Late in the afternoon Abigail came again.
“Deliverance,” she said, “be ye there?” She could not see Deliverance, who lay on her straw bed beneath the window.
A meek voice from the darkness below replied, “I be here wrestling with Satan.” Deliverance rose as she spoke. “Oh, Abigail,” she said, meeting her friend’s glance, “I be sore bruised, buffeting with Satan. I fear God has not pardoned my sins. I be sore tempted. Sir Jonathan was here to-day.”
“Bah, the Old Ruddy-Beard,” sniffed Abigail, “with his stick forever tapping and his sharp nose poking into everybody’s business! I suspicion he be a witch. Where gets he his mickle gold?”
“He be a wicked man,” answered Deliverance, “and now I do perceive he be sent o’ the Lord to test my strength. But have ye heard yet o’ the fine gentleman I telled ye o’ yesterday?”
“Nay,” replied Abigail.
“Then summat unforeseen has held him in Boston Town, for the more I think o’ his goodly countenance, the more convinced I be o’ his goodly heart, though he be high-stomached and given o’er to dress, which ye ken be not the way to heaven,” continued Deliverance. “Did ye bring the paper?”
“I brought my diary,” answered Abigail, “and ye can tear out as many pages as ye need, but no more, and I also brought ye your knitting that ye might have summat to do.”
She lowered by a string the little diary, the tiny ink-horn and quill, and a half-finished stocking, the needles thrust through the ball of yarn.