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"It might," Tish said grimly, "if it heard an oath from the lips of a middle-aged Sunday-school teacher!" We ate Mr. Wiggins's anniversary dinner without any great hilarity. Aggie's neck was very stiff and she had turned in the collar of her dress and wrapped flannels wrung out of lamp oil round it.
The more he thought of that interview, the more bitter grew his mortification; and at length he resolved to force matters to a climax at once by coming to a distinct and final understanding with Wiggins himself. Leon had enjoyed the freedom of the house long enough to know where Wiggins's room was, and into that room he intruded himself abruptly on the following day.
He spoke a few words, and at Wiggins's request to be seated he sat down, while his agitation increased; and he had that hesitating, half-abstracted manner which marks the man who is on the point of giving unpleasant information, about the effect of which he is doubtful. Wiggins, on his part, did not seem to notice this. He sat down, and looked with earnest inquiry at his visitor.
As the shadows lengthened and the robins became tuneful, Holcroft said, "You've done well, Jane. Thank you. Now you can go back to the house." The child soon returned in breathless haste to the field where the farmer was covering the potato pieces she had dropped, and cried, "Mrs. Wiggins's gone!"
She said we could get everything we needed at the park entrance, and that the riding was merely sitting in a saddle and letting the pony do the rest. But on the 21st of June, the anniversary of the day Aggie was to have been married, we went out to decorate Mr. Wiggins's last resting-place, and coming out of the cemetery we met Tish. She was on a horse, astride! She was not alone.
"She had some such idea before, and now this young idiot " I stopped and stared across the table at Aggie. She was sitting rapt, her eyes fixed on the smouldering wicks of Mr. Wiggins's candles. "Barefoot through the Elysian fields!" she said. I am not trying to defend myself. I never had the enthusiasm of the other two, but I rather liked the idea. And I did restrain them.
I believe she tried to induce Hannah to go with her, and only when Hannah failed her did she turn to us. Hannah was frightened and came to warn us. I remember the occasion very well. It was Mr. Wiggins's birthday anniversary, and we usually dine at Aggie's and have a cake with thirty candles on it. Tish was not yet able to be about, so Aggie and I ate together.
Wiggins's last resting-place, after first removing the lavender ribbon, of which she makes cap bows through the year and an occasional pin-cushion or fancy-work bag; then home to chicken and waffles, which had been Mr. Wiggins's favorite meal. In the evening Charlie Sands generally comes in and we play a rubber or two of bridge. On the thirtieth anniversary of Mr.
Why, no one can set up a private prison-house in that style. If the law allowed that, I know of one person who could set up a private jail, and keep it pretty well filled, too." "An idea strikes me," said Leon, "which may explain this on other grounds than madness, and which is quite in accordance with Wiggins's character.
Wiggins's death, while we were in Berlin, Aggie received a small package forwarded from home. It was a small lace doily, and pinned to it was a card. It read: For the sadness, Miss Pilk! Aggie cried over it. I suppose there is something in all of us that harks back to the soil. When you come to think of it, what are picnics but outcroppings of instinct?
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