IN WHICH KEZIAH BREAKS THE NEWS
It was nearly five o'clock, gray dawn of what was to be a clear,
beautiful summer morning, when Keziah softly lifted the latch and
entered the parsonage. All night she had been busy at the Hammond
tavern. Busy with the doctor and the undertaker, who had been called
from his bed by young Higgins; busy with Grace, soothing her, comforting
her as best she could, and petting her as a mother might pet a
stricken child. The poor girl was on the verge of prostration, and from
hysterical spasms of sobs and weeping passed to stretches of silent,
dry-eyed agony which were harder to witness and much more to be feared.
“It is all my fault,” she repeated over and over again. “All my fault! I
killed him! I killed him, Aunt Keziah! What shall I do? Oh, why couldn't
I have died instead? It would have been so much better, better for
everybody.”
“Ss-sh! ss-sh! deary,” murmured the older woman. “Don't talk so; you
mustn't talk so. Your uncle was ready to go. He's been ready for ever so
long, and those of us who knew how feeble he was expected it any time.
'Twa'n't your fault at all and he'd say so if he was here now.”
“No, he wouldn't. He'd say just as I do, that I was to blame. You don't
know, Aunt Keziah. Nobody knows but me.”
“Maybe I do, Gracie, dear; maybe I do. Maybe I understand better'n you
think I do. And it's all been for the best. You'll think so, too, one
of these days. It seems hard now; it is awful hard, you poor thing, but
it's all for the best, I'm sure. Best for everyone. It's a mercy he went
sudden and rational, same as he did. The doctor says that, if he hadn't,
he'd have been helpless and bedridden and, maybe, out of his head for
another year. He couldn't have lived longer'n that, at the most.”
“But you DON'T know, Aunt Keziah! You don't know what I--I AM to blame.
I'll never forgive myself. And I'll never be happy again.”
“Yes, you will. You'll come, some day, to think it was best and right,
for you and--and for others. I know you think you'll never get over it,
but you will. Somehow or other you will, same as the rest of us have
had to do. The Lord tries us mighty hard sometimes, but He gives us the
strength to bear it. There! there! don't, deary, don't.”
Dr. Parker was very anxious.
“She must rest,” he told Mrs. Coffin. “She must, or her brain will give
way. I'm going to give her something to make her sleep and you must get
her to take it.”
So Keziah tried and, at last, Grace did take the drug. In a little while
she was sleeping, uneasily and with moans and sobbings, but sleeping,
nevertheless.
“Now it's your turn, Keziah,” said the doctor. “You go home now and
rest, yourself. We don't need you any more just now.”
“Where's--where's Cap'n Nat?” asked Keziah.
“He's in there with his father. He bears it well, although he is mighty
cut up. Poor chap, he seems to feel that he is to blame, somehow. Says
Cap'n Eben and he had disagreed about something or other and he fears
that hastened the old man's death. Nonsense, of course. It was bound to
come and I told him so. 'Twas those blasted Come-Outers who really did
it, although I shan't say so to anyone but you. I'm glad Nat and the
girl have agreed to cruise together. It's a mighty good arrangement. She
couldn't have a better man to look out for her and he couldn't have a
better wife. I suppose I'm at liberty to tell people of the engagement,
hey?”
“Yes. Yes, I don't see any reason why not. Yes--I guess likely you'd
better tell 'em.”
“All right. Now you go home. You've had a hard night, like the rest of
us.”
How hard he had no idea. And Keziah, as she wearily entered the
parsonage, realized that the morning would be perhaps the hardest
of all. For upon her rested the responsibility of seeing that the
minister's secret was kept. And she, and no other, must break the news
to him.
The dining room was dark and gloomy. She lighted the lamp. Then she
heard a door open and Ellery's voice, as he called down the stairs.
“Who is it?” he demanded. “Mrs. Coffin?”
She was startled. “Yes,” she said softly, after a moment. “Yes, Mr.
Ellery, it's me. What are you doin' awake at such an hour's this?”
“Yes, I'm awake. I couldn't sleep well to-night, somehow. Too much
to think of, I imagine. But where have you been? Why weren't you at
meeting? And where--Why, it's almost morning!”
She did not answer at once. The temptation was to say nothing now, to
put off the trying scene as long as possible.
“It's morning,” repeated the minister. “Are you sick? Has anything
happened?”
“Yes,” she answered slowly, “somethin' has happened. Are you dressed?
Could you come down?”
