II

The Perkins horse and wagon rumbled along over the dusty country
road, and after a discreet silence, maintained as long as human
flesh could endure, Rebecca remarked sedately:

"It's a sad errand for such a shiny morning, isn't it, Mr.
Perkins?"

"Plenty o' trouble in the world, Rebecky, shiny mornin's an'
all," that good man replied. "If you want a bed to lay on, a roof
over your head, an' food to eat, you've got to work for em. If I
hadn't a' labored early an' late, learned my trade, an' denied
myself when I was young, I might a' be'n a pauper layin' sick in
a loggin' cabin, stead o' bein' an overseer o' the poor an'
selectman drivin' along to take the pauper to the poor farm."

"People that are mortgaged don't have to go to the poor farm, do
they, Mr. Perkins?" asked Rebecca, with a shiver of fear as she
remembered her home farm at Sunnybrook and the debt upon it; a
debt which had lain like a shadow over her childhood.

"Bless your soul, no; not unless they fail to pay up; but Sal
Perry an' her husband hadn't got fur enough along in life to BE
mortgaged. You have to own something before you can mortgage it."

Rebecca's heart bounded as she learned that a mortgage
represented a certain stage in worldly prosperity.