For a while, as she walked, she told herself stories. She believed that she was the princess of one of Mr. Jeminy's fairy tales; then Anna became a duchess, or an old queen. The fact that nothing unusual happened to her, did not seem to her of any importance; she saw the russet fields, the bare woods, the solemn clouds, and far off shine and shadow; and walked with serious pomp for her own delight, as long as she was able.
But after a while she grew tired, and sat down by the roadside to rest. As she sat there, the sun sank lower, and the gathering chill of evening made itself felt in the air. Then for the first time doubt as to the wisdom of her course presented itself to her.
"We're going to catch it when we get home," she told Anna.
With a feeling of dismay, she remembered how far away from home she was. The hush of evening, the silence of the fields, filled her head with vague fears. She held her doll tightly to her breast for comfort. The little red squirrel, flirting along the low stone wall, seemed to peer at her as though to say; "This is where I live. But where do you live? You can't live here; I won't have it." Juliet began to shiver with cold.
"Oh, goodness," she whispered to Anna, "I'm going to catch it when I get home."
But to start for home again in the gloom, took more courage than she had left her. Grasping her umbrella, her five pennies, and her doll, she retreated to the middle of the road. "Mr. Jeminy," she cried, "Mr. Jeminy, where are you?"
The silence, more ghostly than before, was not to be endured. "Mr.Jeminy," she called at the top of her voice, "Mr. Jeminy, Mr. Jeminy,Mr. Jeminy.
"Oh, please come back."
She was saved the ignominy of tears. For at that moment she heard from down the road a sound of wheels, and the beat of hoofs. And presently a farm wagon, drawn by an old white horse, approached her in the twilight.
"Well, bite me," said the farmer, peering at her over the front of the wagon. "Are you lost, child?"
"No, sir," said Juliet. Now that she was found, she was in the best of spirits, all sprightliness and wheedle. "I'm not lost. I'm looking for somebody."
"Do tell," said the farmer. "A friend of yourn?"
"An old man," said Juliet. "An old, old man. He's a friend of mine. I have to tell him to come home as fast as he can, because it's a wicked sin."
"Does he live hereabouts?" asked the farmer.
"He used to," said Juliet, "but he ran away. Now Mrs. Grumble's sick, he ought to come home again, and ease her last hours."
The farmer began to chuckle. "What's the old gaffer's name?"
"Mr. Jeminy," said Juliet.
"Hop in," said the farmer. "I'll take you along. He's been stopping with Aaron Bade, over to the Forge. I declare, if that don't beat all. Curl up in the hay, child, it'll keep you warm. What were you doing, hollering for him?"
"Yes, sir," said Juliet.
The farm wagon started on again, through the rapidly falling dusk. Juliet, under a blanket in the hay, looked up at the tall figure of the farmer, set like a giant above her.
"Mister," she said.
"Yes, ma'am?"
"Did he come with a scarlet woman, did you hear?"
"Not so far as I know. No, he came all alone, early in the morning.Wasn't anybody with him."
Beneath her blanket, Juliet hugged Anna to her breast. "There, you see," she whispered. And in her fresh, young voice, she began to sing, while the wagon rattled down the road to Milford, a song she had heard her mother singing the year Noel Ploughman died.
"Love is the first thing,Love goes past.Sorrow is the next thing,Quiet is the last.
Love is a good thing,Quiet isn't bad,But sorrow is the best thingI've ever had."
From the Bade farmhouse, a mile below Hemlock Mountain, the road winds down to Adams' Forge, past Aaron Bade's stony fields. To the north lies Milford; but to the south lies that enchanting land, blue in the distance, misty in the sun, which the heart delights to call its home.
It is the land we see from any hilltop. As we gaze at its far off rises, its hazy, shadowy valleys, we feel within us a longing and a faint melancholy. There, we think, dwell the friends who would love us, if we were known to them, and there, too, must be found the beauty and the happiness that we have failed to discover where we are. It seems to us that there, in the distance, we should be happier, we should be more amiable and more dignified.
Aaron Bade, tied to his rocky farm on the slopes above Adams' Forge, remembered with a feeling of pleasure his one journey as far south as Attleboro. He had been obliged to return home before he had found the happiness which he had expected to find. However, once he was home, he realized that he had left it behind him, in Attleboro, or just a little further south . . .