He replied that he would be down in a moment. When he came he found
her standing by the table waiting for him. The look of her face in the
lamplight shocked him.
“Why, Mrs. Coffin!” he exclaimed. “What IS it? You look as if you had
been through some dreadful experience.”
“Maybe I have,” she replied. “Maybe I have. Experiences like that come
to us all in this life, to old folks and young, and we have to bear 'em
like men and women. That's the test we're put to, Mr. Ellery, and the
way we come through the fire proves the stuff we're made of. Sorrows and
disappointments and heartbreaks and sicknesses and death--”
She paused on the word. He interrupted her.
“Death?” he repeated. “Death? Is some one dead, some one I know? Mrs.
Coffin, what is it you are trying to tell me?”
Her heart went out to him. She held out both her hands.
“You poor boy,” she cried, “I'm trying to tell you one of the hardest
things a body can tell. Yes, some one is dead, but that ain't all. Eben
Hammond, poor soul, is out of his troubles and gone.”
“Eben Hammond! Captain Eben? Dead! Why, why--”
“Yes, Eben's gone. He was took down sudden and died about ten o'clock
last night. I was there and--”
“Captain Eben dead! Why, he was as well as--as--She said--Oh, I must go!
I must go at once!”
He was on his way to the door, but she held it shut.
“No,” she said gravely, “you mustn't go. You mustn't go, Mr. Ellery.
That's the one thing you mustn't do.”
“You don't understand. By and by I can tell you why I must be there, but
now--”
“I do understand. I understand it all. Lord help us! if I'd only
understood sooner, how much of this might have been spared. Why DIDN'T
you tell me?”
“Mrs. Coffin--”
“John--you won't mind my callin' you John. I'm old enough, pretty nigh,
to be your mother, and I've come to feel almost as if I was. John,
you've got to stay here with me. You can't go to that house. You can't
go to her.”
“Mrs. Coffin, what are you saying? Do you know--Have you--”
“Yes, I know all about it. I know about the meetin's in the pines and
all. Oh, why didn't you trust me and tell me? If you had, all would have
been SO much better!”
He looked at her in utter amazement. The blood rushed to his face.
“You know THAT?” he whispered.
“Yes, I know.”
“Did she tell--”
“No, nobody told. That is, only a little. I got a hint and I suspicioned
somethin' afore. The rest I saw with my own eyes.”
He was now white, but his jaw shot forward and his teeth closed.
“If you do know,” he said, “you must realize that my place is with her.
Now, when she is in trouble--”
“Would you want to make that trouble greater? More than she could bear?”
“I think I might help her to bear it. Mrs. Coffin, you have been my
truest friend, but one, in Trumet. You HAVE been like a mother to me.
But I have thought this out to the end and I shall go through with it.
It is my affair--and hers. If my own mother were alive and spoke as you
do, I should still go through with it. It is right, it is my life. I'm
not ashamed of anything I've done. I'm proud. I'm proud of her. And
humble only when I think how unworthy I am to be her husband. I suppose
you are fearful of what my congregation will say. Well, I've thought of
that, too, and thought it through. Whatever they say and whatever they
do will make no difference. Do you suppose I will let THEM keep me from
her? Please open that door.”
He was very tragic and handsome--and young, as he stood there. The tears
overflowed the housekeeper's eyes as she looked at him. If her own love
story had not been broken off at its beginning, if she had not thrown
her life away, she might have had a son like that. She would have given
all that the years had in store for her, given it gladly, to have been
able to open the door and bid him go. But she was firm.
“It ain't the congregation, John,” she said. “Nor Trumet, nor your
ministry. That means more'n you think it does, now; but it ain't that.
You mustn't go to her because--well, because she don't want you to.”
“Doesn't want me? I know better.” He laughed in supreme scorn.
“She doesn't want you, John. She wouldn't see you if you went. She would
send you away again, sure, sartin sure. She would. And if you didn't
go when she sent you, you wouldn't be the man I hope you are. John, you
mustn't see Grace again. She ain't yours. She belongs to some one else.”
“Some one else!” He repeated the words in a whisper. “Some one ELSE?
Why, Mrs. Coffin, you must be crazy! If you expect me to--”
“Hush! hush! I ain't crazy, though there's times when I wonder I ain't.
John, you and Grace have known each other for a few months, that's
all. You've been attracted to her because she was pretty and educated
and--and sweet; and she's liked you because you were about the only
young person who could understand her and--and all that. And so you've
been meetin' and have come to believe--you have, anyway--that 'twas
somethin' more than likin'. But you neither of you have stopped to think
that a marriage between you two was as impossible as anything could be.
