appeared to reflect his inshape, setting and colour. In the man's face there showed perplexity, admiration, ironic amusement; in the girl's there was a glimmer of thesmile with which she had challenged the adoring look of the miller. 

The flush left the features of young Revercomb, and he turned back, witha scowl on his forehead, while old Adam cackled softly over the stem ofhis pipe. 

"Wiles come as natchel to women as wickedness to men, young Adam, " hesaid. "The time to beware of 'em is in yo' youth befo' they've bewitchedyo'. Why, 'tis only since I've turned ninety that I've trusted myself tothink upon the sex with freedom. "

"I'm bewarin', " replied his son, "but when Molly Merryweather widens hereyes and bites her underlip, it ain't in the natur of man or beast tostand out agin her. Why, if it had been anybody else but the rector Icould have sworn I saw him squeezin' her hand when he let down the barsfor her last Sunday. "

"It's well knowed that when he goes to upbraid her for makin' eyes athim durin' the 'Have mercy on me, ' he takes a mortal long time about thebusiness, " responded Solomon, "but, good Lord, 'tain't fur me to wishit different, seein' it only bears out all I've argured about falsedoctrines an' evil practice. From the sprinklin' of the head thar's buta single step downward to the holdin' of hands. "

"Well, I'm a weak man like the rest of you, " rejoined young Adam, "an'though I'm sound on the doctrines--in practice I sometimes backslide. I'm thankful, however, it's the lesser sin an' don't set so heavy on thestomach. "

"Ah, it's the light women like Molly Merryweather that draws the eyes ofthe young, " lamented old Adam. 

"A pretty bit of vanity, is she?" inquired the stranger lightly, andfell back the next instant before the vigorous form of the miller, whoswung round upon him with the smothered retort, "That's a lie!" Theboyish face of the young countryman had paled under his sunburn and hespoke with the suppressed passion of a man who is not easily angered andwho responds to the pressure of some absorbing emotion. 

"Lord, Lord, Abel, Mr. Jonathan warn't meanin' no particular disrespect, not mo' was I, " quavered old Adam. 

"You're too pipin' hot, miller, " interposed Solomon. "They warn'tmeanin' any harm to you nor to the gal either. With half the countycourtin' her it ain't to be expected that she'd go as sober as a greymare, is it?"

"Well, they're wastin' their time, " retorted the miller, "for shemarries me, thank God, this coming April. "

Turning away the next instant, he vaulted astride the bare back of themare, and started at a gallop in the direction of the turnpike. 

"I'll be blessed if that little gal of Reuben Merryweather's ain't hisreligion, " commented young Adam. 

"An' he's of the opinion that he's going to marry her this comin'spring, " cackled Solomon. "Well, I could be namin' two or three othersof the same mind, if I'd take the trouble. It's all sensible enough tolambaste the women when they don't pick up every virtue that we throwaway, but what's to be expected of 'em, I ax, when all the men senceAdam have been praisin' the sober kind of gal while they was runnin'arter the silly? Thar're some among 'em, I reckon, as have reasoned outto themselves that a man's pursuit speaks louder in the years, arterall, than his praise. Now, thar's a fine, promisin' farmer, like themiller gone runnin' loose, mo's the pity. "

"A kind heart at bottom, " said old Adam, "but he's got a deal of larnin'to do befo' he'll rest content to bide along quietly in the same worldwith human natur. "

"Oh, he's like the Revercombs from the beginnin', " protested Solomon, "slow an' peaceable an' silent until you rouse 'em, but when they'reonce roused, they're roused beyond God or devil. "

"Is this young Cain or Abel the head of the family?" inquired thestranger. 

"Bless you, no, Mr. Jonathan, he ain't the head--for thar's his brotherAbner still livin'--but, head or tail, he's the only part that counts, when it comes to that. Until the boy grew up an' took hold of things, the Revercombs warn't nothin' mo' than slack fisted, out-at-heel po'white trash, as the niggers say, though the old man, Abel's grandfather, al'ays lays claim to bein' connected with the real Revercombs, higherup in the State--However that may be, befo' the war thar warn't no placefor sech as them, an' 'tis only since times have changed an' the bottombegun to press up to the top that anybody has heerd of 'em. Abel went toschool somehow by hook or crook an' got a good bit of book larnin', theysay, an' then he came back here an' went to turnin' up every stone an'stick on the place. He ploughed an' he sowed an' he reaped till he'dsaved up enough to buy that piece of low ground betwixt his house andthe grist-mill. Then Ebenezer Timberlake died of the dropsy an' thefirst thing folks knew, Abel had moved over and turned miller. All thegrain that's raised about here now goes to his mill, an' they say he'llbe throwin' out the old and puttin' in new-fangled machinery befo' theyear is up. He's the foremost man in these parts, suh, unless you war tocome to Jordan's Journey to live like yo' uncle. "

"To live like my uncle, " repeated the young man, with an ironicintonation that escaped the ears of old Adam. "But what of the miller'slittle sweetheart with the short hair and the divine smile? Whosedaughter is she?"

Old Adam's thin lips flattened until a single loosened tooth midway ofhis lower gum wagged impishly back and forth. His face, sunburnedand frosted like the hardened rind of some winter fruit, revealed theprominent bones of the skull under the sunken flesh. One of his gnarledold hands, trembling and red, clutched the clay bowl of his pipe; theother, with the callous skin of the palm showing under the bent fingers, rested half open on the leather patch that covered the knee of hisoveralls. A picture of toilworn age, of the inevitable end of all mortallabour, he had sat for hours in the faint sunshine, smiling with hissunken, babyish mouth at the brood of white turkeys that crowded aboutthe well. 

"Well, she's Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter, suh, " replied Solomonin the place of the elder. "He was overseer at Jordan's Journey, youknow, durin' the old gentleman's lifetime, after the last Jordan diedand the place was bought by yo' uncle. Ah, 'twas different, suh, whenthe Jordans war livin'!"

Some furtive malice in his tone caused the stranger to turn sharply uponhim. 

"The girl's mother--who was she?" he asked. 

"Janet Merryweather, the prettiest gal that ever set foot on theseroads. Ah, 'twas a sad story, was hers, an' the less said about it, the soonest forgotten. Thar was some folks, the miller among 'em, thatdropped dead out with the old minister--that was befo' Mr. Mullen'stime--for not wantin' her to be laid in the churchyard. A hard case, doubtless, but a pious man such as I likes to feel sartain that howevermuch he may have fooled along with sinful women in this world, only themost respectable of thar sex will rise around him at the Jedgment. "

"And the father?" inquired the stranger, with a sound as if he drew inhis breath sharply. 

"Accordin' to the Law an' the Prophets she hadn't any. That may be goin'agin natur, suh, but 'tis stickin' close to Holy Writ an' the wisdom ofGod. "

To this the young man's only response was a sudden angry aversion thatshowed in his face. Then lifting his horse's head from the trodden grassby the well, he sprang into the saddle, and started, as the miller haddone, over the three roads into the turnpike. Remembering as he passedthe gate posts that he had spoken no parting word to the group under themulberry tree, he raised himself in his stirrups, and called back "Goodday to you. Many thanks, " in his pleasant voice. 

CHAPTER II

IN WHICH DESTINY WEARS THE COMIC MASK

Putting his horse to a canter, Mr. Jonathan Gay rode through the oldgate into the turnpike. His still indignant look was fixed on theheavy wheelruts ahead, while his handsome though fleshy figure inclinedslightly forward in the saddle after a foreign fashion. Seen closeat hand his face, which was impressive at a distance, lost a certaindistinction of contour, as though the marks of experience had blurred, rather than accentuated, the original type. The bones of forehead andnose still showed classic in outline, but in moulding the mouth and chinnature had not adhered closely to the aristocratic structure beneath. The flesh sagged a little in places; the brow was a trifle too heavy, the jaw a trifle too prominent, the lips under the short dark moustachewere a trifle too full. Yet in spite of this coarseness of finish, hisface was well coloured, attractive, and full of generous, if whimsical, humour. A judge of men would have seen in it proof that Mr. Gay'scharacter consisted less in a body of organized tendencies than in aprocession of impulses. 

White with dust the turnpike crawled straight ahead between blood-redclumps of sumach and bramble on which the faint sunlight still shone. Atintervals, where the dripping from over-hanging boughs had worn theroad into dangerous hollows, boles of young saplings had been placedcross-wise in a corduroy pattern, and above them clouds of small belatedbutterflies drifted in the wind like blown yellow rose leaves. On theright the thin corn shocks looked as if they were sculptured in bronze, and amid them there appeared presently the bent figure of a harvester, outlined in dull blue against a sky of burnt orange. From the lowgrounds beside the river a mist floated up, clinging in fleecy shreds tothe short grass that grew in and out of the bare stubble. The aspect ofmelancholy, which was depressing even in the broad glare of noon, becamealmost intolerable under the waning light of the afterglow. Miles ofloneliness stretched on either side of the turnpike, which trailed, without fork or bend, into the flat distance beyond the great pine atthe bars. 

For the twentieth time since he had left the tavern, Mr. Gay, whosehabit it was to appear whimsical when he felt despondent, declared tohimself that he'd be damned if the game was worth half what the candlewas likely to cost him. Having arrived, without notable misadventure, at the age of thirty, he had already reduced experience to a seriesof episodes and had embraced the casual less as a pastime than as aphilosophy. 

"If the worst comes to the worst--hang it!--I suppose I may hunt a MollyCotton-tail, " he grumbled, bringing his horse's gait down to an amble. "There ought to be good hounds about, judging from the hang-dog look ofthe natives. Why in thunder did the old boy want to bury himself andhis heirs forever in this god-forsaken land's end, and what in the deucehave mother and Aunt Kesiah done with themselves down here for the lasttwenty years? Two thousand acres? Damn it! I'd rather have six feeton the good English soil! Came to get rid of one woman, did he?--andtumbled into a pretty puddle with another as soon as he got here. ByGeorge, it's in the bone and it is obliged to come out in the blood. A Gay will go on ogling the sex, I suppose, as long as he is able tototter back from the edge of the grave. "

As he approached the blazed pine, a spot of darkness, which he had atfirst mistaken for a small tree, detached itself from the surroundingshadows, and assumed gradually a human shape. His immediate impressionwas that the shape was a woman and that she was young. With his nextbreath he became aware that she was also beautiful. In the fading lighther silhouette stood out as distinctly against the mellow background ofthe sky, as did the great pine which marked the almost obliterated pathover the fields. Her dress was the ordinary calico one, of some dullpurplish shade, worn by the wives and daughters of the neighbouringfarmers; and on her bare white arm, with its upturned sleeve, shecarried a small split basket half filled with persimmons. She was ofan almost pure Saxon type--tall, broad-shouldered, deep-bosomed, witha skin the colour of new milk, and soft ashen hair parted smoothly overher ears and coiled in a large, loose knot at the back of her head. Ashe reached her she smiled faintly and a little brown mole at the cornerof her mouth played charmingly up and down. After the first minute, Gayfound himself fascinated by this single imperfection in her otherwiseflawless features. More than her beauty he felt that it stirred hisblood and aroused in him the physical tenderness which he associatedalways with some vague chivalrous impulse. 

She moved slightly when he dismounted beside her, and a number ofsmall splotches of black circling around her resolved themselves into abodyguard of little negroes, clad in checked pinafores, with the scantlocks wrapped tightly with crimson cotton. 

"May I let down the bars for you?" he asked, turning to look into herface with a smile, "and do you take your collection of piccaninniesalong for protection or for amusement?"

"Grandma doesn't like me to go out alone, sir--so many dreadful thingshappen, " she answered gently, with an utter absence of humour. "I can'ttake anybody who is at work, so I let the little darkies come. Mary Jois the oldest and she's only six. "

"Is your home near here?"

"I live at the mill. It's a mile farther on, but there is a short cut. "

"Then you are related to the miller, Mr. Revercomb--that fine lookingchap I met at the ordinary?"

"He is my uncle. I am Blossom Revercomb, " she answered. 

"Blossom? It's a pretty name. "

Her gaze dwelt on him calmly for and instant, with the faintest quiverof her full white lids, which appeared to weigh heavily on her ratherprominent eyes of a pale periwinkle blue. 

"My real name is Keren-happuch, " she said at last, after a struggle withherself, "grandma bein' a great Scripture reader, chose it when I wasborn--but they call me Blossom, for short. "

"And am I permitted, Miss Keren-happuch, to call you Blossom?"

Again she hesitated, pondering gravely. 

"Mary Jo, if you unwrap your hair your mother will whip you, " shesaid suddenly, and went on without a perceptible change of tone, "Keren-happuch is an ugly name, and I don't like it--though grandma sayswe oughtn't to think any of the Bible names ugly, not even Gog. Sheis quite an authority on Scripture, is grandma, and she can repeat thefirst chapter in Chronicles backward, which the minister couldn't dowhen he tried. "

"I'd like to hear the name that would sound ugly on your lips, MissKeren-happuch. "

If the sons of farmers had sought to enchant her ears with similarstrains, there was no hint of it in the smiling eyes she lifted to his. The serenity of her look added, he thought, to her resemblance to somepagan goddess--not to Artemis nor to Aphrodite, but to some creaturecompounded equally of earth and sky. Io perhaps, or Europa? By Jove hehad it at last--the Europa of Veronese!

"There'll have to be a big frost before the persimmons get sweet, " sheobserved in a voice that was remarkably deep and full for a woman. With the faint light on her classic head and her milky skin, he founda delicious piquancy in the remark. Had she gossiped, had she evenlaughed, the effect would have been disastrous. Europa, he was vaguelyaware, would hardly have condescended to coquetry. Her speech, like herglance, would be brief, simple, direct. 

"Tell me about the people here, " he asked after a pause, in which heplucked idly at the red-topped orchard grass through which they werepassing. Behind them the six little negroes walked primly in singlefile, Mary Jo in the lead and a chocolate-coloured atom of two toddlingat the tail of the procession. From time to time shrill squeaks went upfrom the rear when a startled partridge whirred over the pasture or abare brown foot came down on a toad or a grasshopper. 

As she made no reply, he added in a more intimate tone, "I am JonathanGay, of Jordan's Journey, as I suppose you know. "

"The old gentleman's nephew?" she said, while she drew slightly awayfrom him. "Mary Jo, did you tell Tobias's mammy that he was comingalong?"

"Nawm, I ain done tole nobody caze dar ain nobody done ax me. "

"But I said that you were not to bring him without letting Mahaly know. You remember what a whipping she gave him the last time he came!"

At this a dismal howl burst from Tobias. "Iain't-a-gwine-ter-git-a-whuppin'!"

"Lawd, Miss Blossom, hit cyarn' hut Tobias ez hit ud hut de res'er us, "replied Mary Jo, with fine philosophy, "case dar ain but two years er'im ter whup. "

"I ain't-a-gwine-ter-git-a-whuppin'!" sang Tobias in a passionaterefrain. 

"Now that's just it, " said Gay, feeling as though he should like tothrottle the procession of piccaninnies. "What I can't understand is whythe people about here--those I met at Bottom's Ordinary, for instance, seem to have disliked me even before I came. "

Without surprise or embarrassment, she changed the basket from her rightto her left arm, and this simple movement had the effect of placing himat a distance, though apparently by accident. 

"That's because of the old gentleman, I reckon, " she answered, "my folksall hated him, I don't know why. "

"But can you guess? You see I really want to understand. I've been awaysince I was eight years old and I have only the haziest memories. "

The question brought them into a sudden intimacy, as if his impulsiveappeal to her had established a relation which had not existed theminute before. He liked the look of her strong shoulders, of her deepbosom rising in creamy white to her throat; and the quiver of her redlower lip when she talked, aroused in him a swift and facile emotion. The melancholy of the landscape, reacting on the dangerous softness ofhis mood, bent his nature toward her like a flame driven by the wind. Around them the red-topped orchard grass faded to pale rose in thetwilight, and beyond the crumbling rail fence miles of featherybroomsedge swept to the pines that stood straight and black against thewestern horizon. Impressions of the hour and the scene, of colour andsound, were blended in the allurement which Nature proffered him, forher own ends, through the woman beside him. Not Blossom Revercomb, butthe great Mother beguiled him. The forces that moved in the wind, in thewaving broomsedge, and in the call of the whip-poor-will, stirred inhis pulses as they stirred in the objects around him. That fugitiveattraction of the body, which Nature has shielded at the cost of finerattributes, leaped upon him like a presence that had waited in earth andsky. Loftier aspirations vanished before it. Not his philosophy but theaccident of a woman's face worked for destiny. 

"I never knew just how it was, " she answered slowly as if weighing herwords, "but your uncle wasn't one of our folks, you know. He boughtthe place the year before the war broke out, and there was always somemystery about him and about the life he led--never speaking to anybodyif he could help it, always keeping himself shut up when he could. Hehadn't a good name in these parts, and the house hasn't a good nameeither, for the darkies say it is ha'nted and that old Mrs. Jordan--'oleMiss' they called her--still comes back out of her grave to rebuke theha'nt of Mr. Jonathan. There is a path leading from the back porch tothe poplar spring where none of them will go for water after nightfall. Uncle Abednego swears that he met his old master there one night when hewent down to fill a bucket and that a woman was with him. It all comes, I reckon, of Mr. Jonathan having been found dead at the spring, and youknow how the darkies catch onto any silly fancy about the dead walking. I don't believe much in ha'nts myself, though great-grandma has seenmany a one in her day, and all the servants at Jordan's Journey willnever rest quiet. I've always wondered if your mother and Miss Kesiahwere ever frightened by the stories the darkies tell?" For a moment shepaused, and then added softly, "It was all so different, they say, whenthe Jordans were living. "

Again the phrase which had begun to irritate him! Who were these deadand gone Jordans whose beneficent memory still inhabited the house theyhad built?

"I don't think my mother would care for such stories, " he replied aftera minute. "She has never mentioned them in her letters. "

"Of course nobody really puts faith in them, but I never pass thespring, if I can help it, after the sun has gone down. It makes me feelso dreadfully creepy. "

"The root of this gossip, I suppose, lies in the general dislike of myuncle?"

"Perhaps--I'm not sure, " she responded, and he felt that her rusticsimplicity possessed a charm above the amenities of culture. "The oldclergyman--that was before Mr. Mullen's day--when we all went to thechurch over at Piping Tree--used to say that the mercy of God would haveto exceed his if He was ever going to redeem him. I remember hearinghim tell grandma when I was a child that there were a few particularsin which he couldn't answer with certainty for God, and that old Mr. Jonathan Gay was one of 'em. 'God Almighty will have to find His own wayin this matter, ' he used to declare, 'for I wash my hands of it. ' I'msorry, sir, " she finished contritely, "I forgot he was your own bloodrelation. "

In the spirit of this contrition, she changed the basket back again toher left arm; and perceiving his advantage, Gay acted upon it with hisaccustomed alacrity. 

"Don't apologize, please, I am glad I have this from your lips--not froma stranger's. "

Under the spell of her beauty, he was aware of a pleasurable sensation, as though the pale rose of the orchard grass had gone to his head andcoloured his vision. There was a thrill in feeling her large, soft armbrushing his sleeve, in watching the rise and fall of her bosom underher tight calico dress. 

"I shall always know that we were friends--good friends, from thefirst, " he resumed after a minute. 

"You are very kind, sir, " she answered, "this is my path over the stileand it is growin' late--Tobias's mother will surely give him a whippin'. I hope you don't mind my havin' gathered these persimmons on your land, "she concluded, with an honesty which was relieved from crudeness by herphysical dignity, "they are hardly fit to eat because there has been solittle frost yet. "

"Well, I'm sorry for that, Miss Keren-happuch, or shall it be Blossom?"

"I like Blossom better, " she answered shyly, lifting her scant calicoskirt with one hand as she mounted the stile. 

"Then good night, lovely Blossom, " he called gaily while he turnedback into the bridle path which led like a frayed white seam over thepasture. 

CHAPTER III

IN WHICH MR. GAY ARRIVES AT HIS JOURNEY'S END

Broad and low, with the gabled pediment of the porch showing throughboughs of oaks, and a flight of bats wheeling over the ivied roof, thehouse appeared to Gay beyond a slight swell in the meadows. The groveof oaks, changing from dark red to russet, was divided by a shortwalk, bordered by clipped box, which led to the stone steps and to twodiscoloured marble urns on which broken-nosed Cupids were sporting. Ashe was about to slip his reins over the back of an iron chair on thelawn, a shriek in a high pitched negro voice pierced his ears from ahalf shuttered dormer-window in the east wing. 

"Fo' de Lawd, hit's de ha'nt er ole marster! Yessuh--Yessuh, --I'sea-comin'--I'se a-comin'. "

The next instant the window slammed with a bang, and the sound of flyingfootsteps echoed through the darkened interior of the house. 

"Open the door, you fool! I'm not a ghost!" shouted Gay, but the onlyresponse came in an hysterical babble of moans from the negro quarterssomewhere in the rear and in the soft whir in his face of a leatherwingbat as it wheeled low in the twilight. There was no smoke in thechimneys, and the square old house, with its hooded roof and its vacantwindows, assumed a sinister and inhospitable look against the backgroundof oaks. His mother and his aunt, he concluded, were doubtless away fortheir winter's shopping, so lifting his horse's head from the grass, hepassed between the marble urns and the clipped box, and followed a path, deep in leaves, which led from the west wing of the house to the outsidekitchen beyond a paved square at the back. Half intelligible wordsfloated to him as he approached, and from an old pear-tree near the doorthere was a flutter of wings where a brood of white turkeys settled toroost. Beyond the bole of the tree a small negro in short skirts was"shooin'" a large rooster into the henhouse, but at the muffled fall ofGay's horse's hoofs on the dead leaves, she turned with a choking sound, and fled to the shelter of the kitchen at her back. 

"My time's done come, but I ain't-a-gwine! I ain't-a-gwine!" wailedthe chorus within. "Ole marster's done come ter fotch me, but Iain't-a-gwine! O Lawd, I ain't-a-gwine! O Jesus, I ain't-a-gwine!"

"You fools, hold your tongues!" stormed the young man, losing histemper. "Send somebody out here to take my horse or I'll give yousomething to shout over in earnest. "

The shrieks trembled high for an instant, and then died out in adespairing moan, while the blanched face of an old servant appeared inthe doorway. 

"Is hit you er yo' ha'nt, Marse Jonathan?" he inquired humbly. 

"Come here, you doddering idiot, and take my horse. "

But half reassured the negro came a step or two forward, and madea feeble clutch at the reins, which dropped from his grasp when theroosting turkeys stirred uneasily on the bough above. 

"I'se de butler, marster, en I ain never sot foot in de stable sence dedays er ole miss. "

"Where's my mother?"

"Miss Angela, she's done gone up ter town en Miss Kesiah she's done goneerlong wid 'er. "

"Is the house closed?"

"Naw, suh, hit ain closed, but Miss Molly she's got de keys up yonder atde house er de overseer. "

"Well, send somebody with a grain of sense out here, and I'll look upMiss Molly. "

At this the butler vanished promptly into the kitchen, and a minutelater a half-grown mulatto boy relieved Gay of his horse, while hepointed to a path through an old apple orchard that led to the cottageof the overseer. As the young man passed under the gnarled boughs to ashort flagged walk before the small, whitewashed house in which "MissMolly" lived, he wondered idly if the lady who kept the keys would proveto be the amazing little person he had seen some hours earlier perchedon the load of fodder in the ox-cart. The question was settled almostbefore it was asked, for a band of lamplight streamed suddenly from thedoor of the cottage, and in the centre of it appeared the figure ofa girl in a white dress, with red stockings showing under her shortskirts, and a red ribbon filleting the thick brown curls on herforehead. From her movements he judged that she was mixing a bowl ofsoft food for the old hound at her feet, and he waited until she hadcalled the dog inside for his supper, before he went forward and spokeher name in his pleasant voice. 

At the sound she turned with a start, and he saw her vivid little face, with the wonderful eyes, go white for a minute. 

"So you are Mr. Jonathan? I thought so, " she said at last, "butgrandfather told me you sent no word of your coming. "

She spoke quickly, with a refinement of accent which puzzled him untilhe remembered the malicious hints Solomon Hatch had let fall at thetavern. That she was, in reality, of his blood and the child of hisuncle, he had not doubted since the moment she had smiled at him fromher seat on the oxcart. How much was known, he now wondered. Had hisuncle provided for her? Was his mother--was his Aunt Kesiah--aware ofthe truth?

"She missed my letter, I suppose, " he replied. "Has she been long away?"

"Only a week. She is expected home day after to-morrow. "

"Then I shall beg you to open the house for me. "

She had turned back to the old hound, and was bending over to place hisbowl of bread and milk on the hearth. A log fire, in which a few pinebranches stood out illuminated like boughs of flame, filled the bigstone fireplace, which was crudely whitewashed to resemble the low wallsof the room. A kettle hung on an iron crane before the blaze, and thesinging of the water made a cheerful noise amid a silence which struckGay suddenly as hostile. When the girl raised her head he saw that herface had grown hard and cold, and that the expression of her eyes hadchanged to one of indignant surprise. The charming coquetry had fledfrom her look, yet her evident aversion piqued him into a half smiling, half serious interest. He wondered if she would marry that fine lookingrustic, the miller, and if the riotous Gay blood in her veins wouldflow placidly in her mother's class? Had she, too, inherited, if not thename, yet the weaknesses of an older race? Was she, like himself, cursedwith swift fancies and swifter disillusionments? How frail she was, andhow brilliant! How innocent and how bitter!

He turned away, ostensibly to examine a print on the wall, and while hisback was toward her, he felt that her gaze stabbed him like thethrust of a knife. Wheeling quickly about, he met her look, but to hisamazement, she continued to stare back at him with the expression ofindignant surprise still in her face. How she hated him and, by Jove, how she _could_ hate! She reminded him of a little wild brown animal asshe stood there with her teeth showing between her parted red lips andher eyes flashing defiance. The next minute he found himself asking ifshe could ever grow gentle--could ever soften enough to allow herselfto be stroked? He remembered Solomon Hatch's remark that "she wasonmerciful to an entire sex, " and in spite of his effort at composure, alaugh sprang to his lips. 

In the centre of the room a table was laid, and going over to it, shebusied herself with the cups and saucers as though she were anxious toput a disagreeable presence out of her thoughts. 

"May I share your supper?" he asked, and waited, not without amusement, for her answer. 

"I'm sorry there isn't any for you at the big house, " she answeredpolitely. "If you will sit down, I'll tell Delily to bring in somebatter bread. "

"And you?"

"I'll have mine with grandfather. He's out in the barn giving medicineto the red cow. "

While she spoke Delily entered with a plate of cornbread and a pot ofcoffee, and a minute later Reuben Merryweather paused on the thresholdto shake off a sprinkling of bran from his hair and beard. He was abent, mild looking old man, with a wooden leg which made a stumpingnoise when he walked, and a pair of wistful brown eyes, like those of anaged hound that has been worn out by hard service. Past seventy now, his youth had been trained to a different civilization, and there wasa touching gentleness in his face, as if he expressed still the mentalattitude of a class which had existed merely as a support or a foil tothe order above it. Without spirit to resent, he, with his fellows, hadendured the greatest evils of slavery. With the curse of free labouron the land, there had been no incentive for toil, no hire for thelabourer. Like an incubus the system had lain over them, stiflingall energy, checking all progress, retarding all prosperity save theprosperity of the great land-owners. Then the soil had changed hands, and where the plough had broken the earth, the seeds of a democracy hadgerminated and put forth from the very blood of the battlefields. In theupward pressure of class, he had seen the stability of custom yield atlast to the impetus of an energy that was not racial but individual. Yetfrom the transition he had remained always a little apart. Reverence hadbecome for him a habit of mind, and he had learned that respect couldoutlive even a belief in the thing upon which it was founded. Mr. Jonathan and he had been soldiers together. His old commander stillentered his thoughts to the rattle of musketry and the roar of cannon, and a single sublime action at Malvern Hill had served in the mind ofthe soldier to spread a legendary glamour over a life which held hardlyanother incident that was worthy of remembrance. 

At his entrance Molly melted from her hostile attitude, and while shehung on the old man's breast, Gay noticed, with surprise, that shewas made up of enchanting curves and delicious softness. Her sharpenedfeatures grew rounder, and her thin red lips lost their hardness ofoutline. When she raised her head after a minute, he saw that the lightin her eyes adorned and enriched her. By Jove, he had never imaginedthat she could change and colour like that!

"You are late, grandfather, " said the girl, "I was coming to look foryou with a lantern. "

"The red cow kept me, " answered the old man, adding as he held out hishand to Gay, "So you've come at last, Mr. Jonathan. Your mother will bepleased. "

"I was sorry to find her absent, " replied Gay, "and I was just askingyour granddaughter if she would permit me to join you at supper?"

"To be sure--to be sure, " responded Reuben, with a cheerfulness whichstruck Gay as singularly pathetic. "After supper Molly will go over withPatsey and see that you are made comfortable. "

The old hound, blind and toothless, fawned at his knees, and leaningover, he caressed it with a knotted and trembling hand. 

"Has Spot had his supper, Molly?"

"Yes, grandfather. He can eat only soft bread and gravy. " At her voicethe hound groped toward her, and stooping, she laid her soft, flushedcheek on his head. 

"Well, sit down, suh, sit down, " said Reuben, speaking timidly as ifhe were not sure he had chosen the right word. "If you'll tell Delily, honey, Mr. Jonathan will have his supper. "

"On condition that you let me share yours, Mr. Merryweather, " insistedGay, in his genial tone. "If you're going to make company of me, I shallgo hungry until to-morrow. "

From a wooden safe in the corner Molly brought a plate and a cup, andmade a place for the young man at the end of the red-and-white cloth onthe table. Then she turned away, without speaking, and sat down behindthe tin coffeepot, which emitted a fragrant steam. 

"Cream and sugar?" she inquired presently, meeting his eyes over theglass lamp which stood midway between them. 

Gay had been talking to Reuben about the roads--"jolly bad roads, "he called them, "wasn't it possible to make them decent for riding?"Looking up at the girl's question, he answered absently, "two lumps. Cream? Yes, please, a little, " and then continued to stare at her witha vague and impersonal wonder. She was half savage, of course, with redhands, and bad manners and dressed like a boy that had got into skirtsfor a joke--but, by George, there was something about her that bit intothe fancy. Not a beauty like his Europa of the pasture (who was, whenit came to that?)--but a fascinating little beggar, with a quality ofsudden surprises that he could describe by no word except "iridescent. "He liked the high arch of her brows; but her nose wasn't good and herlips were too thin except when she smiled. When she smiled! It was hersmile, after all, that made her seem a thing of softness and bloom bornto be kissed. 

Reuben ate his food rapidly, pouring his coffee into the saucer, and drinking it in loud gulps that began presently to make Gay feeldecidedly nervous. Once the young man inadvertently glanced towardhim, and turning away the instant afterwards, he found the girl's eyeswatching him with a defiant and threatening look. Her passionate defenceof Reuben reminded Gay of a nesting bird under the eye of the hunter. She did not plead, she dared--actually dared him to criticise the oldman even in his thoughts!

That Molly herself was half educated and possessed some smattering ofculture, it was easy to see. She was less rustic in her speech than hisEuropa, and there was the look of breeding, or of blood, in the finepoise of her head, in her small shapely hands, which he remembered werea distinguishing mark of the Gays. 

"Mr. Mullen came for you in his cart, " said Reuben, glancing from oneto the other of his hearers with his gentle and humble look. "I told himyou must have forgotten as you'd ridden down to the low grounds. "

"No, I didn't forget, " replied Molly, indifferent apparently to therestraint of Gay's presence, "I did it on purpose. " Meeting the youngman's amused and enquiring expression, she added defiantly, "There areplenty of girls that are always ready to go with him and it's becauseI'm not that he wants me. "

"He's not the only one, to judge from what I heard at the ordinary. "

She shrugged her shoulders--an odd gesture for a rustic coquette--whilea frown overshadowed her features. 

"They're all alike, " she retorted scornfully. "If you go over to themill you'll probably find Abel Revercomb sulking and brow-beating hismother because I smiled at you this afternoon. And I did it only toplague him!"

"Molly's a good girl, " said Reuben, rather as if he expected theassertion to be disputed, "but she was taught to despise folks when shewas a baby--wasn't you, pretty?"

"Not you--never you, grandfather. "

The intimate nature of the conversation grated upon Gay not a little. There was something splendidly barbaric about the girl, and yet themixture of her childishness and her cynicism affected him unpleasantlyrather than otherwise. His ideal woman--the woman of the early Victorianperiod--was submissive and clinging. He was perfectly assured thatshe would have borne her wrongs, and even her mother's wrongs, withhumility. Meekness had always seemed to him the becoming mental andfacial expression for the sex; and that a woman should resent appearedalmost as indelicate as that she should propose. 

When supper was over, and Reuben had settled to his pipe, with the oldhound at his feet, Molly took down a bunch of keys from a nail in thewall, and lit a lantern with a taper which she selected from a chinavase on the mantelpiece. Once outside she walked a little ahead of Gayand the yellow blaze of the lantern flitted like a luminous bird overthe flagged walk bordered by gooseberry bushes. Between the stones, which were hollowed by the tread of generations, nature had embroideredthe bare places with delicate patterns of moss. 

At the kitchen the girl stopped to summon Patsey, the maid, who wasdiscovered roasting an apple at the end of a long string before thelogs. 

"I am going to the big house. Come and make up the bed in the blueroom, " Gay heard through the door. 

"Yes'm, Miss Molly, I'se a-comin' in jes a minute. "

"And bring plenty of lightwood. He will probably want a fire. "

With this she appeared again on the outside, crossed the paved square tothe house, and selecting a large key, unlocked the door, which grated onits hinges as Gay pushed it open. Following her into the hall, he stoodback while she lit a row of tallow candles, in old silver sconces, whichextended up the broad mahogany staircase to the upper landing. One byone as she applied the taper, the candles flashed out in a misty circle, and then rising in a clear flame, shone on her upraised hand and on thebrilliant red of her lips and cheeks. 

"That is your mother's room, " she said, pointing to a closed door, "andthis is yours. Patsey will make a fire. "

"It's rather gloomy, isn't it?"

"Shall I bring you wine? I have the key to the cellar. "

"Brandy, if you please. The place feels as if it had been shut up for acentury. "

"It was your uncle's room. Do you mind sleeping here? It's the easiestto get ready. "

"Not with a fire--and I may have a lamp, I suppose?"

At his question Patsey appeared with an armful of resinous pine, and afew minutes later, a cheerful blaze was chasing the shadows up the greatbrick chimney. When Molly returned with the brandy, Gay was leaningagainst the mantelpiece idly burning a bunch of dried cat-tails he hadtaken from a blue-and-white china vase. 

"It's a gloomy old business, isn't it?" he observed, glancing from thehigh canopied bed with its hangings of faded damask to an engraving ofthe Marriage of Pocahontas between the dormer-windows. "If there areghosts about, I suppose I'd better prepare to face them. "

"Only in the west wing, the darkies say, but I think they are bats. As for those in the haunt's walk, I never believed in them. Patsey isbringing your brandy. Can I do anything else for you?"

"Only tell me, " he burst out, "why in thunder the whole county hatesme?"

She laughed shortly. "I can't tell you--wait and find out. "

Here audacity half angered, half paralyzed him. 

"What a vixen you are!" he observed presently with grudging respect. 

The crimson flooded her face, and he watched her teeth gleamdangerously, as if she were bracing herself for a retort. The impulse totorment her was strong in him, and he yielded to it much as a boy mighthave teased a small captive animal of the woods. 

"With such a temper you ought to have been an ugly woman, " he said, "butyou're so pretty I'm strongly inclined to kiss you. "

"If you do, I'll strike you, " she gasped. 

The virgin in her showed fierce and passionate, not shy and fleeting. That she was by instinct savagely pure, he could tell by the look ofher. 

"I believe it so perfectly that I've no intention of trying, " herejoined. 

"I'm not half so pretty as my mother was, " she said after a pause. 

Her loyalty to the unfortunate Janet touched him to sympathy. "Don'tquarrel with me, Molly, " he pleaded, "for I mean to be friends withyou. "

As he uttered the words, he was conscious of a pleasant feeling ofself-approbation while his nature vibrated to the lofty impulse. Thissensation was so gratifying while it lasted that his manner assumed acertain austerity as one who had determined to be virtuous at any cost. Morally he was on stilts for the moment, and the sense of elevation wasas novel as it was insecure. 

"I know you are a good girl, Molly, " he observed staidly, "that is why Iam so anxious to be your friend. "

"Is there nothing more that I can do for you?" she inquired, with frigidreserve, as she took up the lantern. 

"Yes, one thing--you can shake hands. "

The expression of indignant surprise appeared again in her face, and shefell back a step, shaking her head stubbornly as she did so. 

"I'd rather not--if you don't mind, " she answered. 

"But if I do mind--and I do. "

"Still I'd rather not. "

"Do you really dislike me as much as you dislike the miller?"

"More. "

"Or the rector?"

"Oh, far more. You are a Gay. "

"Yes, I am a Gay, " he might have retorted, "and you, my pretty savage, are very much a Gay, also. "

Swinging the lantern in her hand, she moved to the door, as if she wereanxious to put an end to a conversation which had become suddenly toointimate. On the threshold she looked back, and remarked in a precise, authoritative voice:

"There are blankets in the bottom drawer if you find you haven'tcovering enough. "

"I shall remember--there are blankets in the bottom drawer. "

"Patsey will bring hot water at eight and Uncle Abednego will give youbreakfast in the dining-room. "

"Then I'm not to have it with you?"

"With me? Oh, I live with grandfather. I never come to the big houseexcept when Mrs. Gay is in town. "

"Do you see nothing, then, of my mother when she is at home?"

"Sometimes I help her to make raspberry vinegar or preserves. If youhear a noise in the night it is only the acorns dropping on the roof. There are so many oaks. Good night, Mr. Jonathan. "

"Good night, " he returned, "I wish you'd shake hands, "--but she hadvanished. 

The room was cosy and warm now--and flinging himself into a chair withdeep arms that stood on the hearth, he lit his cigar and sipped drowsilythe glass of brandy she had left on a silver tray on the table. The ceiling was ridiculously high--what a waste of good bricks andmortar!--the room was ridiculously large! On the smooth white wallsreddish shadows moved in a fantastic procession, and from the bigchintz-covered lounge the monstrous blue poppies leaped out of thefirelight. The high canopy over the bed was draped with prim folds ofdamask, and the coverlet was of some quaint crocheted work that hung infringed ends to the floor. Here again from the threadbare velvet carpetthe blue poppies stared back at him. 

An acorn dropped on the roof, and in spite of Molly's warning, hestarted and glanced toward the window, where a frosted pattern of ivyshowed like a delicate lacework on the small greenish panes. Anotherdropped; then another. Gradually he began to listen for the sound and tomiss it when there came a long silence. One might easily imagine itto be the tapping of ghostly fingers--of the fingers of pretty JanetMerryweather--some quarter of a century earlier. Her daughter was hardlymore than twenty now, he supposed, and he wondered how long the madidyllic period had lasted before her birth? Turning to the books on thetable, he opened one and a yellowed fragment of paper fluttered to thefloor at his feet. When he stooped after it, he saw that there was asingle word on it traced faintly in his uncle's hand: "To-morrow. "

And then, being a person whose imagination dealt with the obvious, he undressed, blew out the light, and fell peacefully asleep to thedropping of acorns. 

CHAPTER IV

THE REVERCOMBS

On the morning after the meeting at Bottom's Ordinary, Abel Revercombcame out on the porch of the little house in which he lived, and lookedacross the steep rocky road to the mill-race which ran above a silverstream known as Sycamore Creek. The grist-mill, a primitive logbuilding, worked after ancient methods, had stood for a hundred yearsor more beside a crooked sycamore tree, which grew mid-way of the streamand shaded the wheel and the shingled roof from the blue sky above. Theold wooden race, on which the young green mosses shone like a coating offresh paint on a faded surface, ran for a short distance over the brook, where the broad yellow leaves drifted down to the deep pond below. Across the slippery poplar log, which divided the mill from the road andthe house occupied by the miller, there was a stretch of good corn land, where the corn stood in shocks after the harvest, and beyond this thefeathery bloom of the broomsedge ran to the luminous band of marshes onthe far horizon. 

From the open door before which the miller was standing, there came theclatter of breakfast dishes and the sound of Scripture text quoted inthe voice of his mother. Above his head several strings of red pepperhung drying, and these rustled in the wind with a grating noise thatseemed an accompaniment to the speaker in the kitchen. 

"The Lord said that, an' I reckon He knew His own mind when He wasspeakin' it, " remarked Sarah Revercomb as she put down the coffeepot. 

"I declare there's mother at it again, " observed Abel to himself witha frown--for it was Sarah's fate that an excess of virtue should havewrought all the evil of a positive vice. From the days of her infancy, when she had displayed in the cradle a power of self-denial at which herpastor had marvelled, she had continued to sacrifice her inclinationsin a manner which had rendered unendurable the lives around her. Herparents had succumbed to it; her husband had died of it; her childrenhad resigned themselves to it or rebelled against it according to thequality of their moral fibre. All her life she had laboured to makepeople happy, and the result of this exalted determination was a cowedand resentful family. 

"Yo' buckwheat cakes will be stone cold if you don't come along in, Abel, " she called now from the kitchen. "You've been lookin' kind ofsallow these last days, so I've got a spoonful of molasses and sulphurlaid right by yo' plate. "

"For heaven's sake, take it away, " he retorted irritably. "I don't needit. "

"I reckon I can tell by the look of you better than you can by thefeelin', " rejoined Sarah grimly, "an' if you know what's good for you, you'll come and swallow it right down. "

"I'll be hanged if I do!" exclaimed Abel without moving, and his toneimplied that the ceaseless nagging had got at last on his nerves. Hewas a robust, well-built, red-brown young fellow, who smelt always offreshly ground meal, as though his body, from long usage, had grown toexhale the cleanly odour of the trade he followed. His hair was thick, dark and powdered usually with mill-dust. His eyes, of a clear brighthazel, deep-set and piercing, expressed a violence of nature which hisfirm, thin-lipped mouth, bare of beard or moustache, appeared to deny. A certain tenacity--a suggestion of stubbornness in the jaw, gave thefinal hint to his character, and revealed that temperamental intoleranceof others of the rustic who has risen out of his class. An opinion onceembraced acquired the authority of a revelation; a passion once yieldedto was transformed into a principle. Impulsive, generous, undisciplined, he represented, after all, but the reaction from the spirit of racialsubmission which was embodied in Reuben Merryweather. Traditionhad bound Reuben in thongs of steel; Abel was conscious only of hisliberated intelligence--of a passionate desire to test to the fullestthe certainty of that liberation. As the elder had suffered beneath theweight of the established order, so the younger showed the disturbingeffects of a freedom which had resulted from a too rapid change ineconomic conditions rather than from the more gradual evolution ofclass. When political responsibility was thrust on the plainer peopleinstead of sought by them, it was but natural that the process ofadjustment should appear rough rather than smooth. The land which hadbelonged to the few became after the war within reach of the many. At first the lower classes had held back, paralyzed by the burden ofslavery. The soil, impoverished, wasted, untilled, rested under theshadow of the old names--the old customs. This mole-like blindness ofthe poorer whites persisted still for a quarter of a century; and theawakening was possible only after the newer authority was but a shadow;the past reverence but a delusion. When the black labourer worked, notfreely, but for hire, the wages of the white labourer went up as bymagic. To rise under the old system had been so impossible that Abel'sancestors had got out of the habit of trying. The beneficent charity ofthe great landowners had exhausted the small incentive that might haveremained--and to give had been so much the prerogative of a singleclass, that to receive had become a part of the privileges of another. In that pleasant idyllic period the one act which went unhonoured andunrewarded was the act of toil. So in the odour of shiftlessness Abel'sfather had died; so after ninety years his grandparents still sat by thehearth to which his mother had called him. 

The house, an oblong frame building, newly shingled, was set back fromthe road in a straggling orchard of pear-trees, which bore a hardgreen fruit too sour to be used except in the form of preserves. Smallshanties, including a woodhouse, a henhouse, and a smokehouse for dryingbacon and hams, flanked the kitchen garden at the rear, while in front ashort, gravelled path, bordered by portulaca, led to the paling gate atthe branch road which ran into the turnpike a mile or so farther on. InAbel's dreams another house was already rising in the fair green meadowbeyond the mill-race. He had consecrated a strip of giant pine to thispurpose, and often, while he lingered in the door of his mill, he felthimself battling against the desire to take down his axe and strike hisfirst blow toward the building of Molly's home. His mother might nagat him about Molly now, but let them be married, he told himself, withsanguine masculine assurance, and both women would reconcile themselvesto a situation that neither could amend. Before the immediate ache ofhis longing for the girl, all other considerations evaporated to thinair. He would rather be unhappy with her, he thought passionately, thangive her up!

"Abel, if you don't stop mopin' out thar an' come along in, I'll clearoff the dishes!" called his mother again in her rasping voicewhich sounded as if she were choking in a perpetual spasm of moralindignation. 

Jerking his shoulders slightly in an unspoken protest, Abel turnedand entered the kitchen, where Sarah Revercomb--tall, spare andcommanding--was preparing two bowls of mush for the aged people, whocould eat only soft food and complained bitterly while eating that. Shewas a woman of some sixty years, with a stern handsome face under harshbands of yellowish gray hair, and a mouth that sank in at one cornerwhere her upper teeth had been drawn. Her figure was erect and flat as alath, and this flatness was accentuated by the extreme scantiness ofher drab calico dress. In her youth she had been beautiful in a hard, obvious fashion, and her eyes would have been still fine except fortheir bitter and hostile expression. 

At the table there were Abner Revercomb, some ten or twelve yearsolder than Abel, and Archie, the youngest child, whom Sarah adored andbullied. Blossom was busy about something in the cupboard, and on eitherside of the stove the old people sat with their small, suspicious eyesfixed on the pan of mush which Sarah was dividing with a large woodenspoon into two equal portions. Each feared that the other would receivethe larger share, and each watched anxiously to see into which bowl thelast spoonful would fall. For a week they had not spoken. Their old agewas racked by a sharp and furious jealousy, which was quite exclusiveand not less exacting than their earlier passion of love. 

With a finishing swirl of the big wooden spoon, the last drops of mushfell into grandfather's bowl, while a sly and injured look appearedinstantly on the face of his wife. She was not hungry, but it annoyedher unspeakably that she should not be given the larger portion of food. Her rheumatism was severer than her husband's, and it seemed to her thatthis alone should have entitled her to the greater share of attention. There was a fierce contempt in her manner when she alluded to his ageor to his infirmities, for although he was three years her elder, he wasstill chirpy and cheerful, with many summers, as she said resentfully, left in him yet. 

"Breakfast is ready, grannies, " remarked Sarah, who had allowed hercoffee to grow cold while she looked after the others; "are you ready toeat?"

Grandmother's sly little eyes slanted over her hooked nose in thedirection of the two bowls which her daughter-in-law was about tosprinkle with sugar. An idea entered her old head which made her chucklewith pleasure, and when her mush had been covered, she croaked outsuddenly that she would take her breakfast unsweetened. "I'm too bad totake sugar--give that to him--he has a stomach to stand it, " she said. Though her mouth watered for sweets, by this trick she had outwittedgrandfather, and she felt that it was better than sugar. 

The kitchen was a large, comfortable room, with strings of red peppershanging from the ceiling, and boards of sliced apples drying on upturnedflour barrels near the door. The bright homespun carpet left a strip ofbare plank by the stove, and on this stood two hampers of black walnutsready for storing. A few coloured prints, culled from garden magazines, were tacked on the wall, and these, without exception, representedblossoms of a miraculous splendour and size. In Sarah's straitenedand intolerant soul a single passion had budded and expanded intofulfillment. Stern to all mortal things, to flowers alone she softenedand grew gentle. From the front steps to the back, the kitchenwas filled with them. Boxes, upturned flour barrels, corners ofchina-shelves and window-sills, showed bowers of luxuriant leaf andblossom. Her calla lilies had long been famous in the county; theyhad taken first prizes at innumerable fairs, and whenever there was awedding or a funeral in the neighbourhood, the tall green stalks wereclipped bare of bloom. Many were the dead hands that had been laid inthe earth clasping her lilies. This thought had been for years the chiefsolace in her life, and she was accustomed to refer to it in the heatof religious debates, as though it offered infallible proof of hercontention. After calla lilies, fuchias and tuberoses did best in herhands, and she had nursed rare night blooming cereus for seven yearsin the hope that it would arrive at perfection the following June. Hermarriage had been a disappointment to her, for her husband, a pleasant, good-looking fellow, had turned out an idler; her children, with theexception of Archie, the youngest, had never filled the vacancy in herlife; but in her devotion to flowers there was something of the ecstasyand all of the self-abandonment she had missed in her human relations. 

As he sat down at the table, the miller nodded carelessly to hisbrothers, who, having finished their bacon and cornbread, were waitingpatiently until the buckwheat cakes should be ready. The colouredservant was never allowed to cook because, as Sarah said, "she could notabide niggers' ways, " and Blossom, standing before the stove, with herapron held up to shield her face, was turning the deliciously browningcakes with a tin cake lifter. 

"Ain't they done yet, daughter?" asked Abner in his amiable drawlingvoice. He was a silent, brooding man, heavily built, with a coarsereddish beard, stained with tobacco juice, which hung over his chest. Since the death of his wife, Blossom's mother, some fifteen yearsbefore, he had become more gloomy, more silent, more obstinatelyunapproachable. He was one who appeared to dwell always in the shadow ofa great grief, and this made him generally respected by his neighboursthough he was seldom sought. People said of him that he was "a solidman and trustworthy, " but they kept out of his way unless there was roadmending or a sale of timber to be arranged. 

Blossom tossed the buckwheat cakes into a plate and brought them to herfather, who helped himself with his knife. When she passed them to Abel, who was feeding his favorite hound puppy, Moses, with bacon, he shookhis head and drew back. 

"Give them to mother, Blossom, she never eats a bite of breakfast, " hesaid. He was the only one of Sarah's sons who ever considered her, butshe was apt to regard this as a sign of weakness and to resent it withcontumely. 

"I ain't hungry, " she replied grimly, "an' I reckon I'd rather you'd sayless about my comfort, Abel, and do mo'. Buckwheat cakes don't come wellfrom a son that flies into his mother's face on the matter of eternaldamnation. "

Without replying, Abel helped himself to the cakes she had refused andreached for the jug of molasses. Sarah was in one of her nagging moods, he knew, and she disturbed him but little. The delight and the desire offirst love was upon him, and he was thinking rapturously of the big pinethat would go to the building of Molly's house. 

Grandmother, who wanted syrup, began to cry softly because she must eather tasteless mush. "He's got the stomach to stand it, " she repeatedbitterly, while her tears fell into her bowl. 

"What is it, granny? Will you try a bite of buckwheat?" inquired Sarahsolicitously. She had never failed in her duty to her husband's parents, and this virtue also, she was inclined to use as a weapon of offense toher children. 

"Give it to him--he's got teeth left to chaw on, " whimpered grandmother, and her old chest heaved with bitterness because grandfather, who wasthree years the elder, still retained two jaw teeth on one side of hismouth. 

A yellow-and-white cat, after vainly purring against grandmother'sstool, had jumped on the window-sill in pursuit of a belated wasp, andSarah, rushing to the rescue of her flowers, cuffed the animal soundlyand placed her in grandfather's lap. He was a lover of cats--a harmlessfancy which was a source of unceasing annoyance to his wife. 

"Abel, I wish you'd mend that leak in the smokehouse after breakfast, "remarked Sarah, in an aggressive tone that meant battle. "Two shinglesare gone an' thare four more that want patchin'. "

"I can't, I've got work to do at the mill, " replied Abel, as he rosefrom his chair. "Solomon Hatch sent me his corn to grind and he's comingover to get the sacks. "

"Well, I reckon I'm worth as much as Solomon Hatch, a little pasty facedcritter like that, " rejoined Sarah. 

"Why can't Archie do it? What is he good for?"

"I'm going hunting with Jim Halloween, " returned Archie sullenly, "he'sgot some young dogs he wants to break in to rabbit running. "

"I might have known thar warn't nobody to do what I ask 'em, " observedSarah in the voice and manner of a martyr. "It's rabbits or girls, one or the other, and if it ain't an old hare it's some light-moraledcritter like Molly Merryweather. "

Abel's face had changed to a dull red and his eyes blazed. 

"Say anything against Molly, mother, an' I'll never speak to you again!"he cried out angrily. 

"Thar, thar, ma, you an' Abel are too pepper tongued to get into aquarrel, " remarked Abner, the silent, who seldom spoke except for thepromotion of peace. "I'll mend the roof for you whenever you want it. "

"I reckon I've got as much right to use my tongue as anybody else has, "retorted Sarah, indignant because a solution had been found and hergrievance was annulled. "If a girl ain't a fast one that gets as good asengaged to half the young men in the county, then I'd like to know whois, that's all?"

Then, as Abel called sharply to his fox-hound puppy and flung himselffrom the room, she turned away and went to sprinkle her calla lilies. There was an agony in her breast, though she would have bitten out hertongue sooner than have confessed it. Her strength lay in the fact thatnever in her life had she admitted even to herself, that she had been inthe wrong. 

CHAPTER V

THE MILL

Outside, a high wind was driving the fallen leaves in swirls and eddies, and as Abel crossed the road to the mill, he smelt the sharp autumnscent of the rotting mould under the trees. Frost still sparkled on thebright green grasses that had overgrown the sides of the mill-race, andthe poplar log over the stream was as wet as though the dancing shallowshad skimmed it. Over the motionless wheel the sycamore shed its broadyellow leaves into the brook, where they fluttered downward with a noisethat was like the wind in the tree-tops. 

Inserting a key into the rusty lock, which was much too large for it, Abel opened the door, and counted Solomon Hatch's sacks of grist, whichstood in a row beside a raised platform where an old mill-stone waslying. Other sacks belonging to other farmers were arranged inan orderly group in one corner, and his eye passed to them in abusinesslike appraisement of their contents. According to an establishedcustom of toll, the eighth part of the grain belonged to the miller;and this had enabled him to send his own meal to the city markets, wherethere was an increasing demand for the coarse, water-ground sort. Someday he purposed to turn out the old worn-out machinery and supply itsplace with modern inventions, but as yet this ambition was remote, andthe mill, worked after the process of an earlier century, had raised hisposition to one of comparative comfort and respectability. He wasknown to be a man of character and ambition. Already his name had beenmentioned as a possible future representative of the labouring classesin the Virginia assembly. "There is no better proof of the grit that isin the plain people than the rise of Abel Revercomb out of Abner, hisfather, " some one had said of him. And from the day when he had pickedhis first blackberries for old Mr. Jonathan and tied his earnings in astocking foot as the beginning of a fund for schooling, the story of hislife had been one of struggle and of endurance. Transition had been thepart of the generation before him. In him the democratic impulse wasno longer fitful and uncertain, but had expanded into a stable andindestructible purpose. 

Before starting the wheel, which he did by thrusting his arm through thewindow and lifting the gate on the mill-race, Abel took up a broom, madeof sedges bound crudely together, and swept the smooth bare floor, whichwas polished like that of a ballroom by the sacks of meal that had beendragged back and forth over the boards. From the rafters above, longpale cobwebs were blown gently in the draught between the door andwindow, and when the mill had started, the whole building reverberatedto the slow revolutions of the wheel outside. 

The miller had poured Solomon Hatch's grist into the hopper, and wasabout to turn the wooden crank at the side, when a shadow fell over thethreshold, and Archie Revercomb appeared, with a gun on his shoulder andseveral fox-hounds at his heels. 

"You'll have to get Abner to help you dress that mill-rock, Abel, " hesaid, "I'm off for the morning. That's a good pup of yours, but he's oldenough to begin learning. "

With the inherited idleness of the Revercombs, he combined theheadstrong impulses and dogged obstinacy of his mother's stock, yetbecause of his personal charm, these faults were not only tolerated buteven admired by his family. 

"You're always off in the mornings when there's work to be done, "replied Abel, "but for heaven's sake, bring home a string of hares toput ma into a better humour. She whets her tongue on me and I'll behanged if it's right. "

"She never used to do it till you went over to Mr. Mullen's church andfell in love with Molly Merryweather. Great Scott, I'm glad I don'tstand in either of your shoes when it comes to that. Life's too short topay for your religion or your sweetheart every day you live. "

"It would have been the same anyway--she's put out with me aboutnothing. I had a right to go to Old Church if I wanted to, and what onearth has she got against Mr. Mullen anyway, except that he couldn'trecite the first chapter in Chronicles? What kind of religion does thattake I'd like to know?"

The meal poured softly out of the valve into the trough beneath, andlifting a wooden scoop he bent over and scattered the pile in thecentre. A white dust had settled on his hair and clothes, and thisaccentuated the glow in his face and gave to his whole appearance apicturesque and slightly theatrical cast. 

"If it hadn't been Molly, it would have been some one else, " he addedimpulsively. "Ma would be sure to hate any woman she thought I'd fallenin love with. It's born in her to be contrary just as it is in thathopvine out yonder that you can't train up straight. "

"All the same, if I were going through fire and water for a girl, I'd bepretty sure to choose one that would make it worth my while at the end. I wouldn't put up with all that hectoring for the sake of anybody thatwas as sweet to half a dozen other fellows as she was to me. "

Abel's face darkened threateningly under his silvered hair. 

"If you are trying to hint anything against Molly, you'd as well stop inthe beginning, " he said. "It isn't right--I'll be hanged if it is!--thatevery man in the county should be down on a little thing like that, nobigger than a child. It wasn't her fault, was it, if her father playedfalse with her mother?"

"Oh, I'm not blaming her, am I? As far as that goes all the women likeher well enough, and so do all the dogs and the children. The troubleseems to be, doesn't it, merely that the men like her too much? She'sgot a way with her, there's no question about that. "

"Why in thunder do you want to blacken her character?"

"I wasn't blackenin' her character. I merely meant that she was a flirt, and you know that as well as I do--better, I shouldn't wonder. "

"It's the way she was brought up. Her mother was crazy for ten yearsbefore she died, and she taught Molly all that foolishness about themeanness of men. "

"Oh, well, it's all right, " said Archie carelessly, "only look out thatyou don't go too near the fire and get scorched. "

Whistling to the hounds that were nosing among some empty barrels in adark corner, he shouldered his gun more firmly and went off to his hunt. 

After he had gone, the miller stood for a long while, watching themeal pour from the valve. A bit of chaff had settled on his lashes, but without moving his hand to brush it away, he shook his head onceor twice with the gesture of an animal that is stung by a wasp. "Why dothey keep at me about her?" he asked passionately. "Is it true that sheis only playing with me as she plays with the others?"--but the pain wastoo keen, and turning away with a sigh, he rested his elbows on thesill of the window and looked out at the moving wheel under the gauzyshadows. The sound of the water as it rushed through the mill-race intothe buckets and then fell from the buckets into the whirlpool beneath, was loud in his ears while his quick glance, passing over the driftingyellow leaves of the sycamore, discerned a spot of vivid red in thecornlands beyond. The throbbing of his pulses rather than the assuranceof his eyes told him that Molly was approaching; and as the bit ofcolour drew nearer amid the stubble, he recognized the jacket of crimsonwool that the girl wore as a wrap on chill autumn mornings. On her headthere was a small knitted cap matching the jacket, and this resting onher riotous brown curls, lent a touch of boyish gallantry to her slenderfigure. Like most women of mobile features and ardent temperament, herbeauty depended so largely upon her mood that Abel had seen her changefrom positive plainness to amazing loveliness in the space of a minute. Her small round face, with its wonderful eyes, dimpled now over thecrimson jacket. 

"Abel!" she called softly, and paused with one foot on the log while thewater sparkled beneath her. Ten minutes before he had vowed to himselfthat she had used him badly and he would hold off until she madesufficient amends; but in forming this resolution, he had reckonedwithout the probable intervention of Molly. 

"I thought--as long as I was going by--that I'd stop and speak to you, "she said. 

He shook his head, unsoftened as yet by her presence. "You didn't treatme fair yesterday, Molly, " he answered. 

"Oh, I wanted to tell you about that. I quite meant to go with you--onlyit went out of my head. "

"That's a pretty excuse, isn't it, to offer a man?"

"Well, you aren't the only one I've offered it to, " she dimpledenchantingly, "the rector had to be satisfied with it as well. He askedme, too, and when I forgot I'd promised you, I said I'd go with him tosee old Abigail. Then I forgot that, too, " she added with a penitentsigh, "and went down to the low grounds. "

"You managed to come up in time to meet Mr. Jonathan at thecross-roads, " he commented with bitterness. 

A less daring adventurer than Molly would have hesitated at his tone andgrown cautious, but a certain blithe indifference to the consequences ofher actions was a part of her lawless inheritance from the Gays. 

"I think him very good-looking, don't you?" she inquired sweetly. 

"Good-looking? I should think not--a fat fop like that. "

"Is he fat? I didn't notice it--but, of course, I didn't mean that hewas good-looking in your way, Abel. "

The small flowerlike shadows trembled across her face, and beneath herfeet the waves churned a creamy foam that danced under her like light. His eyes warmed to her, yet he held back, gripped by a passion ofjealousy. For the first time he felt that he was brought face to facewith a rival who might prove to have the advantage. 

"I am coming over!" called Molly suddenly, and a minute later she stoodin the square sunshine that entered the mill door. 

Had he preserved then his manner of distant courtesy, it is probablethat she would have melted, for it was not in her temperament to drawback while her prey showed an inclination for flight. But it was hisnature to warm too readily and to cool too late, a habit of constitutionwhich causes, usually, a tragedy in matters of sex. 

"You oughtn't to treat me so, Molly!" he exclaimed reproachfully, andmade a step toward her. 

"I couldn't help forgetting, could I? It was your place to remind me. "

Thrust, to his surprise, upon the defensive he reached for her hand, which was withdrawn after it had lain an instant in his. 

"Well, it was my fault, then, " he said with a generosity that did himsmall service. "The next time I'll remind you every minute. "

She smiled radiantly as he looked at her, and he felt that herindiscretions, her lack of constancy, her unkindness even, were but thesportive and innocent freaks of a child. In his rustic sincerity he wasforever at the point of condemning her and forever relenting before theappealing sweetness of her look. He told himself twenty times a day thatshe flirted outrageously with him, though he still refused to admit thatin her heart she was to blame for her flirting. A broad and charitabledistinction divided always the thing that she was from the thing thatshe did. It was as if his love discerned in her a quality of soul ofwhich she was still unconscious. 

"Molly, " he burst out almost fiercely, "will you marry me?"

The smile was still in her eyes, but a slight frown contracted herforehead. 

"I've told you a hundred times that I shall never marry anybody, " sheanswered, "but that if I ever did---"

"Then you'd marry me. "

"Well, if I were obliged to marry _somebody_, I'd rather marry you thananybody else. "

"So you do like me a little?"

"Yes, I suppose I like you a little--but all men are the same--motherused always to tell me so. "

Poor distraught Janet Merryweather! There were times when he was seizedwith a fierce impatience of her, for it seemed to him that her ghoststood, like the angel with the drawn sword, before the closed gates ofhis paradise. He remembered her as a passionate frail creature, withaccusing eyes that had never lost the expression with which they had metand passed through some hour of despair and disillusionment. 

"But how could she judge, Molly? How could she judge?" he pleaded "Shewas ill, she wasn't herself, you must know it. All men are not alike. Didn't I fight her battles more than once, when you were a child?"

"I know, I know, " she answered gratefully, "and I love you for it. That's why I don't mind telling you what I've never told a single one ofthe others. I haven't any heart, Abel, that's the truth. It's all playto me, and I like the game sometimes and sometimes I hate it. Yet, whether I like it or hate it, I always go on because I can't help it. Your mother once said I had a devil that drives me on and perhaps shewas right--it may be that devil that drives me on and won't let me stopeven when I'm tired, and it all bores me. The rector thinks that I'llmarry him and turn pious and take to Dorcas societies, and Jim Halloweenthinks I'll marry him and grow thrifty and take to turkey raising--andyou believe in the bottom of your heart that in the end I'll fallinto your arms and find happiness with your mother. But you'rewrong--all--all--and I shan't do any of the things you expect of me. Iam going to stay here as long as grandfather lives, so I can take careof him, and then I'll run off somewhere to the city and trim hats for aliving. When I was at school in Applegate I trimmed hats for all of thepupils. "

"Oh, Molly, Molly, I'll not give you up! Some day you'll see thingsdifferently. "

"Never--never. Now, I've warned you and it isn't my fault if you keep onafter this. "

"But you do like me a little, haven't you said so?"

Her frown deepened. 

"Yes, I do like you--a little. "

"Then I'll keep on hoping, anyhow. "

Her smile came back, but this time it had grown mocking. 

"No, you mustn't hope, " she answered, "at least, " she correctedprovokingly, "you mustn't hope--too hard. "

"I'll hope as hard as the devil, darling--and, Molly, if you marry me, you know, you won't have to live with my mother. "

"I like that, even though I'm not going to marry you. "

"Come here, " he drew her toward the door, "and I'll show you where ourhouse will stand. Do you see that green rise of ground over the meadow?"

"Yes, I see it, " her tone was gentler. 

"I've chosen that site for a home, " he went on, "and I'm saving a goodstrip of pine--you can see it over there against the horizon. I've halfa mind to take down my axe and cut down the biggest of the trees thisafternoon!"

