"I don't know, Hester, no more than you do," laughed Jeremiah happily; "only William says he's tired of runnin' things all alone, an' he wants me to take hold again. They're goin' ter make out the papers right away; an' say, Hester,"--the bent shoulders drew themselves erect with an air of pride,--"I thought mebbe this afternoon we'd drive over ter Huntersville an' get some shoes for you. Ye know you're always needin'

shoes!"

The Long Road

"Jane!"

"Yes, father."

"Is the house locked up?"

"Yes."

"Are ye sure, now?"

"Why, yes, dear; I just did it."

"Well, won't ye see?"

"But I have seen, father." Jane did not often make so many words about this little matter, but she was particularly tired to-night.

The old man fell back wearily.

"Seems ter me, Jane, ye might jest see," he fretted. "'T ain't much I'm askin' of ye, an' ye know them spoons--"

"Yes, yes, dear, I'll go," interrupted the woman hurriedly.

"And, Jane!"

"Yes." The woman turned and waited. She knew quite well what was coming, but it was the very exquisiteness of her patient care that allowed her to give no sign that she had waited in that same spot to hear those same words every night for long years past.

"An' ye might count 'em--them spoons," said the old man.

"Yes."

"An' the forks."

"Yes."

"An' them photygraph pictures in the parlor."

"All right, father." The woman turned away. Her step was slow, but confident--the last word had been said.

To Jane Pendergast her father had gone with the going of his keen, clear mind, twenty years before. This fretful, childish, exacting old man that pottered about the house all day was but the sh.e.l.l that had held the kernel--the casket that had held the jewel. But because of what it had held, Jane guarded it tenderly, laying at its feet her life as a willing sacrifice.

There had been four children: Edgar, the eldest; Jane, Mary, and Fred.

Edgar had left home early, and was a successful business man in Boston.

Mary had married a wealthy lawyer of the same city; and Fred had opened a real estate office in a thriving Southern town.

Jane had stayed at home. There had been a time, it is true, when she had planned to go away to school; but the death of Mrs. Pendergast left no one at home to care for Mary and Fred, so Jane had abandoned the idea.

Later, after Mary had married and Fred had gone away, there was still her father to be cared for, though at this time he was well and strong.

Jane had pa.s.sed her thirty-fifth birthday, when she became palpitatingly aware of a pair of blue-gray eyes, and a determined, smooth-shaven chin belonging to the recently arrived princ.i.p.al of the village school. In spite of her stern admonition to herself to remember her years and not quite lose her head, she was fast drifting into a rosy dream of romance that was all the more enthralling because so belated, when the summons of a small boy brought her sharply back to the realities.

"It's yer father, miss. They want ye ter come," he panted. "Somethin'

has took him. He's in Mackey's drug store, talkin' awful queer. He ain't his self, ye know. They thought maybe you could--do somethin'."

Jane went at once--but she could do nothing except to lead gently home the chattering, shifting-eyed thing that had once been her father. One after another the village physicians shook their heads--they could do nothing. Skilled alienists from the city--they, too, could do nothing.

There was nothing that could be done, they said, except to care for him as one would for a child. He would live years, probably. His const.i.tution was wonderfully good. He would not be violent--just foolish and childish, with perhaps a growing irritability as the years pa.s.sed and his physical strength failed.

Mary and Edgar had come home at once. Mary had stayed two days and Edgar five hours. They were shocked and dismayed at their father's condition.

So overwhelmed with grief were they, indeed, that they fled from the room almost immediately upon seeing him, and Edgar took the first train out of town.

Mary, shiveringly, crept from room to room, trying to find a place where the cackling laugh and the fretful voice would not reach her. But the old man, like a child with a new toy, was pleased at his daughter's arrival, and followed her about the house with unfailing persistence.

"But, Mary, he won't hurt you. Why do you run?" remonstrated Jane.

Mary shuddered and covered her face with her hands.

"Jane, Jane, how can you take it so calmly!" she moaned. "How can you bear it?"

There was a moment's pause. A curious expression had come to Jane's face.

"Some one--has to," she said at last, quietly.

Jane went down to the village the next afternoon, leaving her sister in charge at home. When she returned, an hour later, Mary met her at the gate, crying and wringing her hands.

"Jane, Jane, I thought you would never come! I can't do a thing with him. He insists that he isn't at home, and that he wants to go there. I told him, over and over again, that he _was_ at home already, but it didn't do a bit of good. I've had a perfectly awful time."

"Yes, I know. Where is he?"

"In the kitchen. I--I tied him. He just would go, and I couldn't hold him."

"Oh, _Mary_!" And Jane fairly flew up the walk to the kitchen door.

A minute later she appeared, leading an old man, who was whimpering pitifully.

"Home, Jane. I want ter go home."

"Yes, dear, I know. We'll go." And Mary watched with wondering eyes while the two walked down the path, through the gate and across the street to the next corner, then slowly crossed again and came back through the familiar doorway.

"Home!" chuckled the old man gleefully.

"We've come home!"