the result of rosamund's increased determination was that, by the end of the week, a curiously assorted household was taxing the capacity of the cottage almost to the utmost. grace tobet, however, was not there. rosamund had many long talks with her about other things; the poor soul had been miserably uneasy since the episode of the stone-throwing, and besought rosamund to release her from her bond of silence. but that their friendship might bring trouble upon herself she denied, and when rosamund tried to persuade her to take shelter in the brown house she would do no more than shake her head or raise the girl's hand to her own cheek in caress, or look off to the hills with unseeing eyes tear-brimmed, as on the first day she had spoken of her baby; and rosamund could not urge her farther after that.
"it's often that a way," mother cary said, when rosamund told her about it. "it binds 'em to a place faster than ropes could. you can break through most anything you can see, honey-bud; it's the things you can't see that you can't get away from. and they holds you all the tighter when they're the things you useter have and haven't any more—'specially little child'en."
eleanor, too, had a word to say on grace's side. "can't you see, sweet, that if she leaves her joe, she will be admitting his unworthiness?"
"but since he plainly is unworthy——?"
"what he is has very little to do with it. it is what she must believe him to be, as long as she can."
"how can she believe him to be anything that is good? he killed their baby—and you know very well that she has had to go through the woods all alone at night to warn him when the government men are out."
eleanor shook her head. "we don't know that, rose. and as long as grace stays with him and says nothing, we can't know it. she is keeping that fact from being knowledge—if it is fact. don't you see that she just has to hold on to that vague 'if'?"
"but she cannot possibly love the man, eleanor!"
eleanor looked at her curiously, and for some hidden reason which she could not define rosamund's heart, under that long look, began to beat faster.
"ah, rosamund, which of us can understand love?" eleanor asked. after a pause she added, "i have wondered sometimes whether they really and truly love—the people who question 'why'!"
rosamund was beginning to be afraid of the turn the conversation was taking. "oh, eleanor!" she exclaimed, somewhat impatiently, "your subtleties are beyond me!"
while they talked, tim had been tramping back and forth on the front veranda of the house, himself the horse of a little iron wagon that was one of his new toys. he was seldom willing that eleanor should waste time in uninteresting conversation with grown-ups. he had taken her for his own; and rosamund, yetta, mother cary—everyone who had ministered to him before—were all but forgotten. eleanor must now do everything for him; nothing less than complete possession could satisfy his hungry little heart. and eleanor's hunger for tim went beyond his for her; as she talked, her eyes followed him, her look brooding upon him as if he were new-born and her own.
at rosamund's last exclamation she laughed, and bending towards timmy on one of his turnings, gathered him into her arms, in spite of his indignantly protesting squirms and thrusts.
"my subtleties, indeed!" she said, while burrowing for kisses under the curls on his neck. "i'm the most elemental creature alive! i'm nothing more than a mother hen!"
"matt chopped ve chicken's head off wif a ax," said tim, "an' it hopped an' hopped an' hopped. an' sue took all its fevvers off. but chickens don't catch cold. an' anyway its head was gone."
"mercy!" said rosamund. "matt ought not to have let the child see that! and i do wish he wouldn't be so—so explicit!"
they laughed, but eleanor could not ignore the opportunity for a lesson in good manners. she had tried in vain to impress it upon tim before; now she repeated, "you must call her aunt sue, timmy! i call her that, and miss rose does. you want to be polite, too, don't you?"
but tim knew what he wanted; he had thought it out for himself. "she ain't," he said, frowning. "an' i don't want her. i got a muvver."
"oh! the darling!" cried eleanor, and let him swagger back to his march with the wagon.
so the boy was provided for, and eleanor daily gained in health. ogilvie was delighted.
"just let it go on for a few months," said he, "and she'll forget she has any eyes. pity she'll have to go back to work, though," he added.
he had been away for a few days, on some consultation, and so could notice the change in her all the more for his absence. they were driving through the golden woods; the first heavy frost had fallen the night before.
her breath fluttered a little as she answered. "she will not have to work any more—not as she used to—if she decides really to adopt timmy," she said, palpitating in wonder as to how he would take the disclosure of her gift and what it implied.
he turned quickly to look at her, all interest. "so that's what flood meant!" he said.
she returned his look rather blankly. "mr. flood? what on earth do you mean?"
