"Why cannot people be contented with ruling while living, without subjecting others to the domination of an irrevocable will, when they are no longer able to mold or govern circumstances. I beg your pardon. Pray go on. But first let me inquire whether the person to whom you were commanded to trust your affairs proved trustworthy?"
"As trustworthy as nearly absolute power on one side, and timid inexperience on the other, is likely to make any one. When we arrived finally in Portland, he took my wagons and cattle off my hands, and returned me next to nothing for them. Yet, he was about like the average administrator; it did not make much difference, I suppose, whether this one man got my property, or a probate court."
"Poor child! I can see just how you were situated. Alone in a new country, with a baby on your hands, and without means to make a home for yourself. What did you do? did you never think of going back to your parents?"
"How could I get back? The tide of travel was not in that direction. Besides, I had neither money nor a sufficient outfit. There was no communication by mail in those days oftener than once in three months. You might perish a thousand times before you could get assistance from the East. O, no! there was nothing to be done, except to make the best of the situation."
"Certainly, you had some friends among your fellow-immigrants who interested themselves in your behalf to find you a home? Somebody besides your guardian already mentioned."
"The most of them were as badly off as myself. Many had lost near friends. I was not the only widow; but some women had lost their husbands who had several young children. They looked upon me as comparatively fortunate. Men had lost wives, and these were the most wretched of all; for a woman can contrive some way to take care of her children, where a man is perfectly helpless. Families, finding no houses to go into by themselves, were huddled together in any shelter that could be procured. The lines of partition in houses were often as imaginary as the parallels of latitude on the earth; or were defined by a window, or a particular board in the wall. O, I couldn't live in that way. My object was to get a real home somewhere. As soon as I could, I rented a room in a house with a good family, for the sake of the protection they would be to me, and went to work to earn a living. Of course, people were forward enough with their suggestions."
"Of what, for instance?"
"Most persons—in fact everybody that I talked with—said I should have to marry. But I could not think of it; the mention of it always made me sick that first winter. I was recovering strength, and was young; so I thought I need not despair."
"Such a woman could not but have plenty of offers, in a new country especially; but I understand how you must have felt. You could not marry so soon after your husband's death, and it revolted you to be approached on the subject. A wife's love is not so easily transferred."
"You speak as any one might think, not having been in my circumstances. But there was something more than that in the feeling I had. I could not realize the fact of Mr. Greyfield's death. It was as if he had only fallen behind the train, and might come up with us any day. I waited for him all that winter."