"Three cheers for the gospel! Say! I wish--"
"Well?"
"Never mind," replied Caleb. "I was only thinkin' that if our church
could hear that, there'd be an almighty revival of religion. Reckon I'd
better git back to the store. Say, you've been so full of palace-makin'
that you've let the fires go out. I'll just load 'em up again for you;
afterwards, if you chance to think of 'em, there's lots of good dry
hick'ry in the woodshed, right behind the kitchen."
Philip continued to make hurried dashes into the store for necessities
and makeshifts. When finally he entered for candles, Caleb remarked:--
"I'll call you in when your wife comes; but if you don't want her to
smell a rat, you'd better shut the front shutters. There's already
been people hangin' on the fence, lookin' at them lace fixin's in
the winders, an' women are powerful observin'. An' say, here's a new
tea-kettle, full of water; better set it on the kitchen stove. Pianners
are splendid,--I never would have believed there could be anythin' like
'em,--but the singin' of a tea-kettle's got a powerful grip on most
women's ears. I didn't see no ev'ryday dishes among your things. Don't
you want some?"
Philip thought he did not, and he hurried to the house. He was soon
summoned to the store, and through the coming darkness of the sunset
hour he saw at the back door his wife, who said:--
"Oh, Phil! Mrs. Taggess is the dearest woman! We were of the same age
before I'd been with her an hour."
"Eh? You don't look a moment older."
"But she looked twenty years younger. When she's animated, she--oh, I
never saw such a complexion."
"Not even in your mirror?"
"No, you silly dear! And her home is real cosey. There's nothing showy
or expensive in it; but if ever I get homesick, I'm going to hurry up
there, even if the mud is a foot deep."
"Good! Perhaps you got some ideas of how to fix up our own dismal barn
of a house. Come down and look about it once more."
Together they started. As they reached the front door, and Philip threw
it open, Caleb, with his eye at the back window of the store, saw Grace
stop and toss up her hands. As the door closed, Caleb jumped up and
down, and afterward said to himself:--
"There are times when I wish, church or no church, that I'd learned how
to dance."
"Phil! Phil! Phil!" exclaimed Grace, dashing from one room to another,
all of which were as well lighted as candles could make them. "How
did you?--how could you? No woman could have done better! Oh!
home!--home!--home! And a few hours ago, right here, I was the most
disheartened, rebellious, wicked woman in the world! Come here to
me--this instant!"
There are times when manly obedience is a natural virtue. For a few
moments a single easy chair was large enough for the couple, who
laughed, and cried, and otherwise comported themselves very much as
any other healthy and affectionate couple might have done in similar
circumstances. A knock at the door recalled them to the world.
"Don't like to disturb you," said Caleb, "but Doc Taggess has dropped
in again an' asked for Mr. Somerton, an' as his time's not all his own,
mebbe you'd--"
"Do tell him how I enjoyed my day with his wife," said Grace. "I tried
to, when he brought me down, but I don't feel that I said half enough."