"Oh! Well, the next day happened to be the one in which I met my old army chum, Jim, who reconstructed me in the way I wrote you about. One consequence of Jim's over-haulin' was that when I got to their house an' walked into their parlor, they didn't know me from Adam; both of 'em stood there, like a couple o' stuck pigs."
"What an elegant expression!" exclaimed Mary.
"You don't say that as if you b'lieved it over an' above hard, my dear, but I do assure you that the expression means a lot to Western people. Pretty soon her brother came to himself an' asked what had happened, an' I said, 'Oh, nothin', except that when I'm in Turkey, an' likely to stay awhile, I try to do as the turkeys do.' Well, things kept goin' on, about that way, for some days, an' between thinkin' 'twas time for that corn-meal to come, an' wishin' that it wasn't, an' wishin' a lot of other things, I was in quite a state o' mind for a while, an' self-examination didn't help me much.
"All the time there kep' runnin' in my mind an old sayin' that your Uncle Jethro was mighty fond of—'There's only one hoss in the world,' an' the most I could do to keep from bein' a plumb fool was to remind myself that that sort of a hoss had some rights of its own that ought to be respected. I showed off my own good p'ints as well as I could, an' I coaxed Mary to go about with me considerable, because Mrs. Somerton had told me that her judgment and taste were remarkably good,—that's the excuse I made,—an' we talked about a lot o' things, an' found we didn't disagree about much. I accidentally let out what I was goin' to England for, an' she got powerful interested in it, for she'd read an' heard lots about the way the poorest English live in big cities, so she thought I was really goin' on missionary work, an' she said she would almost be willing to be a man if she could have such a job.
"She looked so splendid when she said it that I felt plumb electrified—felt just as if a new nerve had suddenly been put into me some way, so I made bold to say that she'd do that sort o' work far better as a woman, an' that there was a way for her to do it, too, if she was willin', an' if her minister would say a few words appropriate to that kind of arrangement."
"That is exactly the way he spoke," said Mary, "and as coolly as if he wasn't saying anything of special importance."
"Caleb's mind is sometimes in the clouds," Grace said, "where everything for the time being appears just as it should be."
"That must be so, I reckon, Mrs. Somerton," said Caleb, "seein' that you say it; but I want to remark that if I was in the clouds that day, I got out of 'em mighty quick, an' down to earth, an' mebbe a mighty sight lower; for Mary suddenly turned very white, an' right away I felt as if Judgment Day had come, an' I'd been roped off among the goats. But all of a sudden she turned rosy, an' said, very gentle-like an' sweet, ''Tis a long way to London, an' you might change your mind on the way.' Said I, ''Tis longer to eternity, but I'll be of the same mind till then, an' after, too.' She was kind o' skittish for a while after that, but she didn't do any kickin', which I took for a good sign."
"Kicking, indeed!" said Mary, studying the decoration of her coffee-cup. "Breathing was all the poor thing dared hope to do."
"Well, at last she said she thought it might be better for me to go alone, so both of us could have a fair chance to think it over, an' I said that I wouldn't presume to doubt the good sense of whatever she thought, an' that her will was law to me, an' would go on bein' so as long as she would let it. Just then the corn-meal came, an' I went. After I got fairly started on the trip, I found myself feelin' kind o' glad she wasn't with me. As we've just been eatin' breakfast, I won't go into particulars; but after I got over bein' seasick, I felt as well an' strong as a giant, an' I ran a private prayer an' praise meetin' all the way across. At first I was sorry that I hadn't asked her for her picture to take along, but I soon found that I had one—had it in both eyes, day an' night, an' all the time I was in London, too, an' the more I looked at it, the more I wanted to see the original again.