“Now I’m going to examine it again and see what I can do. I will try to set it going till Annie comes back.”
“I shall never take any interest in such things any more,” said Mis’ Overfield. “It is all the same to me whether the clock goes or stands still, or whether life goes or stands still, for that matter. I loved Annie, and that is what makes it so hard. She used to watch over me when I was sick, oh, so faithfully, but I shall never feel the touch of her hand again, Annie’s hand. I would weep, but I have no tears to shed. Life is all a blank since this came upon me. The burying lot, as it looks to me, is the pleasantest place on earth. I look out of the pantry window sometimes and say, ‘Annie, come back.’ Then I shut my heart. Oh, that this should come to me!”
She seemed to be listening.
“How I used to wait for Annie evenings—conference meeting and candle-light meeting nights and singing-school evenings! How my heart used to beat hard when she lifted the latch of the porch door in the night!
“She came home like an angel then. I wonder if Annie’s hand will ever again lift the latch in the night. Trouble brings the heart home and sends us back to God. But I wouldn’t speak to her—lud, no, no, no!”
The tenderness went out of her face, and a strange, foreign light came into her blue-gray eyes.
She sat looking fixedly toward the hill. The old graves were there.
Farmer Overfield came in.
“Thinking?” said he.
“I was thinking of how Annie used to lift the latch evenings. I wish it could be so again. But it can’t.”