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His indecision concerning the acceptance of the Hunniwell invitation lasted until the day before Thanksgiving. Then Barbara added her persuasions to those of Captain Sam and his daughter and he gave in. "If you don't go, Uncle Jed," asserted Babbie, "we're all goin' to be awfully disappointed, 'specially me and Petunia and Mamma and Uncle Charlie."
Six or eight weeks ago in January 'twas there was a drummer in my store sellin' a line of tools and he was lookin' out of the window when this Phillips cuss went by with Maud Hunniwell, both of 'em struttin' along as if common folks, honest folks, was dirt under their feet. And when this drummer see 'em he swore right out loud.
Finding the latter out, he had taken the liberty of following him to the Hunniwell home. "I'm going to stay but a moment, Captain Hunniwell," he went on. "I wanted to talk with Winslow on a well, on a business matter. Of course I won't do it now but perhaps we can arrange a time convenient for us both when I can."
"And he was mighty fine," declared Phillips with emphasis. "We had a heart to heart talk and I held nothing back. I tell you, Jed, it did me good to speak the truth, whole and nothing but. I told Captain Hunniwell that I didn't deserve his daughter. He agreed with me there, of course." "Nonsense!" interrupted Maud, with a happy laugh. "Not a bit of nonsense.
You and Sam Hunniwell and the rest of the gang have fixed him so he don't come to his father to tell things any longer. But he told his step-mother this very mornin' and she told me. You was the one that advised him to enlist, he said. Good Lord; think of it!
But I don't cal'late Mrs. Ruth Mrs. Armstrong, I mean would want to leave Charlie to home alone on Thanksgivin' Day. If she took Babbie, you know, there wouldn't be anybody left to keep him company." Miss Hunniwell twirled the fox tail in an opposite direction. "Oh, of course," she said, with elaborate carelessness, "we should invite Mrs. Armstrong's brother if we invited her.
When they were a safe distance from the windmill shop the captain cautioned his daughter. "Maud," he said, "you'd better not tease Jed too much about that good-lookin' tenant of his. He's so queer and so bashful that I'm afraid if you do he'll take a notion to turn the Armstrongs out when this month's up." Miss Hunniwell glanced at him from the corner of her eye. "Suppose he does?" she asked.
You're so bashful that I know you'd never call on a young woman, but I never figured that one might begin callin' on you. Course she's kind of extra young, but she'll grow out of that, give her time." Maud Hunniwell laughed merrily, enjoying Mr. Winslow's confusion. "Oh, the little girl is only the bait, Father," she declared. "It is the pretty widow that Jed is fishing for.
"Jed," she said, "Captain Hunniwell was just here with you; I saw him go. Tell me, what was he talking about?" Jed was confused. "Why why, Mrs. Ruth," he stammered, "he was just talkin' about about a note he'd been collectin', and and such." "Wasn't he speaking of his daughter and and my brother?" This time Jed actually gasped. Ruth drew a long breath. "I knew it," she said.
Jed was not blind and he had seen, perhaps sooner than any one else, the possibilities in the case. And what he saw distressed him greatly. Captain Sam Hunniwell was his life-long friend. Maud had been his pet since her babyhood; she and he had had many confidential chats together, over troubles at school, over petty disagreements with her father, over all sorts of minor troubles and joys.
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