It was balmy spring weather, but they had taken their places at the hearthstone from old habit when a matter of importance had to be considered. Their two chairs were the seats of authority in the domestic realm.
Mrs. Dill stooped, took up the turkey-wing, and gave the clean hearth a perfunctory flick15. Then she returned the wing to its place and leaned back in her chair, gazing absently at the shining andirons.
"Well," she said, "Henrietta Parkman was in this mornin', and she told me you'd bought the medder; but I didn't hardly believe it."
"Yes," said Myron. He spoke16 in rather a consequential17 voice, and cleared his throat frequently in the course of talking, as if to accord his organs a good working chance. "The deeds were passed last week, and it's bein' recorded."
"What you goin' to do with it?"
"I bought it because it lays next to the Turnbull place, and when that come into my hands last fall, I knew 'twas only a matter o' time till I got the medder, too."
"Well, what you goin' to do with it?"
A tinge18 of anxiety was apparent in her voice, a wistful suggestiveness, as if she could conceive [239]of uses that would be almost too fortunate to be hoped for. Myron hesitated. It often looked as if he judged it unwise to answer in any haste questions concerning the domestic polity, and Mrs. Dill was used to these periods of incubation. She had even thought once, in a moment of illuminative19 comparison, that her husband seemed to submit a bill before one branch of his mental legislature before carrying it on to the next.
"I'm goin' to pasture my cows in it," he responded. "I shall buy in some more stock this spring, and I expect to set up a milk-route."
"How under the sun you goin' to manage that?" She seldom questioned her lawful21 head, but the surprise of the moment spurred her into a query22 more expressive23 of her own mood than a probing of his. "You can't keep any more cows'n you've got now. The barn ain't big enough."
"The Turnbull barn is. I've seen the day when there was forty head o' cattle tied up there from fall to spring."
"The Turnbull barn's twenty minutes' walk from here. You can't go over there mornin' and evenin', milkin' and feedin' the critters. You'd be all the time on the road."
"Yes," said Myron, "'tis a good stretch. So I've made up my mind we'd move over there."
A significant note had come into his voice. It indicated a complexity24 of understanding: chiefly [240]that she would by nature resist what he had to say, and then resume her customary acquiescence26. But for a moment she forgot that he was Mr. Dill, and that she had promised to obey him.
"Why, Myron," she said, with a mild passion, warmed by her incredulity, "we've lived on this place thirty year."
"Yes, yes," said her husband. "I know that. What's the use o' goin' back over the ground, and tellin' me things I know as well as you do? What if 'tis thirty year? Time we got into better quarters."
"But they ain't better. Only it's more work."
Myron got up and moved back his chair.
"I don't think o' movin' till long about the middle o' May," he rejoined. "You can kinder keep your mind on it and, when you get round to your spring cleanin', pick up as you go. Some things you can fold right into chists, blankets and winter clo'es, and then you won't have to handle 'em over twice. If Herman comes back from gettin' the horse shod, you tell him to take an axe27, and come down where I be in the long lot, fencin'. I want him."
He paused for a hearty28 draught29 from the dipper at the pump, pulled his hat on tightly, and went out through the shed to his forenoon's work. Mrs. Dill rose from her seat, and stepped [241]quickly to the window to watch him away. She often did it when he had most puzzled her and roused in her a resistance which was inevitable30, she knew by long experience, but also, as her dutiful nature agreed, the result in her of an unconquerable old Adam which had never yet felt the transforming touch of grace. When his tall, powerful figure had disappeared beyond the rise at the end of the lot, she gave a great willful sigh, as if she depended on it to ease her heart, put her apron31 to her eyes, and held it there, pressing back the tears.
Herman drove into the yard, and she did not hear him. She went to the fireplace now, and leaned her head against the corner of the mantel, looking down, with a bitter stolidity32, at the hearth. Herman unharnessed, and came in, a tall brown-haired fellow with dark eyes full of softness, and a deep simplicity33 of feeling. As his foot struck the sill, his mother roused herself, and became at once animated34 by a commonplace activity. She did not face him, for fear he should find the tear-marks on her cheeks; but when he had thrown his cap into a chair, and gone to the sink to plunge35 his face in cold water, and came out dripping, she did steal a look at him, and at once softened36 into a smiling pleasure. He was her handsome son always, but to-day he looked brilliantly excited; eager, also, as if he [242]had something to share with her, and was timid about presenting it.
