uire, piteously--"it's that, Abigail."

"I don't know that she's any too willing to," returned Abigail, half
laughing. "The principal thing that seems to trouble the child is
that Jerome won't come to see her. I rather think that if he would
come to see her she would be perfectly contented."

"And why can't he come to see her, if she wants him to--will you tell
me that?" cried the Squire, with sudden fervor.

"Eben Merritt, would you have the poor child getting to thinking more
of him than she does, when he isn't going to marry her?"

"And why isn't he going to marry her, if she wants him? By the Lord
Harry, Lucina shall have whoever she wants, if it's a prince or a
beggar! If that fellow has been coming here, and now--"

"Eben, listen to me and keep quiet!" cried Abigail, running at her
great husband's side, with a little, wiry, constraining hand on his
arm, for the Squire had sprung from his seat and was tramping up and
down in his rage that Lucina should be denied what she wanted, even
though it were his own heart's blood. "You know what I told you,"
Abigail said. "Jerome is behaving well. You know he can't marry
Lucina--he hasn't a penny."

"Then I'll give 'em pennies enough to marry on. The girl shall have
whom she wants; I tell you that, Abigail."

"How much have you got to give them until we are gone, even if Jerome
would marry under such conditions; and I told you what he said to
Lucina about it," returned his wife, quietly.

"I'll go to work myself, then," shouted the Squire; "and as for the
boy, he shall swallow his damned pride before he gives my girl an
anxious hour. What is he, to say he will or will not, if she lifts
her little finger? By the Lord Harry, he ought to go down on his face
like a heathen when she looks at him!"

"Eben," said Abigail, "will you listen to me? I tell you, Jerome is
behaving as well as any young man can. I know he is, from what Lucina
has told me. He loves her, and he is proving it by giving her up. You
know that he cannot marry her unless he drags her into poverty, and
you know how much you have to help them with. You know, too, good as
Jerome is, and worthy of praise for what he has done, that Lucina
ought to do better than marry him."

"He is a good boy, Abigail, and if she's got her heart set on him she
shall have him."

"You don't know that her heart is set on him, Eben. I think the best
thing we can do is to send her down to Boston for a little visit--she
may f