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The rick in the yard stood like a skeleton against the fading yellow of the sky; some fowls were roosting comfortably on the tongue. It was very peaceful; but Mrs. Butterfield's face was puckered with anxiety. "Yet I don't know as I can do anything about it," she said, her foot tapping the stone step nervously; "she ain't got no call to be so foolish."
Butterfield happened to be safe likewise. He nodded. 'I'll look in and have a word with the old lady to-night, eh? Mrs. Butterfield's husband, some years deceased, had been a fellow-workman with Bower. The latter, prying about the school-building as soon as he heard that Egremont was going to convert it into a library, had discovered that the caretaker was known to him.
I set off, fancying that I should have no difficulty in finding my way, but I wandered about for a couple of hours or more before I succeeded in getting back to Mr Butterfield's house. Aunt Deb received me with a frown. "Now where have you been all this time?" she asked. "I've had luncheon an hour or so, or more.
As I was pacing to and fro, I thought of the high stool in the dark corner of Mr Butterfield's office; the dreary, dreary days I was doomed to sit there; the dull, dull evenings in the society of Aunt Deb and her cousin, and the not more lively Sundays, with attendances at three services, for Aunt Deb was very strict in this respect.
In the dark passage she was startled by coming in contact with someone. 'Oh, who is that? A muttered reply informed her that it was the old woman. They went forward into the nearest room. There was a disagreeable smile on Mrs. Butterfield's thin lips. 'If you please, have you got a hammer? Thyrza asked. 'Mr. Egremont wants one.
She went down to Croft's pretty nearly every day when his cousin Maria from Bridgton come to house-clean. Maria suspicioned something, I guess. Anyhow, she asked me if Miss Butterfield's two hundred a year was in gov'ment bonds.
Butterfield's bedroom window with her thimble finger. This proving of no avail, she was obliged to pry open the kitchen shutter, split open a mosquito netting with her shears, and crawl into the house over the sink. This was a considerable feat for a somewhat rheumatic elderly lady, but this one never grudged trouble when she wanted to find out anything.
In the beacon The storm continues The tide turns I again seek for food I meet with another accident Brighter weather A sail in sight My hopes and fears My signal My rescue A voice from the deep Three old friends meet again On board the "Falcon" The good captain Sydney harbour, and why I did not go ashore there The homeward voyage Mark and I learn navigation My reception at Liverpool Sad, sad news My journey to Sandgate I enter Mr Butterfield's office, and have had no cause to regret doing so.
Butterfield's hard feelings were all gone; her heart warmed to Nathaniel; warmed even to the mangy dog that limped out from the barn and curled up on Lizzie's skirt. But when she went away, "comfortable in her mind," as she told her husband, Lizzie Graham still sat in the dark under her elm, trying to get her wits together. "I know Josh is right," she told herself; "he's a careful talker.
Aunt Hitty always said of this catastrophe, "If I'd 'a' be'n Mis' Potter, I'd 'a' be'n so mortified I believe I'd 'a' said, 'I wa'n't plannin' to be buried, but now I'm in here I declare I'll stop. Old Mrs. Butterfield's funeral was not only voted an entire success by the villagers, but the seal of professional approval was set upon it by an undertaker from Saco, who declared that Mrs.
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