"Much obliged, Uncle Israel. I 'll tell mother and Ruth; I 'm sure they will enjoy it. Ruth said the other day she wished she might have a chance to see a quilting-bee while we are here. Shall I take your message over to Aunt Tryphosa?"
"Much obleeged, Alan. Thank ye, Rose,"--as Rose brought out the large arm-chair and placed it for him; "I 'll set a spell 'n' rest me."
It was a typical northern midsummer night. Across the valley the mountains loomed, softly luminous, against the pale green translucent stretch of open sky in the west. There were no clouds; but high above and around there swept a long trail of motionless mist, flame-colored over the mountain tops, but darkening, with the coming of the night, into gray towards the east. The stars were not yet out. The veeries were choiring antiphonally in the woodlands.
An hour afterwards Alan Ford rose to go, and Uncle Israel soon followed his example.
"I 'll go down the woods'-road a piece with you, Uncle Israel," said Rose.
As she came back up the Mountain a cool breath drew through the pines, and the spruces gave forth their resinous fragrance upon the dewless night. The stars were brilliant in the dark blue deeps.
A midsummer night among the mountains of New England! And far away in the sickening heat and wet, the fever-laden exhalations of the tropics rose into the nostrils of a man, who sat motionless in the rude field-hospital, hastily improvised on the slope of San Juan, watching, with his knees drawn up to his chin and his hands clasping them, for some faint tremor in the still face on the army blanket spread upon the ground.
The lantern cast its light full upon that still face. Suddenly the watcher bent forward; his keen eyes had detected a twitch of an eyelid--a flutter in the muscles of the throat. "Don't move him," the surgeon had said; "the least movement will cause the final hemorrhage."
There was a catch of the breath--the eyes opened, partly filmed.
"Jack!" The watcher spoke, bending lower; his ear over the other's lips.