And, besides, there's another man. A man she's known all her life and
loved and respected--”
“Stop, Mrs. Coffin! stop this wicked nonsense. I won't hear it.”
“John, Grace Van Horne is goin' to marry Cap'n Nat Hammond. There!
that's the livin' truth.”
In his absolute confidence and faith he had again started for the door.
Now he wheeled and stared at her. She nodded solemnly.
“It's the truth,” she repeated. “She and Nat are promised to each other.
Cap'n Eben, on his deathbed, asked Dr. Parker and me to be witnesses to
the engagement. Now you see why you mustn't go nigh her again.”
He did not answer. Instead, he stood silently staring. She stepped
forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.
“Set down, John,” she said. “Set down and let me tell you about it. Yes,
yes, you must. If I tell you, you'll understand better. There! there!
don't you interrupt me yet and don't you look that way. Do set down.”
She led him over to the rocking-chair and gently forced him into it.
He obeyed, although with no apparent realization of what he was doing.
Still with her hand on his shoulder she went on speaking. She told him
of her visit to the Hammond tavern, saying nothing of Mr. Pepper's
call nor of her own experience in the grove. She told of Captain Eben's
seizure, of what the doctor said, and of the old Come-Outer's return to
consciousness. Then she described the scene in the sick room and how Nat
and Grace had plighted troth. He listened, at first stunned and stolid,
then with growing impatience.
“So you see,” she said. “It's settled; they're engaged, and Dr. Parker
will tell everybody of the engagement this very mornin'. It wa'n't any
great surprise to me. Those two have been brought up together; 'twas the
natural thing that was almost bound to happen. Eben's heart was set on
it for years. And she'll have a good husband, John, that I know. And
she'll do her best to make him happy. He's a good man and--”
The minister sprang to his feet.
“A good man!” he cried furiously. “A good man! One who will make use of
a dying father to drive a girl into--Stand aside, Mrs. Coffin!”
“John, you mustn't speak that way of Nat Hammond. He ain't the kind to
drive a girl against her will. And Grace is not one to be driven.”
“Are you blind? Can't you see? Why, only yesterday, she--Do you think I
shall permit such a wicked crime as that to--”
“Ss-sh! No, it ain't wicked, it's right. Right and best for everybody,
for her especial. Yesterday she might have forgot for a minute. But
think, just think what would have happened if she cared for you.”
“But she does! I know she does. Mrs. Coffin, stand away from that door.”
“No, John; if you go out of that door now, to go to her, you'll have to
go by main strength. You shan't wreck yourself and that girl if I can
help it. Be a man.”
The pair looked at each other. Keziah was determined, but so, evidently,
was he. She realized, with a sinking heart, that her words had made
absolutely no impression. He did not attempt to pass, but he slowly
shook his head.
“Mrs. Coffin,” he said, “perhaps you believe you're doing right. I
hope--yes, I'll give you credit for that belief. But I KNOW I am right
and I shall go to her. Such a--a BARGAIN as that you have just told me
of is no more to be regarded than--”
“John, I beg you--”
“NO.”
“Then go. Go this minute and break her heart and ruin her life and spoil
her good name in this village where she's lived since she was eight
years old. Go! be selfish. I suppose that's part of a man's make-up. Go!
Never mind her. Go!”
“I do 'mind' her, as you call it. I AM thinking of her.”
“No, you're not. It's yourself.”
“If it was myself--and God knows it is the only happiness on earth for
me--if it was only myself, and I really thought she wished me to stay
away, I'd stay, I'd stay, though I'd pray to die before this hour was
over.”
“I know, I know. I've prayed to die myself afore now, but I'm here yet;
and so will you be. We can't die so easy.”
“But I know--”
“Do you suppose SHE would come to YOU if she knew it would be your
ruin?”
He hesitated. The last time they met, ages before--no, only the previous
afternoon--she had told him it was his happiness and his future only
that she thought of. He choked and drew his hand across his eyes.
“Mrs. Coffin,” he said, “you tell me it will be her ruin. YOU tell me
so. You SAY she doesn't want me. I tell you that the only thing that
will keep me from her is hearing that from her own lips. When she tells
me to leave her I will, and not before.”
