But in spite of this resolution, as midnight advanced Jenny found that Mary's answers, even when Billy Bender was the topic, became more and more unsatisfactory, and finally ceased altogether. Concluding to let her sleep a few minutes, and then wake her up, Jenny turned on her pillow and when her eyes again opened, the morning sun was shining through the half-closed shutters, and the breakfast bell was jingling in the lower hall.
When Mary returned to the poor-house, she found a new arrival in the person of Mrs. Perkins! The widow had hailed Mike as he passed her house the day before, and on learning how matters stood, offered to accompany him home. Mike, who had an eye for "fancy-looking girls," did not exactly like Mrs. Perkins' appearance. Besides that, his orders were to bring Mary, and he had no idea of taking another as a substitute. Accordingly, when on his return from Mrs. Mason's, he saw the widow standing at her gate, all equipped with parasol and satchel, he whipped up his horse, and making the circuit of the school-house, was some ways down the road ere the widow suspected his intentions. "Thanking her stars" (her common expression) "that she had a good pair of feet," Mrs. Perkins started on foot, reaching the poor-house about sunset. She was now seated in what had been Mrs. Parker's room, and with pursed-up lips, and large square collar very much like the present fashion, was stitching away upon the shroud, heaving occasionally a long-drawn sigh, as she thought how lonely and desolate poor Mr. Parker must feel!
"Will you give me some work?" asked Mary, after depositing her bonnet upon the table.
"There's nothing for you," returned Mrs. Perkins. "I can do all that is necessary, and prefer working alone."
"Yes, she shall help too, if she wants to," snapped out Mrs. Grundy, with one of her old shoulder jerks. "Mary's handy with the needle, for I larnt her myself."
In a short time Mrs. Perkins disappeared from the room, and Sally's little bright eyes, which saw every thing, soon spied her out in the woodshed asking Mr. Parker "if Polly Grundy couldn't be kept in the kitchen where she belonged."
Scarcely had she left the shed when Miss Grundy herself appeared, fretting about "the meddlesome old widow who had come there stickin' round before Mrs. Parker was hardly cold!"
This put a new idea into Sally's head, and the whole household was startled as she broke out singing, "the loss of one is the gain of another," and so forth. Mrs. Perkins proposed that she should be shut up, but Miss Grundy, for once in Sally's favor, declared "she'd fight, before such a thing should be done;" whereupon Mrs. Perkins lamented that the house had now "no head," wondering how poor Mr. Parker would get along with "such an unmanageable crew."
Numerous were the ways with which the widow sought to comfort the widower, assuring him "that she ached for him clear to her heart's core! and I know how to pity you, too," said she, "for when my Hezekiah died I thought I couldn't stand it." Then by way of administering further consolation, she added that "the wust was to come, for only them that had tried it knew how lonesome it was to live on day after day, and night after night, week in and week out, without any husband or wife."
Mr. Parker probably appreciated her kindness, for when after the funeral the following day she announced her intention of walking home, he ordered Mike to "tackle up," and carry her. This was hardly in accordance with the widow's wishes, and when all was in readiness, she declared that she was afraid to ride after Mike's driving. Uncle Peter was then proposed as a substitute, but the old man had such a dread of Mrs. Perkins, who Sal (for mischief) had said was in love with him, that at the first intimation he climbed up the scuttle hole, where an hour afterwards he was discovered peeping cautiously out to see if the coast was clear. Mr. Parker was thus compelled to go himself, Miss Grundy sending after him the very Christian-like wish that "she hoped he'd tip over and break the widow's neck!"