"Mother!" said Herman. He was standing25 before her now, smiling invitingly37, and she smiled back again and picked a bit of lint38 from his collar for the excuse of coming near him, and proving to herself her proud ownership. "I've had a letter."
"From Annie?"
He nodded.
"What's she say?" asked his mother. But before he could answer, she threw in a caressing39 invitation. "You want I should get you a piece o' gingerbread and a glass o' milk?"
"No, I ain't hungry. She says she's kep' school about long enough, and if I'm goin' to farm it, she'll farm it, too. I guess she'd be married the first o' the summer, if we could fetch it."
Mrs. Dill stepped over to the hearth and sank into her chair. It seemed as if there were to be another family council. Her silence stirred him.
"I asked her," he hastened to say. "I coaxed40 her, mother. She ain't as forward as I make it out, the way I've told it."
"No," said his mother absently. She was resting her elbows on the chair-arm, and, with hands lightly clasped, gazing thoughtfully into space. Fine lines had sprung into her forehead, and now [243]she took off her glasses and wiped them carefully on her apron, as if that would help her to an inner vision. "No, I know that. Annie's a nice girl. There's nothin' forward about Annie. But I was only wonderin' where you could live. This house is terrible small."
"You know what I thought," Herman reminded her. He spoke impetuously as if begging her to remember, and therefore throw the weight of her expectation in with his. "When father bought the Turnbull place I thought, as much as ever I did anything in my life, he meant to make it over to me."
His mother's eyes stayed persistently41 downcast. A little flush rose to her cheeks.
"Well," she temporized42, "you ain't goin' to count your chickens before they're hatched. It's a poor way. It never leads to anything but disappointment in the end."
"Why, mother," said Herman warmly, "you thought so too. We talked it over only night before last, and you said you guessed father'd put me on to that farm."
"I said I didn't know what he'd bought it for, if 'twa'n't for that," she amended43. "Don't you build on anything I said. Don't you do it, Hermie."
Her son stood there frowning in perplexity, his hands deep in his pockets, and his feet apart.
[244]"But you said so yourself, mother," he persisted. "I told you how I'd always helped father out, long past my majority, and never hinted for anything beyond my board and clothes. And when I got engaged to Annie, I went to him and said, 'Father, now's the time to give me a start, or let me cut loose from here.' And he never answered me a word; but a couple of weeks after that he bought the Turnbull place. And last week it was, he said to me, kind of quick, as if he'd made up his mind to somethin', and wa'n't quite ready to talk it over, 'I've got a sort of a new scheme afoot.' And then 'twas I wrote to Annie and asked her how soon she could be ready to come, if I was ready to have her. You know all that, mother. What makes you act as if you didn't?"
The argument was too warm for Mrs. Dill. She rose from her chair and began putting up the table-leaf and setting out the necessary dishes for a batch44 of cake.
"Your father wanted you should take an axe and go down where he is in the long lot," she remarked. "And I wouldn't open your head to him about what we've been sayin', Hermie. You talk it over with mother. That's the best way."
"Why, course I sha'n't speak of it till I have to." He took up his cap, and then with an air of aggrieved45 dignity turned to the door. "But the [245]time'll come when I've got to speak of it. Lot Collins was tellin' me only this mornin' over to the blacksmith's, how his father's took him into partnership46, and Lot's only twenty-one this spring. His father ain't wasted a day."
"Well, that's a real business, blacksmithin' is," his mother hastened to reply.
"So's farmin' a real business. And father's treated me from the word 'go' like a hired man and nothin' else. He's bought and sold without openin' his head to me. I wonder I've grown up at all. I wonder I ain't in tyers, makin' mud-pies. If 'twa'n't for you and Annie, I shouldn't think I was any kind of a man."
His angry passion was terribly appealing to her. It made her heart ache, and she had much ado to keep from taking him to her arms, big as he was, and comforting him, as she used to, years ago, when he came in with frostbitten fingers or the dire47 array of cuts and bruises48. But she judged it best, in the interest of domestic government, to quell49 emotion that could have, she knew, no hopeful issue, and she began breaking eggs into her mixing bowl and then beating them with a brisk hand.
"Father never was one to talk over his business with anybody, even the nearest," she rejoined. "You know that, Hermie. We've got to take folks as we find 'em. Now you go ahead [246]down to the long lot. He'll be wonderin' where you be."
