"How canst thou judge? Thy mother hath more wisdom and may tell another story. There, get to supper. It is weary lying here, but the Lord's ways are not as ours."
Andrew ate a little supper in the plain, bare room. On the green where the ladies had sat was a strong cherry table, containing some plates and glasses and a great stone pitcher curiously molded. How the trees had waved overhead and sifted golden gleams and shadows through! There had been a bit of peerless blue sky, the sweetness of the grass, the soft lap of the river that one could hear only when the talk stopped. How beautiful it all was! That was God's world. And the long ride home, the woods in solemn grandeur, the bits of river now and then. He was stirred mysteriously. He was a new man.
Rachel still sat on the doorstep. Sometimes he came out, and, though they said little, there was a pleasure in the nearness.
Penn Morgan returned from the great barn, where he and the hired man had left things comfortable for the night. Anything was safe enough. No need to lock or bolt in this Arcadian simplicity, except to keep cattle from straying.
Penn told over his day's work and the morrow's plans and went to bed. Rachel had not been knitting for some time, but she folded up her work and passed in without a word. Friends of the stricter sort were as careful of vain and idle words as the most rigid Puritan.
He missed something sorely to-night. It was the little girl who had kissed him.
Two days later Madam Wetherill brought her over in the neatest attire, with no furbelows or laces. Primrose had demurred somewhat. "Nay," said Madam Wetherill with a consoling sound in her voice, "they would not like it, and it is only for a few months. All the articles will be here on thy return or in the city," smiling. "It will not be long and thou must be a brave, good girl, and happy, too. Sometime thou wilt choose. A hundred things may happen."
She ran down the path and said good-by to the nodding flowers. She was sorry to part with Bella and Patty, and Casper and the great dog, and the mother cat with the two kittens, and she was loath to leave the gay chatter and the visions of the radiant young women who petted her now and then. She was not afraid of Mistress Kent, though her tongue was still sharp, and she kept her riding whip handy to give Casper and Joe, the black boys, who were very full of frolic, a cut now and then.
The ride in the clumsy chaise was a silent one. Madam Wetherill was surprised to find how the little one had crept into her heart. And she was growing ever so much prettier, more like her mother. It was the care, no doubt. They would let her get tanned and try to subdue the curl in her lovely silken hair. The lady smiled oddly to herself, thinking a mightier power than Quaker rule had put it there. But it would be bad for the child, this continual changing. However, it could not be helped now. One consolation was that she was much too young to give anything but a child's love to her cousin. And he would be married to some thrifty woman before she was grown up.
It was Rachel who came to take the budget done up in a stout hempen cloth, and lifted out the little girl, then holding the horse while Madam descended, and fastening it to the hitching post. The old lady sat under the same tree, but the little girl was weeding in the garden and stood up to look, covered with her widebrimmed hat.