The stage stopped at the door of Crewne's new cottage, and Crewne got out. The pastor entered the parlor to open the meeting, and was selecting a hymn, when Mrs. Leekins startled the meeting by ejaculating:
"Lands alive!"
The meeting was demoralized; the sisters hastened to the window, and the good pastor, laying down his hymn-book, followed in time to see Crewne helping out a well-dressed and apparently young and handsome lady.
"Hardhack girls not good 'nough for him, it seems!" sneered Mrs. Leekins.
A resigned and sympathetic sigh broke from the motherly lips present, then Mrs. Leekins cried:
"Gracious sakes! married a widder with children!"
It certainly seemed that she told the truth, for Crewne lifted out two children, the youngest of whom seemed not more than three years old.
The gazers abruptly left the window, and the general tone of the meeting was that of melancholy resignation.
"Why didn't he ever say he was a married man?" asked the prospective Mrs. Faxton, of her lover, that evening.