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She was afraid she had been undignified, but she wished for a moment that Clemantiny was there. Wicked as she feared it was, Miss Salome thought she could have enjoyed a tilt between her ancient handmaid and Mrs. Elwell. "I beg your pardon, Mrs. Elwell, if I have used any intemperate expressions," she said with great dignity. "You provoked me more than was becoming by your remarks.
Chester never knew it, but after he had fallen asleep, with the tears still glistening on his brown cheeks, Clemantiny tiptoed silently in with a candle in her hand and bent over him with an expression of almost maternal tenderness on her face. It was late and an aroma of boiling sugar hung about her.
"Not very much, perhaps," said Miss Salome mildly. "But what could I do? You wouldn't have me turn the child adrift on the world again, would you, Clemantiny?" Clemantiny did not choose to answer this appeal. She rattled her dishes noisily into the dishpan. "Well, where are you going to put him to sleep?" she demanded. "The hands you've got will fill the kitchen chamber.
"Mary Morrow," said Chester, wondering what upon earth Clemantiny meant. Clemantiny turned to Miss Salome with an air of surrendering a dearly cherished opinion. "Well, ma'am, I guess you must be right about his looking like Johnny. I must say I never could see the resemblance, but it may well be there, for he that very fellow there and Johnny are first cousins. Their mothers were sisters!"
Bending over him was a tall, gaunt woman with a thin, determined face and snapping black eyes, and, standing beside her with a steaming bowl in her hand, was the nice rosy lady who had given him the taffy on the boat! When he opened his eyes, Miss Salome knew him. "Why, it's the little boy I saw on the boat!" she exclaimed. "Well, you've come to!" said Clemantiny, eyeing Chester severely.
Miss Salome was sitting in her favourite sunny corner of the kitchen and Clemantiny was flying around with double briskness. The latter's thin lips were tightly set and disapproval was writ large in every flutter of her calico skirts. "Chester," said Miss Salome kindly, "your time is up today." Chester nodded. For a moment he felt as he had felt when he left the provision store in Montrose.
"And have him starving on people's doorsteps in the meantime?" questioned Miss Salome severely. "Well," returned Clemantiny with the air of one who washes her hands of a doubtful proposition, "don't blame me if you repent of it." By this time Chester had grasped the wonderful fact that his troubles were ended for a while, at least.
"Looks more to me as if he had fainted from sheer starvation," returned Clemantiny brusquely as she picked him up in her lean, muscular arms. "Why, he's skin and bone. He ain't hardly heavier than a baby. Well, this is a mysterious piece of work. Where'll I put him?"
Please give me something to do." "You can go out and cut me some wood for my afternoon's baking," said Clemantiny. "And see you cut it short enough. Any other boy that's tried always gets it about two inches too long." When he had gone out, she said scornfully to Miss Salome, "Well, what do you expect that size to accomplish in a harvest field, Salome Whitney?"
But I could guess." Early in the morning Miss Salome and Chester started. They were to drive to Montrose, leave their team there and take the boat for Belltown. Chester bade farewell to the porch chamber and the long, white kitchen and the friendly barns with a full heart. When he climbed into the wagon, Clemantiny put a big bagful of taffy into his hands. "Good-by, Chester," she said.
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