If his ardour touched her there was no sign of it in the movement withwhich she withdrew herself from his grasp. 

"You'd better finish your grinding. There isn't the least bit of ahurry, " she returned with a smile. 

"If you'll go with me, Molly, you may take your choice and I'll cut thetree down for you. "

"But I can't, Abel, because I've promised Mr. Mullen to visit hismother. "

The glow faded from his eyes and a look like that of an animal under thelash took its place. 

"Come with me, not with him, Molly, you owe me that much, " he entreated. 

"But he's such a good man, and he preaches such beautiful sermons. "

"He does--I know he does, but I love you a thousand times better. "

"Oh, he loves me because I am pretty and hard to win--just as you do, "she retorted. "If I lost my hair or my teeth how many of you, do youthink, would care for me to-morrow?"

"I should--before God I'd love you just as I do now, " he answered withpassion. 

A half mocking, half tender sound broke from her lips. 

"Then why don't you--every one of you, fall head over ears in love withJudy Hatch?" she inquired. 

"I don't because I loved you first, and I can't change, however badlyyou treat me. I'm sometimes tempted to think, Molly, that mother isright, and you are possessed of a devil. "

"Your mother is a hard woman, and I pity the wife you bring home toher. "

The softness had gone out of her voice at the mention of Sarah's name, and she had grown defiant and reckless. 

"I don't think you are just to my mother, Molly, " he said after amoment, "she has a kind heart at bottom, and when she nags at you it ismost often for your good. "

"I suppose it was for my mother's good that she kept her from going tochurch and made the old minister preach a sermon against her?"

"That's an old story--you were only a month old. Can't you forget it?"

"I'll never forget it--not even at the Day of Judgment. I don't care howI'm punished. "

Her violence, which seemed to him sinful and unreasonable, reduced himto a silence that goaded her to a further expression of anger. Whileshe spoke he watched her eyes shine green in the sunlight, and he toldhimself that despite her passionate loyalty to her mother, the blood ofthe Gays ran thicker in her veins than that of the Merryweathers. Herimpulsiveness, her pride, her lack of self-control, all these marked herkinship not to Reuben Merryweather, but to Jonathan Gay. The qualitiesagainst which she rebelled cried aloud in her rebellion. The inheritanceshe abhorred endowed her with the capacity for that abhorrence. Whileshe accused the Gays, she stood revealed a Gay in every tone, in everyphrase, in every gesture. 

"It isn't you, Molly, that speaks like that, " he said, "it's somethingin you. " She had tried his patience almost to breaking, yet in the verystrain and suffering she put upon him, she had, all unconsciously tothem both, strengthened the bond by which she held him. 

"If I'd known you were going to preach, I shouldn't have stopped tospeak to you, " she rejoined coldly. "I'd rather hear Mr. Mullen. "

He stood the attack without flinching, his hazel eyes full of an angrylight and the sunburnt colour in his face paling a little. Then when shehad finished, he turned slowly away and began tightening the feed strapof the mill. 

For a minute Molly paused on the threshold in the band of sunlight. "ForGod's sake speak, Abel, " she said at last, "what pleasure do you think Ifind in being spiteful when you won't strike back?"

"I'll never strike back; you may keep up your tirading forever. "

"I wouldn't have said it if I'd known you'd take it so quietly. "

"Quietly? Did you expect me to pick you up and throw you into thehopper?"

"I shouldn't have cared--it would have been better than your expressionat this minute. It's all your fault anyway, for not falling in love withJudy Hatch, as I told you to. "

"Don't worry. Perhaps I shall in the end. Your tantrums would wear thepatience of a Job out at last. It seems that you can't help despising aman just as soon as he happens to love you. "

"I wonder if that's true?" she said a little sadly, turning away fromhim until her eyes rested on the green rise of ground over the meadow, "I've seen men like that as soon as they were sure of their wives, andI've hated them for it. "

"What I can't understand, " he pursued, not without bitterness, "is whyin thunder a man or a woman who isn't married should put up with it foran instant?"

At his words she left the door and came slowly back to his side, wherehe bent over the meal trough. 

"The truth is that I like you better than anyone in the world, exceptgrandfather, " she said, "but I hate love-making. When I see that lookin a man's face and feel the touch of his hands upon me I want to strikeout and kill. My mother was that way before I was born, and I drank itin with her milk, I suppose. "

"I know it isn't you fault, Molly, and yet, and yet---"

She sighed, half pitying his suffering, half impatient of hisobtuseness. As he turned away, her gaze rested on his sunburnt neck, rising from the collar of his blue flannel shirt, and she saw that hishair ended in a short, boyish ripple that was powdered with mill-dust. Asudden tenderness for him as for a child or an animal pierced her like aknife. 

"I shouldn't mind your kissing me just once, if you'd like to, Abel, "she said. 

A little later, when he had helped her over the stile and she wasreturning home through the cornlands, she asked herself with passionateself-reproach why she had yielded to pity? She had felt sorry for Abel, and because she had felt sorry she had allowed him to kiss her. "OnlyI meant him to do it gently and soberly, " she thought, "and he was sorough and fierce that he frightened me. I suppose most girls like thatkind of thing, but I don't, and I shan't, if I live to be a hundred. I've got no belief in it--I've got no belief in anything, that is thetrouble. I'm twisted out of shape, like the crooked sycamore by themill-race. "

A sigh passed her lips, and, as if in answer to the sound, there camethe rumble of approaching wheels in the turnpike. As she climbed the lowrail fence which divided the corn-lands from the highway, she met theold family carriage from Jordan's Journey returning with the two ladieson the rear seat. The younger, a still pretty woman of fifty years, withshining violet eyes that seemed always apologizing for their owner'sphysical weakness, leaned out and asked the girl, in a tone of gentlepatronage, if she would ride with the driver?

"Thank you, Mrs. Gay, it's only a quarter of a mile and I don't mind thewalk. "

"We've brought an overcoat--Kesiah and I--a good thick one, for yourgrandfather. It worried us last winter that he went so lightly cladduring the snow storms. "

Molly's face changed, and her eyes sparkled with pleasure. 

"Oh, thank you, thank you!" she exclaimed, losing her manner of distantpoliteness. "I've been trying to persuade him to buy one, but he hatesto spend money on himself. "

Kesiah, who had leaned back during the conversation, with the scowlinglook she wore when her heart was moved, nodded grimly while she felt inthe black travelling bag she carried for Mrs. Gay's salts. She was oneof those unfortunate women of a past generation, who, in offering noallurement to the masculine eye, appeared to defeat the single endfor which woman was formed. As her very right to existence lay in herpossible power to attract, the denial of that power by nature, or thefrustration of it by circumstances, had deprived her, almost fromthe cradle, of her only authoritative reason for being. Her small, short-sighted eyes, below a false front which revealed rather thanobscured her bare temples, flitted from object to object as though inthe vain pursuit of some outside justification of her indelicacy inhaving permitted herself to be born. 

"Samson tells me that my son has come, Molly, " said Mrs. Gay, in aflutter of emotion. "Have you had a glimpse of him yet?"

The girl nodded. "He took supper at our house the night he got here. "

"It was such a surprise. Was he looking well?"

"Very well, I thought, but it was the first time I had seen him, youknow. "

"Ah, I forgot. Are you sure you won't get in, child? Well, drive on, Samson, and be very careful of that bird cage. "

Samson drove on at the command, and Molly, plodding obstinately afterthe carriage, was enveloped shortly in the cloud of dust that floatedafter the wheels. 

CHAPTER VI

TREATS OF THE LADIES' SPHERE

As the carriage rolled up the drive, there was a flutter of servantsbetween the white columns, and Abednego, the old butler, pushed asidethe pink-turbaned maids and came down to assist his mistress to alight. 

"Take the bird cage, Abednego, I've bought a new canary, " said Mrs. Gay. "Here, hold my satchel, Nancy, and give Patsey the wraps and umbrellas. "

She spoke in a sweet, helpless voice, and this helplessness wasexpressed in every lovely line of her figure. The most casual observerwould have discerned that she had surrendered all rights in order tograsp more effectively at all the privileges. She was clinging and smalland delicate and her eyes, her features, her plaintive gestures, unitedin an irresistible appeal to emotions. 

"Where is Jonathan?" she asked, "I hoped he would welcome me. "

"So I do, dearest mother--so I do, " replied the young man, runninghurriedly down the steps and then slipping his arm about her. "You camea minute or two earlier than I expected you, or I should have met you inthe drive. "

Half supporting, half carrying her, he led the way into the house andplaced her on a sofa in the long drawing-room. 

"I am afraid the journey has been too much for you, " he said tenderly. "Shall I tell Abednego to bring you a glass of wine. "

"Kesiah will mix me an egg and a spoonful of sherry, dear, she knowsjust how much is good for me. "

Kesiah, still grasping her small black bag, went into the dining-roomand returned, bearing a beaten egg, which she handed to her sister. In her walk there was the rigid austerity of a saint who has adoptedsaintliness not from inclination, but from the force of a necessityagainst which rebellion has been in vain. Her plain, prominent featureswore, from habit, a look of sullen martyrdom that belied her naturalkindness of heart; and even her false brown front was arranged inlittle hard, flat curls, as though an artificial ugliness were lessreprehensible in her sight than an artificial beauty. 

In the midst of the long room flooded with sunshine, the little ladyreclined on her couch and sipped gently from the glass Kesiah had handedher. The tapestried furniture was all in soft rose, a little faded fromage, and above the high white wainscoting on the plastered walls, thissame delicate colour was reflected in the rich brocaded gowns in thefamily portraits. In the air there was the faint sweet scent of cedarlogs that burned on the old andirons. 

"So you came all the way home to see your poor useless mother, "murmured Mrs. Gay, shielding her cheek from the firelight with a peacockhand-screen. 

"I wanted to see for myself how you stand it down here--and, by Jove, it's worse even than I imagined! How the deuce have you managed to dragout twenty years in a wilderness like this among a tribe of barbarians?"

"It is a great comfort to me, dear, to think that I came here on youruncle's account and that I am only following his wishes in making theplace my home. He loved the perfect quiet and restfulness of it. "

"Quiet! With that population of roosters making the dawn hideous! I'dchoose the quiet of Piccadilly before that of a barnyard. "

"You aren't used to country noises yet, and I suppose at first they aretrying. "

"Do you drive? Do you walk? How do you amuse yourself?"

"One doesn't have amusement when one is a hopeless invalid; one has onlymedicines. No, the roads are too heavy for driving except for a month ortwo in the summer. I can't walk of course, because of my heart, and asthere has been no man on the place for ten years, I do not feel thatit is safe for Kesiah to go off the lawn by herself. Once she got intoquite a dreadful state about her liver and lack of exercise--(poor dearmother used to say that the difference between the liver of a lady andthat of another person, was that one required no exercise and theother did)--but Kesiah, who is the best creature in the world, is veryeccentric in some ways, and she imagines that her health suffers whenshe is kept in the house for several years. Once she got into a temperand walked a mile or two on the road, but when she returned I was insuch a state of nervousness that she promised me never to leave the lawnagain unless a gentleman was with her. "

"What an angel you must be to have suffered so much and complained solittle!" he exclaimed with fervour, kissing her hand. 

Her eyes, which reminded him of dying violets, drooped over him abovethe peacock feathers she waved gently before her. 

"Poor Kesiah, it is hard on her, too, " she observed, "and I sometimesthink she is unjust enough to blame me in her heart. "

"But she doesn't feel things as you do, one can tell that to look ather. "

"She isn't so sensitive and silly, you dear boy, but my poor nerves areresponsible for that, you must remember. If Kesiah had been a man shewould have been an artist, and it was really a pity that she happened tobe born a woman. When she was young she had a perfect mania for drawing, and it used to distress mother so much. A famous portrait painter--Ican't recall his name though I am sure it began with S--saw one of hersketches by accident and insisted that we ought to send her to Paris tostudy. Kesiah was wild to go at the time, but of course it was out ofthe question that a Virginia lady should go off by herself and paintperfectly nude people in a foreign city. There was a dreadful scene, Iremember, and Kesiah even wrote to Uncle William Burwell and asked himto come down and win mother over. He came immediately, for he was thekindest soul, but, of course after he understood, he decided againstit. Why on earth should a girl want to go streaking across the water tostudy art, he asked, when she had a home she could stay in and men folkwho could look after her? They both told her she made herself ridiculouswhen she talked of ambition, and as they wouldn't promise her a pennyto live on, she was obliged in the end to give up the idea. She nursedmother very faithfully, I must say, as long as she lived, never leavingher a minute night or day for the last year of her illness. Don'tmisjudge poor Kesiah, Jonathan, she has a good heart at bottom, thoughshe has always been a little soured on account of her disappointment. "

"Oh, she was cut out for an old maid, one can see that, " rejoined Gay, only half interested in the history of his aunt, for he seldom exertedhis imagination except under pressure of his desires, "and, by the way, mother, what kind of man was my Uncle Jonathan?"

"The dearest creature, my son, heaven alone knows what his loss meantto me! Such consideration! Such generosity! Such delicacy! He and Kesiahnever got on well, and this was the greatest distress to me. "

"Did you ever hear any queer stories about him? Was he--well--ah, wild, would you say?"

"Wild? Jonathan, I am surprised at you! Why, during the twenty yearsthat I knew him he never let fall so much as a single indelicate word inmy presence. "

"I don't mean that exactly--but what about his relations with the womenaround here?"

She flinched as if his words had struck her a blow. 

"Dear Jonathan, your poor uncle would never have asked such a question. "

Above the mantel there was an oil portrait of the elder Jonathan at theage of three, painted astride the back of an animal that disported theshape of a lion under the outward covering of a lamb. 

"Ah, that's just it, " commented Gay, while his inquiring look hung onthe picture. After a minute of uncertainty, his curiosity triumphed overhis discretion and he put, in an apologetic tone, an equally indelicatequestion. "What about old Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter? Has shebeen provided for?"

For an instant Mrs. Gay looked at him with shining, reproachful eyesunder a loosened curl of fair hair which was threaded with sliver. Thoseeyes, very blue, very innocent, seemed saying to him, "Oh, be careful, I am so sensitive. Remember that I am a poor frail creature, and do nothurt me. Let me remain still in my charmed circle where I have alwayslived, and where no unpleasant reality has ever entered. " The quaintpeacock screen, brought from China by old Jonathan, cast a shadow on hercheek, which was flushed to the colour of a faded rose leaf. 

"Yes, the girl is an orphan, it is very sad, " she replied, and her toneadded, "but what can I do about it? I am a woman and should know nothingof such matters!"

"Was she mentioned in my uncles's will, do you remember?"

His handsome, well-coloured face had taken a sudden firmness of outline, and even the sagging flesh of his chin appeared to harden with theresolve of the moment. Across his forehead, under the fine dark hairwhich had worn thin on the temples, three frowning wrinkles leaped outas if in response to some inward pressure. 

"There was something--I can't remember just what it was--Mr. Chamberlayne will tell you about it when he comes down to-morrow to talkover business with Kesiah. They keep all such things away from me out ofconsideration for my heart. But I've never doubted for an instant thatyour uncle did everything that was just and generous in the matter. Hesent the girl to a good school in Applegate, I remember, and there wasa bequest of some sort, I believe--something that she comes into on hertwenty-first birthday. "

"She isn't twenty-one then, is she?"

"I don't know, Jonathan, I really can't remember. "

"Perhaps Aunt Kesiah can tell me something about her?"

"Oh, she can and she will--but Kesiah is so violent in all her opinions!I had to ask her never to mention Brother Jonathan's name to me becauseshe made me quite ill once by some dreadful hints she let fall abouthim. "

She leaned back wearily as if the conversation had exhausted her, whilethe peacock firescreen slipped from her hand and dropped on the whitefur rug at her feet. 

"If you'll call Kesiah, Jonathan, I'll go upstairs for a rest, " she saidgently, yet with a veiled reproach. "The journey tired me, but I forgotit in the pleasure of seeing you. "

All contrition at once, he hastily summoned Kesiah from the storeroom, and between them, with several solicitous maids in attendance, theycarried the fragile little lady up to her chamber, where a fire ofresinous pine was burning in the big colonial fireplace. 

An hour afterwards, when Kesiah had seen her sister peacefully dozing, she went, for the first time since her return, into her own bedroom, andstood looking down on the hearth, where the servants had forgotten tolight the sticks that were laid cross-wise on the andirons. It was thehabit of those about her to forget her existence, except when shewas needed to render service, and after more than fifty years of suchomissions, she had ceased, even in her thought, to pass judgment uponthem. In her youth she had rebelled fiercely--rebelled against nature, against the universe, against the fundamental injustice that divided hersister's lot from her own. Generations existed only to win love or tobestow it. Inheritance, training, temperament, all combined to developthe racial instinct within her, yet something stronger than these--someexternal shaping of clay--had unfitted her for the purpose for whichshe was designed. And since, in the eyes of her generation, anyself-expression from a woman, which was not associated with sex, wasan affront to convention, that single gift of hers was doomed to witheraway in the hot-house air that surrounded her. A man would have struckfor freedom, and have made a career for himself in the open world, buther nature was rooted deep in the rich and heavy soil from which shehad tried to detach it. Years after her first fight, on the day of hermother's death, she had suffered a brief revival of youth; and then shehad pulled in vain at the obstinate tendrils that held her to the spotin which she had grown. She was no longer penniless, she was no longerneeded, but she was crushed. The power of revolt was the gift ofyouth. Middle-age could put forth only a feeble and ineffectualresistance--words without passion, acts without abandonment. At timesshe still felt the old burning sense of injustice, the old resentmentagainst life, but this passed quickly now, and she grew quiet as soonas her eyes fell on the flat, spare figure, a little bent in thechest, which her mirror revealed to her. The period was full of woman'sadvancement--a peaceful revolution had triumphed around her--yet she hadtaken no part in it, and the knowledge left her unmoved. She had readcountless novels that acclaimed hysterically the wrongs of her sex, butbeneath the hysterics she had perceived the fact that the newer womanwho grasped successfully the right to live, was as her elder sisterwho had petitioned merely for the privilege to love. The modern heroinecould still charm even after she had ceased to desire to. Neither in thenew fiction nor in the old was there a place for the unhappy woman whodesired to charm but could not; she remained what she had always been--atragic perversion of nature which romance and realism conspired toignore. Women in novels had revolted against life as passionately asshe--but one and all they had revolted in graceful attitudes andwith abundant braids of hair. A false front not only extinguishedsentiment--it put an end to rebellion. 

"Miss Kesiah, dar's Marse Reuben in de hall en he sez he'd be moughtyglad ef'n you'd step down en speak a wud wid 'im. "

"In a moment, Abednego. I must take off my things. "

Withdrawing the short jet-headed pins from her bonnet with a hurriedmovement, she stabbed them into the hard round pincushion on her bureau, and after throwing a knitted cape over her shoulders, went down the widestaircase to where Reuben awaited her in the hall. As she walked shegroped slightly and peered ahead of her with her nervous, short-sightedgaze. 

At the foot of the staircase, the old man was standing in a patientattitude, resting upon his wooden leg, which was slightly in advanceof his sound one. His fine bearded face might have been the face of ascholar, except for its roughened skin and the wistful, dog-like look inthe eyes. 

In response to Kesiah's greeting, he explained that he had come at onceto acknowledge the gift of the overcoat and to "pay his respects. "

"I am glad you like it, " she answered, and because her heart wasswelling with kindness, she stammered and grew confused while theanxious frown deepened between her eyebrows. A morbid horror of makingherself ridiculous prevented her always from making herself understood. 

"It will be very useful to me, ma'am, when I am out of doors in badweather, " he replied, wondering if he had offended her by his visit. 

"We got it for that purpose, " and becoming more embarrassed, she addedhastily, "How is the red cow, Mr. Merryweather?"

"She mends slowly, ma'am. I am givin' her bran mash twice a day andkeepin' her in the barn. Have you noticed the hogs? They're a fine lotthis year and we'll get some good hams at the killin'. "

"No, I hadn't looked at them, but I've been struck with the corn you'vebrought up recently from the low grounds. "

For a minute or two they discussed the crops, both painfully ill at easeand uncertain whether to keep up the conversation or to let it trailoff into silence. Then at the first laboured pause, Reuben repeated hismessage to Mrs. Gay and stamped slowly out of the back door into thearms of Jonathan, who was about to enter. 

"Halloo! So it's you!" exclaimed the young man in the genial tone whichseemed at once to dispel Kesiah's embarrassment. "I've wanted to talkwith you for two days, but I shan't detain you now for I happen toknow that your granddaughter is hunting for you already. I'll come upto-morrow and chat awhile in the barn. "

Reuben bowed and passed on, a little flattered by the other's intimatetone, while Gay followed Kesiah into the drawing-room, and put aquestion to her which had perplexed him since the night of his arrival. 

"Aunt Kesiah, was old Reuben Merryweather on friendly terms with myuncle?"

She started and looked at him with a nervous twitching of her eyelids. 

"I think so, Jonathan, at least they appeared to be. Old Reuben was bornon the place when the Jordans still lived here, and I am sure your unclefelt that it would be unjust to remove him. Then they fought through thewar together and were both dangerously wounded in the same charge. "

He gazed at her a moment in silence, narrowing his intense blue eyeswhich were so like the eyes of Reuben's granddaughter. 

"Did my uncle show any particular interest in the girl?" he inquired, and added a little bitterly, "It's not fair to me that I shouldn't knowjust where I am standing. "

"Yes, he did show a particular interest in her and was anxious thatshe should be educated above her station. She was even sent off to aboarding-school in Applegate, but she ran away during the middle of thesecond session and came home. Her grandfather was ill with pneumonia, and she is sincerely devoted to him, I believe. "

"Was there any mention of her in Uncle Jonathan's will?"

"None whatever. He left instructions with Mr. Chamberlayne, however, which are to be made known next April on Molly's twenty-first birthday. It is all rather mysterious, but we only know that he owned considerableproperty in the far West, which he left away from us and in trust tohis lawyer. I suppose he thought your mother would not be alive whenthe girl came of age; for the doctors had agreed that she had only a fewyears to live at the utmost. "

"What in the devil did my poor mother have to do with it?"

She hesitated an instant, positively scowling in her perplexity. 

"Only that I think--I believe your Uncle Jonathan would have married thegirl's mother--Janet Merryweather--but for your mother's influence. "

"How in the deuce! You mean he feared the effect on her?"

"He broke it to her once--his intention, I mean--and for several daysafterwards we quite despaired of her life. It was then that she made himpromise--he was quite distracted with remorse for he adored Angela--thathe would never allude to it again while she was alive. We thought thenthat it would be only for a short while, but she has outlived him tenyears in spite of her heart disease. One can never rely on doctors, youknow. "

"But what became of the girl--of Janet Merryweather, I mean?"

"That was the sad part, though it happened so long ago--twentyyears--that people have almost forgotten. It seems that your uncle hadbeen desperate about her for a time--before Angela came to live withhim--and Janet counted rather recklessly upon his keeping his word andmarrying her as he had promised. When her trouble came she went quiteout of her mind--perfectly harmless, I believe, and with lucid intervalsin which she suffered from terrible melancholia. Her child inherits manyof her characteristics, I am told, though I've never heard any harmof the girl except that she flirts with all the clowns in theneighbourhood. "

"Uncle Jonathan appears to have been too ready with his promises, but, I suppose, he thought there was a difference between his obligation toJanet Merryweather and to his brother's widow?"

"There was a difference, of course. Janet Merryweather could hardly havehad Angela's sensitive feelings--or at least it's a comfort to thinkthat, even if it happens not to be true. Before the war one hardlyever heard of that class, mother used to say, it was so humble andunpresuming--but in the last twenty-five or thirty years it hasoverrun everything and most of the land about here has passed into itspossession. "

She checked herself breathlessly, surprised and indignant that sheshould have expressed her feelings so openly. 

"Yes, I dare say, " returned Jonathan--"The miller Revercomb is a goodexample, I imagine, of just the thing you are speaking of--a kind of newplant that has sprung up like fire-weed out of the ashes. Less than halfa century produced him, but he's here to stay, of that I am positive. After all, why shouldn't he, when we get down to the question? He--orthe stock he represents, of course--is already getting hold of thesoil and his descendants will run the State financially as well aspolitically, I suppose. We can't hold on, the rest of us--we're losinggrip--and in the end it will be pure pluck that counts wherever it comesfrom. "

"Ah, it's just that--pluck--but put the miller in the crucibleand you'll find how little pure gold there is to him. It is not inprosperity, but in poverty that the qualities of race come to thesurface, and this remarkable miller of yours would probably be crushedby a weight to which poor little Mrs. Bland at the post-office--she wasone of the real Carters, you know--would hardly bend her head. "

"Perhaps you're right, " he answered, and laughed shortly under hisbreath, "but in that case how would you fix the racial characteristicsof that little firebrand, Molly Merryweather?"

CHAPTER VII

GAY RUSHES INTO A QUARREL AND SECURES A KISS

At dawn next morning Jonathan Gay, who had spent a restless night inhis uncle's room, came out into the circular drive with his gun onhis shoulder, and strolled in the direction of the meadows beyond thehaunted Poplar Spring at the end of the lawn. It was a rimy Octobermorning, and the sun rising slowly above the shadowy aspens in thegraveyard, shone dimly through the transparent silver veil that hungover the landscape. The leaves, still russet and veined with purple onthe boughs overhead, lay in brown wind-rifts along the drive, where theyhad been blown during the night before the changeful weather had settledinto a frosty stillness at daybreak. 

"By Jove, it's these confounded acorns that keep me awake, " thought Gay, with a nervous irritation which was characteristic of him when he hadbeen disturbed. "A dozen ghosts couldn't have managed to make themselvesmore of a nuisance. "

Being an emotional person in a spasmodic and egotistical fashion, he found himself thinking presently of Janet Merryweather, as he hadthought more than once during the wakeful hours of the night. He felt, somehow, that she had been treated detestably, and he was angry withhis uncle for having left him, as he described it, "in such a deuce of ahole. " "One can't acknowledge the girl, I suppose, though for the matterof that those tell-tale eyes of hers are not only an acknowledgment, buta condemnation. "

With a low whistle, he brought his gun quickly down from his shoulder asa partridge, rising with a gentle whir from the red-topped orchard grassin front of him, skimmed lightly into the golden pathway the sun madethrough the mist. At the same instant a shot rang out close beside him, and the bird dropped at his feet while Archie Revercomb sauntered slowlyacross the pasture. A string of partridges and several rabbits hungfrom his shoulder, and at his heels a pack of fox-hounds followed withmuzzles held close to the moist ground. 

For a minute Gay's angry astonishment left him rooted to the spot. Accustomed to the rigid game laws of England, and ignorant of thehabits of the country into which he had come, he saw in the act, not theancient Virginian acceptance of the bird as the right of the hunter, buta lawless infringement of his newly acquired sense of possession. 

"You confounded rogue!" he exclaimed hotly, "so you're not only shootingmy partridges, but you're actually shooting them before my eyes. "

"What's that?" asked Archie, only half understanding the words, "wereyou after that bird yourself then?"

"Well, rather, my friend, and I'll trouble you at the same time to handover that string on your shoulder. "

"Hand them over? Well, I like that! Why, I shot them. "

"But you shot them on my land didn't you?"

"What in the devil do you mean by that? My folks have shot over thesefields before yours were ever heard of about here. A bird doesn't happento be yours, I reckon, just because it takes a notion to fly over yourpasture. "

"Do you mean to tell me that you don't respect a man's right to hisgame?"

"A man's game is the bird in the bag, not in the air, I reckon. Thisland was open hunting in the time of the Jordans, and we're not going tokeep off of it at the first bid of any Tom-fool that thinks he's got abetter right to it. "

The assumption of justice angered Gay far more than the originalpoaching had done. To be flouted in his own pasture on the subject ofhis own game by a handsome barbarian, whom he had caught red-handed inthe act of stealing, would have appealed irresistibly to his sense ofhumour, if it had not enraged him. 

"All the same I give you fair warning, " he retorted, "that the next timeI find you trespassing on my land, I'll have the law after you. "

"The law--bosh! Do you think I'm afraid of it?"

Somewhere at the back of Gay's brain, a curtain was drawn, and he sawclearly as if it were painted in water colour, an English landscape anda poacher, who had been caught with a stolen rabbit, humbly pullingthe scant locks on his forehead. Well, this was one of the joys ofdemocracy, doubtless, and he was in for the rest of them. These peoplehad got the upper hand certainly, as Aunt Kesiah had complained. 

"If you think I'll tamely submit to open robbery by such insolentrascals as you, you're mistaken, young man, " he returned. 

The next instant he sprang aside and knocked up Archie's gun, which hadbeen levelled at him. The boy's face was white under his sunburn, andthe feathers on the partridges that hung from his shoulder trembled asthough a strong wind were blowing. 

"Rascal, indeed!" he stammered, and spat on the ground after his wordsin the effort to get rid of the taste of them, "as if the whole countydoesn't know that you're another blackguard like your uncle before you. Ask any decent woman in the neighbourhood if she would have been seen inhis company!"

His rage choked him suddenly, and before he could speak again the otherstruck him full in the mouth. 

"Take that and hold your tongue, you young savage!"

Then as he stooped for his gun, which he had laid down, a shot passedover his head and whizzed lightly across the meadow. 

"The next time I'll take better aim!" called Archie, turning away. "I'llshoot as straight as the man who gave your uncle his deserts down atPoplar Spring!"

Whistling to his dogs, he ran on for a short distance; then vaulting therail fence he disappeared into the tangle of willows beside the streamwhich flowed down from the mill. 

While he watched him the anger in Gay's face faded slowly into disgust. 

"Now I've stirred up a hornet's nest, " he thought, annoyed by hisimpetuosity. "Who, I wonder, was the fellow, and what a fool--what atremendous fool I have been!"

With his love of ease, of comfort, of popularity, the situation appearedto him to be almost intolerable. The whole swarm would be at his headnow, he supposed; for instead of silencing the angry buzzing around hisuncle's memory, he had probably raised a tumult which would deafen hisown ears before it was over. Here, as in other hours and scenes, hisresolve had acted less as a restraint than as a spur which had impelledhim to the opposite extreme of conduct. 

Still rebuking his impulsiveness, he shouldered his gun again, andfollowed slowly in the direction Archie had taken. The half baredwillows by the brook distilled sparkling drops as the small red sun rosehigher over the meadows, and it was against the shimmering background offoliage, that the figure of Blossom Revercomb appeared suddenly out ofthe mist. Her scant skirts were lifted from the cobwebs on the grass, and her mouth was parted while she called softly after a cow that hadstrayed down to the willows. 

"You, sir!" she exclaimed, and blushed enchantingly under the pearly dewthat covered her face. "One of our cows broke pasture in the night andwe think she must have crossed the creek and got over on your side ofthe meadow. She's a wonderful jumper. We'll have to be hobbling hersoon, I reckon. "

"Do you milk?" he asked, charmed by the mental picture of so noble adairymaid. 

"Except when grandma is well enough. You can't leave it to the darkiesbecause they are such terrible slatterns. Put a cow in their hands andshe's sure to go dry before three months are over. "

She looked up at him, while the little brown mole played hide and seekwith a dimple. 

"Have you ever been told that you are beautiful, Miss Keren-happuch?" heinquired with a laugh. 

Her pale eyes, like frosted periwinkles, dropped softly beneath hisgaze. 

"How can you think so, sir, when you have seen so many city ladies?"

"I've seen many, but not one so lovely as you are this morning with thefrost on your cheeks. "

"I'm not dressed. I just slip on any old thing to go milking. "

"It's not the dress, that doesn't matter--though I can imagine you intrailing purple velvet with a trimming of sable. "

An illumination shone in her face, as if her soul had suddenlyblossomed. 

"Purple velvet, and what else did you say, sir?" she questioned. 

"Sable--fur, you know, the richest, softest, queenliest fur there is. "

"I'd like to see it, " she rejoined. 

"Well, it couldn't improve you!--remember always that the fewer fineclothes you have on the better. Tell me, Blossom, " he added, touchingher shoulder, "have you many lovers?"

She shook her head. "There are so few about here that any woman wouldlook at. "

"I've been told that there's an engaging young rector. "

"Mr. Mullen--well, so he is--and he preaches the most beautiful sermons. But he fancies Molly Merryweather, they say, like all the others, thoughhe won't be likely to marry anybody from around here, I suppose. "

Her drawling Southern tongue lent a charm, he felt, to her naivedisclosures. 

"Like all the others?" he repeated smiling. "Do you mean to tell methat Reuben's piquant little granddaughter is a greater belle in theneighbourhood than you are?"

"She has a way with them, " said Blossom sweetly. "I don't know what itis and I am sure she is a good, kind girl--but I sometimes think menlike her because she is so contrary. My Uncle Abel has almost lost hishead about her, yet she plays fast and loose with him in the cruelestfashion. "

"Oh, well, she'll burn her fingers some day, at her own fire, and thenshe'll be sorry. "

"I don't want her to be sorry, but I do wish she'd try just a littleto be kind--one day she promises to marry Abel and the next you'd thinkshe'd taken a liking to Jim Halloween. "

"Perhaps she has a secret sentiment for the rector?" he suggested, topique her. 

"But I don't believe he will marry anybody around here, " she insisted, while the colour flooded her face. 

The discovery that she had once cherished--that she still cherished, perhaps, a regard for the young clergyman, added a zest to theadventure, while it freed his passion from the single restraint of whichhe had been aware. It was not in his nature to encourage a chivalrousdesire to protect a woman who had betrayed, however innocently, asentiment for another man. When the Reverend Mr. Mullen inadvertentlyintroduced an emotional triangle, he had changed the situation from oneof mere sentimental dalliance into direct pursuit. By some law of reflexaction, known only to the male mind at such instants, the first signthat she was not to be won threw him into the mental attitude of thechase. 

"Are the fascinations of your Mr. Mullen confined to the pulpit?" heinquired after a moment, "or does he wear them for the benefit of theheterodox when he walks abroad?"

"Oh, he's not my Mr. Mullen, sir, " she hastened to explain though herwords trailed off into a sound that was suspiciously like a sigh. 

"Molly Merryweather's Mr. Mullen, then?"

"I don't think he cares for Molly--not in that way. "

"Are you quite as sure that Molly doesn't care for him in that way?"

"She couldn't or she wouldn't be so cruel. Then she never goes tolectures or Bible classes or mission societies. She is the only girl inthe congregation who never makes him anything to wear. Don't you think, "she asked anxiously, "that if she really cared about him she would havedone some of these things?"

"From my observation of ladies and clergymen, " replied Gay seriously, "Ishould think that she would most likely have done all of them. "

She appeared relieved, he thought, by the warmth of his protestation. Actually Mr. Mullen had contributed a decided piquancy to the episode. 

"I'm afraid, Blossom, " he said after a moment, "that I am beginningto be a little jealous of the Reverend Mullen. By the way, what is theChristian name of the paragon?"

"Orlando, sir. "

"Ye Gods! The horror grows! Describe him to me, but paint him mildly ifyou wish me to survive it. "

For a minute she thought very hard, as though patiently striving toinvoke a mental image. 

"He's a little taller than you, but not quite--not quite so broad. "

"Thank you, you _have_ put it mildly. "

"He has the most beautiful curly hair--real chestnut--that grows in twopeaks high on his forehead. His eyes are grey and his mouth is small, with the most perfect teeth. He doesn't wear any moustache, you see, tohide them, and they flash a great deal when he preaches---"

"Hold on!"

"I beg you pardon, sir. "

"I mean that I am overcome. I am mentally prostrated before suchperfections. Blossom, you are in love with him. "

"Oh, no, sir; but I do like to watch him in the pulpit. He gesticulatesso beautifully. "

"And now--speak truth and spare not--how do I compare with him?"

"Oh, Mr. Jonathan, you are so different!"

"Do you imply that I am ugly, Blossom?"

"Why, no--not ugly. Indeed I didn't mean that. "

"But I'm not so handsome as Reverend Orlando?--now, confess it. "

She blushed, and he thought her confusion the most charming he had everseen. 

"Well, perhaps you aren't quite so--so handsome; but there's somethingabout you, sir, " she added eagerly, "that reminds me of him. "

"By Jove! You don't mean it!"

"I can't tell just what it is, but it is something. You both look asthough you'd lived in a city and had learned to wear your Sunday clotheswithout remembering that they are your Sunday clothes. Of course, yourhair doesn't curl like his, " she added honestly, "and I doubt if you'dlook nearly so well in the pulpit. "

"I'm very sure I shouldn't, but Blossom---"

"What, Mr. Jonathan?"

"Do you think you will ever like me as well as you like Mr. Mullen?"

His gay and intimate smile awaited her answer, and in the pause, hestretched out his hand and laid it on her large round arm a littleabove the elbow. The flush deepened in her face, and he felt a slighttrembling under his fingers like the breast of a frightened bird. 

"Blossom, " he repeated, half mocking, half tender, "do you think youwill ever like me better than you like Mr. Mullen?"

At this her rustic pride came suddenly between them, and withdrawingher arm from his clasp, she stepped out of the bridle path into the wetorchard grass that surrounded them. 

"I've known him so much longer, " she replied. 

"And if you know me longer will you like me better, Blossom?"

Then as she still drew back, he pressed nearer, and spoke her name againin a whisper. 

"Blossom--Blossom, are you afraid of me? Do you think I would hurt you?"

The gentleness in his voice stayed her flight for an instant, and inthat instant, as she looked up at him, he stooped quickly and kissed hermouth. 

"What a damned ass I've made of myself, " he thought savagely, when shebroke from him and fled over the mill brook into the Revercombs' pasturebeyond. She did not look back, but sped as straight as a frightened hareto the covert; and by this brilliant, though unconscious coquetry, shehad wrested the victory from him at the moment when it had appeared tofall too easily into his hands. 

"Well, it's all right now. I'll take better care in the future, " hethought, his self-reproach extinguished by the assurance that, afterall, he had done nothing that justified the intrusion of his conscience. "By Jove, she's a beauty--but she's not my kind all the same, " he addedas he strolled leisurely homeward--for like many persons whose moralstandard exceeds immeasurably their ordinary rule of conduct, hecherished somewhere in an obscure corner of his brain an image ofperfection closely related to the type which he found least alluring inreality. Humanly tolerant of those masculine weaknesses he shared, hehad erected mentally a pinnacle of virtue upon which he exacted thata frailer being should maintain an equilibrium. A pretty woman, it wastrue, might go at a merry pace provided she was not related to him, buthe required that both his mother and his aunt should be above suspicion. In earlier days he had had several affairs of sentiment with ladies towhom he declined to bow if he happened to be walking with a member ofhis family; and this fine discrimination was characteristic of him, forit proved that he was capable of losing his heart in a direction wherehe would refuse to lift his hat. 

At the late breakfast to which he returned, he found Mr. Chamberlayne, who had ridden over from Applegate to consult with Kesiah. In appearancethe lawyer belonged to what is called "the old school, " and his mannerproduced an effect of ostentation which was foreign to his characteras a Christian and a gentleman. His eyebrows, which were still darkand thick, hung prominently over his small, sparkling eyes behind goldrimmed spectacles, while a lock of silver hair was brushed across hisforehead with the romantic wave which was fashionable in the period whenLord Byron was the favorite poet. Kindness and something more--somethingthat was almost a touching innocence, looked from his face. "It is agood world--I've always found it to be a good world, and if I've everheard anything against it, I've refused to believe it, " his look seemedto say. 

All through breakfast he rambled on after his amiable habit--praisingthe food, praising the flowers, praising the country, praisingthe universe. The only creature or object he omitted to praise wasKesiah--for in his heart he regarded it as an outrage on the part ofProvidence that a woman should have been created quite so ugly. Whilehe talked he kept his eyes turned away from her, gazing abstractedlythrough the window or at a portrait of Mrs. Gay, painted in the firstyear of her marriage, which hung over the sideboard. In the mental worldwhich he inhabited all women were fair and fragile and endowed witha quality which he was accustomed to describe as "solace. " Whenoccasionally, as in the case of Kesiah, one was thrust upon hisnotice, to whom by no stretch of the imagination these graces could beattributed, he disposed of the situation by the simple device of gazingabove her head. In his long and intimate acquaintance, he had neverlooked Kesiah in the face, and he never intended to. He was perfectlyaware that if he were for an instant to forget himself so far as tocontemplate her features, he should immediately lose all patience withher. No woman, he felt, had the right to affront so openly a man's idealof what the sex should be. When he spoke of her behind her back it waswith indignant sympathy as "poor Miss Kesiah, " or "that poor good soulKesiah Blount"--for in spite of a natural bent for logic, and more thanforty years of sedulous attendance upon the law, he harboured at thebottom of his heart an unreasonable conviction that Kesiah's plainnesswas, somehow, the result of her not having chosen to be pretty. 

"Any sport, Jonathan?" he inquired cheerfully, while he buttered hiswaffles. "If I scared up one Molly Cotton-tail out of the briars I didat least fifty. "

"No, I didn't get a shot, " replied Gay, "but I met a poacher on my landwho appeared to have been more successful. There seems to be absolutelyno respect for a man's property rights in this part of the country. Thefellow actually had the impudence to stop and bandy words with me. "

"Well, you mustn't be too hard on him. His ancestors, doubtless, shotover your fields for generations, and he'd probably look upon an attemptto enforce the game laws as an infringement of his privileges. "

"Do you mean that the landowner is utterly unprotected?"

"By no means--go slow--go slow--you might search the round globe, Ibelieve for a more honest or a more peaceable set of neighbours. Butthey've always been taught, you see, to regard the bird in the air asbelonging to the man with the gun. On these large estates game was soplentiful in the old days and pot-hunters, as they call them, so few, that it didn't pay a man to watch out for his interest. Now that thebirds are getting scarce, the majority of farmers in the State arehaving their lands posted, but your uncle was too little of a sportsmanto concern himself in the matter. "

"Well, I knocked a tooth out of the fellow, so the whole county will beafter me like a pack of hounds, I suppose. I wonder who he was, by theway--young, good looking, rather a bully?"

"The description fits a Revercomb. As they are your next neighbours itwas probably the miller or his brother. "

"I know the miller, and it wasn't he--but when I come to think of it, the youngster had that same rustic look to him. By Jove, I am sorry itwas a Revercomb, " he added under his breath. 

A frown had settled on the face of the old gentleman, and he poured thesyrup over his buckwheat cakes with the manner of a man who is about toargue a case for the defence when his natural sympathies are with theprosecution. 

"They are an irascible family from the mother down, " he observed, "andI'm sorry you've got into trouble with them so soon for the miller isprobably the most popular man in the county. " He paused, cleared histhroat, and after a tentative glance at Kesiah, which fell short of herbosom, decided to leave the sentence in his mind unspoken while theyremained in her presence. 

A little later, when the two men were smoking in the library, Gaybrought the conversation back again to the point at which the lawyer hadso hastily dropped it. 

"Am I likely, then, to have trouble with the Revercombs?" he asked, witha disturbing memory of Blossom's flaxen head under the hooded shawl. 

"It's not improbable that the family will take up the matter. Thesecountry folk are fearful partisans, you see. However, it may leadto nothing worse than the miller's refusing to grind your corn orforbidding you to use the bridle path over his pasture. "

"Had my uncle any friction in that quarter when he lived here?"

Mr. Chamberlayne's cigar had gone out while he talked, and striking amatch on a silver box, he watched the thin blue flame abstractedly aninstant before he answered. 

"Were you ever told, " he inquired, "that there was some talk ofarresting Abner Revercomb before the coroner's jury agreed on averdict?"

"Abner? He's the eldest of the brothers, isn't he? No, I hadn't heard ofit. "

"It was only the man's reputation for uprightness, I believe, thatprevented the arrest. The Revercombs are a remarkable family for theirstation in life, and they derive their ability entirely from theirmother, who was one of the Hawtreys. They belong to the new order--tothe order that is rapidly forging to the surface and pushing usdilapidated aristocrats out of the way. These people have learned alot in the last few years, and they are learning most of all that theaccumulation of wealth is the real secret of dominance. When they getcontrol of the money, they'll begin to strive after culture, and acquirea smattering of education instead. It's astonishing, perhaps, but thefact remains that a reputable, hard-working farmer like our friend themiller, with his primitive little last century grist-mill, has probablygreater influence in the State to-day than you have, for all your twothousand acres. He has intelligence enough to go to the Legislature andmake a fair showing, if he wants to, and I don't' believe that either ofus could stand in the race a minute against him. "

"Well, he's welcome to the doubtful honour! But the thing that puzzlesme is why in thunder his brother Abner should have wanted to shoot myuncle?"

"It seems--" the lawyer hesitated, coughed and glanced nervously atthe door as if he feared the intrusion of Kesiah--"it seems he was alover--was engaged in fact to Janet Merryweather before--before sheattracted your uncle's attention. Later the engagement was broken, andhe married a cousin in a fit of temper, it was said at the time. Therewas always ill blood after this, it appeared, and on the morning of youruncle's death Abner was seen crossing the pasture from Poplar Springwith his gun on his shoulder. "

"It's an ugly story all round, " remarked Gay quietly, "and I wish toheaven that I were out of it. How has my poor mother stood it?"

"She has known very little about it, " Mr. Chamberlayne answered, whilehis jutting eyebrows twitched nervously as he turned away. "Your mother, my dear boy, is one of those particularly angelic characters from whosepresence even the thought of evil is banished. You have only to lookinto her face to discern how pure and spotless she has kept her soul. My old friend Jonathan was very devoted to her. She represented, indeed, the spiritual influence in his life, and there was no one on earth whoserespect or affection he valued so highly. It was his consideration forher alone that prevented him from making a most unfortunate marriage. "

"The girl died insane, didn't she?"

"It was a distressing--a most distressing case; but we must remember, in rendering our verdict, that if Janet Merryweather had upheld theprinciples of her sex, it would never have happened. "

"We'll rest it there, then--but what of her daughter? The child couldhardly have been accessory before the fact, I suppose?"

An expression of suffering patience came into the old gentleman's face, and he averted his gaze as he had done before the looming countenance ofKesiah. 

"Your uncle rarely spoke to me of her, " he answered, "but I have reasonto know that her existence was a constant source of distress to him. Hewas most anxious both to protect your mother and to provide generouslyfor the future of Janet's daughter. 

"Yet I understand that there was no mention of her in his will. "

"This omission was entirely on your mother's account. The considerableproperty--representing a third of his entire estate--which was left intrust to me for a secret purpose, will go, of course, to the girl. Inthe last ten years this property has practically doubled in value, andMolly will take possession of the income from it when she reaches hertwenty-first birthday. The one condition is that at Reuben's death sheshall live with your aunt. "

"Ah, " said Jonathan, "I begin to see. "

"At the time, of course, he believed that your mother would survivehim only a few months, and his efforts to shield her from any painfuldiscoveries extended even after his death. His wish was that thegirl should be well educated and prepared for any change in hercircumstances--but unfortunately she has proved to be rather a wilfulyoung person, and it has been impossible entirely to fulfil hisintentions with regard to her. Ah, he wasn't wise always, poor Jonathan, but I never doubted that he meant well at bottom, however thingsmay have appeared. His anxiety in the case of your mother was verybeautiful, and if his plans seem to have miscarried, we must lay theblame after all, on the quality of his judgment, not of his heart. "

"And the girl will be twenty-one next April, I am told?"

"Her birthday is the seventeenth, exactly ten years from the date ofJonathan's death. "

CHAPTER VIII

SHOWS TWO SIDES OF A QUARREL

At dusk that evening the miller, who had spent the day in Applegate, stopped at Bottom's Ordinary on his way home, and received a garbledaccount of the quarrel from the farmers gathered about the hospitablehearth in the public room. The genius of personality had enabled BetseyBottom to hold open doors to the traveller long after the wayside tavernin Virginia had passed from the road and the one certain fact relatingto the chance comer was that he never came. By combining a store with apublic house, she managed still to defy the progress of time as well asthe absence of guests. "Thank the Lord, I've never been one to give into changes!" it was her habit to exclaim. 

The room was full of tobacco smoke when Abel entered, and as he paused, in order to distinguish the row of silhouettes nodding against the ruddysquare of the fireplace, Adam Doolittle's quavering voice floated to himfrom a seat in the warmest corner. The old man was now turning ninety, and he had had, on the whole, a fortunate life, though he would haveindignantly repudiated the idea. He was a fair type of the rustic of thepast generation--slow of movement, keen of wit, racy of speech. 

"What's this here tale about Mr. Jonathan knockin' Archie down an'settin' on him, Abel?" he inquired. "Ain't you got yo' hand in yet, seein' as you've been spilin' for a fight for the last fortnight?"

"I hadn't heard of it, " replied Abel, his face flushing. "What in helldid he knock Archie down for?"

"Jest for shooting' a few birds that might as well have been flyingabout on yo' land as on his, if thar minds had been set over towardyou. "

"Do you mean Mr. Jonathan got into a quarrel with him for hunting onhis land? Why, we shot over those fields for a hundred years before thefirst damned Gay ever came here. "

"So we have--so we have, but it seems we ain't a-goin' to do so anylonger if Mr. Jonathan can find a way to prevent it. Archie was downhere jest a minute or two arter you went by this mornin', an' he wasswearin' like thunder, with a busted lip an' a black eye. "

A smarting sensation passed over Abel, as though the change to the warmroom after the cold outside were stinging his flesh. 

"Well, I wish I had been there, " he retorted, "somebody else would havebeen knocked down and sat on if that had happened. "

"Ah, so I said--so I said, " chuckled old Adam. "Thar ain't many men withsech a hearty stomach for trouble, I was jest sayin' to Solomon. "

Bending over the fire, he lifted a live ember between two small sticks, and placing it in the callous palm of his hand, blew softly on it aninstant before he lighted his pipe. 

"What goes against my way of thinkin', " remarked Betsey Bottom, wipinga glass of cider on her checked apron before she handed it to Abel, "isthat so peaceable lookin' a gentleman as Mr. Jonathan should begin tostart a fuss jest as soon as he lands in the midst of us. Them plump, soft-eyed males is generally inclined to mildness whether they be men orcattle. "

"'Taint nothin' on earth but those foreign whims he's brought back an'is tryin' to set workin' down here, " said Solomon Hatch. "If we don'tget our backs up agin 'em in time, we'll find presently we don't evendare to walk straight along the turnpike when we see him a comin'. A fewbirds, indeed!--did anybody ever hear tell of sech doin's? 'Warn't thembirds in the air?' I ax, 'an' don't the air belong to Archie the same asto him?'"

"It's because he's rich an' we're po', that he's got a right to layclaim to it, " muttered William Ming, a weakly obstinate person, to whosecharacter a glass of cider contributed the only strength. 

"You'd better hold yo' tongue, suh, " retorted his wife, "it ain't yo'air anyway, is it?"

"I reckon it's as much mine as it's Mr. Jonathan's, " rejoined William, who, having taken a double portion, had waxed argumentative. "An' whatI reason is that birds as is in the air ain't anybody's except the man'sthat can bring 'em down with a gun. "

"That's mo' than you could do, " replied his wife, "an' be that whetheror no, it's time you were thinkin' about beddin' the grey mule, an' sheain't in the air, anyhow. If I was you, Abel, " she continued in a softertone, "I wouldn't let 'em make me so riled about Mr. Jonathan till I'dlooked deep in the matter. It may be that he ain't acquainted with thecustom of the neighbourhood, an' was actin' arter some foolish foreignlaws he was used to. "

"I'll give him warning all the same, " said Abel savagely, "that if Iever catch him on my land I'll serve him in the fashion that he servedArchie. "

"You don't lose nothin' by goin' slow, " returned Solomon. "Old Adamthere is a born fire eater, too, but he knows how to set back whenthar's trouble brewin'. "

"I ain't never set back mo' than was respectable in a man of ninety, "croaked old Adam indignantly, while he prodded the ashes in his corncobpipe with his stubby forefinger. "'Tis my j'ints, not my sperits thathave grown feeble. "

"Oh, we all know that your were a gay dog an' a warnin' to the righteouswhen you were young, " rejoined Solomon, in an apologetic manner, "an'it must be a deal of satisfaction to be able to look back on a sinfulpast when you've grown old and repented. I've been a pious, God-fearingsoul from my birth, as you all know, friends, but sad to relate, I ain'tfound the solid comfort in a life of virtue that I'd hoped for, an'that's the truth. "

"The trouble with it, Solomon, " replied old Adam, pushing a log back onthe andirons with his rough, thick soled boot to which shreds of manurewere clinging, "the trouble with it is that good or bad porridge, it allleaves the same taste in the mouth arter you've once swallowed it. I'vehad my pleasant trespasses in the past, but when I look backward on 'emnow, to save my life, I can't remember anything about 'em but some smallpainful mishap that al'ays went along with 'em an' sp'iled the pleasure. Thar was the evening I dressed up in my best clothes an' ran off toApplegate to take a yellow haired circus lady, in pink skirts, out tosupper. It ought to have been a fine, glorious bit of wickedness toremember, but the truth was that I'd put on a new pair of boots, an' oneof 'em pinched so in the toes that I couldn't think of another thingthe whole blessed evening. 'Tis al'ays that way in my experience oflife--when you glance back or glance befo' 'tis pleasant enough to theeye, but at the moment while you're linin' it thar's al'ays the damnshoe that pinches. "

"Ah, you're right, you're right, Mr. Doolittle, " remarked William Ming, who had lingered in the doorway to follow the conversation. 

"It's life, that's what it is, " commented Solomon, heaving a sigh thatburst a button hole in his blue shirt. "An' what's mo' than life, it'smarriage. When I see the way some men wear themselves out with wantin'little specks of women, I say to myself over an' over agin, 'Ah, if theyonly knew that thar ain't nothin' in it except the wantin'. '"

"Not another thing--not another blessed mite of a thing, " agreedWilliam, who had imbibed secretly again behind the back of his wife. 

"I've know a man to throw himself into the river from sheer love befo'marriage, " said Solomon, "an' two weeks arter the woman had takenhim, to fall out with her because she'd put too much shortenin' in hispie-crust. "

"It's all love befo' marriage an' all shortenin' arterwards, " observedBetsey Bottom, with scorn. "I've al'ays noticed in this world that theless men folks have to say for themselves the better case they make ofit. When they've spent all thar time sence Adam tryin' to throw dust inthe eyes of women, it would be better manners if they'd stop twittin''em because they'd succeeded. "

"True, true, you never spoke a truer word, ma'am, in my acquaintancewith you, " responded Solomon, with what hasty gallantry he could summon. "I was thinkin' them very things to myself when you mentioned 'em. Notthat anybody could throw dust in yo' eyes, even if he tried to. "

"Well, it would take mo'n a man to do that, I reckon, " she replied, amiably enough, "I saw through 'em early, an' when you've once seenthrough 'em it's surprisin' how soon the foolishness of men begins tolook like any other foolishness on earth. "

She was listened to with respectful and flattering attention by herguests, who leaned forward with pipes in hand and vacant, admiring eyeson her still comely features. It was a matter of gossip that she hadrefused half the county, and that her reason for marrying William hadbeen that he wasn't "set, " and would be easy to manage. The event hadproved the prophecy, and to all appearance it was a perfectly successfulmating. 

Abel was the first to move under her gaze, and rising from his chair bythe fire, he took up his hat, and made his way slowly through the group, which parted grudgingly, and closed quickly together. 

"Take a night to sleep on yo' temper Abel, " called Solomon after him, "and git a good breakfast inside of you befo' you start out to doanything rash. Well, I must be gittin' along, folks, sad as it seems tome. It's strange to think, now ain't it--that when Nannie was marriedto Tom Middlesex an' livin' six miles over yonder at Piping Tree, Icouldn't have got over that road too fast on my way to her. "

"You'd still feel like that, friend, if she were still married to TomMiddlesex, " quavered old Adam. "'Tis the woman we oughtn't to think onthat draws us with a hair. "

"Now that's a case in p'int, " replied Solomon, nodding after thevanishing figure of Abel. "All his wits are in his eyes, as you can telljest to look at him--an' for sech a little hop-o'-my-thumb female thatdon't reach nigh up to his shoulder. "

"I can't see any particular good looks in the gal, myself, " remarkedMrs. Bottom, "but then, when it's b'iled down to the p'int, it ain'ther, but his own wishes he's chasin'. "

"Did you mark the way she veered from him to Mr. Jonathan the otherday?" inquired William Ming, "she's the sort that would flirt with ascarecrow if thar warn't anything else goin'. "

"The truth is that her eyes are bigger than her morals, an' I said itthe first time I ever seed her, " rejoined old Adam. "My taste, even whenI was young, never ran to women that was mo' eyes than figger. "

Still discoursing, they stumbled out into the dusk, through which Abel'slarge figure loomed ahead of them. 

"A man that's born to trouble, an' that of the fightin' kind--as thesparks fly upward, " added the elder. 

As the miller drove out of the wood, the rustle of the leaves under hiswheels changed from the soft murmurs in the moist hollows to the crispcrackle in the open places. In the west Venus hung silver white over thenew moon, and below the star and the crescent a single pine tree stoodas clearly defined as if it were pasted on a grey background of sky. 

Half a mile farther on, where his road narrowed abruptly, a voicehallooed to him as he approached, and driving nearer he discerned dimlya man's figure standing beside a horse that had gone lame. 

"Halloo, there? Have you a light? My horse has got a stone or cast ashoe, I can't make out which it is. "

Reaching for the lantern under his seat, Abel alighted and after calling"Whoa!" to his mare, walked a few steps forward to the stationaryhorse and rider in the dusk ahead. As the light shone on the man and herecognized Jonathan Gay, he hesitated an instant, as though uncertainwhether to advance or retreat. 

"If I'd known 'twas you, " he observed gruffly, "I shouldn't have been soquick about getting down out of my gig. "

"Thank you, all the same, " replied Gay in his pleasant voice. "Itdoesn't seem to be a stone, after all, " he added. "I'm rather afraid hegot a sprain when he stumbled into a hole a yard or two back. "

Kneeling in the road, Abel lifted the horse's foot, and felt for theinjury with a practised hand. 

"Needs a bandage, " he said at last curtly. "I happen to have a bottle ofliniment in the gig. "

The light glided like a winged insect over the strip of corduroy road, and a minute later the pungent odour of the liniment floated to Gay'snostrils. 

"Give me anything you have for a compress, " remarked the miller, dropping again on his knees. "Pick a few of those Jimson weeds by thefence and lend me your handkerchief--or a couple of them would be stillbetter. There, now, that's the best I can do, " he added after a moment. "Lead him slowly and be sure to look where you're going. "

"I will, thank you--but can you find your way without the lantern?"

"Hannah can travel the road in the dark and so can I for that matter. You needn't thank me, by the way. I wouldn't have troubled about you, but I've a liking for horses. "

"A jolly good thing it was for me that you came up at the instant. Isay, Revercomb, I'm sorry it was your brother I got into a row with thismorning. "

"Oh, that's another score. We haven't settled it yet, " retorted theMiller, as he stepped into his gig. "You've warned us off your land, soI'll trouble you to keep to the turnpike and avoid the bridle path thatpasses my pasture. "

Before Gay could reply, the other had whistled to his mare and wasspinning over the flat road into the star-spangled distance. 

When the miller reached home and entered the kitchen, his mother's firstwords related to the plight of Archie, who sat sullenly nursing hisbruised mouth in one corner. 

"If you've got any of the Hawtrey blood in yo' veins you'll takesides with the po' boy, " she said. "Thar's Abner settin' over thar soeverlastin' mealy mouthed that he won't say nothin' mo' to the p'intthan that he knew all the time it would happen. "

"Well, that's enough, ain't it?" growled Abner; "I did know it wouldhappen sure enough from the outset. "

"Thar ain't any rousin' him, " observed Sarah, with scorn. "I declar, I believe pa over thar has got mo' sperit in him even if he does livemostly on cornmeal mush. "

"Plenty of sperit in me--plenty of sperit, " chirped grandfather, alertas an aged sparrow that still contrives to hop stiffly in the sunshine. 

"Oh, yes, he's sperit left in him, though he's three years older thanI am, " remarked grandmother, with bitterness. "_He_ ain't wo' out withwork and with child bearin' befo' he was ninety. _He_ ain't bald, _he_ ain't toothless, " she concluded passionately, as if each ofgrandfather's blessings were an additional insult to her. "He can stilleat hard food when he wants it. "

"For pity's sake, be quiet, ma, " commanded Sarah sternly, at which theold woman broke into sobs. 

"Yes, I must be quiet, but _he_ can still talk, " she moaned. 

"Tell me about it, Archie, " said Abel, drawing off his overcoat andsitting down to his supper. "I passed Jonathan Gay in the road and heasked me to bind up his horse's sprain. "

"He'd be damned befo' I'd bind up a sprain for him!" burst out Archie, with violence. "Met me with a string of partridges this morning andjumped on me, blast him, as if he'd caught me in the act of stealing. I'd like to know if we hadn't hunted on that land before he or hisrotten old uncle were ever thought of?"

"Ah, those were merry days, those were!" piped grandfather. "Used to gohuntin' myself when I was young, with Mr. Jordan, an' brought home anyday as many fine birds as I could carry. Trained his dogs for him, too. "

"Thar was al'ays time for him to go huntin', " whimpered grandmother. 

"What are you goin' to do about it, Abel?" asked Sarah, turning upon himwith the smoking skillet in her hand. 

At the question Blossom Revercomb, who was seated at work under thelamp, raised her head and waited with an anxious, expectant look for theanswer. She was embroidering a pair of velvet slippers for Mr. Mullen--atask begun with passion and now ending with weariness. While shelistened for Abel's response, her long embroidery needle remainedsuspended over the toe of the slipper, where it gleamed in the lamplight. 

"I don't know, " replied Abel, and Blossom drew a repressed sigh ofrelief; "I've just ordered him to keep clear of our land, if that's whatyou're hintin' at. "

"If you had the sperit of yo' grandpa you'd have knocked him down in theroad, " said Sarah angrily. 

"Yes, yes, I'd have knocked him down in the road, " chimed in the oldman, with the eagerness of a child. 

"You can't knock a man down when he asks to borrow your lantern, "returned Abel, doggedly, on the defensive. 

"Oh, you can't, can't you?" jeered Sarah. "All you're good for, Ireckon, is to shuck corn or peel potatoes!"

For a minute Abel stared at her in silence. "I declare, mother, I don'tbelieve you're any better than a heathen, " he remarked sadly at last. 

"Well, I'm not the kind of Christian you are, anyway, " retorted Sarah, "I'd like to know whar you'll find anything in Scripture about notknockin' a man down because he asks you for a lantern. I thought I knewmy Bible--but I reckon you are better acquainted with it--you an' yo'Mr. Mullen. "

"Of course, you know your Bible. I wasn't meanin' that. "

"Then if readin' yo' Bible ain't bein' a Christian, I suppose it'shavin' curly hair, an' gittin' up in the pulpit an' mincin'. Who arethose slippers for, Keren-happuch?"

"Mr. Mullen, grandma. "

"Well, if I was goin' to embroider slippers for a minister, " tauntedSarah, "I'd take care to choose one that could repeat his Scripture whenhe was called on. "

"Ah, 'tis the age, not the man, " lamented grandfather, "'tis an age ofsmall larnin' an' weak-kneed an' mealy mouthed into the bargain. Why, they're actually afeared to handle hell-fire in the pulpit any longer, an' the texts they spout are that tame an' tasteless that 'tis likedosin' you with flaxseed tea when you're needin' tar-water. 'Twasdifferent when I was young and in my vigour, " he went on eagerly, undisturbed by the fact that nobody paid the slightest attention to whathe was saying, "for sech was the power and logic of Parson Claymore'ssermons that he could convict you of the unpardonable sin against theHoly Ghost even when you hadn't committed it. A mo' blameless soul neverlived than my father, yet I remember one Sunday when parson fixed hiseye upon him an' rolled out his stirrin' text 'Thou art the man, ' hewas so taken by surprise an' suddenness that he just nodded back at thepulpit 'an answered, 'Yes, parson, I am, if you'll excuse me. '"

"It's a pity ain't mo' like Parson Claymore now, " remarked Sarah, whohad stopped to listen to the concluding words of the anecdote. "Tharain't vim enough in this generation of preachers to skeer a rabbit. "

Her profile, with its sparse wave of hair from the forehead, wasrepeated in grotesque exaggeration on the wall at her back. The ironwill in her lent a certain metallic hardness to her features, and hershadow resembled in outline the head on some ancient coin that had lainburied for centuries. Intrenched behind an impregnable self-esteem, shehad never conceded a point, never admitted a failure, never accepted acompromise. "It ain't no wonder that a new comer thinks he can knockyou down an' set on you for shootin' a few birds, " she added, after amoment. 

"He'll find out I ain't done with him yet, " growled Archie, and risingfrom his seat, he took down his gun and began polishing the barrel withan old yarn stocking of Sarah's. 

The long needle missed the hole at which Blossom had pointed it, and shelooked up with a sullen droop to her mouth. 

"I reckon Mr. Gay has just as good a right to his things as we have toours, " she said. 

"Right! Who wants his right?" flared Archie, turning upon her. "You'llsay next, I reckon, that he had a right to split my upper lip open if hewanted to. "

"From the way grandma carries on anybody would think that was what_she_ wanted, " persisted Blossom, adhering stubbornly to the point, "shesounds as if she were mad because people ain't everlastingly fighting. "

"You needn't think I don't see what you're aimin' at, Keren-happuch, "rejoined Sarah, who used this name only in moments of anger, "you'retryin' to make me think a grown man can't do anything better than get upin the pulpit and mouth texts so soft that a babe couldn't cut its teethon 'em. You've had notions in yo' head about Orlando Mullen ever sincehe came here, an' you ain't fooled me about 'em. "

"Thar, thar, don't you begin pesterin' Blossom, " interposed Abner, aroused at last from his apathy. 

