Nathan stepped forward.
“You know Mrs. Theddon, Mr. Gridley?”
Caleb beheld his altered protégé as in a daze. “It was an afternoon of daisies,” or dazes, as Edith expressed it afterward.
“You an’ me writ a poem about her once, didn’t we?” was the tanner’s perturbing demand before those wondering guests. “Know her?—Bub!—Bub!—To think it’s all ended here—Gracie Hemin’way!”
Mrs. Theddon fought for self-possession and won.
“Mr. Gridley and myself knew each other very intimately when we were in our twenties,” she announced.
The guests were arriving and crowding in and old Caleb had to give way. But he gripped Madelaine’s hand with a palm which had thrown hides for twenty years and could not exactly be described as “moonbeam.” He cried huskily:
“Ma’am—you got the finest boy in the world, b’damn if you haven’t! Only you got to see the unholy scrapes he can get into, to find it out. Same as me. We writ poetry, once, ma’am. B’damn if we didn’t write perty good poetry. I congratulate you, ma’am. This is a scrumpshus occasion—a dam’ fine one!”
Madelaine laughed merrily.
“You’re so good, Mr. Gridley. You’re going to be one of my dearest friends, because you’ve been Nathan’s. He’s told me all about you. He said you were the only real father he’d ever known.”