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It was a pleasant young face with a good forehead and frank eyes. The indeterminate sweetness of the mouth and chin hinted that this was a man in the making, his strength to be wrought out, his weakness to be mastered. Like the blue plush the photograph was faded, as were alas, the roses in Persis' cheeks.
But no doubt none of these signs had passed unnoticed by his wife, to whom Lapham said one day, when he came home, "Persis, what's the reason Pen don't marry Corey?" "You know as well as I do, Silas," said Mrs. Lapham, with an inquiring look at him for what lay behind his words. "Well, I think it's all tomfoolery, the way she's going on. There ain't any rhyme nor reason to it."
Some perversity kept her eyes upon her work, her hands occupied. "Good-by, Thomas." The door creaked ajar. There was a pause. It closed reluctantly. She heard him stumble at the steps, go haltingly down the path. She stabbed the fabric in her hand with her needle as if that minute tool had been a weapon. "Men are all alike," repeated Persis, the tears running down her cheeks.
It may be of a certain kind of inferior value, but it is far beneath the highest beauty of Christian service, nor will its issues reach the loftiest point of usefulness to which even our poor service may attain. Persis seems to me to suggest, too, the safeguard of work.
"Yes, but if they don't want he should come? Should you feel just right about letting him?" "How're you going to stop him? I swear, Persis, I don't know what's got over you! What is it? You didn't use to be so. But to hear you talk, you'd think those Coreys were too good for this world, and we wa'n't fit for 'em to walk on."
As she rapped the assembly to order, she had every appearance of a teacher calling on the A-class to recite. "Ladies, I am glad to see so many of you punctual. Miss Persis Dale has sent word that she will be detained for a little by the pressure of Saturday's work, but that she will join us later, and undoubtedly other tardy arrivals will have excuses equally good.
It really seemed to him that he felt very ill and he found a somber satisfaction in reflecting that in the event of his death, Persis would realize her appalling selfishness. "'Twon't come much short of murder," he thought with gloomy relish. Joel's periods of invalidism had been too frequent and prolonged for this sporadic attack to upset the peaceful order of the household.
During the progress of this moral tale, Persis' thoughts had been self-accusing. She reflected that curiosity is not among the seven deadly sins, and that if Mrs. Trotter found in listening at key-holes any compensation for the undeniable hardships of her lot, only a harsh nature would grudge her such solace.
I hope Persis and mother will be as game when my turn comes." "Oh, Kenneth the war will be over before your turn cometh." There! She had lisped again. Another great moment of life spoiled! Well, it was her fate. And anyhow, nothing mattered. Kenneth was off already he was talking to Ethel Reese, who was dressed, at seven in the morning, in the gown she had worn to the dance, and was crying.
Sometimes Thomas felt that his reputation for uprightness was a proof of hypocrisy, and that his friends and neighbors would shrink away aghast if they suspected a fraction of his unsavory secrets. Persis was alone when Thomas entered. Not till the last lingering tinge of gold had deserted the west, would Joel venture to leave the room barricaded against the hostile element.
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