Herman strode away, after one incredulous look at her, a shaft50 she felt through her downcast lids. It demanded whether father and mother had equally forsaken51 him, and gave her a quick, sharp pang52, and a blinding flash of tears. But she went on mixing cake, and battling arguments as she worked, and when her tin was in the oven, washed her baking dishes methodically and then sat down by the window to read the weekly paper. But as she read, she glanced up, now and then, at the familiar walls of her kitchen, and through the window at the trees just shimmering53 into green and the skyey intervals over them. This was the pictured landscape she had worked on, framed by these wide, low windows, for all the years she had lived here, doing her wifely duties soberly, and her motherly ones with a hidden and ecstatic buoyancy.
The house, the bit of the world it gave upon, seemed a part of her life, the containing husk of all the fruitage born to her. It was incredible that she was to give it up and undertake not only a heavier load of work but a new scene for it, at a time when she longed to fold her hands and sit musing54 while young things filled the picture with beautiful dancing motions, and the loves and fears she remembered as a part of the warm [247]reality of it, but not now so intimately her own. It was as if the heaped-up basket of earthly fruits had passed her by, to be given into other hands; but she had eaten and was content, if only she might see the banquet lamps and hear the happy laughter. She began to feel light-headed from the pain of it all, the pleasures and sadnesses of memory, the fear of anticipation55, and turned again to her paper with the intent of giving her mind to safe and homely56 things. But something caught her eyes and held them. A window seemed to be opened before her. She looked through it into her tumultuous past. Or was this a weapon put into her hand for the exacting58 future?
That night Myron Dill came into the sitting-room59 after his chores were done, and lay down on the lounge between the two front windows. He composed himself on his back with his hands placidly60 folded, and there his wife found him when she came in after her own completed list of deeds. He did not look up at her, and she was glad. She did not know how her eyes gleamed behind the glittering plane of their glasses, nor how deep the red was in her cheeks; but she was conscious of an inward tumult57 which must, she knew, somehow betray itself. For an instant she stood and looked at her husband, in what might have been relenting or anticipation [248]of the road she had to take. She knew so well what mantle61 of repose62 was over him: how he liked the peeping of the frogs through the open window, and what measure of satisfaction there was for him in the consciousness of full rest and the certainty that next day would usher63 in a crowding horde64 of duties he felt perfectly65 able to administer. Mrs. Dill was a feminine creature, charged to the full with the love of service and unerring intuition as to the manner of it, and she did love to "see menfolks comfortable."
"Don't you want I should pull your boots off?"
This she said unwillingly66, because she was about to break the current of his peace, and it seemed deceitful to offer him an alleviation67 that would do him no good after all.
"No," said Myron sleepily. "Let 'em be as they are."
Mrs. Dill drew up a chair and sat down in it at his side, as if she were the watcher by a sick-bed or the partner in a cosy68 conversation.
"Myron," said she. Her voice frightened her. It sounded hoarse69 and strange, and yet there was very little of it, deserted70 by her failing breath.
"What say?" he answered from his drowse.
"I found a real interestin' piece in the 'Monitor' this mornin'. It was how some folks [249]ain't jest one person, as we think, but they're two and sometimes three. And mebbe one of 'em's good, and t'other two are bad, and when they're bad they can't help it. They can't help it, Myron, the bad ones can't, no matter how hard they try."
"Yes, I believe I come acrost it," said Myron. "Terrible foolish it was. That's one o' the things doctors get up to feather their own nest."
"No, Myron, it ain't foolish," said his wife. She moved her chair nearer, and her glasses glittered at him. "It ain't foolish, for I'm one o' that same kind, and I know."
His eyes came open, and he turned his head to look at her.
"Ain't you feelin' well, Caddie?" he asked kindly71.
"Oh, yes, I'm well as common," she answered. "But it ain't foolish, Myron, and you've got to hear me. 'Double Personality,' that's what they call it. Well, I've got it. I've got double personality."
Myron Dill put his feet to the floor, and sat upright. He was regarding his wife anxiously, but he took pains to speak with a commonplace assurance.
"We might as well be gettin' off to bed early, I guess. I'm tired, and so be you."
"I've felt it for quite a long spell," said his [250]wife earnestly. "I don't know but I've always felt it—leastways, all through my married life. It's somethin' that makes me as mad as tophet when you start me out to do anything I don't feel it's no ways right to do, and it keeps whisperin' to me I'm a fool to do it. That's what it says, Myron. 'You're a fool to do it!'"
Myron was touched at last, through his armor of esteem72.
"I ain't asked you to do what ain't right, Caddie," he asseverated73. "What makes you tell me I have?"
"That's what it says to me," she repeated fixedly75. "'You're a fool to do it.' That's what it says. It's my double personality."
