“I’m sure I don’t think it at all strange he is loath to sell her. Any one thinks a great deal of the first things they make. I’ve got a pair of clouded stockings in the chest of drawers. I spun the yarn and knit them when I was eight and a half years old, and had to stand on a plank to reach the wheel, and I don’t think Henry Griffin or anybody else could buy them.”
“I don’t believe but there’s some other reason.”
“Perhaps so.”
“It may be that he wants to go off, and have a sail and a grand time with Fred somewhere, as they did before.”
“I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Perhaps he’s got some word from John, by Joe Griffin, that he’s coming home, and he’s keeping her for that.”
“If he’d heard anything of that kind, he would have told us the first thing.”
“Well, whatever the reason is, he’ll tell you when he gets ready.”
But he didn’t tell Sally, nor did he tell the boys after they had gone to bed that night, but chose a very different confidant.