In the kitchen, Margaret, going to light the lamp, smiled at her thoughts, which were timid and gay. She was happy because Mr. Jeminy, who had seen so many elegant women, helped her with her apple jellies, and brought her kindlings for the stove.
When the cows were milked, Mr. Jeminy came out of the barn, and stood looking up at the sky, yellow and green, with its promise of frost. "A cold night," he said to himself, "and a bright morning." He could hear the wind rising in the west. "Winter is not far off," he said, and he carried the two warm, foaming milkpails into the kitchen.
As he was eating his supper, a wagon came clattering down the road and stopped at the door. "There's Ellery Deakan back from Milford," said Margaret at the window. "I wonder what he wants at this time of night. Looks to be somebody with him. Go and see, Mr. Jeminy. I've the pudding to attend to."
XII
MRS. WICKET
Mrs. Grumble was dying. She lay without moving, one wasted hand holding tightly to the fingers of Mrs. Wicket, who sat beside the bed. There, where Mrs. Grumble had worked and scolded for twenty years, all was still; while the clock on the dresser, like a solemn footstep, seemed to deepen the silence with its single, hollow beat.
But if it was quiet in the schoolmaster's house, it was far from being quiet in the village, where Mrs. Tomkins was going hurriedly from house to house in search of Mrs. Wicket's runaway daughter. Mrs. Wicket, who was dozing, did not hear the anxious voices calling everywhere for Juliet. To Mrs. Grumble, the sound was like the dwindling murmur of a world with which she was nearly done. She felt that her end was approaching, and remarked:
"I hope I haven't given you too much trouble, Mrs. Wicket."
Mrs. Wicket tried to assure Mrs. Grumble that she had not been any trouble to her. But Mrs. Grumble said weakly:
"Maybe when I was out of my head . . ."