"'Oh, no, Eben! she's too old; she never could get there, and she never could live there. She says very often she wouldn't leave Simsbury for gold untold; she was born here, and she's bound to die here. I know she wouldn't go.'
"'Ask her, Hetty!'
"'No, it wouldn't be any use; it would only fret her always to think I staid at home for her, and you know she can't do without me.'
"'No more can't I,' says I. 'Do you love her the best, Hetty?'
"I was kinder sorry I'd said that; for she grew real white, and I could see by her throat she was chokin' to keep down somethin'. Finally she said,—
"'That isn't for me to say, Eben. If it was right for me to go with you,
I should be glad to; but you know I can't leave grandmother.'
"Well, Doctor, I couldn't say no more. I got up to go. Hetty put down her work and walked to the big ellum by the gate with me. I was most too full to speak, but I catched her up and kissed her soft little tremblin' lips, and her pretty eyes, and then I set off for home as if I was goin' to be hanged.
"Young folks is obstreperous, Doctor. I've been a long spell away from Hetty, and I don't know as I should take on so now. That night I never slept. I lay kickin' and tumblin' all night, and before mornin' I'd resolved to quit Simsbury, and go seek my fortin' beyond seas, hopin' to come back to Hetty, arter all, with riches to take care on her right there in the old place. You'd 'a' thought I might have had some kind of feelin' for my old father, after seein' Hetty's faithful ways; but I was a man and she was a woman, and I take it them is two different kind o' craft. Men is allers for themselves first, an' Devil take the hindmost; but women lives in other folks's lives, and ache, and work, and endure all sorts of stress o' weather afore they'll quit the ship that's got crew and passengers aboard.
"I never said nothin' to father,—I couldn't 'a' stood no jawin',—but I made up my kit, an' next night slung it over my shoulder, and tramped off. I couldn't have gone without biddin' Hetty goodbye; so I stopped there, and told her what I was up to, and charged her to tell father.
"She tried her best to keep me to home, but I was sot in my way; so when she found that out, she run up stairs an' got a little Bible, and made me promise I'd read it sometimes, and then she pulled that 'are little ring off her finger and give it to me to keep.