Jewel: A Chapter in Her Life

PREPARER'S NOTE This text was prepared from a 1903 edition, published by Grosset & Dunlap, New York.
“Now you polish up those buckles real good, won't you, 'Zekiel? I will say for Fanshaw, you could most see your face in the harness always.”
The young fellow addressed rubbed away at the nickel plating good humoredly, although he had heard enough exhortations in the last twenty-four hours to chafe somewhat the spirit of youth. His mother, a large, heavy woman, stood over him, her face full of care.
“It's a big change from driving a grocery wagon to driving a gentleman's carriage, 'Zekiel. I do hope you sense it.”
“You'd make a bronze image sense it, mother,” answered the young man, smiling broadly. “You might sit and sermonize just as well, mightn't you? Sitting's as cheap as standing,”—he cast a glance around the clean spaces of the barn in search of a chair,—“or if you'd rather go and attend to your knitting, I've seen harness before, you know.”
“I'm not sure as you've ever handled a gentleman's harness in your life, 'Zekiel Forbes.”
“It's a fact they don't wear 'em much down Boston way.”
His mother regarded his shock of light hair with repressed fondness.
“It was a big responsibility I took when I asked Mr. Evringham to let you try the place,” she said solemnly, “and I'm going to do my best to help you fill it. It does seem almost a providence the way Fanshaw's livery fits you; and if you'll hold yourself up, I may be partial, but it seems to me you look better in it than he ever did; and I'm sure if handsome is as handsome does, you'll fill it better every way, even if he was a fashionable English coachman. Mrs. Evringham was so pleased with his style she tried to have him kept even after he'd taken too much for the second time; but Mr. Evringham valued his horses too highly for that, I can tell you.”
“Thought the governor was a widower still,” remarked Ezekiel as his mother drew forward a battered chair and dusted it with the huge apron that covered her neat dress. She seated herself close to her boy.