The next day, a sweet and sunshiny Sunday, the mystery of the Lord's Supper was yet again enacted in Jamestown—the symbolic wine, clear and ruddy as heart's blood; the bread, white as an infant's brow.
Next day Henry Deans drove to the market town. On Tuesday Dan Follett was served with a summons to appear before the Court to show why he had broken the law by selling a bottle of wine to one Henry Deans in unlawful hours.
Follett's rage was intense, and could only be gauged by the height of Henry Deans' satisfaction. Of course Follett was fined. He had no defence and offered none, but was fain to relieve his mind by attempting to thrash Deans, which only resulted in his being laid under bonds to keep the peace. The whole affair had completely sickened Follett of Jamestown. He departed to new scenes, and the Black Horse Inn again was tenantless.
The exploit covered Henry Deans with glory, and he bore the honor with the conscious front of one who feels he is not overestimated. Dan Follett was dead now, and Henry Deans slept the sleep of the just in musing over his memories. And from the lonely garden of the Black Horse Inn the English sweet violets sent up their fragrance to the unperceiving night.
CHAPTER VIII.
"Oh, yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill,
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt and taints of blood."
Next day, early in the afternoon, Mrs. Deans put away her sewing, and, donning a black bonnet and a large broche shawl folded corner-wise, betook herself out of the house. She went quietly, even sneakingly—this caution was exercised with an object. Mrs. Deans did not want the bound girl to know she had gone. Such knowledge would be too conducive to a sinful peace of mind.
Mrs. Deans took her way to the village, intent on getting some dye from the store. She hesitated before the gate of the Holder cottage, then, assuming a look calculated to show the beholder that the milk of human kindness had in her case turned to cream, she entered the garden. Partly out of a desire to show old Mrs. Holder that this was really a neighborly visit, and partly to come upon her unawares if possible and see what she was doing, and also to have an opportunity of seeing the child without asking to see it, Mrs. Deans followed the little footpath round to the back door. It was open. The small kitchen was scrupulously clean; some washtubs stood in one corner full of soapy water, awaiting the return of Myron to empty them. Mrs. Holder had deferred her washing, evidently. A line hung diagonally across one corner of the room, and upon it a row of little ill-shaped garments hung drying, fluttered by the slight breeze from the open door. The rest of the scanty washing Mrs. Deans could see in the garden; old Mrs. Holder never hung a garment of the child's outside.
Mrs. Deans scrutinized all these things, standing at the open door, but not knowing where Mrs. Holder might be; and fearful lest the sharp-eyed old Englishwoman had already seen her spying out the land, she felt impelled to knock. This she did, and in a moment Mrs. Holder came from the front room. Seeing Mrs. Deans, she greeted her with the nearest approach to warmth she was capable of displaying, and placed a wooden rocking-chair for her, sitting down herself in a narrow high-backed wooden chair, bolt upright and with her arms folded. Presently she let fall her hands into her lap, twisting them nervously, one within the other; they were bleached an unhealthy pallor, and their palms and fingers tips crinkled like crape, from her washing.