"O my Lord!" uttered Amanda, under her breath. Then she roused herself to the present exigency of comfort. "You come an' set in the kitchen a spell," she said, coaxingly, "an' I'll go an' get the things back."
Old Lady Green looked at her with that unquestioning trust which was the most pathetic accompaniment of her state. "You'll git 'em back, 'Mandy, won't ye?" she repeated, smiling a little and wiping her eyes. "That's a good gal! So't we can tell what time 'tis."
Amanda led her into the kitchen, and established her by the window. She shut the door of the denuded sitting-room, and, giving her courage no time to cool, ran across lots to the Blaisdells', the hated money clasped tightly in her hand. The family was at supper, and the stranger with them, when she walked in at the kitchen door. She hurried up to her enemy, and laid the little roll of bills by his plate. Her cheeks were scarlet, her thin hair-flying.
"Here's your money," she said, in a strained, high voice, "an' I want our things. You hadn't ought to gone over there an' talked over an old lady that—that—"
There she stopped. Amanda had never yet acknowledged that her mother was not in her "perfect mind." Chapman took out a long pocket-book, and for a moment her courage stood at flood-tide; she thought he was about to accept the money and put it away. But no! He produced a slip of white paper and held it up before her. She bent forward and examined it,—a receipt signed by her mother's shaking hand.
"But it ain't right!" she cried, helpless in her dismay. "Cap'n Jabez, you speak to him! You know how 'tis about mother! She wouldn't any more ha' sold that clock than she'd ha' sold—me!"
Captain Jabez looked at his plate in uncomfortable silence. He was a just man, but he hated to interfere.
"Well, there!" he said, at length, pushing his chair back to leave the table. "It don't seem jestly right to me, but then he's got the resate, an' your mother signed it—an' there 'tis!"
"An' you won't do anything?" cried Amanda, passionately, turning back to the stranger. "You mean to keep them things?"
He was honestly sorry for her, as the business man for the sentimentalist, but he had made a good bargain, and he held it sacred.