Fanny was getting tired and cold, and went up the slope to where Roy was waiting for her.
“Yes, that is mother’s grandfather,” she said, rather cheerfully, as she looked at the monument and read the inscription upon it.
There was some difference between this costly stone and well-kept enclosure where a number of Allens were lying and the sunken, neglected graves under the shadow of the wall, and Fanny felt the difference, and her spirits began to rise in the vicinity of the Allens, who represented the aristocracy of the cemetery. Both belonged to her, the grand monument and the sunken graves, the Allens and the Daltons,—but the Allens were the nearest of kin,—they were like what she was born to and had been accustomed to all her life and she felt a thrill of pride on reading the eulogy on her great-grandfather, who had rendered such service to his country and been so highly esteemed by his fellow-citizens.
“Good blood there, of the bluest kind,” Roy said, teasingly. “It ought to make amends for forty ’Tinas.” Then, as the shrill whistle from the shoe shop came echoing across the fields, he continued: “Twelve o’clock; time we were going, if you have seen enough of your ancestors. I’m getting hungry.”
He was very practical and led Fanny so adroitly from what he called “an ancestral fit” that she was quite herself by the time they reached the Prospect House. Mrs. Taylor had prepared a most appetizing dinner for them, which she served upon a small round table placed near a window and the stove, where they could have both warmth and light. All her best things were on duty and Fanny, who found the dinner excellent, began to change her mind with regard to the hotel. In the summer it must be very pleasant, especially on the broad piazzas, and perhaps she should come again, she said to Mr. and Mrs. Taylor, as she bade them good bye.
“Bless you, child, I hope you will,” Uncle Zacheus replied, holding her hand and trying to keep back his tears which his wife told him he needn’t shed so often unless he had softening of the brain, of which they were signs. “It is good for my old eyes to see young people. There don’t many come since they built the big stone tavern on the Common. I began to run down when Mark went away. A good feller, that, and I cry when I think of him dead. I can’t help it if ’tis sign of soff’nin’. I remember the old days when Mark and your mother and this young man’s father and mother was here and the house was full of young voices and courtin’ and love-makin’ from mornin’ till night. Your young man,—I know he is yourn by the way he looks at you,—has a good face like his father and mother. You’ll be happy with him, and he’ll be happy with you. Your face ain’t like nobody’s, but makes me think of some flower that is ever so sweet and lovely and modest,—I can’t remember the name. ’Tain’t a rose, nor a pink, nor a piney.”
Roy laughed, and suggested, “Lily of the Valley.”
“I swan, that’s it. Lily of the Valley,” Uncle Zach returned, and continued, “I s’pose I must say good bye and God bless you and make you happy. Good bye.”
He turned to leave them, when Fanny took his hand again,—the one her mother had kissed years ago—and pressed her lips upon it just as Helen had done.
“I’ll surely come again,” she said, and then hurried away, for it was getting near train time and they were going to walk.