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At first it was much easier than the old. And, as a matter of fact, it was never as hard as before. The heart to heart talk between Captain Zelotes and his grandson had given each a glimpse of the other's inner self, a look from the other's point of view, and thereafter it was easier to make allowances.
Then the door flew open, and Amos Lee, who had seen the light in the windows, and was burning to impart the news of the tragedy, rushed in. "Heard what's happened?" he cried out. They all thought of Ellen. "What?" demanded Andrew, in a terrible voice. Fanny dropped her work and stared at him, with her chin falling as if she were dying. Mrs. Zelotes made a queer gurgling noise in her throat.
Fanny drank the whiskey and water and went to bed, half stupefied, and Mrs. Zelotes went home. "You ring the bell in the night if she's taken worse, and I'll come over," said she to her son. When Ellen and her father were left alone they looked at each other, each with pity for the other. Andrew laid a tender, trembling hand on the girl's shoulder.
What had come over her? Didn't she love her father and mother any more that she should set out to act this way? Yes, she declared that she loved them as much as ever, but that she loved her lover more than all the world, and no one not even her parents should separate them. Captain Zelotes gave it up at last. That is, he gave up the appeal to reason and the pleadings.
Zelotes stood clasping little Ellen, who clung to her, trembling. "Well, come over here with me," she said, "you and Ellen." "Live here in the next house!" said Andrew. "Do you suppose Fanny would have the child living under her very eyes in the next house? No, there is no way out of the misery no way; but if it was not for the child, I would go!"
Now now I want to say I am sorry for being so well, so pig-headed about the rest of it. I realize that you have been mighty kind to me and that I owe you about everything that I've got in this world." He paused again. It had seemed to him that Captain Zelotes was about to speak. However, he did not, so the young man stumbled on.
"It don't make any odds whether she did or not," returned Eva, with no affectation of secrecy. "I don't care which way 'twas." She sat up straighter than ever, and some men in a passing sleigh turned to look after her. "I s'pose she don't think my shawl looks genteel enough to wear," Mrs. Zelotes said to Fanny; "but she's dreadful silly."
Why, last night, after you and he had finished talkin' and he came up to bed and the land knows what time of night or mornin' THAT was he woke me out of a sound sleep to tell me about that New York magazine man givin' you a written order to write six stories for his magazine at five hundred dollars a piece. Zelotes couldn't seem to get over it. 'Think of it, Mother, he kept sayin'. 'Think of it!
Captain Zelotes came back from the post-office that morning, a crumpled newspaper in his hand, and upon his face the look which mutinous foremast hands had seen there just before the mutiny ended. Laban Keeler was the first to notice the look. "For the land sakes, Cap'n, what's gone wrong?" he asked. The captain flung the paper upon the desk. "Read that," he grunted.
Captain Zelotes sat at his desk, the copy of the Boston morning paper which he had been reading sticking out of the waste basket into which it had been savagely jammed a half hour before. The news had not been to the captain's liking.
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