"If ever I'm a widow," said a panting voice a few paces away, "if ever I'm a widow (which the Lord forbid!), I'll end my days on a ground floor 'pon the flat. Companion-ladders is bad enough when you've a man to look after; but when you've put 'en away and can take your meals easy, to chase a bereaved woman up a hill like the side of a house, an' then up a flight of stairs, for five shillings a week and all found—O-oh!"
Mrs. Purchase halted at the stair-head; and it is a question which of three faces was redder.
"O-oh!" repeated Mrs. Purchase. "Here come I with news enough to upset a town, and simmin' to me here's a pair that won't value it more'n a rush. Well-a-well! Am I to go away, my dears, or wish 'ee fortune? You're a sly fellow too, Tom Trevarthen, to go and get hold of a schoolmistress, when 'tis only a little schoolin' you want to get a certificate and be master of a ship. That's the honest truth, my dear,"—she turned to Hester. "'Twas he that worked the Virtuous Lady home, and if you can teach 'en navigation to pass the board, he shall have her and you too. Do I mean it? Iss, fay, I mean it. I'm hauled ashore. 'Tis 'Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant,' with Hannah Purchase."
Late that evening Clem and Myra walked hand in hand, hushed, through the unkempt garden—their garden now, though to their childish intelligence no more theirs than it had always been. They might lift their voices now and run shouting with no one to rebuke them. They understood this, yet somehow they did not put it to the proof. Home was home, and the old constraint a part of it.
Late that same evening Samuel Rosewarne passed down the streets of Plymouth and unlatched the door of a dingy house which, empty of human love, of childhood, of friendship, was yet his home and the tolerable refuge of his soul. He no longer feared himself. He could face the future. He could live out his life.
THE END.
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Transcriber's note: The following corrections were made to the text. Chapter IV 'a petty tradesman's daughter of Warwick' to 'a pretty tradesman's daughter of Warwick' Chapter VI 'You'm wanted at home, and to once!" to 'You'm wanted to home, and at once!" (The Cornish tend to say--He's to Truro rather than--He's at Truro) Chapter XV 'C let us give thanks to the lord' to 'Come let us give thanks to the lord' Chapter XXIII 'They why are you left on board?' to 'Then why are you left on board' Chapter XXIV 'I hall be surprised' to 'I shall be surprised' Chapter XXV 'but simply because her elate spirit craved for a talk' to 'but simply because her elated spirit craved for a talk' |