“I’ll write a will for you if I can find anything to write with,” offered Elizabeth.
The old woman made a desperate effort to raise herself on her elbow and thus see more plainly this comforting visitor.
“Will it hold in the courts of men?”
“It will hold if you have the forty dollars,” Elizabeth assured her. “There are some men back here who will witness it, I’m sure.”
Fortunately one of the road-makers had a dull pencil and an old envelope. But they were not so willing to help as Elizabeth expected. At last after a great deal of persuasion the youngest consented to go with her. She wrote a brief statement and the old woman put a mark on it, and the road-maker signed his name as witness. Then he hurried away, glad to get out of the filthy cabin.
“Put it up there back of the beam, lady. It’s a place my offspring have never found.”
“Can’t I do anything to make you comfortable? I could heat some water and—” as she spoke Elizabeth looked round for a vessel or cloths or soap.
“Water shortens life,” said the old soul as though she were quoting a proverb.
Then Elizabeth asked her a question, because she had come to ask it, not because she had either expectation or desire of having it answered here.
“Did you ever know John Baring?”