"Notions about Mr. Mullen!" repeated Blossom, and though there was a hotflush in her face, her tone was almost one of relief. 

CHAPTER IX

IN WHICH MOLLY FLIRTS

On a November morning several weeks later, when the boughs of treesshowed almost bare against the sky, Molly Merryweather walked down toBottom's store to buy a bottle of cough syrup for Reuben, who had acold. Over the counter Mrs. Bottom, as she was still called from anhereditary respect for the house rather than for the husband, delivereda coarse brown paper. The store, which smelt of dry-goods and gingersnaps, was a small square room jutting abruptly out of the bar, fromwhich it derived both its warmth and its dignity. 

"Even men folks have got the sperit of worms and will turn at last, " sheremarked in her cheerful voice, which sounded as if it issued from thefeather bed she vaguely resembled. 

"Let them turn--I can do without them very well, " replied Molly, tossingher head. 

"Ah, you're young yet, my dear, an' thar's a long road ahead of you. Butwait till you've turned forty an' you'll find that the man you throwedover at twenty will come handy, if for nothin' mo' than to fill a gap inthe chimney. I ain't standin' up for 'em, mind you, an' I can't rememberthat I ever heard anything particular to thar credit as a sex--but po'things as we allow 'em to be, thar don't seem but one way to git alongwithout 'em, an' that is to have 'em. It's sartain sure, however, thatthey fill a good deal mo' of yo' thought when they ain't around thanwhen they are. Why, look at William, now--the first time he axed me tomarry him, I kept sayin' 'you're still slue-footed an' slack-kneed an'addle-headed an' I'll marry you whether or no. ' Twenty years maynot change a man for the better, but it does a powerful lot towardpersuadin' a woman to put up with the worst!"

"Well, best or worst, I've seen enough of marriage, Mrs. Bottom, to knowthat I shouldn't like it. "

"I ain't denyin' it might be improved on without hurtin' it--but asingle woman's a terrible lonesome body, Molly. "

"I'm not lonely, while I have grandfather. "

"He's old an' he ain't got many years ahead of him. "

"If I lose him I'll go to Applegate and trim hats for a living. "

"It's a shame, Molly, with the po' miller splittin' his heart over you. "

"He'll mend it. They're like that, all of them. "

"But Mr. Mullen? Ain't he different now, bein' a parson?"

"No, he's just the same, and besides he'd always think he'd stooped tomarry me. "

"Then take Jim Halloween. With three good able-bodied lovers at yo'beck an' call, it's a downright shame to die an old maid just from purecontrariness. It's better arter all, to eat dough that don't rise thanto go hungry. "

A step sounded on the platform outside and a lank, good-lookingcountryman glanced cautiously in through the crack in the door. Observing Molly, he spat a wad of tobacco over the hitching rail by thesteps, and stopped to smooth his straw-coloured hair with the palm ofhis hand before crossing the threshold. 

"Thar's Jim Halloween now jest as we were speakin' of him, " whisperedBetsey Bottom, with a nudge at Molly's shoulder. 

"Well, if that don't beat all, " drawled the young man, in an embarrassedrapture, as he entered. "I was gettin' my horse shod over thar at TimMallory's, an' I thought to myself that I'd jest drop over an' say'howdy' to Mrs. Bottom. "

"Oh, I reckon you caught a glimpse of red through the door, " chuckledBetsey, who was possessed of the belief that it was her Christian dutyto further any match, good or bad, that came under her eye. 

"I must be going, so don't hurry your visit, " replied Molly, laughing. "Mrs. Hatch has been in bed for a week and I'm on my way to see Judy. "

"I'll walk a bit of the road with you if you ain't any seriousobjection, " remarked the lover, preparing to accompany her. 

"Oh, no, none in the world, " she replied demurely, "you may carry mycough syrup. "

"It ain't for yourself, I hope?" he inquired, with a look of alarm. 

"No, for grandfather. He caught cold staying in the barn with the redcow. "

"Well, I'm glad 'taint for you--I don't like a weak-chested woman. "

She looked up smiling as they passed the store into the sunken roadwhich led in the direction of Solomon Hatch's cottage. 

"I did see a speck of red through the crack, " he confessed after aminute, as if he were unburdening his conscience of a crime. 

"You mean you saw my cap or jacket--or maybe my gloves?"

"It was yo' cap, an' so I came in. I hope you have no particularobjection?" His face had flushed to a violent crimson and in his throathis Adam's apple worked rapidly up and down between the high points ofhis collar. "I mean, " he stammered presently, "that I wouldn't have gonein if I hadn't seen that bit of red through the do'. I suppose I hadbetter tell you, that I've been thinking a great deal about you in theevening when my day's work is over. "

"I'm glad I don't interfere with your farming. "

"That would be a pity, wouldn't it? Do you ever think of me, I wonder, at the same time?" he inquired sentimentally. 

"I can't tell because I don't know just what that time is, you see. "

"Well, along after supper generally--particularly if ma has madebuckwheat cakes an' I've eaten a hearty meal an' feel kind of cosy an'comfortable when I set down by the fire an' there's nothin' special todo. "

"But you see I don't like buckwheat cakes, and I've always something'special' to do at that hour. "

"Ah, you don't mean it, do you--about not liking buckwheat cakes? Asfor the rest, bein' a woman, I reckon you would have the washin' up toattend to just at that time. I don't like a woman that sets around idleafter supper--an' I'm glad you're one to be brisk an' busy about thehouse, though I'm sorry you ain't over partial to buckwheat. May Iinquire, if you don't object to tellin' me, what is yo' favourite food?"

"It's hard to say--I have so many--bread and jam, I believe. "

"I hope you don't think I'm too pressin' on the subject, but ma hasalways said that there wasn't any better bond for matrimony than thesame taste in food. Do you think she's right?"

"I shouldn't wonder. She's had experience anyway. "

"Yes, that's jest what I tell her--she's had experience an' she oughtto know. Pa and she never had a word durin' the thirty years of theirmarriage, an' she always said she ruled him not with the tongue, butwith the fryin' pan. I don't reckon there's a better cook than ma inthis part of the country, do you?"

"I'm quite sure there isn't. She has given up her life to it. "

"To be sure she has--every minute of it, like the woman whose priceis above rubies that Mr. Mullen is so fond of preachin' about. " Fora moment he considered the fact as though impressed anew by itsimportance. "I'm glad you feel that way, because ma has always stuck outthat you had the makin' of a mighty fine cook in you. "

"Has she? That was nice of her, wasn't it?"

"Well, she wouldn't have said so if she hadn't thought it. It ain't herway to say pleasant things when she can help it. You must judge her byher work not by her talk, pa used to say. "

"She's the kind that doesn't mind taking trouble for you, I know thatabout her, " replied Molly, gravely. 

"You're right about that, an' you're the same way, I am sure. I'vewatched you pretty closely with your grandfather. "

"Yes, I believe I am--with grandfather. "

"'Twill be the same way when you marry, I was sayin' as much to ma onlyyesterday. 'She'd be jest as savin' an' thrifty as you, '--I mean, ofcourse, if the right man got you to marry him, --but 'tis all the samein the end. " Again he paused, cleared his throat, and swallowedconvulsively, "I've sometimes felt that I might be the right man, MissMolly, " he said. 

"O Mr. Halloween!"

"Why, I thought you knew I felt so from the way you looked at me. "

"But I can't help the way I look, can I?"

"Well, I've told you now, so it ain't a secret. I've thought aboutaskin' you for more than a year--ever since you smiled at me one Sundayin church while Mr. Mullen was preachin'. "

"Did I? I've quite forgotten it!"

"I suppose you have, seein' you smile so frequent. But that put the ideain my head anyway an' I've cared a terrible lot about marryin' you eversince. "

"But I'm not the kind of person, at all. I'm not saving, I'm notthrifty. "

"I hope you're wrong--but even if you're not, well, I want you terriblehard just the same. You see I can always keep an eye on the expenses, "he hastened to add, and made a desperate clutch at her hand. 

The red worsted mitten came off in his grasp, and he stood eyeing itruefully while he waited for her answer. 

"I've determined never, never to marry, " she replied. 

His chest heaved. "I knew you felt that way about the other's but Ithought somehow I was different, " he rejoined. 

"No, it's not the man, but marriage that I don't like, " she responded, shaking her head. "It's all work an' no play wherever I've seen it. "

"It's terrible for a woman to feel like that, an' goes against God an'nature, " he answered. "Have you ever tried prayin' over it?"

"No, I've never tried that, because you see, I don't really mind it verymuch. Please give me my glove now, here is Judy's cottage. "

"But promise me first that you'll try prayin' over your state of mind, an' that I may go on hopin' that you will change it?"

Turning with her hand still outstretched for the glove, she glancedroguishly from his face to the shuttered window of the Hatch cottage. 

"Oh, I don't mind your hoping, " she answered, composing her expressionto demureness, "if only you won't hope--very hard. "

Then, leaving him overwhelmed by his emotions, she tripped up thenarrow walk, bordered by stunted rose-bushes, to the crumbling porch ofSolomon's house. At the door a bright new gig, with red wheels, caughther eye, and before the mischievous dimples had fled from her cheek, sheran into the arms of the Reverend Orlando Mullen. 

Her confusion brought a beautiful colour into his cheeks, while, in achivalrous effort to shield her from further embarrassment, he turnedhis eyes to the face of Judy Hatch, which was lifted at his side likethe rapt countenance of one of the wan-featured, adoring saints of a FraAngelico painting. No one--not even the nurse of his infancy--had everimputed a fault either to his character or to his deportment; for hehad come into the world endowed with an infallible instinct for thecommonplace. In any profession he would have won success as a shininglight of mediocrity, since the ruling motive of his conduct was less theambition to excel than the moral inability to be peculiar. His mind wassmall and solemn, and he had worn three straight and unyielding wrinklesacross his forehead in his earnest endeavour to prevent people fromacting, and especially from thinking, lightly. This sedulous devotion tothe public morals kept him not only a trifle spare in figure, but lentan habitual manner of divine authority to his most trivial utterance. His head, seen from the rear, was a little flat, but this, fortunately, did not show in the pulpit--where at the age of twenty-four hiseloquence enraptured his congregation. 

"I postponed my visit to Applegate until to-morrow, " he said, whenhe had given her what he thought was sufficient time to recover hercomposure. "If you are returning shortly, perhaps I may have thepleasure of driving you in my gig. I have just come to inquire afterMrs. Hatch. "

"It would be kind of you, for I am a little tired, " responded Molly. "I came to speak to Judy, and then I am to stop at the mill to borrow apattern from Blossom Revercomb. Are you going that way, I wonder?"

"I shall make it my way, " he replied gallantly, "as soon as you areready. Don't hurry, I beg of you. It is gratifying to me to find thatyou have so soon taken my advice and devoted a portion of your days tovisiting the sick and the afflicted. "

With her back discreetly turned upon Judy, she looked up at him for amoment, and something in her eyes rendered unnecessary the words thatfell slowly and softly from her lips. 

"You give such good advice, Mr. Mullen. "

A boyish eagerness showed in his face, breaking through the professionalausterity of his manner. 

"I hope you've advised Judy this morning, " she added before he couldanswer. 

"To the best of my ability, " he replied gravely. "And now, as I havesaid before, there is no hurry, but if you are quite ready, I shouldsuggest our starting. "

"Just a word or two with Judy, " she answered, and when the words werespoken in the doorway she laid her hand in the rector's and mounted, with his scrupulous assistance, over the red wheel to the shining blackseat of the gig, which smelt of leather and varnish. After he had takenhis place beside her he tucked in the laprobe carefully at the corners, rearranged the position of his overcoat at her back, and suggested thatshe should put the bottle of cough syrup in the bottom of the vehicle. 

Like all his attentions, this solicitude about the cough syrup had anair that was at once amorous and ministerial, a manner of implying, "Observe how I take possession of you always to your advantage. "

"Are you quite comfortable?" he asked when they had rolled between thestunted rose-bushes into the turnpike. 

"Oh, perfectly, you are always so thoughtful, Mr. Mullen. "

"I think I am right in ranking thoughtfulness--or consideration, Ishould have said--among the virtues. "

"Indeed you are; as soon as I found that you had not gone to Applegateas you intended to, I said to myself that, of course, some act ofkindness had detained you. "

His large, very round grey eyes grew soft as he looked at her. 

"You have expressed it beautifully, as 'an act of kindness, '" hereturned, "since you yourself were the cause of my postponing my visit. "

"I--oh, you can't mean it? What have I done?"

"Nothing. Don't alarm yourself--absolutely nothing. Three months agowhen I spoke to you of marriage, you entreated me to allow you alittle time in which to accustom yourself to my proposal. That time ofprobation, which has been, I hope, equally trying to us both, has endedto-day. "

"But I don't think I really love you, Mr. Mullen. "

"I trust your eyes rather than your words--and your eyes have told me, all unconsciously to yourself, your secret. "

"Well, I do love your sermons, but---"

"My sermons are myself. There is nothing in my life, I trust, thatbelies my preaching. "

"I know how good you are, but honestly and truly, I don't want to marryanybody. "

His smile hardened slowly on his face like an impression on metal thatcools into solidity. From the beginning he had conducted his courtship, as he had conducted his sacred office, with the manner of a gentlemanand the infallibility of an apostle. Doubt of his perfect fitness foreither vocation had never entered his head. Had it done so he wouldprobably have dismissed it as one of the insidious suggestions of thelower man--for the lower man was a creature who habitually disagreedwith his opinions and whom his soul abhorred. 

As he sat beside her, clerical, well-groomed, with his look of small yetsolemn intelligence, she wondered seriously if he would, in spite of allopposition, have his way with her at last and pattern her to his liking?

"I am not in the least what you think me, Mr. Mullen--I don't know justhow to say it---"

"There is but one thing you need know, dearest, and that is that youlove me. As our greatest poet has expressed it 'To know no more iswoman's happiest knowledge. '"

"But I can't feel that you really--really care for me. How can you?"

With a tender gesture, he laid his free hand on hers while he lookedinto her downcast face. 

"You allude, I suppose, to the sad fact of your birth, " he repliedgently, "but after you have become my wife, you will, of course need noname but mine. "

"I'm so sorry, Mr. Mullen, but really I didn't mean you to think--Oh, there's the mill and Abel looking out of the window. Please, pleasedon't sit so close to me, and look as if we were discussing your sickparishioners. "

He obeyed her instantly, quite as circumspect as she in his regard forthe proprieties. 

"You are excited now, Molly dear, but you will not forbid my hoping thatyou will accept my proposal, " he remarked persuasively as the gig drewup to the Revercombs' gate. 

"Well, yes, if you'll let me get down now, you may hope, if you wishto. "

Alighting over the wheel before he could draw off his glove and assisther, she hurried, under Abel's eyes, to the porch, where BlossomRevercomb stood gazing happily in the direction of Jordan's Journey. 

CHAPTER X

THE REVEREND ORLANDO MULLEN PREACHES A SERMON

On the following Sunday, a mild autumn morning, Mr. Mullen preached oneof his most impressive sermons from the text, "_She looketh well to theways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness_. "

Woman, he said in the course of it, was created to look after the waysof her household in order that man might go out into the world and makea career. No womanly woman cared to make a career. What the womanlywoman desired was to remain an Incentive, an Ideal, an Inspiration. Ifthe womanly woman possessed a talent, she did not use it--for this wouldunsex her--she sacrificed it in herself in order that she mightreturn it to the race through her sons. Self-sacrifice--to use a wornmetaphor--self-sacrifice was the breath of the nostrils of the womanlywoman. It was for her power of self-sacrifice that men loved her andmade an Ideal of her. Whatever else woman gave up, she must alwaysretain her power of self-sacrifice if she expected the heart of herhusband to rejoice in her. The home was founded on sacrifice, and womanwas the pillar and the ornament of the home. There was her sphere, herpurpose, her mission. All things outside of that sphere belonged to man, except the privilege of ministering to the sick and the afflicted inother households. 

He leaned forward in the old pulpit, his shapely, well-kept hand hangingover the edge in one of his most characteristic gestures; and the autumnsunlight, falling through the plain glass windows, shone on his temples. Immediately below him, in a front pew, sat his mother, a dried littleold woman, with beady black eyes and a pointed chin, which jutted outfrom between the stiff taffeta strings of her poke bonnet. She gazedupward, clasping her Prayer-book in her black woollen gloves, which weredarned in the fingers; and though she appeared to listen attentively tothe sermon, she was wondering all the time if the coloured servant athome would remember to baste the roast pig she had left in the oven. To-day was the Reverend Orlando's birthday, and the speckled pig she hadfattened throughout the summer, lay now, with an apple in his mouth, onthe trencher. She had invited Molly to dine with them rather againsther wishes, for she harboured a secret fear that the girl was tryingto marry the rector. Besides, as she said to herself, with her eyeson Orlando's hand, how on earth could he do full justice to the pig ifthere was a pretty parishioner to distract his attention?

In the pew next to Mrs. Mullen sat old Adam Doolittle, his hand behindhis left ear, his withered old lips moving as if he were repeating thewords of the sermon. From time to time he shook his head as though hedisagreed with a sentence, and then his lips worked more rapidly, andan obstinate, argumentative look appeared in his face. Mentally he wasconducting a theological dispute with the preacher in which the youngerman suffered always a crushing rhetorical defeat. Behind him sat themiller and Blossom Revercomb, who threw an occasional anxious glance atthe empty seat beside Mrs. Gay and Kesiah; and behind them Judy Hatchraised her plain, enraptured face to the pulpit, where the rector hadshaken out an immaculately ironed handkerchief and wiped his brow. She knew who had ironed that handkerchief on Wednesday, which was Mrs. Mullen's washing day, and her heart rejoiced as she remembered the carewith which she had folded the creases. 

It made no difference, said Mr. Mullen, replacing the handkerchiefsomewhere under his white surplice, whether a woman was ugly orbeautiful, since they possessed Scriptural authority for the statementthat beauty was vain, and no God-fearing man would rank loveliness offace or form above the capacity for self-sacrifice and the unfailingattendance upon the sick and the afflicted in any parish. Beauty, indeed, was but too often a snare for the unwary--temptresses, he hadbeen told, were usually beautiful persons. 

Molly's lips trembled into a smile, and her eyes were wide and bright asshe met those of the preacher. For an instant he looked at her, gentle, admonishing, reproachful--then his gaze passed over Judy's seraphicfeatures to the face of an old grey horse that stared wonderingly inthrough the south window. Along the whitewashed plank fence of thechurch-yard, other horses were waiting patiently for the service toend, and from several side saddles, of an ancient pattern, hung floppingalpaca riding skirts, which the farmer's wives or daughters had wornover their best gowns to church. A few locust trees shed their remainingsmall yellow leaves on the sunken graves, which were surrounded bycrumbling wooden enclosures. Here and there, farther off, a flattombstone was still visible in the tall grass; and over the dust of oldJonathan Gay a high marble cross, selected by his brother's widow, borethe words, unstained by the dripping trees, and innocent of satire:"Here lieth in the hope of a joyful resurrection---"

At the end of the service there was a rustle either of relief ordisappointment, and the congregation filed slowly through the southdoors, where the old grey horse stood resigned and expectant amid theobliterated graves. Mrs. Gay, who had lingered in the walk to speakto Mr. Mullen, raised her plaintive violet eyes to his face when heappeared. 

"You are always so comforting. I don't know how to thank you for helpingme, " she murmured, and added impulsively to the little old woman at hisside, "Oh, what a blessing such a son must be to you!"

"Orlando's never given me a moment's worry in his life, ma'am--not evenwhen he was teething, " replied Mrs. Mullen, who looked sharper and morewithered than ever in the broad daylight. "If you'll believe me, hewasn't more than six months old when I said to his father that Icould tell by the look of him he was intended for the ministry. Suchsweetness, such self-control even as an infant. "

"How happy he must make you! And then, to have the privilege of hearinghis beautiful sermons! But you'll lose him some day, as I was justsaying to Kesiah. It won't be long before some fortunate woman takes himaway from you. We can only hope she will be worthy of the ideal he hasfor her. "

"Ah, that's just it, Mrs. Gay, I sometimes tell myself there isn't awoman in the world that's fit for him. "

She spoke as fast as she could, eager to dilate on the subject of theembarrassed Orlando's virtues, flattered in her motherly old heart bythe praise of his sermons, and yet, all the time, while her peaked chinworked excitedly, thinking about the roasted young pig that waited forher to attend to the garnishing. 

The delay was short; Orlando silenced her at last by a gentle admonitorypressure of her elbow, and the two ladies drove off in their carriage, while Molly walked sedately out of the churchyard between the clergymanand his mother. The girl was pleasantly aware that the eyes of themiller and of Jim Halloween followed her disapprovingly as she went; andshe thought with complacency that she had never looked better thanshe did in her white felt hat with its upturned brim held back bycherry-coloured ribbon. It was all very well for the rector to saythat beauty was of less importance than visiting the sick, but the factremained that Judy Hatch visited the sick more zealously than she--andyet he was very far, indeed, from falling in love with Judy Hatch! Thecontradiction between man and his ideal of himself was embodied beforeher under a clerical waistcoat. 

"I believe, " remarked the Reverend Orlando, thrusting his short chin asfar as possible over his collar, which buttoned at the back, "I believethat the elder Doolittle nourishes some private grudge against me. Hehas a most annoying habit of shaking his head at me during the sermon asthough he disagreed with my remarks. "

"The man must be an infidel, " observed Mrs. Mullen, with asperity, asshe moved on in front of him. 

"He doesn't know half the time what he is doing, " said Molly, "you knowhe passed his ninetieth birthday last summer. "

"But surely you cannot mean that you consider age an excuse foreither incivility or irreligion, " rejoined her lover, pushing aside animpertinent carrot flower that had shed its pollen on his long coat, while he regarded his mother's back with the expression of indignantsuspicion he unconsciously assumed on the rare occasions when hisopinions were disputed. "Age should mellow, should soften, shouldsweeten. "

"I suppose it should, but very often it doesn't, " retorted Molly, atrifle tartly, for the sermon had bored her and she looked forward withdread to the dinner. 

At her words Mrs. Mullen, who was walking a little ahead, with herskirts held up to avoid the yellow stain of the golden-rod, glancedsharply back, as she had done in church when old Adam had coughed at thewrong time and spoiled the full effect of a period. 

"One reason that Orlando is so helpful to people is that he always seesso clearly just what they ought to be, " she observed. "I don't believethere's a man in the ministry or out, who has a higher ideal of womanand her duty. "

"But do women ever live up to his ideal of them?"

"It isn't his fault if they don't. All he can do is to point it out tothem earnestly and without ceasing. "

They had reached the rectory gate, where she hesitated an instant withher hand on the latch, and her head bent toward the house in a surprisedand listening attitude. "I declare, Orlando, if I didn't go off andleave that cat locked up in the parlour!" she exclaimed in horror as shehurried away. 

"Yes, " observed Mr. Mullen in his tenderest and most ministerial manner, "my ideal is a high one, and when I look into your face, I see reflectedall the virtues I would have you reach. I see you the perfect woman, sharing my sorrows, easing my afflictions---"

Intoxicated by his imagination, he turned toward her as though he beheldthe living embodiment of his eloquence. 

For a minute Molly smiled up at him; then, "I wonder if your motherreally locked the cat in the parlour, " she rejoined demurely. 

After the birthday dinner, at which Mrs. Mullen talked ceaselessly ofOrlando's excellencies, while she reserved the choicest piece of meatand the fattest dumpling for his plate, Molly tied her cherry-colouredstrings under her chin, and started home, with a basket of apple tartsfor Reuben on her arm. At the crossroads Mr. Mullen left her to returnto an afternoon Sunday school, and she was about to stop at the ordinaryto ask William to see her safely over the pasture, when Abel Revercomb, looking a trifle awkward in his Sunday clothes, came out of the houseand held out his hand for the basket. 

"I thought you'd be coming home this way after dinner, " he said, turninghis throat when he moved. His hair was brushed flat on his head aswas his habit on Sundays, and he wore a vivid purple tie, which he hadbought on his last journey to Applegate. He had never looked worse, norhad he ever felt quite so confident of the entire correctness of hisappearance. 

As Molly made no reply, but merely fell into step at his side, heinquired, after a moment's pause, "How did you enjoy the sermon?"

"Oh, I don't like to be preached at, and I'm sorry for Mr. Mullen's wifeif he expects her to ease everybody's pains in the parish. He lookedvery handsome in church, " she added, "didn't you think so?"

"I didn't notice, " he answered ruefully. "I never pay any attention tothe way a man looks, in church or out of it. "

"Well, I do--and even Judy Hatch does. She asked me the other day whomI thought the handsomest man in the neighbourhood, and I'm sure sheexpected me to say Mr. Mullen. "

She dimpled, and his arm went out impulsively toward her. 

"But you didn't, Molly?" he returned. 

"Why, of course not--did you imagine that I should? I said I thought Mr. Jonathan Gay was the best looking. "

His arm fell to his side, and for a minute or two he walked on insilence. 

"I wish I didn't love you, Molly, " he burst out at last. "I sometimesalmost believe that you're one of the temptresses Mr. Mullen preachedagainst this morning. I've tried again and again to tear you out of myheart, but it is useless. "

"Yes, it's useless, Abel, " she answered, melting to dimples. 

"I tell myself, " he went on passionately, "that you're not worthit--that you're perfectly heartless--that you're only a flirt--thatother men have held your hands, kissed your lips even---"

"And after telling yourself those dreadful truths, what happens?" sheinquired with interest. 

"What happens? Well, I go to work and don't think of you for at leastthree hours. Then, when I am dead tired I stop for a minute to rest, andas soon as my eyes fall on a bit of green grass, or a flower growing bythe road, or the blue sky, there you are again, popping in between themwith your big eyes and your mouth that was made for kisses. I forget howheartless and light you are, and remember only the times you've crept upto me and put your hand on my arm and said, 'Abel, I'm sorry. ' Most ofall I remember the one time you kissed me, Molly. "

"Don't, Abel, " she said quickly, and her voice broke and died in herthroat. 

As he drew close to her, she walked faster until her steps changed intoa run. 

"If you only knew me as I am, you wouldn't care so, Abel, " she threwback at him. 

"I don't believe you know yourself as you are, Molly, " he answered. "It's not you that leads men on to make love to you and then throws themover--as you have thrown me--as you will throw Mr. Mullen. " His tonegrew suddenly stern. "You don't love Mr. Mullen, and you know it, " headded. "If you love any man on earth to-day, you love me. "

At his first change from tenderness to accusation, her face hardened andher voice returned to her control. 

"What right have you to judge me, Abel Revercomb?" she asked angrily. "I've had one sermon preached at me to-day, and I'll not listen toanother. "

"You know I'm not preaching at you, Molly, but I'm a man of flesh andblood, not of straw. How can I have patience?"

"I never asked you to have patience, did I?"

"No, and I don't believe you want it. If I'd catch hold of you and shakeyou, you'd probably like me better. "

"It's just as well that you don't try it to see how I'll take it. "

"Oh, I shan't try it. I'll go on still believing in you againstyourself, like the born fool I am. "

"You may believe in me or not just as you please--but it isn't my faultif you won't go off and marry Judy Hatch, as I have begged you to. She's everything on earth that Mr. Mullen preached about to-day in hissermon. "

"Hang Judy Hatch! You are bent on starting a quarrel with me, that isthe trouble. As soon as you mentioned Jonathan Gay I knew what you werein for. "

"As if I couldn't say a man was good looking without putting you into arage. "

"I'm not in a rage, but I hate a flirt. Every sensible man does. "

"Judy Hatch isn't a flirt. "

"Leave Judy Hatch out of it--though I've more than half a mind to walkoff and ask her to marry me. "

"That's just what I've advised you to do for the last six months, isn'tit?"

"Ah, no, you haven't, Molly, no, you haven't--and you'd be just assorry as I the minute after I had done it. You've got some small foolishchildish notions in your head about hating men--but you're much nearerloving me than hating me at this moment, and that's why you're afraid!"

"I'm not afraid--how dare you say so?"

"Oh, my pretty, how foolish we are, both of us! I'd work my fingers tothe bone for you, Molly, I'd lie down and let your little feet walk overme if they wanted to--I'd shed my life's blood for you, day by day, ifit could help you. "

"Every one of you say this in the beginning, but it isn't true in theend, " she answered. 

"Not true--not true? Prove it. Why do you think I've struggled andraised myself except to keep equal with you? Why did I go to school andteach myself and make money enough to take classes in Applegate? Justfor you. All those winter afternoons when I drove over there to learnthings, I was thinking of you. Do you remember that when you were atschool in Applegate, you'd tell me the names of the books you read sothat I might get them?"

"Don't, " she cried fiercely, "don't tell me those things, for I'll neverbelieve them! I'm hard and bitter inside, there's no softness in me. IfI went on my knees and prayed to love, I couldn't do it. Oh, Abel, thereisn't any love in my heart!"

"Do you remember when you kissed me?"

"No, I have forgotten. "

"It was only three weeks ago. "

"Yes, that was three weeks ago. "

The light died slowly out of his eyes as he looked at her. 

"When you speak like that I begin to wonder if any good can ever cometo us, " he returned. "I've gone on breaking my heart over you ever sinceyou were a little girl in short dresses, and I can't remember that I'veever had anything but misery from you in my life. It's damnable thethings I've stood and yet I've always forgotten them afterwards, andremembered only the times you were soft and gentle and had ceased to beshrewish. Nobody on earth can be softer than you, Molly, when you wantto, and it's your softness, after all, that has held me in spite ofyour treatment. Why, your mouth was like a flower when I kissed you, andparted and clung to me---"

"I wish you wouldn't talk about it. I hate to hear such things afterthey are over. "

"Such things!" He stood flicking hopelessly with a small branch hecarried at the carrot flowers in the field. "If you will tell mehonestly that you were playing with me, Molly, I'll give you up thisminute, " he said. 

The colour was high in her face and she did not look at him. 

"I was playing with you, and I told you so the day afterwards, " shereplied. 

"Yes, but you didn't mean it. I can't go any further because this is Mr. Jonathan's land. "

His eyes had in them the hurt reproachful look of a wounded dog's, andhis voice trembled a little. 

"I meant always--always to lead you on until I could hurt you--as I didthe others--and then throw you over. "

"And now that you can hurt me, you throw me over?" he asked. 

Without speaking, she held out her hand for the basket, which he wasabout to fling from him. 

"Then I'll never forgive you, Molly, so help me God, " he added harshly;and turning away from her, struck out across the pasture in thedirection of the mill. 

For a moment she stood looking after him, her lips parted, her eyes wideand bright as if she were asking a question. 

"I am hard--hard and cruel, " she thought as she went slowly up thewitch-hazel path that led by the Poplar Spring, "but I wonder--oh, Iwonder if I treat Abel worst because I like him best?"

CHAPTER XI

A FLIGHT AND AN ENCOUNTER

When Abel had flung himself over the fence, he snatched the collar fromhis neck and threw it away from him into the high grass of the meadow. The act was symbolical not only of his revolt from the power of love, but, in a larger measure, of his rebellion against the tyranny ofconvention. Henceforth his Sunday clothes might hang in the closet, for he would never again bend his neck to the starched yoke of custom. Everything had been for Molly forever. Her smiles or her frowns, her softness or her cruelty, would make no difference to him in thefuture--for had not Molly openly implied that she preferred Mr. Mullen?So this was the end of it all--the end of his ambition, of his struggleto raise himself, of his battle for a little learning that she might notbe ashamed. Lifting his head he could see dimly the one great pine thattowered on the hill over its fellows, and he resolved, in the bitternessof his defeat, that he would sell the whole wood to-morrow in Applegate. He tried to think clearly--to tell himself that he had never believed inher--that he had always known she would throw him over at the last--butthe agony in his heart rose in his throat, and he felt that he wasstifling in the open air of the pasture. His nature, large, impulsive, scornful of small complexities, was stripped bare of the veneer ofculture by which its simplicity had been overlaid. At the instant he wascloser to the soil beneath his feet than the civilization of his race. 

As he neared the brook, which divided his pasture from the fieldsbelonging to Jordan's Journey, the sound of angry voices came to hisears, and through the bared twigs of the willows, he saw Archie andJonathan Gay standing a little apart, while the boy made threateninggestures with a small switch he carried. 

"I've told him he was not to come on our land and he's laughed in myface!" cried Archie, turning to his brother. 

"I'm not laughing, I merely said that the restriction was absurd, "replied Jonathan in a friendly tone. "Why this pasture of yours juts inbetween my field and the road, and I'm obliged to cross it. I told youbefore I was awfully sorry about the quarrel when I first came, but aslong as you leave my birds alone, you may walk over my land all day ifyou like and I shan't care a copper. "

"Damn your birds! I don't take a blow from any man without paying himback, " retorted Archie. 

"Hold your tongue, Archie, " said Abel sternly. "It's my farm, I reckon, and I manage it. I'm sorry, Mr. Jonathan, " he added, "that you startedthe trouble, but we aren't people to sit down tamely and take athrashing from you just because you happen to own Jordan's Journey. I'llstand by Archie because he's right, though if he were not right, I'dstill stand by him because he's my brother. The best we can do is tokeep clear of each other. We don't go on your place and you'd just aswell take care to keep off ours. "

A frown contracted Gay's brow, while he glanced anxiously over hisshoulder at the crooked path which led in the direction of the mill. 

"Do you mean to say that you object to my taking a stroll through yourmeadows?" he asked. 

"Why on earth do you want to stroll over here when you've got twothousand acres on every other blessed side of you?"

When the other's reply came there was a curious hesitation about it. 

"Well, a man has his fancies, you know. I've taken a liking to this paththrough the willows. "

"All the same I warn you that if you keep it up, you'll very likely runinto trouble. If Archie sets the dogs on you, I'll be obliged to standby him. "

Without waiting for a response, he put his hand on the boy's shoulder, and pushed him over the brook into the path on the opposite side. To hissurprise Blossom, dressed as though for church, appeared there at theinstant. 

"Why, where in thunder are you going?" he demanded, releasing Archie, who staggered back at the sudden withdrawal of the powerful grasp. Hehad always known that his niece was a handsome girl, but the bloom, thesoftness of her beauty came to him while he stood there, as vividly asif for the first time. 

"I--I--have you seen grandma's cat?" she returned after the breathlesssuspense of a minute. 

"No, I don't think you'll find her down there. Archie and Mr. Jonathanhave quarreled loud enough to frighten her away. "

"Quarreled again!" she said. "Oh, why have they quarreled again?"

"He must keep off our place, " replied Archie, angrily. "I warned himI'll set the dogs on him the next time I find him on this side thefence!"

"How--how can you be so uncivilized?" she returned, and there were tearsin her eyes. 

"Uncivilized or not, he'll find he can't split my lip open for nothing, "growled Archie, like a sullen child. 

"You'd as well come back with us, " said Abel, "the cat isn't downthere--I'd take a look in the mill. "

She turned her face away, stooping to pluck the withered frond of a fernthat grew in the path. When she looked up at him again all the bloom andradiance had flown. 

"Yes, I'll come back with you, " she answered, and falling into stepbetween them, walked languidly up the hill to the kitchen garden at thetop. In his own misery Abel was hardly aware of her, and he heard asfrom a distance, Archie's muttered threats against Gay, and Blossom'spalpitating responses. When they reached the house, Sarah's yellow andwhite cat squeezed herself through the door and came purring towardthem. 

"Why, the cat's got back!" exclaimed Archie. 

"It must have been in the store-room all the time, " returned Blossomquickly. "I forgot to look there. Now, I must go and pour out the buttermilk for dinner before grandma scolds me. "

She turned away, glanced back an instant later to make sure that theyhad entered the house, and then gathering up her Sunday skirt of blueHenrietta cloth, started in a rapid run back along the path to thewillows. When she reached a sheltered nook, formed by a lattice ofboughs, she found Gay walking impatiently back and forth, with his handsin his pockets and the anxious frown still on his forehead. At sight ofher, his face cleared and he held out his arms. 

"My beauty!--I'd just given you up. Five minutes more by my watch, and Ishould have gone. "

"I met Abel and Archie as I was coming and they made me go back withthem, " she answered, placing her hand on her bosom, which rose and fellwith her fluttering breath. It was characteristic of their differenttemperaments that, although he had seen her every day for three weeks, he still met her with outstretched arms, which she still evaded. Since that first stolen kiss, she had held off from him, alluring yetunapproachable, and this gentle, but obstinate, resistance had inflamedhim to a point which he admitted, in the cold grey morning before he hadbreakfasted, to have become positively dangerous. Ardently susceptibleto beauty, the freedom of his life had bred in him an almost equalworship of the unattainable. If that first kiss had stirred his fancy, her subsequent repulse had established her influence. The stubbornvirtue, which was a part of the inherited fibre of her race, hadachieved a result not unworthy of the most finished coquette. Againsthis desire for possession there battled the instinctive chastity thatwas woven into the structure of Sarah Revercomb's granddaughter. Hardlyless violent than the natural impulse against which it warred, it gaveBlossom an advantage, which the obvious weakness of her heart hadhelped to increase. It was as though she yearned toward him while sheresisted--as though she feared him most in the moment that she repulsedhim. 

"Good God! how beautiful you are and how cold!" he exclaimed. 

"I am not cold. How can you say so when you know it isn't true?"

"I've been waiting here an hour, half dead with impatience, and youwon't so much as let me touch you for a reward. "

"I can't--you oughtn't to ask me, Mr. Jonathan. "

"Could a single kiss hurt you? I kissed you once. "

"It's--it's because you kissed me once that you mustn't kiss me again. "

"You mean you didn't like it?"

"What makes you so unkind? You know it isn't that. "

"Then why do you refuse?" He was in an irritable humour, and thisirritation showed in his face, in his movements, in the short, abruptsound of his words. 

"I can't let you do it because--because I didn't know what it was likeuntil that first time, " she protested, while two large tears rolled fromher eyes. 

Softened by her confusion, his genial smile shone on her for an instantbefore the gloom returned to his features. The last few weeks had preyedon his nerves until he told himself that he could no longer control theworking of his emotions. The solitude, the emptiness of his days, therestraint put upon him by his invalid mother--all these engendered acondition of mind in which any transient fancy might develop into awinged fury of impulse. There were times when his desire for Blossom'sbeauty appeared to fill the desolate space, and he hungered and thirstedfor her actual presence at his side. In the excitement of a greatcity, he would probably have forgotten her in a month after their firstmeeting. Here, in this monotonous country, there was nothing for himbut to brood over each trivial detail until her figure stood out in hisimagination edged by the artificial light he had created around it. Her beauty, which would have been noticeable even in a crowd, becamegoddess-like against the low horizon in the midst of the Novembercolours. 

"If you only knew how I suffer from you, darling, " he said, "I haven'tslept for nights because you refused to kiss me. "

"I--I haven't slept either, " she faltered. 

"Because of me, Blossom?"

"I begin to think and it makes me so unhappy. "

"Oh, damn it! Do you love me, Blossom?"

"What difference does it make whether I do or not?"

"It makes all the difference under Heaven! Would you like to love me, Blossom?"

"I oughtn't to let myself think of it, and I don't when I can help it. "

"But can you help it? Tell me, can you help it?"

Turning away from him, she cast a startled glance under the willows inthe direction of the house. 

"I must be going back. They will miss me. "

"Don't you think I shall miss you, Beauty?"

"I don't know. I haven't thought. "

"If you knew how miserable I'll be after you have left me, you'd kiss meonce before you go. "

"Don't ask me, I can't--I really can't, Mr. Jonathan. "

"Hang Mr. Jonathan and all that appertains to him! What's to become ofme, condemned to this solitude, if you refuse to become kind to me? ByJove, if it wasn't for my mother, I'd ask you to marry me!"

"I don't want to marry you, " she responded haughtily, and completed hertriumph. Something stronger than passion--that _something_ compoundedpartly of moral fibre, partly of a phlegmatic temperament, guided herat the critical moment. His words had been casual, but her reception ofthem charged them with seriousness almost before he was aware. A passingimpulse was crystallized by the coldness of her manner into a permanentdesire. 

"If I were free to do it, I'd make you want to, " he said. 

She moved from him, walking rapidly into the deeper shelter of thewillows. The autumn sunlight, shining through the leafless boughs, casta delicate netting of shadows over the brilliant fairness of her body. He saw the rose of her cheek melting into the warm whiteness of herthroat, which was encircled by two deliciously infantile creases offlesh. To look at her led almost inevitably to the desire to touch her. 

"Are you going without a word to me, Blossom?"

"I don't know what to say--you never seem to believe me. "

"You know well enough what I want you to say--but you're frozen allthrough, that's what's the matter. "

"Good-bye, Mr. Jonathan. "

"At what hour to-morrow, Blossom?"

She shook her head, softly obstinate. 

"I mustn't meet you again. If grandma--or any of the others found outthey would never forgive me--they are so stern and straight. I've gonetoo far already, and besides---"

"Besides what?"

"You make me feel wicked and underhand. "

"Do you mean that you can walk off like this and never see me again?"

Tears came to her eyes. "You oughtn't to put it like that!"

"But that's just what it means. Now, darling, do you think you can doit?"

"I won't think--but I'll have to do it. "

His nervous irritability became suddenly violent, and the muscles of hisface contracted as if from a spasm of physical pain. 

"Confound it all! Why shouldn't I marry you, Blossom?" he burst out. "You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen and you look every incha lady. If it wasn't for my mother I'd pick you up to-day and carry youoff to Washington. "

"Your mother would never give in. There's no use talking about it. "

"It isn't her giving in, but her health. You see, she has heart disease, and any sudden shock brings on one of these terrible attacks that maykill her. She bears everything like an angel--I never heard a complaintfrom her in my life--not even when she was suffering tortures--but thedoctors say now that another failure of her heart would be fatal. "

"I know, " she admitted softly, "they said that twenty years ago, didn'tthey?"

"Well, she's been on her back almost all the time during those twentyyears. It's wonderful what she's borne--her angelic patience. And, ofcourse her hopes all hang on me now. She's got nobody else. "

"But I thought Miss Kesiah was so devoted to her. "

"Oh, she is--she is, but Aunt Kesiah has never really understood her. Just to look at them, you can tell how different they are. That's how itis Blossom--I'm tied, you see--tied hand and foot. "

"Yes, I see, " she rejoined. "Your uncle was tied, too. I've heard thathe used to say--tied with a silk string, he called it. "

"You wouldn't have me murder my mother, would you?" he demandedirritably, kicking at the twisted root of a willow. 

"Good-bye, Mr. Jonathan, " she responded quietly, and started toward thehouse. 

"Wait a minute, --oh, Blossom, come back!" he entreated--but withoutpausing she ran quickly up the crooked path under the netting ofshadows. 

"So that's the end, " said Gay angrily. "By Jove, I'm well out of it, "and went home to dinner. "I won't see her again, " he thought as heentered the house, and the next instant, when he ascended the staircase, "I never saw such a mouth in my life. It looks as if it would melt ifyou kissed it---"

The dinner, which was pompously served by Abednego and a younger butler, seemed to him tasteless and stale, and he complained querulously ofa bit of cork he found in his wine glass. His mother, supported bycushions in her chair at the head of the table, to which he had broughther in his arms, lamented his lack of appetite, and inquired tenderly ifhe were suffering? For the first time in his life he discovered thathe was extinguishing, with difficulty, a smouldering resentment againsther. Kesiah's ugliness became a positive affront to him, and he felt asbitterly toward her as though she had purposely designed her appearancein order to annoy him. The wine she drank showed immediately in herface, and he determined to tell his mother privately that she mustforbid her sister to drink anything but water. By the dim gilt framedmirror above the mantel he discovered that his own features wereflushed, also, but a red face was not, he felt, a cause of compunctionto one of his sex. 

"You haven't eaten your mutton, dear, " said Mrs. Gay anxiously. "Iordered it especially because you like it. Are you feeling unwell?"

"I'm not hungry, " he replied, rather crossly. "This place gets on mynerves, and will end by driving me mad. "

"I suppose you'd better go away, " she returned, plaintively wounded. "Iwouldn't be so selfish as to want to keep you by me if you are unhappy. "

"I don't want to leave you, mother--but, I ought to get back to thestock market. It's no good idling around--I don't think I was cut outfor a farmer. "

"Try this sherry. Your uncle brought if from Spain, and it was buriedduring the war. "

He filled his glass, drained it quickly, and with an effort recoveredhis temper. 

"Yes, I'd better go, " he repeated, and knew while he spoke that he couldnot leave as long as the thought of Blossom tormented him. Swift halfvisions of her loveliness--of certain delectable details of her faceor figure flitted always before him. He saw her eyes, like frostedperiwinkles under their warm white lids, which appeared too heavyto open wide; the little brown mole that played up and down when shelaughed; and the soft, babyish creases that encircled her throat. Eachof these memories set his heart to a quicker beating and caused a warmsensation, like the caress of a burning sun, to pass over his body. 

"The Revercombs over at the mill are kicking up a row, mother, " he saidsuddenly, again filling his wine glass and again putting it down empty, "have they any sort of standing in the county, do you suppose?"

"I've heard they call themselves connections of the Revercombs higher inthe State, dear--but I don't know and I've never come into contact withany of the country people about here. Kesiah may be able to tell you. "

Until then neither of them had alluded to Kesiah, whom they acceptedby ignoring much as if she had been one of the familiar pieces offurniture, at which they never glanced because they were so firmlyconvinced that it stood in its place. She had eaten her dinner with therelish of a person to whom food, taken at regular hours three times aday, has become the prime consolation in life; and when the questionwas put to her, she was obliged to ask them to repeat it because she hadbeen thoughtfully regarding a dish of baked tomatoes and wondering if asingle yielding to temptation would increase a tendency to the gout thathad lately developed. 

"What do you know of the Revercombs, Kesiah? Are they in any degreeabove the common people about here?"

"The miller is a rather extraordinary character, I believe, " sheanswered, lifting the spoon out of the dish of tomatoes as it was handedto her, and then shaking her head with a sigh and letting it fall. "Mr. Chamberlayne says he is quite well educated, but the rest of them, ofcourse, are very primitive and plain. They have always been strait-lacedand honest and I hear that the mother--she came from Piping Tree andwas one of the Hawtreys--is violently opposed to her son's marriagewith Molly Merryweather. There is a daughter, also, who is said to bebeautiful though rather dull. "

"Yes, I've seen the girl, " observed Mrs. Gay, "heavy and blond, isn'tshe? The mother, I should say, is decidedly the character of the family. She has rather terrible convictions, and once a great many years ago, she came over here--forced her way into my sick-room to rebuke me aboutthe behaviour of the servants or something. Your Uncle Jonathan wasobliged to lead her out and pacify her--she was quite upset, I remember. By the way, Kesiah, " she pursued, "haven't I heard that Mr. Mullen isattentive to the daughter? It seems a pity, for he is quite a superioryoung man--his sermons are really remarkable, and he might easily havedone better. "

"Oh, that was when he first came here, Angela, before he met MollyMerryweather. It's singular the fascination that girl possesses for themen around here. "

Gay laughed shortly. "Well, it's a primitive folk, isn't it?" he said, "and gets on my nerves after a while. "

Through the afternoon he was restless and out of humour, tormented lessby the memory of Blossom's face than by the little brown mole on hercheek. He resolved a dozen times a day that he would not see her, and inthe very act of resolving, he would begin to devise means of waylayingher as she went down to the store or passed to and from the pasture. Acertain sex hatred, which is closely allied to the mere physical fact oflove, asserted itself at times, and he raged hotly against her coldness, her indifference, against the very remoteness that attracted him. Thenhe would soften to her, and with the softening there came always thelonging not only to see, but to touch her--to breathe her breath, to layhis hand on her throat. 

The next day he went to the willow copse, but she did not come. On theone following, he took down his gun and started out to shoot partridges, but when the hour of the meeting came, he found himself wandering overthe fields near the Revercombs' pasture with his eye on the little pathdown which she had come that rimy October morning. The third afternoon, when he had watched for her in a fury of disappointment, he ordered hishorse and went for a gallop down the sunken road to the mill. At thefirst turn, where the woods opened into a burned out clearing, he camesuddenly upon her, and the hunger at his heart gave place to a delicioussense of fulfilment. 

"Blossom, how can you torture me so?" he exclaimed when he haddismounted at her side and flung his arm about her. 

She drew slowly away, submissive even in her avoidance. 

"I did not mean to torture you--I'm sorry, " she answered humbly. 

"It's come to this!" he burst out, "that I can't stand it another weekwithout losing my senses. I've thought till I'm distracted. Blossom, will you marry me?"

"O Mr. Jonathan!" she gasped while her breast fluttered like a bird's. 

"Not openly, of course--there's my mother to think of--but I'll takeyou to Washington--we'll find a way somehow. Can't you arrange to go toApplegate for a day or two, or let your people think you have?"

"I can--yes--" she responded in the same troubled tone. "I've a schoolfriend living there, and I sometimes spend several days with her. "

"Then go on Saturday--no, let's see--this is Tuesday. Can you go onFriday, darling?"

"Perhaps. I can't tell--I think so--I must see. "

As he drew her forward, she bent toward him, still softly, still humbly, and an instant later, his arms were about her and his lips pressed hers. 

CHAPTER XII

THE DREAM AND THE REAL

The following Friday Abel drove Blossom in his gig to the house of herschool friend in Applegate, where she was to remain for a week. Onhis way home he stopped at the store for a bottle of harness oil, andcatching the red glow of the fire beyond the threshold of the publicroom, he went in for a moment to ask old Adam Doolittle about a supplyof hominy meal he had ready for him at the mill. As the ancient mancrouched over the fire, with his bent hands outstretched and hisfew silvery hairs rising in the warmth, his profile showed with theexaggeration of a twelfth century grotesque, the features so distortedby the quivering shadows that his beaked nose appeared to rest in thecrescent-shaped silhouette of his chin. His mouth was open, andfrom time to time he shook his head and muttered to himself in anundertone--a habit he had fallen into during the monotonous stretchesof Mr. Mullen's sermons. Across from him sat Jim Halloween, and in themiddle of the hearth, Solomon Hatch stood wiping the frost from his facewith a red cotton handkerchief. 

"It's time you were thinkin' about goin' home, I reckon, old Adam, "remarked Mrs. Bottom. "You've had yo' two glasses of cider an' it ain'tproper for a man of yo' years to be knockin' around arter dark. Thisor'nary is goin' to be kept decent as long as I keep it. "

"To be sure, to be sure, " replied old Adam, nodding cheerfully at thefire, "I ain't all I once was except in the matter or corn-shuckin'--an'a cold-snap like this goes clean to the bones when they ain't covered. "

"Did you carry any of yo' winesaps into Applegate, Abel?" inquired JimHalloween. "I'm savin' mine till Christmas, when the prices will take ajump. "

"No, I only drove Blossom over. She's to spend a few days in town. "

"Mr. Jonathan's gone off, too, I see, " observed Solomon. "He went by atthe top of his speed while I was haulin' timber this mornin'. Thar's badblood still betwixt you an' him, aint' thar, Abel?"

"Oh, I'm not seekin' a quarrel. The trouble is in Archie's hands an'he'll have to keep it there. "

"Well, he's a fine shape of a man, " declared Betsey Bottom. "Some womentry to make out that they ain't got an eye for the shape as long as thesense is all square and solid--but I ain't never been one of 'em. Senseis all right in its place, no doubt, but thar're times when a finefigger is mo' convincin' than any argyment that ever was uttered. "

"It's a thing that beats me, " pondered Solomon Hatch, "why a sensiblewoman should care how a man is made on the outside so long as the properstuffin' is inside of him. With a man now, of course, it is different, seein' as natur made 'em with a sharp eye for the beauty in the oppositesex, an' they're all for natur an' al'ays have been. But I'll be blestif I can understand it in women. "

"Well, I've noticed that they have a particular likin' for the worthlessover the hardworkin' sort, " remarked old Adam, "an' when it comes tothat, I've known a woman to git clear set against a man on o'count ofnothin' bigger than a chaw of tobaccy. "

"It's the way of the sex, " said Solomon Hatch. "When I was courtin' mywife I was obleeged to promise her I'd give up the habit befo' she'dkeep company with me. "

"An' you began agin, I low, after the ceremony was spoken. "

"To be sure--'twas a courtin' promise, not a real one. "

"It happened the same in my case, some sixty years or mo' ago, " said oldAdam. "Thar was two of us arter Minnie--for the matter of that, itnever entered my head to court her till I saw that Jacob Halloween--yo'grandpa, Jim--had begun to git soft on her. It's safer to trust anotherman's jedgment than yo' own I said to myself, an' I started into therace. Well, Jacob was the pious, churchgoin' sort that she liked--but hewould chaw in season an' out of it--thar was some as said he chawed evenwhen he was sleepin'--an' a woman so out an' out with tobaccy you neverset eyes on. Sez she to me, 'Adam, you will give up the weed for me, won't you?' An' sez I, 'Why, to be sartin sure, I will, ' meanin' ofcourse, while I was courtin'. Then she answered, 'Well, he's a Christianan' a churchgoer an' you ain't, but if he was the Angel Gabriel himself, Adam, an' was a chawer, I wouldn't marry him. The men may make theirhabits, Adam, ' she said, 'but it takes the women to break 'em. ' Lord!Lord! durin' that courtin' season my mouth would water so for a wad oftobaccy that I'd think my tongue was goin' to ketch fire. "

"I shouldn't like to have stood in yo' shoes when you began agin, "remarked Betsey Bottom. 

"Oh, she larned, she larned, " chuckled the elder, knocking the ashes outof his pipe on the hearth and then treading them under his boot. "'Tisamazin' what a deal of larnin' women have to do arter they're married. "

"If they'd done it befo' thar's precious few of 'em that would ever setfoot into the estate!" retorted Betsey. "Thar ain't many men that areworth the havin' when you git close up to 'em. Every inch of distancebetwixt 'em is an inch added to thar attractions. "

"Now, I've noticed that in my own case, " observed Jim Halloween sadly, "no woman yet has ever let me come with kissin' distance--the nearer Igit, the further an' further they edges away. It's the curse of my luck, I reckon, for it seems as if I never open my mouth to propose that Idon't put my foot in it. "

"You may comfort yo'self with the thought that it runs in yo' family, "rejoined old Adam. "'Tis a contrariness of natur for which you're not tobe held accountable. I remember yo' grandpa, that same Jacob, tellin'me once that he never sot out to make love that his tongue didn't take atwist unbeknownst to him, an' to his surprise, thar'd roll off 'turnips'an' 'carrots' instid of terms of endearment. Now, with me 'twas quiteopposite, for my tongue was al'ays quicker than my heart in the matterof courtin'. It used to go click! click! click! quite without my willin'it whenever my eyes lit on a pretty woman. "

"Ah, you were a gay young bird, but it's over now, " commented Solomon. 

"I ain't regrettin' it since I've lived long enough to repent of it, "responded the ancient sinner. 

"What worries me, " said young Adam, pursuing his habitual train ofdespondency, "is that my life is just one long repentance with naught init worth repentin' of. 'Tain't for lack of ch'ice I've never tasted, butfor lack of opportunity. "

"Well, thar's some that even sinners can't suffer, " commented hisfather. "You are short of words, miller. "

"I was thinkin', " replied Abel roughly, draining his glass, and risingto his feet while he drew on his sheepskin gloves, "that when thethought of a woman once gets into the brain it's worse than a maggot. "

"The best way is to get her, " retorted Solomon, "but that ain't so easya matter as it looks, unless you are a parson. Was thar ever a parson, Mr. Doolittle, that couldn't get married as often as he'd take thenotion?"

"Thar may be sech, but I've never seed him an' never heard on him, "responded old Adam. "'Tis kind of professional work with 'em an' they'vegot the advantage of the rest of us bein' so used to pulpit speakin'. "

"I suppose our Mr. Mullen might have whomsoever he'd set his eyes on, "pursued Solomon. 

"Without a doubt he might. If all else failed him he'd but to ax her inhis pulpit gown an' his prayin' voice, an' thar'd be no gainsayin' himfor a female. Let him boom out 'Dearly Beloved, ' as he does in churchan' ten chances to one she'd answer 'Amen' just out of the habit. I'm abold man, suh, an' I've al'ays been, but I ain't one to stand up ag'insta preacher when thar's a woman in the race. "

Wrapping his blue knitted comforter about his throat, Abel nodded, good-humoredly to the group, and went out to his gig, which he had leftunder a shed in the yard. As he removed the blanket from his mare, hismind dwelt stubbornly on the remarks old Adam had let fall concerningclergymen and women. He had already convinced himself that the ReverendMr. Mullen was the object of Molly's preference, and his nature was bigenough to rejoice that she should have chosen so good a man. At least, if this were true, Jonathan Gay would not be his rival. 

It was the season of the year when the sunny days gave place to frostynights, and all the changes of the autumn--the reddening of the fruit, the ripening of the nuts, the falling of the leaves--appeared to occurin the hours between sunset and sunrise. A thin and watery moon shed aspectral light over the meadows, which seemed to float midway betweenthe ashen band of the road and the jagged tops of the pines on thehorizon. There was no wind, and the few remaining leaves on the treeslooked as if they were cut out of velvet. The promise of a hoar-frostwas in the air--and a silver veil lay already over the distance. 

When he had turned into the branch road that led from the turnpike tothe mill, a gig passed him, driven rapidly, and Reuben Merryweathercalled "good-night, " in his friendly voice. An instant later a spot ofwhite in the road caught Abel's glance, and alighting, he picked up aknitted scarf, which he recognized even in the moonlight as one thatMolly had worn. Looking back he saw that the other gig had stopped atthe turnpike, and as he hastened toward it with the scarf in his hand, he was rewarded by a flash of bright eyes from the muffled figure atReuben's side. 

"I found this in the road, " he said, "you must have dropped it. "

"Yes, it fell out--thank you, " she answered, and it seemed to him thather hand lingered an instant in his before it was withdrawn and buriedbeneath the rugs. 

The pressure remained with him, and a little later as he drove over thefrosted roads, he could still feel, as in a dream, the soft clingingtouch of her fingers. Essentially an idealist, his character was theresult of a veneering of insufficient culture on a groundwork of rawimpulse. People and objects appeared to him less through forms ofthought than through colours of the emotions; and he saw them out ofrelation because he saw them under different conditions from those thathold sway over this planet. The world he moved in was peopled by a raceof beings that acted under ideal laws and measured up to an impossiblestandard; and this mixture of rustic ignorance and religious fervorhad endowed him with a power of sacrifice in large matters, while itrendered him intolerant of smaller weaknesses. It was characteristic ofthe man that he should have arranged for Molly in his thoughts, and atthe cost of great suffering to himself, a happiness that was suited tothe ideal figure rather than to the living woman. 

When he entered the kitchen, after putting the mare into her stall, the familiar room, with its comfortable warmth, dragged him back intoa reality in which the dominating spirit was Sarah Revercomb. Even hisaching heart seemed to recognize her authority, and to obtrude itselfwith a sense of embarrassment into surroundings where all mentalmaladies were outlawed. She was on her knees busily sorting a pile ofsweet potatoes, which she suspected of having been frost-bitten; and bysheer force of character, she managed to convince the despairing loverthat a frost-bitten potato was a more substantial fact than a brokenheart. 

"I declar' if the last one of 'em ain't specked! I knew 'twould be sowhen they was left out thar in the smoke-house that cold spell. Abel, all those sweet potatoes you left out in the smoke-house have beennipped. "

"Well, I don't care a hang!" retorted Abel, as he unwrapped his muffler. "If it isn't one thing, it's another. You're enough to drive a sober manto drink. "

"If you don't care, I'd like to know who ought to, " responded Sarah, whose principal weapon in an argument was the fact that she was alwaysthe injured person. "It seems that 'twas all yo' fault since you put 'emthar. "

"You'd better give him some supper--he looks almost played out, "observed Abner from a corner of the hearth, where he sat smoking withhis head hanging on his chest. 

Though she might harrow her son's soul, Sarah was incapable of denyinghim food, so rising from her knees, she unpinned her skirt, and broughthim coffee and broiled herring from the stove where they had beenkeeping hot. 

"Where's Archie?" asked Abel, while she plied him with corn muffins. 

"Courtin', I reckon, though he'd best be down yonder in the swampsettin' old hare traps. I never saw sech courtin' as you all's anyhow, "she concluded. "It don't seem to lead nowhar, nor to end in nothin'except itself. That's what this here ever-lastin' education has done foryou, Abel--if you hadn't had those books to give you something to thinkabout, you'd have been married an' settled a long time befo' now. Yo'grandpa over thar was steddyin' about raisin' a family before he wastwenty. "

On either side of the stove, grandfather and grandmother nodded likean ancient Punch and Judy who were at peace only when they slept. Grandfather's pipe had gone out in his hand, and from grandmother's lapa ball of crimson yarn had rolled on the rag carpet before the fire. Twenty years ago she had begun knitting an enormous coverlet in brightcoloured squares, and it was still unfinished, though the strips, packedaway in camphor, filled a chest in Sarah's store closet. 

"You wouldn't like any girl I'd marry, " he retorted with a feebleattempt at mirth. "If I tried to put your advice into practice there'dbe trouble as sure as shot. "

"No, thar wouldn't--not if I picked her out, " she returned. 

"Great Scott! Won't you let me choose my own wife even?" he exclaimed, with a laugh in which there was an ironic humour. The soft pressure ofMolly's fingers was still on his hand, and he saw her face looking up athim, gentle and beseeching, as she had looked when she offered her lipsto his kiss. Above the yearning of his heart there rose now the decisionof his judgment--and this had surrendered her to Mr. Mullen! Some rigidstrain of morality, inherited from Sarah and therefore continually atwar with her, caused him to torture himself into a mental recognitionthat her choice was for the best. 

"That man never walked that had sense enough to pick out a wife, "rejoined Sarah. "To think of a great hulkin' fellow like you losin' yo'sense over a half mad will-o'-the-wisp that don't even come of decentpeople. If she hadn't had eyes as big as saucers, do you reckon you'dever have turned twice to look at her?"

"For God's sake don't talk about her--she's not going to marry me, " heresponded, and the admission of the truth he had so often repeated inhis own mind caused a pang of disbelief. 

"I'd like to know why she ain't?" snorted Sarah indignantly, "does shethink she's goin' to get a better catch in this neighbourhood?"

"Oh, it's all one. She doesn't want to, that is enough. "

"Well, she's a fool if she doesn't want to, an' I'll say it to her face. If thar's a better lookin' man around here, I'd like to see him, or abetter worker. What have the Merryweathers to be so set up about, I'dlike to know? And that gal without even a father to her name that shecan call her own!"

"You mustn't--I won't stand it any longer. "

"Well, it's for yo' good, I reckon. If yo' own mother can't take yo'side, I'd like to know who's goin' to do it?"

"I don't want anybody to take my side. She's got a right not to marryme. "

"I ain't saying' she ain't, an' it's a mighty good thing for you thatshe's sech a plum fool as not to want to. 'Twould be the worst news I'dever heard if she'd been minded to have you. I'd move heaven an' earthto keep you from marryin' her, an' if the good Lord has done it insteadof me, I'm thankful enough to Him for His trouble. "

Rising from the table, Abel pushed his untasted food aside with agesture of loathing. A week ago he had been interested in the minordetails of life; to-night he felt that they bored him profoundly. 

"If you knew what you were saying you'd hold your tongue, " he retortedangrily. 

"Ain't you goin' to eat yo' supper?" inquired Sarah anxiously, "thatherrin' is real nice and brown. "

"I don't want anything. I'm not hungry. "

"Mebbe you'd like one of the brandied peaches I'm savin' for Christmas?"

"No, I'm dead beat. I'll go up to sleep pretty soon. "

"Do you want a fire? I can lay one in a minute. "

He shook his head, not impatiently, but as one to whom brandied peachesand wood fires are matters of complete indifference. 

"I've got to see about something in the stable first. Then I'll go tobed. "

Taking down a lantern from a nail by the door, he went out, as was hisnightly habit, to look at his grey mare Hannah. When he came in againand stumbled up the narrow staircase to his room, he found that Sarahhad been before him and kindled a blaze from resinous pine on the twobricks in the fireplace. At the sound of his step, she entered with anarmful of pine boughs, which she tossed to the flames. 

"I reckon the cracklin' will make you feel mo' comfortable, " sheobserved. "Thar ain't anything like a lightwood fire to drive away themisery. "

"It does sound friendly, " he responded. 

For a moment she hesitated, groping apparently for some topic ofconversation which would divert his mind from one subject that engrossedhim. 

"Archie's just come in, " she remarked at last, "an' he walked up withold Uncle Toby, who said he'd seen a ha'nt in the dusk over at PoplarSpring. I don't see how Mrs. Gay an' Miss Kesiah can endure to livethar. "

"Oh, they're just darkies' tales--nobody believes in them any more thanin conjuring and witches. "

"That's true, I reckon, but I shouldn't like to live over thar allthe same. They say old Mr. Jonathan comes out of his grave and walkswhenever one of 'em is to be buried or married. "

"Nobody's dead that I've heard of, and I don't suppose either Mr. Jonathan or Miss Kesiah are thinking of getting married. "

"Well, I s'pose so--but I'm might glad he ain't taken the notion to walkaround here. I don't believe in ha'nts, but I ain't got no use for 'em. "

She went out, closing the door after her; and dropping into a chair bythe fire, he buried his face in his hands, while he vowed in his heartthat he would stop thinking of Molly. 

