"Absurd!" exclaimed Mrs. Trott. "He says he owes you more than he ever could repay. He says you cared for me when he deserted me, and that you played the part of a man while he was a coward. But that is neither here nor there. Joel, I have willed all my new possessions to you and your wife and children. When I'm dead and gone you will have to have them, anyway, so why not make me happy the remainder of my life?"
He was unable to formulate a logical reply, but beneath the revelation she had made he sat limp and bruised as a flower drenched and beaten by abnormal rain and wind.
"Does Tilly know all this?" he asked, timidly, a cowed expression in his dull eyes.
"Yes, Joel, and she wants you to accept my plan. She will be happy when you do, for your sake and for the sake of the children."
He got up. His tanned face above his clean but frayed collar looked like the mask of some Indian chieftain thwarted in his last patriotic hope. His poor, underfed horse, in reaching for the grass near his bitted mouth, had drawn the reins beneath his hoofs and was about to break them.
"Excuse me," Joel said, and he went to the animal and tied up the reins. He came back. His face was still rigid, his lips were quivering.
"You wish it, you say," he faltered. "Tilly wants it, but how about your son? Would he care for me to share in the benefits of his gifts to you?"
Mrs. Trott deliberated for an instant, then she said: "He is doing it more for you, perhaps, than us, Joel. He declares he owes it to you. I've told him how you have often stinted yourself to pay my bills. I have told him, too, that but for you I'd have remained in the life he so detested. Not one man in a thousand would have treated me as you have done. You can't avoid it, Joel—we are all going to live in that fine house and be comfortable and happy at last."
He bowed silently. That was his answer. He accepted her proposal as a proud man might a shameful verdict of death. He went back to his wagon, raised his tattered hat, and mounted upon his load of wood.