Part 7 (1/2)

She had arrived home from Briarwood the night before. For more than eight months she had seen neither Uncle Jabez nor Aunt Alvirah; and she had been so tired and sleepy on her arrival that she had quickly gone to bed. She felt as though she had scarcely greeted the two old people.

Uncle Jabez was bending over the kitchen stove. He always looked gray of face, and dusty. The mill-dust seemed ground into both his clothes and his complexion.

The first the old man knew of her presence, the arms of Ruth were around his neck.

”Ugh-huh?” questioned the old man, raising up stiffly as the fire began to chatter, the flames flas.h.i.+ng under the lids, and turned to face the girl who held him so lovingly. ”What's wanted, Niece Ruth?” he added, looking at her grimly under his bristling brows.

Ruth was not afraid of his grimness. She had learned long since that Uncle Jabez was much softer under the surface than he appeared. He claimed to be only just to her; but Ruth knew that his ”justice” often leaned toward the side of mercy.

Her mother, Mary Potter, had been the miller's favorite niece; when she had married Ruth's father, Uncle Jabez had been angry, and for years the family had been separated. But when Uncle Jabez had taken Ruth in ”just out of charity,” old Aunt Alvirah had a.s.sured the heartsick girl that the miller was kinder at heart than he wished people to suppose.

”He don't never let his right hand know what his left hand doeth,”

declared the loyal little old woman who had been so long housekeeper for the miller. ”He saved me from the poorhouse-yes, he did!-jest to git all the work out o' me he could-to hear him tell it!

”But it ain't so,” quoth Aunt Alvirah, shaking her head. ”He saw a lone ol' woman turned out o' what she'd thought would be her home till she come to death's door. An' so he opened his house and his hand to her.

An' he's opened his house and hand to _you_, my pretty; and who knows?

mebbe 'twill open wide his heart, too.”

Ruth had been hoping the old man's heart _was_ open, not only to her, but to the whole world. She knew that, in secret, Uncle Jabez was helping to pay Mercy Curtis's tuition at Briarwood. He still loved money; he always would love it, in all probability. But he had learned to ”loosen up,” as Tom Cameron expressed it, in a most astonis.h.i.+ng way.

One could not honestly call Uncle Jabez a miser nowadays.

He was miserly in the outward expression of any affection, however. And that apparent coldness Ruth Fielding longed to break down.

Now the girl, all flushed from her deep sleep, and smiling, lifted her rosy lips to be kissed. ”I didn't scarcely say 'how-do' to you last night, Uncle,” she said. ”Do tell me you're glad to see me back.”

”Ha! Ye ain't minded to stay long, it seems.”

”I won't go to Sunrise Farm if you want me here, Uncle Jabez,” declared Ruth, still clinging to him, and with the same smiling light in her eyes.

”Ha! ye don't mean that,” he grunted.

He knew she did. His wrinkled, hard old face finally began to change.

His eyes tried to escape her gaze.

”I just _love_ you, Uncle,” she breathed, softly. ”Won't-won't you let me?”

”There, there, child!” He tried for a moment to break her firm hold; then he stooped shamefacedly and touched her fresh lips with his own.

Ruth nestled against his big, strong body, and clung a moment longer.

His rough hand smoothed her sleek head almost timidly.

”There, there!” he grumbled. ”You're gittin' to be a big gal, I swow!

And what good's so much schoolin' goin' ter do ye? Other gals like you air helpin' in their mothers' kitchens-or goin' to work in the mills at Cheslow. Seems like a wicked waste of time and money.”

But he did not say it so harshly as had been his wont in the old times.

Ruth smiled up at him again.