“She'll tell you, John; she'll tell you. I know you must despise me,
pretty nigh. I cal'late you think I'm a worldly old woman, carin'
nothin' for your feelin's. Maybe I've talked pretty hard in the last few
minutes, but I haven't meant to be hard. To be honest, I didn't think
you'd listen to me. I expected you'd insist on seein' her yourself.
Well, then, go and see her, if you must, though what will come of it
can only be more trouble, for you run the risk of folks knowin' it and
beginnin' to wonder. And I know Grace. She's made up her mind and won't
change it. But I do ask you this: I ask you not to go now. Wait a little
while, do. I left her asleep, worn out by what she's been through and
under the effects of the doctor's sleepin' medicine. He said she must
rest or he was afraid her brain would give out. For her sake, then,
wait a little. Then, if you don't hear from her, maybe I can arrange a
meetin' place where you can see her without anyone's knowin' it. I'll
try. But do wait a little while, for her sake, won't you?”
At last he was listening and hesitating.
“Won't you?” begged Keziah.
“Yes,” he answered slowly. “I'll wait. I'll wait until noon, somehow,
if I can. I'll try. But not a minute later. Not one. You don't know what
you're asking, Mrs. Coffin.”
“Yes, I do. I know well. And I thank you for her sake.”
But he did not have to wait until noon. At six o'clock, through the
dew-soaked grass of the yard, came the Higgins boy. For the first time
in his short life he had been awake all night and he moved slowly.
The housekeeper opened the door. Ike held up an envelope, clutched in a
grimy hand.
“It's for you, Mrs. Keziah,” he said. “Gracie, she sent it. There ain't
no answer.”
Keziah took the letter. “How is she? And how's Nat?” she asked.
“They're doin' pretty well, so ma says. Ma's there now and they've sent
for Hannah Poundberry. Gee!” he added, yawning, “I ain't slept a wink.
Been on the jump, now I tell ye. Didn't none of them Come-Outers git in,
not one. I sent 'em on the home tack abilin'. You ought to hear me give
old Zeke Bassett Hail Columby! Gosh! I was just ahopin' HE'D come.”
Mrs. Coffin closed the door and tore open the envelope. Within
was another addressed, in Grace's handwriting, to Mr. Ellery. The
housekeeper entered the study, handed it to him and turned away.
The minister, who had been pacing the floor, seized the note eagerly.
It was written in pencil and by a hand that had trembled much. Yet there
was no indecision in the written words.
“Dear John,” wrote Grace. “I presume Aunt Keziah has told you of uncle's
death and of my promise to Nat. It is true. I am going to marry him. I
am sure this is right and for the best. Our friendship was a mistake and
you must not see me again. Please don't try.
“GRACE VAN HORNE.”
Beneath was another paragraph.
“Don't worry about me. I shall be happy, I am sure. And I shall hope
that you may be. I shall pray for that.”
The note fell to the floor with a rustle that sounded loud in the
stillness. Then Keziah heard the minister's step. She turned. He was
moving slowly across the room.
“John,” she cried anxiously, “you poor boy!”
He answered without looking back.
“I'm--going--up--to--my--room,” he said, a pause between each word. “I
want to be alone awhile, Mrs. Coffin.”
Wearily Keziah set about preparing breakfast. Not that she expected the
meal would be eaten, but it gave her something to do and occupied her
mind. The sun had risen and the light streamed in at the parsonage
windows. The breeze blew fresh and cool from the ocean. It was a
magnificent morning.
She called to him that breakfast was ready, but he did not answer. She
could eat nothing herself, and, when the table was cleared, prepared
to do the week's washing, for Monday is always washday in Trumet. Noon
came, dinner time, but still he did not come down. At last Keziah could
stand it no longer. She determined to go to him. She climbed the steep
stairs and rapped on the door of his room.
“Yes?” she heard him say.
“It's me,” was the reply. “Mr. Ellery, can I come in? I know you want
to be alone, but I don't think you'd ought to be, too much. I'd like to
talk with you a few minutes; may I?”
A moment passed before he told her to enter. He was sitting in a chair
by the window, dressed just as he had been when she returned from the
tavern. She looked sharply at his face as it was turned toward her. His
eyes were dry and in them was an expression so hopeless and dreary that
the tears started to her own.
“John,” she said, “I couldn't bear to think of your facin' it alone up
here. I just had to come.”
He smiled, and the smile was as hopeless as the look in his eyes.
“Face it?” he repeated. “Well, Mrs. Coffin, I must face it, I suppose.
I've been facing it ever since--since I knew. And I find it no easier.”
