Four or five of the days during which I had been sufficiently strong to sit up had passed away, and I was able to give more of my time to my mail and paper, and thus to seem preoccupied when Adah came to read. I found Zillah also a useful though unconscious ally, and I lured her into my room by innumerable stories. Reuben and Mr. Yocomb were now very busy in their harvest, and I saw them chiefly in the evening, but they were too tired to stay long. Time often hung wofully heavy on my hands, and I longed to be out of doors again; but Mrs. Yocomb was prudently inexorable. I am sure that she restrained Adah a great deal, for she grew less and less demonstrative in manner, and I was left more to myself.
Thus a week passed. It was Saturday morning, and between the harvest without and preparations for Sunday within, all the inmates of the farmhouse were very busy. The forenoon had wellnigh passed. I had exhausted every expedient to kill time, and was looking on the landscape shimmering in the fierce sunlight with an apathy that was dull and leaden in contrast, when a low knock caused me to look up; but instead of Adah, as I expected, Miss Warren stood in the doorway.
"They are all so busy to-day," she said hesitatingly, "that I thought I might help you pass an hour or two. It seems too bad that you should be left to yourself so long."
To my disgust, I—who had resolved to be so strong and self-poised in her presence—felt that every drop of blood in my body had rushed into my face. It certainly must have been very apparent, for her color became vivid also.
"I fear I was having a stupid time," I began awkwardly. "I don't want to make trouble. Perhaps Mrs. Yocomb needs your help."
"No," she said, smiling, "you can't banish me on that ground. I've been helping Mrs. Yocomb all the morning. She's teaching me how to cook. I've succeeded in proving that the family would have a fit of indigestion that might prove fatal were it wholly dependent on my performances."
"Tell me what you made?" I said eagerly. "Am I to have any of it for my dinner?"
"Indeed you are not. Dr. Bates would have me indicted."
She looked at me with solicitude, for although I had laughed with her I felt ill and faint. Despairingly, I thought, "I cannot see her and live. I must indeed go away."
"So you are coming downstairs to-morrow?" she began. "We shall give yon a welcome that ought to make any man proud. Mrs. Yocomb is all aglow with her preparations."