CHAPTER XIII

BY THE MILL-RACE

A warm, though hazy, sun followed the sharp night, and only theblackened and damaged plants in the yard bore witness to the frost, which had melted to the semblance of rain on the grass. On the dappledboughs of the sycamore by the mill-race several bronze leaves hung limpand motionless, as if they were attached by silken threads to the stems, and the coating of moss on the revolving wheel shone like greenenamel on a groundwork of ebony. The white mist, which had wrapped thelandscape at dawn, still lay in the hollows of the pasture, from whichit floated up as the day advanced to dissolve in shining moisture uponthe hillside. There was a keen autumn tang in the air--a mingling ofrotting leaves, of crushed winesaps, of drying sassafras. As Abel passedfrom the house to the mill, his gaze rested on a golden hickory treenear the road, where a grey squirrel sported merrily under the branches. Like most of his neighbours, he had drawn his weather predictions fromthe habits of the wild creatures, and had decided that it would be anopen winter because the squirrels had left the larger part of the nutsungarnered. 

At the door of the mill, as he turned the big rusty key in the lock, he told himself doggedly that since he was not to have Molly, the onlysensible thing was to surrender the thought of her. While he starteda blaze in the stove, and swept the floor with the broomsedge broom hekept for the purpose, he forced his mind to dwell on the sacks of gristthat stood ready for grinding. The fox-hound puppy, Moses, had followedhim from the house, and sat now over the threshold watching a robin thathopped warily in the band of sunlight. The robin was in search of a fewgrains of buckwheat which had dropped from a measure, and the puppy haddetermined that, although he was unable to eat the buckwheat himself, hewould endeavor to prevent the robin from doing so. So intent was heupon this resolve, that he forgot to bark at an old negro, who drove uppresently in an ancient gig, the harness of which was tied on a decrepitmule with pieces of rope. The negro had left some corn to be ground, and as he took his sack of meal from the miller, he let fall a fewlamentations on the general forlorn state of human nature. 

"Dish yer livin' is moughty hard, marster, but I reckon we'se all gotter come ter hit. "

"Well, you manage to raise a little good corn anyway, so you ought to bethankful instead of complaining. "

"Dar ain' nuttin' 'tall ter be thankful fur in dat, suh, case de LawdHe ain' had no mo' ter do wid dat ar co'n den ole Marse Hawtrey way overyonder at Pipin' Tree. I jes' ris dat ar con' wid my own han' right downde road at my f'ont do', an' po'd de water on hit outer de pump at myback un. I'se monst'ous glad ter praise de Lawd fur what He done done, but I ain' gwine ter gin 'im credit fur de wuk er my own fis' en foot. "

"Are you going by Jordan's Journey, uncle? I'd like to send ReubenMerryweather's buckwheat to him. "

"Naw, boss, I ain't a-gwine by dar, caze dat ar Jerdan's Jerney ain gota good name ter my years. I ain't a-feard er ha'nts by daylight, butI'se monst'ous feared er badness day er nightime, en hit sutney do pearter me like de badness er ole Marse Jonathan done got in de a'r er datar Jerdan's Jerney. Hit's ha'nted by badness, dat's what 'tis, en darain nobody cep'n Gawd A'mought Hisse'f dat kin lay badness. "

He went out, stooping under the weight of his bag, and picking up a greyturkey's wing from the ledge, Abel began brushing out the valve of themill, in which the meal had grown heavy from dampness. 

"The truth is, Moses, " he remarked, "you are a fool to want what youcan't have in life. " The puppy looked up at him inquiringly, its longears flapping about its soft foolish face. "But I reckon we're allfools, when it comes to that. "

When the grinding was over for the day, he shut down the mill, andcalling Moses to heel, went out on the old mill-race, where the uppergate was locked by a crude wooden spar known as the "key. " He wasstanding under the sycamore, with this implement in his hand, when hediscerned the figure of Molly approaching slowly amid the feathery whitepollen which lay in patches of delicate bloom over the sorrel waste ofthe broomsedge. Without moving he waited until she had crossed the logand stood looking up at him from the near side of the stream. 

"Abel, are you still angry with me?" she asked, smiling. 

Dropping the key into the lock, he walked slowly to the end of themill-race, and descended the short steps to the hillside. 

"No, I'm not angry--at least I don't think I am--but I've taken youradvice and given you up. "

"But, Abel---"

"I suppose you meant to take Mr. Mullen all the time that you weremaking a fool of me. He's a better man for you, probably, than I am. "

"Do you really think that?" she asked in a tone of surprise. "Would youlike to see me married to him?"

He hesitated an instant and then answered: "I honestly believe that itis the best thing for you to do. "

Instead of producing the effect he had foreseen his advice brought aluminous moisture to her eyes. 

"I suppose you think it would do me good to be preached to three times aday?" she rejoined. 

"Well, I believe it wouldn't hurt you, Molly, " he responded with asmile. 

His attitude of renouncement drew her suddenly nearer. 

"It wasn't about Mr. Mullen that I came to talk to you--there issomething else. "

"Surely you aren't thinking of Jim Halloween?"

"No, no, it isn't a man. Why do you seem to think that the beginningand middle and end of my existence is a man? There are times when I findeven a turkey more interesting. "

"It is about a turkey, then, that you have come to see me?"

"Oh, no, it's a man, after all, but not a lover--he's Mr. Chamberlayne, the lawyer, from Applegate. Yesterday when he was spending the day atthe big house, he came over to see me. "

"Had he never seen you before?"

"Of course, when I was little--and later he took me to school inApplegate. I was to stay there until I was twenty-one you know, but Iran away the second year because grandfather fell ill with pneumonia andthere was no one to look after him. You remember that, don't you?"

"Yes, I remember. I picked you up on the road and brought you home in mygig. There was a heavy snow storm. "

"It seems that I was meant to be educated as a lady. Old Mr. Jonathanleft a letter about it. "

"He did?--damn him! Why didn't he save himself the trouble by actingdecently in the beginning?"

"That was because of Mrs. Gay--he had promised her, when he thought shewas dying, some dreadful thing. And after that he was afraid--afraid ofher all his life. Isn't it terrible that such a saintly person shouldhave caused so much sin?"

"But what was she to him that he should have been such a coward abouther?"

"Oh, he loved her more than anything on earth--for he loved my motheronly a little while. When Mrs. Gay first came to live with him, she wasso beautiful and so delicate, that she looked as if a wind wouldblow her away--so soft that she could smother a person like a mass offeathers. He felt after that that he had entangled himself, and it wasonly at the last when he was dying that he had any remorse. With allhis wickedness there was a terrible kind of religion in him--like a rockthat is buried under the earth--and he wanted to save his soul alivebefore he passed on to judgment. As if _that_ did any good--or he_could_ make amends either to me or to God. "

"I rather hope he was as unsuccessful in the last case as in the first. But, tell me, Molly, how does it affect you?"

"Not at all--not at all--if he has left me money, I shall not touch it. He wasn't thinking of mother, but of his own soul at the end, and canyou tell me that God would wipe out all his dreadful past just becauseof one instant's fear?"

Her passion, so unlike the meekness of Janet Merryweather, made him lookat her wonderingly, and yet with a sympathy that kept him dumb. It tookthe spirit of a Gay to match a Gay, he thought, not without bitterness. 

"But why does Mr. Chamberlayne come to you now?" he asked, when he hadregained his voice. 

"It is Mrs. Gay--it has always been Mrs. Gay ever since Mr. Jonathanfirst saw her. She smothered his soul with her softness, and wound himabout her little finger when she appeared all the time too weak tolift her hand. That's just the kind Mr. Mullen preaches about in hissermons--the kind that rules without your knowing it. But if she'd beenbold and bad instead of soft and good, she couldn't have done half theharm!"

"And Miss Kesiah?" he asked, "had she nothing to do with it?"

"She? Oh, her sister has drained her--there isn't an ounce of red bloodleft in her veins. Mr. Jonathan never liked her because she is homely, and she had no influence over him. Mrs. Gay ruled him. "

"I always thought her so lovely and gentle, " he said regretfully, "sheseems to me so much more womanly than Miss Kesiah. "

"I suppose she is as far as her face goes, and that's what people judgeby. If you part your hair and look a certain way nothing that you can dowill keep them from thinking you an angel. When I smile at Mr. Mullen inchurch it convinces him that I like visiting the sick. "

"How can you laugh at him, Molly, if you are going to marry him?"

"Have you positively decided, " she inquired, "that I am going to marryhim?"

"Wasn't that what you meant when you threw me over?"

She shook her head, "No, it wasn't what I meant--but since you've madeup your mind, I suppose there's no use for me to say a word?"

"On the whole I don't think there is--for your words are not honestones. "

"Then why do you judge me by them, Abel?" she asked very softly. 

"Because a man must judge by something and I can't look into your heart. But if I'm not to be your lover, " he added, "I'll not be your plaything. It's now or never. "

"Why, Abel!" she exclaimed in mock astonishment. 

"It's the last time I shall ever ask you--Molly, will you marry me?"

"You've forgotten poor Mr. Mullen. "

"Hang Mr. Mullen! I shall ask you just three times, and the third timewill be the last--Now, Molly will you marry me? That's the second. "

"But it's so sudden, Abel. "

"If ten years can't prepare you, ten minutes will be no better. Heregoes the third and last, Molly---"

"Abel, how _can_ you be so silly?"

"That's not an answer--will you---"

"Do you mean if I don't promise now, I'll never have the chance again?"

"I've told you--listen---"

"Oh, wait a minute. Please, go slowly. "

"--Marry me?"

"Abel, I don't believe you love me!" she said, and began to sob. 

"Answer me and I'll show you. "

"I didn't think you'd be so cruel--when---"

"When? Remember I've stopped playing, Molly. "

"When you know I'm simply dying for you, " she responded. 

He smiled at her without moving. "Then answer my question, and there'sno drawing back this time remember. "

"The question you asked me? Repeat it, please. "

"I've said it three times already, and that's enough. "

"Must I put it into words? Oh Abel, can't you see it?"

Lifting her chin, he laughed softly as he stooped and kissed her. "I've seen it several times before, darling. Now I want it put intowords--just plain ones. "

"Then, Mr. Abel Revercomb, " she returned demurely, "I should like verymuch to marry you, if you have no objection. "

The next instant her mockery fled, and in one of those spells ofsadness, which seemed so alien to her, and yet so much a part of her, she clung to him, sobbing. 

"Abel, I love you so, be good to me, " she entreated. 

"Good to you!" he exclaimed, crushing her to him. 

"Oh, those dreadful days since we quarrelled!"

"Why did you do it, darling, since you suffered as well as I?"

"I can't tell--there's something in me like that, I don't know what itis--but we'll quarrel again after this, I suppose. "

"Then we deserve to be punished and I hope we shall be. "

"How will that help? It's just life and we can't make it different. "She drew gently away from him, while a clairvoyance wiser than her yearssaddened her features. "I wonder if love ever lasts?" she whispered halfto herself. 

But there was no room in his more practical mind for the question. "Ourswill, sweetheart--how can you doubt it? Haven't I loved you for the lastten years, not counting the odd days?"

"And in all those years you kissed me once, while in the last fiveminutes you've kissed me--how many times? You are wasteful, Abel. "

"And you're a dreadful little witch--not a woman. "

"I suppose I am, and a nice girl wouldn't talk like this. I'm not thewife you're wanting, Abel. "

"The first and last and only one, my darling. "

"Judy Hatch would suit you better if she wasn't in love with therector. "

"Confound Judy Hatch! I'll stop your mouth with kisses if you mentionher again. "

At this she clung to him, laughing and crying in a sudden passion offear. 

"Hold me fast, Abel, and don't let me go, whatever happens, " she said. 

When he had parted from her at the fence which divided his land fromGay's near the Poplar Spring, he watched her little figure climb theHaunt's Walk and then disappear into the leafless shrubbery at the backof the house. While he looked after her it seemed to him that thewan November day grew radiant with colour, and that spring blossomedsuddenly, out of season, upon the landscape. His hour was upon himwhen he turned and retraced his steps over the silver brook and up thegradual slope, where the sun shone on the bare soil and revealed eachseparate clod of earth as if it were seen under a microscope. All naturewas at one with him. He felt the flowing of his blood so joyously thathe wondered why the sap did not rise and mount upward in the trees. 

In the yard Sarah was directing a negro boy, who was spreading a secondlayer of manure over her more delicate plants. As Abel closed the gate, she looked up, and the expression of his face held her eyes while hecame toward her. 

"What has happened, Abel? You look like Moses when he came down from themountain. "

"It was all wrong--what I told you last night, mother. Molly is going tomarry me. "

"You mean she's gone an' changed her mind jest as you'd begun to gitalong without her. I declar', I don't know what has got into you to showso little sperit. If you were the man I took you to be, you'd up an' lether see quick enough that you don't ax twice in the same quarter. "

"Oh, all that's over now--she's going to marry me. "

"You needn't shout so. I ain't deaf. Samson, sprinkle another spadefulof manure on that bridal-wreath bush over thar by the porch. "

"Won't you say you're pleased?"

"I ain't pleased, Abel, an' I ain't going to lie about it. When I gitdown on my knees to-night, I'll pray harder than I ever prayed in mylife that you'll come to yo' senses an' see what a laughing-stock thatgal has made of you. "

"Then I wish I hadn't told you. "

"Well, I'd have knowed it anyhow--it's burstin' out of you. Where're yougoin' now? The time's gittin' on toward dinner. "

"For my axe. I want to cut a little timber. "

"What on earth are you goin' to cut timber at this hour for?"

"Oh, I feel like it, that's all. I want to try my strength. "

Going into the kitchen, he came out a minute later with his axe onhis shoulder. As he crossed the log over the mill-stream, the spottedfox-hound puppy waddled after him, and several startled rabbits peeredout from a clump of sassafras by the "worm" fence. Over the fence wentAbel, and under it, on his fat little belly, went Moses, the puppy. Inthe meadow the life-everlasting shed a fragrant pollen in the sunshine, and a few crippled grasshoppers deluded themselves into the belief thatthe summer still lingered. Once the puppy tripped over a love-vine, and getting his front paws painfully entangled yelped sharply forassistance. Picking him up, Abel carried him in his arms to the pinewood, where he place him on a bed of needles in a hollow. 

Through the slender boles of the trees, the sunlight fell in bars onthe carpet of pine-cones. The scent of the living forest was in hisnostrils, and when he threw back his head, it seemed to him that theblue sky was resting upon the tree-tops. Taking off his coat, he feltthe edge of his blade, while he leaned against the great pine he hadmarked out for sacrifice. In the midst of the wood he saw the walls ofhis house rising--saw the sun on the threshold--the smoke mount fromthe chimney. The dream in his brain was the dream of the race in itsbeginning--for he saw the home and in the centre of the home he saw awoman and in the arms of the woman he saw a child. Though the man wouldchange, the dream was indestructible, and would flow on from the futureinto the future. The end it served was not individual, but racial--forit belonged not to the soul of the lover, but to the integral structureof life. 

Moving suddenly, as if in response to a joyous impulse, he drew awayfrom the tree, and lifting his axe swung it out into the sunlight. Foran instant there was silence. Then a shiver shook the pine from itsroots upward, the boughs rocked in the blue sky, and a bird flying outof them sailed slowly into the west. 

CHAPTER XIV

SHOWS THE WEAKNESS IN STRENGTH

When Abel had gone, Sarah folded her grey woollen shawl over her bosom, and ordered the boy with the wheelbarrow to return to the barnyard. Leftalone her eyes followed her son's figure as it divided the broomsedge inthe meadow, but from the indifference of her look she might have gazedon the pine tree toward which he was moving. A little later, when herglance passed to the roof of the mill there was no perceptible change inher expression; and she observed dispassionately that the shingles whichcaught the drippings from the sycamore were beginning to rot. While shestood there she was in the throes of one of the bitterest sorrows ofher life; yet there was no hint of it either in her quiet face or in therigid spareness of her figure. Her sons had resisted her at times, butuntil to-day not one of them had rebelled openly against her authorityin the matter of marriage. Years ago, in the period of Abner's reactionfrom a blighted romance, she had chosen, without compunction, amild-mannered, tame-spirited maiden for his wife. Without compunction, when the wedding was over, she had proceeded, from the best possiblemotives, to torment the tame-spirited maiden into her grave. 

"He's layin' up misery for himself and for all concerned, " she saidaloud, after a moment, "a girl like that with no name and preciouslittle religion--an idle, vain, silly hussy, with a cropped head!"

A small coloured servant, in a girl's pinafore and a boy's breeches, came to the door, and whispered that the old people were demanding asnack of bread and molasses. 

"Tell 'em it ain't the day for sweets an' they ain't goin' to have meatan' molasses the same day, " she remarked as she entered the kitchen. "If I didn't watch you every minute, you'd make yo'selves sick withovereatin'. "

"I reckon you're right, Sary, " piped grandfather in angry tones, "butI ain't so sure I wouldn't rather have the sickness than the watchin'. It's hard on a man of my years an' experience that he shouldn't beallowed to project with his own stomach. "

"You'd have been dead long ago but for me, an' you ought to be ashamedof yo'self for talkin' such foolishness. As if I hadn't wo' myself outwith waitin' on you, an' no blood relation. "

"No blood relation!" chimed in grandmother maliciously, "no bloodrelation!"

"Well, you hurry up an' get ready for dinner, for I'm goin' outafterwards. "

"Whar on earth are you goin', Sary? It ain't Sunday. "

"It don't matter to you whar I'm goin'--you jest set right up an' eatyo' soup. "

When she had poured the contents of the pot into the two earthenwarebowls, she crumbled a piece of bread into each, and gave the dinner intothe trembling hands which were stretched out eagerly to receive it. Thentaking the red-and-white cloth from the cupboard, she set the table forfive, and brought the dish of turnips and boiled beef from the stove. Every detail was carefully attended to as if her thoughts were noton the hillside with Abel, but she herself could not eat so much as amouthful. A hard lump rose in her throat and prevented her swallowing. 

The men did not appear, so leaving their dinner in the stove, she wentupstairs and put on the black poke bonnet and the alpaca mantle trimmedwith bugles which she wore on Sundays and on the occasional visitsto her neighbours. As it was her custom never to call without bearingtribute in the form of fruit or preserves, she placed a jar of redcurrant jelly into a little basket, and started for her walk, holding ittightly in her black worsted gloves. She knew that if Molly divined herpurpose she would hardly accept the gift, but the force of habit wastoo strong for her, and she felt that she could not start out to make avisit with empty hands. 

Her chief anxiety was to be gone before Abel should return, and forthis reason she left the house by the back door, and chose the small, descending path that led through the willows to Jordan's Journey. Asshe neared the brook a bow of blue ribbon hanging on a branch caughther eye, and she recognized a bit of the trimming from Blossom's Sundaydress. Releasing it she put it into her pocket, with the resolve thatshe would reprove her granddaughter for wearing her best clothes in suchunsuitable places. Then her thoughts returned to the immediate objectof her visit, and she told herself sternly that she would let MollyMerryweather know her opinion of her while there was yet time for thegirl to withdraw from the marriage. That she was wronging her son byexerting such despotic authority was the last thought that would haveoccurred to her. A higher morality than that of ordinary mortals hadguided her in the past, and she followed it now. 

When she reached the rail fence, she found some difficulty in climbingit, since her legs had grown rheumatic with the cold weather; but byletting the basket down first on a forked stick, she managed to easeherself gently over to the opposite side. Here she rested, while shecarefully brushed away the dried pollen from the golden-rod, which wasstaining her dress. Then regaining her strength after a minute, shepushed on under the oak trees, where the moist, dead leaves made a soft, velvety sound, to the apple orchard and the sunken flagged walk that ledto the overseer's cottage. 

In the sunshine on the porch Reuben Merryweather was sitting; and atsight of his visitor, he rose, with a look of humble surprise, andinvited her into the house. His manner toward her was but a smallerexpression of his mental attitude to the universe. That he possessedany natural rights as an individual had never occurred to him; and thehumility with which he existed gave place only to the mild astonishmentwhich filled him at any recognition of that existence by man orProvidence. 

"Walk in an' sit down, ma'am, " he said hospitably leading the way intothe little sitting-room, where the old hound dozed on the rug. "Molly'sjest gone down to the spring-house, but she'll be back in a minute. "

"Reuben Merryweather--" began Sarah, and then she stopped, "you ain'tlookin' over sprightly, " she said after a pause. 

"I've got a weak chest, an' the cold settles on it. "

"Did you ever try mutton suet laid over it on a piece of red flannel?'Tis the best cure I know of. "

"Molly makes me a plaster for it at night. " The feeling that he hadengrossed the conversation for his selfish ends led him to remark aftera minute, "You have changed but little, Sarah, a brave woman you are. "

"Not so brave, Reuben, but I'm a believer an' that helps me. I'd havebroken down under the burden often enough if my faith hadn't supportedme. You've had yo' troubles, too, Reuben, an' worse ones. "

"It's true, it's true, " said the old man, coughing behind his hand, "tosee my po' gal suffer so was worst--but however bad things seemed to uson top, I've al'ays believed thar was a hidden meanin' in em' that oureyes couldn't see. "

"Ah, you were al'ays a soft natured man, Reuben, too soft natured foryo' own good, I used to think. "

"'Twas that that stood against me with you, Sarah, when we were young. Do you remember the time you refused to drive back with me from thatpicnic at Falling Creek because I wouldn't give Jacob Bumpass a hidingabout something? That was a bitter pill to me, an' I've never forgotit. "

Sarah had flushed a little, and her stern face appeared to havegrown ten years younger. "To think that you ain't forgot all that oldfoolishness, Reuben!"

"Well, thar's been time enough an' trouble enough, no doubt, " heanswered, "but seein' you lookin' so like yo' old self put me in mind ofit. "

"Lord, Reuben, I ain't thought of all that for forty years!"

"No mo' have I, Sarah except when I see you on Sundays sittin' acrossthe church from me. You were a beauty in yo' day, though some folks useto think that that little fair thing, Mary Hilliard, was better lookin'. To me 'twas like settin' a dairy maid beside a queen. "

"Even my husband thought Mary Hilliard, was prettier, " said Sarah, andher tone showed that this tribute to her youthful vanity had touched herheart. 

"Well, I never did. You were al'ays too good for me an' I neverbegrudged you to Abner. He was a better man. "

For an instant she looked at him steadily, while living honestystruggled in her bosom against loyalty to the dead. 

"No, Reuben, Abner was not a better man, " she said presently, as if thewords were thrust out of her by a chastening conscience. "My pride keptme up after I had married him; but he was born shiftless an' he diedshiftless. He never did a day's work in his life that I didn't drive himto. His children have never known how it was, for I've al'ays made 'emthink he was a hard worker an' painstakin' to keep back his lazinessfrom croppin' out in 'em, if I could. "

"You've brought 'em up well. That's a fine son of yours that comescourtin' my gal, Sarah. I've hoped she'd fancy him for the sake of oldtimes. "

"I never thought of yo' recollectin' that feelin', Reuben. It makes mefeel almost young again, an' I that old an' wo' out. I've had a hardlife--thar's no disputin' it, marriage is mostly puttin' up with things, I reckon, when it ain't makin' believe. "

"Thar's mighty few that gits the one that's meant for 'em, " said Reuben, "that's sure enough. If we did we'd stop movin' forward, I suppose, an'begin to balk. I haven't much life now, except in Molly, an' it's thethings that pleases or hurt her that I feel the most. She's got a warmheart an' a hot temper like you used to have, Sarah, an' the world ain'teasy generally to yo' sort. "

For a time Sarah was silent, her hands in their black woolen glovesgripping the handle of the basket. 

"Well, I must be goin', Reuben, " she said presently, rising from herchair. "I'm sorry about yo' chest, an' I jest stepped over to bring youthis glass of currant jelly I made last summer. It goes well with meatwhen yo' appetite ain't hearty. "

She held out her hand, shook his with a hurried and awkward movement, and went out of the front door and down the flagged walk as Molly'ssteps were heard in the kitchen at the back. 

"Sarah Revercomb has been here, honey, " said Reuben. "She brought meover this glass of currant jelly, and said she was sorry to miss you. "

"Why, what could she have meant?" asked Molly. "She hates me and sheknows I've never liked her. "

"Like most folks it ain't Sarah but the way you take her that matters. We've all got the split somewhar in our shell if you jest know how tofind it. I reckon she's given in about Abel an' came over to show it. "

"I'm glad she brought you the jelly, and perhaps she is getting softerwith age, " rejoined Molly, still puzzled. 

"Don't worry, honey, she's a good woman at bottom, but mortal slow oflarnin', and thar's a lot of Sarah in that boy of hers. "

"I suppose there is, grandfather, for all their fierce quarrelling. Theyhave the kind of love that will die for you and yet will not so much assuffer you to live. That's the way Mrs. Revercomb loves, and it's theway Abel is loving me now. "

"Let him larn, pretty, let him larn. He'll be worth twice as much atfifty as he is to-day, an' so will you for that matter. They're foolsthat say love is for the young, Molly, don't you believe 'em. "

Sarah, meanwhile, passed slowly down the flagged walk under the gnarledold apple trees in the orchard. A few heavy-winged insects, awaking fromthe frost of the night, droned over the piles of crushed winesaps, andshe heard the sound as though it came to her across a distance offorty years. They were not easy years; she was worn by their hardness, crippled by their poverty, embittered by their sorrows. "I've had a hardlife, " she thought. "I've had a hard life, an' it warn't fair. " For thefirst time it occurred to her that the Providence she had served hadnot used her honourably in return. "Even Abner al'ays thought that MaryHilliard was the prettiest, " she added, after a minute. 

As she crossed the lawn at Jordan's Journey, Uncle Abednego, the butler, appeared at the back door, and detained her with an excited wave of thehand. 

"Lawd A'mighty, dar's bad times yer, Miss Sary!" he cried, "Miss Angelashe's been mos' dead fur goin' on two hours, en we all's done sontCephus on de bay horse arter Marse Jonathan!"

CHAPTER XV

SHOWS THE TYRANNY OF WEAKNESS

Three days later the bay horse returned at a gallop with Jonathan Gayin the saddle. At the head of the steps Kesiah was standing, and sheanswered the young man's anxious questions with a manner which she triedto make as sympathetic as the occasion required. This effort to adjusther features into harmony with her feelings had brought her browstogether in a forbidding scowl and exaggerated the harsh lines betweenmouth and chin. 

"Am I in time?" he asked in a trembling voice, and his hand reached outto her for support. 

"The immediate danger is over, Jonathan, " she answered, while she ledhim into the library and closed the door softly behind them. "For hourswe despaired of her recovery, but the doctors say now that if there isno other shock, she may live on for months. "

"I got your note last night in Washington, " he returned. "It wasforwarded by mail from Applegate. Is the doctor still with her?"

"No, he has just gone. The rector is there now. She finds him a greatcomfort. "

"It was so sudden, Aunt Kesiah--she appeared well when I left her. Whatcaused the attack?"

"A talk she had had with Mr. Chamberlayne. It seems he thought it bestto prepare her for the fact that your Uncle Jonathan left a good dealof his property--it amounts to an income of about ten thousand a year, I believe, to Reuben Merryweather's granddaughter when she comes of age. Of course it wasn't the money--Angela never gave that a thought--butthe admission that the girl was his illegitimate daughter that struck soheavy a blow. "

"But surely she must have suspected---"

"She has never suspected anything in her life. It is a part of hersweetness, you know, that she never faces an unpleasant fact until it isliterally thrust on her notice. As long as your uncle was so devoted toher and so considerate, she thought it a kind of disloyalty to inquireas to the rest of his life. Once I remember, twenty years ago, when thatpoor distraught creature came to me--I went straight to Angela and triedto get her to use her influence with her uncle for the girl's sake. Butat the first hint, she locked herself in her room and refused to letme come near her. Then it was that I had that terrible quarrel with Mr. Gay, and he hardly spoke to me again as long as he lived. I believe, though, he would have married Janet after my talk with him except forAngela's illness, which was brought on by the shock of hearing him speakof his intention. " She sighed wonderingly, her anxious frown deepeningbetween her eyebrows. "They both seemed to think that in some way I wasto blame for the whole thing, " she added, "and your uncle never forgaveme. It's the same way now. Mr. Chamberlayne spoke quite angrily to mewhen he saw the effect of his interview. He appeared to think that Iought to have prevented it. "

"Could it have been kept from her, do you suppose?"

"That looked impossible, and of course, he broke it to her very gently. He also, you know, has all his life had a sentiment about Angela, andthat, I think is why he never married. He told me once that she camenearer than any woman he had ever seen to representing every man'sideal. "

"What I can't understand is why she should have been so upset by thediscovery?"

"Well, she was very fond of your uncle, and she has cherished quiteromantically the memory of his affection for her. I think--for thatis Angela's way--that he means much more to her dead than he didliving--and this, she says, has blackened the image. "

"But even then it seems incomprehensible that it should have made herreally so ill. "

"Oh, you don't know her yet, Jonathan. I remember your uncle used to saythat she was more like a flower than a woman, and he was always startingalarms about her health. We lived in a continual panic about her forseveral years, and it was her weakness, as much as her beauty, that gaveher her tremendous power over him. He was like wax in her hands, thoughof course he never suspected it. "

The tread of Mr. Mullen was heard softly on the staircase, and heentered with his hand outstretched from the starched cuff that showedbeneath the sleeve of his black broadcloth coat. Pausing on the rug, heglanced from Kesiah to Jonathan with a grave and capable look, asthough he wished them to understand that, having settled everythingwith perfect satisfaction in the mind of Mrs. Gay, he was now ready toperform a similar office for the rest of the household. 

"I am thankful to say that I left your dear mother resting peacefully, "he observed in a whisper. "You must have had a distressing journey, Mr. Gay?"

"I was very much alarmed, " replied Gay, with a nervous gesture as if hewere pushing aside a disagreeable responsibility. "The note took threedays to find me, and I didn't know until I got here whether she wasalive or dead. "

"It is easy to understand your feelings, " returned the rector, stillwhispering though Gay had spoken in his natural voice. "Such a motheras yours deserves the most careful cherishing that you can give her. Toknow her has been an inspiration, and I am never tired of repeating thather presence in the parish, and occasional attendance at church, areprivileges for which we should not forget to be thankful. It is notpossible, I believe, for any woman to approach more closely the perfectexample of her sex. "

"Perhaps I had better go up to her at once. We are deeply grateful toyou, Mr. Mullen, for your sympathy. "

"Who would not have felt?" rejoined the other, and taking up his hatfrom the table, he went out, still treading softly as though he werewalking upon something he feared to hurt. 

"Poor mother! It's wonderful the way she has with people!" exclaimedGay, turning to Kesiah. 

"She's always had it with men--there's something so appealing about her. You'll be very careful what you say to her, Jonathan. "

"Oh, I'll not confess my sins, if that's what you mean, " he responded ashe ascended the staircase. 

The room was fragrant with burning cedar, and from the dormer-windows, latticed by boughs, a band of sunlight stretched over the carpet to thehigh white bed in which his mother was lying. Her plaintive blue eyes, which clung to him when he entered, appeared to say; "Yes, see how theyhave hurt me--a poor frail creature. " Above her forehead her hair, whichwas going grey, broke into a mist, and spread in soft, pale strands overthe pillow. Never had her helpless sweetness appealed so strongly to hisemotions, as when she laid her hand on his arm and said in an apologeticwhisper:

"Dear boy, how I hated to bring you back. "

"As if I wouldn't have come from the end of the world, dearest mother, "he answered. 

He had fallen on his knees by her bed, but when Kesiah brought him achair, he rose and settled himself more comfortably. 

"I wanted you, dear, but if you knew how I dreaded to become a dragon you. Men must be free, I know--never let me interfere with yourfreedom--I feel such a helpless, burdensome creature. "

"If you could only see how young and lovely you look even when youare ill, you would never fear becoming a burden. In spite of your greyhairs, you might pass for a girl at this minute. "

"You wicked flatterer!--but, oh, Jonathan, I've had a blow!"

"I understand. It must have been rough. "

"And to think how I always idealized him!--how I had believed in hislove for me and cherished his memory! To discover that even at thelast--on his deathbed--he was thinking of that woman!"

She wept gently, wiping her eyes with a resigned and suffering gestureon the handkerchief Kesiah had handed her. "I feel as if my wholeuniverse had crumbled, " she said. 

"But it was no affront to you, mother--it all happened before he sawyou, and was only an episode. Those things don't bite into a man's life, you know. "

"Of course, I knew there had been something, but I thought he hadforgotten it--that he was faithful to his love for me--his spiritworship, he called it. Then to find out so long after his death--whenhis memory had become a part of my religion--that he had turned back atthe end. "

"It wasn't turning away from you, it was merely an atonement. Yourinfluence was visible even there. "

"I am sorry for the child, of course, " she said sadly, after weeping alittle--"who knows but she may have inherited her mother's character?"

"The doctor said you were to be quiet, Angela, " remarked Kesiah, who hadstood at the foot of the bed in the attitude of a Spartan. "Jonathan, ifyou begin to excite her, you'd better go. "

"Oh, my boy, my darling boy, " sobbed Mrs. Gay, with her head on hisshoulder, "I have but one comfort and that is the thought that you areso different--that you will never shatter my faith in you. If you onlyknew how thankful I am to feel that you are free from these dreadfulweaknesses of men. "

Cowed by her helplessness, he looked down on her with shining eyes. 

"Remember the poor devil loved you, mother, and be merciful to hismemory, " he replied, touched, for the first time, by the thought of hisuncle. 

"I shall try, Jonathan, I shall try, though the very thought of evil isa distress to me, " she replied, with a saintly look. "As for the girl, Ihave only the tenderest pity for the unfortunate creature. "

"That's like you, mother. "

"Kesiah says that she has behaved very well. Didn't you say so, Kesiah?"

"Yes, Mr. Chamberlayne told me that she appeared perfectly indifferentwhen he spoke to her. She even remarked, I believe, that she didn't seethat it concerned her. "

"Well, she's spirit enough. Now stop talking, mother, I am going. "

"God bless you, my darling boy--you have never failed me. "

Instead of appeasing his conscience, the remark completed his descentinto the state of disenchantment he had been approaching for hours. Theshock of his mother's illness, coming after three days of marriage, hadbeen too much for his unstable equilibrium, and he felt smothered byan oppression which, in some strange way, seemed closing upon him fromwithout. It was in the air--in the faded cretonne of the room, inthe grey flashes of the swallows from the eaves of the house, in theleafless boughs etched delicately against the orange light of thesky. Like most adventurers of the emotions, he was given to swiftdespondencies as well as to vivid elations, and the tyranny of a moodwas usually as absolute as it was brief. The fact was there while itlasted like the physical sensation of hunger or gratification. When itdeparted he seldom spurred his imagination to the pursuit of it. 

"So it's over, " he said under his breath, as he looked through thelacework of ivy on the small greenish panes to the desolate Novemberfields, "and I've been a damn fool for the asking!"

At the end of the week Blossom returned to the mill, and on theafternoon of her arrival, Gay met her in the willow copse by the brook. To the casual observer there would have appeared no perceptible changein his manner, but a closer student of the hearts of lovers mighthave drawn an inference from the fact that he allowed her to waitfive minutes for him at the place of meeting. True, as he explainedpassionately, his mother had asked for him just as he was leaving thehouse, and it was clearly impossible that he should refuse his mother!That he was still ardent for Blossom's embraces was evident to herglance, but the affair was settled, the mystery solved, and there was nolonger need that he should torment himself. That the love of his kind isusually a torment or nothing had not, at this stage, occurred to eitherof the lovers. He was feeling strongly that, having conducted himselfin so honourable a manner there was nothing more to be expected of him;while she assured her heart that when his love had proved capable of sogallant a sacrifice, it had established the fact of its immortality. Thetruth was that the fire still burned, though the obstacles, which hadsupplied fuel to the flames, were consumed, and a pleasant warmth ratherthan a destroying blaze was the result. Had Gay sounded the depths ofhis nature, which he seldom did, he would have discovered that for himpassion was a kind of restlessness translated into emotion. When therestlessness was appeased, the desire in which it had revealed itselfslowly evaporated. 

"How is your mother?" was Blossom's first eager question, "oh, I do hopeshe is better!"

"Better, yes, but we're still awfully anxious, the least shock may killher--Aunt Kesiah and I are walking on pins and needles. How are you, Beauty? Did you enjoy your visit?"

He kissed her lips, and she clung to him with the first expression ofweakness she had ever shown. 

"How could I when it ended like that?"

"Well, you're married anyway--that ought to satisfy you. What does itfeel like?"

"I can't believe it--and I haven't even any ring. "

"Oh, the ring! If you'd had it, you'd have dropped it about somewhereand let out the secret. "

"I wish it had been in church and before a clergyman. "

"Are you trying to make me jealous again of the Reverend Orlando? I'm anold married man now, and it is hopeless. "

"Do you really feel married, Jonathan?"

"The deuce I don't! If I did I'd be galloping down the turnpike. "

"I wonder why you did it?" she questioned a little wistfully, "you takeit so lightly. "

"I could only take it lightly after I'd done it--that's why, darling. "

"If I could believe in it I shouldn't mind the secrecy, " she said, "butI feel so wicked and underhand that I hardly dare hold up my head beforethe folks at home. Jonathan, when do you think we may come out andconfess?"

For a moment he did not answer, and she watched the frown gather slowlybetween his eyebrows. 

"There, there, Blossom, don't begin that already, " he respondedirritably, "we can't make it public as long as my mother lives--that'sout of the question. Do you think I could love you if I felt you hadforced me to murder her? Heaven knows I've done enough--I've married youfair and square, and you ought to be satisfied. "

"I am satisfied, " she replied on the point of tears, "but, oh, Jonathan, I'm not happy. "

"Then it's your own fault, " he answered, still annoyed with her. "You'vehad everything your own way, and just because I get in trouble and cometo you for sympathy, you begin to nag. For God's sake, don't become anagging woman, Blossom. A man hates her worse than poison. "

"O Jonathan!" she cried out sharply, placing her hand on her breast asthough he had stabbed her. 

"Of course, I'm only warning you. Your great charm is poise--I never sawa woman who had so much of it. That's what a man wants in a wife, too. Vagaries are all right in a girl, but when he marries, he wantssomething solid and sensible. "

"Then you do love me, Jonathan?"

"Don't be a goose, " he rejoined--for it was a question to which he hadnever in his life returned a direct answer. 

"Of course, I know you do or you wouldn't have married me--but I wishyou'd tell me so--just in words--sometimes. "

"If I told you so, you'd have no curiosity left, and that would be badfor you. Come, kiss me, sweetheart, that's better than talking. "

She kissed him obediently, as mildly complaisant as she had once beencoldly aloof. Though the allurement of the remote had deserted her, shestill possessed, in his eyes, the attraction of the beautiful. If theexcitement of the chase was ended, the pleasure of the capture was stillamply sufficient to make up the difference. He laughed softly as hekissed her, enjoying her freshness, her surrender, her adoration, whichshe no longer attempted to hide. 

When he parted from her several hours afterwards, he had almostrecovered the casual gaiety which had become his habit of mind. Lifewas too short either to wonder or to regret, he had once remarked, anda certain easy fatalism had softened so far the pricks of a disturbingconscience. 

The walk from the pasture to the house led through a tangle of shrubberycalled by the negroes, the Haunt's Walk, and as he pushed the leaflessboughs out of his way, a flitting glimpse of red caught his eye beyonda turn in the path. An instant later, Molly passed him on her way to thespring or to the meadows beyond. 

"Good day, Mr. Jonathan, " she said, while her lips curved and she lookedup at him with her arch and brilliant smile. 

"Good day to yourself, cousin, " he responded gaily, "what is yourhurry?"

As he made a movement to detain her, she slipped past him, and a minuteafterwards her laugh floated back. 

"Oh, there's a reason!" she called over her shoulder. 

A sudden thought appeared to strike him at her words, and turningquickly in the path, he looked after her until she disappeared down thewinding path amid the tangle of shrubbery. 

"Jove, she is amazingly pretty!" he said at last under his breath. 

CHAPTER XVI

THE COMING OF SPRING

The winter began in a long rain and ended in a heavy snow which lay fora week over the country. In the chill mornings while she dressed, Mollywatched the blue-black shadows of the crows skimming over the whiteground, and there was always a dumb anxiety at her heart as she lookedafter them. 

On Christmas Eve there had been a dance at Piping Tree, and because shehad danced twice with Gay (who had ridden over in obedience to a whim), Abel had parted from her in anger. For the first time she had feltthe white heat of his jealousy, and it had aroused rebellion, notacquiescence, in her heart. Jonathan Gay was nothing to her (thoughhe called her his cousin)--he had openly shown his preference forBlossom--but she insisted passionately that she was free and would dancewith whomsoever she pleased. To Abel's demand that she should give up"round dances" entirely, she had returned a defiant and mocking laugh. They had parted in an outburst of temper, to rush wildly together a fewdays later when they met by chance in the turnpike. 

"You love him, but you don't love him enough, honey, " said Reuben, patting her head. "You love yourself still better than him. "

"Three months ago he hardly dared hope for me--he would have kissed thedust under my feet--and now he flies into fits of jealousy because Idance with another man. "

"'Tis human natur to go by leaps an' starts in love, Molly. "

"It's a foolish way, grandfather. "

"Well, I ain't claimin' that we're over-wise, but thar's al'ays lifeready to teach us. "

When the snow thawed, spring appeared so suddenly that it looked asif it had lain there all winter in a green and gold powder over themeadows. Flashes of blue, like bits of fallen sky, showed from therail fences; and the notes of robins fluted up from the budding willowsbeside the brook. On the hill behind Reuben Merryweather's cottage thepeach-trees bloomed, and red-bud and dogwood filled the grey woods withclouds of delicate colour. Spring, which germinated in the earth, movedalso, with a strange restlessness, in the hearts of men and women. Asthe weeks passed, that inextinguishable hope, which mounts always withthe rising sap, looked from their faces. 

On the morning of her birthday, a warm April day, Molly smiled atherself in the mirror, and because the dimples became her, wondered howshe could manage to keep on smiling forever. Blushing and paling shetried a ribbon on her hair, threw it aside, and picked up another. 

"I am thankful for many things, " she was thinking, "and most of all Iam thankful that I am pretty. I suppose it's better to be good like JudyHatch, but I'd rather be pretty. "

She was at the age when the forces of character still lie dormant, andan accident may determine the direction of their future development. It is the age when it is possible for fortune to make a dare-devil of aphilosopher, a sceptic of a worshipper, a cynic of a sentimentalist. 

When she went down the flagged walk a little later to meet Abel by theblazed pine as she had promised, she was still smiling to herself andto the blue birds that sang joyously in the blossoming trees in theorchard. At the end of the walk her smile vanished for she came face toface with Jim Halloween, who carried a new-born lamb in his arms. 

"Many happy returns of the day, " he began with emotion. "I thought apresent like this would be the most acceptable thing I could bring toyou--an' ma agreed with me when I asked her advice. "

"It's very good of you--and how darling it is! I'll take it back andmake it comfortable before I start out. "

Taking the lamb into her arms, she hid her face in its wool while theyreturned to the house. 

"It ain't so young as it looks, an will begin to be peart enough befo'long, " he remarked. "Something useful as well as ornamental, was what Ihad in mind to bring you. 'Thar's nothin' mo' suitable all round for thepurpose than a lamb, ' was what I said to ma. 'She can make a pet of itat first, an' then when it gets too big to pet, she can turn it intomutton. '"

"But I wouldn't--I'd never let it be killed--the little darling!"

"Now, that's foolishness, I reckon, " he returned admiringly, "but thar'ssomething downright takin' in foolishness as long as a woman is pretty. I don't mind it, an' I don't reckon ma would unless it turned towastefulness. Is thar' any hope you've changed yo' mind since the lasttime I spoke about marriage?"

"No, I haven't changed, Mr. Halloween. "

He sighed not passionately, but with a resigned and sentimental regret. 

"Well, in that case, it's a pity I've wasted so much time wantin' you, Ireckon, " he rejoined. "It ain't sensible to want what you can't have, anI've always tried to be sensible, seein' I'm a farmer. If I hadn't setmy fancy on you I'd have waited on Blossom Revercomb as likely as not. "

They had reached the house, and she did not reply until she had enteredthe living-room and placed the lamb in a basket. Coming out again, shetook up the thread of the conversation as she closed the door behindher. 

"I wonder all of you don't turn your eyes on Blossom, " she observed. 

"Yes, she's handsome enough, but stiff-mouthed and set like all the restof the Revercombs. I shouldn't like to marry a Revercomb, when it comesto that. "

"Shouldn't you?" she asked and laughed merrily. 

"They say down at Bottoms, " he went on, "that she's gone moonstruckabout Mr. Jonathan, an' young Adam Doolittle swears he saw them walkin'together on the other side of old orchard hill. "

"I thought she was too sensible a girl for that. "

"They're none of 'em too sensible. I'm the only man I ever saw who neverhad a woman moonstruck about him--an' it makes me feel kind of lonesometo hear the others talk. It's a painful experience, I reckon, but itmust be a fruitful source of conversation with a man's wife, if he evermarries. Has it ever struck you, " he inquired, "that the chief thinglackin' in marriage is conversation?"

"I don't know--I've never thought about it. "

"Now, I have often an' over again, ma bein' sech a silent person to livewith. It's the silence that stands between Blossom Revercomb an' me--an'her brother Abel is another glum one of the same sort, isn't he?"

"Do you think so? I hadn't noticed it. "

"An' you seein' so much of him! Well, all folks don't observe things assharply as I do--'twas a way I was born with. But I passed him at thefork as I came up, an' he was standin' just as solemn an' silent whileMr. Chamberlayne, over from Applegate, was askin' him questions. "

"What questions? Did you hear them?"

"Oh, about his mother an' prospects of the grist-mill. The lawyer wenton afterward to the big house to do business with Mr. Jonathan. "

They had reached the point in the road where a bridle path from the millran into it; and in the centre of the field, which was woven in faintspring colours like an unfinished tapestry, Molly descried the figureof Abel moving rapidly toward her. Dismissing her companion, she ranforward with her warm blood suffusing her face. 

"Abel, " she said, "tell me that you are happy, " and lifted her mouth tohis kiss. 

"Something in the spring makes me wild for you, Molly. I can't livewithout you another year, and hear the blue birds and see the greenburst out so sudden. There is a terrible loneliness in the spring, darling. "

"But I'm here, Abel. "

"Yes, you're here, but you aren't near enough, for I'm never sure ofyou. That's the cause of it--shall I ever be sure of you even afterwe are married? You've got different blood in you, Molly--blood thatdoesn't run quiet, --and it makes me afraid. Do you know I've been tolook at the pines this morning, and I am all one big ache to begin onthe house. "

"But you're happy--say you're happy. "

"How can I be happy, when I'm wanting you with every drop of my bloodand yet never certain that I shall have you. The devil has a lot todo with it, I reckon--for there are times when I am half blind withjealousy and doubt of you. Did you ever kiss a man before me, Molly?"

She laughed, moved by an instinct to torment him. "You wouldn't haveasked me that three months ago, and you wouldn't have cared. "

"It's different now. I've got a right to know. "

"You'll never know anything because you have the 'right' to, " shereturned impatiently. "I hate the word--how silly you are, Abel. "

"If you'd call me mad you'd come nearer to it, I reckon. It's the wayof the Hawtreys--we've always gone neck and crop over the fences withoutgiving a thought to the damage we've done by the way. My mother wentlike that at religion--she's gone over so hard to religion that shehasn't left a piece of her for common humanity. All the world is dividedfor her between religion and damnation. I believe she thinks the veryeggs in the hen-house are predestined to be saved or damned. And withme it's the same, only it isn't religion, but you. It's all you to me, Molly, even the spring. "

"You're so wholehearted, and I'm so lightminded. You ought to have loveda staid, sober woman. I was born passionate and changeful just as youwere born passionate and steady. "

"Don't, Molly, if you only knew how you hurt me when you talk like that. You've flown into my heart like a little blue bird into a cage, andthere you'll beat and flutter, but you can't get out. Some day you'llrest there quiet, sweetheart. "

"Don't call it a cage, and never, never try to hold me or I'll flyaway. "

"Yet you love me, Molly?"

She threw her arms about his neck, rising on tiptoe while she kissed hismouth. "I love you--and yet in my heart I don't really believe in love, "she answered. "I shouldn't be surprised to wake up any morning and findthat I had dreamed it. "

"It makes me want to curse those that put your mind out of joint whenyou were little and innocent. "

"I don't believe I was ever little and innocent--I was born out ofbitterness. "

"Then I'll cure you, darling. I'll love you so hard that you'll forgetall the terrible things you knew as a child. "

She shook her head, gaily and yet with a touch of scorn for hisassurance. "You may try with all your strength, but when a sapling hasbeen bent crooked you can't pull it straight. "

"But you aren't crooked, Molly, " he answered, kissing her throat aboveher open blouse. 

She glowed at his kiss, and for one instant, it seemed to them thattheir spirits touched as closely as their bodies, while the longing andthe rapture of spring drew them together. 

"You're mine now, Molly--I've got you close, " he said as he held her. 

At his words the rosy waves upon which they had floated broke suddenlyon the earth, and turning slowly they walked hand in hand out of thefield into the turnpike. A strange shyness had fallen over them, forwhen Molly tried to meet his eyes, she found that her lashes trembledand fell;--yet this shyness was as delicious as the ecstasy from whichit had come. 

But Nature seldom suffers such high moments to pass before theyhave been paid for in physical values. As the lovers passed into theturnpike, there came the sound of a horse at a trot, and a minute laterJonathan Gay rode toward them, leaning slightly over the neck of hisbay. Seeing them, he lifted his hat and brought down his horse to awalk, as if prompted by a sudden desire to look closer in Molly's face. Her rapture evidently became her, for after his first casual glance, heturned again quickly and smiled into her eyes. Her look met his with thefrankness of a child's and taken unawares--pleased, too, that he shouldso openly admire her--she smiled back again with the glow of her secrethappiness enriching her beauty. 

In a moment Gay had passed on, and turning to Abel, she saw that a frowndarkened his features. 

"He had no right to look at you like that, and you oughtn't to havesmiled back, Molly, " he said sternly. 

Her nature leaped instantly to arms. "I suppose I've a right to mysmiles, " she retorted defiantly. 

"No you haven't--not now. An engaged woman ought to be proper andsober--anybody will tell you so--ask Mr. Mullen. A girl may flirt alittle and nobody thinks any harm of it, but it's different afterwards, and you know it. "

"I know nothing of the kind, and I refuse to be preached to. I might aswell marry Mr. Mullen. "

The taunt, though it was uttered half in jest, appeared to torment himbeyond endurance. 

"How can you talk to me like this, after what you said five minutesago?" he demanded. 

His tone approached, unfortunately, the ministerial, and as he spoke, her anger flamed over her as hotly as her happiness had done a fewminutes earlier. 

"That was five minutes ago, " she retorted with passion. 

Stopping in the road, he caught her arms and held them to her sides, while the thunder cloud blackened his forehead. Two playthings ofNature, swept alternately by the calm and the storm of elemental forces, they faced each other in the midst of mating birds and insects that wereas free as they. 

"Do you mean that you've changed, and in five minutes?" he asked. 

"I've always told you I could change in three, " she retorted. 

"I don't believe it--you are behaving foolishly. "

"And you are wise, I suppose--preaching and prating to me as if youstood in the pulpit. When you were begging me so humbly for a kind word, I might have known that as soon as you got the kind word, you'd begin towant to manage me body and soul--that's a man all over. "

"I merely said that an engaged woman ought not to smile too free atother men--and that you ought not to even more than others, becausethere is something so inviting about you. Mr. Mullen would say the samething from the pulpit--and what one man can say in the pulpit, I reckon, another may repeat in the road. "

"No, he mayn't--not if he wants to marry me. "

"If I promise not to say a word more about it, will you get over yourtemper?"

"If you keep your promise, but how am I to know that you won't burst outagain the next time I look at a man?"

"Only try to look at them a little differently, Molly, not quite sowide-eyed and red-lipped--but primmer and with lowered lashes, just abit contemptuous, as if your were thinking 'you might as well be a stickor a stone for all the thought I am giving you. '" The mental pictureappeared to afford him satisfaction, for he resumed after a moment. "I believe if you'd practise it a while before the glass you could doit--you are so clever. "

"Why on earth should I make myself ugly just to please you?"

"It wouldn't be making yourself ugly--I can't endure an ugly woman. AllI want you to be is sober. "

"Then what made you fall in love with me? It certainly was not forsoberness. "

He shook his head hopelessly, puzzled for the first time by the tooobvious contradiction between the ideal and the actual--between thephantom of a man's imagination and the woman who enthralls his heart. 

"To save my life I couldn't tell you why I did, " he replied. "It doesseem, a bit foolish to fall in love with a woman as she is and then tryto make her over into something different. "

"Judy Hatch was the person God intended for you, I'm sure of it. "

"Well, I'm not, and if I were I'd go ahead and defeat his intentionsas I'm doubtless doing this minute. Let's make up now, so you'd as wellstop talking silliness. "

"It's you that talks silliness, not I--as if I were going through lifelowering my lashes and looking contemptuous! But you're your mother allover again. I've heard her say a dozen times that a girl who is bornhomely ought to get down on her knees and thank the Lord for protectingher from temptation. "

"You never heard me say it, did you?"

"No, but I shall yet if I live long enough--and all because of yourridiculous jealousy. "

The humour of this struck him, and he remarked rather grimly:

"Good God, Molly, what a vixen you are!" Then he broke into a laugh, andcatching her to him, stopped her mouth with kisses. 

"Well, we're in it, " he said, "and we can't get out, so there's no usefighting about it. "

CHAPTER XVII

THE SHADE OF MR. JONATHAN

Old Reuben, seated in his chair on the porch, watched Molly come up theflagged walk over the bright green edgings of moss. Her eyes, whichwere like wells of happiness, smiled at him beneath the blossoming appleboughs. Already she had forgotten the quarrel and remembered only thebliss of the reconciliation. 

"I've had visitors while you were out, honey, " said the old man as shebent to kiss him. "Mr. Chamberlayne and Mr. Jonathan came up and sat abit with me. "

"Was it on business, grandfather?"

"'Twas on yo' business, Molly, an' it eased my mind considerableabout what's to become of you when I'm dead an' gone. It seems old Mr. Jonathan arranged it all befo' he died, an' they've only been waitin'till you came of age to let you into the secret. He left enough money inthe lawyer's hands to make you a rich woman if you follow his wishes. "

"Did they tell you his wishes?" she asked, turning from Reuben to Spotas the blind dog fawned toward her. 

"He wants you to live with Miss Kesiah and Mr. Jonathan when I'm takenaway from you, honey, an' you're to lose all but a few hundred if youever marry and leave 'em. Old Mr. Jonathan had sharp eyes, an' he sawI had begun to fail fast befo' he died. It's an amazin' thing to thinkthat even after all the morality is wrung out of human natur thar'llstill be a few drops of goodness left sometimes at the bottom of it. "

"And if I don't do as he wished? What will come of it, then, grandfather?"

"Then the bulk goes to help some po' heathens over yonder in China tothe Gospel. He was a strange man, was old Mr. Jonathan. Thar warn'tnever any seein' through him, livin' or dead. "

"Why did he ever come here in the beginning? He wasn't one of ourpeople. "

"The wind blew him this way, pretty, an' he was never one to keep goin'against the wind. When the last Jordan died childless an' the place wasput up to be sold, Mr. Jonathan read about it somewhar, an' it looked tohim as if all he had to do was to come down here an' bury himself aliveto git rid of temptation. But the only way to win against temptation isto stand square an' grapple with it in the spot whar it finds you, an'he came to know this, po' sinner, befo' he was done with it. "

"He was a good soldier, wasn't he?" asked Molly. 

"So good a soldier that he could fight as well on one side as ont'other, an' 'twas only an accident that sent him into the army withme instead of against me. I remember his telling me once when I met himafter a battle that 'twas the smell of blood, not the cause, that madehim a fighter. Thar's many a man like that on both sides in every war, Ireckon. "

"I wonder how you can be so patient when you think of him!" she saidpassionately as he stopped. 

"You'll understand better when you're past seventy, " he answered gently. "Thar's a softness like a sort of green grass that springs up an' coversyou when you begin to git old an' worn out. I've got it an' Spot'sgot it--you can tell by the way he won't trouble to git mad with thechickens that come peckin' around him. As soon as it's safely spreadover you, you begin to see that the last thing to jedge anybody by iswhat you've known of the outside of 'em. "

"I can't feel about him as you do, but I don't mind takin' his money aslong as you share it, " returned the girl in a softer voice. 

"It's a pile of money such as you've never heard of, Molly. Mr. Chamberlayne says thar'll be an income of goin' on ten thousand dollarsa year by the time you're a little older. "

"Ten thousand dollars a year just for you an' me!" she exclaimed, startled. 

"Thar warn't so much when 'twas left, but it's been doublin' on itselfall the while you were waitin'. "

"We could go everywhere an' see everything, grandfather. "

"It ain't for me, pretty. Mr. Jonathan knew you wouldn't come into ittill I was well on my way to the end of things. "

Kneeling at his side, she caught his hands and clung to him sobbing. 

"Don't talk of dying! I can't bear to think of your leaving me!"

His trembling and knotted hands gathered her to him. "The young an' theold see two different sides of death, darlin'. When you're young an'full of spirit, it looks powerful dark an' lonely to yo' eyes, but whenyou're gittin' along an' yo' bones ain't quite so steady as they oncewere, an' thar seem to be mo' faces you're acquainted with on the otherside than on this one--then what you've been so terrible afeared ofdon't look much harder to you than settlin' down to a comfortable rest. I've liked life well enough, but I reckon I'll like death even betteras soon as I've gotten used to the feel of it. The Lord always appearsa heap nearer to the dead, somehow, than He does to the livin', andI shouldn't be amazed to find it less lonely than life after I'm oncesafely settled. "

"You've seen so many die that you've grown used to it, " said Mollythrough her tears. 

For a moment he gazed wistfully at the apple boughs, while his facedarkened, as if he were watching a procession of shadows. In his seventyyears he had gained a spiritual insight which penetrated the visiblebody of things in search of the truth beneath the ever-changingappearance. There are a few blameless yet suffering beings on whomnature has conferred a simple wisdom of the heart which containsa profounder understanding of life than the wisdom of the mind cangrasp--and Reuben was one of these. Sorrow had sweetened in his souluntil it had turned at last into sympathy. 

"I've seen 'em come an' go like the flakes of light out yonder in theorchard, " he answered almost in a whisper. "Young an' old, glad an'sorry, I've seen 'em go--an' never one among 'em but showed in thar facewhen 'twas over that 'twas the best thing had ever happened. It's hardfor me now to separate the livin' from the dead, unless it be that thedead are gittin' closer all the time an' the livin' further away. "

"And you're never afraid, grandfather?"

"Well, when it comes to that, honey, I reckon if I can trust the Lord inthe light, I can trust him in the darkness. I ain't as good a Christianas my ma was--she could beat Sarah Revercomb when it came to sayin' theBible backwards--but I've yet to see the spot of natur, either humanor clay, whar we couldn't find the Lord at work if we was to dig deepenough. "

He stopped at sight of a small figure running under the apple trees, and a minute later Patsey, the Gay's maid, reached the flagged walkand panted out a request that Miss Molly should come to the house for abirthday present which awaited her there. 

"Won't you go with me, grandfather?" asked the girl, turning to Reuben. 

"I ain't at home thar, Molly, " answered the old man. "It's well enoughto preach equality an' what not when you're walking on the opposite sideof the road, as Abel would say, but it don't ring true while yo' feetare slippin' an' slidin' over a parlour floor. "

"Then I shan't go without you. Where you aren't welcome is a place I canstay away from. "

"Thar, thar, honey, don't be runnin' arter Abel's notions till you findout whar they're leadin' you. Things are better as they are or the Lordwouldn't have made 'em so, an' He ain't goin' to step a bit faster orslower on o' count of our ragin'. Some folks were meant to be on top an'some at bottom, for t'otherwise God Almighty wouldn't have put 'em thar. Abel is like Sarah, only his generation is different. "

"Do you really think he's like his mother?" asked Molly a littlewistfully. 

"As haw is like haw. They're both bent on doin' the Lord's job overagain an' doin' it better, an' thar manner of goin' to work would beto melt up human natur an' pour it all into the same pattern. It ain'tnever entered Sarah's head that you can't fit the same religion to everyman any mo' than you can the same pair of breeches. The big man takesthe big breeches an' the little man takes the small ones, an' it's jestthe same with religion. It may be cut after one pattern, but it's mightyapt to get its shape from the wearer inside. Why, thar ain't any text sopeaceable that it ain't drawn blood from somebody. "

"All the same I shan't go a step without you, " persisted the girl. 

"Then find my stick an' straighten my collar. Or had I better put on mySunday black?"

"No, I like you as you are--only let me smooth your hair a little. Runahead, Patsey, and say we're both coming. "

Slipping her arm in his, she led him through the orchard, where thebluebirds were fluting blissfully in the apple-trees. To the heart ofeach spring was calling--but to Molly it meant promise and to Reubenremembrance. Though the bluebirds sang only one song, they brought tothe old man and to the girl a different music. 

"I've sometimes thought Mr. Mullen better suited to you than Abel, Molly, " said Reuben presently, uttering an idea that had come to himmore than once. "If you'd been inclined to fancy him, I don't believeeither Mrs. Gay or Miss Kesiah could have found any fault with him. "

"But you know I couldn't care for him, grandfather, " protested Mollyimpatiently. "He is like one of Mrs. Bottom's air plants that growwithout any roots. "

"Well, he's young yet an' his soul struts a trifle, but wait tillhe's turned fifty an' he'll begin to be as good a Christian as he is aparson. It's a good mould, but he congealed a bit too stiff when he waspoured into it. "

They reached the grape arbour as he finished, and a minute laterAbednego lead them into the library, where Kesiah placed Reuben in acomfortable chair and hastened to bring him a glass of wine from thesideboard. At Molly's entrance, Gay and Mr. Chamberlayne came forward toshake hands with her, while Mrs. Gay looked up from her invalid's couchand murmured her name in a gentle, reproachful voice. The pale bluecircles around the little lady's eyes and faintly smiling mouth were theonly signs of the blighting experience through which she had passed. Asshe turned her angelic gaze on old Jonathan's daughter there was not aninstant's doubt in the minds of those about her that she would acceptthe blow with the suffering sweetness that enhanced her beauty. 

"We wanted to give you a little reminder of us on your birthday, Molly, "she said, taking up an amethyst cross on a slender chain from the tablebeside her, "and Jonathan thought you would like a trinket to wear withyour white dresses. "

"I was right, wasn't I, cousin?" asked Gay, with his genial smile. 

Mrs. Gay flushed slightly at the word, while Reuben cast a gratefulglance at him over the untasted glass of wine in his hand. 

Without drawing a step nearer, Molly stood there in the centre of theroom, nervously twisting her handkerchief in and out of her fingers. She was physically cramped by her surroundings, and the reproachfulgentleness in Mrs. Gay's face embarrassed her only less than did theintimate pleasantry of Jonathan's tone. Every detail of the library--therichness and heaviness of the furniture, the insipid fixed smiles in thefamily portrait, the costly fragility of the china ornaments--all theseseemed to unite in some occult power which overthrew her self-possessionand paralyzed her emotions. 

Pitying her shyness, Gay took the chain from his mother's hand, and, slipping it around Molly's neck, fastened it under the bunch of curlsat the back. Then he patted her encouragingly on the shoulder, while hespoke directly to Reuben. 

"It looks well on her don't you think, Mr. Merryweather, " he inquired. 

"Yes, it's a pretty gift an' she's much obliged to all of you, " repliedReuben, with the natural dignity which never deserted him. "She's a goodgirl, Molly is, " he added simply. "For all her quick words an' waysthar ain't a better girl livin'. "

"We are very sure of that, " said Mr. Chamberlayne, speaking in Gay'splace. "She is a kinswoman any of us may be proud of owning. " And goinga step nearer to her, he began explaining her father's wishes in theshortest words at his command. 

They were all kind--all honestly anxious to do their duty in aiding theatonement of old Jonathan. Their faces, their voices, their gestures, revealed an almost painful effort to make her appear at ease. Yet inspite of their irreproachable intentions, each one of them was perfectlyaware that the visit was very far from being a success. They admired hersincerely, but with the exception of Gay, who was bothered by few moralprejudices, they were one and all nervously constrained in manner. ToMr. Chamberlayne she represented merely an attractive object of charity;to Kesiah she appeared as an encroaching member of the inferior order;to Mrs. Gay she embodied the tragic disillusionment of her life. In timethey would either forget these first impressions or grow accustomed tothem; but while she stood there, awkward and blushing, in the middle ofthe library, where old Jonathan had worked out his repentance, even thelawyer found his legal eloquence tripping confusedly on his tongue, andturned at last in sheer desperation to stare with a sensation of reliefat the frowning countenance of Kesiah. When, after a hesitating word ofthanks, the girl held out her hand to Reuben, and they went away arm inarm, as they had come, a helpless glance passed from Jonathan to Mrs. Gay and from Mrs. Gay into vacancy. 

