FullReads

“Yes, I guess so,” replied Hetty.

“I dun’ know how in the world I can have you. All the beds will be full – I expect his mother some to-night, an’ I’m dreadful stirred up anyhow.”

“Everybody’s havin’ company; I never see anything like it.”Hetty’s
voice was inscrutable. The other woman looked sharply at her.

“You’ve got a place, ain’t you?” she asked, doubtfully.

“Yes, I have.”

At the left of this house, quite back from the road, was a little unpainted cottage, hardly more than a hut. There was smoke coming out of the chimney, and a tall youth lounged in the door. Hetty, with the woman and children staring after her, struck out across the field in the little foot-path towards the cottage.”I wonder if she’s goin’ to stay there?” the woman muttered, meditating.

The youth did not see Hetty until she was quite near him, then he aroused suddenly as if from sleep, and tried to slink off around the cottage. But Hetty called after him.”Sammy,” she cried, “Sammy, come back here, I want you!”

“What d’ye want?”

“Come back here!”

The youth lounged back sulkily, and a tall woman came to the door. She bent out of it anxiously to hear Hetty.

“I want you to come an’ help me move my stove an’ things,” said Hetty.

“Where to?”

“Into the meetin’-house.”

“The meetin’-house?”

“Yes, the meetin’-house.”

The woman in the door had sodden hands; behind her arose the steam of a wash-tub. She and the youth stared at Hetty, but surprise was too strong an emotion for them to grasp firmly.

“I want Sammy to come right over an’ help me,” said Hetty.

“He ain’t strong enough to move a stove,” said the woman.

“Ain’t strong enough!”

“He’s apt to git lame.”

“Most folks are. Guess I’ve got lame. Come right along, Sammy!”

“He ain’t able to lift much.”

“I s’pose he’s able to be lifted, ain’t he?”

“I dun’ know what you mean.”

“The stove don’t weigh nothin”,” said Hetty; “I could carry it myself if I could git hold of it. Come, Sammy!”

Hetty turned down the path, and the youth moved a little way after her, as if perforce. Then he stopped, and cast an appealing glance back at his mother. Her face was distressed.”Oh, Sammy, I’m afraid you’ll git sick,” said she.

“No, he ain’t goin’ to git sick,” said Hetty.”Come, Sammy.”And Sammy followed her down the path.

It was four o’clock then. At dusk Hetty had her gay sunflower quilt curtaining off the chimney-corner of the church gallery; her stove and little bedstead were set up, and she had entered upon a life which endured successfully for three months. All that time a storm brewed; then it broke; but Hetty sailed in her own course for the three months.

It was on a Saturday that she took up her habitation in the meeting-house. The next morning, when the boy who had been supplying the dead sexton’s place came and shook the door, Hetty was prompt on the other side.”Deacon Gale said for you to let me in so I could ring the bell,” called the boy.

“Go away,” responded Hetty.”I’m goin’ to ring the bell; I’m saxton.”

Hetty rang the bell with vigor, but she made a wild, irregular jangle at first; at the last it was better. The village people said to each other that a new hand was ringing. Only a few knew that Hetty was in the meeting-house. When the congregation had assembled, and saw that gaudy tent pitched in the house of the Lord, and the resolute little pilgrim at the door of it, there was a commotion. The farmers and their wives were stirred out of their Sabbath decorum. After the service was over, Hetty, sitting in a pew corner of the gallery, her little face dark and watchful against the flaming background of her quilt, saw the people below gathering in groups, whispering, and looking at her.