Part 10 (1/2)
”I'll be some glad ter git away from these here fussy old hens fer a spell,” he grumbled, as he slammed the vial back on the bureau; but Angy looked so reproachful and grieved that he felt ashamed of his ingrat.i.tude, and asked with more gentleness:
”Yew goin' ter miss me, Mother?”
Then the old wife was ashamed to find herself shaking of a sudden, and grown wretchedly afraid--afraid of the separation, afraid of the ”hardening” process, afraid of she knew not what.
”I'm glad 't ain't goin' ter be fer all winter this time,” she said simply; then arose to open the door in order that he might not see the rush of tears to her foolish, old eyes.
According to the arrangement, Captain Darby was to drive over from Twin Coves with his hired man, and Ezra, after taking the two old men to the bay, was to return to the Home for Angy and her little trunk.
When Samuel drove up to the front door, he found Abe pacing the porch, his coat-collar turned up about his neck, his shabby fur cap pulled over his brow, his carpet-bag on the step, and, piled on the bench at the side of the door, an a.s.sortment of woolen articles fully six feet high, which afterward developed to be shawls, capes, hoods, comforters, wristlets, leggings, nubias, fascinators, guernseys, blankets, and coats.
Abe was fuming and indignant, scornful of the contributions, and vowing that, though the sisters might regard a scooter as a freight ocean-liner, he would carry nothing with him but what he wore and his carpet-bag.
”An' right yer be,” p.r.o.nounced Samuel, with a glance at the laden bench and a shake of his head which said as plainly as words, ”Brother, from what am I not delivering thee?”
The sisters came bustling out of the door, Mrs. Homan in the lead, Angy submerged in the crowd, and from that moment there was such a fuss, so much excitement, so many instructions and directions for the two adventurers, that Abraham found himself in the carriage before he had kissed Angy good-by.
He had shaken hands, perhaps not altogether graciously, with every one else, even with the deaf-and-dumb gardener who came out of his hiding-place to witness the setting-out. Being dared to by all the younger sisters, he had waggishly brushed his beard against Aunt Nancy Smith's cheek, and then he had taken his place beside Samuel without a touch or word of parting to his wife.
He turned in his seat to wave to the group on the porch, his eyes resting in a sudden hunger upon Angeline's frail, slender figure, as he remembered. She knew that he had forgotten in the flurry of his leave-taking, and she would have hastened down the steps to stop the carriage; but all the old ladies were there to see, and she simply stood, and gazed after the vehicle as it rolled away slowly behind the jog trot of Samuel's safe, old calico-horse. She stood and looked, holding her chin very high, and trying to check its unsteadiness.
A sense of loneliness and desolation fell over the Home. Piece by piece the sisters put away all the clothing they had offered in vain to Abe.
They said that the house was already dull without his presence. Miss Abigail began to plan what she should have for dinner the day of his return.
No one seemed to notice Angy. She felt that her own departure would create scarcely a stir; for, without Abraham, she was only one of a group of poor, old women in a semi-charity home.
Slowly she started up the stairs for her bonnet and the old broche shawl. When she reached the landing, where lay the knitted mat of the three-star pattern, the matron called up to her in tragic tones:
”Angy Rose, I jest thought of it. He never kissed yew good-by!”
Angy turned, her small, slender feet sinking deep into one of the woolly stars, her slim figure encircled by the light from the upper hall window. She saw a dozen faces uplifted to her, and she answered with quiet dignity:
”Abe wouldn't think of kissin' me afore folks.”
Then quickly she turned again, and went to her room--their room--where she seated herself at the window, and pressed her hand against her heart which hurt with a new, strange, unfamiliar pain, a pain that she could not have shown ”afore folks.”
XIV
CUTTING THE Ap.r.o.n-STRINGS
The usual hardy pleasure-seekers that gather at the foot of Sh.o.r.e Lane whenever the bay becomes a field of ice and a field of sport as well were there to see the old men arrive, and as they stepped out of the carriage there came forward from among the group gathered about the fire on the beach the editor of the ”Sh.o.r.eville Herald.”
Ever since his entrance into the Old Ladies' Home, Abe had never stopped chafing in secret over the fact that until he died, and no doubt received a worthy obituary, he might never again ”have his name in the paper.”
In former days the successive editors of the local sheet had been willing, nay, eager, to chronicle his doings and Angy's, whether Abe's old enemy, rheumatism, won a new victory over him or Angy's second cousin Ruth came from Riverhead to spend the day or--wonder indeed to relate!--the old man mended his roof or painted the front fence. No matter what happened of consequence to Captain and Mrs. Rose, Mr. Editor had always been zealous to retail the news--before the auction sale of their household effects marked the death of the old couple, and of Abe especially, to the social world of Sh.o.r.eville. What man would care to read his name between the lines of such a news item as this?
The Old Ladies' Home is making preparations for its annual quilting bee. Donations of worsted, cotton batting, and linings will be gratefully received.
Mr. Editor touched his cap to the two old men. He was a keen-faced, boyish little man with a laugh bigger than himself, but he always wore a worried air the day before his paper, a weekly, went to press, and he wore that worried look now. Touching his hand to his fur cap, he informed Samuel and Abe that news was ”as scarce as hens' teeth”; then added: ”What's doing?”