"Like most eccentric bequests made in moments of great moral purpose, it was, of course, a mistake, " said the lawyer. "Had Jonathan known thecharacter of the miller, he would certainly have had no objection toMolly's choice--if she has, indeed, a serious fancy for the young man, which I doubt. But in his day, we must remember, the Revercombs hadgiven little promise of either intelligence or industry except in themother. Granting this, " he added thoughtfully, "it might be possibleto have the conditions set aside, but not without laying bare a scandalwhich would cause great pain to sensitive natures---"

He glanced sympathetically at Mrs. Gay, who responded almostunconsciously to the emotional suggestion of his ideal of her. 

"Oh, never that! I could not bear that!" she exclaimed. 

"The whole trouble comes of the insane way people arrange the future, "remarked Jonathan with irritation. "He actually believed, I dare say, that he was assuring the girl's happiness by that ridiculous document. But for mother I'd fight the thing in the courts and then give Molly hershare outright and let her marry the miller. "

The lawyer shook his head slowly, with his eyes on Mrs. Gay. "Before allelse we must consider your mother, " he answered. 

For the first time Kesiah spoke. "I am quite willing to take the girlwhen Reuben dies, " she said, "but why in the world did he put in thatfoolish clause about her living with Jonathan and myself?"

Without looking at her Mr. Chamberlayne answered almost sharply. "Thewhole truth of the matter is that there was a still more absurd ideain his mind, dear lady, " he replied. "I may as well let you know itnow since I combated it uselessly in my last interview with him. At thebottom of his heart Jonathan remained incorrigibly romantic until hisdeath, and he clung desperately to the hope that if Molly receivedthe education he intended her to have, her beauty and her charm, whichseemed to him very remarkable, might win his nephew's affections, ifshe were thrown in his way. That in short, is the secret meaning of thisextraordinary document. "

The uncomfortable silence was broken by a laugh as Gay rose to his feet. "Well, of all the ridiculous ideas!" he exclaimed in the sincerity ofhis amusement. 

CHAPTER XVIII

THE SHADE OF REUBEN

Arm in arm Reuben and Molly walked slowly home through the orchard. Neither spoke until the old man called to Spot at his doorstep, andthen Molly noticed that his breath came with a whistling sound that wasunlike his natural voice. 

"Are you tired, grandfather? What is the matter?"

"It's my chest, daughter. Let me sit down a while an' it will pass. Whois that yonder on the bench?"

"Old Mr. Doolittle. Wait here a minute before you speak to him. "

It was a perfect spring afternoon, and the air was filled with vague, roving scents, as if the earth exhaled the sweetness of hidden flowers. In the apple orchard the young grass was powdered with gold, and thelong grey shadows of the trees barred the ground like the sketchyoutlines in a impressionist painting. 

On a bench at one end of the porch old Adam was sitting, and at sight ofthem, he rose, and stood waiting with his pipe in his hand. 

"As 'twas sech a fine day an' thar warn't any work on hand for a man ofmy years, I thought I'd walk over an' pay my respects to you, " he said. "I've heard that 'twas yo' granddaughter's birthday an' that she's liketo change her name befo' it's time for another. "

"Well, I'm glad to see you, old Adam, " replied Reuben, sinking into achair while he invited his visitor to another. "I've gone kind of faint, honey, " he added, "an' I reckon we'd both like a sip of blackberry wineif you've got it handy. Miss Kesiah gave me something to drink, but mythroat was so stiff I couldn't swallow it. "

The blackberry wine was kept in a large stone crock in the cellar, andwhile she filled the glasses, Molly heard the voice of old Adam droningon above the chirping of the birds in the orchard. 

"I've been settin' here steddyin' them weeds out thar over-runnin'everything, " he was saying, "an' it does appear to a considerin' bodythat the Lord might have made 'em good grass an' grain with preciouslittle trouble to Himself an' a mortal lot of satisfaction to the po'farmers. "

"He knows best. He knows best, " responded Reuben. 

"Well, I used to think that way befo' I'd looked into the matter, "rejoined the other, "but the deeper I get, the less reason I see to besartain sure. 'Tis the fashion for parsons, an' for some people outsideof the pulpit, to jump to conclusions, an' the one they've jumped thefarthest to get at, is that things are all as they ought to be. If youain't possessed of the gift of logic it takes with you, but if you arepossessed of it, it don't. Now, I tell you that if a farmer was to tryto run his farm on the wasteful scale on which this world is conducted, thar wouldn't be one among us as would trust him with next season'scrops. 'Tis sech a terrible waste that it makes a frugal mind sick tosee it. "

"Let's be thankful that it isn't any worse. He might have made it so, "replied Reuben, shocked by his neighbour's irreverence, yet too modestto dispute it with authority. 

"Now, if that's logic I don't know what logic is, though I was born withthe gift of it, " retorted old Adam. "When twenty seeds rot in the groundan' one happens up, thar're some folks as would praise the Lord forthe one and say nothin' about the twenty. These same folks are foreverdrawin' picturs of wild things hoppin' an' skippin' in the woods, as ifthey ever had time to hop an' skip when they're obleeged to keep oneeye on the fox an' the hawk an' t'other on the gun of the hunter. Yetto hear Mr. Mullen talk in the pulpit, you'd think that natur was allhoppin' an' skippin'. "

"You're a wicked unbeliever, " said Reuben, mildly sorrowful, "an' youought to go home and pray over your thankless doubts. "

"I'm as I was made, " rejoined the other. "I didn't ax to be bornan' I've had to work powerful hard for my keep. " Taking the glass ofblackberry wine from Molly's hand, he smacked his lips over it withlingering enjoyment. 

"Do you feel better, grandfather?" inquired the girl, in the pause. 

"The wine does me good, honey, but thar's a queer gone feelin' insideof me. I'm twenty years younger than you, old Adam, but you've got mo'youth left in you than I have. "

"'Tis my powerful belief in the Lord, " chuckled the elder, wiping hismouth with the back of his hand and placing the glass on the end of thebench. "No, no, Reuben, when it comes to that I ain't any quarrel withfolks for lookin' al'ays at the pleasant side, but what staggers me iswhy they should take it as a merit to themselves when 'tis nothin' lessthan a weakness of natur. A man might jest as well pride himself that hecan't see out of but one eye or hear out of but one ear as that he can'tsee nothin' but good when evil is so mixed up into it. Thar ain't allof us born with the gift of logic, but even when we ain't we might setsilent an' listen to them that is. "

A south wind, rising beyond the river, blew over the orchard, and thebarred shadows swung back and forth on the grass. 

"'Tis the eye of sense we see with, " remarked Reuben quietly. 

"Eh, an' 'tis the eye of sense you're weak in, " responded old Adam. "Iknew a blind man once that had a pictur of the world in his mind jest assmooth an' pretty as the views you see on the backs of calendars--withall the stink-weeds an' the barren places left out of it--an' he used totalk to us seein' ones for all the earth as if he were better acquaintedwith natur than we were. "

"I ain't larned an' I never pretended to be, " said Reuben, piously, "butthe Lord has used me well in His time an' I'm thankful to Him. "

"Now that's monstrous odd, " commented the ancient cynic, "for lookin' atit from the outside, I'd say He'd used you about as bad as is His habitin general. "

He rose from the bench, and dusted the seat of his blue overalls, while he gazed sentimentally over the blossoming orchard. "'Tis theseventeenth of April, so we may git ahead with plantin', " he remarked. "Ah, well, it's a fine early spring an' puts me in mind of seventy yearsago when I was courtin'. Thar ain't many men, I reckon, that canenjoy lookin' back on a courtin' seventy years after it is over. 'Tissurprisin' how some things sweeten with age, an' memory is one of 'em. "

Reuben merely nodded after him as he went, for he had grown too tiredto answer. A curious stillness--half happiness, half indifference--wasstealing over him, and he watched as in a dream, the blue figure of oldAdam hobble over the sun-flecked path through the orchard. A few minuteslater Molly flitted after the elder, and Reuben's eyes followed her withthe cheerful look with which he had faced seventy years of life. On arush mat in the sunshine the old hound flicked his long black ear at afly of which he was dreaming, and from a bower of ivy in the eaves therecame the twitter of sparrows. Beyond the orchard, the wind, blowing fromthe marshes, chased the thin, sketchy shadows over the lawn at Jordan'sJourney. 

While he sat there Reuben began to think, and as always, his thoughtswere humble and without self-consciousness. As he looked underthe gnarled boughs of the orchard, he seemed to see his whole lifestretching before him--seventy years--all just the same except thatwith each he appeared a little older, a little humbler, a little lessexpectant that some miracle might happen and change the future. At theend of that long vista, he saw himself young and strong, and filled witha great hope for something--he hardly knew what--that would make thingsdifferent. He had gone on, still hoping, year by year, and now atthe end, he was an old, bent, crippled man, and the miracle had neverhappened. Nothing had ever made things different, and the great hope haddied in him at last as the twenty seeds of which old Adam had spoken haddied in the earth. He remembered all the things he had wanted that hehad never had--all the other things he had not wanted that had made uphis life. Never had a hope of his been fulfilled, never had an eventfallen out as he had planned it, never had a prayer brought him theblessing for which he had prayed. Nothing in all his seventy years hadbeen just what he had wanted--not just what he would have chosen if thechoice had been granted him--yet the sight of the birds in the appletrees stirred something in his heart to-day that was less an individualnote of rejoicing than a share in the undivided movement of life whichwas pulsing around him. Nothing that had ever happened to him as ReubenMerryweather would he care to live over; but he was glad at the end thathe had been a part of the spring and had not missed seeing the littlegreen leaves break out in the orchard. 

And then while he sat there, half dreaming and half awake, the stillnessgrew suddenly full of the singing of blue birds. Spring blossomedradiantly beneath his eyes, and the faint green and gold of the meadowsblazed forth in a pageant of colour. 

"I'm glad I didn't miss it, " he thought. "That's the most that can besaid, I reckon--I'm glad I didn't miss it. "

The old hound, dreaming of flies, flapped his long ears in the sunshine, and a robin, hopping warily toward a plate of seed-cakes on the arm ofReuben's chair, winged back for a minute before he alighted suspiciouslyon the railing. Then, being an old and a wise bird, he advanced again, holding his head slightly sideways and regarding the sleeping man witha pair of bright, inquisitive eyes. Reassured at last by the silence, heuttered a soft, throaty note, and flew straight to the arm of the chairin which Reuben was sitting. With his glance roving from the quiet manto the quiet dog, he made a few tentative flutters toward the plate ofcake. Then, gathering courage from the adventure, he hopped deliberatelyinto the centre of the plate and began pecking greedily at the scatteredcrumbs. 

CHAPTER XIX

TREATS OF CONTRADICTIONS

As Molly passed down the Haunt's Walk, it seemed to her, also, that thespring had suddenly blossomed. A moment before she had not knownthat the path she trod was changing to emerald, that the meadows werespangled with wild-flowers, that the old oaks on the lawn were blushingin rose and silver. For weeks these miracles had happened around her, and she had not noticed. As oblivious to them as old Adam Doolittle was, she had remembered only that her birthday came on the seventeenth ofApril, when, except for some luckless mishap, the promise of the springwas assured. 

A red-winged blackbird darted like a flame across the path in front ofher, and following it into the open, she found Kesiah gathering wildazalea on the edge of the thicket. 

At the girl's approach, the elder woman rose from her stooping posture, and came forward, wearing a frown, which, after the first minute, Mollysaw was directed at the sunlight, not at herself. Kesiah's long, sallowface under the hard little curls of her false front, had neverappeared more grotesque than it did in the midst of the delicate springlandscape. Every fragile blossom, every young leaf, every blade ofgrass, flung an insult at her as she stood there frowning fiercely atthe sunbeams. Yet only five minutes before she had suffered a sharprecrudescence of soul--of that longing for happiness which is a partof the resurrection of the spring, and which may survive not only theknowledge of its own fruitlessness, but a belief in the existence of thevery happiness for which it longs. All the unlived romance in her hearthad come to life with the young green around her. Middle-age had notdeadened, it had merely dulled her. For the pang of desire is not, after all, the divine prerogative of youth, nor has it even a consciousrelation to the possibility of fulfilment. Her soul looked out of hereyes while she gazed over the azalea in her hand--yet, in spite of thesongs of the poets, the soul in her eyes did not make them beautiful. 

"I came down with Jonathan, Molly, " she said. "You will doubtless findhim at the brook. " For an instant she hesitated in confusion and thenadded hurriedly, "We were speaking about you. "

"Were you?" asked Molly a little awkwardly, for Kesiah alwaysembarrassed her. 

"We were both saying how much we admired your devotion to yourgrandfather. One rarely finds such attachment in the young to the old. "

"I have always loved him better than anybody except mother. "

"I am sure you have, and it speaks very well for both of you. We are allmuch interested in you, Molly. "

"It's kind of you to think about me, " answered Molly, and her voice wasconstrained as it had been when she spoke in the library at Jordan'sJourney. 

"We feel a great concern for your future, " said Kesiah. "Whatever we cando to help you, we shall do very gladly. I always felt a peculiar pityand sympathy for your mother. " Her voice choked, for it was, perhaps, as spontaneous an expression of her emotions as she had ever permittedherself. 

"Thank you, ma'am, " replied Molly simply, and the title of respect towhich Reuben had trained her dropped unconsciously from her lips. Shehonestly liked Kesiah, though, in common with the rest of her littleworld, she had fallen into the habit of regarding her as a person whomit was hardly worth one's while to consider. Mrs. Gay had so completelyeffaced her sister that the rough edges of Kesiah's character werehardly visible beneath the little lady's enveloping charm. 

"It is natural that you should have felt bitterly toward your father, "began the older woman again in a trembling voice, "but I hope yourealize that the thought of his wrong to you and your mother saddenedhis last hours. "

To her surprise Molly received the remark almost passionately. 

"How could that give me back my mother's ruined life?" she demanded. 

"I know, dear, but the fact remains that he was your father---"

"Oh, I don't care in the least about the fact, " retorted Molly, with herpretty rustic attempt at a shrug, which implied, in this case, that thegovernment of nature, like that of society, rested solely on the consentof the governed. What was clear to Kesiah was that this rebellionagainst the injustice of the universe, as well as against the expiationof Mr. Jonathan, was the outcome of a strong, though undisciplined, moral passion within her. In her way, Molly was as stern a moralist asSarah Revercomb, but she derived her convictions from no academic systemof ethics. Kesiah had heard of her as a coquette; now she realized thatbeneath the coqueteries there was a will of iron. 

"You must come to us, some day, dear, and let us do what we can to makeyou happy, " she said. "It would be a pity for all that money to go tothe conversion of the Chinese, who are doubtless quite happy as theyare. "

"I wonder why he chose the Chinese?" replied the girl. "They seem sofar away, and there's poor little Mrs. Meadows at Piping Tree who isstarving for bread. "

"He was always like that--and so is my sister Angela--the thing thatwasn't in sight was the thing he agonized over. " She did not confessthat she had detected a similar weakness in herself, and that, seen theworld over, it is the indubitable mark of the sentimentalist. 

Analysis of Mr. Jonathan's character, however, failed to interest hisdaughter. She smiled sweetly, but indifferently, and made a movement topass on into the meadow. Then, looking into Kesiah's face, she said ina warmer voice: "If ever you want my help about your store room, MissKesiah, just send for me. When you're ready to change the brine on yourpickles, I'll come down and do it. "

"Thank you, Molly, " answered the other; "you're a nice light hand forsuch things. "

In some almost imperceptible manner she felt that the girl had rebuffedher. The conversation had been pleasant enough, yet Kesiah had meantto show in it that she considered Molly's position changed since theevening before; and it was this very suggestion that the girl had tossedlightly aside--tossed without rudeness or malice, but with a firmness, a finality, which appeared to settle the question forever. Theacknowledged daughter of Mr. Jonathan Gay was determined that sheshould continue to be known merely as the granddaughter of his overseer. Kesiah's overtures, had been--well, not exactly repulsed, but certainlyignored; her advice had melted to thin air as soon as it was spoken. As Molly flitted from her over the young weeds in the meadow, the olderwoman stood looking after her with a heaviness, like the weight ofunshed tears, in her eyes. Not the girl's future, but her own, appearedto her barren of interest, robbed even of hope. The spirit that combats, she saw, had never been hers--nor had the courage that prevails. Forthis reason fate had been hard to her--because she had never yielded topressure--because she had stepped by habit rather than choice into thevacant place. She was a good woman--her heart assured her of this--shehad done her duty no matter what it cost her--and she had possessed, moreover, a fund of common sense which had aided her not a little indoing it. It was this common sense that told her now that facts were, after all, more important than dreams--that the putting up ofpickles was a more useful work in the world than the regretting ofpossibilities--that the sordid realities were not less closely woveninto the structure of existence than were the romantic illusions. Shetold herself these things, yet in spite of her words she saw her futurestretching away, like her past, amid a multitude of small duties forwhich she had neither inclination nor talent. One thing after another, all just alike, day after day, month after month, year after year. Nothing ahead of her, and, looking back, nothing behind her that shewould care to stop and remember. "That's life, " she said softly toherself and went on her way, while Molly, glancing back, beheld her onlyas a blot on the sunshine. 

"Poor Miss Kesiah, " the girl thought before she forgot her. "I wonder ifshe's ever really lived?"

Then the wonder fled from her mind, for, as a shadow fell over her path, she looked up, startled, into the eyes of Gay, who had burst suddenlyout of the willows. His face was flushed and he appeared a trifleannoyed. As he stopped before her, he cut sharply at the weeds with asmall whip he carried. 

"Don't, please, " she said; "I hate to see people cut off the heads ofinnocent things. "

"It is rather beastly, " her returned, his face clearing. "Did you comeout to find me, cousin?"

"Why should I, Mr. Jonathan?"

"You don't soften the blow--but why 'Mr. Jonathan'?"

"I thought it was your name. "

"It's not my name to you--I say, Molly, do you mind my telling you thatyou're a brick?"

"Oh, no, not if you feel like it. "

"I do feel like it tremendously. "

"Then I don't mind in the least, " and to prove it she smiled radiantlyinto his face. Her smile was the one really beautiful thing about Molly, but as far as her immediate purpose went it served her as successfullyas a host. 

"By George, I like your devotion to the old chap!" he exclaimed. "I hopea girl will stick by me as squarely when I am beginning to totter. "

"Have you ever been as good to one?" she asked quite seriously, andwondered why he laughed. 

"Well, I doubt if I ever have, but I'd like very much to begin. "

"You're not a grandfather, Mr. Jonathan. "

"No, I'm not a grandfather--but, when I come to think of it, I'm acousin. "

She accepted this with composure. "Are you?" she inquired indifferentlyafter a minute. 

While she spoke he asked himself if she were really dull, or if shehad already learned to fence with her exrustic weapons? Her face wasbrimming with expression, but, as he reminded himself, one never couldtell. 

"I haven't any cousin but you, Molly. Don't you think you can agree totake me?"

She shook her head, and he saw, or imagined he saw, the shadow of herindignant surprise darken her features. 

"I've never thought of you as my cousin, " she answered. 

"But I am, Molly. "

"I don't think of you so, " she retorted. Again, as in the caseof Kesiah's advances, she was refusing to constitute a law by heracknowledgment. 

"Don't you think if you tried very hard you might begin to?"

"Why should I try?"

"Well, suppose we say just because I want you to. "

"That wouldn't help me. I can't feel that it would make any difference. "

"What I want, you mean?"

"Yes, what you want. "

"Aren't you a shade more tolerant of my existence than you were atfirst?"

"I suppose so, but I've never thought about it--any more than I'vethought of this ten thousand a year. It's all outside of my life, butgrandfather's in it. "

"Don't you ever feel that you'd like to get outside of it yourself? Theworld's a big place. "

For the first time she appeared attentive to his words. 

"I've often wondered what it was like--especially the cities--New York, Paris, London. Paris is the best, isn't it?"

"Yes, Paris is the best to me. Have you ever thought that you'd like towear pretty gowns and drive through a green park in the spring--filledwith other carriages in which are wonderful women?"

"But I'd feel so miserable and countrified, " she answered. "Are they anyhappier than I am--those wonderful women?"

"Perhaps not so happy--there's a green-eyed dragon gnawing at the heartsof most of them, and you, my nut-brown beauty, have never felt hisfangs. "

"I'd like to see them, " she said after a minute, and moved slowlyonward. 

"Some day you may. Look here, Molly, " he burst out impulsively, "I'm notgoing to be sentimental about you. I haven't the least idea of makinglove to you--I've had enough of that sort of rot, God knows--but I dolike you tremendously, and I want to stand to you as a big brother. Inever had a sister, you know, " he added. 

Something earnest and tender in his voice touched her generosity, whichoverflowed so easily. 

"And I never had a brother, " she rejoined. 

"Then, that's where I'll come in, little cousin, " he answered gently, and drawing her to him, kissed her cheek with a caress which surprisedhim by its unlikeness to the ordinary manifestations of love. 

His hand was still on her shoulder, when he felt her start back from hisgrasp, and, turning quickly in the direction of her glance, he saw themiller looking at them from the thicket on the opposite side of thebrook. The anger in Abel's face had distorted his handsome featuresuntil they appeared swollen as if from drink, and for a single instantGay imagined that it was indeed whisky and not passion that had wroughtso brutal a change in him. 

"So you've made a fool of me, too, Molly?" he said when he had swungover the stream and stood facing her. 

"You're all wrong, Revercomb, " began Gay, and stopped the next instant, because Molly's hand had shot out to silence him. 

"Will you be quiet?" she flung at him impatiently; and then fixing hereyes on Abel, she waited silently for him to finish his speech. Thather lover's fiery temper had aroused her own, Gay realized as soon as heturned to her. Her face was pale, but her eyes blazed and never had hefelt so strongly the tie of blood that united them as he did while shestood there waiting for Abel's accusations with a gesture which appearedto fling them back in disdain. 

"I might have known 'twas all fool's play with you--I might have knownyou had flirted too much to settle down to an honest love, " said Abel, breathing hard between his word as if each one were torn from him with aphysical wrench at his heart. In losing his self-possession he hadlost his judgment as well, and, grasping something of his love from thesincerity of his emotion, Gay made another ineffectual effort to presentthe situation in a fairer light. 

"If you would only listen, my good fellow--if you would only let meexplain things---" he began. 

"Will you be quiet?" said Molly a second time, and then facing himpassionately she threw him a gesture of dismissal. "If you want toplease me, you will go. "

"And leave you alone with him?"

She laughed. "Do you think I'm afraid of an angry man, or that I'venever seen one before?"

With that he obeyed her, turning from time to time on his way over themeadow to make sure that she did not need his support. In spite of theutter unreasonableness of the affair, in some unaccountable way hissympathies were on the side of the miller. The fellow was a boor, ofcourse, but, by Jove! he was a magnificent boor. It had been long sinceGay had seen such an outburst of primitive feeling--long since he hadcome so close to the good red earth on which we walk and of which we aremade. 

"You're out of your head, Abel, " said Molly--Gay turned away fromthem--and the tone in which she spoke was hardly calculated to bring himback to the place he had deserted. "You will say things you'll regret, but I'll never forgive. "

"I'm sick of your eternal forgiveness, " he retorted. "I've been forgivenevery time you got into a temper, and I suppose I'll be forgiven nextevery time you are kissed. " The "rousing" which had threatened everyRevercomb was upon him at last. 

"Well, as a matter of fact it is time enough for you to forgive me whenI ask you to, " she returned. 

"You needn't ask. It's too much this time, and I'll be damned before Iwill do it. "

Bending over a grey skeleton of last year's golden-rod, she caressed itgently, without breaking its ghostly bloom. Years afterward, when shehad forgotten every word he uttered, she could still see that driedspray of golden-rod growing against the April sky--she could still heara bluebird that sang three short notes and stopped in the willows. Inthe quiet air their anger seemed to rush together as she had sometimesthought their love had rushed to a meeting. 

"You have neither the right to forgive me nor to judge me, " she said. "Do you think I care what a man imagines of me who believes a thingagainst me as easily as you do. If you went on your knees to me now Ishould never explain--and if I chose to kiss every man in the county, "she concluded in an outburst of passion, "you have nothing to do withit!"

"Explain? How can a girl explain a man's kissing her, except by sayingshe let him do it?"

"I did let him do it, " she gasped. 

For an instant they gazed at each other in an anger more violent in itsmanifestation than their love had been. An observer, noticing them forthe first time, would have concluded that they had hated each other foryears, not that they had been lovers only a few minutes before. Nature, having wearied of her play, was destroying her playthings. 

"I would marry no man on earth who wouldn't believe me in spite ofthat--and everything else, " she said. 

"Do you expect a man to believe you in spite of his eyes?"

"Eyes, ears--everything! Do you think I'd have turned on you like thatbefore I had heard you?"

A sob, not of pity, but of rage, burst from her lips, and the soundsobered him more completely than her accusations had done. Her temper hecould withstand, but that little childish sob, bitten back almost beforeit escaped, brought him again on his knees to her. 

"I can't understand--oh, Molly, don't you see I am in torment?" hecried. 

But the veil of softness was gone now, and the cruelty that is bound upin some inexplicable way in all violent emotion--even in the emotion oflove--showed itself on the surface. 

"Then stay there, for you've made it for yourself, " she answered, andturned away from him. As his voice called her again, she broke into arun, flying before him over the green meadow until she reached the lawnof Jordan's Journey, and his pursuit ended. Then, hurrying through theorchard and up the flagged walk, she ascended the steps, and bent overReuben in his chair. 

"Grandfather, I am back. Are you asleep?"

The robin that had flown from the railing at her approach swung on thebough of an apple-tree and regarded her with attention. 

"Grandfather, " she said again, touching him, "oh, grandfather, wake up!"

CHAPTER XX

LIFE'S IRONIES

When he came down to breakfast next morning, Abel heard of Reuben'sdeath from his mother. 

"Well, you can't tell who's goin' to be the next, " she concluded grimly, as she poured the coffee. 

In spite of her austere manner and her philosophical platitude, Sarahwas more moved in her heart than she had dared to confess. From themoment that she had heard of Reuben's death--when she had gone over withsome of her mourning to offer Molly--she had ceased to think of himas an old man, and her mind had dwelt upon him as one who had beenruthlessly cut off in his prime--as he might have been had the end comesome thirty or forty years before. Memory, that great miracle worker, had contrived to produce this illusion; and all Sarah's hard commonsense could not prevent her feeling an indignant pity because Reuben'spossibilities of happiness had been unfulfilled. Trouble after troubleand never anything to make up for them, and then to go this way while hewas resting! "It's like that, " she thought bitterly to herself, alludingto life. "It's like that!" And it seemed to her suddenly that the wholeof existence was but a continual demonstration of the strong religiousdogmas on which her house of faith had been reared. When you lookedaround you, she thought, with triumph, there wasn't any explanation ofthe seeming injustice except original sin. There was a strange comfortin this conviction, as though it represented the single reality to whichshe could cling amid the mutable deceptions of life. "Thar wouldn'tbe any sense in it if 'twarn't for that, " she would sometimes say toherself, as one who draws strength from a secret source of refreshment. 

In Abel the news of Reuben's death awoke a different emotion, and hisfirst thought was of Molly. He longed to comfort her in his arms, andthe memory of the quarrel of yesterday and even of the kiss that led toit seemed to increase rather than diminish this longing. 

Rising from his untasted breakfast, he hurriedly swallowed a cup ofcoffee and took up his hat. 

"I am going to see Molly, mother; would you like to send a message?"

Blossom, who was gazing out of the window with her eyes full of dreams, turned at his words. 

"Give her my love, Abel, " she said. 

"Tell her he was a good man and had fewer sins to his account than mostof us, " added Sarah. 

"Did you know, Abel, that old Mr. Jonathan left her ten thousand dollarsa year as long as she lives with the Gays?" asked Blossom, coming overto where he stood. 

He stared at her in amazement. "Where on earth did you hear that?" heasked. 

A flush reddened her face. 

"Somebody told me. I forget just who it was, " she replied. 

"When did it happen? How long have you known it?"

But she was on her guard now, wrapped in that soft, pale reticence whichwas the spiritual aspect of her beauty. 

"It may have been only one of the darkies' stories. I didn't pay muchattention to it, " she answered, and busied herself about the geraniumsin the window. 

"Oh, you can't put any faith in the darkies' tales, " rejoined Abel, andafter leaving a message with his mother for a farmer with whom he hadan appointment, he hastened out of the house and over the fields in thedirection of Reuben Merryweather's cottage. Here, where he had expectedto find Molly, Kesiah met him, with some long black things over her arm, and a frown of anxious sympathy on her face. 

"The child is broken-hearted, " she said with dignity, for a funeralwas one of the few occasions upon which she felt that she appeared toadvantage. "I don't think she can see you--but I'll go in and ask, ifyou wish it. "

She went in, returning a minute later, with the black things still overher arm, and a deeper frown on her forehead. 

"No--I'm sorry, but she doesn't wish to see any one. You know, the oldhound died the same night, and that has added to her sorrow. "

"Perhaps if I come back later?"

"Perhaps; I am not sure. As soon as the funeral is over she will come tous. You have heard, I suppose, of the change in--in her circumstances?"

"Then it is true? I heard it, but I didn't believe it. "

Molly had fled suddenly into remoteness--not Reuben's death, but Mr. Jonathan's "provision, " had swept her away from him. Like othermortals in other crises of experience, she was aware of a helpless, a rebellious, realization of the power, not of fate, but of money. Noother accident of fortune could have detached her so completely from thesurroundings in which he had known her. Though he told himself thatto think of wealth as a thing to separate them was to show a sordidbrutality of soul, he revolted the next instant from the idea that hislove should demand so great a sacrifice. Like the majority of men whohave risen to comparative comfort out of bitter poverty, he had at thesame time a profound contempt and an inordinate respect for the tangiblefact of money--a contempt for the mere value of the dollar and a respectfor the ability to take stands of which that mystic figure was thesymbol. Sarah's hard common sense, overlaid as it was by an embroideryof sentiments and emotions, still constituted the basic quality in hischaracter, and Sarah would have been the last woman in the world tothink lightly of renouncing--or of inviting another to renounce--anincome of ten thousand dollars a year. _He_ might dream that love wouldbring happiness, but she was reasonably assured that money would bringcomfort. Between the dream and the assurance there would have been, in Sarah's mind at least, small room left for choice. He had known fewwomen, and for one dreadful minute he asked himself, passionately, ifMolly and his mother could be alike?

Unconsciously to himself his voice when he spoke again had lost its ringof conviction. 

"Perhaps I may see her later?" he repeated. 

"The funeral will be to-morrow. You will be there?"

"Yes, I'll be there, " he replied; and then because there was nothingfurther for him to say, he bowed over his hat, and went down the flaggedwalk to the orchard, where the bluebirds were still singing. His miseryappeared to him colossal--of a size that overshadowed not only thespring landscape, but life itself. He tried to remember a time when hewas happy, but this was beyond the stretch of his imagination at themoment, and it seemed to him that he had plodded on year after year witha leaden weight oppressing his heart. 

"I might have known it would be like this, " he was thinking. "First, Iwanted the mill, so I'd lie awake at night about it, and then when I gotit all the machinery was worn out. It's always that way and alwayswill be, I reckon. " And it appeared to him that this terrible law ofincompleteness lay like a blight over the over the whole field of humanendeavour. He saw Molly, fair and fitting as she had been yesterdayafter the quarrel, and he told himself passionately that he wanted hertoo much ever to win her. On the ground by the brook he saw the sprayof last year's golden-rod, and the sight brought her back to him witha vividness that set his pulses drumming. In his heart he cursed Mr. Jonathan's atonement more fervently than he had ever cursed his sin. 

The next day he went to Reuben's funeral, with his mother and Blossomat his side, walking slowly across the moist fields, in which the vividgreen of the spring showed like patches of velvet on a garment of dingycloth. In front of him his mother moved stiffly in her widow's weeds, which she still wore on occasions of ceremony, and in spite of hersincere sorrow for Reuben she cast a sharp eye more than once on the hemof her alpaca skirt, which showed a brown stain where she had allowedit to drag in a forgetful moment. Only Archie was absent, but that wasmerely because he had driven over to bring one of the Halloween girls inAbel's gig. Sarah had heard him whistling in the stable at daybreak, and looking out of the window a little later she had seen him oiling thewheels of the vehicle. It had been decided at supper the evening beforethat the family as a unit should pay its respects to Reuben. FromSarah, comforting herself behind her widow's weeds with the doctrine oforiginal sin, to Archie, eager to give his sweetheart a drive, one andall had been moved by a genuine impulse to dignify as far as layin their power the ceremonial of decay. Even Abner, the silent, hadremarked that he'd "never heard a word said against Reuben Merryweatherin his life. " And now at the end of that life the neighbours hadgathered amid the ridges of green graves in the churchyard to bearwitness to the removal of a good man from a place in which he had beenhonoured. 

During the service Abel kept his eyes on Molly, who came leaningon Gay's arm, and wearing what appeared to him a stifling amount offashionable mourning. He was too ignorant in such matters to discernthat the fashion was one of an earlier date, or that the mourning hadbeen hastily gathered from cedar chests by Kesiah. The impression heseized and carried away was one of elegance and remoteness; and thelittle lonely figure in the midst of the green ridges bore no relationin his mind to the girl in the red jacket, who had responded so ardentlyto his kiss. The sunlight falling in flecks through the network oflocust boughs deepened the sense of unreality with which he watched her. 

"It's a good service as such ready-made things go, " observed Sarah asthey went homeward, "but it seems to me that a man as upright as Reubenwas is entitled to a sermon bein' preached about him when he's laid inhis grave. What's the difference between the good man and the bad, ifyou're goin' to say the same words over the one and the other? I ain'ta friend to flattery, but it can't hurt a man to have a few complimentspaid him in the churchyard, and when all's said an' done, 'lookin' forthe general Resurrection' can't be construed into a personal complimentto Reuben. "

"When a man has been as pious as that he hasn't any use for compliments, livin' or dead, " rejoined Abner. 

"Well, I ain't contendin', " replied his mother. "The Lord knows tharain't any of his kind left, the mo' 's the pity! Things have changedsence Reuben an' I was young, an' the very language Abel an' Blossomspeak is different from ours. I reckon if old Mr. Jonathan was to ridealong these roads to-day thar wouldn't be anybody, unless it was anigger, to open the gate for him. "

"You bet there wouldn't!" exclaimed Abel with fervour. 

Abner, walking at Sarah's side, wore the unnerved and anxious expressionof a man who is conscious that he is wearing his Sunday suit when it hasgrown too small to contain him. His agony was so evident that Blossom, observing it in the midst of her sentimental disturbances, remarkedaffectionately that he looked as if he "were tired to death. "

"I've got the church fidgets in my legs, " he said. "I reckon I'll getinto my everyday suit an' finish that piece of ploughin'. Are you goin'back to the mill, Abel?"

"No, I've shut down for the day, " Abel replied. The funeral had turnedhis mind into its Sunday habit of thought and he was determined that hispresent state of misery should extend reverently until the evening. Fromsome instinct, which he did not attempt to explain, it appeared morerespectful to Reuben to sit idle for the rest of the day than to followAbner's example and go out and finish his work. 

The next morning he decided to write Molly a letter, and as the ordinarypaper his mother kept at the house seemed unsuitable for delivery atJordan's Journey, he walked down to the store to purchase a few sheetsfrom Mrs. Bottoms. 

"Nothing common and cheap, " he said, "but the very best you have in thestore--such as they use in the city. "

Suspecting his purpose, she produced at once a turquoise coloured box, from which she extracted an envelope that was ornamented on the flapwith a white dove holding a true lover's knot in his beak. 

"This is the very thing you're lookin' for, " she observed, in the toneof one who is conscious of being an authority in that sphere to whichGod has called her, "the latest style in Applegate. "

Picking up the envelope he held it doubtfully toward the light in thedoorway. 

"Are you sure it isn't a little--a little loud?" he inquired wistfully. 

"Loud? Dear me, to think of you callin' a dove an' a blue ribbon bowloud! Ain't that jest like a man? They can't be expected to have tastein sech matters. No, it ain't loud!" she replied with more directcondescension. "It's the latest thing from Applegate--the girls are allcrazy about it--jest the little artistic trifle that catches a woman'seye. "

In the end, under the sting of her rebuke, though but half convinced, heconcluded the purchase and went out, bearing the box of ornamented paperunder his arm. An hour later, after the letter was written, misgivingsbesieged him anew, and he stood holding the envelope at arm's length, while he frowned dubiously at the emblematic dove on the flap. 

"It doesn't look just right to me, " he said under his breath, "but Mrs. Bottom ought to know, and I reckon she does. "

The letter went, and the next afternoon he followed it in person toJordan's Journey. Gay was coming down the walk when he reached the lawn, and after a moment's hesitation they stopped to exchange a few remarksabout the weather. 

"There's something I want to explain to you, Revercomb, " said Jonathan, wheeling back abruptly after they had parted. "Molly has become a memberof our household, you see; so my relation to her is really that of acousin. She's a staunch little soul--I've a tremendous admiration forher--but there has never been the slightest sentiment between us, youunderstand. "

"Yes, I understand, " replied Abel, and fell silent. 

There was a certain magnanimity, he recognized, in Gay's effort to putthings right even while he must have preferred in his heart to have themremain in the wrong. As Molly's cousin it was hardly probable that heshould care to hasten her marriage to a country miller. 

"Well, I wanted you to know, that was all, " said Gay in a friendly tone. "You'll find Molly in the side-garden, so I wouldn't trouble to knock ifI were you. "

He went on, swinging with an easy stride between the hedges of box, while Abel, passing the right wing in obedience to the directions, foundMolly walking up and down in a small grassy path, which was sprinkledwith snowdrops. The "side-garden" was a ruined, over-grown square, planted in miniature box, which the elder Gay had laid out after oneof his visits to Italy. Now, with its dwindling maze and its unprunedrose-bushes, it resembled a picture which has been blotted out until theoriginal intention of the artist is no longer discernible. Yet the placewas exquisite still. Spring had passed over it with her magical touch, and she had decorated the spot she could no longer restore. The scent ofbox filled the air, and little new green leaves had put out on the duskywindings of the maze. 

As Abel approached, Molly was moving slowly away from him, her longblack skirt, which had been made to fit Mrs. Gay, trailing over thesnowdrops in the path. When she turned at the end of the walk, therewas the faintest hesitancy in her manner before she came forward with asmile and an outstretched hand. In some subtle way she had changed--hefelt it before she reached him--before she uttered a word. He had neverseen her in a long dress until to-day; and in putting on Mrs. Gay's gownshe seemed to have clothed herself in that lady's appealing and pensivemanner. The black skirt, flowing between them on the grass, divided themmore completely than the memory of their quarrel. He was chilled becauseit made her appear reserved and distant; she was embarrassed becauseshe had not yet learned to walk in a train, and while it pleased andflattered her with a sense of dignity, it also caused her to feelawkward and unnatural in her movements, as if she were not "playing up"successfully to the part that had been assigned her. She had learneda good deal in three days, and she was still a little confused by theendeavour to understand all of her lessons. Sincere as her sorrow wasfor Reuben, her youth and a certain quickness of observation had kepther mindful of every change through which she had passed, of everydetail which distinguished life at the "big house" from life in theoverseer's cottage. She had learned, for instance, the necessity, insuch circumstances, of eating as if it were an utterly indifferentmatter, and yet of coming to one's meals dressed as elaborately as ifone were on one's way to church. Kesiah had taught her much; butfrom Gay, with his abundant kindliness, his self-possession, his goodclothes, she had learned incomparably more. Kesiah had shown her theexternal differences in "things, " while Gay had opened her eyes to theexternal differences that might count in men. Until she knew Gay shehad believed that the cultivation of one's appearance was a matter thatconcerned women alone. Now, when moved by some unfortunate impulse ofrespect for her mourning, Abel showed himself before her in his Sundayclothes, she was conscious of a shock which she would never have felt inthe old days in the overseer's cottage. In his working dress, with hisfine throat bared by his blue shirt, there was a splendid vitality abouther lover beside which Jonathan appeared flabby and over-weighted withflesh. But dressed in imitation of the work of Gay's London tailor, themiller lost the distinction which nature had given him without acquiringthe one conferred by society. 

"You got my letter, Molly?" he asked--and the question was unfortunate, for it reminded her not only of the letter, but of Gay's innocent jestabout the dove on the envelope. She had been ashamed at the instant, and she was ashamed now when she remembered it, for there is nothing socontagious as an active regard for the petty social values of life. Inthree days she had not only begun to lose her own crudeness--she hadattained to a certain small criticism of the crudeness of Abel. Alreadythe difference between the two men was irritating her, yet she was stillunconscious as to the the exact particular in which this difference lay. Her vision had perceived the broad distinction of class, though itwas untrained as yet to detect minute variations of manner. She knewinstinctively that Gay looked a man of the world and Abel a rustic, butthis did not shake in the least the knowledge that it was Abel, not Gay, whom she loved. 

"Yes, I got your letter, " she answered, and then she added very softly:"Abel, I've always known I was not good enough for you. "

Her tone, not her words, checked his advance, and he stood staring ather in perplexity. It was this expression of dumb questioning which hadso often reminded her of the look in the eyes of Reuben's hound, and asshe met it now, she flinched a little from the thought of the pain shewas inflicting. 

"I'm not good and faithful, Abel; I'm not patient, I'm not thrifty, I'mnot anything your wife ought to be. "

"You're all I'm wanting, anyway, Molly, " he replied quietly, but withoutmoving toward her. 

"I feel--I am quite sure we could not be happy together, " she went on, hurriedly, as if in fear that he might interrupt her before she hadfinished. 

"Do you mean that you want to be free?" he asked after a minute. 

"I don't know, but I don't want to marry anybody. All the feeling I hadwent out of me when grandfather died--I've been benumbed ever since--andI don't want to feel ever again, that's the worst of it. "

"Is this because of the quarrel?"

"Oh, know--you know, I was always like this. I'm a thing of freedom--Ican't be caged, and so we'd go on quarrelling and kissing, kissing andquarrelling, until I went out of my mind. You'd want to make me over andI'd want to make you over, like two foolish children fighting at play. "

It was true what she had said, and he realized it, even though heprotested against it. She was a thing of freedom as much as one of theswallows that flashed by in the sunlight. 

"And you don't want to marry me? You want to be free--to be rich?"

"It isn't the money--but I don't want to marry. "

"Have you ever loved me, I wonder?" he asked a little bitterly. 

For an instant she hesitated, trying in some fierce self-reproach tobe honest. "I thought so once, and I suppose I'll think so again, "she answered. "The truth is I've loved you some days, and some days Ihaven't. I've never believed much in it, you know--I wasn't that kind ofwoman. It always meant so much less to me than to others. "

It was true again, he admitted it. She had never been--and he hadalways known it--"that kind of woman. " She had safely mocked at sexonly because she had never felt its significance. From the depths of hismisery, he told himself, while he faced her, that she would be perfectif she were only a little different--if she were only "that kindof woman. " She possessed a thousand virtues, he was aware; she wasgenerous, honourable according to her lights, loyal, brave, charitable, and unselfish. But it is the woman of a single virtue, not a thousand, that a man exalts. 

"Yes, I suppose it always meant less to you than to others, " he repeateddully. 

"It wasn't my fault--why do you blame me?" she responded quickly. "Menhold a woman to blame when she doesn't love, however ill they may useher as soon as she does it. Oh, I know you're not that sort--you needn'texplain it. You are different, and this is why I am half loving you evennow. Last night when I awoke and heard a mockingbird in the cedars, I told myself that I could never be happy away from you. But whenthe light came, I wanted to see the world, and I forgot you. I'm onlytwenty-one. I'm too young to tie myself down forever. "

"My mother married when she was sixteen, " he replied, partly becausehe could think of nothing else to say at the moment, partly because hehonestly entertained the masculine conviction that the precedent in someway constituted an argument. 

"And a sensible marriage it was!" retorted Molly with scorn. "She's hada hard enough lot and you know it. " In her earnestness she had almostassumed the position of Sarah's champion. 

"Yes, I reckon it is, " he returned, wounded to the quick. "I've no rightto ask you to exchange what they offer you for a life like my mother's. "

Fulness of emotion lent dignity to his words, but if he had shownindifference instead of tenderness, it would probably have served himbetter. She was so sure of Abel--so ready to accept as a matter ofcourse the fact that she could rely on him. 

"So you want it to be all over between us?" he asked. 

"I don't want to be tied--I don't think I ought to be. " Her tone wasfirm, but she plucked nervously at a bit of crape on the sleeve of Mrs. Gay's gown. 

"Perhaps you're right, " he replied quietly. He had spoken in a stiff andconstrained manner, with little show of his suffering, yet all thewhile he felt that a band of iron was fastened across his brain, and thephysical effect of this pressure was almost unendurable. He wanted toease his swollen heart by some passionate outburst, but an obstinateinstinct, which was beyond his control, prevented his making aridiculous display of his emotion. The desire to curse aloud, to hurldefiant things at a personal deity, was battling within him, but insteadof yielding to it he merely repeated:

"I reckon you're right--it wouldn't be fair to you in the end. "

"I hope you haven't any hard feeling toward me, " she said presently, sweetly commonplace. 

"Oh no, I haven't any hard feeling. Good-bye, Molly. "

"Good-bye, Abel. "

Turning away from her, he walked rapidly back along the short grassypath over the snowdrops. As she watched him, a lump rose in her throat, and she asked herself what would happen if she were to call after him, and when he looked round, run straight into his arms? She wanted to runinto his arms, but her knowledge of herself told her that once there shewould not want to stay. The sense of bondage would follow--on his partthe man's effort to dominate; on hers the woman's struggle for theintegrity of personality. As long as he did not possess her she knewthat emotion would remain paramount over judgment--that the longing towin her would triumph over the desire to improve what he had won. Butonce surrendered, the very strength and singleness of his love wouldbring her to cage. The swallow flights and the freedom of the sky wouldbe over, and she would either beat her wings hopelessly against thebars, or learn to eat from his hand, to sing presently at his whistle. Had passion urged her, this hesitancy would have been impossible. Thenshe would either have seen none of these things, or, having seen them, she would have dared greatly. She was too cool, too clear-sighted, perhaps, for a heroine of romance. The single virtue that has fedvampire-like on the blood of the others, the abject attitude of theheart, the moral chicanery of sex--she would have none of these things. 

"I am very fond of him, but I want to live--to live, " she said, raisingher arms with a free movement to the sky, while she looked after hisfigure. "Poor Abel, " she added after a moment, "he will never get overit. "

Then, while the sigh of compassion was still on her lips, she wasarrested by a scene which occurred in the sunny meadow. From the brooka woman's form had risen like a startled rabbit at Abel's approach, wavering against the background of willows, as if uncertain whether toadvance or to retreat. The next instant, as though in obedience to somemental change, it came quickly forward and faced the miller with anupward movement of the hands to shelter a weeping face. 

"I believe--I really believe it is Judy Hatch, " said Molly to herself, and there was a faint displeasure in her voice. "I wonder what she isdoing in the willows?"

Judy Hatch it was, and at sight of Abel she had sprung up in terror fromthe edge of the brook, poised for flight like a wild thing beforethe gun of the hunter. He saw that her eyes were red and swollen fromweeping, her face puckered and distorted. The pain in his own heart wasso acute that for a moment he felt a sensation of relief in finding thathe was not alone in his agony--that the universal portion of sufferinghad not been allotted entirely to himself, as he had imagined. Had shesmiled, he would have brushed past her in silence, but because of heragitated and despairing look, he called her name, and when she turnedtoward him in bewilderment, held out his hand. It was a small accidentthat brought them together--nothing more than the fact that she hadstooped to bathe her eyes in the stream before going on to the turnpike. 

"Don't go, Judy; you're in trouble, I see, and so am I, " he said withbitterness. 

"Oh, Mr. Revercomb!" she blurted out. "I didn't want anybody to catch mein such a pass!"

"I'm not anybody, Judy; I'm a poor devil that was born without senseenough to plough his furrow straight. "

She was a plain woman, but a pretty one would have sent him off in apanic over the meadow. He had had his lesson from a pretty woman, andthe immediate effect of it was to foster the delusion that there was amysterious affinity between ugliness and virtue. 

"Tell me what it is, Judy. Can I help you?" he said kindly. 

"It's nothin'. I am always in trouble, " she answered, sobbing outrightbehind her sunbonnet. "Between pa and my stepmother, there isn't a spoton earth I can rest in. "

She looked at him and he knew immediately, from her look, thatneither Solomon Hatch nor his second wife was responsible for Judy'sunhappiness. For a mocking instant it occurred to him that she mighthave cherished a secret and perfectly hopeless passion for himself. Thatshe might be cherishing this passion for another, he did not consider atthe moment--though the truth was that her divinity inhabited not a mill, but a church, and was, therefore, she felt, trebly unapproachable. Buther worship was increased by this very hopelessness, this elevation. Itpleased her that the object of her adoration should bend always aboveher--that in her dreams he should preach a perpetual sermon and wear animperishable surplice. 

"Well, I'm sorry for you, " said Abel; "I'm sorry for you. " And indeed hewas. "You're a good, pious, virtuous girl--just the sort of a girl a manwould want for his wife. "

"I try to be good and I don't see why I should be so--so unhappy, "sobbed Judy. "There ain't a better hand for raisin' chickens and flowersand young lambs in the county. "

Again she looked up at him through her tears, and the fool that lies atthe bottom of all generous hearts rose instantly to her bait. As he hadonce been the sport of his desire, so he was to become now the sport ofhis pity. 

"Any man ought to be proud to have you for his wife, Judy, " he said. 

"Ought they, Abel?" she replied passionately, with the vision of theReverend Orlando rising in serene detachment before her. 

For a moment he gazed down at her without speaking. It was pleasant tofeel pity; it was more than pleasant to receive gratitude in return. Onthe raw wound in his heart something that was almost like a cooling balmhad been poured. 

"God knows I'm sorry for you, Judy, " he repeated; "we're both in thesame boat, so I ought to be. Come to me if I can ever help you, andyou'll find you may count on my word. "

"I--I'll remember, Abel, " she answered tearfully, but her thoughtswere of a certain pair of purple velvet slippers, begun in rivalry ofBlossom's black ones, which she was embroidering in pansies. 

As he turned away from her into the crowd of silver willows beside thebrook, she stood looking after him with the abstracted gaze of one whodwells not in the world of objects, but in the exalted realm of visions. 

CHAPTER XXI

IN WHICH PITY MASQUERADES AS REASON

As Abel crossed the poplar log he said to himself, "I shall not think ofHer again"; when he reached the end of the willows he said, "I mustnot think of Her again"; and at the beginning of the kitchen garden, hechanged this to, "I will not think of Her again. "

The scent of hyacinths, which floated from a row blooming on eitherside of the white paling gate, whipped his senses into revolt, andhe quickened his steps in a vain effort to escape from the tormentingfragrance. Yet even while he fled from his pain he knew in his heartthat he did not desire the strength to turn and renounce it--that tobanish the image of Molly from his thoughts was to drive the bloom fromthe meadow, the perfume from the air, the sunlight from the orchard. Spring became as desolate as winter when it was robbed of the thought ofher. 

By the house a late pear-tree was in blossom, and the sunshine, fallingobliquely across it, awoke a white fire in its branches, as if pilesof new fallen snow had warmed suddenly to a reflected flame. Beneathit Sarah Revercomb was sowing portulaca seeds in a rockery she had madeover a decaying stump. Her back was strained with bending, but not oncehad she stopped to gaze at the glorified pear-tree overhead. All herlife she had distinguished carefully between the aristocracy and thecommon herd of blossoms, and not all the magic gilding of the springsunshine could delude her into regarding the useful product of afruit-tree as a flower. 

"I don't see why you want to go wearin' yo' Sunday clothes every day, Abel, " she observed as he was about to pass her. 

"Why shouldn't I?" he retorted with the defiance of despair. 

Something in his voice caused the woman who had borne him to raiseherself from her stooping posture, and stare at him with an amazed andincredulous expression, as if she were asking herself when and whereshe could have given him birth. In her mental vision, which saw only onething at a time, but saw that thing with great distinctness, the ideaof love slowly presented itself as the cause of such a reversal of thenatural order as a Sunday suit on week days. Her conceptions of lifewere derived so closely from facts, or from a logic as inexorable asfacts, that she was conscious of a baffled and exasperated sensationwhen she was confronted by anything intangible which would not, as sheput it in her own mind, "get out of her way. " It was natural enough, sheknew, that a material object or condition should possess the powerto block one's progress or even to change the normal current of one'sexistence. Such things had happened a dozen times at least in herlimited experience. But when a mere emotion assumed the importanceand the reality of a solid body, she was seized by the indignantastonishment with which a mathematician might regard the differentialcalculus if it ceased suddenly to behave as he expected it to do. Shehad always controlled her own feeling with severity, and it was beyondthe power of her imagination to conceive a possible excuse--unless itwas a disordered liver--for another person's inability to do thesame. Besides, as she had often asked herself, what was the use of notcontrolling your feelings when you came to think about it?

"Thar ain't a bit of use in yo' goin' on this way over that girl, Abel, "she said presently, as an annotation to his last remark, "you'd betterjest start along about yo' work, an' put her right straight out of yo'mind. I al'ays knew thar warn't a particle of sense in it. "

There was sound reason in her advice, and he did not attempt to disputeit. The unfortunate part was, however, that in the very soundness ofher reason lay its point of offence. Philosophy was dealing again in herhigh handed fashion with emotion, and emotion, in its turn, was treatingphilosophy with an absence of that respectful consideration to whichshe was entitled. Abel knew quite as well as Sarah that there wasn't "aparticle of sense" in his thinking of Molly; but the possession of thisknowledge did not interfere in the least with either the intensity orthe persistence of his thought of her. His mind seemed to have as muchcontrol over the passion that raged in his heart as an admonishingapostle of peace has over a mob that is headed toward destruction. Atthe moment he felt that the last straw--the one burden more that hecould not bear--was to be told to follow what he admitted to be the onlyclear and rational course. Turning away from her without a reply, herushed through the open gate and across the road and the poplar log intothe friendly shelter of his mill. 

"What he needs is to wear himself out and to settle down into a sort ofquiet despair, " thought Sarah as she looked after him. Then lifting hertrowel, she returned with a sigh to the sowing of portulaca seeds in herrockery. 

In the twilight of the mill, where he was hunted through the door by thescent of flowers, he went over to the shelf of books in a corner, andtaking down the volumes one by one, turned their leaves with a tremblingand eager hand, as though he were seeking some thought so strong, sosteadying, that once having secured it, the rush of his passion wouldbeat in vain against its impregnable barrier. But the books, likeSarah, treated life in the grand manner and with the fine detachment ofphilosophy. He could get no assistance from them, because they only toldhim that he would be happier if he acted always as a rational being, andthis did not help him. They told him, also, in what seemed a burst ofunanimity, that human nature would be better and happier if it were nothuman nature, but something else. Some of the writers believed that thisresult might be attained by making many laws and some of them were ofthe opinion that the way to it was to undo a majority of the laws thatwere already made. All admitted that the world was very badly off andthat something must be done, and done very quickly, to relieve it--butthe trouble was that each writer's remedy was different from every otherwriter's, and yet each writer's was the imperative, the essential one. There was a single point on which they agreed, and that was that humannature would be better and happier if it were different. But poor humannature, having known this ever since it left the tree-tops, went on, just the same, being all the time the thing that it was obliged to be. 

"There's no help for me here, " said Abel, and moving away from theshelf, he leaned his arms in the window, and looked out on the drippingwheel and the crooked sycamore, which was decorated with little roundgreenish balls of flowers. On the hot agony in his heart the languorousSouthern spring laid a cooling and delicate touch. Beneath the throbof his pain he felt the stirring of formless, indefinite longings, halfspiritual, half physical, which seemed older and more universal than hisimmediate suffering. 

For six weeks the canker gnawed at his heart, and he gave no sign ofits presence. Then relief came to him for a few hours one day when hedrifted into a local meeting in Applegate and entered into a discussionof politics. At the end he spoke for twenty minutes, and when his speechwas over, he told himself that at last he had found something that mighttake the place of love in his life. The game of politics showed itselfto him in all the exciting allurement of a passion. 

A gentle mannered old clergyman, with a dream-haunted face and thepatient waiting attitude of one who had watched for miracles for fiftyyears, spoke to him when the meeting was breaking up, and after abrief conversation, invited him to address a club of workingmen on thefollowing Friday. Though the old clergyman had spent half a century in afutile endeavour to persuade every man to love his neighbour as himself, and thereby save society the worry and the expense of its criminalcode, he still hoped on with the divine far-sighted hope of thevisionary--hoped not because he saw anything particularly encouragingin his immediate outlook, but because it was his nature to hope and hewould probably have continued to do so had Fate been so unjust as toconsign him to an Inferno. He was one of those in whom goodness is anatural instinct, and whose existence, even in a more or less ingloriousobscurity, leavens the entire lump of humanity. Mr. Mullen, who regardedhim with the active suspicion with which he viewed all living examplesof Christian charity, spoke of him condescendingly as a "man ofimpracticable ideas"--a phrase which introduced his index prohibitory ofopinions. But the old clergyman, having attained a serviceable senseof humour, as well as a heavenly fortitude, went on quietly doing goodafter the fashion in which he was made. In his impracticable way hehad solved the problem of life by an indiscriminate application of theGolden Rule. This solution had appeared to him so simple and yet socomplete, that he had spent fifty years, with but moderate success, inpersuading others to adopt it. At the end he was not what Mr. Mullenwould have called a "shining light, " in the Church, yet his bread castupon the waters had returned to him in quantities, which, though smalland moist, were sufficient, with stringent economy, to keep body andsoul together. One of these quantities he discerned now in the eageryoung countryman, whose face accompanied him through a trying day, andhelped to brighten his self-sacrificing labours. 

To Abel, driving home some hours later in his gig, the old clergyman waspresent less as a mental image, than as a vague yet impelling influencefor good. The impression was still in his thoughts, when he overtookJudy Hatch a mile or two before reaching the crossroads, and stopped toask her to drive with him as far as her cottage. At sight of her wan andhaggard face, he felt again that impulse of pity, which seemed while itlasted to appease the violence of his suffering. 

"I haven't seen you to speak to for a long time, " he observed, as shemounted over the wheel to her place at his side. 

"Not since that day by the brook, " she answered, and flinched as if araw wound had been touched. 

Though she did not look at him, he was conscious, through some subtleundercurrent of feeling, that her spirit was drenched with the youngsummer, with the pulsing of life of the June forest and the scent ofwild grape and honeysuckle which filled the air. Her face was lifted tothe fluted leaves of a sycamore, from which the song of a thrush rippledlike running water, and which gave her, if he had only known it, alikeness to one of the minor saints in a primitive Italian painting. Solittle, however, did her passion use her body as its medium that, afterglancing casually at her parted lips, he decided that she was probablycounting the eggs she had set to hatch in her hen-house, and hesitatedto interrupt the absorbing business of her calculations. Mentally, he regarded her with the ungrudging respect which a man of any sortinstinctively yields to a woman who obviously disdains to ensnare hisjudgment in the mesh of his senses. The palpitations of her spirit werecommunicated to him in so elusive a process, that, even while he feltthe stir of his pulses, he was not aware that it was due in any measureto the woman at his side. If she had been pretty--if she had beeneven attractively plain--it would hardly have occurred to him that herintense and breathless expression was associated with the hatching ofchickens; but, like other philosophers of whom he had never heard, it was impossible for him to distinguish the qualities of thething-in-itself from the qualities of the phenomenon beneath his eyes. Had he winnowed his superficial impressions the underlying thought wouldprobably have been: "No woman with a bosom as flat as that can have anynonsense about her. " From the first moment of their meeting he had neverdoubted that it was this lack of "nonsense" which had attracted him. Heliked her evident indifference to his opinion of her, and he liked, too, her listless silence, when she sat, with clasped hands, gazing straightahead through the shadowy colonnade of the woods. Not once had hertroubled look wandered from the moist dead leaves on the ground, to themisty edges of the forest, where small wild flowers thronged in a paleprocession of pipsissewa, ladies' tresses, and Enchanter's nightshade. 

"Did you know that the Gays are in Europe?" asked Judy turning her eyeson his face for the first time. 

His heart gave a throb and was quiet. 

"No, I hadn't heard it, " he replied in an arid voice. 

"They say it's more than likely Molly will marry Mr. Jonathan. He'swaitin' on her. "

Reaching for the whip, Abel touched the mare lightly on her glossyflank. After that single pang his suffering had left him--for six weeksof sleepless nights and tormented days had exhausted his endurance andreduced him to a condition of emotional lassitude. In his briefreaction from spiritual revolt into a state of apathetic submission, heapproached his mother's permanent austerity of mind as closely as he wasever likely to do in the whole of his experience. The mere possibilityof a fresh awakening of feeling filled him with aversion. At the momenthe had as profound a distrust as Sarah of the immaterial elements; andlooking ahead, he saw his future stretching before him as firm andflat as the turnpike which he was approaching. Delight and despair wereequally distasteful to him. He shrank as instinctively from the thoughtof love as a man shrinks from re-opening an old wound which is stillsensitive to the touch, though it has ceased to ache. And so proneis human nature to affirm its inherent belief in the eternity of thepresent, that he was assured, not only that this was the most desirablepoint of view he had ever reached, but that it was entirely out of thequestion that he should ever travel beyond it to another. Forgettingthe many times when he had revolted from advice merely because it was"sensible, " he began calmly to arrange his life in accordance with thatlaw of practical expediency against which a month ago he had so hotlyrebelled. 

As they drove out of the woods, and turned into the sunken road beyondthe ordinary which led in the direction of Solomon Hatch's farm, hewithdrew his gaze from the head of his mare and looked attentively athis companion. 

"I hope you are having an easier time, Judy, " he said. 

Her eyes brimmed. "You are the only person who cares about that, Abel. "

"Why shouldn't I care? You are the best and the cleverest girl I know, "he returned. 

Her gratitude fanned his sympathy, which was beginning to smoulder, andhe felt again the pleasant sense of being in the position of benefactorrather than of the benefited. His eyes rested without shrinking on hersallow face, with the faint bluish tinge to the eyelids, and on herscant drab coloured hair, which was combed smoothly back from herforehead--and while he looked his pity clothed itself in the softer andgentler aspect of reason. "She ought to be happy, " he thought. "It'sa shame they should lead her such a life! It's a shame some good mandoesn't fall in love with her and marry her. She's really not so plain, after all. I've seen many women who were worse looking than she is. "Unknown to him, an illusion was gradually shedding colour and warmth onhis vision of her. Mentally, he had endowed her with all the sober andsaner virtues to which his present mood was committed--though he had, inreality, no better reason for so doing than the fact that she evidentlyesteemed him and that she was deserving of pity. The discordant forcesof passion no longer disturbed the calm and orderly processes of hismind, and he told himself that he saw clearly, because he saw starkimages of facts, stripped not only of the glamour of light and shade, but even of the body of flesh and blood. Life spread before him likea geometrical figure, constructed of perfect circles and absolutelyconformable to the rules and the principles of mathematics. That theseperfect circles should ever run wild and become a square was clearlyunthinkable. Because his nature was not quiescent it was impossible forhim to conceive of it in motion. 

And all the while, in that silence, which seemed so harmless while itwas, in reality, so dangerous, the repressed yet violent force inJudy wrought on his mood in which bare sense and bare thought wereunprotected by any covering of the love which had clothed them as farback as he could remember. That breathless, palpitating appeal forhappiness--an appeal which is as separate from beauty as the body offlesh is separate from the garment it wears--was drawing him slowly yetinevitably toward the woman at his side. Her silence--charged as it waswith the intoxicating spirit of June--had served the purpose of life asneither words nor gestures could have done. It had reconciled him to herpresence in the very moment that made him conscious of the strength ofhis pity. 

Presently, as they drove through the burned out clearing, she spokeagain. 

"I wonder why you are always so good to me, Abel?"

He liked the honest sound of the words, and he did not know that beforeuttering them she had debated in her heart whether it was worth whileto marry Abel since she could not marry Mr. Mullen. Marriage, havingfew illusions for her, possessed, perhaps for that reason, the greaterpractical value. She was unhappy with her stepmother in a negative way, but so impervious had she become to casual annoyances, that shehardly weighed the disadvantages of her home against the probablerelinquishment of Mrs. Mullen's washing day after her marriage to Abel. Her soul was crushed like a trapped creature in the iron grip of ahopeless passion, and her insensibility to the lesser troubles oflife was but the insensibility of such a creature to the stings of theinsects swarming around its head. The outcome of her drive with Abelaroused only a dull curiosity in her mind. Some years ago, in the daysbefore Mr. Mullen, she would probably have fallen a helpless victim tothe miller had his eyes wandered for an instant in her direction. Butthose days and that probability were now over forever. 

Unfortunately, however, it is not given to a man to look into the soulof a woman except through the inscrutable veil of his own personality. Had Abel pierced that purple calico dress and witnessed the patheticstruggle in Judy's bosom, his next words would hardly have been uttered. 

"I wish I could do something to make you happier, Judy. "

She looked at him with mysterious, brooding eyes, and he was consciousagain of the attraction, as subtile and as penetrating as a perfume, which she exhaled in the stillness, and which vanished as soon as shebroke the quivering intensity of the silence. That this attraction wasmerely the unconscious vibration of her passion for another man, whichshed its essence in solitude as naturally as a flower sheds its scent, did not occur to him. Without his newly awakened pity it could not havemoved him. With it he felt that he was powerless to resist its appeal. 