It seemed best to Myron to humor this inexplicable76 mood, until he could persuade her back into a normal one.
"That wa'n't the way I understood it," he told her, "when I read the piece. The folks that were afflicted77 seemed like different folks. Now, you ain't any different, rain or shine. You're as even as anybody I should wish to see. That's what I've liked about ye, Caddie."
The softness of the implication she swept aside, as if she hardly dared regard it lest it weaken her resolve.
"Oh, I ain't goin' to be the same, day in, day out," she declared eagerly. "I feel I ain't, Myron. [251]It's gettin' the best of me, the other creatur' that wants to have its own way. It's been growin' and growin', same as a child grows up, and now it's goin' to take its course. Same 's Hermie's growed up, you know. He's old enough to have his way, and lead his life same's we've led ours, and we've got to stand one side and let him do it."
Her husband gave her a sharp, sudden glance, and then fell again to the contemplation of his knotted brown hands that seemed, like all his equipment, informed with specialized78 power.
"Well," he said at length, "I guess you need a kind of a change. You'll feel better when you get over to t'other house. There's a different outlook over there, and you'll have more to take up your mind."
She answered instantly, in the haste that dares not wait upon reflection. Her eyes were brighter now, and her hands worked nervously79.
"Oh, I ain't goin' to move, Myron. I might as well tell you that now. I'm goin' to stay right here where I be. I don't feel able to help it. That's my double personality. It won't let me."
Her husband was looking at her now in what seemed to her a very threatening way. His shaggy eyebrows80 were drawn81 together and his eyes had lightning in them. She continued staring at him, held by the fascination82 of her terror. [252]In that instant she realized a great many things: chiefly that she had never seen her husband angry with her, because she had taken every path to avoid the possibility, and that it was even more sickening than she could have thought. But she knew also that the battle was on, and suddenly, for no reason she could formulate83, she remembered one of her own fighting ancestors who was said to have died hard in the Revolution.
"That was old Abner Kinsman84," she broke out; and when her husband asked, out of his amaze at her irrelevance85, "What's that you said?" she only answered confusedly, "Nothin', I guess."
At that the storm seemed to Myron to be over, and his forehead cleared of anger. He looked at her in much concern.
"I guess you better lay late to-morrer mornin'," he said, rising to close the windows and wind the clock. "I'll ride over and get Sally Drew to come and stay a spell and help you."
Something tightened86 through her tense body, and she answered instantly in a clear, loud note,—
"I ain't goin' to have Sally Drew. Last time I had her she washed up the hearth with the dish-cloth. If I want me a girl, I'll get one; but mebbe I sha'n't want one till Hermie brings Annie into the neighborhood to live."
[253]She stood still in her place for a moment, trembling all over, and wondering what would happen when Myron had wound the clock and closed the windows and turned the wooden button of the door. He did not look at her, nor did he speak again, and when she heard his deep, regular breathing from the bedroom she slipped in softly, made ready for bed, and lay down beside him.
She slept very little that night. He seemed to be a stranger, because there had been outward division between them; and yet, curiously87, she felt nearer to him because she might have hurt him, and the jealous partisanship88 within her kept prompting her to a more tumultuous good-will, a warmer service.
Next morning, when Hermie had left them at the breakfast-table, and gone silently to his tasks, his mother leaned across the table as if, for some reason, she had to attract her husband's attention before speaking to him. He was just taking the last swallow of coffee, and now he set down his cup with decision, and moved away his plate. She knew what the next step would be. He would push back his chair, clear his throat, and then he would be gone.
"Myron!" she said. She spoke as something within Myron remembered the school-teacher [254]speaking, when she called him to the board. The something within him responded to it, and without knowing why, he straightened and looked attentive89. "You noticed Hermie, didn't you?" she adjured90 him. "You noticed he didn't have a word to say for himself, and he wouldn't look neither of us in the face?"
"What's he been up to?" Myron queried91, with his ready frown. "He done somethin' out o' the way?"
"No, he ain't. I should think you'd be ashamed to hint such a thing, Myron Dill, your own boy, too! All he's done is to stay here, and work his fingers to the bone, and no thanks for it, and he's right down discouraged. I know how the boy feels. Myron, I want you should do somethin'. I want you should do it now."
Myron gave his chair the expected push, but he still sat there.
"Well," he said, "what is it? I've got to be off down to the medderlands."
"I want you should make over the Turnbull place to Hermie, and have him fetch Annie there as soon as ever she'll come, and let him farm it without if or but from you and me."