Now, at forty, he was neither happy nor unhappy, but turned back in his mind to the fancies of his youth, and enjoyed, in imagination, the travels denied him in reality.
He had no love for the farm, which had belonged to his father; an old flute, on which his father used to play, was more of a treasure to him. Often in summer, as day faded, and the dews of night descended; when the clear lights in the valley were set twinkling one by one, leaving the uplands to the winds and stars, Aaron Bade, perched upon his pasture bars, piped to the faintly glowing sky his awkward thoughts and clumsy feelings.
In the morning he took leave of his wife, and with his hoe slung over his shoulder, made his way down to the cornfield. There, seated upon a stone, he saw himself in Attleboro again, pictured to himself the countryside beyond, and before noon, was half way round the world, leaving friends behind him in every land. Then, with a sigh, he would go in among the corn with his weeder, only to stand dreaming at every rustle of wind, seeing, in his mind, the smoke of distant cities, hearing, in fancy, the booming of foreign seas.
His wife was no longer a young woman. As a girl she had also had hopes for herself. It seemed to her, when she chose Aaron Bade, that in his company, life would be surprising and delightful. She expected to see something of the world—he spoke of it so much. But she was mistaken. For Aaron's travels were all of the mind. And she soon discovered that the more he talked, the more there remained for her to do. Thus her hopes died away; between the stove and the chickens, and what with cleaning, washing, sweeping and dusting, she rarely found time nowadays for more than a shake of her head, never very pretty, and at last no longer young, at the thought of what she had looked for, what she had meant to find. In short, from hopeful girl, Margaret Bade was, sensibly enough, turned practical woman; and when, on clear afternoons, with his work still to do, Aaron would take his flute down into the fields, she did his chores, as well as her own, with the wise remark that after all, they had to be done.
Nevertheless, when the dishes were washed—when the shadows of evening crept in past the lamp, no longer able to exclude them, she began to feel lonely and sad. And as the notes of Aaron's flute mingled with the night sounds, the chirp of crickets, the hum of insects, she felt, rather than thought, "Life is so much spilt milk. And all that comes of fancies, is Aaron's flute, playing down there in the pasture."
It was to this family that Mr. Jeminy came in the chilly dawn, on his way, apparently, to the ends of the earth, and, after breakfast, fell asleep in the hayloft, leaving them both gaping with pleasure and curiosity. For he came, Aaron had to admit, like a tramp; but spoke, Margaret thought, like the Gospels. "He's from roundabout," she said; "I hope he doesn't think to try and sell us anything. Men with something to sell always talk like the minister first."
But Aaron, with his mind on the far off world across the smoky autumn hills, was pained at such a suggestion. "You're wrong, mother," he said solemnly. "No, sirree. He's not from roundabout. And he's no common tramp either. He's come a distance, I believe."
"Then," said Margaret with regret, "I suppose he'll be going on again."
Aaron Bade stared attentively at one brown hand. "We could use a man on the farm," he said.
It gave his wife no pleasure to be obliged to agree with him.
"There's plenty still for a man to do, after you're done," she said. But she smiled almost at once; for like the women of that north country, crabbed and twisted as their own apple trees, she loved her husband for the trouble he gave her.
"It's a queer thing," said Aaron; "he has the look of a bookish man. Like old St. John Deakan down to the Forge, only St. John don't know anything, for all his looks."
"His talk was elegant," Mrs. Bade agreed. She stood still for a moment, looking down at her pots and pans. "He's seen a deal of life, I dare say," she added casually—so casually as to make one almost think that she herself had seen all she wanted to see.
"Well," said Aaron, "that's what schooling does for a man. It gives him a manner of talking, along with something to say."
Margaret, bent over her work again, plunged her red, wet arms up to the elbow in hot, soapy water. "You'll never lack talk, Aaron," she remarked; "or suffer for want of something to say. But it isn't washing my pots for me, nor bringing in the corn . . ."
"I'm going along now," said Aaron. "If the old man wakes before I'm back again, don't hurry him off, mother; I'd be glad to talk with him a bit before he goes."
"Who said anything about hurrying him off?" cried Mrs. Bade. "He can stay till doomsday, for all I care. He can sit and talk to me, while you're blowing on your flute. It'll be real companionable."
And she turned back to her pots and pans, a faint smile causing her mouth to curl down at one end, and up at the other.
