One morning I had some letters to write, and Ruby and Jim took the rods and went up the brook without me. They both begged me to go, Ruby being particularly urgent, I thought, but I had already delayed the mail too long and so refused point-blank—too abruptly, perhaps, as I thought afterward, when I remembered the keen look of disappointment in her face. When she re-entered the cabin alone an hour later she passed me hurriedly, and calling out to her father that Jim was wanted at the sawmill to fix the wheel and would not be back until morning, shut herself into her room before I could offer myself in Jim's place—which I would gladly have done, now that her morning's pleasure had been spoiled.
When she joined us at supper—she had kept her room all day—I saw that her eyes were red, as if she had been crying. I knew then that I had offended her.
"Ruby, I really couldn't go," I said. "You don't feel cross about it, do you?"
"Oh, no," she answered, with some earnestness. "And I knew you were busy."
"And about Jim—what's the matter with the wheel?" I asked, greatly relieved at the discovery that whatever troubled her, my staying at home had not caused it.
"One of the buckets is broken—Uncle Jim always fixes it," and she turned her head away to hide her tears.
"Is Jim a carpenter, too?" I asked, with a smile.
"Why, yes," she replied. "Didn't you know that? They often send for him to fix the mill. There's no one else about here who can." And she changed the conversation and began talking of the beauty of that part of the brook where they had been to fish, and of the rich brown tint of the water in the pools, and how lovely the red sumachs were reflected in their depths.
The next morning, and without any previous warning, Ruby appeared in her cloth dress and jacket and announced her intention of taking the stage back to Plymouth, adding that as Jim had not returned, Marvin must drive her over to the cross-roads. I offered my services, but she declined them graciously but firmly, bidding me good-by and saying with one of her earnest looks, as she held my hand in hers, that she should never forget my kindness to Jim, and that she would always remember me for what I had done for him, and then she added with peculiar tenderness:
"And dear Uncle Jim won't forget you, either."