Myron was on his feet. He looked portentously92 large and masterful.
"You better not think o' packin' the chiny," he said, in his ordinary tone of generalship. [255]"We can set it into baskets with a mite93 o' hay, and it'll get as fur as that without any breakages."
His wife slipped out of her chair, and went round the table to him. She laid a hand on his arm. Myron wanted, in the irritation94 of the moment, to shake it off, but he was a man of dignity, and forbore. His wife was speaking in a very gentle tone, but somehow different from the one he was used to noting.
"Myron, ain't you goin' to hear me?"
"I ain't goin' to listen to any tomfoolery, and I ain't goin' to have anybody dictatin' to me about my own business."
"It ain't your business, Myron, any more'n 'tis mine. Hermie's much my son as he is your'n, and what you bought that place with is as much mine as 'tis your'n. I helped you earn it. Myron, it's comin' up in me. I can feel it."
"What is?"
In spite of all his old dull certainties, he felt the shock of wonder. He looked at her, her scarlet95 cheeks and widening eyes. Even her pretty hair seemed to have acquired a nervous life, and stood out in a quivering aureole. Myron was much bound to his Caddie in his way of being attached to his own life and breath. A change in her was horrible to him, like the disturbance96 of illness in an ordered house.
[256]"What is it?" he inquired again. "What is it you feel?"
"It's that," she said, with an added vehemence97. "It's my double personality."
Myron Dill could have wept from the surprise of it all, the assault upon his wondering nerves.
"You spread up the bed in the bedroom, Caddie," he bade her, "and go lay down a spell."
"No," said his wife, "I sha'n't lay down, and I sha'n't give up to you. It's riz up in me, the one that's goin' to beat, no matter what comes of it, same as old Abner Kinsman stood up ag'inst the British. Mebbe it'll die fightin', same's he did, and I never'll hear no more from it,—and a good riddance. But Myron, it's goin' to beat."
Her husband was frowning, not harshly now, but from the extremity98 of his distress99. He spoke in a tone of well-considered adjuration100.
"Caddie, you know what you're doin' of? You're settin' up your will in place o' mine."
"Oh, no, I ain't, Myron," she responded eagerly, with an earnest motion toward him, as if she besought101 him to put faith in her. "It ain't me that's doin' it."
"It ain't you? Who is it, then?"
"Why, it's my double personality. Ain't I just told you so?"
Myron stood gazing at her in the futility102 of [257]comprehension he had felt years ago, when Caddie, who had been "a great reader," as the neighbors said, before the avalanche103 of household cares had overwhelmed her, propounded104 to him, while he was drawing off his boots for an hour of twilight105 somnolence106 before going to bed, problems that, he knew, no man could answer. Neither were they to be illumined by Holy Writ107, for he had offered that loophole of exit, and Caddie had shaken her head at him disconsolately108, and implied that the prophets would not do. But when she had seemed to forget that interrogative attitude toward life, he had settled down to unquestioning content in knowing he had the best housekeeper109 in the neighborhood. Now here it was again, the spectre of her queerness rising to distress him.
She looked at him with wide, affrighted eyes.
"You set here with me a spell," she adjured him. "I'll lay down on the sofy, and you take the big rocker. If you see it comin' up in me, you kinder say somethin', and mebbe it'll go away."
Myron, though in extreme unwillingness110, did as he was bidden. He wanted to bundle the whole troop of her imaginings out of doors, and plod111 off, like a sane112 man, to his fencing; but somehow her earnestness itself forbade. When [258]they were established, she on the sofa, with her bright eyes piercing him, and he seated at an angle where a nurse might easiest wait upon a patient's needs, the absurdity113 of it all swept over him. The clock was ticking irritatingly behind him. He looked at his watch, and took assurance from the vision of the flying day.
"Now, Caddie," said he, in that specious114 soothing115 we accord to children, "you lay right still, and I'll go out a spell and do a few chores, and then mebbe I'll come in and see how you be."
Caddie put out a hand, and fastened it upon his in an inexorable clasp.
"No, Myron," said she, "you ain't goin'. If I should be left here to myself, and it come up in me, I dunno what I might do."
Myron felt himself yielding again, and clutched at confidence as the spent swimmer reaches for a plank116.
"What do you think you'd do, Caddie?" he demanded. "That's what I want to know."