"i stayed with him in new york, you know. he told me the kiddie's future was provided for, but he was too modest to tell me how. that's one of the things i like about him—his modesty. he's a fine fellow, flood is."
it was something more than disconcerting to have her generosity attributed to someone else; that he should give the credit of it to flood, of all people, was plainly provoking.
"did he give you to understand that he had done the providing?" she asked.
"why, no! i've just told you he was too modest!" then, perhaps at something in her look of disdain, he understood. "oh, i see! i'm sure i beg your pardon! it is you who are doing it?"
she did not reply nor look at him, but flushed deeply.
but he did not seem to think it mattered either way. "well, it'll be the best thing in the world for them both," he said.
so there was to be no word of praise for herself! she forgot to wonder at his unquestioning acceptance of the fact that she should have enough to spare for such a gift; it did not occur to her until afterward that he must have known of her fortune all along.
in her disappointment and dismay she spoke with a little tremor of anger which did not escape him.
"i suppose you think it is no more than i ought to do!" she said.
he ran his fingers through his hair. "well! is it?" he questioned.
she did not reply to that, and he asked, "you will not miss what you give, will you?" by his tone he might have been asking, "well, what of it? what's money good for, anyway?"
at that she turned to him, head lifted, eyes aflame. "i suppose you are one of those people who think that we ought to divide everything equally—number the people and give them equal shares—so many pennies apiece!"
he laughed good-humoredly. "o lord, no! if the wealth of the nations were equally divided on a monday, it would be back in the pockets it was taken from by the first saturday night! the smart ones would get it all back again."
"i am not one of the—'smart'—ones. but i suppose it wouldn't matter if i went hungry——"
whatever she had hoped for from that, his reply was certainly unexpected. he looked at her for a moment, then put his head back and roared—laughed until the woods rang, until white rosy turned her head to look at him, until rosamund, her anger melting, laughed with him.
"oh, i say!" he cried at last. "i'm awfully sorry! miss randall—you'll forgive me for being so utterly stupid, won't you?"
"i did want you to praise me," she admitted, dimpling.
instantly he became serious. "to praise you would be like praising the sunlight, or the blessed rain, or any other of the crowning works of god almighty," he said.
"we were talking of timmy," she reminded him, not quite truthfully, but grasping at anything that might turn him from that strain, "and mr. flood!"
the ruse succeeded. "flood! yes. he's a big man."
"i don't think i quite realized that you were such friends!"
"i like him," said ogilvie. "i like him mighty well. he's a chap who's not afraid to be fine. i tell you, it was a surprise to me to find him that sort—benson flood. you know, the name seems to suggest bonanzas, show and glitter, crudeness, perhaps a little—well—not what he is, anyway."
"but, surely, you have only seen him—twice, three times, isn't it? how can you possibly know all that about him?"
he smiled. "oh, men don't always have to learn each other, as they would lessons, you know. i know what flood is as well as if i had known him for years—and i like him as well, too!"
she looked at his enthusiastic face a little wonderingly. "women are not like that," she said. "we—i don't think we—believe in our friends, as men do!"
"oh, come now! why don't you?"
"because we don't. and because we don't deserve it. why, you talk about mr. flood, who is certainly a new friend, to say the least, as if you would make any sacrifice for him! women wouldn't do that for each other."
he could not guess that her touch of bitterness was due to her new humility—the humility she was so rapidly learning through her experiences here in the mountains; certainly he was far from seeing that he had himself done much to teach it to her, even during the past hour, when he had seemed to look upon her wealth as of small significance; now he was putting far more emphasis upon the fineness of character of flood, the man she had so lightly esteemed.
"i fancy mrs. reeves would have something to say to that," said ogilvie.
"oh, eleanor! eleanor is my exception, of course! we all have our exceptions. but aside from eleanor, there is no one else for whom i would make a sacrifice; yet you would do so for mr. flood, wouldn't you?"
now he was rumpling his hair until it stood on end. "why, yes, i suppose so! yes, of course," he said, as if he were wondering where the talk was leading. then he put it aside, and turned towards her.
"how little you know yourself!" he said.
