I
“For the land’s sake! If there isn’t Jonas Lane!” burst out Miss
Cockerill irrelevantly.
She so far forgot the respect due to a minister’s wife, and that
reserve which should be the portion of a maiden lady, as to forsake
her chair for the window. Peering discreetly through her lattice of
geraniums, she regarded with tense interest the actions of a gentleman
who was emerging from a buggy in front of her neighbour’s house. This
person, after securing his horse to a ringed post, made his way with
some deliberation toward the door.
“He’s taken on flesh,” pursued Miss Cockerill. She drew a trifle to one
side in order to share her opportunity with her visitor, but losing
nothing of what it was vouchsafed her to behold during the interval
between the pull at the bell and the opening of the door. “She keeps
him waitin’, same as she’s done for twenty years,” commented the
spectator.
The door at which he sued closed behind the expectant gentleman who had
“taken on flesh.” And as Miss Cockerill’s most piercing gaze failed to
penetrate that exasperating barrier, she turned apologetically:
“You see, Mis’ Webster, I’ve known Martha Waring ever since we were
that high.” She indicated an altitude above the floor about equal to
that of an ambitious kitten. “She was born in that very house, and I
was born in this, and now we’re the only ones left of our folks. So it
seems like I knew more about her than I did about myself.”
It is to be feared that Mrs. Webster, lately come from more impersonal
atmospheres to that of Ackerton, made small effort to discourage the
revelations which it not seldom befell her to hear. On the contrary,
she made it a point to regard them as among the roses which garnish the
rather thorny path of young divines and their wives.
“A friendship like that is charming,” she remarked. “It is not many
that survive the perils of childhood. You are both fortunate in having
such constant friends.”
“H’m! It’s a pity she don’t see it!” exclaimed Miss Cockerill somewhat
grimly. “Like as not she’ll tell Jonas Lane to go back out West.”
“Jonas Lane?” echoed Mrs. Webster with diplomatic interrogation. “Mr.
Lane? I don’t seem to remember that name.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” agreed Miss Cockerill promptly. “His family’s all
dead, like the rest of ours, and he went away twenty years ago--after
he’d proposed to Martha the first time.”
“O!” exclaimed Mrs. Webster with discreet non-committal. But there was
that in the regard she cast upon Miss Cockerill which did not deter
that lady from continuing:
“He’s only been back twice since. That was when he proposed to her the
second and third times. Now I s’pose he’s doing it the fourth.”
She looked out of the window again, at the house in which so momentous
an event should be taking place. The house gave no hint, however, of
being the abode of passion. It stood back in its maple-shaded yard,
more trim and respectable in its clap-boarded dove-colour than a thing
of nature, but as indifferent to human palpitations. The eyes of both
ladies devoted to it an interval of silence. Then Miss Cockerill turned
once more to her companion:
“I don’t see how she can refuse him this time. You see the first time
she had her father an’ mother and Anne. Her father was real sickly,
and Anne took after him. They both lay abed for years. Father Waring
did because he fell from the hay loft. But Anne did because her father
did, I guess. Anyhow, when Jonas first proposed to Martha, twenty years
ago, she said she liked him well enough but that she couldn’t leave
her folks while they needed her. So Jonas went out West, he was that
provoked. He did mighty well, too. He went into lumber, and he’s a rich
man now. But he didn’t forget Martha, for all that. He was always as
faithful as you’d want to see--from the time he was a boy and we all
went to school together.”
Miss Cockerill let her eye return to the dove-coloured house with a
reminiscent light which quickened Mrs. Webster’s interest.
“He asked me to keep him informed of what went on here. He wasn’t a
great hand at writin’, and Martha wasn’t either. And so after her
father died he came back. She told him she wasn’t ready, though. An’
’twas the same when Anne went. Martha said she liked him just as much
as ever, and maybe more, but that her duty was with her mother. Jonas
said then he’d marry her mother, too. He was always a great hand at his
jokes, was Jonas. But Martha said her mother wanted to spend her last
days at home, and so Jonas had to go off the third time. Seems like
Martha knew her own mind better than most folks.”
Again Miss Cockerill paused a moment and contemplated the fateful grey
house.
“That was twelve years ago,” she resumed. “And it’s hardly a fortnight
since Mis’ Waring was laid in her grave, and here comes Jonas knocking
again at Martha’s door. Guess she’ll have to let him in this time.
Anyway, I’ll know as soon as anybody. Jonas always promised that he’d
tell me first.”
It seemed to Mrs. Webster that she found a certain parallel between the
decently painted clap-boards to which her attention had thus been drawn
and the somewhat inscrutable exterior of her hostess. There was more
within than appeared on the surface. As for Miss Cockerill, her gaze
had an intensity which walls of brass could scarcely have withstood.
And as if the house could keep its secret from her no longer, Jonas
Lane suddenly emerged upon the veranda.
“He’s coming over now, I do believe!” exclaimed Miss Cockerill
excitedly, endeavouring to make the most of the window without
appearing from the outside to do so.
Jonas, however, strode down the path, untied his horse, threw the
halter into the back of the buggy, got in with much less deliberation
than he had got out, and drove rapidly away.
Miss Cockerill watched the buggy until it disappeared in the long elm
vista. Then, after another glance at the grey house, she turned to her
visitor.
“Well, I declare!” she burst forth. “If she hasn’t refused him again!”