“She is a still woman, Ezra,” said Granny. “Some are born so. It does not mean that they are always sad women.” She added in a low voice to Polly, as the girl passed, “Speak to him, child! You will not let your man go into the wilderness without a word?”
Polly went to her husband obediently, and said with a sudden effort, “Stay!”
He turned and caught her in his arms, his face radiant.
“Why, my pretty; why my own dear! You do not want me to leave you, then? Yet it was you who bade me go. And so I passed my word, and Neighbor Cook is waiting to ride on with me, and I have told others that I would surely be at the meeting of Court in Harrodsburg. To tell the truth, I thought our son might be proud, some day, to know that his father was one of those to bring the law into Kentucky.
“It will not be for long, Polly only a matter of a week or two—but ’tis the longest and farthest we have been separated since I found you; which makes it hard both.”
He kissed her hungrily, kisses which, after a moment of passivity, she returned, almost with violence. Granny knitted obliviously, smiling to herself. He put his wife from him at last with an effort, muttering:
“I must go now, or—I cannot⸺ Eh, well, black Ben shall sleep in the lean-to each night I am gone, and ’tis many a day since the savages ventured close to a settlement, thank God! You will be safe, at least. You are not afraid?”
Polly shook her head.
“Of course not”—he laughed shortly—“you who have known so much worse than loneliness! Remember there are neighbors within gunshot, and you have Granny for company—Granny and our son. Polly!” He was eying her closely, and asked again, “You are not afraid?”
“Don’t you see,” suggested Granny, “’tis you she fears for, son, you going, out alone into the wilderness? Ah, ’tis the hardest thing a woman has to bear, the waiting!”