Miss Mehitable peered out eagerly from behind the shutters. Up the road came Araminta—may the saints preserve us!—with a man! Miss Mehitable quickly placed him as that blackmailing play-doctor who now should never have his four dollars and a half unless he collected it by law. Only in the last ditch would she surrender.
They were talking and laughing, and Ralph's black-coated arm was around Araminta's white-robed waist. They came slowly to the gate, where they stopped. Araminta laid her head confidingly upon Ralph's shoulder and he held her tightly in his arms, kissing her repeatedly, as Miss Mehitable guessed, though she could not see very well.
At last they parted and Araminta ran lightly into the house, saying, in a low, tender voice: "To-morrow, dear, to-morrow!"
She went up-stairs, singing. Even then Miss Mehitable observed that it was not a hymn, but some light and ungodly tune she had picked up, Heaven knew where!
She went to her room, still humming, and presently her light was out, but her guardian angel was too stiff with horror to move.
"O Lord," prayed Araminta, as she sank to sleep, "keep me from the contamination of—not being married to him, for Thy sake, Amen."
XXIV
Telling Aunt Hitty
Araminta woke with the birds. As yet, it was dark, but from afar came the cheery voice of a robin, piping gaily of coming dawn. When the first ray of light crept into her room, and every bird for miles around was swelling his tiny throat in song, it seemed to her that, until now, she had never truly lived.
The bird that rocked on the maple branch, outside her window, carolling with all his might, was no more free than she. Love had rolled away the stone Aunt Hitty had set before the door of Araminta's heart, and the imprisoned thing was trying its wings, as joyously as the birds themselves.