“Mebby it is,” admitted the storekeeper, briefly.
Betsey turned on him quickly. There was a peculiar aggressive sparkle in her eyes, a set look of determination on her face.
“Brother Joel,” she said, “you’ve jest got to have a grain of common sense. You’ve got to go over thar this minute an’ see ‘er. Ef you don’t she ain’t a-goin’ to sleep a wink. I know women, an’ I’ve knowed Mis’ Gibbs a long time.”
Joel drew his feet from the fire and wedged his heels under the rung of his chair. The muscles of his face were twitching. There was no mistaking Betsey’s tone. She sat down near him and laid her thin, tremulous hand on his knee.
“Do as I tell you, brother. Don’t be back’ard. You can’t hide nothin’.”
Joel rose. He tried to smile indifferently as he went to a little mirror on the wall and brushed his hair and beard.
“You must wish me good luck, then, sister,” he said, huskily. “I ain’t no ways shore what she will do about me.”
After he had gone out Betsey took up an album and opened it at a collection of tintype pictures. On one of these her eyes rested long and mistily. Then she kissed it, wiped her eyes, and went to bed. Two hours later she heard the front door close and her brother creeping to his room.
“Oh, Joel!” she called out. “Come to my door a minute.”
His boots made a loud clatter in the dead stillness of the house, as he approached.