“I know I’d be comfortable but—”
“Then it’s all settled. By the way, I don’t know your name yet?”
“My name is Braswell—Nathan Braswell, late high private of the rear rank in the Eighteenth Tennessee Infantry. But up at Forks of Hatchie—that’s my home town, ma’am, a little town up in West Tennessee—they call me the Reverend Braswell, sometimes.”
“Reverend?” Her eyelids narrowed. “Are you a minister?”
“Oh, nome. But sometimes when we’re short on a preacher I make out to take the pulpit and read the Scriptures and make a little kind of a talk—not a regular sermon—just a little kind of a religious talk. And I’m purty active in church work generally. So I reckin that’s why some people call me the Reverend Braswell. But I never use the entitlement myself—it wouldn’t be becoming in a layman.”
“I see. You preach but you’re not a preacher. I guess you practice what you preach, too. You look like a good man, to me—and a good man can be set down anywhere and not suffer by it; at least that’s my opinion. So, Mr. Braswell, right here is where you camp.”
“Just as you say, ma’am.” His surrender was complete now, his weariness was, too. “Probably you’re right—if I tried to go any further tonight it’s likely I wouldn’t be much good tomorrow and I want to be spry and fresh so I can knock around and see if I can’t run across some of my old pardners in the army. But excuse me again—you got my name but you ain’t told me yours?”
“Call me Miss Sissie, if you want to. That’s what nearly everybody does call me. Or else just plain Sis.”
“All right, Miss Sissie, just as you say.” He bowed to her with a grave simplicity. “And I’m sure I’m very much beholden to you, ma’am. It ain’t every day that an old fellow like me is lucky enough to run into such a lovely nice lady as you.”
He drank his coffee, and, being helped to his feet, he went upstairs with some aid from the lovely nice lady and presently was sound asleep in a clean bed in what he regarded as a very fine bedroom indeed. Its grandeur impressed him even through his tiredness.