Country Neighbors

								

o' folderol an' enjoy it. You was always one to enjoy things."
They sat a long time at the table, and Jared took, as he said, more
coffee than was good for him, and praised the making of it. Then he
followed her about as she cleared away, and helped her a little with an
awkward hand. Amelia left the dishes in the sink.
"I won't clear up till night," she said. "We ain't talked out yet."
She led the way into the garden, and under the grape-trellis, where the
tall lilac-hedge shut them from the sight of passers-by, she gave him
old lady Knowles's great armchair, and took the little one that was hers
when she came over to sit a while with her old friend. The talk went
wandering back as if it sought the very sources of youth and life; but
somehow it touched commonplaces only. Yet Amelia had the sense, and she
was sure he had, too, of wandering there hand in hand, of finding no
surprises, but only the old things grown more dear, the old loyalties
the more abiding.
Suddenly he spoke, haltingly, voicing her own conviction.
"Don't seem but a minute, 'Melia, sence we set talkin' things over, much
as we do now. Seems if we hadn't been so fur separated all these years."
"No," said Amelia, with her beautiful sincerity, "I don't believe we
have been, Jared. Maybe that's how it is when folks die. We can't see
'em nor speak to 'em, but maybe they go right along bein' what we like
best. I know 'tis so with mother. Seems if, if she walked in here this
minute, we shouldn't have so very many stitches to take up. Sometimes
I've thought all I should say would be, 'Well, mother, you've got back,
ain't you?' Kinder like that."
The beautiful afternoon light lay on the grass and turned the grapevine
to a tender green. Jared looked upon the land as if he were treasuring
it in his heart for a day of loss. When the sun was low, and green and
red were flaming in the west, he rose.
"Well, 'Melia," he said, "I've seen you. Now I'll go."
Amelia stirred, too, recalled to service.
"I want to make you a cup o' tea," she said. "You get me a pail o' fresh
water, Jared. 'Twon't take but a minute."
He followed her about, this time, while she set the table; and again
they broke bread together. When he rose from his chair now, it was for
good.
"Well, 'Melia," he said; and she gave him her hand.
She went with him to the door, and stood there as he started down the
path. Half-way he hesitated, and then came back to her. His eyes were
soft and kindly.
"'Melia," he said, "I ain't told you the half, an' I dunno 's I can tell
it now. I never knew how things were with you. I've laid awake nights,
wonderin'. You never was very strong. 'Why,' says I to myself many a
night when I'd hear the wind blowin' ag'inst the winder, 'mebbe she's
had to go out to work. Mebbe she ain't got a place to lay her head.'"
He was rushing on in a full tide of confidence, and she recalled him.
She leaned forward to him, out of the doorway of her beautiful house,