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Ewbert queried submissively, though he was aware of being quite as fagged as his wife accused him of being, after he spoke. "Yes," Hilbrook returned. "I guess I ha'n't been exactly up and down with myself. I guess I've been playing fast and loose with myself.
"You can strip away layer after layer till you seem to get to nothing at all; but when you've got to that nothing you've got to the very thing that had the life in it, and that would have grown again if you had put it in the ground." "Exactly!" said Ewbert. "You made a point that I can't get round," Hilbrook continued, and it was here that Ewbert enjoyed a little instant of triumph.
He realized what the misery of mere weakness must be, and the horror of not having the power to rest. He wished to go to bed before the hour when Hilbrook commonly appeared, but this was so early that Ewbert knew he should merely toss about and grow more and more wakeful from his premature effort to sleep.
Ewbert would not be able to see him, and perhaps there was nothing to uplift him in the reasons she gave, though she obscurely resented his continued dejection as a kind of ingratitude. She explained that poor Mr. Ewbert was quite broken down, and that the doctor had advised his going to the seaside for the whole of August, where he promised everything from the air and the bathing. Mr.
He had thrown out that hasty suggestion without much faith in it at the time, and his faith in it had not grown since. "I'm glad," he began, but Hilbrook pressed on as if he had not spoken. "I guess we're built like an onion," he said, with a severity that forbade Ewbert to feel anything undignified in the homely illustration.
In describing the incident to his wife Ewbert stopped at this point, and then passed on to say that after they got to talking Hilbrook seemed more and more gratified, and even glad, to see him. "Everybody's glad to see you, Clarence," she broke out, with tender pride. "But why do you say, 'After we got to talking'? Didn't you go to talking at once?"
She felt obliged to make him the more welcome on account of his humility, and she showed him into the library with perhaps exaggerated hospitality. It was a chilly evening of April, and so early that the lamp was not lighted; but there was a pleasant glow from the fire on the hearth, and Ewbert made his guest sit down before it.
Hilbrook did not come again till Ewbert had been to see him; and in the meantime the minister suffered from the fear that the old man was staying away because of some hurt which he had received in their controversy.
I tried to go over what you said, in my own mind, but I couldn't seem to make it." He lifted his face, sculptured so fine by age, and blinked at Ewbert, who was glad to fancy something appealing in his words and manner. "You mean as to a life beyond this?" "Ah!" "Well, let us see if we can't go over it together."
Then, as if some excuse were necessary, he brought a dozen eggs in a paper bag, which he said he hoped Mrs. Ewbert could use, because his hens were giving him more than he knew what to do with. He came to the back door with them; but Mrs. Ewbert always let her maid of all work go out Sunday evening, and she could receive him in the kitchen herself.
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