“No.” He watched the girl’s downcast face, and he, too, was aware that he did not want to go very far away. Yet—There were no other words spoken for a moment, and then the girl raised her eyes. “Do you remember how we said at the time of the freshet that it wasn’t worth while to borrow trouble? And look what the freshet did for Polly, though it did destroy a part of our garden.”
“And therefore you think my going away need not be an unalloyed disaster? That is very pleasant to know. I was hardly conceited enough to think it would cause any very great sorrow.”
Agnes’s fair face flushed. “I meant that it might be the means of bringing you good fortune, and that would be a pleasure to your friends, however much they might miss you.” She had grown much gentler since the coming of Honey among them, Parker was quick to perceive.
“If you keep on being so sweetly philosophical, I’m afraid you will soon be ready to be a minister’s wife,” he said with a half smile.
Agnes compressed her lips. “Oh, do you think so?” she returned coldly. Then, after a pause, “Yes, I am quite sure that Jimmy will be ample protection for us, and as it is for your pleasure and profit to go away, I advise you to do it.”
There was a womanliness in her manner of speech that set him wondering. Was it the reminder of the minister’s wife that so suddenly changed her? Perhaps, after all, it was not Honey, but Archie who was the cause of the new gentleness. She was trying to prepare herself for that new life with Archie; that was it. “Well, little girl,” he said lightly, “then I will go; but I shall keep track of you, and I shall see you sometimes.”
Sometimes! He who had been a part of her daily life for all these months would see her only sometimes, just as she was learning his worth and her own dependence upon him. She laid her cheek against Honey’s hair, and the touch gave her comfort. “Poor little baby,” she said, “I wonder whether your mother is grieving for you. I almost hope he has no mother.”
“Perhaps he has not. Would you like to know?”
“We ought to know.”
“We have tried to find out, you remember, but we can try again. I am going up the river a short distance to-morrow,—now that the water has subsided, it will be safe to go—and I’ll make inquiry of every one along the way. Dod Hunter knows every one, and he may be able to tell. I am going his way.”