it seemed as if he should lose his head and go wild for very anguish
of heart.

"I 'spose I'm kinder thin and some changed, so ye didn't know me,"
said Reuben, with a feeble smile. "Ye see I've been here a year, and
am going into a decline. I sent word home to have father ask Deacon
Nash if he wouldn't let me go home to be nussed up by mother. I should
get rugged again if I could have a little o' mother's nussin. P'raps
ye've come to take me home, Perez?" And a faint gleam of hope came
into his face.

"Reub, Reub, I didn't know you was here," groaned Perez, as he put his
arm about his brother, and supported his feeble figure.

"How come ye here, then?" asked Reuben.

"I was going home. I haven't been home since the war. Didn't you know?
I heard o' George's being here, and came in to see him, but I didn't
think o' you're being here."

"Where have ye been, Perez, all the time? I callated ye must be in
jail, somewheres, like all the rest of the soldiers."

"I had no money to get home with. But how came you here, Reub? Who put
you here?"

"Twas Deacon Nash done it. I tried to start a farm arter the war, and
got in debt to Deacon for seed and stock, and there wasn't no crop,
and the hard times come. I couldn't pay, and the Deacon sued, and so I
lost the farm and had to come here."