The next morning when Marion waked, through the odd little oriel window the late winter light was struggling fitfully in. At first she could not tell where she was: the rafters over her head, the bare white walls that surrounded her, the blue-and-white homespun quilt that covered her, were unlike any thing she had ever seen before.
She was on her feet in a moment, half frightened at the dim light. Had another night come? Had she slept over Thanksgiving?
When she went to the kitchen, Aunt Betty was 151 there busy over the cooking-stove. She was about making an apology for her lateness, but she was interrupted by,—
“’Taint never too late to pray; you may read the Bible.” She pointed without another word to the old family Bible. Marion took it, opened it slowly, waiting to be told where to read.
“Thanksgiving,” said Aunt Betty briefly.
“It’s all Thanksgiving my father says. He thinks the Bible was given us to make us happy.”
“Thirty-fourth Psalm, then,” and a quiet look came into the old seamed face.
When Marion had read it, her aunt rose from her chair, stepped behind it, tilted it on its front legs, and folding her hands on its top began to pray.
Like the grace at table, it was the same old prayer that had gone up from that same old kitchen for one hundred and twenty years. Its quaint simplicity was a marvel to the young girl who listened, but a breath of its devotion reached and touched her heart.
Then followed breakfast. Marion wondered, as they two sat at the table alone, how the old aunt could have borne the loneliness for so many long years.