Part 20

"I'm too amazed to think it out," faltered Amanda.

"Don't you think it out, for God's sake, or you'll never do it!" He caught at her hand as if it had been a life-line--her kind, smooth hand, the helpful hand with the bit of white cambric bound round a finger burned in his service.

"It was the kitchen that put the courage into me," he went on feverishly. "I laid here an' thought: 'If she can make a house look so different in a week, what could she do with a man?'"

"I ain't afraid but I could," stammered Amanda; "if the man would help--not hinder."

"Just try me, Amanda. I wouldn't need a year--honest, I wouldn't--I could show you in three months!"

Caleb's strength was waning now. His head dropped forward and Amanda caught it on her breast. She put one arm round his shoulders to keep him from falling back, while her other hand supported his head. His cheek was wet and as she felt the tears on her palm, mutely calling to her strength, all the woman in her gathered itself together and rushed to meet the man's need.

"If only ... you could take me ... now ... right off," he faltered; "before anything happens ... to prevent? I'd be good to you ... till the day I die!"

"I ain't afraid to risk it, Caleb," said Amanda. "I'll take you now when you need me the most. We'll just put our two forlorn houses together an' see if we can make 'em into a home!"

Caleb gave one choking sob of content and gratitude. His hand relaxed its clasp of Amanda's; his head dropped and he fainted.

William Benson came in just then.

"What's the matter?" he cried, coming quickly toward the bed. "Has he had a spell? He was so much better last night I expected to see him settin' up!"

"He'll come to in a minute," said Amanda. "Give me the palm-leaf fan. We're goin' to be married in a day or so, an' he got kind of excited talkin' it over."

"Moses in the bulrushes!" ejaculated William Benson, sitting down heavily in the nearest chair.

William Benson was not a sentimental or imaginative person, and he confessed he couldn't make head nor tail out o' the affair; said it was the queerest an' beatin'est weddin' that ever took place in Bonny Eagle; didn't know when they fixed it up, nor how, nor why, if you come to that. Amanda Dalton had never had a beau, but she was the likeliest woman in the village, spite o' that, an' Caleb Kimball was the onlikeliest man. Amanda was the smartest woman, an' Caleb the laziest man. He kind o' thought Amanda 'd married Caleb so 't she could clean house for him; but it seemed an awful high price to pay for a job. He guessed she couldn't bear to have his everlastin' whiteweed seedin' itself into her hayfield, an' the only way she could stop it was to marry him an' weed it out. He thought, too, that Caleb had kind o' got int' the habit o' watchin' Mandy flyin' about down to her place. There's nothin' so fascinatin' as to set still an' see other folks work. The critter was so busy, an' so diff'rent from him, mebbe it kind o' tantalized him.

The Widow Thatcher was convinced that Mandy must have gone for Caleb hammer 'n' tongs when he was too weak to hold out against her. No woman in her sober senses would paper a man's kitchen for him unless she intended to get some use out of it herself. "We don't know what the disciples would 'a' done," she said, "nor the apostles, nor the saints, nor the archangels; we only know what women-folks would 'a' done, and there ain't one above ground that would 'a' cleaned Caleb Kimball's house without she expected to live in it."

Susan Benson had a vague instinct with regard to the real facts of the case, but even she mustered up courage to ask Amanda once how the wonderful matter came about.

Amanda looked at Mrs. Benson with some embarrassment, for she was not good at confidences.

"Susan, you an' I've been brought up together, gone to school together, experienced religion an' joined the church together, an' I stood up with you an' William when you was married, so 't I'd speak out freer to you than I would to most."

"I hope so, I'm sure."

"Though I wouldn't want you to repeat anything, Susan."

"'Tain't likely I would, Mandy."

"Well, I'd no sooner got Caleb into a clean bed an' a clean room an' begun to feed him good food than I begun to like him. There's things in human hearts that I ain't wise enough to explain, Susan, an' I ain't goin' to try. Caleb Kimball seemed to me like a man that was drownin', all because there wa'n't anybody near to put a hand under his chin an' keep his head out o' water. I didn't suspicion he'd let me do it! I thought he'd just lie there an' drown, but it didn't turn out that way."

"Well, it does kind o' seem as if you'd gone through the woods o' life to pick up a crooked stick at last," sighed Susan; "though I will say, now I've been under Caleb Kimball's roof, he's an awful sight nicer man close to than he is fur off. So, take it all in all, life an' men-folks bein' so uncertain, an' old age a-creepin' on first thing you know, perhaps it's for the best; an' I do hope you'll make out to be happy, Mandy."

There was a quiver of real feeling in Susan Benson's voice, though she made no movement to touch her friend's hand.

"I'm goin' to be happy!" said Amanda cheerfully. "I always did like plenty to do, an' now I've got it for the rest o' my life!"

"I only hope you can stan' his ways, Amandy," and Susan's voice was still doubtful. "That's all I'm afraid of; that you're so diff'rent you can't never stan' his ways."

"He won't have so many ways when we've been married a spell," said Amanda.

HULDAH THE PROPHETESS