“John, what are you goin' to do?”
He shook his head. “I don't know,” he said. “Go away somewhere, first
of all, I guess. Go somewhere and--and try to live it down. I can't, of
course, but I must try.”
“Go away? Leave Trumet and your church and your congregation?”
“Did you suppose I could stay here?”
“I hoped you would.”
“And see the same people and the same places? And do the same things?
See--see HER! Did you”--he moved impatiently--“did you expect me to
attend the wedding?”
She put out her hand. “I know it'll be hard,” she said, “stayin' here, I
mean. But your duty to others--”
“Don't you think we've heard enough about duty to others? How about my
duty to myself?”
“I guess that's the last thing we ought to think about in the world, if
we do try to be fair and square. Your church thinks a heap of you, John.
They build on you. You've done more in the little while you've been here
than Mr. Langley did in his last fifteen years. We've grown and we're
doin' good--doin' it, not talkin' it in prayer meetin'. The parish
committee likes you and the poor folks in the society love you. Old Mrs.
Prince was tellin' me, only a little spell ago, that she didn't know how
she'd have pulled through this dreadful time if 'twa'n't for you. And
there's lots of others. Are you goin' to leave them? And what reason
will you give for leavin'?”
He shook his head. “I don't know,” he answered. “I may not give any. But
I shall go.”
“I don't believe you will. I don't believe you're that kind. I've
watched you pretty sharp since you and I have been livin' together and I
have more faith in you than that comes to. You haven't acted to me like
a coward and I don't think you'll run away.”
“Mrs. Coffin, it is so easy for you to talk. Perhaps if I were in your
place I should be giving good advice about duty and not running away and
so on. But suppose you were in mine.”
“Well, suppose I was.”
“Suppose--Oh, but there! it's past supposing.”
“I don't know's 'tis. My life hasn't been all sunshine and fair winds,
by no means.”
“That's true. I beg your pardon. You have had troubles and, from what
I hear, you've borne them bravely. But you haven't had to face anything
like this.”
“Haven't I? Well, what is it you're asked to face? Disappointment? I've
faced that. Sorrow and heartbreak? I've faced them.”
“You've never been asked to sit quietly by and see the one you love more
than all the world marry some one else.”
“How do you know I ain't? How do you know I ain't doin' just that now?”
“Mrs. Coffin!”
“John Ellery, you listen to me. You think I'm a homely old woman,
probably, set in my ways as an eight-day clock. I guess I look like it
and act like it. But I ain't so awful old--on the edge of forty, that's
all. And when I was your age I wa'n't so awful homely, either. I had
fellers aplenty hangin' round and I could have married any one of a
dozen. This ain't boastin'; land knows I'm fur from that. I was brought
up in this town and even when I was a girl at school there was only one
boy I cared two straws about. He and I went to picnics together and
to parties and everywhere. Folks used to laugh and say we was keepin'
comp'ny, even then.
“Well, when I was eighteen, after father died, I went up to New Bedford
to work in a store there. Wanted to earn my own way. And this young
feller I'm tellin' you about went away to sea, but every time he come
home from a voyage he come to see me and things went on that way till we
was promised to each other. The engagement wa'n't announced, but 'twas
so, just the same. We'd have been married in another year. And then we
quarreled.
“'Twas a fool quarrel, same as that kind gen'rally are. As much my fault
as his and as much his as mine, I cal'late. Anyhow, we was both proud,
or thought we was, and neither would give in. And he says to me, 'You'll
be sorry after I'm gone. You'll wish me back then.' And says I, BEIN' a
fool, 'I guess not. There's other fish in the sea.' He sailed and I did
wish him back, but I wouldn't write fust and neither would he. And then
come another man.”
She paused, hesitated, and then continued.
“Never mind about the other man. He was handsome then, in a way, and he
had money to spend, and he liked me. He wanted me to marry him. If--if
the other, the one that went away, had written I never would have
thought of such a thing, but he didn't write. And, my pride bein' hurt,
and all, I finally said yes to the second chap. My folks did all they
could to stop it; they told me he was dissipated, they said he had a bad
name, they told me twa'n't a fit match. And his people, havin' money,
was just as set against his takin' a poor girl. Both sides said ruin
would come of it. But I married him.
“Well, for the first year 'twa'n't so bad. Not happiness exactly, but
not misery either. That come later. His people was well off and he'd
never worked much of any. He did for a little while after we was
married, but not for long. Then he begun to drink and carry on and lost
his place. Pretty soon he begun to neglect me and at last went off to
sea afore the mast. We was poor as poverty, but I could have stood that;
I did stand it. I took in sewin' and kept up an appearance, somehow.
