After the supper dishes were cleared away and the milk-pans washed, Sarah went out to him. The twilight was deepening. There was a clear green glow in the sky. Before them stretched the smooth level of field; in the distance was a cluster of hay-stacks like the huts of a village; the air was very cool and calm and sweet. The landscape might have been an ideal one of peace.
Sarah bent over and touched her husband on one of his thin, sinewy shoulders. “Father!”
The old man’s shoulders heaved: he was weeping.
“Why, don’t do so, father,” said Sarah.
“I’ll—put up the—partitions, an’—everything you—want, mother.”
Sarah put her apron up to her face; she was overcome by her own triumph.
Adoniram was like a fortress whose walls had no active resistance, and went down the instant the right besieging tools were used. “Why, mother,” he said, hoarsely, “I hadn’t no idee you was so set on’t as all this comes to.”