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She made a picture of sweet, strong, steady womanliness, although she did not know it. Caleb knew something extraordinary was going on inside of him, but under what impulse he was too puzzled and inexperienced to say.

“Amanda.”

Amanda turned sharply at the sound of his voice as she was lifting the steaming arrowroot out of the water.

“Whose cat is this?”

“Mine.–Come off that bed, Tristram!”

“Don’t disturb him; I like to have him there.–Where’s Abby Thatcher?”

“She’s gone home on an errand; she’ll be back in fifteen minutes now.”

“Where’s William?”

“It’s only five o’clock. He don’t come till six. What can I get for you? Have you had a good sleep?”

She set the gruel on the back of the stove and went in to his bedside.

“I don’t sleep much; I just lie an’ think … Amanda, … now, they’re all away, … if I get over this spell, … an’ take a year to straighten up an’ get hold o’ things like other folks, … do you think … you’d risk … marryin’ me?”

There was a moment’s dead silence; then Amanda said, turning pale: “Are you in your right mind, Caleb Kimball?”

“I am, but I don’t wonder at your askin’,” said the man humbly. “I’ve kind o’ fancied you for years; but you’ve always been way down there across the fields, out o’ reach!”

“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.