Mr. Jeminy awoke in the afternoon. It was the nature of this kind and simple man to accept without question the hospitality of people he had never seen before; for he felt friendly toward every one. As he sat down to supper with the Bades, he bowed his head, and offered up a grace, with all his heart:
"Abide, O Lord, in this house; and be present at the breaking of bread, in love and in kindness. Amen."
During the meal, Aaron Bade asked Mr. Jeminy many questions, to discover what the old man hoped to do. "I suppose," he said, "you've come a good distance."
"Yes," said Mr. Jeminy gravely, "I have come a good distance."
Aaron Bade gave his wife a look which said plainly, "There, you see, mother."
"Where is your home, old man?" asked Mrs. Bade kindly.
"I have no home," said Mr. Jeminy.
Aaron Bade cleared his throat. "Are you bound anywhere in particular?" he asked.
"No," said Mr. Jeminy.
"Then," said Aaron Bade, "we'd admire to have you stay with us, if it's agreeable to you."
Mr. Jeminy looked about him at the homely kitchen, with its brown crockery set away neatly on the shelves. "If I stay with you," he said, "I should like to work in the fields, and help with the sowing and the harvesting."
"So you may," said Aaron Bade.
Mr. Jeminy looked at Margaret. "And you, madam?" he asked. "Would you care for the company of a garrulous old man at evening in your kitchen?"
Margaret blushed with pleasure. "Yes," she said.
"Very well," said Mr. Jeminy; "I will stay."
In this fashion Mr. Jeminy settled down at Bade's Farm, as farm hand to Aaron Bade. At the end of a week he felt that he had nothing to regret. He was active and spry, and believed himself to be useful. In fact, he could not remember when he had been so happy. High on his hill, he heard October's skyey gales go by above his head, and in the noonday drowse, watched, from the shade of a tree, the crows fly out across the valley, with creaking wings and harsh, discordant cries. In the early morning, he came tip-toeing down the stairs; from the open doorway he marked day rise above the east in bands of yellow light, and saw the foggy clouds of dawn slip quietly away, rising from the valleys, drifting across the hills; in the afternoon he labored in the fields, and at night, his tired body filled his mind with comfortable thoughts.
On his way to lunch, he stopped at the woodpile to get an armful of kindling for Mrs. Bade. The sober way she looked at him as he came in, hid from all but herself the almost voluptuous pleasure it gave her merely to be waited on, a pleasure she was more than half afraid to enjoy, for fear at jealous heaven might take it away, and leave her with all her work to do, and bad habits besides.
Therefore, as she ladled out potatoes, two to a plate, she seemed, to look at her, busier than ever; and far from being grateful, might have been used to favors every day of her life, whereas all the while she was saying ecstatically to herself, "Lord, make me humble."
For she saw in Mr. Jeminy all she had fancied as a girl, and lost hope in as a woman. Life . . . life was, then, to be had—leastways, a view of it, a good view of it—was to be heard of, by special act of Grace, on Bade's Farm, at Adams' Forge—of all places. So she dressed in her neatest, and was kinder than ever to Aaron, who was missing it. For she felt it was all just for her; she alone saw Mr. Jeminy for what he was, a grand, unusual peephole on the world. It was her own private peep, she thought. But she was wrong. Aaron was peeping as hard as she, and pitying her, as she was pitying him, for all he thought she was missing.
As for Mr. Jeminy, he let them think what they pleased. At first he was silent, out of shame. But later he enjoyed it as much as they did. "In Ceylon," he would say, "the tea fields . . ."
One day, a week after his arrival, Mr. Jeminy took the plow horse, Elijah, to the village to be shod. There the fragrance of wood fires mingled with a sweeter smell from barns and kitchens. As it was the hour when school let out, the yard in front of the schoolhouse was filled with children on their way home; laughing and calling each other, their voices rose in minor glees along the road, like the squabble of birds. And Mr. Jeminy, in front of the smithy, watched them go by, while his thoughts as follows:
"There," he said to himself, "its arms of texts, goes the new world. Within those careless heads and happy hearts we must look for courage, for wisdom and for sacrifice. Yet I believe they have the same thoughts as anybody else. That is to say, they suppose it is God's business to look after them. Yes, they are like their parents: they are carried away by what they are doing, which they do not believe could be done otherwise. One can see with what coldness, or even blows, they receive the advances of other little children, who wish to play with them. Well, as for those others, they go off at once, and play by themselves. One of them, whose hat has been taken by the rest, is digging in the earth with a bent twig, sharpened at one end. Possibly he is digging for a treasure, which will be of no value to anybody but himself. When he is older, he will be sorry he is not a child again."
