Uncle Benson and my father are sitting looking at me, who am standing awkwardly enough and shifting my feet about. Uncle Benson is saying, “We're going to put it to you, Ben,” and my father bursts in nervously:
“That's it, Ben. We're going to put it to you, just how it is, don't you see?” My uncle coughed, and beginning in an oddly stiff and formal way told the story of the year 1838, for the most part what I knew already, as I told him, not meaning to be impolite.
“Aye, Ben,” said he, quietly, “but I'm going on. You don't know that your mother, for a year or more——”
“Eighteen months,” said my father, leaning forward and speaking huskily.
“Eighteen months. Well, well, a wonderful woman, your mother, but women take trouble different ways. Some take it hard.”
I stared at them, bewildered enough, while they looked long at each other, seeming to take comfort from it. Uncle Benson, leaning forward, touched my father's knee.
“You and me, Tom, we most gave it up.”
And my father pulled his beard fiercely.
“Gave what up?” I cried. “What was it?”
“Aye,” said my father with a start, “we're going to put it to you, Ben.”