"Why shouldn't I be good to you, Judy?" he repeated. 

Tears overflowed her eyes at his words. Looking at her, he saw her notas she was, but as he desired that she should be; and this desire, heknew, sprang from his loneliness and from his need of giving sympathyto some one outside of himself. The illusion that surrounded her boreno resemblance to the illusion of love--yet it was akin to it in theswiftness and the completeness with which it was born. If any one hadtold him an hour ago that he was on the verge of marriage to Judy, hewould have scoffed at the idea--he who was the heartbroken lover ofMolly! Yet this sudden protecting pity was so strong that he foundhimself playing with the thought of marriage, as one plays in loftymoments with the idea of a not altogether unpleasant self-abnegation. He did not love Judy, but he was conscious of an overwhelming desire tomake Judy happy--and like all desires which are conceived in a fog ofuncertainty, its ultimate form depended less upon himself than it didupon the outward pressure of circumstances. 

"I sometimes think it's more than anybody can stand to go on living asI do, " said Judy, breaking the silence, "to slave an' slave an' never toget so much as a word of thanks for it. "

For a moment he said nothing. Then turning he looked hard into her humideyes, and what he saw there made him bend over and take her hand. 

"Do you think I could make you happier, Judy?" he asked. 

BOOK SECOND

THE CROSS-ROADS

CHAPTER I

IN WHICH YOUTH SHOWS A LITTLE SEASONED

Some six months after Abel's parting from Molly, he might have been seencrossing the lawn at Jordan's Journey on a windy November morning, andeven to a superficial observer it would have been evident that certainsubtle modifications had been at work in his soul. Disappointed love hadachieved this result with a thoroughness which victorious love couldnot have surpassed. Because he had lost Molly, he had resolved, in hisreturning sanity, that he would make of himself the man who might havewon Molly had she known him in his completeness. And in the act ofresolving, his character had begun to ripen into the mellowness ofmaturity. 

The day was bleak, and something of this external bleakness wasreflected in the look which he raised to the ivy draped dormer-windowsin the hooded roof. Small greyish clouds were scudding low above thewestern horizon, and the sorrel waste of broomsedge was rolling high asa sea. The birds, as they skimmed over this billowy expanse, appearedblown, despite their efforts, on the wind that swept in gusts out ofthe west. On the lawn at Jordan's Journey the fallen leaves were dancingmadly like a carnival in rough carousal. Watching them it was easy toimagine that they found some frenzied joy in this dance of death--theend to which they had moved from the young green of the bud through theopulent abundance of the summer. The air was alive with their sighing. They rustled softly under foot as Abel walked up the drive, and then, whipped by a strong gust, fled in purple and wine-coloured multitudesto the shelter of the box hedges, or, rising in flight above the nakedboughs, beat against the closed shutters before they came to restagainst the square brick chimneys on the roof. 

Beneath the trees a solitary old negro was spreading manure overthe grass, hauling it in a wheelbarrow from a pile somewhere in thebarnyard. Back and forth he passed, scattering the fine manure from hisspade until the wheelbarrow was empty, when he replenished it inthe barnyard and returned to his sprinkling. All the while he smokedsteadily a long corncob pipe, and to watch him at his task, was toreceive an impression that the hauling of manure was sufficient to fillone's life with dignity and contentment. The work appeared no longer amenial employment but a sober and serious share of the great problem ofproduction. 

"That's the way I intend to go about the work of my mill, " thought Abel, as he watched him. "When you do it like that it really makes very littledifference what you are doing. It all comes to good. " A minute beforehis thought had been on the new roller mill he had recently bought andwas now working in his primitive little building, which he had slightlyremodelled. The next thing to go, he supposed, would be the old woodenwheel, with its brilliant enamel of moss, and within five years hehoped to complete the reconstruction of his machinery on lines that werescientific rather than picturesque. His water power was good, and by thetime he could afford an entire modern equipment, he would probably haveall the grain at his door that he was ready to handle. Then he began towonder, as he had often done of late, if the work of the farm andthe mill might be left safely to Abner and Archie when he went up toRichmond to the General Assembly, in the event of his future election?Already he had achieved a modest local fame as a speaker--for his voiceexpressed the gradual political awakening of his class. Though he was inadvance of his age, it was evident, even to the drowsy-eyed, that he wasmoving in the direction whither lagging progress was bound. In the lasteighteen months he had devoured the books of the political economists, and he had sucked in theories of social philosophy as a child sucks inmilk. That the business of the politician is not to reshape theories, but to readjust conditions he was ready to admit, yet impelled by astrong religious conviction, by a belief in the determining power of apractical Christianity, he was sharing the slowly expanding dream ofhis century--the dream of a poverty enriched by knowledge, of asocial regeneration that would follow an enlightened and instructedproletariat. Ripples from the thought waves of the world had reached himin the dusty corners of his mill at Old Church. Since no man thinketh tohimself, he could no more have escaped the mental impulsion of histime than he could have arrested his embryonic development from theinvertebrate to the vertebrate. His mind being open, ideas hadentered, and having entered, they proceeded immediately to take activepossession. He was serving a distant Utopia of industrial democracy asardently as a lover serves his mistress. 

As for his actual mistress, she had become not only visionary, butenskied. Some months ago, while his wound was still fresh, he had notsuffered his thoughts to dwell on her because of the violence of thepain. Pride as well as common sense, he had told himself during thefirst weeks of his loss, demanded that he should banish her image fromhis mind. Though he had never, even in his first anger, called her"a light woman, " he had come perilously near the feeling that she hadgrazed the skirts of impropriety with a recklessness which no soberminded son of Sarah Revercomb could countenance for a minute. Hisvery success as a miller depended upon an integrity of character whichpermitted no compromise with the fundamental moralities. Youth is theperiod of harsh judgments, and a man seldom learns until he reachesthirty that human nature is made up not of simples, but of compounds. What Abel had never divined was that Molly, like himself, mightapproach the angelic in one mood and fall short of the merely human inanother--that she, also, was capable of moments of sublimation and ofhours of recusancy. There were the ashes of a poet in her soul as inhis, and to contain the ashes of a poet one must have been first thecrucible for purifying flames. 

But it was six months ago that he had condemned her, and since then thesubtle modifications had worked in his habit of thought. As the sorenesspassed from his heart, he had nursed the scar much as a crusader mighthave cherished a wound out of the Holy Wars. From the actual conditionsof life in which he had loved her, he now beheld her caught up into thezone of ideal and impossible beauty. Through the outer covering of herflesh he could see her soul shine, as the stars shone through the web ofpurple twilight on the marshes. From his earlier craving for possession, his love had grown, through frustration and disappointment, into asimpler passion for service. 

"Well, one has to find out things, " he said to himself on this Novembermorning, while he watched the old negro at his work. Some red leaveswhirled into his face, and the wind, lifting the dark hair from hisforehead, showed three heavy furrows between his knitted brows. Heappeared a little older, a little braver, a little wiser, yet there wasabout him still the look of superb physical vitality which had been theresult of a youth spent in the open fields. 

"Howdy, Uncle Boaz, " he said to the old negro, who approached with hiswheelbarrow. "Your folks have all gone away for good haven't they?"

"Hit looks dat ar way, marster, hit sutney do look dat ar way. "

"Well, you keep good grass here all the same. "

"Dar ain' but one way ter do hit, suh, en dat's ter dung hit, " repliedUncle Boaz, and he remarked a minute afterwards, as he put down thelowered handles of the wheel barrow, and stood prodding the ashes in hispipe, "I'se gwinter vote fur you, Marse Abel, I sholy is---"

"Thank you, Uncle Boaz!"

"En I'se got a sack er co'n I'd be moughty bleeged ter git ground up furhominy meal---"

With a laugh Abel passed on through the side-garden, and entered theleafless shrubbery that bordered the Haunt's Walk. The old negro haddisturbed his dream, which had been of Molly in her red stockings, withthe red ribbon binding her curls. Then he thought of Spot, the agedhound--"That dog must have lived to be seventeen years old, " he saidaloud in the effort to smother the sharp pang at his heart, "I rememberhow fond old Reuben was of him even as a puppy. He would never let himrun hares with anybody except himself. " It was seventeen years ago thatSpot was a puppy and he a boy--and now the one was dust with old Reuben, and the other had settled down so effectually that he was going to marryJudy in a fortnight. At least Judy was a good woman--nobody had eversaid a word against her--and she would make him a good wife. That, afterall, was what a farmer must think of--a good, saving wife, without anyfoolishness about her, who would be thrifty and lend a hand at his workwhen he needed it. All the rest was nonsense when once a man married. Dreams were all very well in their way, but realities and not dreams, after all, were things he must live with. Looking ahead he saw hisfuture stretching smooth and firm, like the flat white turnpike thatdragged its solid length into the distance. On that road there was noplace for the absurdity of red stockings! And so, in the absence of allelation, only the grim sense of duty in the doing soothed him as he madehis way to Solomon Hatch's cottage. 

On the back porch he found Judy deftly taking butter out of the churn, and watched her while she worked the soft lumps with a wooden paddlein a large yellow bowl. Though he would have been the last to suspectit--for passion like temptation appeared to him to beset the beautifulalone--Judy, in her homely way, was also a crucible, and the littleearthern pot of her body was near to bursting at the moment from theviolence of the flames within. She had just seen a black coated figurein a red gig spin by on the road, and for one blissful minute, she hadpermitted herself a flight of fancy, in which she was the bride, not ofAbel Revercomb, but of Orlando Mullen. To sit in that red wheeled gig, touching the sleeve of his black coat! To stitch the frayed seams in issilk waistcoat! To iron his surplices as only she could iron when thedivine fury seized her! To visit his poor and afflicted! To lift herswooning gaze every Sunday, with a sense of possession, to that pulpit!For a minute only the rapture lasted, and all the time, she went onplacidly making butter in the large yellow bowl. She was in the mood tocommit sublime follies and magnificent indiscretions. For the sake ofa drive in that red wheeled gig she would have foresworn Abel atthe altar. For the ecstasy of ironing those surplices she would haveremained a spinster forever. 

"That's nice butter, Judy, " remarked her lover, and believed that he hadpaid her a tribute peculiarly suited to the complexion of her soul. 

His gaze followed the drab sweep of her hair, which was combed straightback from her forehead. Her eyes were looking heavenward while sheworked, yet they caught no beam, no colour from her celestial visions. Small hectic blotches burned in the centre of her cheeks, and herthin lips were pressed tightly together as though she bit back a cry. Sometimes she would remain dumb for an hour in his presence, while herthoughts soared like birds in the blue region of dreams. She indulgedher imagination in grotesque but intoxicating reveries, in which shepassed nobly and with honour through a series of thrillingly romanticadventures; and, in fact, only ten minutes before Abel's arrival, shehad beheld herself and the young clergyman undergoing a rapturous, ifslightly unreal, martyrdom, as missionaries to the Chinese. 

Her dreams dropped suddenly, with broken wings, in their flight, forher stepmother, a small sickly woman, with a twisted smile, looked outthrough the dining-room window, and remarked facetiously:

"You all don't look much like a co'tin couple to my eyes. "

"I've been admiring her butter, " replied Abel, who was always undulyregardful of his English in the presence of Mrs. Hatch. 

"She's a good hand at butter when she chooses to be, but she has her upsand downs like the rest of us. "

"All of us have them, I suppose, " he rejoined, and Mrs. Hatch drew inher head. 

"I never imagined that you got put out, Judy, " he said, forgetting thetears that had led him to his sacrifice; "you always seem so quiet andsober. "

She glanced up, for there was a sound of wheels on the road, and Mr. Mullen drove by again, sitting very erect, and uncovering, with agraceful bend, to some one who was visible at the front. Her faceflushed suddenly to the colour of the brickdust, and she felt thatthe confusion in her soul must fill the universe with noise. Quiet andsober, indeed, if he could only have heard it!

But Abel was busy with his own problems, while his gaze followed Mr. Mullen's vanishing back, which had, even from a distance, a look ofslight yet earnest endeavour. He still liked the young rector for hissincerity and his uprightness, but he had found, on the whole, that hecould approach his God more comfortably when the straight and narrowshadow of the clergyman did not come between. 

"Aren't you going to pat it any more?" he asked presently, returning tohis consideration of the butter. 

Picking up a square linen cloth, Judy dipped it into a basin of brine, and, after wringing it out, carefully folded it over the yellow bowl. 

"All the buttermilk is out of it, " she answered, and thought of theunfinished pair of purple slippers laid away in tissue paper upstairs inher bureau drawer. As a married woman could she, with virtue, continueto embroider slippers in pansies for her rector? These had been laidaside on the day of her engagement to Abel, but she yearned now to riotin purple shades with her needle. While she listened with a detachedmind to Abel's practical plans for the future, her only interest inthe details lay in the fact that they would, in a measure, insure thepossibility of a yearly offering of slippers. And while they looked intoeach other's eyes, neither suspected for a moment the existence of asecret chamber in the other's soul. All appeared plain and simple on thesurface, and Judy, as well as Abel, was honestly of the opinion that sheunderstood perfectly the situation and that the passionate refusal ofher heart was the only element that threatened the conventional securityof appearances. 

She was in the morbid condition of mind when the capacity for feelingseems concentrated on a single centre of pain. Her soul revolved in acircle, and outside of its narrow orbit there was only the arid flatnesswhich surrounds any moment of vivid experience. The velvet slippers, which might have been worn by the young clergyman, possessed a vitaland romantic interest in her thoughts, but the mill and the machineryof which Abel was speaking showed to her merely as sordid and mechanicaldetails of existence. 

Looking at her suddenly, he realized that she had heard nothing of whathe was saying. If he had looked deeper still he would have seen thetragedy of her lovely little soul spinning the web of its perishingillusion. Of all the martyrdoms allotted to love's victims, she wasenduring the bitterest, which is the martyrdom of frustration. Yetbecause she appeared dull and undesirable on the surface, he haddeclined, with the rest of Old Church, to regard her emotions any lesscasually than he regarded her complexion. 

"Well, I ought to be a proud man to have you, Judy, " he remarked, androse to his feet. 

"I hope neither of us will ever regret it, " she returned. 

"Not if I can help it, " he said, and, putting his arm around her, hedrew her to him and kissed her lips. It was the second time he hadkissed her, and on the first occasion she had burst into hystericalweeping. He did not know that it was the only caress she had everreceived, and that she had wept because it had fallen so far short ofwhat her imagination had deluded her into expecting. Now, though shehad herself well in hand and gave no visible sign of her disappointment, there was a fierce, though unspoken, protest in her heart. "To thinkthat after all the nights I've lain awake an' wondered what 'twaslike, it should turn out to be so terrible flat, " she said bitterly toherself. 

"It's just a fortnight off now, Judy, " he remarked gently, if nottenderly. 

"I hope your mother will get on with me, Abel. "

"She sets great store by you now. You're pious, and she likes that eventhough you do go to the Episcopal church. I heard her say yesterday thatit was a rare thing to see a girl find as much comfort in her religionas you do. "

"You'll never want to come between me and my church work, will you, Abel? I do most of the Foreign Mission work, you know, an' I teach inSunday school and I visit the sick every Friday. "

"Come between? Why, it makes me proud of you! When I asked Mr. Mullenabout marrying us, he said: 'She's been as good as a right hand to meever since I came here, Revercomb. '"

"Tell me over again. What were his words exactly?"

"'She's been as good as a right hand to me, Revercomb, ' that was what hesaid, and he added, 'She's the salt of the earth, that's the only way todescribe her. ' And now, goodbye, Judy, I must be going back to work. "

Without glancing round, he went at his rapid stride down the narrow walkto the whitewashed gate, which hung loose on broken hinges. In the roadhe came face to face with Jonathan Gay, who was riding leisurely in thedirection of Jordan's Journey. 

"How are you, Revercomb? All well?"

"Yes, all well, thank you. " Turning in his tracks, he gazed thoughtfullyafter the rider for a moment. 

"I wonder why he came out of his way instead of keeping to theturnpike?" he thought, and a minute later, "that's the third time he'scome back since the family left Jordan's Journey. "

CHAPTER II

THE DESIRE OF THE MOTH

At the gate before the Revercombs' house Blossom was standing in a dressof vivid blue. 

"Are you going to a party?" Abel inquired as he reached her, and sheanswered impatiently:

"I promised to wear this dress over to Judy's, so that she could see howit is trimmed. "

"Does she want a blue one?" he asked. It seemed to him little short ofludicrous that Judy should buy a new dress because she was going to bemarried to him; but in the presence of a custom so firmly entrenchedbehind the traditions of respectability, he knew that protest would beuseless. Judy would check out her unromantic person in wedding finerybecause finery was customary on such occasions. 

"Of course we couldn't dress just alike, Abel, " replied Blossom. Hisquestion had seemed foolish to her and her usual soft solemnity wasruffled by a passing irritation. "Judy's frock will be green, but shewants bretelles like these on it. "

"Bretelles?" he repeated as incredulously as if he had possessed any butthe vaguest idea of the article the word described. "Why didn't she waituntil she was married, and then I'd have bought them for her, " he added. 

"Of course she wants her wedding clothes--all girls do, " said Blossom, invoking tradition. "Are you coming in now. We're having dinner a littleearlier. "

She turned and moved slowly up the walk, while he followed, caressingthe head of Moses, his spotted hound. From the kitchen he could hearSarah Revercomb scolding the small negro, Mary Jo, whom she was trainingto wait on the table. On one side of the hearth grandmother sat veryalert, waiting for her bowl of soup, into which Mary Jo was crumblingsoft bread, while across from her grandfather chuckled to himself over arecollection which he did not divulge. 

At Abel's entrance, the old man stopped chuckling and inquired in aninterested tone, "Did you buy that ar steer, Abel?"

"Not yet, I'm to think it over and let Jim Bumpass know. "

"Thar never was sech a man for steers, " remarked grandmother, contemptuously. "Here he's still axin' about steers when he can't histhimself out of his cheer. If I were you, Abel, I'd tell him he'd betterbe steddyin' about everlastin' damnation instead of steers. Steers ain'tgoin' to haul him out of hell fire if he once gits down into it. "

"Well, you can tell her, Abel, " retorted grandfather, "that it's timeenough to holler 'hell-fire!' when you begin to burn. "

Mary Jo prevented a rejoinder by appearing with a napkin, which she tiedunder his wife's chin, and a little later the old woman could be hearddrinking greedily her bowl of soup. She lived for food, yet, like mostpassions which have become exaggerated by concentration out of allproportion to the fact upon which they depend, the moment of fulfilmentseemed always brief and unsatisfactory after the intensity ofanticipation. To-day the trouble was there were no carrots in the soup, and this omission reduced her to tears because it had blighted the hopesof her entire morning. 

"An' I'd been hankerin' arter them carrots ever since breakfast, " shewhimpered. 

"Don't cry, ma, I'll mash you up some nice ones for supper. That'llbe something to look forward to, " said Sarah, who might have wonan immortal crown had such trophies been awarded to the patience ofdaughters-in-law. "So you didn't buy that steer, Abel?"

"No, I didn't buy it. "

"Have you seen Judy to-day?"

"I stopped there on my way home. She was making butter, and we talkedabout buying an extra cow or two and letting Blossom and her send someto market. "

"Well it beats me!" observed Sarah, but whether her discomfiture was dueto Judy's butter or to Abel's love making, she did not explain. On thewhole the staidness of the courtship was pleasing to her. Her senseof decorum was flattered by it, for she had as little tolerance of thesofter virtues as of the softer vines. It had been years since shehad felt so indulgent toward her second son; yet in spite of thegratification his dejection afforded her, she was, as she had justconfessed, utterly and entirely "beat. " His period of common sense--ofperfect and complete sobriety--had lasted for half a year, but shewas too shrewd a woman to be deceived by the mere external calmness ofappearances. She had had moreover, a long experience with males ofthe Revercomb stock, and she knew that it was when their blood flowedquietest that there was the greatest danger of an ultimate "rousing. "All her life she had lived in dread of this menace to respectability--tothat strict observance of the letter of the social law for which theHawtreys had stood for generations. On several occasions she had seena Revercomb really "roused, " and when the transformation was onceachieved, not all the gravity of all the Hawtreys could withstand theforce of it. And this terrible potential energy in her husband's stockwould assert itself, she knew, after a period of tranquillity. Shehadn't been married to a Revercomb for nothing, she had once remarked. 

If anything could have put her into a cheerful humour, it would havebeen the depressed and solemn manner with which Abel went about thepreparations for his marriage. The inflexible logic of Calvinism hadpassed into her fibre, until it had become almost an instinct with herto tread softly in the way of pleasure lest God should hear. Generationsof joyless ancestors had imbued her with an ineradicable suspicion ofhuman happiness--as something which must be paid for, either literallyin its pound of flesh, or in a corresponding measure of the materials ofsalvation. 

"I declar' things are goin' on so smooth that something must be gettin'ready to happen, " she said anxiously to herself at least twenty times aday--for she had observed life, and in her opinion, the observation hadverified the rigid principles of her religion. Do what you would thedoctrines of original sin and predestination kept cropping up under thesurface of existence. And so--"It looks all right on top, but you nevercan tell, " was the habitual attitude of her mind. 

When dinner was over, Abel went out to the mill, with Moses, the hound, trotting at his heels. The high wind was still blowing, and while hestood by the mill-race, the boughs of the sycamore rocked back and forthover his head with a creaking noise. At each swing of the branches acrowd of broad yellow leaves was torn from the stems and chased over themoving wheel to the open meadow beyond. 

With the key of the mill in his hand, Abel stopped to gaze over thegreen knoll where he had once planned to build his house. Beyond it hesaw the strip of pines, and he knew that the tallest of the trees hadfallen uselessly beneath his axe. The great trunk still lay there, fastrotting to dust on the carpet of pine cones. He had never sold it fortimber. He would never use it for the rafters of his home. 

As he looked back now all that past life of his appeared to him fair anddesirable. He remembered the early morning risings in his boyhood, and it seemed to him that he had enjoyed every one of them to itsfullest--that it was only the present that showed stale and unprofitablein his eyes. A rosy haze obscured all that was harsh and unlovely in thepast, and he thought of himself as always eager and enthusiastic then, as always finding happiness in the incidents that befell him. The yearwhen he had gone away, and worked in the factory in order to educatehimself, was revealed as a period of delightful promise, of wonderfulopportunity. In remembering his love for Molly, he forgot the quarrels, the jealousies, the heartburnings, and recalled only the exquisiteinstant of their first lover's kiss. Then, he told himself, that evenwhile he had enjoyed his life, it had cheated him, and he would not liveit over again if he could. 

Turning presently in the other direction, he discerned a patch of vividblue in the pasture, and knew that it was Blossom crossing the fields toSolomon Hatch's. "She's gone a good piece out of her road, " he thought, and then, "I wonder why she doesn't marry? She might have anybody abouthere if she wasn't so particular. " The vivid blue spot in the midst ofthe russet and brown landscape held his gaze for a moment; then callingMoses to his side, he unlocked the door of the mill and began countingthe sacks of grist. 

Outside, in the high wind, which made walking difficult, Blossom movedin the direction of the willow copse. Gay had promised to meet her, but she knew, from the experience of the last few months, that he wouldneither hasten his luncheon nor smoke a cigar the less in order to doso. As she pressed on the wind sang in her ears. She heard it like thesound of rushing wings in the broomsedge, and when it died down, shewaited for it to rise again with a silken murmur in the red-toppedorchard grass. She could tell from the sound whether the gust was stillin the field of broomsedge or had swept on to the pasture. 

In spite of her blue dress, in spite of the flush in her cheeks andthe luminous softness in her eyes, the joy in her bosom fluttered oncrippled wings. Gay was kind, he was gentle, he was even solicitous onthe rare occasions when she saw him; but somehow--in some way, it wasdifferent from the ideal marriage of which she had dreamed. If he waskind, he was also casual. She had hoped once that love would fill herlife, and now, to her despair, it looked as if it might be poured intoa tea-cup. She had imagined that it would move mountains, and the mostordinary detail of living was sufficient to thrust it out of sight. 

When she reached the brook, she saw Gay coming slowly along the Haunt'sWalk, to the spring. As he walked, he blew little clouds of smoke intothe air, and she thought, as he approached her, that the smell of hiscigar was unlike the cigar of any other man she knew--that it possessed, in itself, a quality that was exciting and romantic. This trait inhis personality--a disturbing suggestion of the atmosphere of a richerworld--had fascinated her from the beginning, and after eighteen monthsof repeated disappointments, it still held her, though she struggled nowin its power like a hare in a trap. 

"So you're here!" he exclaimed as he reached her. Then, after a swiftglance over the fields, he drew her into the shelter of the trees, andholding his cigar in his left hand, kissed her lips. 

Closing her eyes, she leaned against him, while the scent of tobaccointoxicated her with its train of happier associations. 

"You're looking all right, though your letters have been rather jumpy. My dear girl, when you pounce on me like that you frighten me out of mywits. You really mustn't, you know. "

"O Jonathan!" she gasped, and clung to him. 

"Why, I had to manufacture some excuse on the instant for coming down. Icouldn't tell what foolishness you'd be capable of if I didn't. "

His tone was half caressing, yet beneath it there was a seriousannoyance, which killed the suffering joy in her heart. She was slowlylearning that it is not safe to remind the man of pleasure of hisobligations, since he is attracted chiefly by his opportunities. 

"The time was when you wanted to come just as much as I, " she said. 

"Don't I still? Haven't I proved it by telling a tremendous lie andrushing down here on the first train? Come, now, kiss me like a goodgirl and look cheerful. You've got to make up, you know, for all thetrouble you've put me to. "

She kissed him obediently, yielding to his casual embraces with adocility that would have charmed him had his passion been in itsbeginning instead of its decline. 

"You're glad now you came, aren't you?" she asked presently pleading tobe reassured. 

"Oh, yes, of course, I like it, but you mustn't write to me that wayagain. "

Putting his arm closer about her, he pressed her to his side, and theysat in silence while the wind whistled in the tree-tops above them. Fromtheir shelter they could see the empty chimneys of Jordan's Journey, anda blurred and attenuated figure on the lawn, which was that of the oldnegro, who passed back and forth spreading manure. Some swallows withslate grey wings were flying over the roof, and they appeared from adistance to whirl as helplessly as the dead leaves. 

"You do love me as much as ever, don't you, Jonathan?" she askedsuddenly. 

He frowned, staring at the moving figure of the old negro. Again she hadblundered, for he was disinclined by temperament to do or say the thingthat was expected of him. 

"Why, of course I do, " he answered after a pause. 

She sighed and nestled against him, while his hand which had been onher shoulder, slipped to her waist. Her heart had turned to lead in herbreast, and, like Judy, she could have wept because the reality of lovewas different from her virgin dreams. 

CHAPTER III

ABEL HEARS GOSSIP AND SEES A VISION

Two nights before the wedding a corn shucking was held in the barn atBottom's Ordinary--a usually successful form of entertainment, by whichthe strenuous labours of a score of able-bodied men were secured at thecost of a keg of cider and a kettle of squirrel stew. In the centre ofthe barn, which was dimly lighted by a row of smoky, strong-smellingkerosene-oil lanterns, suspended on pegs from the wall, there was ahuge wooden bin, into which the golden ears were tossed, as they werestripped of the husks, by a circle of guests, ranging in years fromold Adam at the head to the youngest son of Tim Mallory, an inquisitiveurchin of nine, who made himself useful by passing the diminishingpitcher of cider. It was a frosty night, and the faces of the huskersshowed very red above the knitted woollen comforters which wrapped theirthroats. Before each man there was a small pile of corn, still in theblade, and this was replenished when it began to dwindle by a band ofworkers in the moonlight beyond the open windows. In his effort to keepwarm somebody had started a hymn, which was vigorously accompanied bya beating of numbed feet on the scattered husks on the floor. Above thevolume of sound old Adam's quavering falsetto could be heard piping onlike a cracked and discordant flute. 

 "O-ver thar, O-ver thar, Th-ar's a la-nd of pure de-light. O-ver th-ar, We will la-y our bur-den do-wn. An' re-ceive our gol-den cro-wn. In that la-nd of pure de-light O-ver th-ar. "

"That's a cold hymn, an' unsuitable to the weather, " remarked TimMallory at the end of the verse. "If you ask me, I'd say thar was mo'immediate comfort in singin' about the redness of hell-fire, an' howmortal close we're comin' to it. "

"We don't want no impiousness at this here shuckin', Tim, " observedWilliam Ming, who occupied the position of host in Betsey's absenceabout the more important matter of supper. "You fill up with cider an'go at that thar pile befo' you. "

"Then pass it on, " replied Mallory, reaching for the jug of cider, whichtravelled in a regular orbit from old Adam's right hand round the circleto the neighbour on his left, who chanced to be Solomon Hatch. 

"Speakin' of impiousness, " remarked that sour-faced little man, "haveyou all heard the tales about Reuben Merryweather's gal sence she's hadher windfall? Why, to see the way she trails her skirt, you'd thinkshe was the real child of her father. " Then rushing hurriedly togeneralization at Abel's entrance, he added in a louder tone--"Ah, it'sa sad pass for things to come to, an' the beginnin' of the end of publicmorality, when a gal that's born of a mischance can come to act as if aman was responsible for her. It ain't nothin' mo' nor less than flyin'in the face of the law, which reads different, an' if it keeps up, the women folks will be settin' up the same rights as men to all theinstincts of natur'. "

Old Adam--the pride and wonder of the neighbourhood because he couldstill walk his half mile with the help of his son and still drink hisshare of cider with the help of nobody--bent over the heap of cornbefore him, and selecting an ear, divested it of the husks with atwirling, sleight-of-hand movement. 

"They're losing virtue fast enough, " he observed, throwing the nakedear into the bin and reaching for another. "Why, when I was young tharwarn't nothin' in the way of meanness that a good woman wouldn't put upwith. They'd shut thar eyes to Hagars, white or black, rather than losethe respect of men by seemin' to be aware of any immodesty. "

"Ah, the times have changed now!" sighed Solomon Hatch, "but thar's onething sho' to my mind, an' that is, that if a woman thinks she's goin'to attract men by pryin' an' peekin' into immorality an' settin' itstraight ag'in, she's gone clean out of her head. Thar's got to beindecency in the world because thar al'ays has been. But a man sets aheap mo' sto' by his wife if she ain't too inquirin' upon the subject. "

"True, true, Solomon, " said old Adam, "I for one was al'ays set againstteachin' women to read for fear they'd come to know things. Thar's adeal of evil that gits into print, an' if you ain't acquainted with yo'letters thar's less temptation to nose arter it. Reuben Merryweatherwould have his daughter Janet taught, though I urged strongly againstit--holdin' that she could learn about sins an' immoralities even inHoly Writ. Who knows if she'd ever have gone wrong if she hadn't learnedto read printed words?"

"Well, I'm glad print is too difficult for me, " observed young Adam. "The pains I take to spell out the words would stand greatly in the wayof my enj'yin' any immorality if I was to stumble across it. What partof Scripture, pa, is it that deals with sech doin's?"

"They crop up powerful thick in Kings, son, but I've found 'em when Ilooked sharp in Leviticus. "

"If you are goin' to talk free, men, you can go to yo' own homes to doit, " remarked Betsey, who was accustomed to appear at unexpected momentsin order to impress them with the necessity of earning their supper. "This ain't no place for loose speakin', " she added, solemnly eyeingyoung Adam, who, having a weak memory, was striving to fix the names ofKings and Leviticus in his mind by repeating them slowly to himself. 

"Axin' yo' pardon, Mrs. Bottom, we didn't know a lady was in hearin' orwe'd never have made so bold, " said old Adam. "Stop workin' yo' lips, son, an' hand Mrs. Bottom a cheer. "

"What's all this talk anyway about Molly Merryweather an' Mr. Jonathan?"she demanded. "Abel, have you heard anything about it?"

The men glanced at each other with uneasy eyes, while they workednervously at the shucking, for the question had been in the air from themoment of Abel's entrance, though none of them had been bold enoughto speak it aloud. And now a woman, with characteristic femininerecklessness, had uttered the thought which had been revolving in eachmind for ten minutes--yet nothing had happened!

Old Adam, pausing for the first time in his work, glanced withungrudging respect at the short, lumpy figure in the black calico dress. Her face was still comely, and there was the mild mulishness inher expression that is seen in the countenances of many amiable yetobstinate persons. 

"No, I haven't heard, " replied Abel, and he added a moment later, "Whatdo they say?"

"Well, Mr. Halloween had it from a man in Applegate who had it from aman in Petersburg who had it from a man in Richmond. "

"Had what?"

"That Mr. Jonathan had been waitin' on her steady for some months, an''twas mo' likely than not to end in marriage. She's a good girl, isMolly. I ain't got no use for a woman that don't stand up for her sex inthe face of men. "

"True, true, " admitted her hearers solemnly, one after another, for noneamong them had ever dared to defy the source of so many benefactions. 

"Thar're some that thinks morals ain't meant for any but women, " shepursued, "but I ain't one of 'em, as William Ming can testify, thatholds to that view. Viciousness is viciousness whether it be male orfemale, and Mr. Mullen himself in the pulpit couldn't convince me thatit don't take two to make an impropriety. "

"True, true, " they repeated, belying themselves under coercion in theaccents of the chorus in a Greek drama. "'Tis true, ma'am, as you speakit. "

"Thar were some mean enough to side against the po' innocent from thehour of her birth, " she continued oracularly, while she looked severelyat Solomon, who nodded in response, "an' these same folks have beenpreachin' over her an' pintin' at her ever sence she larned to crawl outof the cradle. But thar never was a kinder heart or a quicker hand introuble than Molly's, an' if she did play fast and loose with the men, was it any worse, I'd like to know, than they deserve?"

"Thar's truth in what you say, ma'am, thar's a deal of truth in it, "they agreed, nodding dejected craven heads over their pipes. Like allborn politicians, their eye was for the main chance rather than forthe argument, and they found it easier to forswear a conviction than toforego a comfort. 

"Well, I'm roastin' a young possum along with the squirrel stew, soyou'd better work up an appetite, " she said in a mollified tone at atthe end of her lecture, as though she were desirous of infusing a moreardent spirit into them before her departure. 

When the barn door closed behind her, a sigh of relief, half stifledthrough fear of detection, passed round the group. 

"Thar goes a woman in a thousand, " observed old Adam, edging nearer thebin. 

"In a million--let's make it a million, " urged Solomon Hatch. 

"If they were all like that the world would be different, Mr. Doolittle, " remarked Jim Halloween. 

"Ah, yes, it would be different, " agreed old Adam, and he sighed again. 

"Thar'd be strict walkin' among us, I reckon, " said his son. 

"An' a chalk line the same as we draw for the sex, " added Solomon Hatch. 

"Sin would be scarce then an' life earnest, " remarked William Ming, who had alluded to Betsey in the most distant terms ever since he hadmarried her. 

"We'd abide by the letter like the women, not by the spirit as we do, "reflected Solomon. 

They sighed for the third time more heavily, and the dried husks on thefloor around the bin rattled as though a strong wind had entered. 

"But she's one in a million, Mr. Doolittle, " protested Solomon, after apause, and his tone had grown cheerful. 

"Yes, I reckon it's a million. Thar ain't mo' than one in a million ofthat rare sort, " responded old Adam, falling to work with a zest. 

"Was that ar young possum she spoke of the one yo' dawg Bess treed daybefo' yesterday, William?" inquired Jim Halloween, whose hopes werecentred upon the reward of his labours. 

"Naw! that was an old un, " replied William. "But thar never was a betterpossum dawg than that Bess of ours. I declar, she's got so much sensethat she'll tree anything that grins at her, whether it's nigger orpossum. Ain't that so, old gal?" he inquired of the spotted hound on abed of husks at his side. "It wan't no longer than last week that shekept that little nigger of Uncle Boaz's up a persimmon tree for mo'n anhour. "

"Thar's some niggers that look so much like possums when they git up inpersimmon branches that it takes a sharp eye to tell the difference, "observed Tim Mallory. 

"Well, I'm partial to possum, " remarked old Adam. "When all's said, tharain't a better meat to the taste as long as it's plump an' juicy. Willyou hand on that jug of cider, Tim? It's wonderful the way corn shuckin'manages to parch the throat an' whet the appetite. "

The miller, who had declined Betsey's feast of possum, went out as soonas he had finished his pipe, and turned into the sunken road that ledto Solomon Hatch's. In the little "best room, " which was opened only for"courtings" or funerals, he found Judy seated under a dim lamp with abasket of darning in her lap. 

"I was over at Mrs. Mullen's this morning, " she explained, "an' she toldme her eyesight was failing, so I offered to do her darnin'. "

Slipping a small round gourd into the toe of a man's black sock, sheexamined it attentively, with her needle poised in the lamplight. Thenbending her head slightly sideways, she surveyed her stitches fromanother angle, while she smoothed the darn with short caressing strokesover the gourd. He thought how capable and helpful she was, and from thecheerful energy with which she plied her needle, he judged that it gaveher pleasure merely to be of use. What he did not suspect was that herwedding garments had been thrust aside as of less importance than Mrs. Mullen's basket of darning. She was just the girl for a farmer's wife, he told himself as he watched her--plain and sensible, the kind thatwould make a good mother and a good manager. And all the time a voice inthe back of his brain was repeating distinctly. "They say it will end ina marriage--they say it will end in a marriage. " But this voice seemedto come from a distance, and to have no connection either with histhought or with his life. It was independent of his will, and while itwas speaking, he went on calmly thinking of Judy's children and of howwell and properly she would bring them up. 

"I went over again to look at the steer to-day, " he said, after amoment. "There's a Jersey cow, too, I think of buying. "

She nodded, pausing in her work, yet keeping her gaze fixed on the pointof her needle. If he had looked at her darning, he would have seen thatit was woven of exquisite and elaborate stitches--such stitches as wentinto ecclesiastical embroideries in the Middle Ages. 

"They're the best kind for butter, " she observed, and carefully ran herneedle crosswise in and out of the threads. 

Conversation was always desultory between them, and when it flagged, asit did now, they could sit for hours in the composed and unembarrassedsilence of persons who meet upon the firm basis of mutual assistancein practical matters. Their relation was founded upon the simple law ofracial continuance, which is as indifferent to the individual as it isto the abstract, apotheosis of passion. 

"I'm going to Applegate to-morrow to order a new mill-stone, " he saidat last, when he rose. "Is there anything you would like me to get foryou?"

She reflected a moment. "I need a quarter of a yard of braid to finishthe green dress I am making. Could you match it?"

"I'll try if you'll give me a sample. "

Laying her work aside for the first time, she hunted amid a number ofcoloured spools in her basket, and brought to light a bit of silverbraid, which she handed to him. 

"Was Mr. Mullen at your house to-day, Abel?" she asked suddenly, turningher face from the lamp. 

"Yes, he comes to see Blossom now, but she doesn't appear to care forhim. I thought she did once, didn't you?"

"Yes, I thought she did, but that was when he was in love with Molly, wasn't it?"

For an instant he gazed at the bit of braid, as though his soul wereintent upon unravelling the intricate pattern. 

"I wonder whether it is that we get a thing when we stop wanting it orthat we merely stop wanting it when we get it?" he demanded passionatelyof fate. 

But Judy had no mind for dubious philosophies. The thing she wanted sheknew she should never get and she knew as well that, in all likelihood, she should never stop wanting it. Only a passionate soul in acommonplace body could have squandered itself with such superbprodigality. 

"I don't know, " she answered wearily, "I've never noticed much eitherwhat people get or what they want. "

"Well, Blossom wanted Mr. Mullen once and now he wants Blossom. I wishmother didn't have so poor an opinion of him. "

She flushed and looked up quickly, for in her heart she felt that shehated Sarah Revercomb. A disgust for her coming marriage swept over her. Then she told herself stubbornly that everybody married sooner or later, and that anyway her stepmother would never forgive her if she broke offwith Abel. 

"She doesn't even go to his church. I don't see what right she has tofind fault with him, " she said. 

"That's her way, you know. You can't make her over. She pretends hedoesn't know his Scripture and when he comes to see Blossom, she askshim all sorts of ridiculous questions just to embarrass him. Yesterdayshe told him she couldn't call to mind the difference in cubits betweenthe length and the breadth of Solomon's temple, and would he please saveher the trouble of going to the Bible to find out?"

"Does she want him to stop coming?" inquired Judy, breathlessly. 

"I don't know what she wants, but I wish Blossom would marry him, don'tyou?"

"Don't I?" she repeated, and her basket of spools fell to the floor, where they scattered on the square rag carpet of log-cabin pattern. Asthey were gathering them up, their heads touched by accident, and hekissed her gravely. For a moment she thought, while she gazed into hisbrilliant eyes, "Abel is really very handsome, after all. " Then foldingher work carefully, she stuck her needle through the darn and placedthe basket on a shelf between a bible with gilt clasps and a wreath ofpressed flowers under a glass case. "He couldn't have got anybody tofill in those holes better, " she said to herself, and the reflection wasnot without a balm for her aching heart. 

At dawn next morning Abel passed again, driving in the direction ofthe Applegate road. The day was breaking clear and still, and over theautumnal pageantry in the abandoned fields, innumerable silver cobwebsshone iridescent in the sunrise. Squirrels were already awake, busilyharvesting, and here and there a rabbit bobbed up from beneath a shelterof sassafras. Overhead the leaves on a giant chestnut tree hung asheavily as though they were cut out of copper, and beyond a sharp twistin the corduroy road, a branch of sweet gum curved like a bent flameon the edge of the twilight dimness of the forest. The scarlet of theleaves reminded him of the colour of Molly's jacket, and immediatelythe voice somewhere in his brain repeated, "They say it will end inmarriage. " The words awoke in him a violent and unreasonable resentment. He could think of his own marriage quite calmly, as something that didnot bear directly upon his ideal of Molly; but the conception of her asGay's wife, struck a blow at the image he had enskied and then schooledhimself into worshipping from a distance. He was willing to relinquishher as too fair and flitting for mortal embraces, but the thought thatanother man should possess that elusive loveliness was like the thrustof hot iron into his wound. That Molly loved Gay he could not believe. That she was willing to marry him without loving him, was a suggestionwhich appeared to him little short of an insult. True, he did not loveJudy to whom he was to be married to-morrow, but that was a case soentirely and utterly different that there could be no comparison! He wasdoing it because he was sorry for Judy and it was the only way he couldhelp her. Besides, had not Molly urged such a step upon him repeatedlyas the fulfillment of his obvious destiny?

The reasons were all there. He had them labelled and assorted in hismind, ready for instant reference should they be required. Sleeplessnights had gone to the preparation of them, and yet--and yet--in hisheart he knew, beyond contradiction, that he was wedding Judy becausehis pity had once made a fool of him. He had acted from the loftiestmotives when he had asked her to marry him, and twenty-four hours laterhe would have given ten years of his life to have been able to eliminatethose lofty motives from his character. To go back on her was, ofcourse, out of the question. In the history of Old Church no man--withthe exception of two drunkards and old Mr. Jonathan Gay--had evergone back on a woman. With girls it was different, since they, beingsentimentally above the proneness to error as well as practically belowthe liability for maintenance, might play fast and loose wherevertheir fleeting fancy alighted. But in the case of his unhappy sex anhonourable inclination once yielded to, was established forever. Hissacrifice was sanctioned by custom. There was no escape since it wastradition that held him by the throat. 

His business in Applegate, which included a careful matching of Judy'sbraid, took up the entire morning; and it was dinner time before heturned back to the little inn, known as Raleigh's Tavern, at which thefarmers usually stopped for meals. Here, after washing his hands in abasin on the back porch, he hastily smoothed his hair, and passed intothe small paved court in front of the tavern. As he approached thedoorway, the figure of a young woman in a black dress, which he feltinstinctively did not "belong" to Applegate, came down the short steps, and paused an instant to caress a large dog that was lying in thesunshine near the entrance. The next minute, while he fell back, hat inhand, behind a pile of boxes in the yard, he heard his name called ina familiar voice, and lifting his eyes found himself face to face withMolly. 

"Abel, aren't you going to speak to me?" she asked, and moving a steptoward him, held out both hands with an impulsive gesture. 

As his hand met hers, he withdrew it quickly as though he were stung bythe touch of her soft fingers. Every nerve in his body leaped suddenlyto life, and the moment was so vivid while he faced her, that hefelt half convinced that all the long months since their parting haddissolved in shadows. The border line between the dream and actualitywas obliterated. It seemed to him not only impossible, but absurd thathe should ever have believed himself engaged to Judy Hatch--that heshould be going to marry her to-morrow! All that side of his life hadno closer relation to his real self than it had to the self of old AdamDoolittle. While he had planned it he had been a corpse not a livingman, but at the sound of Molly's voice, at the clasp of her fingers, at the touching, expectant brightness in her eyes, the resurrection hadhappened. Judy was a corpse preparing to wed a corpse that had becomealive--and the mating of death with life was abhorrent to him in hisillumination. 

"We are on our way to Richmond, " explained Molly, very gently, "and weare waiting to change trains. Oh, Abel, I have wanted so much to seeyou!"

It was the old Molly, in truth--Molly in her softest, in her mostdangerous, in her divinest mood. While he gazed at her he could makeno answer because an emotion that was half self-reproach, half furiouslonging, choked back his words, and had he opened his lips it would havebeen to utter some foolish inarticulate arraignment of destiny. In theconfusion of his senses, he did not notice that she had altered, but thenext day he remembered that her face looked smaller and more delicate, like a tinted egg-shell he had once seen, and that her eyes inconsequence were wondrously, were almost startlingly, large. All that hewas conscious of when he turned and rushed from her after that one look, was that the old agony of his loss had resurged afresh in his heart. 

CHAPTER IV

HIS DAY OF FREEDOM

He crossed the courtyard, and turned mechanically into a street whichled in the opposite direction from the road to Old Church. A crowd ofmen, gathered in the doorway of the post-office, called to him to jointhem, and he answered in a voice that sounded remote and cheerful in hisown ears. 

"If you want to whip the bosses in these parts there's a man for you, "he heard one of them remark, and knew that they were discussing hispolitical chances. Quickening his steps, he walked rapidly to the endof the street, passed the scattered negro hovels, surrounded by blightedsunflowers, and turned into a road which ran between fields of dustystubble into a stretch of brown and desolate country. 

Suddenly, as though a screw had loosened in his brain, he felt hispassion slip the control of his will and beat down, one by one, theorderly procession of reasons that had risen against it. A sense ofexhilaration, of joy so fierce that it was akin to pain, took possessionof him. "I won't go back!" he said defiantly, "I won't go back!" Andwith the words his longing for Molly was swallowed up in the tumultuousconsciousness of his release. It was as if he had burst his bonds by asingle effort of strength, and was stretching his cramped limbs in theopen. The idea of escape from captivity was so strong, that he lookedneither to right or left of him, but kept his gaze fixed on the roadstraight ahead, as a man does who saves his energy for the final breakfrom his pursuers. At the moment he would have bartered his soul inexchange for the unholy, the nameless rapture of the vagabond and thegipsy, of all the neglected and the despised of civilization. Duty, love, ambition--all these were nothing beside the perfect, theincommunicable passion of the open road!

It is a mood that comes once to every man--to some men morefrequently--a mood in which the prehistoric memory of the soul isstirred, and an intolerable longing arises for the ancient nomadicfreedom of the race; when the senses surfeited by civilization cry outfor the strong meat of the jungle--for the scent of the raw, dark earthand for the gleam of the yellow moonlight on the wet, rustling leaves. This longing may come but once in adolescence, or many times untilthe frost of age has withered the senses. It may come amid the showerywarmth and the roving fragrance of an April day, or beside the shining, brown, leaf-strewn brooks of November. But let it come to a man whenit will, and that man renounces, in spite of himself, his little leadengods of prosperity, and in his heart, beneath the woven garment ofcustom, he exchanges his birthright of respectability for a mess ofRomany pottage. Under the luminous sweep and rush of this vision, Abellaughed suddenly at the thought of his marriage to Judy. Obstacles whichhad appeared insurmountable at sunrise, showed now as unsubstantial andevanescent as shadows. 

"I won't go back!" he repeated exultantly, "I won't go back!"

"You're talkin' to yo'self, mister, " said a voice at his side, andlooking down he saw a small barefooted boy, in overalls, with a bag ofstriped purple calico hanging from one shoulder. 

"You've been talkin' to yo'self all along the road, " the boy repeatedwith zest. 

"Have I? What are you up to?"

"I've been chinquapinin'. Ma, she thinks I'm at school, but I ain't. "He looked up wickedly, bubbling over with the shameless joys of truancy. "Thar's a lot of chinquapin bushes over yonder in Cobblestone's wood an'they're chock full of nuts. "

"And they're in your bag now, I suppose?"

"I've got a peck of 'em, an' I'm goin' to make me a chain as longas--that. It'll be a watch chain, an' I've made a watch out of a walnut. It can't keep time, of course, " he added, "'cep'n for that it's really asho' nough watch. " His small freckled face, overhung by a mat of carrotyhair, was wreathed in a contagious, an intoxicating smile--the smile ofone who has bought happiness at the price of duty, and whose enjoymentis sweetened by the secret knowledge that he has successfully eluded theStern Daughter of the Voice of God. Instinctively, Abel was aware thatthe savour was not in the chinquapins, but in the disobedience, and hisheart warmed to the boy with the freckled face. 

"Are you going home now?" he asked. 

"You bet I ain't. I've got my snack ma fixed for me. " He unrolled abrown paper package and revealed two thin slices of bread with a fishinghook stuck in one corner. "Thar's apple-butter between 'em, " he added, rolling his tongue, and a minute later, "Ma'd whip me jest the same, an' I'd ruther be whipped for a whole day than for a half. Besides, " heburst out as though the mental image convulsed him with delight, "if Iwent home I'd have to help her tote the water for the washin'. "

"But what are you going to do with yourself?"

"I'm goin' huntin' with a gravel shooter, an' I'm goin' fishin' with awillow pole, an' I'm goin' to find all the old hare traps, an' I'm goin'to see 'em make hog's meat over at Bryarly's an' I'm goin' to the ciderpressin' down here at Cobblestone's. She ain't goin' to ketch me tillI've had my day!" he concluded with a whoop of ecstasy. Startled by thesound, a rabbit sprang from a clump of sassafras, and the boy was overthe fence, on a rush of happy bare feet, in pursuit of it. 

The road curved abruptly into a short wood, filled with dwarfed hollytrees, which were sown thickly with a shower of scarlet berries--andwhile Abel walked through it, his visions thronged beside him like thepainted and artificial troupe of a carnival. He saw Molly coming to him, separating him from Judy, surrendering her warm flesh and blood to hisarms. "I won't go back!" he said, still defiantly, "I'll love Molly ifI pay for it to the last day I live. " With a terrible exultation he feltthat he was willing to pay for it--to pay any price, even the price ofhis honour. His passion rushed like flame through his blood, scorching, blackening, devouring. 

Beyond the wood, the winding ash-coloured road dipped into a hollow, andwhen he reached the brow of the low hill ahead, a west wind, which hadrisen suddenly from the river, caught up with his footsteps and raced onlike a wild thing at his side. He could hear it sighing plaintively inthe bared trees he had left, or driving the hurtled leaves like a flockof frightened partridges over the sumach and sassafras, and then lashingitself into a frenzy as it chased over a level of broomsedge. Alwaysit sang of freedom--of the savage desire and thirst for freedom--of theineffable, the supreme ecstasy of freedom! And always while he listenedto it, while he felt the dead leaves stinging his flesh, he toldhimself passionately that he "would not go back--that he would not marryto-morrow!"

For hours he stalked with the wind. Then, turning out of the road, heflung himself down on the broomsedge and lay for other hours gazing overthe autumn landscape to the softly luminous band on the far horizon. Somewhere in a darkened corner of his brain there was the resolve thathe would not return until, like the freckled faced, barefooted boy, hehad "had his day. "

At nine o'clock that night he entered an inn in the town of Briarwood, twenty miles north of Applegate, and sitting down at one of the tables, ordered something to eat. His limbs ached, not from the walk in thewind, but from the passion that had whipped his body like a destroyingfire. He felt still the burning throb of the sore that it had left. Apart from this dull agony he could feel nothing--he could desirenothing--he could remember nothing. Everything was over except theinstinct that told him that he was empty and must be fed. 

While he sat there, with his aching forehead bowed in his hands, therecame a light touch on his shoulder, and looking up he saw the ReverendOrlando Mullen, standing at his side like an embodiment of all thethings from which he had fled. For an instant he could only stareblindly back at him. Then something which had opened in his soul, closedsoftly, as if it were a shell of custom, and he knew that he was againa prisoner. With the sight of that conventional figure, the scatteredinstincts of habit and of respectability--of all the qualities for whichthe race stood and against which the individual had rebelled--all theserallied anew to the battlefield from which they had been routed by hisinsurgent emotions. 

"I suppose you're waiting, like myself, for the nine-forty-five train?"

"Yes, I'm waiting for the train. "

"Business brought you so far away?"

"Yes, business brought me. " Lifting his glass of beer, he drained itslowly under Mr. Mullen's friendly and curious eyes. 

"It looks as if we should have a perfect day for the wedding, " remarkedthe rector, after a pause. "Like you, I was called off on an urgentmatter, but fortunately, it only means losing a little sleep. "

Then the whistle of the train blew, and ten minutes later, Abel followedthe young clergyman into the single coach and sat down in a vacant seatat his side. 

It was two o'clock when at last he drove into the back gate at the mill, and unhitching his mare, turned her out into the pasture. As he crossedthe road to the house, he lifted his eyes mechanically to the sky, andsaw that the stars shone soft and near as if they were watching over anight of love. 

CHAPTER V

THE SHAPING OF MOLLY

Leaning back in the uncomfortable plush-covered chair in the train toRichmond, Molly watched the flat landscape glide past, while she thoughta little wistfully of the morning she had made this same trip dressedin one of Mrs. Gay's gowns. On her knees Mrs. Gay's canary, extinguishedbeneath the black silk cover to his cage, uttered from time to time afeeble pipe of inquiry, and on the rack above her head Mrs. Gay's teabasket rattled loudly in a sudden lurch of the train. Since the hour inwhich she had left the overseer's cottage and moved into the "big house"at Jordan's Journey, the appealing little lady had been the dominantinfluence in her life--an influence so soft and yet so overpowering thatshe had at times a sensation of being smothered in scented swansdown. For several months after leaving Old Church her education had absorbedher energies, and she had found time merely to gasp occasionally inthe oppressive sweetness of the atmosphere which Mrs. Gay's personalitydiffused. Everything was strange then, and her desire for strangeness, for unfamiliar impressions, had amounted to a passion. She had been veryanxious, too, very much afraid lest she should make a mistake. When shehad entered the hotel dining-room in New York she had felt as if shewere walking on ploughed ground, and the red velvet carpet had seemedto rise and sink under her feet. That first night had been exquisitetorture to her, and so, she surmised through some intuitiveunderstanding, had it been to Kesiah. For weeks after that timeof embarrassment, she had watched herself carefully--watched everyinstant--and in the end she had triumphed. With her growing ease, her old impulsiveness had returned to her, and with the wonderfuladaptability of the Southern woman, she had soon ceased to feel a senseof discomfort in her changed surroundings. The instinct of class she hadnever had, and this lack of social reverence had helped her not alittle in her ascent of the ladder. It is difficult to suffer from adistinction which one does not admit--and her perfect unconsciousness ofinferiority to Mrs. Gay had placed her, without her being aware of it, in the position of an equal. 

With her hands clasped on the cage of the canary, she gazed thoughtfullyat Kesiah, who was sitting a little in front of her, with her eyeglasseson her nose and the daily paper opened before her. Gay was to meet themin Richmond, and as Molly remembered this now, she realized that herfeeling about their meeting had changed during the last few hours. Sheliked Gay--she responded to his physical charm, to the indefinable airof adventure which hangs sometimes about men who have lived hard withoutwasting their surplus vitality--but in spite of the strong attraction hepossessed for her, she knew that in her heart she had never thoroughlybelieved in him. Unconsciously to herself she had measured his statureagainst Abel's and he had come short of her standard. 

"Molly, " asked Mrs. Gay, turning her head suddenly, "did you writeJonathan to expect us by this train?"

"Yes, Aunt Angela, he knows we are coming. Shall I lower the shade? Isthe sunlight too strong on you?"

"A little, " murmured Mrs. Gay in a tone of resigned sweetness and theconversation was over. 

At the sound of Molly's voice an old lady, travelling South with atrained nurse, turned in her chair, and looked at the girl as she mighthave looked at a fruit for which she longed, but which she had beenforbidden to touch. Her face, under an elaborate bonnet trimmed withartificial purple wistaria, was withered and crossed with lines, and herpoor old hands were so knotted from gout that she could hardly lift thetea-cup from the small table which had been fastened in front of her. Yet for one instant, as she gazed on Molly's girlish freshness, heryouth stirred feebly somewhere in the dregs of her memory, and her eyesgrew deprecating and piteous, as though her soul were saying, "I know Ihave missed it, but it isn't my fault---"

The tea-cup trembled in her hand, and her old lips fumbled patheticallyfor her bit of toast, while across from her, with only the narrow aisleof the car between, youth incarnate sat weaving its separate dream of auniverse. 

"Yes, two hours earlier, " ran Molly's thoughts, "I looked forward tothe meeting with Jonathan, and now, in so short a time, I have grown todread it. " She tried to think of his pleasant, well-coloured face, ofhis whimsical, caressing smile, but in the niche where his image shouldhave stood, she saw Abel in his country clothes, with his red-brownthroat rising out of his blue shirt and his brilliant eyes under thedark hair on his forehead. Then suddenly memory played her a ridiculoustrick, for she remembered that his hair grew in a close clipped circularwave, like the hair which has been bound by a fillet on the head of achild. 

"I wonder why he wouldn't speak to me?" she thought, with a pang. "Iwonder if he has really got over caring?" She had always thought ofAbel as a possession more absolutely her own than even Mr. Jonathan'sprovision. When she had said so passionately that she wanted to be free, she had not meant that at any minute she chose, Abel would not be readyand willing to fly back into bondage. That Abel, after all these years, should actually have ceased to care for her--should have refused even tospeak to her! It was absurd--it was vindictive--it was unchristian!She had half a mind to get Mr. Mullen to talk to him. Then her heartthrobbed when she remembered the touch of his hand, the look in hiseyes, the thirst of his lips seeking hers. That was only six monthsago--such a very little while--and now he had rushed away from the sightof her! She thought of their parting, when she had said that she wantedto see the world, and he had offered at once to release her. Since thenshe had seen the world until she was tired of it. At times she had beenterribly homesick for Old Church, and she had never been happy exceptwhen Gay had taken her to see pictures or into wonderful parks. Alwaysthe thought had lain hidden in her mind that some day, when she couldstand it no longer, she would go back and wear her red jacket and runfree in the fields with Abel again. Her very selfishness had seemednatural to her because Abel had always been there, like the air and thesky and the broomsedge; he was a part of the scene, and she found itimpossible to detach him from his surroundings. 

At the station in Richmond, Gay met them, and for the first few minuteshis mother absorbed his attention. Molly had not seen him for sixweeks, and she noticed that he had grown fleshier and that this lent anadditional heaviness to his shaven chin. Even his charming smilecould not disguise the slight coarseness of feature, with which he wasbeginning already to pay for his pleasures. By the time he was forty, hewould be quite stout and "lumpy, " she thought. 

There was much excitement about collecting Mrs. Gay's packages, and thedrive to the hotel was filled with anxious inquiries from Kesiah, whowas always nervous and fussy when she travelled. 

"Molly, did you see my umbrella put in?"

"Yes, Aunt Kesiah, it is here in the corner by Jonathan. "

"I forgot to notice Angela's medicine case. Did you see that it wasn'toverlooked?"

"Yes, Patsey has it. "

Then came a solicitous exhibition of filial affection on the partof Gay, and at last, to Molly's relief, they arrived at the new, brilliantly lighted hotel, and were led through stifling corridors, carpeted in red, to their rooms on the second floor in the front of thebuilding. As she passed over the velvet carpets, Molly had again thesensation that she was walking over ploughed ground; and when she hadescaped from Mrs. Gay's sitting-room, on the pretext of dressingfor dinner, she threw open the window, and leaned out of the closeatmosphere into the freshness of the November evening. This was what shehad once looked upon as pleasure--or at least as exciting amusement--tomove continually from one hot and over furnished hotel to another, tofuss about missing packages, to see crowds of strange faces passingbefore her, all fat and overfed and all, somehow, looking exactly alike. 

A wave of homesickness for the white roads and the golden broomsedgeof Old Church swept over her. She wanted the open fields, and more thanall, far more than all, she wanted Abel! It was her fault--she had madeher choice--no one else was to blame for it. And, then, though she hadmade her choice and no one else was to blame for it, she felt that shealmost hated old Mr. Jonathan, as she still called him in her thoughts, because he had left her his money. At the bottom of her heart, therewas the perfectly unreasonable suspicion that he had arranged the wholething out of spite. 

In the sitting-room, meanwhile, which Kesiah's bedroom separated fromMolly's, Mrs. Gay was lying on a couch beside a table on which stood acut-glass bowl of purple orchids sent to her by her son. She was lookinga little pale, but this pallor was not unbecoming since it enhanced theexpression of appealing melancholy in her eyes. To look at her was torecognize that life had crushed her, and yet that her soul exhaled anintense sweetness in the midst of its suffering. 

Jonathan had just gone down to buy the evening papers; in the next roomshe could hear Kesiah at the unpacking; so she was left for a momentalone with her imagination. The fatigue of the trip had affected hernerves, and she sank, while she lay there in her travelling gown, which she had not yet removed, into one of those spells of spiritualdiscontent which followed inevitably any unusual physical discomfort. She thought, not resentfully but sadly, that Kesiah managed to grow evenmore obstinate with years, that Jonathan must have tired of her or hewould never have forgotten the list of medicines she had sent him, thatMolly took Kesiah away from the sickroom entirely too often. From thesereflections she drifted naturally into an emotion of self pity, andthe thought occurred to her, as it did invariably in such hours ofdepression, that her world had never been large enough for the fullexercise and appreciation of her highest qualities. If she had onlylived in a richer century amid more congenial surroundings! Who couldtell what her usefulness might have been had not destiny continuallythwarted her aspirations? Before the idea of this thwarted usefulness, which was always vaguely associated with the moral regeneration ofdistinguished historic sinners of the opposite sex, like Lord Byronor Alfred de Musset, she began to feel that she had been not onlyneglected, but wasted in the atmosphere in which she had been placed. 

Jonathan's entrance, with the evening papers in his hand, broke thethread of her reverie, and as he sat down in a chair by her side, shewondered if he had inherited her "nature" and if he, also, cherished inhis soul the same spiritual yearnings? Her wonder was, however, entirelyunnecessary, for Jonathan had very little imagination, and would neverhave wasted his time yearning over a sinner whom he had never seen. 

"I stopped a minute to get into my evening clothes, " he said, in thecheerful voice of one who is a stranger to aspirations of soul. "Ithought Molly would be dressed by this time. She is usually so quick. "

"Yes, she is usually very quick, " replied Mrs. Gay gently, whileshe gathered all the forces of her character, which were slightlydisorganized by her recent indulgence in pensive musings, to do battleagainst an idea which she had striven repeatedly of late to banish fromher thoughts. "I wish, dear Jonathan, " she added, "that you would speaka few words to Molly. You have such influence with her, and I am sure Idon't wonder. "

"I'll speak them with pleasure, mother. Just drop me a hint as to whatthey are to be about. "

"She's a sweet, unselfish girl, we all know that, but there aretimes, dear, especially when strangers are present, when she appears alittle--well, a little crude--you know what I mean?"

"I fancy I know, but I don't see just what we are to do about it. Youmight as well attempt to reshape Molly's nose as her character. Let'sadmit that both might be improved and then give up the job. She's gotcharm--there's no doubt of that. I believe even if she were plain she'dbe almost as attractive. Why, I've seen her when she was very nearlyplain sometimes, and she hasn't been a whit less fascinating than whenshe's looking her prettiest. It's the infinite variety and all that, youknow. Her soul does it, I suppose. "

"Yes, she must have charm, " replied Mrs. Gay, ignoring what he had saidabout "soul" because she felt a vague dislike to hearing a word appliedindiscriminately to others which had become, as it were, associated withherself. "I can't analyze it, however, for she hasn't a single reallyperfect feature except her eyes. "

"But such eyes! In the sunlight they are nearer the colour of ahumming-birds wing than anything I know of. "

"I suppose they are rather unusual, but, after all a fine pair of eyescan't make exactly a--well, a lady, Jonathan. "

"The deuce!" he ejaculated, and then added quickly, "What has she donenow, mother?"

One of Mrs. Gay's first principles of diplomacy was that an unpleasantfact treated as non-existent, was deprived in a measure of its powerfor evil. By the application of this principle, she had extinguished herbrother-in-law's passion for Janet Merryweather, and she hoped that itwould prove equally effective in blighting her son's incipient fancy forMolly. She looked upon Jonathan's infatuation as a mere sinister shadowas yet, but she was shrewd enough to suspect that the shadow would beconverted into substance at the first hint of her recognition thatit was impending. Indirect influence alone remained to her, and shesurmised that her ultimate triumph would depend upon the perfection ofher indirectness. When it came to the game of strategy, Jonathan, beingof an open nature, was no match for his mother. He was inclinedby temperament to accept things at their face value--particularlywomen--and not to worry about them unless they interfered with hisappetite. When he lost his desire for his meals, then he began, somewhatto his surprise, to consider them seriously. 

