Mahala turned suddenly and went back to her room where she was greeted with another gush of song from the throat of her bird. She was too weak to reach its cage. She dropped upon the side of the bed and sat staring through the window. When Ellen came presently, saying supper was ready, she went to the dining room and tried with all her might to force down her throat some of the very good food which the girl had deftly prepared. Then she sat for an hour in an arm chair on the veranda, looking at the flowers redeemed from the trespassing of overrunning weeds, fertilized, and cultivated. How they would bloom in the spring, how well the bushes looked, and the trees; how rank the grass! By and by, the moon came up and the night was filled with the soft sounds of fall. It was Jason who said to her: “I wish you would lie down now, Mahala. I think you’re taxing yourself too far. You’ve got to take this slowly. In a few weeks you’ll be surprised at what the air, and the food, and the work that you will find, will do for you.”
Mahala arose and went to him. She laid her hands upon his arm. “Jason,” she said in a shaking voice, “I had hopes about this land the minute I saw it. It will take all the rest of my life to tell you what a wonderful thing I think you have done in fixing up my house for me. I never, never can tell you what it means to me to have these things from my home back again. How does it happen?”
“Don’t, Mahala,” said Jason, taking her arm and trying to guide her toward the door. “Don’t worry about these things now. Don’t try to talk. There’s a long time coming when you can tell me anything you want to.”
Mahala stood looking up at him.
“Jason, are you going back to Ashwater to-night?” she asked.
“No,” answered Jason, “I’m only going to Ashwater when business takes me there. I’ve still got my interest with Peter. I am going to help him with his books. I’m paying a good man that I trained myself to take my place. After I got your house started enough that I knew what it would cost, I had sufficient money left to buy forty more acres joining yours, so I went into partnership with you. As soon as you’re able, you’re going to do the house work and I’m going to do the farm work, and we’re going to share and share alike. There’s nothing the matter with your land. All it needs is work. The cost of the improvements on the house I have charged to you; I’ll take that much out of your share. Now you go to bed and go to sleep. My room is over the carriage room in the stable, and Ellen’s going to stay all night with you as long as you want her.”
Then Mahala found herself standing beside her bed. Slowly, she slipped down on her knees. She leaned forward; she tried to pray. But she found there was nothing that she wanted to say to God except to beg of Him to take care of Jason, to reward his thoughtfulness and his kindness. Then she put out the light, laid her head on her pillow, and in spite of herself, began an intensive review of the day.
She recalled and dwelt upon each incident and suddenly, with the torture of memory, there came to her the thought that while Jason had overwhelmed her with kindness, had given her every assurance that she would be sheltered and cared for, he had not said the words that her heart had been hungering to hear him say. He had not gripped her hands tightly and looked straight into her eyes and said with the firmness of deliberate assurance: “Mahala, I know that you didn’t touch that money.”
The thought shocked and startled her. She recalled that she had expected it. She wondered how he could have forgotten to give her the assurance that he must have known her heart would crave. She found herself sitting up in bed, looking through the window at the moon-whitened world outside. The notes of a whippoorwill came sharply stressed through the night. Back in the orchard she could hear the wavering complainings of a hunting screech owl. She could hear the little creatures of night calling. With her hands gripped together and pressed hard against her heart, she heard her own voice repeating: “Oh, Jason, I didn’t! I didn’t!” Over and over she reached the moment of the question she had asked. Finally, she was able to comfort herself with the kindness of the things that he had said, with the manifestations of the thoughtfulness and the planning and the work that he had done in her behalf. She succeeded in making herself believe that Jason was so sorry, and his mind so filled with what he had been doing, that he had merely neglected to speak the words her heart so longed to hear.
She made a brave effort in the days that followed, to keep that thought from entering her mind. She was too proud to mention the matter again, but constantly she kept watching Jason. She found that she was waiting to hear him involuntarily say the words that she longed to hear. As she studied him and the situation, there came to her the realization that he was thinking for her, that he was planning for her, that he was working for her, but equally he was thinking, he was planning, he was working for himself. He was making the money that would insure her having a home again and freedom, but he was assuming nothing. Whatever he made, he divided equally. For the share of land that she furnished he was doing his equivalent in work. The division was fair enough. She did not know, until Jason told her, that he always had loved the country, that it had been a boyhood hope to own and to work upon land, that he had only done the thing that he was glad in his heart to do when he had escaped from the grocery through the arrangement he had made, and found himself free to devote most of his time to the development and cultivation of land. He pointed out to her the extent of the land he had purchased adjoining her nearest neighbour, James Ford, the father of Ellen who was still helping her about the house and in the garden.