"I can't tell, Myron," she returned solemnly. "True as I'm a livin' woman, I can't tell you. Mebbe I'd go over to the Turnbull house and set it a-fire, so 't I shouldn't ever live in it. Mebbe I'd take my bank-book, and go up to the Street, and draw out that money aunt Susan left me, and give it to Hermie, so 's he [259]could run away, and take Annie with him. If that other one come up in me, I dunno what I'd do."
Myron gazed at her, aghast.
"Why, Caddie," said he, "you can't go round settin' houses a-fire. That's arson117."
"Is it?" she inquired. "Well, I dunno what it's called, but if that other one gets the better o' me, mebbe that's what I shall do."
Myron held her hand now with an involuntary fervor118 of his own, not so much because she bade him, but with the purpose of restraining her. An hour passed, and her blue eyes were fixed74 upon him with the same imploring119 force. He fidgeted, and at last longed childishly to see them wink120.
"Don't you want to see the doctor?" he ventured.
"No," said Caddie, in the same tone of wild asseveration. "Doctors won't do me a mite o' good. Besides, doctors know all about it, and they'd see what was to pay, and they'd send me off to some kind of a hospital, and there'd be a pretty bill o' costs."
"I don't believe a word of it," Myron ventured, with a grasp at mental liberty. He essayed, at the same time, to draw away his hand, but Caddie seemed to fix him with a sharper eye-gleam, and he forbore.
[260]"There's Hermie," she said. "I hear him in the shed, rattlin' round amongst the tools. You call him in here, and when he's here, you tell him he's goin' to have the Turnbull place, and have it now. Myron, you tell him."
Myron made a slight involuntary movement in his chair, as if he were about to rise and carry out her mandate121; but he settled back again, and Herman, having selected the tool he wanted, went off through the shed and, as they both knew, down the garden-path.
The forenoon went on in a strange silence, save for the sound of the birds, and an occasional voice of neighbors calling to Herman as they passed. Myron had still that sickening sense of illness in the house. The breakfast dishes were, he knew, untouched upon the table. The cat came in, looked incidentally at the sofa as if she were accustomed to occupy it at that particular hour, and walked out again. Myron drew forth122 his watch, and looked at it with a stealthiness he could not explain.
"Why," said he, with a simulated wonder, "it's nigh half after eleven. Hadn't you better see about gettin' dinner?"
"I ain't a-goin' to get any dinner," his wife responded. "I don't know as I shall ever get dinners any more. Myron, it's comin' up in me. I feel it." She dropped his hand and rose [261]to a sitting posture123, and for a moment, yielding to the physical relief of the broken clasp, he leaned back in his chair and drew a hearty breath.
"Myron," said his wife. There was something mandatory124 in her voice, and he came upright again. "Now I'm goin' to do it. I don't know what 'tis, but it's got the better o' me and I'm goin' to do what it says. But 'fore20 I give way to it, I'm goin' to tell you this. You've got as good a home and as good a son and as good a wife, if I do say it, as any man in the State o' New Hampshire. And you can keep 'em, Myron, jest as they be, jest as good as they always have been, if you'll only hear to reason and give other folks a chance. You've got to give me a chance, and you've got to give Herman a chance. I guess mebbe I'd sell all my chances for the sake of turnin' 'em in with Hermie's. But you've got to do it, and you've got to do it now. And if you don't, somethin' 's goin' to happen. I don't know what it is. I don't know no more'n the dead, for this is the first time I ever really knew I had that terrible creatur' inside of me that's goin' to beat. But I do know it, and you've got to stand from under."
She turned about and walked to the side window, looking on the garden. She was a slight woman, but Myron, watching her in the fascination [262]of his dread125, had momentary126 remembrance of her father, who had been a man of majestic127 presence and unflinching will.
"Herman," his wife was calling from the window. "Herman, you come here."
That new mysterious note in her voice evidently affected the young man also. He came, hurrying, and when he had entered stayed upon the threshold, warm-hued with work and bringing with him the odor of the soil. His brown eyes went from one of them to the other, and questioned them.
"What is it?" he inquired. "What's happened?"
Myron got upon his feet. He had a dazed feeling that the two were against him, and he could face them better so. He hated the situation, the abasement128 that came from a secret self within him which was almost terribly moved by some of the things his wife had spoken out of her long silence. He was a proud man, and it seemed to him dreadful that he should in any way have won such harsh appeal.
"Herman," his wife was beginning, "your father's got somethin' to say to you."
Herman waited, but his father could not speak. Myron was really seeing, as in a homely vision, the peace of the garden where he might at this moment have been expecting the call to [263]dinner if he had not been summoned to the bar of judgment129.
