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William’s startled eyes followed the direction of Mrs. Stone’s wavering index finger, and saw a great ancient trunk lined with blue and white wall-paper, standing open against the opposite wall.

“She dragged it down from the garret this forenoon,” continued Mrs. Stone, in the same tone of unfaltering tragedy, while Narcissa, her delicate lips pursed tightly, folded up the bedquilt which her mother had brought.”It bumped so hard on those garret stairs I thought she’d break it, or fall herself, but she wouldn’t let me help her. Then she cleaned it, an’ made some paste, an’ lined it with some of the parlor paper. There ain’t any key to it – I never remember none. The trunk was in this house when I come here. Richard had it when he went West before we were married. Narcissa she says she is goin’ to tie it up with the clothes-line. William, can’t you talk to her?Seems to me I can’t go to New York nohow.”

William turned then to Narcissa, who was laying the folded bedquilt in the trunk. He looked pale and bewildered, and his voice trembled when he spoke.”This ain’t true, is it, Narcissa?” he said.

“Yes, it is,” she replied, shortly, still bending over the trunk.

“We ain’t goin’ for a month,” interposed her mother again; “we can’t get the insurance money before then, Lawyer Maxham says; but she says she’s goin’ to have the trunk standin’ there, an’ put things in when she thinks of it, so she won’t forgit nothin’. She says we’d better take one bedquilt with us, in case they don’t have ‘nough clothes on the bed. We’ve got to stay to a hotel. Oh, William, can’t you say anything to stop her?”

“This ain’t true, Narcissa?” William repeated, helplessly.

Narcissa raise herself and faced him. Her cheeks were red, her blue eyes glowing, her hair tossing over her temples in loose waves. She looked as she had when he first courted her.”Yes, it is, William Crane,” she cried.”Yes, it is.”

William looked at her so strangely and piteously that she softened a little.”I’ve got my reasons,” said she.”Maybe I owe it to you to tell them. I suppose you were expecting something different.”She hesitated a minute, looking at her mother, who cried out again:

“Oh, William, say somethin’ to stop her!Can’t you say somethin’ to stop her?”

Then Narcissa motioned to him resolutely.”Come into the parlor, William,” said she, and he followed her out across the entry. The parlor was chilly; the chairs stood as they had done at the funeral, primly against the walls glimmering faintly in the dusk with blue and white paper like the trunk lining. Narcissa stood before William and talked with feverish haste.”I’m going,” said she – “I’m going to take that money and go with mother to New York, and you mustn’t try to stop me, William. I know what you’ve been expecting. I know, now father’s gone, you think there ain’t anything to hinder our getting married; you think we’ll rent this house, and mother and me will settle down in yours for the rest of our lives. I know you ain’t counting on that insurance money; it ain’t like you.”

“The Lord knows it ain’t, Narcissa,” William broke out with pathetic pride.

“I know that as well as you do. You thought we’d put it in the bank for a rainy day, in case mother got feeble, or anything, and that is all you did think. Maybe I’d ought to. I s’pose I had, but I ain’t going to. I ‘ain’t never done anything my whole life that I thought I ought not to do, but now I’m going to. I’m going to if it’s wicked. I’ve made up my mind. I ‘ain’t never had one good time in my whole life, and now I’m going to, even if I have to suffer for it afterwards.

“I ‘ain’t never had anything like other women. I’ve never had any clothes nor gone anywhere. I’ve just stayed at home here and drudged. I’ve done a man’s work on the farm. I’ve milked and made butter and cheese;I’ve waited on father; I’ve got up early and gone to bed late. I’ve just drudged, drudged, ever since I can remember. I don’t know anything about the world nor life. I don’t know anything but my own old tracks, and – I’m going to get out of them for a while, whether or no.”