had seen in Boston. "She shall have that to sit before while she
combs her hair," he thought, with defiant tenderness, when he stowed
away another shilling in a little box in his trunk. It was money
which he ordinarily bestowed upon foreign missions; but his Evelina
had come between him and the heathen. To procure some dainty
furnishings for her bridal-chamber he took away a good half of his
tithes for the spread of the gospel in the dark lands. Now and then
his conscience smote him, he felt shamefaced before his deacons, but
Evelina kept her first claim. He resolved that another year he would
hire a piece of land, and combine farming with his ministerial work,
and so try to eke out his salary, and get a little more money to
beautify his poor home for his bride.

Now if Evelina Adams had come to the appointed time for the closing
of her solitary life, and if her young cousin should inherit a share
of her goodly property and the fine old mansion-house, all necessity
for anxiety of this kind was over. Young Evelina would not need to be
taken away, for the sake of her love, from all these comforts and
luxuries. Thomas Merriam rejoiced innocently, without a thought for
himself.

In the course of the winter he confided in his father; he couldn't
keep it to himself any longer. Then there was another reason. Seeing
Evelina so little made him at times almost doubt the reality of it
all. There were days when he was depressed, and inclined to ask
himself if he had not dreamed it. Telling somebody gave it substance.

His father listened soberly when he told him; he had grown old of
late.