"I guess he's goin' to let me say it," his wife continued. "Father's goin' to give you a deed o' the Turnbull place. It's goin' to be yours, same as if you'd bought it, and you and Annie are goin' to live there all your days, same 's we're goin' to live here."
Herman turned impetuously upon his father. There was a great rush of life to his face, and his father saw it and understood, in the amazement130 of it, things he had never stopped to consider about the boy who had miraculously131 grown to be a man. But Herman was finding something in his father's jaded132 mien133. It stopped him on the tide of happiness, and he spoke impetuously.
"She's dragged it out o' you! Mother's been tellin' you! I don't want it that way, father, not unless it's your own free will. I won't have it no other way."
It was a man's word to a man. Myron straightened himself to his former bearing. In a flash of memory he remembered the day when his father, an old-fashioned man, had given him his freedom suit and shaken hands with him and wished him well. Involuntarily he put out his hand.
"It's my own will, Hermie," he said, in a tone [264]they had not heard from him since the day, eighteen years behind them, when the boy Hermie was rescued from the "old swimmin'-hole." "We'll have the deeds drawed up to-morrer."
They stood an instant, hands gripped, regarding each other in the allegiance not of blood alone. The clasp broke, and they remembered the woman and turned to her. There she stood, trembling a little, but apparently134 removed from all affairs too large for her. She had taken a cover from the stove, and was obviously reflecting on the next step in her domestic progress.
"I guess you better bring me in a handful o' that fine kindlin', Hermie," she remarked, in her wonted tone of brisk suggestion, "so 's 't I can brash up the fire. I sha'n't have dinner on the stroke—not 'fore half-past one."
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
middle-aged
|
|
| adj.中年的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
temperament
|
|
| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
hearth
|
|
| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
invincible
|
|
| adj.不可征服的，难以制服的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
concurrence
|
|
| n.同意；并发 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
aquiline
|
|
| adj.钩状的，鹰的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
constrained
|
|
| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
cumulative
|
|
| adj.累积的，渐增的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
noted
|
|
| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
cascade
|
|
| n.小瀑布，喷流；层叠；vi.成瀑布落下 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
affected
|
|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
expenditure
|
|
| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
intervals
|
|
| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
meditation
|
|
| n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
flick
|
|
| n.快速的轻打，轻打声，弹开；v.轻弹，轻轻拂去，忽然摇动 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
spoke
|
|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
consequential
|
|
| adj.作为结果的，间接的；重要的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
tinge
|
|
| vt.(较淡)着色于，染色；使带有…气息；n.淡淡色彩，些微的气息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
illuminative
|
|
| adj.照明的，照亮的，启蒙的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
fore
|
|
| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
lawful
|
|
| adj.法律许可的，守法的，合法的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
query
|
|
| n.疑问，问号，质问；vt.询问，表示怀疑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
expressive
|
|
| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
complexity
|
|
| n.复杂(性)，复杂的事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
acquiescence
|
|
| n.默许；顺从 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
axe
|
|
| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
hearty
|
|
| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
draught
|
|
| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
inevitable
|
|
| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
apron
|
|
| n.围裙；工作裙 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
stolidity
|
|
| n.迟钝，感觉麻木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
simplicity
|
|
| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
animated
|
|
| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
plunge
|
|
| v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
softened
|
|
| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
invitingly
|
|
| adv. 动人地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
lint
|
|
| n.线头；绷带用麻布，皮棉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
caressing
|
|
| 爱抚的，表现爱情的，亲切的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
coaxed
|
|
| v.哄，用好话劝说( coax的过去式和过去分词 )；巧言骗取；哄劝，劝诱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
persistently
|
|
| ad.坚持地；固执地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
temporized
|
|
| v.敷衍( temporize的过去式和过去分词 )；拖延；顺应时势；暂时同意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
Amended
|
|
| adj. 修正的 动词amend的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
batch
|
|
| n.一批(组，群)；一批生产量 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
aggrieved
|
|
| adj.愤愤不平的，受委屈的；悲痛的；（在合法权利方面）受侵害的v.令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式)；令委屈，令苦恼，侵害( aggrieve的过去式和过去分词) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
partnership
|
|
| n.合作关系，伙伴关系 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
dire
|
|
| adj.可怕的，悲惨的，阴惨的，极端的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
bruises
|
|
| n.瘀伤，伤痕，擦伤( bruise的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
quell
|
|
| v.压制，平息，减轻 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
shaft
|
|
| n.(工具的)柄，杆状物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
Forsaken
|
|
| adj. 被遗忘的, 被抛弃的 动词forsake的过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
pang
|
|
| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
shimmering
|
|
| v.闪闪发光，发微光( shimmer的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