At this point, Elijah being shod and ready, he ceased his reflections and went call for Aaron at the post-office. As the rode home together, the old schoolmaster, sunk in reverie, remained silent. But Aaron wanted to talk, now that he had some one to talk to.
"We'll get around to the wood to-morrow, and lay in another cord or two."
"As you like."
"They're saying down to the store that feed will be higher than ever this winter. I suppose we'd better lay in a store. I can't sell a few barrels of potatoes, though I did want to save them."
Mr. Jeminy roused himself with an effort. "I had the horse shod all around," he said.
Aaron nodded. "I guess it's just as well," he replied. "Did you ask about fixing the harrow?"
"It will take a week," said Mr. Jeminy. "I said to go ahead, figuring that we had the whole winter before us."
"We could do with a new harrow," said Aaron, "only there's no way to pay for it."
Mr. Jeminy shook the reins over Elijah's back. "I have a little money," he began, "laid away . . ."
"You're very kind," said Aaron, "but I don't figure to take advantage of it. Still, living's hard; so much trouble. Take me; here I am bound down to a farm's got as many rocks in it as anything else. I've been as far south as Attleboro, but I've never had a view of the world, like you've had. I'll die as I've lived, without anything to be grateful for, so far as I can see."
"You've had more to be grateful for than I ever had," said Mr. Jeminy simply, "and I'm not complaining."
"Go along," said Aaron; "you're speaking out of kindness. But it doesn't fool me any. I know you've led a wandering life, Mr. Jeminy. But I'd admire to see a little something of the world myself."
Above them the smoke from Aaron's chimney, thin and blue, rose bending like an Indian pipe in the still air. And Mr. Jeminy gazed at it in silence, before replying:
"You have had the good things of life, Aaron Bade."
"Have I?" said Aaron bitterly. "I'm sure I didn't know it. What are the good things of life, Mr. Jeminy?"
"Love," said Mr. Jeminy, "peace, quiet of the heart, the work of one's hands. Perhaps it is human to wish for more. But to be human is not always to be wise. Do you desire to see the world, Aaron Bade? Soon you would ask to be home again."
"Well, I don't know about that," said Aaron.
"Ah," said Mr. Jeminy, "love is best of all."
And once again he relapsed into silence. In the evening he drove the cows in. High up on Hemlock, Aaron, among his slow, thin tunes, thought to himself: "There go the cows. Mr. Jeminy understands me; he's a traveled man." And he played his flute harder than ever, because Mr. Jeminy, who had seen, as Aaron thought, all Aaron had wanted to see, breathed the airs of foreign lands, and sailed the seven seas, was setting Aaron's cows to right, in Aaron's tumbled barn.
In the kitchen, Margaret, going to light the lamp, smiled at her thoughts, which were timid and gay. She was happy because Mr. Jeminy, who had seen so many elegant women, helped her with her apple jellies, and brought her kindlings for the stove.
When the cows were milked, Mr. Jeminy came out of the barn, and stood looking up at the sky, yellow and green, with its promise of frost. "A cold night," he said to himself, "and a bright morning." He could hear the wind rising in the west. "Winter is not far off," he said, and he carried the two warm, foaming milkpails into the kitchen.
As he was eating his supper, a wagon came clattering down the road and stopped at the door. "There's Ellery Deakan back from Milford," said Margaret at the window. "I wonder what he wants at this time of night. Looks to be somebody with him. Go and see, Mr. Jeminy. I've the pudding to attend to."
Mrs. Grumble was dying. She lay without moving, one wasted hand holding tightly to the fingers of Mrs. Wicket, who sat beside the bed. There, where Mrs. Grumble had worked and scolded for twenty years, all was still; while the clock on the dresser, like a solemn footstep, seemed to deepen the silence with its single, hollow beat.
But if it was quiet in the schoolmaster's house, it was far from being quiet in the village, where Mrs. Tomkins was going hurriedly from house to house in search of Mrs. Wicket's runaway daughter. Mrs. Wicket, who was dozing, did not hear the anxious voices calling everywhere for Juliet. To Mrs. Grumble, the sound was like the dwindling murmur of a world with which she was nearly done. She felt that her end was approaching, and remarked:
"I hope I haven't given you too much trouble, Mrs. Wicket."
