"My suz! I guess I know what I'm about. That 'cholera mixture' 's one the old doctor's own prescriptions, an' I've give more of it to more folks 'an you could shake a stick at. It's marked 'poison' so's to keep childern like you from meddlin' with it. A dose of it won't hurt nobody, an' if his malady is the sort I cal'late, I'm treatin' him like the Good Samaritan would on the Sabbath Day. I've made it a powerful dose, an' I 'low it'll settle his hash one way or other. But I hate to touch him. I certainly do."
A last faint moan issued from the sufferer, and his eyes turned upon the girl. He looked so wan and so forlorn that her own natural repugnance left her, and she caught the medicine-glass from Susanna to present it to the sick man's lips. He opened them and drank obediently, even smacking his lips over the fiery mixture, and Kate, having finished her task, hastily withdrew to the outer room.
But what had come over the Widow Sprigg? Her whole manner had changed. Fear seemed to have left her and a stern determination taken its place. Katharine could only observe, wondering, as the mistress of the cottage caught up a pail, and going to the well drew it full several times, throwing out all but the last pailful, which she brought back into the house and set on a table in the bedroom. Beside it she placed a dipper, and observed:
"That water's all right. Moses, he had the well cleaned out for me only last month. We always do do it twicet a year, lest somebody comes along an' drinks it stale. More'n that, the well's fed by a spring, runnin' in an' out, so really don't need any cleanin', but—"
Such solicitude on account of that detested tramp! It was amazing. Yet her next procedure was even more so. Going up-stairs, she looked that the window was shut, and the nail, its only fastening, put in above the lower sash. Anybody inside could have opened it, of course, but that did not occur to her. Each of the windows was thus treated, and, beckoning to Katharine, she led the way out-doors. The door was locked on the outside and Susanna started homeward. She was no longer a weary or a sad-faced woman. She was alert, silent, but unmistakably cheerful.
Kate kept close pace with the now swift steps of the housekeeper, and finally ventured to ask: "Who is he?"
"We may not all hope to be constables, but some of us is constables without ever runnin' for office! Well, well, well! I shouldn't be surprised if the end o' the world happens along now, any time," said Susanna, irrelevantly, and fell into such a brown study that Katy dared not interrupt her, and the rest of the way home was passed in silence.
The deacon was waiting restlessly. He had not liked to desert his post and leave the disabled Moses alone in the house. Neither had he liked to lose his Sunday afternoon nap, well-earned refreshment of a diligent man. One other thing he had not liked: Moses' flat refusal to discuss their employer's affairs. This had led to other controversies, and two disgruntled men were ready to greet the tardy wanderers.
"Hm-m. Thought you never was a-comin' back. That's all the sense a silly woman has; let her get off grounds an' she don't know when to step on to 'em again. The deacon, he's been purty patient, but—I guess we'll be better friends if we part for a spell now," was Moses' greeting; and, instead of resenting it, Susanna said never a word.
In silence she brought him his cup of beef tea. In silence she went out and fed the poultry; came in and gave Sir Philip his bowl of milk and Punch his plate of scraps. She had long since taken the feeding of both animals upon herself, declaring, with some show of truth, that they did not dare "muss around" for her as they did for Eunice or Kate.