"Of course I feel just as you do about it, " remarked Mrs. Gay, after aweighty silence. "I'm fond of her and I see her good points--but there'ssomething about her--I suppose it's the strain of Merryweather blood, or the fact of her being born in such unfortunate circumstances--" Hermanner grew severer. "But--whatever the cause, it shows itself in a kindof social defiance that would always keep her from being just--oh, well, you know---"

"She's bright enough, mother, she's quick enough, and she's prettyenough, isn't she?"

"She would be, Jonathan, if her defiance did not come from purewilfulness. But she says and does the most unconventional things simplyfor the pleasure of shocking people. It isn't that she doesn't know, it's that she doesn't care. "

"But she'll get to care--all women do, if you give them time. " His toneimplied that the whole sex was comprised in an elementary branch ofpsychology which he had mastered with the help of a few simple rules ofanalogy. 

"Well, she may, dear, but I doubt it. She is as absolutely without classinstinct as an anarchist, I believe. When she lived in the overseer'scottage she never looked up and now that she has come out of it, shenever looks down. We've told her repeatedly that she mustn't talk tostrangers about that part of her life, but it isn't the least bit ofuse. Only a few days ago I heard her telling Judge Grayson that nobodyappeared to do any 'courting' in New York. "

To her amazement he burst into a laugh. 

"By Jove, I suppose she misses it, " he returned, "but what about thatfellow she picked up in the North who hung around her last summer?"

"Oh, there have been plenty of them hanging about her. Molly is thekind, you know, that will have lovers wherever you put her. " There wasa faint condescension in her voice, for she herself preferred adorers tolovers. 

"But she hasn't seemed to care about them, " he said. "I believe she hasgrown tired of flirting. "

"I'm sure she doesn't flirt with them, and I think it's all because sheis pining for somebody she left at Old Church--the miller or the rectoror somebody we've never even heard of. "

"What's that?" he started a little, and she saw at once that, althoughshe had used her most delicate weapon, he had flinched from the firsttouch of the blade. "I'm positive she hadn't a real fancy for anybodydown there, " he added, as he relapsed into his attitude of indifference. 

"I know she says so, Jonathan, but there are other ways of telling. "

"Oh, there's no truth in that--it's all nonsense, " he said irritably. 

Then a door creaked in the hall, there was a rustle of silken skirtson the carpet, and Molly, having dried her tears, came in, pliant, blushing, and eager to please them both. 

CHAPTER VI

IN WHICH HEARTS GO ASTRAY

She was enchantingly pretty, there was no doubt of that, thought Gayas he watched her at dinner. He had rarely seen a face so radiant inexpression, and she had lost, he noticed, the touch of provincialism inher voice and manner. To-night, for the first time, he felt that therewas a fawn-like shyness about her, as if her soul had flown startledbefore his approach. Of her meeting with Abel in Applegate he knewnothing, and while he discerned instinctively the softness and therichness of her mood, it was but reasonable that he should attribute itto a different and, as it happened, to a mistaken cause. He liked thatfaint shadow of her lashes on her vivid cheeks, and while he drank hiscoffee and cracked his nuts, he told himself, half humorously, that theideal love, after all, was a perpetual virgin in perpetual flight. Ashe rose from the table, he remembered Blossom, and the pile of herhalf-read letters in his travelling bag. "She's a dear good girl, andjust because I've got myself into a mess, I've no idea of behaving likea cad to her, " he thought. 

That was downstairs in the hotel dining-room, and an hour later, when hefaced Molly alone in the little sitting-room, he repeated the phrase tohimself with an additional emphasis--for when the woman before him inflesh and blood looked up at him with entreating eyes, like a childbegging a favour, the woman in his memory faded quickly into remoteness. 

"What's the matter, little girl?" he asked. 

"Oh, Jonathan, I must go back to Old Church--to-morrow!" she said. 

"Why in thunder do you want to do that?"

"There's something I must see about. I can't wait. I never can wait whenI want anything. "

"So I have observed. This something is so important, by the way, thatyou haven't thought of it for six months?"

"Well, I've thought of it--sometimes, " she admitted. 

"Can't you tell me what it is, Molly?"

She shook her head. Her face was pink and her eyes shone; whatever itwas, it had obviously enriched her beauty. 

"Tell me, little girl, " he repeated and leaned closer. There had alwaysbeen something comfortable and warm in his nearness to her, and underthe influence of it, she felt tempted to cry out, "I want to go back tofind out if Abel still loves me! I am an idiot, I know, but I feel thatI shall die if I discover that he has got over caring. This suspenseis more than I can bear, yet I never knew until I felt it, how much hemeans to me. "

This was what she wanted to say, but instead of uttering it, she merelymurmured:

"I can't, Jonathan, you would never understand. " Her whole being wasvibrant to-night with the desire for love, yet, in spite of his wideexperience with the passion, she knew that he would not comprehend whatshe meant by the word. It wasn't his kind of love in the least that shewanted; it differed from his as the light of the sun differs from theblaze of a prairie fire. "It's just a feeling, " she added, helplessly. "You don't have feelings, I suppose?"

"Don't I?" he echoed. "Oh, Molly, if you only knew how many!"

"While they last--but they don't last, you know, they have theirseasons. That's the curse of them, or the charm. If they only lastedearth would be paradise or hell, wouldn't it?"

But generalizations had no further attraction for her. Her mind was onegreat wonder, and she felt that she could hardly keep alive until shecould stand face to face with Abel and read the truth in his eyes. 

"All the same I want to go, " she repeated obstinately. 

Suspicion seized him, and his mouth grew a little hard under his shortmoustache. 

"Molly, " he asked, "have you been thinking again about the miller?"

"How absurd! What put that into your head?" she retorted indignantly. 

The idea, innocent as it was, appeared to incense her. What a littlefirebrand she looked, and how hot her eyes glowed when she was angry!

"Well, I'm glad you haven't--because, you know, really it wouldn't do, "he answered. 

"What wouldn't do?"

"Your marrying a Revercomb--it wouldn't do in the least. "

"Why wouldn't it?"

"You can see that for yourself, can't you? You've come entirely out ofthat life and you couldn't go back to it. "

"I don't see why I couldn't if I wanted to?" she threw out at him withsudden violence. 

Clearly, as his mother had said, she was lacking in reverence, yet hecouldn't agree that she would never become exactly a lady. Not with thathigh-bred poise of the head and those small, exquisite hands!

"Well, in the first place, I don't believe you'd ever want to, " hesaid calmly, "and in the second place, if you ever did such a thing, mylittle weather-vane, you'd regret it in ten minutes. "

"If I did it, I don't believe I'd ever regret it, " was her amazingrejoinder. 

Stupefied yet dauntless, he returned to the charge. 

"You're talking sheer nonsense, you silly girl, and you know it, " hesaid. "If you were to go back to Old Church to marry the miller, you'dbe sorry before you got up to the altar. "

"I'm not going back there to marry him, " she persisted stubbornly, "butI don't' believe if I were to do it, I'd ever regret it. "

"You think you'd be satisfied to give up ten thousand a year and settledown to raising chickens for a living?"

"I like raising chickens. "

"And you'd expect that pursuit to make up to you for all you wouldsacrifice--for the world and people and freedom to go and come as youplease?"

"I don't care about the world, " she replied, sticking, he told himself, as obstinately as a mule to her point, "and people seem to me just thesame everywhere. "

"The same?" he repeated, "do you actually mean that you can't see anydifference?"

"No difference that matters. It's all in the clothes and the sillierthings they talk about. Why, I'd rather hear old Adam Doolittle talkthan that stupid Judge Grayson, who dined with us the other night, andnever mentioned anything but stocks. If I've got to hear about a singlesubject I'd rather it would be crops than stocks--they seem more human, somehow. "

"By Jove!" he exclaimed, under his breath, "what's got into youto-night, Molly? I honestly believe you've begun to idealize the millernow you've been away from him. He's a handsome fellow; you don't seehis physical match in a day, I'm willing to admit, but if you went backagain you'd be surprised to find how--well, how rustic he would appearto you. "

The colour rushed to her face, and her eyes burned hot under the suddendroop of her lashes. 

"He's better than any one I've seen anywhere, " she replied, "he'sbigger, he's stronger, he's kinder. I'm not good enough to marry him, and I know it. "

For an instant he looked at her in the pained surprise of one who hadnever indulged in verbal excesses. Then he said, coldly; "So you'reworking yourself into a sentiment over young Revercomb. My dear child, if you only knew how unspeakably silly it is. Nothing could be moreabsurd than to throw away an income of ten thousand dollars a year inorder to marry a poor man. " The idea of her committing such folly wasintensely distressing to him. His judgment was now in the ascendant, and like most men, while under the cool and firm control of the rationalpart of his nature, he was incapable of recalling with any sympathythe times when he had followed the lead of those qualities which risesuperior to reason. 

"I don't care how poor he is, " said Molly passionately, for her rationalpart was plainly not in the ascendant. "Nobody ever thought about hisbeing so poor until your uncle left me all that horrid money. He washonestly born and I wasn't, yet he didn't care. He was big and splendidand I was little and mean, that was the matter!"

"By George, you're in love with him!" he exclaimed, and beneath thecoldness of his manner, his heart suffered an incomprehensible pang. Undoubtedly he had permitted himself to drift into a feeling forMolly, which, had he been wise, he would have strangled speedily in thebeginning. The obstacles which had appeared to make for his safety, had, he realized now, merely afforded shelter to the flame until it had grownstrong enough to overleap them. While he stood there, with his angrygaze on her flushing and paling beauty, he had the helpless sensation ofa man who returns at sunrise to find a forest fire raging where he hadleft a few sticks smouldering at midnight. 

"I'm not in love with anybody--you've no right to say so, " she returned, "but I'll not have him abused. It's not true, it's not just, it's notgenerous. "

This was too much for his forbearance, though he told himself that, after all, there was no "getting at" Molly from the surface, and thatthis outburst might conceal a fancy for himself quite as well as forthe miller. The last idea, while it tantalized him, was not without apleasant sting for his senses. 

"You're a goose, Molly, and I've half a mind to shake you soundly, "he said. "Since there's no other way to cure you of this foolishinfatuation, I'll take you down to Old Church to-morrow and let you seewith your own eyes. You've forgotten how things look there, that's myopinion. "

"Oh, Jonathan, " she said, and grew dangerously sweet, while all her softflushing body leaned toward him. "You are a perfect dear, aren't you?"

"I rather think I am, since you put the question. Molly, will you kissme?"

She drew back at once, a little deprecating, because she was honestlysorry, since he was so silly as to want to kiss her, that she couldn'toblige him. For her own part, she felt, she wouldn't have cared, butshe remembered Abel's anger because of the kiss by the brook, andthe thought hardened her heart. It was foolish of men to make so muchimportance of kisses. 

"I'm sorry, but I can't. Don't ask me, Jonathan--all the same you are adarling!"

Then before he could detain her, she had slipped away from him throughKesiah's door, which she closed after her. 

"Aunt Kesiah, " he heard her exclaim joyously, "Jonathan is going to takeme to Old Church to spend to-morrow!"

Kesiah, in an ugly grey dressing-gown, tied at the waist with a blackcord, was drying Mrs. Gay's sheets before the radiator. At Molly'sentrance, she turned, and said warningly, "Patsey is rubbing Angelaafter her bath. What was that about Old Church, dear?"

"Jonathan has promised to take me down there to-morrow. "

"To spend the day? Well, I suppose we may trust you with him. " From hermanner one might have inferred that the idea of not trusting anybodywith Jonathan would have been a joke. 

She went on calmly shaking out Mrs. Gay's sheets before the radiator, asif the conversation were over, while behind her on the pale green wall, her shadow loomed distinct, grotesque, and sexless. But Molly was inthe mood when the need to talk--to let oneself go--is so great that thechoice of a listener is little more than an accident. She had discoveredat last--discovered in that illuminating moment in Applegate--themeaning of the homesickness, of the restlessness, of the despondency ofthe last few months. Before she could understand what Abel had meant toher, she had been obliged to draw away from him, to measure him from adistance, to put the lucid revealing silence between them. It was likelooking at a mountain, when one must fall back to the right angle ofview, must gain the proper perspective, before one can judge of thespace it fills on the horizon. What she needed was merely to see Abelin relation to other things in her life, to learn how immeasurably hetowered above them. Her blood rushed through her veins with a burningsweetness, and while she stood there watching Kesiah, the wonder andthe intoxication of magic was upon her. She had passed within theEnchanter's circle, and her soul was dancing to the music of flutes. 

"Aunt Kesiah, " she asked suddenly, and her voice thrilled, "were youever in love?"

Kesiah looked up from the sheets with the expression of a person who hasbeen interrupted in the serious business of life by the fluttering ofa humming-bird. It required an effort for her to recede from thecomfortable habit of thought she had attained to the point of view fromwhich the aspirations of the soul had appeared of more importance thanthe satisfactions of the body. Only for a few weeks in the spring didshe relapse periodically into such a condition of mind. 

"Never, " she answered. 

"Did you never feel that you cared about anybody--in that way?"

"Never. "

It was incredible! It was appalling! But it really had happened! Love, which filled the world, was not the beginning and the end, as it oughtto be, of every mortal existence. Subtract it from the universe andthere was nothing left but a void, yet in this void, life seemed tomove and feed and have its being just as if it were really alive. Peopleindeed--even women--would go on, like Kesiah, for almost sixty years, and not share, for an instant, the divine impulse of creation. Theycould exist quite comfortably on three meals a day without eversuspecting the terrible emptiness that there was inside of them. They could even wring a stale satisfaction out of this imitationexistence--this play of make-believe being alive. And around them allthe time there was the wonder and the glory of the universe!

Then Kesiah turned suddenly from the radiator, and there was anexpression in her face which reminded Molly of the old lady with thebonnet trimmed with artificial purple wistaria she had seen on thetrain--an expression of useless knowledge and regret, as though sherealized that she had missed the essential thing and that it was life, after all, that had been to blame for it. For a minute only the looklasted, for Kesiah's was a closed soul, and the smallest revelation ofherself was like the agony of travail. 

"If you don't mind, dear, will you carry these sheets to Patsey forAngela's bed, " she said. 

At the time Gay had been only half in earnest when he promised to takeMolly to Old Church, and he presented himself at breakfast next morningwith the unspoken hope in his heart that she had changed her mind duringthe night. When she met him with her hat on, he inquired facetiously ifshe contemplated a journey, and proceeded to make light of her responsethat the carriage was ordered to take them to the station. 

"But we'll starve if we go there, " he urged, "the servants arescattered, and the luncheon I got last time was a subject for badlanguage. "

"I'll cook you one, Jonathan. I can cook beautifully, " she said. 

The idea amused him. After all they could easily get back to dinner. 

"I wonder if you know that you are a nuisance, Molly?" he asked, smiling, and she saw that she had won. Winning was just as easy withJonathan as it had been with Reuben or with Abel. 

It was a brilliant day, in the midst of a brief spell of Indiansummer. When they left the train and drove along the corduroy road fromApplegate, the forest on either side of them was gorgeous in gold andcopper. Straight ahead, at the end of the long vista, they could see abit of cloudless sky beyond the low outlines of a field; and both skyand field were wrapped in a faint purplish haze. The few belated yellowbutterflies, floating over the moist places in the road, seemed to driftpensively in the autumnal stillness. 

On the long drive hardly a word was spoken, for Gay was occupied withthe cigar he had not had time to smoke after breakfast, and Molly wasthinking that but for Reuben's death, she would never have accepted Mr. Jonathan's legacy and parted from Abel. 

"All this happened because I went along the Haunt's Walk and not acrossthe east meadow that April afternoon, " she thought, "but for that, Jonathan would not have kissed me and Abel and I should not havequarrelled. " It was such a little thing--only the eighth of a mile whichhad decided her future. She might just as easily have turned aside ifshe had only suspected. But life was like that--you never suspecteduntil things had happened, and the little decisions, made in the midstof your ignorance, committed you to your destiny. 

The horses came out of the wood, plodding over the sandy soil, whichmarked the beginning of the open country. Across the fields towardBottom's Ordinary, scattered groups of people were walking in twos andthrees, showing like disfiguring patches in the midst of the goldenrod and the life-everlasting. Old Adam, hobbling up the path, whilethe horses stopped to drink at the well, touched his hat as he steadiedhimself with the aid of his big knotted stick. 

"It's a fine sight to see you back among us, " he said. "If you'd come acouple of hours earlier you'd have been in time for the wedding?"

"What wedding?" asked Gay in a clear voice, but moved by some intuitiveknowledge of what the answer would be, he did not look at Molly. 

"Why, Solomon Hatch's daughter, Judy, to be sure. She's just marriedthe miller. " For a minute he stopped, coughed, spat and then added: "Mr. Mullen tied 'em up tight all by heart, without so much as glancin' atthe book. Ah, that young parson may have his faults, an' be unsound onthe doctrine of baptism, but he can lay on matrimony with as pious anair as if he was conductin' a funeral. "

He fell back as Gay nodded pleasantly, and the wheels grated overthe rocky ground by the well. With a slow flick on the long whip, thecarriage crossed the three roads and rolled rapidly into the turnpike. And while she gazed straight ahead into the flat distance, Molly wasthinking, "All this has happened because I went down the Haunt's Walkthat April afternoon and not over the east meadow. "

CHAPTER VII

A NEW BEGINNING TO AN OLD TRAGEDY

The wedding was over. Mr. Mullen had read the service in his melodiousvoice, gazing straight over the Prayer-book as though he saw a vision inthe sunbeam above Judy's head. On that solitary occasion his soul, whichrevolted from what he described in secret as the "Methodistical lowchurch atmosphere" of his parish, had adorned the simple word with thefacial solemnity that accompanies an elaborate ritual. 

From the front pew, Sarah Revercomb, in full widow's weeds, had glaredstonily at the Reverend Orlando, as if she suspected him of somesinister intention to tamper with the ceremony. At her side, SolomonHatch's little pointed beard might have been seen rising and fallingas it followed the rhythmic sound of the clergyman's voice. When theservice was over, and the congregation filed out into the leaf-strewnpaths of the churchyard, it was generally decided that Mr. Mullen'sdelivery had never been surpassed in the memory of the severaldenominations. 

"'Twas when he came to makin' Abel say 'with all my worldly goods' thathe looked his grandest, " commented old Adam, as he started for Solomon'scottage between Sarah and Mrs. Hatch. "But, them are solemn words an'he was wise to give a man pause for thought. Thar ain't a mo' inspirin'sentence in the whole Prayer-book than that. "

"Well, marriage ain't all promisin', " observed Sarah, "thar's a deal toit besides, an' they're both likely to find it out befo' they're mucholder. "

Old Adam, who never contradicted a woman unless he was married to her, agreed to this with some unintelligible mutters through his toothlessgums, while Mrs. Hatch remarked with effusive amiability that "it's asad sight to see a daughter go, even though she's a stepchild. It'sa comfort to think, " she added immediately, "that Judy's got aGod-fearin', pious husband an' one with no nonsense about him for allhis good looks. "

"I ain't so sure about the nonsense, " retorted Sarah, "Abel's got to bemanaged like all men folk, an' he ain't so different from the rest of'em, unless it is that he's mo' set. "

She harboured a carefully concealed opinion that Abel was "stooping" tomarry Judy, for the Hatches were particularly thriftless and had neversucceeded in paying a long standing mortgage. Besides, they were in thehabit of using their parlour commonly on week days, and Mrs. Hatch hadonce been seen at church in a calico dress--though, it was true, she hadslipped out of the side door before the service was over. Added to thesethings, Sarah had observed of late that Judy showed an inclination toshirk her duties, and had a dangerous habit of "mooning" while she wasat the wash tub. 

"Well, I like a man that's set, myself, " rejoined Mrs. Hatch, aseffusive as ever. "I used to say thar never was anybody so set as myfirst husband till I got my second. "

"I ain't had so wide an experience as you, " replied Sarah, as ifshe were condescending to an acknowledged lapse in virtue. "Thar's adifference between marryin' for the sake of matrimony, which is rightan' proper accordin' to Scripture, an' marryin' for the sake of a man, which is a sign of weakness in a woman. "

"You ain't a friend to the feelin's of natur, ma'am, " remarked old Adam, with respect. 

"No, thar never was much natur in me, " responded Sarah, lifting herbombazine skirt with both hands as she stepped over a puddle. Herfloating crape veil, bought ten years after her husband's death, withthe money made from her turkeys, represented the single extravaganceas well as the solitary ambition of her life. Even as a child she hadlonged ardently to wear crape, and this secret aspiration, which hadsmouldered in the early poverty-stricken years of her marriage, hadburst suddenly into flame when she found herself a widow. During theburial service over her husband, while she had sat bowed in mustyblack cotton, which had been loaned her by a neighbour, she had vowedearnestly that she would wear weeds yet for Abner before she died. Tenyears of scraping and saving were devoted to this sacred resolve, andnow, twenty years after the death of Abner Revercomb, she was wearinga crape veil for him to his son's wedding. As she walked, so strong asmell of camphor floated from her garments, that old Adam sneezed twice, and then muttered hurriedly that "'twas the very season for chills. "Something of her secret pride in her garb of mourning had entered intohim while he limped beside her on his rheumatic old legs. 

Instead of stopping with the others for the wedding feast at theSolomon's cottage, Sarah pleaded a sudden palpitation of the heart, andhurried home to put the house in order before the arrival of the bride. Already she had prepared the best chamber and set the supper table withher blue and white china, but as she walked quietly home from churchat the side of old Adam, she had remembered, with a sensation of panic, that she had forgotten to make up the the feather bed, which sherolled over for an airing. Not a speck of dust was left on the flooror windows, and a little later, while she began spreading the sheets, without waiting to remove her bonnet, she thought proudly that Judyprobably never stayed in so entirely respectable a chamber in her life. Even the pitcher and basin were elaborately ornamented with peonies, the colour of the sampler in crewel work over the washstand; and on thebureau, between two crocheted mats of an intricate pattern, there was apincushion in the shape of a monstrous tomato. 

Yes, it was all ready for them, she reflected, while she stood in thedoorway and surveyed the results of her handiwork. "Thar's somethingwantin', " she observed presently to herself. "I never could feel thata weddin' or a funeral was finished without a calla lily somewherearound. " Going downstairs to the kitchen, she clipped the last forcedblossoms of an unusual size from her "prize" plant, and brought themback in a small glass vase to decorate Judy's bureau. "Now it's justlike it was when I was married, " she thought, "an' it's just as itwill be when Abel's sons are bringin' home their brides. " There was nosentiment in her thoughts, for she regarded sentiment as a mere morbidstimulant to the kind of emotion she considered both dangerous anduseless. Even the look on Abel's face, which she had been forced torecognize as that of despair, seemed to her, on the whole, a saferexpression than one of a too-exultant joy. She was not afraid ofdespair--its manifestations were familiar to her, and she had usuallyfound them amenable to the laws of propriety. But she felt vaguely thathappiness in some mysterious way was related to sin, and the shamelessecstasy with which Abel had announced his engagement to Molly hadbranded his emotion as positively immoral in her sight. "No decentfeelin' is goin' to make anybody's face shine like a brass plate, " shehad said to herself. 

After straightening the crocheted mats for the last time, she wentdownstairs to the kitchen to describe the wedding to the two oldpeople, who, chained to their chairs by rheumatism, were on the point ofbursting with curiosity. 

"An' you didn't bring me so much as a bite of cake, " whimperedgrandmother, seeing her empty hands. "Here I've been settin' all day inthis cheer with my mouth waterin' for that weddin' cake. "

"I'm just as sure as I can be that Mrs. Hatch is goin' to send you somemade by Blossom, " replied Sarah soothingly. 

"Ah, to think of Abel bein' at his own weddin' an' we settin' here, "piped grandfather. "'Twas a hasty business, but we Revercombs wereal'ays the folk to swallow our puddin' while 'twas smokin' an' then cryout that we didn't know 'twas hot. I never knew one of us that didn'thave to larn he was a fool befo' he could come at any wisdom. "

"Well, I ain't got anything particular against the girl, " said Sarah, "but it's my bounden belief that she'll turn out a slattern. Thar'ssomething moonstruck about her--you can tell it by that shiftin'skeered-rabbit look in her eyes. She's just the sort to sweep all thetrash under the bed an' think she's cleaned the room. "

"It's amazin', the small sense men have in sech matters, " remarkedgrandfather. "Thar's a feelin' among us, I don't know whar it comesfrom, that the little and squinched-up women generally run to virtue. "

"Oh, I ain't sayin' she's not a good girl accordin' to her lights, "returned Sarah, "an', after all, it ain't a man but his mother thatsuffers from a slattern. Well, I must go an' lay off my weeds befo' it'stime for 'em to get here. Don't you fret, ma, Mrs. Hatch is surely goin'to send you something. "

Inspired by this prophecy, grandmother began immediately to show signsof reviving hope, and a little later, when the sound of wheels was heardon the road, she was seized with an anticipation so violent that shefluttered like a withered leaf in the wind. Then the wheels stopped atthe gate, and Blossom and Mr. Mullen entered, bearing a small basket, which contained disordered remains of the wedding feast. 

"Whar's Abel?" inquired Sarah, bowing stiffly to the young clergyman. 

"We passed them in the road. My horse for once outstripped his mare, "replied Mr. Mullen, who felt a crawling sensation in the back of hisneck whenever Sarah was present, as if he were called upon to face inher single person an entire parsimonious vestry. "I had the pleasure ofdriving your granddaughter home, and now I must be going back to bringmother. It was a delightful occasion, Mrs. Revercomb, and you are to becongratulated on the charming addition to your family. " He hadn'tmeant to use the word "charming"--he had intended to say "estimable"instead--but Sarah embarrassed him by her expression, and it slipped outbefore he was aware of it. Her manner annoyed him excessively. It was asbad as looking up suddenly in the midst of one of the finest paragraphsin his sermon and meeting a supercilious look on a face in hiscongregation. 

"Humph!" observed Sarah shortly, and when he had gone, she emitted thesound again, half to herself, half to her audience, "humph!"

"What's the matter, grandma?" inquired Blossom listlessly, "you don'tlook as if you were pleased. "

"Oh, I'm pleased, " replied Sarah curtly. "I'm pleased. Did you noticehow yellow Abel was lookin' at the weddin'? What he needs is a good doseof castor oil. I've seen him like that befo', an' I know. "

"Oh, grandma! how can you? who ever heard of anybody taking castor oilon their wedding day?"

"Well, thar's a lot of 'em that would better, " rejoined Sarah in hertart manner. The perfection of Mr. Mullen's behaviour in church combinedwith her forgetfulness to make up the feather bed had destroyed her day, and her irritation expressed itself as usual in a moral revolt from hersurroundings. "To think of makin' all this fuss about that pop-eyed JudyHatch, " she thought, and a minute later she said aloud, "Thar they arenow; Blossom, you take Judy upstairs to her room an' I'll see afterAbel. It ain't any use contradictin' me. He's in for a bilious spelljust as sure as you are born. " She spoke irritably, for her anxietyabout Abel's liver covered a deeper disquietude, and she was battlingwith all the obstinacy of the Hawtreys against the acknowledgment thatthe ailment she was preparing to dose with drugs was a simple maladyof the soul. In her moral universe, sin and virtue were two separateentities, as easily distinguished on the surface as any other phenomena. That a mere feeling, not produced by a disordered liver, could make aman wear that drawn and desperate look in his face, appeared to her bothunnatural and reprehensible. 

But Abel did not appear, though Sarah awaited his entrance with abottle in her hand. As soon as he had turned his mare out to pasture, hecrossed the road to the mill, and stopping beside the motionless wheel, watched the excited swallows fly back and forth overhead. He knew how aman felt who was given a life sentence in prison for an act committed ina moment of madness. Why he had ever asked Judy to marry him--why hehad gone on calmly approaching the day of his wedding--he could no moreexplain than he could explain the motives which impelled him to theabsurdities in a nightmare. It was all a part of the terrible and yetuseful perversity of life--of the perversity that enables a human beingto pass from inconsistency to inconsistency without pausing in hiscourse to reflect on his folly. 

In front of him was the vivid green rise in the meadow, which showedlike a burst of spring in the midst of the November landscape. Beyondit, the pines were etched in sharp outlines on the bright blue sky, where a buzzard was sailing slowly in search of food. The weather was soperfect that the colours of the fields and the sky borrowed the intenseand unreal look of objects seen in a crystal. 

"Well, it's over and done, " said Abel to himself; "it's over and doneand I'm glad of it. " It seemed to him while he spoke that it was hislife, not his marriage, to which he alluded--that he had taken thefinal, the irremediable step, and there was nothing to come afterwards. The uncertainty and the suspense were at an end, for the clanging of theprison doors behind him was still in his ears. To-morrow would belike yesterday, the next year would be like the last. Forgetting hispolitical ambition, he told himself passionately that there was nothingahead of him--nothing to look forward to. Vaguely he realized thatinconsistent and irreconcilable as his actions appeared, they had been, in fact, held together by a single, connecting thread, that one dominantfeeling had inspired all of his motives. If he had never loved Molly, he saw clearly now, he should never have rushed into his marriage withJudy. Pity had driven him first in the direction of love--he rememberedthe pang that had racked his heart at the story of the forsakenJanet--and pity again had urged him to the supreme folly of hismarriage. All his life he had been led astray by a temptation for drink. 

"Poor Judy, " he said aloud after a minute, "she deserves to be happy andI'm going to try with all the strength that is in me to make her so. "

And then there rose before him, as if it moved in answer to his resolve, a memory of the past so vivid that it seemed to exist not only in histhoughts, but in the radiant autumn fields at which he was looking. Allthe old passionate sweetness, as sharp as pain, appeared to float therein the Indian summer before him. Rapture or agony? He could not tell, but he knew that he had lost it forever. 

Turning away, he recrossed the log, and stood for a moment, hesitating, with his hand on the gate. A decrepit figure, hobbling with bent headthrough a golden cloud of dust, signed to him to stop, and while hewaited, he made out the person of old Adam, slightly the worse, hegathered, for the wedding feast. 

"I tarried thar till the last, hopin' to have still another taste oftoddy, " remarked the aged merrymaker. "When a man has turned ninety hemight as well cease to take thought for his morals, an' let the natchelbent of 'em have a chance. "

It was plain that his last glass had been too much for him, and that, for the first time in his temperate career, he was rapidly approaching acondition of alcoholic ecstasy. 

"You'd better go home and take a nap, " said Abel kindly. "You can't verywell get lost between here and your house, or I'd go with you. "

"It warn't the weddin' glass that was too much for me, " replied theold man at the point of tears, "'twas the one I had arterwards at theor'nary. Not wishin' to depart from an old custom on account of a rarefestival, I stopped at Mrs. Bottom's just as young Mr. Jonathan an'Reuben Merryweather's gal drove up from Applegate. Ah, sech a sight asshe was--all in shot silk that rustled when you looked at it--an' aspretty as a pictur. "

"So they've come back?" asked Abel, almost in a whisper. 

"Yes, they've come back, an' a sad comin' it was for her, as I could seein her face. 'What are you wearin' yo' Sunday best for, Mr. Doolittle?'asked Mr. Jonathan, spry as a cricket. 'It's a fine weddin' I've beento, Mr. Jonathan, ' I answered, 'an' I've seen two lovin' hearts beatin'as one befo' Mr. Mullen at the altar. ' Then Reuben Merryweather's galcalled out right quickly, 'Whose weddin', old Adam?' an' when I replied, 'Abel Revercomb's, ' as I was bound to, her face went as white as a han'tright thar befo' me---"

"You'd better go home or you won't be in any condition to walk there, "said Abel angrily. "It's down right indecent to see a man of your agerocking about in the road. "

Turning quickly in his tracks, he went over the log again and on to theloneliness of the meadows beyond. 

"And she went as white as a haunt, " he muttered under his breath. 

CHAPTER VIII

A GREAT PASSION IN A HUMBLE PLACE

Time does not stand still even for the unhappily married. A man mayhave wedded the wrong woman, but he comes down to his breakfast and goesabout his work as punctually as if he had wedded the right one. To Abel, with the thought of Molly throbbing like a fever in his brain, it wasstill possible to grind his grist and to subtract carefully the eighthpart as a toll--while Judy, hushed in day dreams, went on makingbutter in a habit of absent-minded tranquillity. Life seldom deals incataclysmic situations--at least on the surface. Living side by sidein a married intimacy for months, Abel and Judy were still strangers toeach other. Their bodies touched while their souls were crucified at animmeasurable distance. 

To Sarah, who embraced Christian theology while she practisedreligiously the doctrine of the physical basis of life, there had seemedno cause for disturbance, until Judy entered the kitchen on a stormyevening in June, and turned a pair of inflamed eyes on the face of hermother-in-law. The young woman wore her wedding dress, now nearly sevenmonths old, and clasped in her hand a neatly bound prayer-book which hadbeen the gift of the Reverend Orlando. For more than six months she hadsuffered silently under Sarah's eyes, which saw only outward and visibleafflictions. Now, at the first sign of quivering flesh, the older womanwas at once on the alert. 

"Whar you goin', Judy?" she inquired. "You ain't thinkin' abouttraipsin' out of doors on a night like this, are you?"

"Archie promised to take me to the Bible class, an' he hasn't comeback, " replied Judy, while her face worked convulsively. "I've waitedfor him since half past seven. "

"If that don't beat all!" exclaimed Sarah. "Why, it's thunderin' likeJedgment Day. Can't you hear it?"

"But I promised Mr. Mullen I wouldn't let anything prevent me, " returnedJudy, growing sullen. "Archie said he'd be back here without fail, an' Iknow he's stayed to supper over at the Halloweens'. "

"Isn't it foolish to wear your best hat out in the rain?" asked Blossom, not without surprise, for her sister-in-law had developed into somethingof a slattern. 

"I reckon hats are made to be worn, " retorted Judy. As a rule her temperwas placid enough, but Archie's defection, after she had given himher best neck-tie for the purpose of binding him to his promise, hadoverstrained the tension of her nerves. "Where's Abner? He used to goregular. "

"He's gone upstairs so tired that he can barely hist his foot, " repliedSarah. "You'd better let that Bible class alone this evening, Judy. Yo'salvation ain't dependin' on it, I reckon. "

But in Judy's colourless body there dwelt, unknown to Nature, which hasno sense of the ridiculous, the soul of a Cleopatra. At the moment shewould cheerfully have died of an asp sooner than relinquish the studyof Exodus under the eyes of the rector. In the arid stretch of herexistence a great passion had flamed, and like most great passions, itwas ruthless, destroying, and utterly selfish. She had made butterall day with the hope of that Bible class in her mind, and she wasdetermined that, whatever it cost the Revercombs, she should have herreward this evening in the commendation of the young clergyman. Thatmere thunder and lightning should keep her from his side appeared to herlittle less than absurd. She knew that he had received a call withinthe week, and she would have walked unshod over burning ploughshares inorder to hear him say that he had declined it. 

"I've got to go, " she insisted stubbornly. "If there isn't anybody to gowith me, I'll go alone. "

"Why, if you're so bent on it I'll take you myself, " said Abel, lookingup from the barrel of his gun, which he was cleaning. His manner to Judywas invariably kind and even solicitous, to a degree which caused Sarahto tell herself at times that "it wasn't natural an' wasn't goin' tolast. " As long as men would behave themselves quietly, and go abouttheir business with the unfailing regularity of the orthodox, she preferred, on the whole, that they should avoid any unusualdemonstration of virtue. An extreme of conduct whether good or bad madeher uneasy. She didn't like, as she put it in her mind, "anything out ofthe way. " Once when Abel, nettled by some whim of Judy's, had retortedwith a slight show of annoyance, his mother had experienced a positivesensation of relief, while she said to herself with a kind of triumphthat "the old Adam was thar still. "

"You've got that hackin' cough, Abel an' you oughtn't to go out in thisstorm, " remarked Sarah, with an uneasiness she could not conceal. 

"Oh, it won't hurt me. I'm a pine knot. Are you ready, Judy?"

"It's such a little way, " said Judy, still sullen under hermother-in-law's disapproval. When Abel coughed once, while he wasgetting into his rubber coat, she glanced at him angrily. Why couldn'the have waited at least until he got out of doors? Instead of gratitudeshe bore him a dull resentment for having married her, and when shelooked back on her hard life in her father's house, she beheld itthrough that rosy veil of idealism in which the imaginative temperamentenvelops the past or the future at the cost of the present. Then she hadhad time, at least, to dream and to dawdle! During the seven months ofher marriage, she had learned that for the brooding soul there is noanodyne so soothing as neglect, no comfort so grateful as freedom to beunhappy. 

When the door closed behind them Sarah looked at Blossom with aneloquent expression. "Well, I never!" she exclaimed, and wrung thedough from her hands into the tray over which she was standing. "Well Inever!"

"I don't believe it's right for Abel to give in to Judy as he does, "said Blossom. 

"I never saw a Revercomb that warn't a fool about something, " answeredSarah. "It don't matter so much what 'tis about, but it's obliged to beabout something. "

Blossom sighed and bent lower over the seam she was running. She hadlong since ceased to draw any consolation from her secret marriage, andher wedding ring (bought weeks after the ceremony by Gay) caused herpain rather than pleasure when it pressed into her bosom, where it hungsuspended by a blue ribbon from her neck. Her strong Saxon instinct forchastity--for the integrity of feminine virtue--sometimes awoke in her, and then she would think exultingly, "At least I am married!" But eventhis amazing triumph of morality--of the spirit of Sarah Revercomb overthe spirit of the elder Jonathan Gay--showed pallid and bloodlessbeside the evanescent passion to which she had been sacrificed. Destiny, working through her temperament, had marked her for victory, but it hadbeen only one of those brief victories which herald defeats. Theforces of law and order--the sound racial instincts which make for thepreservation of society--these had won in the event, though they hadbeen, after all, powerless to change the ultimate issue. The spirit ofold Jonathan, as well as the spirit of Sarah, was immortal. The racialbattle between the soldier of fortune and the militant Calvinist was notyet fought to a finish. 

"I believe Abel would give Judy the clothes on his back if he thoughtshe wanted them, " said Blossom, in the effort to turn her musings awayfrom her own troubles. 

"It ain't natural, " rejoined Sarah stubbornly. "It's a man's natur to bemean about money matters whar his wife is concerned, an' when he beginsto be different it's a sign that thar's a screw loose somewhar inside ofhim. My Abner was sech a spendthrift that he'd throw away a day's marketprices down at the or'nary, but he used to expect the money from aparcel of turkeys to keep me in clothes and medicines and doctor'sbills, to say nothin' of household linen an' groceries for the wholeyear round. "

Blossom sighed softly, "I don't suppose there ever was a man who couldsee that a woman needed anything except presents now and then, " shesaid, "unless it's Abel. Do you know, grandma, I sometimes think he's sokind to Judy because he knows he doesn't love her. "

"Well, I reckon, if thar's got to be a choice between love and kindness, I'd hold on to kindness, " retorted Sarah. 

It was ten o'clock before Abel and Judy returned, and from the hurriedand agitated manner of their entrance, it was plain that the Bible classhad not altogether appeased Judy's temper. 

"She's worn out, that's the matter, " explained Abel, while they stoppedto dry themselves in the kitchen. 

"You go straight upstairs to bed, Judy, " said Sarah, "an' I'll send youup a cup of gruel by Abel. You oughtn't to have gone streakin' out inthis rain, an' it's natural that it should have upset you. "

"It wasn't the rain, " replied Judy, and the instant afterwards, sheburst into tears and ran out of the room before they could stop her. 

"I declar', I never saw anybody carry on so in my life, " observed Sarah. 

Abel glanced at her with a perplexed and anxious frown on his brow. "Youought to be patient with her condition, " he said. His own patiencewas inexhaustible, and its root, as Blossom had suspected, lay in hisremorseful indifference. With Molly he had not been patient, but he hadloved her. 

"Don't talk to me about patience, " rejoined Sarah, "haven't I had ninean' lost six?"

She was entirely without the sentiment which her son felt regarding thephysical function of motherhood, for like the majority of sentiments, ithad worn thin when it had been stretched over a continual repetition offacts. To Abel the mystery was still shrouded in a veil of sympathy, and was hardly to be thought of without tenderness. But his solicitudemerely nettled Sarah. Nobody had ever "carried on" over her when she hadhad her nine. 

"Have you said anything sharp to her to-day, mother?" he inquiredsuspiciously, after a minute. 

"You know I ain't, Abel. She left a dirty glass in the dairy an' I neverso much as mentioned it. Did Mr. Mullen complain of her leavin' offmission work?"

"Why, of course not. He talked to us only a few minutes and he seemedabsent-minded. He's had a good call somewhere in the North, and he toldus that he had prayed over it unceasingly and he believed that the Lordwas directing him to larger fields. "

"Did Judy hear that?"

"Yes, he told us both. "

Sarah was stirring the gruel, and she appeared so absorbed in her taskthat the remark she let fall a minute later bore presumably no relationto the conversation. 

"I sometimes think men ain't got any mo' sense than an unborn babe!" sheobserved. 

Taking the cup from her hands, Abel went up the little staircase to thebedroom, where Judy stood before the bureau, with a long black-headedhat pin in her hand. She had evidently not begun to undress, for her hatwas still on her head, and under the heavy shadow of the brim her eyeslooked back at her husband with an accusing and hostile expression. 

"Drink this, Judy, while it is hot, " he said kindly, placing the cup onthe bureau. 

"I don't want it, " she answered, and her voice sounded as if she wereready to burst again into tears. 

"Are you sick?"

"No. "

"I'm going to sleep in the attic. Call me if you want anything. "

Without replying she took off her hat and placed it on the top shelfin the wardrobe. Had he beaten her she felt that she could almost haveloved him, but the primitive sex instinct in her was outraged by hisgentleness. 

"Has anybody hurt your feelings?" asked Abel, turning suddenly on hisway to the door. 

"No. "

"Then, for God's sake, what is it?" he demanded, at his wit's end. "Youlook as if you'd lost the last friend you had on earth. "

At this she broke into hard dry sobs which rattled in her throat beforethey escaped. A spasm of self-pity worked convulsively in her bosom, and, turning away, she buried her face in her arms, while the long, agonized tremors shook her slender figure. Looking at her, he rememberedbitterly that he had married Judy in order to make her happy. By thesacrifice of his own inclinations he had achieved this disastrousresult. If he had tried to do evil instead of good, he could hardly havewrought more irreparable mischief--and with the thought, pity, which hadled him astray, winged off, like an ironic sprite, and left his heartempty of comfort. 

"God knows I am sorry for you, Judy, " he said in the effort to reinforcehis compassion. 

But Judy, though she was avid of sympathy, did not crave an expressionof it from her husband--for her temperament was of the morbid kindthat is happiest when it is most miserable. Her heart had fed upon thesustenance of her brain until the abnormal enlargement of that singleorgan had prepared her for inevitable suffering at the hands of men--ifnot from actual unkindness, yet from an amiable neglect which couldcut even more deeply. She turned in the direction of sentiment asinstinctively as a plant turns toward light, and the Reverend OrlandoMullen had had predecessors in her affections who had been hardly somuch as aware of her existence. 

As Abel went out of the door, her accusing eyes followed him while shethought, with sentimental regret, of the many things she had given upwhen she married--of Mrs. Mullen's ironing day, of the rector's darning, of the red flannel petticoats she had no longer time to make for theHottentots. It was over one of these flannel petticoats that Mr. Mullenhad first turned to her with his earnest and sympathetic look, as thoughhe were probing her soul. At the moment she had felt that his casualwords held a hidden meaning, and to this day, though she had ponderedthem in sleepless nights ever since, she was still undecided. 

"I don't believe he knew how much I cared, " she said, as she startedmechanically to take out her hairpins. 

CHAPTER IX

A MEETING IN THE PASTURE

As Judy did not appear next morning, her breakfast was carried up toher by Sarah, who allowed her own cakes to become leathery while shearranged the tray. Her feet were still on the staircase, when Blossomturned to Abel and said in a furtive and anxious voice:

"Mrs. Bottom told me yesterday the Gays were coming back to Jordan'sJourney. Have you heard anything about it?"

"No, I haven't heard, " he answered indifferently, though his pulsesthrobbed at the words. Rising from the table an instant later, he wentout into the yard, where the sunshine filtered softly through Junefoliage. By the porch a damask rose-bush was in bloom, and the fragrancefollowed him along the path between the borders of portulaca. At thegate he found a young robin too weak to fly, and lifting it carefully, he returned it to the nest in a pear-tree. Like all young and helplessthings, it aroused in him a tenderness which, in some strange way, wasakin to pain. 

On the crooked sycamore the young leaves fluttered with shirred edges, and beyond the mill and the fallow field, the slender green ribbons ofthe corn were unfolding. As he gazed at the pines on the horizon, heremembered the day he had swung his axe in joy under their branches, andit seemed to him, while he looked back upon it, that the hour belongedto the distant memories of his boyhood. 

"It's over now, and I'm not going to whine about it, " he said aloud tohis hound. "A plain fool is bad enough, Moses, my boy, but a whiningfool is the meanest thing God ever made in man or dog. Because I've lostthe thing I wanted most, I've no mind to wallow in the dust--but, oh, Molly, Molly!"

She came to him again, not fair and flitting, but ardent and tender, with her parted red mouth raised to his, and the light and darknesstrembling on her face like faint shadows in the wind. And this visionof her, which was so vivid that it shook his heart with a pang of agony, seemed saying to him in words which were not his--which were not wordsat all, but some subtler communion of sense--"I am to be loved, butnever possessed, for, like the essence of desire, I elude forever theconditions of mortality. "

A week later, while the thought of her burned like fire in his brain, hemet her face to face in the path which led from the blazed pine over thepasture to Jordan's Journey. Had he seen her in time, he would have fledfrom the meeting, but she appeared without warning as he turned from theturnpike to the bars. Almost before he was aware of it, he was withintouch of her and looking into her eyes. She wore her black dress still, and the air of elegance, of strangeness, was even more obvious than whenhe had met her at Applegate the day before his marriage. Her face hadlost a little of its bloom, and there was a look in it which he hadnever seen there before--a look which was wistful and yet expectant, asthough, like old Reuben, she was hoping against knowledge and in despiteof disappointment. 

"Molly!" he cried, and stopped short, longing to touch her hand andyet with something, which was like conscience in the shape of Judy, restraining him. 

"Abel, how little you've changed!" she said. 

"Haven't I? Well, you're yourself, too, and yet you're different. "

"Different? I suppose you mean I'm wearing better clothes?"

He smiled for the first time. "I wasn't thinking about your clothes. They never seemed to matter. "

What he had meant, though he dared not utter the thought aloud, was thatshe had grown softer and gentler, and was less the Molly of the flashingcharm and the defiant challenge. 

"Yes, I've changed in a way, of course, " she admitted presently, "I feelgrown up now, and I never felt so before. Life was all play to me untilgrandfather died. "

"And it isn't now?"

"Not entirely--I'm still growing. "

Her hand rested on the bars beside which she was standing, and thefragrant festoons of wild grape blooming beside the post, brushed softlyagainst her bosom. There was a quietness, a suggestion of restraint inher attitude which he had never seen in the old Molly. 

"The day you went away you told me you wanted to live, " he said. 

"I remember. I couldn't have done differently. I had to find out thingsfor myself. Of course, life is all just the same everywhere, but thenI didn't know it. I used to think that one had only to travel a certaindistance and one would pass the boundary of the commonplace and comeinto the country of adventure. It was silly, of course, but you seeI didn't know any better. It was the fret of youth, I suppose, thoughpeople never seem to think that women ever feel it--or, perhaps, as Mrs. Bottom used to say, it was only the Gay blood working off. "

"I don't like to hear you talk of the Gay blood in you, " he saidquickly. 

His voice betrayed him, and looking up, she asked quietly, "How is Judy, Abel?"

"She's not well. It seems she suffers with her nerves. "

"I'm coming to see her. Judy and I were always friends, you know. "

"Yes, I know. You were a friend to every woman. "

"And I am still. I've grown to love Aunt Kesiah, and I believe I'm theonly person who sees just how fine she is. "

"Your grandfather saw, I think. Do you remember he used to say life wasalways ready to teach us things, but that some of us were so mortal slowwe never learned till we died?"

Her eyes were starry as she looked away from him over the meadow. "Abel, I miss him so, " she said after a minute. 

"I know, Molly, I know. "

"Nothing makes up for him. All the rest seems so distant and unhuman. Nothing is so real to me as the memory of him sitting in his chair onthe porch with Spot at his feet. "

For a minute he did not reply, and when he spoke at last, it was only tosay:

"I wonder if a single human being could ever understand you, Molly?"

"I don't understand myself. I don't even try. "

"You've had everything you could want for a year--been everywhere--seeneverything--yet, I believe, you'd give it all up to be back in thecottage over there with Reuben and his hound?"

"Why shouldn't I?" she answered passionately, "that was what I loved. "

"I suppose you're right, " he said a little sadly, "that was always whatyou loved. "

She turned her head away, but he saw the delicate flush pass from hercheek to her throat. 

"I mean I am faithful to the things that really matter, " she answered. 

"And the things that do not really matter are men?" he asked with ahumour in which there was a touch of grimness. 

"Perhaps you're right about some of them, at least, " she answered, smiling at a memory. "I was full of animal spirits--of the joy ofenergy, and there was no other outlet. A girl sows her mental wild oats, if she has any mind, just as a boy does. But what people never seemto realize is that women go on and change just as men do. They seem tothink that a girl stands perfectly still, that what she is at twenty, she remains to the end of her life. Of course that's absurd. After thefirst shock of real experience that old make-believe side of thingslost all attraction for me. I could no more go back to flirting with Mr. Mullen or with Jim Halloween than I could sit down in the road and makemud pies for an amusement. How is Mr. Mullen, by the way?" she inquiredin a less serious tone. 

"Just the same. He's had a call. "

"And old Adam? Is he still living?"

"He can't walk any longer, but his mind is perfectly clear. Sometimeshis son puts his chair into an oxcart and brings him over to theordinary. He's still the best talker about here, and he frets if he isleft by himself. "

For a moment they were silent again. Old Adam, having fulfilled hispurpose, was dismissed into space. Molly watched Abel's eyes turn to thepines on the horizon, and in the midst of the June meadow, there was alook in them that reminded her of the autumnal sadness of nature. Shehad seen this look in Reuben's face when he gazed wistfully at theblossoming apple boughs in the spring, and the thought came to herthat just this attitude of soul--this steadfast courage in the face ofcircumstance--was the thing that life was meant to teach them bothat the end. If Abel's energy was now less effervescent, she realizedinstinctively that it had become more assured. Life or marriage--or, perhaps, both together had "tamed" him, as Reuben had prophesied, andthe rough edges of his character had worn smooth in the process. 

A butterfly, marked gorgeously in blue and orange, alighted on the barby her hand, and when it fluttered off again, drunken with summer, hergaze followed it into the meadow, where the music of innumerable beesfilled the sunshine. 

"And you, Abel?" she asked, turning presently, "what of yourself?"

He smiled at her before answering; and with the smile, she felt againthe old physical joy in his presence--in his splendid animal vitality, in the red-brown colour of his flesh, in the glow of his dark eyes, which smiled down into hers. No other man had ever made this appeal toher senses. She had struggled sometimes like a bird in a net against thememory of it, yet it had held her, in spite of her will, even when shewas farthest away from him. The gentleness from which Judy revolted, brought Molly's heart back to him with a longing to comfort. 

"Well, I'm learning, " he answered, still smiling. 

"And you are happy?"

He made a gesture of assent, while he looked over her head at thebutterfly--which had found its mate and was soaring heavenward in aflight of ecstasy. The same loyalty which had prevented his touching herhand when they met, rebelled now against an implied reflection on Judy. 

"I am glad, " she said, "you deserve it. "

She had given her eyes to him almost unconsciously, and their look waslike a cord which drew them slowly to each other. His pulses hammeredin his ears, yet he heard around him still the mellow murmuring of bees, and saw the butterflies whirling deliriously together. All the forceswhich had held him under restraint stretched suddenly, while he met hereyes, like bands that were breaking. Before the solitary primal factof his love for her, the fog of tradition with which civilizationhas enveloped the simple relation of man and woman, evaporated in thesunlight. The harsh outlines of the future were veiled, and he saw onlythe present, crowned, radiant, and sweet to the senses as the garlandsof wild grape around which the golden bees hung in a cloud. For aninstant only the vision held him; then the rush of desire fadedslowly, and some unconquerable instinct, of which he had been almostunconscious, asserted its supremacy in his brain. The ghosts of deadancestors who had adhered to law at the cost of happiness; the ironskeleton of an outgrown and yet indelibly implanted creed; the tenacityof the racial structure against which his individual impulses hadrebelled--these things, or one of these things, proved in the endstronger than the appeal of his passion. He longed with all his strengthto hold her in his arms--every nerve in his body ached for her--yet heknew that because of this unconquerable instinct he was powerless tofollow his longing. 

"I don't think I deserve much, Molly, " he said quietly. 

She hesitated still, looking away from him in the direction of her path, which led over the meadow. 

"Abel, be good to Judy, " she said, without turning. 

"I will, Molly, I promise you. "

He moved a step toward the turnpike, stopped, and looked back. 

"I can't do much for you, Molly, " he said, "but if you ever need anybodyto die for you, remember I'm ready. "

"I'll remember, " she answered, with a smile, but her eyes were mistywhen she passed the blazed pine and turned into the little path. 

CHAPTER X

TANGLED THREADS

In front of Molly, the path, deep in silvery orchard grass, woundthrough the pasture to the witch-hazel thicket at Jordan's Journey; andwhen she entered the shelter of the trees, Gay came, whistling, towardher from the direction of the Poplar Spring. He walked rapidly, andhis face wore an anxious and harassed expression, for he was making theunpleasant discovery that even stolen sweets may become cloying to asurfeited palate. His passion had run its inevitable course of desire, fulfilment, and exhaustion. So closely had it followed the changingseasons, that it seemed, in a larger and more impersonal aspect, as mucha product of the soil as did the flame-coloured lilies that bloomedin the Haunt's Walk. The summer had returned, and a hardier growth hadsprung up from the ground enriched by the decay of the autumn. He wasconscious of a distinct relief because the torment of his earlier lovefor Blossom was over. There was no regret in his mind for the poignantsweetness of the days before he had married her--for the restlessness, the expectancy, the hushed waitings, the enervating suspense--nor evenfor those brief hours of fulfilment, when that same haunting suspensehad seemed to add the sharpest edge to his enjoyment. He did not sufferto-day if she were a few minutes late at the meeting; and he dislikedsuffering so much that the sense of approaching bliss had nevercompensated for the pang of it. Her failures now merely made hismanufactured excuses the easier. Once, when she had not been able tocome, he had experienced a revulsion of feeling; like the sudden liftingof a long strain of anxiety. She still pressed for an acknowledgmentof their marriage, while his refusal was still based on a very realsolicitude for his mother. Only in the last six months had his feelingfor Molly entered into the situation; but like all swift and unguardedemotions, it absorbed the colour in his thoughts, while it left both thepast and the future in the cover of darkness. 

"I wish you wouldn't wander off alone like this, Molly, " he began as hejoined her. 

"Oh, it's perfectly safe, Jonathan--everybody knows me for milesaround. "

"But it would make mother nervous if she were to hear of it. She hasnever allowed Aunt Kesiah to go off the lawn by herself. "

"Poor Aunt Kesiah, " said Molly softly. 

He glanced at her sharply. "Why do you say that?" he asked, "she hasalways seemed to me to have everything she wanted. If she hadn't hadmother to occupy her time, what under heaven would have become of her?"

"I wonder?" she returned; "but has it ever occurred to you that AuntKesiah and I are not exactly alike, Jonathan?"

"Well, rather. What are you driving at?"

Her answering smile, instead of softening the effect of her words, appeared to call attention to the width of the gulf that separatedKesiah's generation from her own. The edge of sweetness to her looktempered but did not blunt the keeness with which it pierced. Thisquality of independent decision had always attracted him, and as hewatched her walking under the hanging garland of the wild grape, hetold himself in desperation that she was the only woman he had ever seenwhose infinite variety he could not exhaust. The mere recollection ofthe others wearied him. Almost imperceptibly he was beginning to feela distaste for the side of life which had once offered so rich anallurement to his senses. The idea that this might be love, after all, had occurred to him more than once during the past six months, and hemet the suggestion with the invariable cynical retort that "he hadn't itin him. " Yet only ten minutes before, he had watched Molly coming to himover the jewelled landscape, and the heavens had opened. Once more theunattainable had appeared to him wrapped in the myriad-coloured veil ofhis young illusions. 

"Molly, " he said almost in spite of himself, "what would have happenedto us if we had met five or six years ago?"

"Nothing, probably. "

"Well, I'm not so sure--not if you like me half as well as I like you. You understand, don't you, that I got myself tied up--entangled beforeI knew you--but, by Jove, if I were free I'd make you think twice aboutme. "

"There's no use talking about what might have been, is there?"

The hint of his "entanglement, " she had accepted quite simply as aveiled allusion to an incident in his life abroad. Her interest in itwould have been keener had she been less indifferent to him as a lover, but while she walked by his side, smiling in response to his words, shewas thinking breathlessly, like one hushed in suspense, "If Abel hadonly been like that a year ago, I should not have left him. " That thequalities she had always missed in the miller had developed only throughthe loss of her, she refused to admit. A swift, an almost miraculouschange had passed over her, and all the warm blood in her body seemedto rush back to her heart, giving it the abundance of life. The worldappeared to her in a clearer and fresher light, as though a perpetualdawn were hanging above it; and this light shone into the secretchambers of her mind as well as over the meadows and into the shadowyplaces of the Haunt's Walk. "Yes, if he had been like that I shouldnever have left him and all this would not have happened, " she thoughtagain; "and if I had been like this would he ever have quarrelled withme?" she asked herself the instant afterwards. 

And Gay, walking at her side, but separated by a mental universe, wasthinking resentfully, "The deuce of it is that it might just as wellnever have happened! If I'd only been a little less of a fool--If I'donly not walked my horse across the pasture that October afternoon--IfI'd only had sense enough to see what was coming--If I'd only--oh, hangit!"

"I'd be a better man to-day if I'd known you sooner, Molly, " he saidpresently. "A man couldn't tire of you because you're never the samething two days in succession. "

"Doesn't a man tire of change?"

"I don't--it's the most blessed thing in life. I wonder why you've givenup flirting?"

"Perhaps because there isn't anybody to flirt with. "

"I like that. Am I not continually at your service?"

"But I don't like your kind of flirting, somehow. "

"What you want, I suppose, is a perpetual supply of Mullens. Have youseen him, by the way?"

"He called on Aunt Angela this morning and read a chapter from theBible. I heard it all the way downstairs on the porch. "

"And the miller?"

She was walking beside a clump of lilies, and the colour of the flowersflamed in her face. 

"I saw him for a few minutes this morning. "

"How has his marriage turned out?"

"I haven't heard. Like all the others, I suppose. "

"Well he's as fine a looking animal as one often encounters. His wife isthat thin, drawn out, anaemic girl I saw at Piping Tree, isn't she? Suchmen always seem to marry such women. "

"I never thought Judy unattractive. She's really interesting if you takethe trouble to dig deep enough. "

"I suppose Revercomb dug, but it isn't as a rule a man's habit to goaround with a spade when he's in want of a wife. "

With an impetuous movement, he bent closer to her:

"Look here, Molly, don't you think you might kiss me?"

"I told you the first time I ever saw you that I didn't care forkissing. "

"Well, even if you don't care, can't you occasionally be generous?You've got a colour in your cheeks like red flowers. "

"Oh, have I?"

"The trouble is, I've gone and fallen in love with you and it's turningmy head. "

"I don't think it will hurt you, Jonathan. "

She broke away from him before he could detain her, and while a protestwas still on his lips, ran up the walk and under the grape arbour intothe back door of the house. 

Left to himself, Gay wheeled about and passed into the side-garden, where he found Kesiah snipping off withered roses with a pair of pruningshears. 

At his approach, she paused in her task and stood waiting for him, withthe expression of interested, if automatic, attention, which appeared onher face, as in answer to some secret spring, whenever she was invitedto perform the delicate part of a listener. She had attained at lastthat battered yet smiling acquiescence in the will of Providence whichhas been eloquently praised, under different names, by both theologiansand philosophers. From a long and uncomplaining submission to boredom, she had arrived at a point of blessedness where she was unable to bebored at all. Out of the furnace of a too ardent youth, her soul hadescaped into the agreeable, if foggy, atmosphere of middle age. Peacehad been provided for her--if not by generously presenting her with thethings that she desired, still quite as effectually by crippling theenergy of her desires, until they were content to sun themselves quietlyin a row, like aged, enfeebled paupers along the south wall of thepoorhouse. 

"Aunt Kesiah, " said Gay, stopping beside her, "do you think any of usunderstand Molly's character? Is she happy with us or not?"

It is a pleasant thing to be at the time of life, and in the possessionof the outward advantages, which compel other persons to stop in themidst of their own interesting affairs and begin to inquire if theyunderstand one's character. As Kesiah lifted a caterpillar on a leaf, and carefully laid it in the centre of the grassy walk, she thoughtquite cheerfully that nobody had ever wondered about her character, andthat it must be rather nice to have some one do so. 

"I don't know, Jonathan; you will tread on that caterpillar if youaren't careful. "

"Hang the caterpillar! I sometimes suspect that she isn't quite so happyas she ought to be. "

"She didn't get over Reuben's death easily, if that is what you mean. "

"I don't know whether it is what I mean or not. "

"Perhaps her development has surprised you, in a way. The first touchof sorrow changed her from a child into a woman. No one ever realized, Isuppose, the strength that was in her all the time. "

Turning away from her, he stared moodily at Uncle Boaz, who was trimmingthe lawn beyond the miniature box hedges of the garden. Furrows of mowngrass lay like golden green wind-drifts behind the swinging passage ofthe scythe, and the face of the old negro showed scarred and wistfulunder the dappled sunshine. June beetles, coloured like emeralds, spunloudly through the stillness, which had in it an almost human quality ofhushed and expectant waiting. All Nature seemed to be breathing softly, lest she should awake from her illusion and find the world dissolvedinto space. 

"I wonder if it is really the miller?" said Gay suddenly. "The truth isher life seems empty of something. "

"I beg your pardon?" returned Kesiah, startled, for she had beenthinking not of Molly's life, but of her own. It was not much of a life, to be sure, but it was all she had, so she felt it was only natural thatshe should think about it. 

"I said I wondered if it were the miller, " repeated Gay a littleimpatiently. Like his mother he found Kesiah's attacks of inattentionvery trying--and if she were to get deaf the only position she had everfilled with credit would be necessarily closed to her. What on earth didshe have to occupy her anyway if not other people's affairs?

"I can hardly believe that, " she answered. "Of course he's a veryadmirable young man, but it's out of the question that Molly shouldworry her mind about him after he has gone and married another woman. "

Her logic seemed rather feeble to Gay, but as he had told himself oftenbefore, Kesiah never could argue. 

"I hear the fellow's come out quite surprisingly. Mr. Chamberlayne tellsme he is speaking now around the neighbourhood, and he has a prettycommand of rough and ready oratory. "

"I suppose that is why Molly is so anxious to hear him. She has orderedher horse to ride over to a meeting at Piping Tree this afternoon. "

"What?" He stared in amazement. 

"Young Revercomb is going to speak at an open air meeting of somekind--political, I imagine--and Molly is going to hear him. "

His answer was a low whistle. "At what time?" he asked presently. 

"She ordered her horse at three--the very hottest part of the day. "

"Well, she'll probably have sunstroke, " Gay replied, "but at any rate, I'll not let her have it alone. "

CHAPTER XI

THE RIDE TO PIPING TREE

A look of surprise came into Molly's face when she found Gay waiting forher, but it passed quickly, and she allowed him to mount her withouta word of protest or inquiry. She had been a good rider ever sincethe days when she galloped bareback on Reuben's plough horses to thepasture, and Gay's eyes warmed to her as she rode ahead of him down thecircular drive, checkered with sunlight. Yet in spite of her prettiness, which he had never dignified by the name of beauty, he knew that it wasno superficial accident of colour or of feature that had first caughthis fancy and finally ripened his casual interest into love. The charmwas deeper still, and resulted from something far subtler than theattraction of her girlish freshness--from something vivid yet soft inher look, which seemed to burn always with a tempered warmth. For needof a better word he called this something her "soul, " though he knewthat he meant, in reality, certain latent possibilities of passion whichappeared at moments to pervade not only her sensitive features, but herwhole body with a flamelike glow and mobility. While he watched her heremembered his meeting with Blossom, and the marriage to which in someperfectly inexplicable manner it had led him, but it was not in hispower, even if he had willed it, to conjure up the violence of pastemotions as he could summon back the outlines of the landscape which hadserved as their objective background. 

"Molly, " he said, riding closer to her as they passed into the turnpike, "I wish I knew why we are going on this wild goose chase after themiller?"

"I'm not going after him--it's only that I want to hear him speak. Idon't see why that should surprise you. "

"I didn't know that you were interested in politics?"

"I'm not--in politics. "

"In the miller then?"