Mrs. Wicket tried to assure Mrs. Grumble that she had not been any trouble to her. But Mrs. Grumble said weakly:
"Maybe when I was out of my head . . ."
"Don't you fret yourself a mite about that," cried Mrs. Wicket; "for that's all over. Now you're going to get well."
"No," said Mrs. Grumble, "no, I'm not going to get well. I'm going to die." She thought over, in silence, what she had just said, and it appeared to satisfy her. At the thought of death she was calm and willing. "I remember," she remarked, "how I used to have a horror of dying. I was afraid to die, without having done anything to make me out different from anybody else. But I guess nobody's any different when it comes to dying, Mrs. Wicket. It feels easy and natural."
"Don't you so much as even think of it," said Mrs. Wicket.
Mrs. Grumble smiled. "There's no use trying to fool me," she declared. "I'm not afraid any more. I'd like to see Mr. Jeminy before I go. I'd like to know he was in good hands. I'd like to think you'd look after him a bit, Mrs. Wicket, when I'm gone."
"Yes," said Mrs. Wicket, "set your mind at rest."
"You've been very kind to me," said Mrs. Grumble, with difficulty."You've had a hard time of it here in Hillsboro. You're a good woman,Mrs. Wicket. I'm glad you'll be here for him when he comes home. Itook care of him for twenty years. As though he were my own."
"I'll care for him the same," said Mrs. Wicket, "as though he were my own."
Mrs. Grumble seemed to be content with this promise, for she remained for some time sunk in silence. At last she said, "He'll come in time for me to see him again. He won't leave me to die alone, not after I took care of him for twenty years.
"I remember the time he brought me a bit of lace from the fair over to Milford. He used to give me a lot of trouble. But he didn't forget to bring me home a piece of lace from the fair. I put it on my petticoat.
"He's on his way home now, Mrs. Wicket: yes, I can feel he's coming home."
Mrs. Wicket, who had been up with Mrs. Grumble the night before, let her head droop forward on her breast. "I don't doubt it," she said. And in the silence of the sickroom, she presently fell asleep. Mrs. Grumble lay with wide open eyes, staring at the door through which Mr. Jeminy was to come. She felt quiet and happy; it seemed to her that her pain was already over and done with. Framed in the doorway, in the yellow lamplight, she beheld the fancies of her youth, the memories of the past. She saw again the woman she had been, and watched, with eyes filled with compassion, her early sorrows, and the troubles of her later years. "It was all of no account," she said to herself, "but it doesn't matter now." And she set herself to wait in patience for Mr. Jeminy, who she never doubted would come to help her die.
Meanwhile the schoolmaster, in Aaron Bade's wagon, was rattling along the road, with Juliet tight asleep in his arms. As he drew near his home, he saw in the distance Barly Hill, and the lights of Barly Farm shining across the valley. "I am coming home again," he said to them; "I have no longer any pride. So now I know that I am an old man."
But later a feeling of peace took possession of his heart. "Yes," he said, "I am an old man. The world is not my affair any more. I belong to yesterday, with its triumphs and its failures; I must share in the glory, such as it is, of what has been done. The future is in the hands of this child, sound asleep by my side. It is in your hands, Anna Barly, and yours, Thomas Frye. But you must do better than I did, and those with whom I quarreled. To youth is given the burden and the pain. Only the old are happy to-day.
"Children, children, what will become of you?"
When Mr. Jeminy, with Juliet in his arms, strode in through Mrs. Grumble's door, Mrs. Wicket rose to her feet, her hands pressed to her bosom with delight and alarm. Mr. Jeminy gave Juliet to her mother. "Take the child home," he said. Then with timid, hesitant steps, he approached Mrs. Grumble's bed.
"You've been a long time coming," she said. "I'm tired."
"I'm here now," replied Mr. Jeminy; "I am not going away any more."
"No," said Mrs. Grumble, "you'd better stay home and attend to things.I won't be here much longer."
Mr. Jeminy wanted to say "nonsense," but he was unable to speak. Instead he took Mrs. Grumble's hand in both of his. "Are you going to leave me, dear friend?" he asked.
