“You’re very kind, Miranda. I am hungry; I believe that’s why I nearly fell asleep.”
“Yessuh, I allus eats when I feels bad. Ain’t noffin’ like it, Mist’ Dan. When my pa died I ate piece ob bacon an’ two cabbages, I sho’ did. I reckon dat’s all dat kep’ me from dyin’ of grief. I sho’ did feel po’erful bad!”
Daniel drew up a chair.
“I’ll take your prescription, Miranda,” he said gratefully.
Miranda beamed tearfully.
“Dat’s right, Mist’ Dan! Dere ain’t any cabbage dere, but dere’s sparrowgrass—an’ dat’s mos’ as good!”
XIX
Daniel was up the next morning at six o’clock and had breakfasted before the other members of the distracted family appeared. The only one he saw was his brother. William had stopped his weary tramp on the piazza at daybreak, and, coming into the library, had thrown himself on the lounge. He lay there when Daniel came down, sleeping the heavy sleep of physical exhaustion. One arm trailed limply toward the floor, the other was thrown across his haggard face, hiding it from view.
Daniel stopped a moment and stood looking at him, touched with pity. He remembered him as he had brought his bride up from the station-gates that first night, so confident in his happiness. It seemed so long ago! The brothers had been very sympathetic as boys, though Daniel’s accident and his subsequent illness, delaying his college course and putting everything out of joint, had rather separated them.
He felt drawn toward the sufferer now. If William had sinned against the finer ethics of society, if he had slighted a noble girl to marry a showy flirt, he was paying the price; and Daniel felt it. He turned away from the stricken figure on the lounge with a poignant feeling of commiseration. Things like this could never be forgotten. No patching-up would hide the scar in William’s heart, or make him regard his wife in the same light again.