It was hard. With a morbid self-consciousness that every one could not but know of her trouble she had hidden, shrinking from the village folk who so often came in; she was so weak that as she crossed the room she had to put her hand against the wall to steady her steps; and now that she was making the effort to rouse herself she began to see the luxury it had been to be perfectly wretched. But Rose resisted the temptation to throw herself again on the bed; she crept steadily, if somewhat weakly, downstairs, and made a brave attempt at smiling. With a guilty sense of all the opportunities for making herself useful she had neglected, she took up a stitch in her knitting Grandmother Sweet had dropped; overcast some velvet for Mrs. Patience, who was in a hurry with a bonnet; and that done helped Miss Silence set the table and make supper ready.
They all saw the struggle Rose was making and helped her by keeping her mind as much as possible off from herself. And though that missing money still hung its dark shadow over her, and she started at every step outside with the sinking fear that it might be some one coming to arrest her, when she went to her room that night Grandmother Sweet patted her cheek as she kissed her good-night and whispered, “Thee has done bravely, Rose,” an unspoken approval she read in the manner of the others. More than that, she was surprised to find her heart lighter than she would have thought possible a few hours before.
To keep steadily on in the way she had marked out for herself was anything but easy during those days of suspense and anxiety. To hold back the lump that was always threatening to rise in her throat, the tears from springing to her eyes; to keep a cheerful face when her heart would be sinking down, down; to feel an interest in the concerns of others when her own seemed to swallow up everything else. But it was her first step in a habit of conscious self-discipline that she never forgot, and that helped her to meet many an after hour of trial.
So something over a week went by, for though Mrs. Blossom had seen Mr. Nathan Fifield several times the mystery was as much of a mystery as the first day, and in spite of all Mrs. Blossom could urge both he and Miss Eudora seemed to grow the more bitter toward Rose. Nor had there come any answer to the letters of inquiry sent to Fredonia. Every possible theory having been exhausted in both cases, the subjects had come to be avoided by a tacit consent. While as to the matter of the marriage certificate, that had made so little impression on Rose’s mind that she was less disappointed than the others in regard to it. Mrs. Blossom did not fail to pray daily at family devotions that the truth they were seeking might be revealed, and innocence established, and she moved around with the serene manner of one who has given over all care to a higher power. But though Rose was unconsciously sustained by a reliance on that strong faith she did not pray for herself. A hopeless apathy chilled her. There might be a God, it didn’t matter much to her, for if there was she was an alien to His love, and she knew she was that for all the rest might say.
But one afternoon Rose saw a little procession—Mr. Nathan Fifield and his two sisters, in single file, crossing the now snow-covered common in the direction of Mrs. Blossom’s. All her fears revived at the sight. She sprang up, her eyes dilated, her face flushing and paling. “There they come!” she cried. “I knew they would. They are going to put me in prison, I know they are! Oh, don’t let them take me away! Don’t let them!” and she threw herself down beside Miss Silence and hid her face in her lap as if for safety.
Silence put her strong arms about the trembling form. “Sit up, Rose,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone, “and wait till you see what there is to be afraid of.”
By the time Rose had struggled back to outward calmness the visitors had entered; Mr. Nathan, his face almost as red as the red silk handkerchief he waved in his hand; Miss Eudora dissolved in tears; and Miss Fifield with an expression of mingled vexation and crestfallen humility.
There was a moment’s awkward silence, broken by Mr. Nathan in an abrupt and aggravated tone. “I’ve come to explain a mistake I have been led into by women’s meddling and—”
“You needn’t include me,” interrupted Miss Eudora. “You know I wouldn’t have said what I did if you hadn’t made me feel that we were in danger of being murdered in our beds, and I hadn’t thought Jane would be always blaming me if I didn’t use decision. Nobody can tell how painful it has been for me to do what I have. I don’t know when my nerves will recover from the strain, and I’ve lost flesh till my dresses are so loose they will hardly hang on me. I’m sure I never dreamed that Jane—”
“Oh, yes, lay all the blame you can on Jane,” rejoined that lady grimly. “It isn’t often you get the chance, so both of you make the best of it. I’m sure when I went away I never dreamed that you were going to get in a panic and act like a pair of lunatics, particularly a strong-minded man like Nathan. I never was so astonished as when I reached home on the stage to-day and found out what had happened. Eudora says she wrote me about it, but if she did she must have forgotten to put the State on; she always does, and the letter may be making the round of the Romes of the whole country; or else Nathan is carrying it in his pocket yet—he never does remember to mail a letter.”