The returned gold-hunter swallowed several times.
“Thankful,” he faltered, “I know you must feel pretty hard agin me, but—but, you see—”
“Hush! hush! Don't speak to me for a minute. Let me get my bearin's, for mercy sakes, if I can. . . . Jedediah—HERE!”
“Yes—yes, I'm here. I am, honest. I—”
“Sshh! You're here now, but—but where have you been all this time? For a man that is, I presume likely, loaded down with money—I presume you must be loaded down with it; you remember you'd said you'd never come back until you was—for that kind of a man I must say you look pretty down at the heel.”
“Thankful—”
“Have you worn out your clothes luggin' the money around?”
“Auntie, don't. Look at him. Think!”
“Hush, Emily! I am lookin' at him and I'm thinkin', too. I'm thinkin' of how much I put up with afore he run off and left me, and how I've worried and laid awake nights thinkin' he was dead. Where have you been all this time? Why haven't you written?”
“I did write.”