"Why shouldn't I be interested in him? I've known him all my life. "

"The fact remains that you're in a different position now and can'tafford a free rein to your sportive fancies. "

"He'd be the last to admit what you say about position--if you meanclass. He doesn't believe in any such thing, nor do I. "

"Money, my dear, is the only solid barrier--but he's got a wife, anyway. "

"Judy and I are friends. That's another reason for my wanting to hearhim. "

"But to ride six miles at three o'clock on a scorching day to listen toa stump speech by a rustic agitator, seems to me a bit ridiculous. "

"There was no reason for your coming, Jonathan. I didn't ask you. "

"I accept the reproof, and I am silent--but I can't resist returning itby telling you that you need a man's strong hand as much as any woman Iever saw. "

"I don't need yours anyway. "

"By Jove, that's just whose, my pretty. You needn't think that because Ihaven't made you love me, I couldn't. "

"I doubt it very much--but you may think so if you choose. "

"Suppose I were to dress in corduroy and run a grist mill. "

Her laugh came readily. 

"You're too fat!"

"Another thrust like that, and I'll gallop off and leave you. "

His face was bent toward hers, and it was only the quick change in herexpression, and the restive start of her horse, that made him swervesuddenly aside and glance at the blazed pine they were passing. Leaningagainst the tree, with her arms resting on the bars, and her bodyas still as if it were chiselled out of stone, Blossom Revercomb waswatching them over a row of tall tiger lilies. Her features were drawnand pallid, as if from sharp physical pain, and a blight had spread overher beauty, like the decay of a flower that feeds a canker at its heart. 

With an exclamation of alarm, Molly turned her horse's head in thedirection of the pine, but with a hasty yet courteous gesture, Gay rodequickly ahead of her, and leaning from his saddle spoke a few words inan undertone. The next instant Blossom had fled and the two were ridingon again down the turnpike. 

"She looked so unhappy, Jonathan. I wonder what was the matter?"

"She was tired, probably. " He despised himself for the evasion, forhis character was naturally an open one, and he heartily dislikedall subterfuge. Yet he implied the falsehood even while he hated thenecessity which forced him to it. So all his life he had done the thingsthat he condemned, condemning himself because he did them. For morethan a year now he had lived above a continuous undercurrent ofsubterfuge--he had lied to Blossom, he had deceived his mother, he hadwilfully encouraged Molly to believe a falsehood--and yet all the time, he was conscious that his nature preferred the honourable and the candidcourse. His intentions were still honest, but long ago in his boyhood, when he had first committed himself to impulse, he had prepared the wayfor his subsequent failures. To-day, with a weakened will, with an everincreasing sensitiveness of his nervous system, he knew that he shouldgo on desiring the good while he compromised with the pleasanter aspectof evil. 

"She wouldn't speak to me, " said Molly, "I can't understand it. What didyou say to her?"

"I asked her if she were ill and if we could do anything for her. "

"I can't get over her look. I wish I had jumped down and run after her, but she went off so quickly. "

So intense was the sunshine that it appeared to burn into the whitestreak of the road, where the dust floated like some smoke on thebreathless air. From the scorched hedges of sumach and bramble, a chorusof grasshoppers was cheerfully giving praise to a universe that ignoredit. 

As Molly rode silently at Gay's side, it seemed to her that Blossom'sstartled face looked back at her from the long, hot road, from the wasteof broomsedge, from the cloudless sky, so bright that it hurt her eyes. It was always there wherever she turned: she could not escape it. Asense of suffocation in the midst of space choked back the words shewould have spoken, and she felt that the burning dust, which hung lowover the road, had drifted into her brain and obscured her thoughts asit obscured the objects around her. When, after passing the ordinary, they turned into the Applegate road, the heavy shade brought a sensationof relief, and the face which had seemed to start out of the blanchedfields, faded slowly away from her. 

As she entered the little village of Piping Tree, her desire to hearAbel's speech left her as suddenly as it had come, and she began to wishthat she had not permitted herself to follow her impulse, or that at thelast moment she had forbidden Gay to accompany her. In place of the cooldetermination of an hour ago, a confusing hesitancy, a baffling shyness, had taken possession of her, weakening her resolution. She felt all atonce that in coming to Piping Tree she had yielded herself to an emotionagainst which she ought to have struggled to the end. Simple as theincident of the ride had appeared to her in the morning, she saw nowthat it was, in reality, one of those crucial decisions, in which thewill, like a spirited horse, had broken control and swerved suddenlyinto a diverging road in spite of the pull of the bit. 

"I don't believe I'll stay, after all, Jonathan, " she said weakly. "It'sso hot and I don't really want to hear him. "

"But we're here now, Molly, and he's already begun. " Against thefeminine instinct to fight the battle and then yield the victory, heopposed the male determination to exact the reward in return for thetrouble. "It's over there in the picnic grounds by the court-house, " hepursued. "Come on. We needn't dismount if you don't feel like it--butI've a curiosity to know what he's talking about. "

Her fuss, of course, he told himself, had been foolish, but after shehad made the fuss, he had no intention of returning without hearingthe miller. Abel's ambition as an orator bored him a little, for in hisclass the generations ahead of him had depleted the racial supply ofpolitical material. The nuisance of politics had been spared him, hewould have said, because the control of the State was passing from thehigher to the lower classes. To his habit of intellectual cynicism, themiller's raw enthusiasm for what Gay called the practically untenableand ideally heroic doctrine of equality, offered a spectacle for honestand tolerant amusement. 

"Oh, come on, " he urged again after a moment, "we'll stop by the fenceunder that cherry-tree and nobody will see us. "

As he spoke he turned his horse toward the paling fence, while Mollyhesitated, hung back, regretted bitterly that she had come, and thenslowly followed. In the cherry-tree, which was laden with red cherries alittle over ripe, birds were quarrelling, and for a minute she could notseparate the sound of Abel's voice from the confusion around her. Thenhis figure, standing under a stunted cedar on a small raised platform, which was used for school celebrations or out-of-door concerts, appearedto gather to itself all that was magnetic and alive in the atmosphere. Of the whole crowd, including Gay, the speaker in his blue shirt, withhis head thrown back enkindled from the fire of his enthusiasm, seemedthe one masculine and dominating intelligence. To Molly he representedneither orator nor reformer, but a compelling force which she feltrather than heard. What he said she was hardly aware of--for it wasemotion not thought that he aroused in her. 

"That's good!" said Jonathan quietly at her side, and glancing at himshe realized that Gay was regarding merely a picturesque embodimentof the economic upheaval of society. Judging the scene from Gay'sstandpoint, she saw that it was, after all, only the ordinary politicalgathering of a thinly settled community. The words, she knew now, werefamiliar. It was the personality of the speaker which charged them withfreshness, with inspiration. What was it but the old plea for socialregeneration through political purity--an appeal to put the dream of theidealist into the actual working of the State, since it is only throughthe brain of the dreamer that a fact may be born into the world. 

"He can speak all right, " observed Gay carelessly, "there's no doubtabout that. "

"I'd like to go, if you don't mind, " answered Molly, and turning sherode softly away from the picnic grounds through the scattered hamlet, too small to be called a village. An old man, killing slugs in a potatofield, stared after them with his long stemmed corn-cob pipe hangingloosely between his lips. Then when they had disappeared, he shook hishead twice very solemnly, spat on the ground, and went on patientlymurdering slugs. 

"'Tis that fly-up-the-creek miller as they've come arter, " he muttered. "Things warn't so in my day, so they oughtn't to be so now. I ain't gotno use for anything that ain't never been befo'. "

And in different language, the same thought was stirring in Gay's mind. "It's all stuff and nonsense, these hifaluting radical theories. There'snever been a fairer distribution of property and there's never going tobe. "

They rode in silence under the flowering locust-trees in the singlestreet, and then, crossing the grassy common, cantered between tworipening fields of oats, and turned into the leafy freshness of theApplegate road. The sun was high, but the long, still shadows had begunto slant from the west, and the silence was brooding in a mellow lightover the distance. 

"I don't know what we're coming to, " said Gay at last, when they hadridden a mile or two without speaking. What he really meant, thoughhe did not say it, was, "I don't know why in the devil's name you keepthinking about that fellow?"

Though his own emotions were superior to reason, he was vaguelyirritated because Molly had allowed hers, even in a small matter, toassert such a supremacy. He was accustomed to speak carelessly ofwoman as "an emotional being, " yet this did not prevent his feeling anindignant surprise when woman, as occasionally happened, illustrated thetruth of his inherited generalization. A lover of the unconventional forhimself, he was almost as strong a hater of it for the women who wererelated to him. It would have annoyed him excessively to see Kesiah makeherself conspicuous in any way, or deviate by a hair's breadth from theaccepted standard of her sex. And now Molly, with whom he had fallenin love, had actually flushed and paled under his eyes at the sight ofyoung Revercomb! In some subtle manner she seemed to have stooped in hisestimation--to have lowered herself from the high and narrow pedestalupon which he had placed her! Yet so contradictory are the passions, that he felt he loved her the more, if possible, because of the angrysoreness at his heart. 

Turning in the direction of Applegate, they continued their ride ata canter, and the afternoon was over when they passed the cross-roadsagain on their homeward way. A thin mist floated like thistledown fromthe marshes, which were so distant that they were visible only as apinkish edge to the horizon. Large noisy insects, with iridescent wings, hovered around the purple, heavy scented tubes of the Jamestown weeds bythe roadside, and the turnpike, glimmering like a white band throughthe purple dusk, was spangled with fireflies. Gay was talking as theyapproached the blazed pine, which stood out sinister and black againstthe afterglow, and it was only when Molly cried out sharply that he sawBlossom's face looking at them again over the tiger lilies. 

"Why, what in the deuce!" he exclaimed, not in anger, but in amazement. 

"Blossom, wait for me!" called Molly, and would have slipped to theground had not Gay reached out and held her in the saddle. 

Then the figure of Blossom, which had waited there evidently since theirfirst passing, vanished like an apparition into the grey twilight. The pallid face floated from them through the grape-scented mist, andMolly's call brought no answer except the cry of a whip-poor-will fromthe thicket. 

CHAPTER XII

ONE OF LOVE'S VICTIMS

A week later Jim Halloween stopped with a bit of news at Bottom'sOrdinary, where old Adam Doolittle dozed under the mulberry tree in arush chair which had been brought over in his son's oxcart. 

"Have you all heard that our Mr. Mullen has accepted a call to largerfields?" he inquired, "an' that Judy Revercomb has gone clean daftbecause he's going to leave us?"

"She didn't have far to go, " observed Mrs. Bottom. 

"Well, you'd never have known it to look at her, " commented young Adam, "but 'tis a true sayin' that you can't tell the quality of the meat bythe colour of the feathers. "

"You'd better be speakin' particular, suh, an' not general, " retortedold Adam, who was in a querulous mood as the result of too abrupt anawakening from his nap. "What you ain't known it doesn't follow otherfolks ain't, does it? Human natur is generally made with a streak offoolishness an' a streak of sense, just as fat an' lean runs in a pieceof bacon. That's what I say, an' I reckon I ought to know, bein' turnedninety. "

"All the same thar's some folks that ain't streaked at all, but a solidlump of silliness like Judy Hatch, " returned his son. 

This was too much for the patience of the patriarchial spirit, and oldAdam began to shake as though he were suddenly smitten with palsy. 

"What do you mean by contradictin' me, suh? Didn't I bring you into theworld?" he demanded. 

A reproachful shake of the head passed round the group. 

"You oughtn't to contradict him, young Adam. Ain't he yo' pa?" said Mrs. Bottom, rebukingly. 

"I warn't contradictin', I was talkin', " replied young Adam, abashed bythe evident disapprobation that surrounded him. 

"Well, don't talk, suh, until you can talk sense, " rejoined his father. "When a talker has turned ninety an' can meet me on equal ground, I'llconsent to argue with him. "

His lower lip protruded threateningly from his toothless gums, whiletwo tears of anger rolled slowly out of his eyes and over his veined androughened cheeks to the crescent shaped hollow of his chin. So deeplyrooted in his mind was the conviction that his ninety years furnished anunanswerable argument for the truth of his opinions, that the assuranceof experience had conferred upon him something of that manner ofsuperhuman authority with which the assurance of inexperience hadendowed Mr. Mullen. 

"I for one was al'ays against Abel's marrying, " interposed Betsey witha placable air. "I knew she'd be a drag on him, an' now that he's goin'into politics with sech good chances, the mo's the pity. I've told himso time and agin when he stopped at the or'nary. "

At this point the appearance of Solomon Hatch caused her to explainhurriedly, "We were jest speakin' of Abel an' his chances for theLegislature. You've got a mighty good son-in-law, Solomon. "

"Yes, " said Solomon, sourly, "yes, but Judy's a fool. "

The confession had burst from an overburdened soul, for like Gayhe could tolerate no divergence from the straight line of duty, novariation from the traditional type, in any woman who was related tohim. Men would be men, he was aware, but if any phrase so original as"women will be women" had been propounded to him, he would probably haveretorted with philosophic cynicism, that "he did not see the necessity. "His vision was enclosed in a circle beyond which he could not penetrateeven if he had desire to, and the conspicuous fact within this circleat the moment was that Judy had made a fool of herself--that she hadactually burst out crying in church when Mr. Mullen had announced hisacceptance of a distant call! He was sorry for Abel, because Judy washis wife, but, since it is human nature to exaggerate the personalelement, he was far sorrier for himself because she was his daughter. 

"Yes, Judy's a fool, " he repeated angrily, and there was a bittercomfort in the knowledge that he had first put into words the thoughtthat had engaged every mind at the ordinary. 

"Oh, she's young yet, an' she'll outgrow it, " observed Betsey assincerely as she had made the opposite remark some minutes before. "Asoft heart is mo' to be pitied than blamed, an' it'll soon harden intoshape now she's settled down to matrimony. "

"I ain't never seen a female with an ounce of good hard sense exceptyou, Mrs. Bottom, " replied Solomon. "Thar's a contrariness in the restof 'em that makes 'em tryin' companions to a rational critter like man, with a firm grip on his heart. To think of gittin' a husband like AbelRevercomb--the risin' man in the county--an' then to turn aside from thecomforts of life on o'count of nothin' mo' than a feelin'. "

"Well, it ain't as if she'd taken a fancy to a plain, ordinary kind ofman, " remarked Betsey. "Thar's somethin' mo' elevatin' about a parson, an' doubtless it's difficult to come down from a pulpit to common earthwhen you've once lifted yo' eyes to it. Thar warn't no shame about hercryin' out like that in church. They ought to have broke it to her mo'gently. "

"I warn't thar, " said old Adam, "but how did Abel conduct himself?"

"Oh, he just got up an' led her out sort of gently, while she was cryin'an' sobbin' so loud that it drowned what Mr. Mullen was sayin', " repliedBetsey. 

"Thar ain't a better husband in the county, " said Solomon, "accordin' toa man's way of lookin' at it, but it seems a woman is never satisfied. "

"I'm glad I never married, " remarked young Adam, "for I might have gotone of the foolish sort seein' as they're so plentiful. "

"Well, I never axed much bein' so unattractive to the sex, " observed JimHalloween, "an' as long as a woman was handsome, with a full figger, an'sweet tempered an' thrifty an' a good cook, with a sure hand for pastry, an' al'ays tidy, with her hair curlin' naturally, an' neat an' freshwithout carin' about dress, I'd have been easy to please with just thethings any man might have a right to expect. "

"It's the way with life that those that ax little usually get less, "commented old Adam, "I ain't sayin' it's all as it ought to be, but bythe time the meek inherit the earth thar'll be precious little left onit except the leavin's of the proud. "

"Thar ain't any way of cultivatin' a proud natur when you're born meek, is thar?" inquired his son. 

"None that I ever heerd of unless it be to marry a meeker wife. Thar'ssomething in marriage that works contrariwise, an' even a worm of a manwill begin to try to trample if he marries a worm of a woman. Who's thatridin' over the three roads, young Adam?"

"It's Abel Revercomb. Come in an' pass the time of day with us, Abel. "

But the miller merely shouted back that he had ridden to Piping Tree fora bottle of medicine, and went on at a gallop. Then he passed from theturnpike into the sunken road that led to the mill, and the cloud ofdust kicked up by his mare drifted after him into the distance. 

In spite of the scene in church, Abel had felt no resentment againstJudy. He knew that she had made herself ridiculous in the eyes ofthe congregation, and that people were pitying him on account ofher hopeless infatuation for the young clergyman, but because he wasindifferent to her in his heart, he was able to look at the situationfrom an impersonal point of view, and to realize something of what shehad suffered. When Solomon had railed at her after the service, Abel hadstopped him in indignation. 

"If you can't speak civilly to my wife, you can leave my house, " he saidsharply. 

"Good God, man! Don't you know she's making a laughin' stock of you?"

"That's a lie!" Abel had replied curtly, and Solomon, with the cravenspirit of all natural despots, had muttered beneath his breath that he"reckoned, after all, it must have been a sudden attack of sickness. "

Of the attack and its nature Abel had said no word after this even toJudy. During that embarrassed walk out of the church, while she clungsobbing hysterically to his arm, he had resolved once for all that, even though her behaviour cost him his ambition, he would never stoop toreproach her. What right, indeed, had he to reproach her when he lovedMolly quite as madly, if not so openly, as she loved the rector? It wasas if he looked on Judy's suffering through his own, and was thereforeendowed with a quality of understanding which his ordinary perceptionswould never have given him. 

When he came in sight of the mill, the flash of red wheels caught hiseyes, and he distinguished Mr. Mullen's gig in the road in front of thedoor. Having seen Judy as he rode by on his round of visits, the rectorhad stopped for a moment to inquire if she had entirely recovered herhealth. 

"I was much concerned about her illness in church yesterday, " heremarked, turning to the miller. 

"I didn't know she was up, " replied Abel, observing the inflamed andswollen state of her features, which had apparently escaped the noticeof Mr. Mullen. "Oughtn't you to have stayed in bed, Judy?" he askedkindly. 

"Oh, no, I'd rather be about, " responded Judy hurriedly. "I came overfrom the house with a message for you when I saw Mr. Mullen passin'. "

"I am trying a young horse of Jim Halloween's, " said the clergyman, "mybay has gone lame, and Jim offered me this one for the day. Badly brokenand needs a firm bit. I'm inclined to believe that he has never beenput between shafts before, for I had quite a sharp tussle with him aboutpassing that threshing machine in Bumpass's field. "

"Oh, that roans all right if you don't fret him, " replied Abel, who hada poor opinion of the rector's horsemanship. "Stop jerking at his mouth, and give him his head. "

But the Reverend Orlando, having drifted naturally into the habitof thinking that he had been placed here to offer, not to receive, instruction, appeared a little restive under the other's directions. 

"I flatter myself that I possess the understanding of horses, " hereplied. "I've never had a disagreement with Harry, though I've drivenhim every day since I've been here. "

"All the same I'd keep a steady hand if I were going by that threshingmachine up the road, " rejoined Abel who magnanimously refrained fromadding that he had assisted at the purchase of Harry, and that horse hadbeen fourteen, if a day, when he passed into the clergyman's keeping. 

A healthful glow suffused Mr. Mullen's cheeks, while he struggledvaliantly to conceal his annoyance. He was very young, and in spite ofhis early elevation to a position of spiritual leadership, he remainedafter all merely an ordinary mortal. So he stiffened perceptibly onthe shiny seat of his gig, and gave a sharp pull at the reins, whichwrenched the head of the young roan away from a clump of sassafras. 

"It is better for every man to follow his own ideas, don't you think, Mr. Revercomb?" he replied, advocating in his resentment a principlewhich he would have been the first to rap soundly had it been advancedby one of his parishioners. "I mean, of course, in the matter ofdriving. "

"When do you go?" asked Judy suddenly, and turned her face away becauseshe could not trust herself to meet his beautiful, earnest eyes. 

"Within a fortnight. It is important that I should assume my newresponsibilities immediately. "

"And you won't come back ever again?" The meadows swam in a blur beforeher eyes, and she thought of the purple velvet slippers which wouldnever be finished. 

He was a kind-hearted young man, who wished well to all the world, andespecially to those of his congregation who had profited spirituallyby his sermons. If he had suspected the existence of Judy's passion, itwould undoubtedly have distressed him--but he did not suspect it, owingto a natural obliquity of vision, which kept him looking away from theworld as it is in the direction of a mental image of the world as heimagined it. So, with an amiable word or two of regret that Providencehad arranged his removal to wider fields, he drove on, sitting veryerect and sawing earnestly at the mouth of the young horse. 

"He's a first-rate parson, but a darn fool of a horseman, " observedAbel, with the disgust of a good driver for a poor one. "You'd better goin and lie down, Judy, you look like a ghost. "

"I don't want to lie down--I wish I were dead, " replied Judy, chokingback her hysterical sobs. Then turning suddenly into the mill, she sankagainst the old mill-stone on the wooden platform and burst into a fitof wild and agonized weeping. Her hand, when he touched it, was as coldas clay and as unresponsive to his. 

"Judy, " he said and his voice was wonderfully gentle, "does it reallymean so much to you? Are you honestly grieving like this about Mr. Mullen?"

If he had only known it his gentleness to her was the thing for whichat times she almost hated him. The woman in her was very primitive--acreature that harked back to the raw sensations of the jungle--andnothing less than sheer brutality on Abel's part could free her from thecharm of the young clergyman's unconscious cruelty. 

She looked up at him with accusing eyes, which said, "I don't care whoknows that I love him, " as plainly as did her huddled and tremblingfigure, clinging pathetically to the old mill-stone, as though it weresome crudely symbolic Rock of Ages which she embraced. 

"Is it because he is going away or would you have felt this just as muchif he had stayed?" he asked, after a minute in which he had watched herwith humorous compassion. 

Raising herself at the question, she pushed the damp hair from herforehead, and sat facing him on the edge of the platform. 

"I could have borne it--if--if I might have had his sermons every Sundayto help me, " she answered, and there was no consciousness of shame, hardly any recognition of her abasement, in her tone. Like all helplessvictims of great emotions, she had ceased to be merely an individual andhad become the vehicle of some impersonal destructive force in nature. It was not Judy, but the passion within her that was speaking throughher lips. 

"But what good would they have done you? You would have been miserablestill. "

"At--at least I should have seen him, an'--an' been strengthened in myreligion---"

The grotesque, the pitiless horror of it struck him for an instant. Thatshe was half distraught and wholly morbid, he saw from her look, and thesight awakened that indomitable pity which had served always as a mediumfor the biting irony of life. 

"To save my soul I can't see what satisfaction you would have got out ofthat, " he remarked. 

"I did--I did. They helped me to be spiritual minded, " wailed Judy withthe incoherence of complete despair. If her infatuation was ridiculous, it occurred to Abel that her courage, at least, was sublime. From adistance and with brighter hair, she might even have been mistaken fora tragic example of immortal passion. The lover in his blood pitied her, but the Calvinist refused to take her seriously. 

"Well, if I were you, I'd go in and lie down, " he said feeling that itwas, after all, the best advice he could offer her. "You're sick, that'swhat's the matter with you, and a cup of tea will do you more good thanhugging that old mill-stone. I know you can't help it, Judy, " he addedin response to a gesture of protestation, "you were born that way, andnone of us, I reckon, can help the way we're born. " And since it iseasier for a man to change his creed than his inheritance, he spoke inthe tone of stern fatalism in which Sarah, glancing about her at life, was accustomed to say to herself, "It's like that, an' thar wouldn't beany justice in it except for original sin. "

Judy struggled blindly to her feet, and still he did not touch her. Inspite of his quiet words there was a taste of bitterness on his lips, as though his magnanimity had turned to wormwood while he was speaking. After all, he told himself in a swift revulsion of feeling, Judy was hiswife and she had made him ridiculous. 

"I know it's hard on you, " she said, pausing on the threshold in thevain hope, he could see, that some word would be uttered which wouldexplain things or at least make them bearable. None was spoken, and herfoot was on the single step that led to the path, when there came thesound of a horse running wildly up the road through the cornlands, and the next instant the young roan passed them, dragging Mr. Mullen'sshattered rig in the direction of the turnpike. 

"Let me get there, Judy, " said Abel, pushing her out of his way, "something has happened!"

But his words came too late. At sight of the empty gig, she uttered asingle despairing shriek, and started at a run down the bank, and overthe mill-stream. Midway of the log, she stumbled shrieked again, andfell heavily to the stream below, from which Abel caught her up as ifshe were a child, and carried her to the opposite side, and across therocky road to the house. As she lay on Sarah's bed, with Blossom workingover her, she began to scream anew, half unconsciously, in the voice offrenzied terror with which she had cried out at the sound of the runninghorse. Her face was grey, but around her mouth there was a blue circlethat made it look like the sunken mouth of an old woman, and hereyes--in which that stark terror was still visible, as though it hadbeen rendered indelible by the violence of the shock that had calledit into being--seemed looking through the figures around her, with theintense yet unseeing gaze with which one might look through shadows insearch of an object one does not find. 

"Get the doctor at once, Abel, " said Blossom, "Grandma says somethinghas happened to bring on Judy's time. Had you two been quarrelling?"

"Good God, no. Mr. Mullen's horse ran away with him and Judy saw itbefore I could catch her. I don't know yet whether he is dead or alive. "

"I saw him running bareheaded through the cornfield just as you broughtJudy in, and I wondered what was the matter. He was going after hishorse, I suppose. "

"Well, he's done enough harm for one day. I'm off to Piping Tree for Dr. Fairley. "

But two hours later, when he returned, with the physician on horsebackat his side, Mr. Mullen's driving, like most earnest yet ignorantendeavours, had already resulted in disaster. All night they workedover Judy, who continued to stare through them, as though they were butshadows which prevented her from seeing the object for which she waslooking. Then at sunrise, having brought a still-born child into theworld, she turned her face to the wall and passed out of it in search ofthe adventure that she had missed. 

CHAPTER XIII

WHAT LIFE TEACHES

Judy was laid away amid the low green ridges in the churchyard, wherethe drowsy hum of the threshing in a wheatfield across the road, was theonly reminder of the serious business of life. And immediately, asif the beneficent green had enveloped her memory, her weaknesses wereeffaced and her virtues were exalted in the minds of the living. Theirjudgment was softened by a vague feeling of awe, but they were nottroubled, while they stood in a solemn and curious row around her grave, by any sense of the pathetic futility of individual suffering in themidst of a universe that creates and destroys in swarms. The mysteryaroused no wonder in their thoughts, for the blindness of habit, whichpasses generally for the vision of faith, had paralyzed in youth theirgroping spiritual impulses. 

On the following Sunday, before leaving for fresher fields, Mr. Mullenpreached a sermon which established him forever in the hearts of hiscongregation, and in the course of it, he alluded tenderly to "theexalted Christian woman who has been recently removed from among us to abrighter sphere. " It was, on the whole as Mrs. Gay observed afterwards, "his most remarkable effort"; and even Sarah Revercomb, who had heardthat her daughter-in-law was to be mentioned in the pulpit, and hadattended from the same spiritual pride with which she had read thefuneral notice in the Applegate papers, admitted on her way home thatshe "wished poor Judy could have heard him. " In spite of the youngwoman's removal to a sphere which Mr. Mullen had described as"brighter, " she had become from the instant of her decease, "poor Judy"in Sarah's thoughts as well as on her lips. 

To Abel her death had brought a shock which was not so much a sense ofpersonal regret, as an intensified expression of the pity he had feltfor her while she lived. The huddled figure against the mill-stone hadacquired a new significance in the act of dying. A dignity which hadnever been hers in life, enfolded her when she lay with the accusing andhostile look in her face fading slowly into an expression of peace. Withthe noble inconsistency of a generous heart, he began to regard Judydead with a tenderness he had never been able to feel for Judy living. The less she demanded of him, the more he was ready to give her. 

"I declar' it does look as if Abel was mournin', " remarked BetseyBottom to Sarah on a September afternoon several months later. "Itain't suprisin' in his case seein' he jest married her to get even withMolly. "

"I don't believe myself in settin' round an' nursin' grief, " respondedSarah, "a proper show of respect is well an' good, but nobody can expecta hearty, able bodied man to keep his thoughts turned on the departed. With women, now, it's different, for thar's precious little satisfactionsome women get out of thar husbands till they start to wearin' weeds for'em. "

"You've worn weeds steady now, ain't you, Mrs. Revercomb?"

Sarah set her mouth tightly. "They were too costly to lay away, " shereplied, and the words were as real a eulogy of her husband as she hadever uttered. 

"It's a pity Abel lost Molly Merryweather, " said Betsey. "Is thar anylikelihood of thar comin' together again? Or is it true--as the rumourkeeps up--that she is goin' to marry Mr. Jonathan befo' many months?"

"It ain't likely she'll throw away all that good money once she's gotused to it, " said Sarah. "For my part, I don't hold with the folks thatblamed her for her choice. Thar ain't many husbands that would be worthyof thar hire, an' how was she to find out, till she tried, if Abel wasone of those few or not?"

"He al'ays seemed to me almost too promisin' for his good looks, Mrs. Revercomb. I'm mighty partial to looks in a man, thar ain't no use mydenyin' it. "

"Well, I ain't, " said Sarah, "they're no mo' than dross an' cobwebs inmy sight, but we're made different an' thar's no sense arguin' abouttastes--though I must say for me that I could never understand how amodest woman like you could confess to takin' pleasure in the sight of ahandsome man. "

"Well, immodest or not, I hold to it, " replied Betsey in as amiable amanner as if there had been no reflection upon her refinement. "Abelstands a good chance for the legislature now, don't he?"

"I ain't a friend to that, for I never saw the man yet that came out ofpolitics as clean as he went into 'em, and thar ain't nothin' thattakes the place of cleanness with me. " In her heart she felt for Betseysomething of the contempt which the stoic in all ranks of life feels forthe epicurean. 

At supper that night Sarah repeated this conversation, and to herastonishment, not Abel, but Blossom, went pitiably white and flinchedback sharply as if fearing a second fall of the lash. 

"I don't believe it! Mr. Jonathan will never marry Molly. There's notruth in it!" she cried. 

Over the coffee-pot which she has holding, Sarah stared at her inperplexity. "Why, whatever has come over you, Blossom?" she asked. 

"You haven't been yo'self for a considerable spell, daughter, " saidAbner, turning to her with a pathetic, anxious expression on his greathairy face. "Do you feel sick or mopin'?"

He looked at Blossom as a man looks at the only thing he loves in lifewhen he sees that thing suffering beneath his eyes and cannot divine thecause. The veins grew large and stood out on his forehead, and the bigknotted hand that was carrying his cup to his lips, trembled in the airand then sank slowly back to the table. His usually dull and indifferentgaze became suddenly piercing as if it were charged with electricity. 

"It's nothing, father, " said Blossom, pressing her hand to her bosom, as though she were choking for breath, "and it's all silly talk, I know, about Molly. "

"What does it matter to you if it's true?" demanded Sarah tartly, but Blossom, driven from the room by a spasm of coughing, had alreadydisappeared. 

It was a close September night, and as Abel crossed the road to lookfor a young heifer in the meadow the heavy scent of the Jamestownweeds seemed to float downward beneath the oppressive weight ofthe atmosphere. The sawing of the katydids came to him out of thesurrounding darkness, through which a light, gliding like a giganticglow-worm along the earth, revealed presently the figure of JonathanGay, mounted on horseback and swinging a lantern from his saddle. 

"A dark night, Revercomb. "

"Yes, there'll be rain before morning. "

"Well, it won't do any harm. The country needs it. I'm glad to hear, bythe way, that you are going into politics. You're a capital speaker. Iheard you last summer at Piping Tree. "

He rode on, and Abel forgot the meeting until, on his way back from themeadow, he ran against Blossom, who was coming rather wildly from thedirection in which Jonathan had vanished. 

"What has upset you so, Blossom? You are like a ghost. Did you meet Mr. Jonathan?"

"No, why should I meet Mr. Jonathan? What do you mean?"

Without replying she turned from him and ran into the house, whilefollowing her more soberly, he asked himself carelessly what could havehappened to disturb her. "I wonder if she is frettin' about the rector?"he thought, and his utter inability to understand, or even to recognizethe contradictions in the nature of women oppressed his mind. "First, she wanted Mr. Mullen and he didn't want her, then he wanted her and shedidn't want him, and now when he's evidently left off caring again, sheappears to be grievin' herself sick about him. I wonder if it's alwayslike that--everybody wanting the person that wants somebody else? Andyet I know I loved Molly a hundred times more, if that were possible, when I believed she cared for me. " He remembered the December afternoonso many years ago, when she had run away from the school in Applegate, and he had found her breasting a heavy snow storm on the road toJordan's Journey. Against the darkness he saw her so vividly, as shelooked with the snow powdering her hair and her eyes shining happily upat him when she nestled for warmth against his arm, that for a minute hecould hardly believe that it was eight years ago and not yesterday. 

Several weeks later, on a hazy October morning, when the air was sharpwith the scent of cider presses and burning brushwood, he met Mollyreturning from the cross-roads, in the short path over the pasture. 

"I thought you had gone, " he said, and held out his hand. 

"Not yet. Mrs. Gay wants to stay through October. "

In her hand she held a bunch of golden-rod, and behind her the field inwhich she had gathered it, flamed royally in the sunlight. 

"Did you know that I rode to Piping Tree to hear you speak one day inJune?" she asked suddenly. 

"I didn't know it, but it was nice of you. "

His renunciation had conferred a dignity upon him which had in itsomething of the quiet and the breadth of the Southern landscape. Sheknew while she looked at him that he had accepted her decision once forall--that he still accepted it in spite of the ensuing logic of eventswhich had refuted its finality. The choice had been offered her betweenlove and the world, and she had chosen the world--chosen in the heat ofyouth, in the thirst for experience. She had not loved enough. Herlove had been slight, young, yielding too easily to the impact of otherdesires. There had been no illusion to shelter it. She had never, sheremembered now, had any illusions--all had been of the substance and thefibre of reality. Then, with the lucidity of vision through which shehad always seen and weighed the values of her emotions, she realizedthat if she had the choice to make over again, she could not make itdifferently. At the time flight from love was as necessary to her growthas the return to love was necessary to her happiness to-day. She sawclearly that her return was, after all, the result of her flight. Ifshe had not chosen the world, she would never have known how little theworld signified in comparison with simpler things. Life was all of asingle piece; it was impossible to pull it apart and say "without thisit would have been better"--since nothing in it was unrelated to therest, nothing in it existed by itself and independent of the events thatpreceded it and came after it. Born as she had been out of sin, and thetragic expiation of sin, she had learned more quickly than other women, as though the spectre of the unhappy Janet stood always at her side tohelp her to a deeper understanding and a sincerer pity. She knew nowthat if she loved Abel, it was because all other interests and emotionshad faded like the perishable bloom on the meadow before the solid, thefundamental fact of her need of him. 

"Do you still get books from the library in Applegate?" she askedbecause she could think of nothing to say that sounded less trivial. 

"Sometimes, and second hand ones from a dealer I've found there. Onecorner of the mill is given up to them. "

Again there was silence, and then she said impulsively in her oldchildlike way. 

"Abel, have you ever forgiven me?"

"There was nothing to forgive. You see, I've learned, Molly. "

"What you've learned is that I wasn't worth loving, I suppose?"

He laughed softly. "The truth is, I never knew how much you were worthtill I gave you up, " he answered. 

"It was the same way with me--that's life, perhaps. "

"That sounded like my mother. You're too young to have learned what itmeans. "

"I don't believe I was ever young--I seem to have known about thesadness of life from my cradle. That was why I wanted so passionatelysome of its gaiety. I remember I used to think that Paris meant gaiety, but when we went there I couldn't get over my surprise because of allthe ragged people and the poor, miserable horses. They spoiled it tome. "

"The secret is not to look, isn't it?" he asked. 

"Yes. Jonathan never looked. It all depends, he used to tell me--uponwhich set of facts I chose to regard--and he calls it philosophical notto regard any but pleasant ones. "

"Perhaps he's right, but isn't it, after all, a question of the way he'smade?"

"Everything is; grandfather used to say that was why he was never ableto judge people. Life was woven of many colours, like Joseph's coat, he once told me, and we could make dyes run, but we couldn't wash thementirely out. He couldn't make himself resentful when he tried--not evenwith--with Mr. Jonathan. "

"Have you ever forgiven him, Molly?"

"I've sometimes thought that he was sorry at the end--but how could thatundo the way he treated my mother? Being sorry when you're dying doesn'thelp things you've hurt in life--but, then, grandfather would have said, I suppose, that it was life, not Mr. Jonathan, that was to blame. AndI can see, too, in a way, that we sometimes do things we don't want todo--that we don't even mean to do--that we regret ever afterwards--justbecause life drives us to do them--" For a minute she hesitated, andthen added bravely, "I learned that by taking Mr. Jonathan's money. "

"But you were right, " he answered. 

"To have the choice between love and money, and to choose--money?"

"You're putting it harshly. It wasn't money you chose--it was the worldor Old Church--Jordan's Journey or the grist mill. "

For a moment the throbbing of her heart stifled her. Then she found hervoice. 

"If I had the choice now I'd choose Old Church and the grist mill, " shesaid. 

There was a short silence, and while it lasted she waited trembling, herhand outstretched, her mouth quivering for his kisses. She rememberedhow eagerly his lips had turned to hers in the past as one who thirstedfor water. 

But when he spoke again it was in the same quiet voice. 

"Would you, Molly!" he answered gently, and that was all. It was not aquestion, but an acceptance. He made no movement toward her. His eyesdid not search her face. 

They turned and walked slowly across the pasture over thelife-everlasting, which diffused under their feet a haunting and ghostlyfragrance. Myriads of grasshoppers chanted in the warm sunshine, and aroving scent of wood-smoke drifted to them from a clearing across theroad. It was the season of the year when the earth wears its richestand its most ephemeral splendour; when its bloom is so poignantly lovelythat it seems as if a breath would destroy it, and the curves of hilland field melt like shadows into the faint purple haze on the horizon. 

"If I could change it all now--could take you out of the life that suitsyou and bring you back to the mill--I wouldn't do it. I like to thinkI'm decent enough not even to want to do it, " he said. 

They had reached the fence that separated Gay's pasture from his, andstopping, he held out his hand with a smile. 

"I hear you're to marry Jonathan Gay, " he added, "and whether or not youdo, God bless you. "

"But I'm not, Abel!" she cried passionately as he turned away. 

He did not look back, and when he had passed out of hearing, sherepeated her words with a passionate repudiation of the thing he hadsuggested, "I'm not, Abel!--I'm not!"

CHAPTER XIV

THE TURN OF THE WHEEL

Tears blinded her eyes as she crossed the pasture, and when she brushedthem away, she could see nothing distinctly except the single pointedmaple that lifted its fiery torch above the spectral procession of theaspens in the graveyard. She had passed under the trees at the PoplarSpring, and was deep in the witch-hazel boughs which made a screen forthe Haunt's Walk, when beyond a sudden twist in the path, she saw aheadof her the figures of Blossom Revercomb and Jonathan Gay. At first theyshowed merely in dim outlines standing a little apart, with the sunlitbranch of a sweet gum tree dropping between them. Then as Molly wentforward over the velvety carpet of leaves, she saw the girl make a swiftand appealing movement of her arms. 

"Oh, Jonathan, if you only would! I can't bear it any longer!" shecried, with her hands on his shoulders. 

He drew away, kindly, almost caressingly. He was in hunting clothes, andthe barrel of his gun, Molly saw, came between him and Blossom, gentlypressing her off. 

"You don't understand, Blossom, I've told you a hundred times it is outof the question, " he answered. 

Then looking up his eyes met Molly's, and he stood silent withoutdefence or explanation, before her. 

"What is impossible, Jonathan? Can I help you?" she asked impulsively, and going quickly to Blossom's side she drew the girl's weeping face toher breast. "You're in trouble, darling--tell me, tell Molly about it, "she said. 

As they clung together in a passion of despair and of pity--the oneappealing by sheer helplessness, the other giving succour out of anabundant self-reliance--Gay became conscious that he was witnessingthe secret wonder of Molly's nature. The relation of woman to man wasdwarfed suddenly by an understanding of the relation of woman to woman. Deeper than the dependence of sex, simpler, more natural, closer to theearth, as though it still drew its strength from the soil, he realizedthat the need of woman for woman was not written in the songs nor in thehistories of men, but in the neglected and frustrated lives which thesongs and the histories of men had ignored. 

"Tell me, Blossom--tell Molly, " said the soft voice again. 

"Molly!" he said sharply, and as she looked at him over Blossom'sprostrate head, he met a light of anger that seemed, while it lasted, toillumine her features. 

"Blossom and I were married nearly two years ago, " he said. 

"Nearly two years ago?" she repeated. "Why have we never known it?"

"I had to think of my mother, " he replied almost doggedly. Then drivenby a rush of anger against Blossom because she was to blame for itall--because he had ever seen her, because he had ever desired her, because he had ever committed the supreme folly of marrying her, and, most of all, because she had, in her indiscretion, betrayed him toMolly--he added with the cruelty which is possible sometimes to generousand kindly natures--"It was a mistake, of course. I am ready to doanything in my power for her happiness, but it wouldn't be for herhappiness for us to start living together. "

Blossom raised her face from Molly's bosom, and the strong sunlightshining through the coloured leaves, showed the blanched look of herskin and the fine lines chiselled by tears around her eyes. Encirclingher mouth, which Gay had once described as looking "as though itwould melt if you kissed it, " there was now a heavy blue shadow whichdetracted from the beauty of her still red and voluptuous lips. In manyways she was finer, larger, nobler than when he had first met her--forexperience, which had blighted her physical loveliness, appeared, also, to have increased the dignity and quietness of her soul. Had Gay beenable to see her soul it would probably have moved him, for he was easilystirred by the thing that was beneath the eyes. But it was impossible topresent a woman's soul to him as a concrete image. 

"I don't want to live with him--I don't want anything from him, "responded Blossom, with pride. "I don't want anything from him everagain, " she repeated, and putting Molly's arms away from her, she turnedand moved slowly down the Haunt's Walk toward the Poplar Spring. 

"I couldn't help loving you, could I, Molly?" he asked in a low voice. 

Her face was pale and stern when she answered. 

"And you couldn't help loving Blossom last year, I suppose?"

"If I could have helped, do you think I should have done it? You don'tunderstand such things, Molly. "

"No, I don't understand them. When love has to cloak cruelty andfaithlessness, I can't see that it's any better than the thing itexcuses. "

"But all love isn't alike. I don't love you in the least as I lovedBlossom. That was a mere impulse, and incident. "

"But how was Blossom to know that? and how am I?"

"One can't explain it to a woman. They're not made of flesh and blood asmen are. "

"They've had to drill their flesh and blood, " she replied, stern ratherthan scornful. 

"I might have known you'd be hard, Molly. "

When she spoke again her voice had softened. 

"Jonathan, it's no use thinking of me--go back to Blossom, " she said. 

"Not thinking of you won't make me go back to Blossom. When that sort ofthing is over, it is over once for all. "

"Even if that is true you mustn't think of me--because I belong--everybit of me--to Abel. "

He stared at her for a moment in silence. "Then it's true, " he said atlast under his breath. 

"It has always been true--ever since anything was true. "

"But you didn't always know it. "

"I had to grow to it. I believe I have been growing to it forever. Everything has helped me to it--even my mistakes. "

She spoke quite simply. Her earnestness was so large that it had sweptaway her shyness and her self-consciousness, as a strong wind sweepsaway the smoke over the autumn meadows. And yet this very earnestness, this passionate sincerity, added but another fold to the luminous evilof mystery in which she was enveloped. He could not understand her whenshe tried to tear the veil away and the terrible clearness of her soulblinded his sight. Therein lay her charm for him--he could never reachher, could never possess her even should she seek to approach him. Behind the mystery of darkness which he might penetrate, there was stillthe mystery of light. 

"If you really care about him like that I don't see why you gave him upand went away from him, " he said helplessly. "You wanted to go. Nobodyurged you. It was your own choice. "

"Yes, that's what you could never understand. I wasn't really going awayfrom him when I went. I was going to him. It was a long and a roundaboutroad, but it was safer. "

"You mean it brought you back in the end?"

"It not only brought me back, it showed me things by the way. It made meunderstand about you and Blossom. "

"By Jove!" he exclaimed, and was silent. The pang of his loss wasswallowed up in the amplitude of his wonder. 

"Are you going to marry him, Molly?" he asked when the silence hadbecome unbearable. 

"If he wants me. I'm not quite sure that he wants me. I know he lovesme, " she added, "but that isn't just the same. "

He did not answer, and they stood looking beyond the thick foliage inthe Haunt's Walk, to the meadows, over which a golden haze shimmered asthough it were filled with the beating of invisible wings. 

"Molly, " he said suddenly. "Shall I go after Blossom?"

"Oh, if you would, dear Jonathan, " she answered. 

Without a word, he turned from her and walked rapidly down the pathBlossom had followed. 

When he had disappeared, Molly went up the walk to the Italian garden, and then ascending the front steps passed into the drawing room, whereKesiah and Mrs. Gay sat in the glow of a cedar fire, reading a new lifeof Lord Byron. 

Kesiah's voice, droning monotonously like the loud hum of bees, roseabove the faint crackling of the logs, on which Mrs. Gay had fixed hersoft, unfathomable eyes, while she reconstructed, after the habit of herimagination, certain magnificent adventures in the poet's life. 

"Have you seen Jonathan, Molly?" asked Kesiah, laying aside her bookwhile Mrs. Gay wiped her eyes. 

"Yes, I left him in the Haunt's Walk. "

"He has not seemed well of late, " said Mrs. Gay softly, "I am trying topersuade him to leave us and go back to Europe. "

"He is anxious about your health and doesn't like to go so far away fromyou, " replied Molly, sitting on an ottoman beside her chair. 

Taking her hand, Mrs. Gay caressed it while she answered. 

"I can never think of myself when Jonathan's happiness is to beconsidered. " Then dropping her voice still lower, she added tenderly, "You are a great comfort to me, dear, a very great comfort. "

What she meant, and Molly grasped her meaning as distinctly as if shehad put it into words, was that she was comforted, she was reassured bythe girl's obvious indifference to Jonathan's passion. Like manypersons of sentimental turn of mind, she found no great difficulty inreconciling a visionary romanticism with a very practical regard for themore substantial values of life. 

"I should never allow the question of my health to interfere withJonathan's plans, " she repeated, while her expression grew angelic inthe light of her sacrificial fervour. 

"I don't think he wants to go, " retorted Kesiah rather snappily, andopening the book again she began to read. 

For an hour her voice droned steadily in the firelight, while Molly, with her head against Mrs. Gay's knee, looked through the casementwindow to where the October roses bloomed and dropped in the squares ofthe Italian garden. Then at the sound of hurried footsteps on the walkoutside, the girl rose from the ottoman and went out, closing the doorafter her. In the hall the blanched face of Uncle Abednego confrontedher like the face of a spectre. 

"I ain't a-gwine ter tell Miss Angela--I ain't a-gwine ter tell MissAngela, " he moaned, "Marse Jonathan, he's been shot down yonder at PoplarSpring des like Ole Marster!"

CHAPTER XV

GAY DISCOVERS HIMSELF

As Gay passed rapidly down the Haunt's Walk a rustle in the witch-hazelbushes accompanied him, stopping instantly when he stopped, andbeginning again when he moved, as though something, crouching there, listened in breathless suspense for the fall of his footsteps. Atthe Poplar Spring the sound grew so distinct that he hastened in thedirection of it, calling in an impatient voice, "Blossom! Are you there, Blossom?" The words were still on his lips, when a thick grape-vineparted in front of him, and the bearded immobile face of Abner Revercomblooked out at him, with hatred in his eyes. 

"Damn you!" said a voice almost in a whisper. The next instant a shotrang out, and Gay stumbled forward as though he had tripped over theunderbrush, while his gun, slipping from his shoulder, discharged itsload into the air. His first confused impression was that he had knockedagainst a poplar bough which had stuck him sharply in the side. Then, asa small drift of smoke floated toward him, he thought in surprise, "I'm shot. By Jove, that's what it means--I'm shot. " At the instant, underlying every other sensation or idea, there was an ironic wonderthat anybody should have hated him enough to shoot him. But while thewonder was still engrossing him--in that same instant, which seemed tocover an eternity, when the shot rang in his ears, something happened inhis brain, and he staggered through the curtain of grape-vine and sankdown as though falling asleep on the bed of life-everlasting. "It'sridiculous that anybody should want to shoot me, " he thought, while thelittle round yellow sun dwindled smaller and smaller until a black cloudobscured it. 

A minute, or an hour afterwards, he opened his eyes with a start, andlay staring up at the sky, where a flock of swallows drifted like smokein the cloudless blue. He had awakened to an odd sensation of floatingdownward on a current that was too strong for him; and though he knewthat the idea was absurd, it was impossible for him to put it out of hismind, for when he made an effort to do so, he felt that he was slippingagain into oblivion. For a time he let himself drift helplessly like aleaf on the stream. Then seized by a sudden terror of the gulf beyond, he tried to stop, to hold back, to catch at something--at anything--thatwould check the swiftness of his descent, that would silence the rushingsound of the river about him. But in spite of his struggles, thiscurrent--which seemed sometimes to flow from a wound in his side, and sometimes to be only the watery rustle of the aspens in thegraveyard--this imaginary yet pitiless current, bore him always fartheraway from the thing to which he was clinging--from this thing hecould not let go because it was himself--because it had separated anddistinguished him from all other persons and objects in the universe. "I've always believed I was one person, " he thought, "but I am amultitude. There are at least a million of me--and any one of themmight have crowded out all the others if he'd got a chance. " A swift andjoyous surprise held him for a moment, as though he were conscious forthe first time of dormant possibilities in himself which he had neversuspected. "Why didn't I know this before?" he asked, like one whostumbles by accident upon some simple and yet illuminating fact ofnature. "All this has been in me all the time, but nobody told me. Imight just as well have been any of these other selves as the one Iam. " The noise of the river began in his head again, but it no longerfrightened him. 

"It's only the hum of bees in the meadow, " he said after a minute, "andyet it fills the universe as if it were the sound of a battle. And nowI've forgotten what I was thinking about. It was very important, butI shall never remember it. " He closed his eyes, while the ghostlyfragrance of the life-everlasting on which he was lying rose in a cloudto envelop him. Something brushed his face like the touch of wings, and looking up he saw that it was a golden leaf which had fallen from abough of the great poplar above him. He had never seen anything in hislife so bright as that golden bough that hung over him, and whenhe gazed through it, he saw that the sky was bluer than he had everimagined that it could be, and that everything at which he lookedhad not only this quality of intense, of penetrating brightness, butappeared transparent, with a luminous transparency which seemed a veilspread over something that was shining beyond it. "I wonder if I'mdead?" he thought irritably, "or is it only delirium? And if I am dead, it really doesn't matter--an idiot could see through anything so thin asthis. "

Again the cloud closed over him, and again just as suddenly it liftedand the joyous surprise awoke in his mind. He remembered feeling thesame sensation in his boyhood, when he had walked one morning at sunriseon a strange road, and had wondered what would happen when he turned along curve he was approaching. And it seemed to him now as then, that atrackless, a virgin waste of experience surrounded him--that he was inthe midst of an incalculable vastness of wonder and delight. It wasa nuisance to have this web of flesh wrapping about him, binding hislimbs, hindering his efforts, stifling his breath. 

And then, as in the brain of a fevered and delirious man, thisimpression vanished as inexplicably as it had come. His ideas wereperfectly independent of his will. He could neither recover one thathe had lost nor summon a fresh one from the border of obscurity thatsurrounded a centre of almost intolerable brightness into which hismental images glided as into a brilliantly lighted chamber. Into thisbrightness a troop of hallucinations darted suddenly like a motley andill-assorted company of players. He saw first a grotesque and indistinctfigure, which he discerned presently to be the goblin his nurse had usedto frighten him in his infancy; then the face of his uncle, the elderJonathan Gay, with his restless and suffering look; and after this theface of Kesiah, wearing her deprecation expression, which said, "Itisn't really my fault that I couldn't change things"; and then the facesof women he had seen but once, or passed in the street and remembered;and in the midst of these crowding faces, the scarred and ravaged faceof an old crossing-sweeper on a windy corner in Paris. . . . "I wishthey'd leave me alone, " he thought, with the helplessness of delirium, "I wish they'd keep away and leave me alone. " He wanted to drive thesehallucinations from his brain, and to recapture the exhilarating senseof discovery he had lost the minute before, but because he sought it, insome unimaginable way, it continued to elude him. The loud hum of beesin the Indian summer confused him, and he thought impatiently that ifit would only cease for an instant, his mind might clear again, and hemight think things out--that he might even remember the important thingshe had forgotten. "Abner Revercomb shot me, " he said aloud. "I don'tknow much. I don't know whether I am alive or dead. All I am certain ofis that it doesn't matter in the least--that it's too small a fact tomake any fuss about. It's all so small--the blamed thing isn't any moreimportant than those bees humming out there in the meadow. And I mightas well have developed into any one of my other selves. What were allthose seeds of possibilities for if they never came to anything? Why, I might have been a hero--it was in me all the time--I might even havebeen a god. "

Then for the first time he became aware of his body as of somethingoutside of himself--something that had been tacked on to him. Hefelt all at once that his feet were as heavy as logs--that they werebenumbed, that they had fallen asleep, and were filled with the sharppricking of thorns. Yet he had no control over them; he could not movethem, could hardly even think of them as belonging to himself. Thissensation of numbness began slowly to crawl upward like some giganticinsect. He knew it would reach his knees and then pass on to his waist, but the knowledge gave him no power to prevent its coming, and when hetried to will his hand to move, it refused to obey the action of hisbrain. 

"I'm really out of my head, " he thought, and the next instant, "or, it'sall a dream, and I've been only a dream from the beginning. "

A century afterwards, he opened his eyes and saw a face bending overhim, which seemed as if it were of gossamer, so vague and shadowy itlooked beside the images of his delirium. An excited and eager hummingwas in his ears, but he could not tell whether it was the voices ofhuman beings or the loud music of the bees in the meadow. From hiswaist down he could feel nothing, not even the crawling of the giganticinsect, but the rest of his body was a single throbbing pain, a pain sointense that it seemed to drag him back from the gulf of darkness intowhich he was drifting. 

"Can you hear?" asked a voice from out the hum of sound, speaking in theclear, high tone one uses to a deaf man. 

Another voice, he was not sure whether it was his own or astranger's--repeated from a distance, "Can I hear?"

"Did you see who shot you?" said the voice. 

And the second voice repeated after it: "Did I see who shot me?"

"Was it Abner Revercomb?" asked the first voice. 

He knew then what they meant, and suddenly he began to think lucidly andrapidly like a person under the mental pressure of strong excitement orof alcohol. Everything showed distinctly to him, and he saw with thiswonderful distinctness, that it made no difference whether it was AbnerRevercomb or one of his own multitude of selves that had shot him. Itmade no difference--nothing mattered except to regain the ineffablesense of approaching discovery which he had lost. 

"Was it Abner Revercomb?" said the first voice more loudly. 

He was conscious now of himself and of his surroundings, and there wasno uncertainty, no hesitation in his answer. 

"It was an accident. I shot myself, " he said, and after a moment headded angrily, "Why should anybody shoot me? It would be ridiculous. "

It was there again--the unexplored, the incalculable vastness. If theywould only leave him alone he might recover it before it eluded him. 

CHAPTER XVI

THE END

In the middle of the afternoon Molly went into the spare room in thewest wing, and stopped beside the high white bed on which Gay was lying, with the sheet turned down from his face. In death his features worea look of tranquil brightness, of arrested energy, as if he had pausedsuddenly for a brief space, and meant to rise and go on again about theabsorbing business of living. The windows were open, and through theclosed shutters floated a pale greenish light and the sound of deadleaves rustling softly in the garden. 

She had hardly entered before the door opened noiselessly again, andKesiah came in bringing some white roses in a basket. Drawing a littleaway, Molly watched her while she arranged the flowers with light andguarded movements, as if she were afraid of disturbing the sleeper. Ofwhat was she thinking? the girl wondered. Was she grieving for her lostyouth, with its crushed possibilities of happiness, or for the richyoung life before her, which had left its look of arrested energystill clinging to the deserted features? Was she saddened by the tragicmystery of Death or by the more poignant, the more inscrutable mysteryof Life? Did she mourn all the things that had not been that did notmatter, or all the things that had been that mattered even less?

Lifting her eyes from Kesiah's face, she fixed them on a small oldpicture of the elder Jonathan, which hung under a rusty sword above thebed. For the first time there came to her an impulse of compassion forthe man who was her father. Perhaps he, also, had suffered because lifehad driven him to do the things that he hated--perhaps he, also, had hadhis secret chamber in which his spirit was crucified? With the thoughtsomething in her heart, which was like a lump of ice, melted suddenly, and she felt at peace. "Because I've lived, " she said softly to herself, "I can understand. "

And on the opposite side of the bed, between the long white curtains, Kesiah was thinking, "Because I've never lived, but have stood apart andwatched life, I can understand. "

Turning away presently, Molly went to the door, where she stood waitinguntil the elder woman joined her. 

"Is Mr. Chamberlayne still with Aunt Angela?" she asked. 

"Yes. He was on his way to visit her when Cephus met him near thecross-roads. " For an instant she paused to catch her breath, and thenadded softly, "Angela is bearing it beautifully. "

Stooping over, she picked up a few scattered rose leaves from thethreshold and dropped them into the empty basket before she followedMolly down the hall of the west wing to the lattice door, which openedon the side-garden. Here the rustling of dead leaves grew louder, andfaint scents of decay and mould were wafted through the evanescentbeauty of the Indian summer. 

While they stood there, Mr. Chamberlayne came down the staircase, wipinghis eyes, which were very red, on his white silk handkerchief. 

"She bears it beautifully, just as we might have expected, " he said "Ihave seldom witnessed such fortitude, such saintly resignation to whatshe feels to be the will of God. "

Molly's eyes left his face and turned to the purple and gold of themeadows, where webs of silver thistledown were floating over thepath she had trodden only a few hours ago. Nothing had changed in thelandscape--the same fugitive bloom was on the fields, the same shadowswere on the hillside, the same amber light was on the turnpike. Shethought of many things in that instant, but beneath them all, likean undercurrent, ran the knowledge that Mrs. Gay was "bearing itbeautifully" behind her closed shutters. When her mind went back to thepast, she remembered the elder Jonathan, who had perished in the finesilken mesh of the influence he was powerless to break. After this camethe memory of the day when Janet Merryweather had flung herself on themercy of the gentle heart, and had found it iron. And then she thoughtof the son, who had drifted into deceit and subterfuge because he wasnot strong enough to make war on a thing so helpless. He, also, had diedbecause he dared not throw off that remorseless tyranny of weakness. Without that soft yet indomitable influence, he would never have liedin the beginning, would never have covered his faithlessness with thehypocrisy of duty. 

"You have been a great comfort to her, Mr. Chamberlayne, " said Kesiah, breaking the silence at last. 

A low sound, half a sob, half a sigh, escaped the lawyer's lips. "Aspirit like hers needs no other prop than her Creator, " he replied. 

"It is when one expects her to break down that she shows her wonderfulfortitude, " added Kesiah. 

"Her consolation now is the thought that she never considered either herhealth or her happiness where her son was concerned, " pursued the oldman. "She clings pathetically to the memory that she urged him to returnto Europe, and that he chose to remain a few weeks for the pleasure ofhunting. Not a breath stains the purity of her utter selflessness. Towitness such spiritual beauty is a divine inspiration. "

For the last few hours, ever since a messenger had met him, half way onthe Applegate road, with the news of Jonathan's death, he had labouredphilosophically to reconcile such a tragedy with his preconceived beliefthat he inhabited the best of all possible worlds. Only when sufferingobtruded brutally into his immediate surroundings, was it necessaryfor him to set about resolving the problem of existence--for, like mosthereditary optimists, he did not borrow trouble from his neighbours. Afamine or an earthquake at a little distance appeared to him a puerileobstacle to put forward against his belief in the perfection of theplanetary scheme; but when his eyes rested upon the martyred saintlinessof Mrs. Gay's expression, he was conscious that his optimism totteredfor an instant, and was almost overthrown. That a just and tender Deityshould inflict pain upon so lovely a being was incomprehensible to hischivalrous spirit. 

"Has any one told her about Blossom?" asked Molly. 

Kesiah shook her head. "Mr. Chamberlayne feels that it would be cruel. She knows so little about Jonathan's affairs that we may be able to keephis marriage from her knowledge if she leaves Jordan's Journey a fewdays after the funeral. "

"In spite of it all I know that Jonathan hated lies, " said Molly almostfiercely. 

"Our first thought must be to spare her, " answered the lawyer. "Itwas her son's endeavour always, just as it was my poor old friendJonathan's. If you will come with me into the library, " he added toKesiah, "we will take a few minutes to look over the papers I havearranged. "

They moved away, walking side by side with halting steps, as thoughthey were crushed by age, and yet were trying to the last to keep up anappearance of activity. For a minute Molly gazed after them. Thenher eyes wandered to the light that shimmered over the meadows, anddescending the stone steps into the side-garden, she walked slowlythrough the miniature maze, where the paths were buried deep inwine-coloured leaves which had drifted from the half bared trees on thelawn. Abel was coming, she knew, and she waited for him in a stillnessthat seemed akin to that softly breathing plant life around her. It wasthe hour for which she had hungered for weeks, yet now that it had come, she could hardly recognize it for the thing she had wanted. A suddenblight had fallen over her, as though she had brought the presence ofdeath with her out of that still chamber. Every sound was hushed intosilence, every object appeared as unsubstantial as a shadow. Beyond thelawn, over the jewelled meadows, she could see the white spire of OldChurch rising above the coloured foliage in the churchyard, and beyondit, the flat ashen turnpike, which had led hundreds of adventurous feettoward the great world they were seeking. She remembered that the sightof the turnpike had once made her restless; now it brought her only apromise of peace. 

Turning at the sound of a step on the dead leaves, she saw that Abelhad entered the garden, and was approaching her along one of thewinding paths. When he reached her, he spoke quickly without taking heroutstretched hand. The sun was in his eyes and he lowered them to theover-blown roses in a square of box. 

"I came over earlier, " he said, "but I couldn't see any one except Mr. Chamberlayne. "

"He told me you would come back. That was why I waited. "

For a moment he seemed to struggle for breath. Then he said quickly. 

"Molly, do you believe it was an accident?"

She started and her hands shook. 

"He said so at the end--otherwise--how--how could it have happened?"

"Yes, how could it have happened?" he repeated, and added after a pause, "He was a fine fellow. I always liked him. "

Her tears choked her, and when she had recovered her voice, she puta question or two about Blossom--delaying, through some instinct offlight, the moment for which she had so passionately longed. 

"It was all so unnecessary, " she said, "that is the worst of it. Itmight just as easily not have happened. "

"I wish I could be of some use, " he answered. "Perhaps Mr. Chamberlaynehas thought of something he would like me to do?"

"He is in the library. Uncle Abednego will show you. "

He put out his hand, "Then good-bye, Molly, " he said gently. 

But at the first touch of his fingers the spell was broken, and themystery of life, not of death, rushed over her like waves of light. She knew now that she was alive--that the indestructible desire forhappiness was still in her heart. The meaning of life did not matterwhile the exquisite, the burning sense of its sweetness remained. 

"Abel, " she said with a sob, half of joy, half of sorrow, "if I go on myknees, will you forgive me?"

He had turned away, but at her voice, he stopped and looked back withthe sunlight in his eyes. 

"There isn't any forgiveness in love, Molly, " he answered. 

"Then--oh, then if I go on my knees will you love me?"

He smiled, and even his smile, she saw, had lost its boyish brightnessand grown sadder. 

"I'd like to see you on your knees, if I might pick you up, " he said, "but, Molly, I can't. You've everything to lose and I've nothing onGod's earth to give you except myself. "

"But if that's all I want?"

"It isn't, darling. You may think so, but it isn't and you'd find itout. You see all this time since I've lost you, I've been learning togive you up. It's a poor love that isn't big enough to give up when thechance comes to it. "

"If--if you give me up, I'll let everything go, " she said passionately. "I'll not take a penny of that money. I'll stay at Old Church and livewith Betsey Bottom and raise chickens. If you give me up I'll die, Abel, " she finished with a sob. 

At the sound of her sob, he laughed softly, and his laugh, unlike hissmile, was a laugh of happiness. 

"If you go to live with Betsey Bottom I'll come and get you, " heanswered, "but Molly, Molly, how you've tortured me. You deserve a worsepunishment than raising chickens. "

"That will be happiness. "

"Suppose I insist that you shall draw the water and chop the wood? Mybeauty, your submission is adorable if it would only last!"

"Abel, how can you?"

"I can and I will, sweetheart. I might even make a miller's wife of youif it was likely that I'd ever do anything but worship you and keep youwrapped in silk. Are you very much in love at last, Molly?"

The sound of his low laugh was in her blood, and while she leaned towardhim, she melted utterly, drawing him with the light of her face, withthe quivering breath between her parted lips. To his eyes she was allwomanhood in surrender, yet he held back still, as a man who has learnedthe evanescence of joy, holds back when he sees his happiness within hisgrasp. 

"It's too late except for one thing, Molly, " he said. "If it isn'teverything you're offering me--if you are keeping back a particle ofyourself--body or soul--it is too late. I won't take anything from youunless I take everything--unless your whole happiness as well as mine isin your giving. "

Then before the look in her face, he held out his arms and stoodwaiting.