"That can hardly be," answered her friend. "I may not spare you
my arm, Goody Cloyse; but here is my staff, if you will."

So saying, he threw it down at her feet, where, perhaps, it
assumed life, being one of the rods which its owner had formerly
lent to the Egyptian magi. Of this fact, however, Goodman Brown
could not take cognizance. He had cast up his eyes in
astonishment, and, looking down again, beheld neither Goody
Cloyse nor the serpentine staff, but his fellow-traveller alone,
who waited for him as calmly as if nothing had happened.

"That old woman taught me my catechism," said the young man; and
there was a world of meaning in this simple comment.

They continued to walk onward, while the elder traveller exhorted
his companion to make good speed and persevere in the path,
discoursing so aptly that his arguments seemed rather to spring
up in the bosom of his auditor than to be suggested by himself.
As they went, he plucked a branch of maple to serve for a walking
stick, and began to strip it of the twigs and little boughs,
which were wet with evening dew. The moment his fingers touched
them they became strangely withered and dried up as with a week's
sunshine. Thus the pair proceeded, at a good free pace, until
suddenly, in a gloomy hollow of the road, Goodman Brown sat
himself down on the stump of a tree and refused to go any
farther.

"Friend," said he, stubbornly, "my mind is made up. Not another
step will I budge on this errand. What if a wretched old woman do