musing
|
|
| n. 沉思，冥想 adj. 沉思的, 冥想的 动词muse的现在分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
anticipation
|
|
| n.预期，预料，期望 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
homely
|
|
| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
tumult
|
|
| n.喧哗；激动，混乱；吵闹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
exacting
|
|
| adj.苛求的，要求严格的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
sitting-room
|
|
| n.（BrE）客厅，起居室 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
placidly
|
|
| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
mantle
|
|
| n.斗篷，覆罩之物，罩子；v.罩住，覆盖，脸红 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
repose
|
|
| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
usher
|
|
| n.带位员，招待员；vt.引导，护送；vi.做招待，担任引座员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
horde
|
|
| n.群众，一大群 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
unwillingly
|
|
| adv.不情愿地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
alleviation
|
|
| n. 减轻，缓和，解痛物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
cosy
|
|
| adj.温暖而舒适的，安逸的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
hoarse
|
|
| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
deserted
|
|
| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
kindly
|
|
| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
esteem
|
|
| n.尊敬，尊重；vt.尊重，敬重；把…看作 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
asseverated
|
|
| v.郑重声明，断言( asseverate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
fixed
|
|
| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
fixedly
|
|
| adv.固定地；不屈地，坚定不移地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
inexplicable
|
|
| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
afflicted
|
|
| 使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
specialized
|
|
| adj.专门的，专业化的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
nervously
|
|
| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
eyebrows
|
|
| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
drawn
|
|
| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
fascination
|
|
| n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
formulate
|
|
| v.用公式表示；规划；设计；系统地阐述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
kinsman
|
|
| n.男亲属 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
irrelevance
|
|
| n.无关紧要；不相关；不相关的事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
tightened
|
|
| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
curiously
|
|
| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
Partisanship
|
|
| n. 党派性, 党派偏见 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
attentive
|
|
| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
adjured
|
|
| v.（以起誓或诅咒等形式）命令要求( adjure的过去式和过去分词 )；祈求；恳求 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
queried
|
|
| v.质疑，对…表示疑问( query的过去式和过去分词 )；询问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
portentously
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
mite
|
|
| n.极小的东西；小铜币 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
irritation
|
|
| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
scarlet
|
|
| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
disturbance
|
|
| n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
vehemence
|
|
| n.热切；激烈；愤怒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
extremity
|
|
| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
distress
|
|
| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
adjuration
|
|
| n.祈求，命令 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
besought
|
|
| v.恳求，乞求（某事物）( beseech的过去式和过去分词 )；(beseech的过去式与过去分词) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
futility
|
|
| n.无用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
avalanche
|
|
| n.雪崩，大量涌来 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
propounded
|
|
| v.提出（问题、计划等）供考虑[讨论]，提议( propound的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
twilight
|
|
| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
somnolence
|
|
| n.想睡，梦幻；欲寐；嗜睡；嗜眠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
writ
|
|
| n.命令状，书面命令 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
disconsolately
|
|
| adv.悲伤地，愁闷地；哭丧着脸 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
housekeeper
|
|
| n.管理家务的主妇，女管家 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
unwillingness
|
|
| n. 不愿意，不情愿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
plod
|
|
| v.沉重缓慢地走，孜孜地工作 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
sane
|
|
| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
absurdity
|
|
| n.荒谬，愚蠢；谬论 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
specious
|
|
| adj.似是而非的；adv.似是而非地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
soothing
|
|
| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
plank
|
|
| n.板条，木板，政策要点，政纲条目 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
arson
|
|
| n.纵火，放火 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
fervor
|
|
| n.热诚；热心；炽热 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
imploring
|
|
| 恳求的，哀求的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
wink
|
|
| n.眨眼，使眼色，瞬间；v.眨眼，使眼色，闪烁 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
mandate
|
|
| n.托管地；命令，指示 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
posture
|
|
| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
mandatory
|
|
| adj.命令的；强制的；义务的；n.受托者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
dread
|
|
| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
momentary
|
|
| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
majestic
|
|
| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
abasement
|
|
| n.滥用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
judgment
|
|
| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
amazement
|
|
| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
miraculously
|
|
| ad.奇迹般地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
jaded
|
|
| adj.精疲力竭的；厌倦的；（因过饱或过多而）腻烦的；迟钝的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
mien
|
|
| n.风采；态度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |