the sense of loneliness which he had experienced so often of late came
over him, and he thought of Euphrasia. His father, he knew, had gone to
Kingston for the night, and so he drove up Hanover Street and hitched
Pepper to the stone post before the door. Euphrasia, according to an
invariable custom, would be knitting in the kitchen at this hour; and at
the sight of him in the window, she dropped her work with a little,
joyful cry.

"I was just thinking of you!" she said, in a low voice of tenderness
which many people would not have recognized as Euphrasia's; as though her
thoughts of him were the errant ones of odd moments! "I'm so glad you
come. It's lonesome here of evenings, Austen."

He entered silently and sat down beside her, in a Windsor chair which had
belonged to some remote Austen of bygone days.

"You don't have as good things to eat up at Mis' Jenney's as I give you,"
she remarked. "Not that you appear to care much for eatables any more.
Austen, are you feeling poorly?"

"I can dig more potatoes in a day than any other man in Ripton," he
declared.

"You'd ought to get married," said Euphrasia, abruptly. "I've told you
that before, but you never seem to pay any attention to what I say."

"Why haven't you tried it, Phrasie?" he retorted.

He was not prepared for what followed. Euphrasia did not answer at once,
but presently her knitting dropped to her lap, and she sat staring at the