girlish look left her, her features sharpened, and her speech
developed an acid reaction; it was at this time, too, that she
bargained with Uncle Billy Kerr for the old Blake place, and also
borrowed money from the old man to put up a new house. When people saw
the house going up it was generally supposed that she was preparing
either to rent it or to live in it as an old maid; but when it was
completed, to the surprise of every one, Charlotte and Blake were
married and moved in.

The morning after the wedding Blake was in his drug-store playing
chess as languidly as ever, but Charlotte spent her whole day planting
a vegetable-garden, in a mood of unreckoning exaltation such as rarely
comes to a woman of her nature, and never comes to her but once. She
had felt no such blissful security when Blake and she were first
engaged. Blake was weak. She had felt it intensely even when her
infatuation for him was too fresh to permit her to reason, and a weak
man while unmarried is peculiarly liable to changes of affection. But,
on the other hand, a weak man once safely married is completely in the
power of his wife; during the last two years of their engagement
certain illusions regarding herself and Blake had fallen from her
eyes; she had stated both those facts plainly to herself, and they had
helped her to decide upon a course of action. There had been moments
when she had despised herself for using her stronger will to coerce
Blake into the fulfilment of his engagement, but on the morning after
the wedding these moments were forgotten, and, as she hoed and raked
and planted in the brisk air and the bright spring sunshine, her whole
existence seemed uplifted by the knowledge that she and Blake at last
belonged unquestionably to each other; that every output of her
strength was for their common comfort, and would continue to be as
long as they both should live.