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After the meeting, Caleb Gale approached the other deacons.”Something’s got to be done,” said he. And the other deacon nodded. He had not smelt the cabbage until his wife nudged him and mentioned it; neither had Caleb Gale.

In the afternoon of the next Thursday, Caleb and the other two selectmen waited upon Hetty in her tabernacle. They stumped up the gallery stairs, and Hetty emerged from behind the quilt and stood looking at them scared and defiant. The three men nodded stiffly; there was a pause; Caleb Gale motioned meaningly to one of the others, who shook his head; finally he himself had to speak.”I’m ‘fraid you find it pretty cold here, don’t you, Hetty?” said he.

“No, thank ye; it’s very comfortable,” replied Hetty, polite and wary.

“It ain’t very convenient for you to do your cookin’ here, I guess.”

“It’s jest as convenient as I want. I don’t find no fault.”

“I guess it’s rayther lonesome here nights, ain’t it?”

“I’d ‘nough sight ruther be alone than have comp’ny, any day.”

“It ain’t fit for an old woman like you to be livin’ alone here this way.”

“Well, I dun’ know of anything that’s any fitter; mebbe you do.”

Caleb looked appealingly at his companions; they stood stiff and irresponsive. Hetty’s eyes were as sharp and watchful upon them all.

“Well, Hetty,” said Caleb, “we’ve found a nice, comfortable place for you, an’ I guess you’d better pack up your things, an’ I’ll carry you right over there.”Caleb stepped back a little closer to the other men. Hetty, small and trembling and helpless before them, looked vicious. She was like a little animal driven from its cover, for whom there is nothing left but desperate warfare and death.

“Where to?” asked Hetty. Her voice shrilled up into a squeak.

Caleb hesitated. He looked again at the other selectmen. There was a solemn, far-away expression upon their faces.”Well,” said he, “Mis’ Radway wants to git somebody, an’ –”

“You ain’t goin’ to take me to that woman’s!”

“You’d be real comfortable –”

“I ain’t goin’.”

“Now, why not, I’d like to know?”

“I don’t like Susan Radway, hain’t never like her, an’ I ain’t goin’ to live with her.”

“Mis’ Radway’s a good Christian woman. You hadn’t ought to speak that way about her.”

“You know what Susan Radway is, jest as well’s I do; an’ everybody else does too. I ain’t goin’ a step, an’ you might jest as well make up your mind to it.”

Then Hetty seated herself in the corner of the pew nearest her tent, and folded her hands in her lap. She looked over at the pulpit as if she were listening to preaching. She panted, and her eyes glittered, but she had an immovable air.

“Now, Hetty, you’ve got sense enough to know you can’t stay here,” said Caleb.”You’d better put on your bonnet, an’ come right along before dark. You’ll have a nice ride.”

Hetty made no response.

The three men stood looking at her.”Come, Hetty,” said Caleb, feebly; and another selectman spoke.”Yes, you’d better come,” he said, in a mild voice.

Hetty continued to stare at the pulpit.

The three men withdrew a little and conferred. They did not know how to act. This was a new emergency in their simple, even lives. They were not constables; these three steady, sober old men did not want to drag an old woman by main force out of the meeting-house, and thrust her into Caleb Gale’s buggy as if it were a police wagon.

Finally Caleb brightened.”I’ll go over an’ git mother,” said he. He started with a brisk air, and went down the gallery stairs; the others followed. They took up their stand in the meeting-house yard, and Caleb got into his buggy and gathered up the reins. The wind blew cold over the hill.”Hadn’t you better go inside and wait out of the wind?” said Caleb.