il
she'd had prayers beside the young man's bed, with Mr. Hand present. I
had to wait with the coffee. And I guess Mr. Hand ain't very much used
to our ways, for when Aunt Susan had made a prayer, Mr. Hand said,
'Yes, ma'am!' instead of Amen."

There was a mixture of disapprobation and grim humor which did not
escape Agatha. She was again beguiled into a smile, though Sallie
remained grave as a tombstone.

"Mr. Hand will learn," said Agatha; and was about to add "Like the rest
of us," but thought better of it. Sallie took up her tale.

"Mr. Van Camp and his friend came in just after I'd put you to bed,
Miss Redmond, and ate a bite of breakfast right offer that table; and
'twas a mercy I'd cleared all the kulch outer the attic, as I did last
week, for Mr. Van Camp he wanted a place to sleep; and he's up there
now. Used to be a whole lot er the parson's books up there; but I put
them on a shelf in the spare room. The other man went off toward the
village."

Agatha, looking about the pleasant kitchen, was tempted to linger.
Sallie's conversation yielded, to the discerning, something of the rich
essence of the past; and Agatha began to yearn for a better knowledge
of the recluse who had been her friend, unknown, through all the years.
But she remembered her industrious plans for the day and postponed her
talk with Sallie.

"I remember there used to be a grove, a stretch of wood, somewhere
beyond the church, Sallie. Which way is it--along the path that goes
through the churchyard?"

"No, this way; right back er the yard. Parson Thayer he used to walk
that way quite often." Sallie went with Agatha to another stile beyond
the churchyard, and pointed over the pasture to a fringe of dark trees
along the farther border. "Right there by that apple tree, the path
is. But don't go far, Miss Redmond; the woods ain't healthy."

"All right, Sallie; thank you. I'll not stay long." She called Danny
and started out through the pasture, with the hound, sober and
dignified and happy, at her heels.

The wood was cool and dim, with an uneven wagon road winding in and out
between stumps. Enormous sugar-maples reared their forms here and
there; occasionally a lithe birch lifted a tossing head; and, farther
within, pines shot their straight trunks, arrow-like, up to the canopy
above.

Farther along, the road widened into a little clearing, beyond which
the birch and maple trees gave place entirely to pines and hemlocks.