Mrs. Grumble smiled; then she gave a sigh. "Look what you called me," she said. And they were both silent, thinking of the past together. In the distance the crisp footsteps of Mrs. Wicket died away down the hill. And presently nothing was to be heard but the steady ticking of the clock on the mantel. Then Mr. Jeminy, for once, could find nothing to say. It seemed to him that instead of the clock's ticking, he heard the footsteps of death in the house, on the stair . . . tik, tok, tik, tok . . . And he sighed, with sadness and horror, "Ah, my friend," he thought, "are you as frightened as I am?"
Presently he saw that Mrs. Grumble was trying to lift herself up in bed. "I'm going now," she said. Her voice was low, but resonant. "Mrs. Wicket will look after you. She's a good woman, Mr. Jeminy. My mind's at peace. I never knew death was so simple and ordinary. It's almost like nothing."
She sank back; her voice gave out and she began to cough. "You will only tire yourself by talking," said Mr. Jeminy. "Rest now. Then in the morning . . ."
"No," said Mrs. Grumble faintly, "there'll be no morning for me, unless it's the morning of the Lord. Not where I'm going."
"You are going where I, too, must go," said Mr. Jeminy. "You are going a little before me. Soon I shall come hurrying after you."
"It's nearly over," said Mrs. Grumble. "I did what I could." Her mind began to wander; she spoke some words to herself.
"You, God," said Mr. Jeminy aloud, "this is your doing. Then come and be present; receive the forgiveness of this good woman, to whom you gave, in this life, poverty and sacrifice."
"Please," whispered Mrs. Grumble, "speak of God with more respect." They were her last words; it was the end. A spasm of coughing shook her; for a moment she seemed anxious to speak. But as Mr. Jeminy bent over her, her breath failed; her head fell back, and with a single, frightened glance, Mrs. Grumble passed away, without saying what she had intended.
Mr. Jeminy closed her eyes, and folded her hands across her breast. "She is gone already," he thought; "she is far away. She has pressed ahead, so swiftly, beyond sight or hearing."
He bent his head. "You made me comfortable in my life, Mrs. Grumble," he said, "yet at the end I could do nothing for you. But you will not think badly of me for that.
"Now you are hurrying through eternity. To you, these few slow hours before the dawn are no different from to-morrow or yesterday; they will never pass.
"Do you see, at last, the meaning of the spectacle you have just quitted? Do you understand what I, for all my wisdom, do not understand? You are free to ask God to explain it to you; you can say, 'I saw armies with banners, and scholars with their books.' Perhaps he will tell you the meaning of it. But for us, who remain, it has no meaning. Well, we say, this is life. We laugh, applaud, talk together, and think about ourselves. And one by one we slip away, no wiser than before.
"We are like the bees, who work from dawn till dark, gathering honey in the fields and in the woods. But we are not as wise as the bees, for each one grasps what he can, and cries, 'this is mine.' Then seeing that it is of no use to him, he adds, 'What will you give me for it?'"
And he began to think of the past. It seemed to him that he was in school again. It was spring; and the children came romping into the schoolroom, their arms full of books and flowers. Summer passed; he saw Anna Barly crying by the roadside, under the gray sky. He heard himself saying to Mrs. Grumble: "Yes, that's right, stop up your ears . . ." And he saw himself walking toward Milford in the moonlight, under the falling leaves. "Who, now," he thought, "will drive me out of doors because my room is in disorder, or burn, when I am away, the scraps of paper on which I have scribbled my memoranda?"
He bowed his head. "Rest quietly, Mrs. Grumble," he said. "Your troubles are over. For you there is neither doubt nor grief; life does not matter to you any more. Nor does it matter very much to me. For there is no one now to care what I do. I am no trouble to anybody."
The chilly breath of morning filled the valley with mist, fine, gray, imperceptible in the faint light of dawn. And a farmer's cart, as it rattled down the road, woke, in his chair, the old schoolmaster from the reverie into which he had fallen.
Faint and clear the early lights of the village went out, leaving the valley empty and cold. A freight train whistled at the junction, and crept, with tolling bell, over the switches, to the south.
The sun, rising, poured its yellow light into Mrs. Grumble's room, illuminating the bed, with its silent burden, and the still figure huddled in the chair. Slowly, and with difficulty, Mr. Jeminy got to his feet and crossed to the window. There his gaze encountered Mrs. Wicket, coming up the hill.
Blowing on his hands, Mr. Jeminy went to meet her in the early sunshine.