"Nonsense!" I insisted, but could not budge him, and soon saw I had my labour for my pains.
"A mule for obstinacy—a very mule," I muttered.
"I own it; I'm an ass. But this ass knows enough to go to his proper stall," he said, with a miserable laugh that touched me.
"Have it as you wish, Jack," I said, gently; "but come into my chamber when you've supped. I'll be there. Lord, what millions of questions I have to ask!"
"To be sure, to be sure," he murmured, then walked away towards the kitchen, while I returned to the inn and cleansed me of the stains of travel.
We supped together, Mrs. Hamilton and I, and found the cheer most comforting, though there was no wine for her and she sipped, with me, the new brew of dark October ale.
A barley soup we had, then winter squash and a roast wild duck, with little quails all 'round, and a dish of pepper-cresses. Lord, how I did eat, being still gaunt from my long sickness! But she kept pace with me; a wholesome lass was she, and no frail beauty fed on syllabubs and suckets. Flesh and blood were her charms, a delicate ripeness, sweet as the cresses she crunched between her sparkling teeth. And ever I heard her little feet go tap, tap, tap, under the lamplit table.
I spoke respectfully of her losses; she dropped her eyes, accepting the condolence, pinching a cress to shreds the while.
She of course knew nothing of my journey to Pittsburg, nor of any events there which might have occurred after she had left, when her husband fell with many another stout frontiersman under Boone and Harrod.
I told her nothing, save that Felicity was in Boston and that I was journeying thither to see her.