Never told a soul. His folks come patronizin' around and offered me
money, so's I needn't disgrace them. I sent 'em rightabout in a hurry.
Once in a while he'd come home, get tipsy and abuse me. Still I said
nothin'. Thank God, there was no children; that's the one thing I've
been thankful for.
“You can't keep such things quiet always. People are bound to find out.
They come to me and said, 'Why don't you leave him?' but I wouldn't.
I could have divorced him easy enough, there was reasons plenty, but I
wouldn't do that. Then word came that he was dead, drowned off in the
East Indies somewheres. I come back here to keep house for Sol, my
brother, and I kept house for him till he died and they offered me this
place here at the parsonage. There! that's my story, part of it, more'n
I ever told a livin' soul afore, except Sol.”
She ceased speaking. The minister, who had sat silent by the window,
apathetically listening or trying to listen, turned his head.
“I apologize, Mrs. Coffin,” he said dully, “you have had trials, hard
ones. But--”
“But they ain't as hard as yours, you think? Well, I haven't quite
finished yet. After word come of my husband's death, the other man come
and wanted me to marry him. And I wanted to--oh, how I wanted to! I
cared as much for him as I ever did; more, I guess. But I wouldn't--I
wouldn't, though it wrung my heart out to say no. I give him up--why?
'cause I thought I had a duty laid on me.”
Ellery sighed. “I can see but one duty,” he said. “That is the duty
given us by God, to marry the one we love.”
Keziah's agitation, which had grown as she told her story, suddenly
flashed into flame.
“Is that as fur as you can see?” she asked fiercely. “It's an easy duty,
then--or looks easy now. I've got a harder one; it's to stand by the
promise I gave and the man I married.”
He looked at her as if he thought she had lost her wits.
“The man you married?” he replied. “Why, the man you married is dead.”
“No, he ain't. You remember the letter you saw me readin' that night
when you come back from Come-Outers' meetin'? Well, that letter was from
him. He's alive.”
For the first time during the interview the minister rose to his feet,
shocked out of his despair and apathy by this astounding revelation.
“Alive?” he repeated. “Your husband ALIVE? Why, Mrs. Coffin, this is--”
She waved him to silence. “Don't stop me now,” she said. “I've told so
much; let me tell the rest. Yes, he's alive. Alive and knockin' round
the world somewheres. Every little while he writes me for money and, if
I have any, I send it to him. Why? Why 'cause I'm a coward, after all,
I guess, and I'm scared he'll do what he says he will and come back.
Perhaps you think I'm a fool to put up with it; that's what most folks
would say if they knew it. They'd tell me I ought to divorce him. Well,
I can't, I CAN'T. I walked into the mess blindfold; I married him in
spite of warnin's and everything. I took him for better or for worse,
and now that he's turned out worse, I must take my medicine. I can't
live with him--that I can't do--but while HE lives I'll stay his wife
and give him what money I can spare. That's the duty I told you was laid
on me, and it's a hard one, but I don't run away from it.”
John Ellery was silent. What could he say? Keziah went on.
“I don't run away from it,” she exclaimed, “and you mustn't run away
from yours. Your church depends on you, they trust you. Are you goin'
to show 'em their trust was misplaced? The girl you wanted is to marry
another man, that's true, and it's mighty hard. But she'll marry a good
man, and, by and by, she'll be happy.”
“Happy!” he said scornfully.
“Yes, happy. I know she'll be happy because I know she's doin' what'll
be best for her and because I know him that's to be her husband. I've
known him all my life; he's that other one that--that--and I give him up
to her; yes, I give him up to her, and try to do it cheerful, because I
know it's best for him. Hard for YOU? Great Lord A'mighty! do you think
it ain't hard for ME? I--I--”
She stopped short; then covering her face with her apron, she ran from
the room. John Ellery heard her descending the stairs, sobbing as she
went.
All that afternoon he remained in his chair by the window. It was six
o'clock, supper time, when he entered the kitchen. Keziah, looking up
from the ironing board, saw him. He was white and worn and grim, but he
held out his hand to her.
“Mrs. Coffin,” he said, “I'm not going away. You've shown me what
devotion to duty really means. I shall stay here and go on with my
work.”
Her face lit up. “Will you?” she said. “I thought you would. I was sure
you was that kind.”