'.

"Wal, come fall, Elderkin he went to college up to Brunswick; and then I
used to see the letters as regular up to the store every week, comin' in
from Brunswick, and old Black Hoss John he see 'em too, and got a way
of droppin' on 'em in his coat-pocket when he come up to the store, and
folks used to say that the letters that went into his coat-pocket didn't
get to Miry. Anyhow, Miry she says to me one day says she, 'Sam, you're
up round the post-office a good deal,' says she. 'I wish, if you see any
letters for me, you'd jest bring 'em along.' I see right into it, and I
told her to be sure I would; and so I used to have the carryin' of great
thick letters every week. Wal, I was waitin' on Hepsy along about them
times, and so Miry and I kind o' sympathized. Hepsy was a pretty gal,
and I thought it was all best as 'twas; any way, I knew I couldn't get
Miry, and I could get Hepsy, and that made all the difference in the
world.

"Wal, that next winter old Black Hoss was took down with rheumatism,
and I tell you if Miry didn't have a time on't! He wa'n't noways
sweet-tempered when he was well; but come to be crooked up with the
rheumatis' and kep' awake nights, it seemed as if he was determined
there shouldn't nobody have no peace so long as he couldn't.

"He'd get Miry up and down with him night after night a makin' her
heat flannels and vinegar, and then he'd jaw and scold so that she was
eenymost beat out. He wouldn't have nobody set up with him, though
there was offers made. No: he said Miry was his daughter, and 'twas her
bisness to take care on him.

"Miry was clear worked down: folks kind o' pitied her. She was a strong
gal, but there's things that wears out the strongest. The worst
on't was, it hung on so. Old Black Hoss had a most amazin' sight o'
constitution. He'd go all down to death's door, and seem hardly to have
the breath, o' life in him, and then up he'd come agin! These 'ere old
folks that nobody wants to have live allers hev such a sight o' wear
in 'em, they jest last and last; and it really did seem as if he'd wear
Miry out and get her into the grave fust, for she got a cough with bein'
up so much in the cold, and grew thin as a shadder. 'Member one time I
went up there to offer to watch jest in the spring o' the year, when the
laylocks was jest a buddin' out, and Miry she come and talked with me
over the fence; and the poor gal she fairly broke down, and sobbed as if
her heart would break, a tel