Fuller threw open the window and called "Ruth." She came in slowly, and started when she saw Reuben there, and both she and he stood for a moment in some confusion.

"Gi'e the wench a kiss and ha' done with it," said Fuller. "Her's as ready as thee beest willin'."

Reuben acted on this sage counsel, and Ruth, though she blushed like a rose, made no protest.

"Theer," said papa, hugging his fat waistcoat, and rolling from the room. "Call me when I'm wanted."

He was not wanted for a long time, for the lovers had much to say to each other, as was only natural. First of all, Ruth shyly gave Reuben the letter she had written the night before, and he read it, and then there were questions to be asked and answered on either side, as--Did she really love him? And why? And since when? And had she not always known that he loved her? All which the reader shall figure out of his or her own experience or fancy; for these things, though delightful in their own time and place, are not to be written of, having a smack of foolishness with much that is tender and charming.

Next--or rather interlaced with this--came Ruth's version of Aunt Rachel's curious behavior. And then said Reuben,

"I think I hold the key to that. But whether I do or not remains to be seen. I found this in Manzini. You see how old it looks. The very pin that held it to the paper was rusted half through. You see," turning it over, "it is addressed to Mr. Gold. I am afraid it was meant for my uncle, and that he never saw it. If it is a breach of faith to show it you I cannot help it. Read it, darling, and tell me what you think is best to be done."

Ruth read it, and looked up with a face pale with extreme compa.s.sion.

"Reuben," she said, "this is Aunt Rachel's handwriting. This is all her story." She began to cry, and Reuben comforted her. "What can we do?"

she asked, gently evading him. "Oh, Reuben, how pitiful, how pitiful it is!"

"Should he have it after all these years?" asked Reuben. "What can it be but a regret to him?"

"Oh yes," she answered, with clasped hands and new tears in her eyes, "he must have it. Think of his poor spirit knowing afterwards that we had kept it from him?"

"It will be a sore grief for him to see it. I fear so. A sore grief."

"Aunt Rachel will be less bitter when she knows. But oh, Reuben, to be parted in that way for so long! Do you see it all? He wrote to her asking her to be his wife, and she wrote back, and he never had her answer, and waited for it. And she, waiting and waiting for him, and hearing nothing, thinking she had been tricked and mocked, poor thing, and growing prouder and bitterer until she went away. I never, never heard of anything so sad." She would have none of Reuben's consoling now, though the tears were streaming down her cheeks. "Go," she begged him--"go at once, and take it to him. Think if it were you and me!"

"It would never have happened to you and me, my darling," said Reuben.

"I'd have had 'Yes' or 'No' for an answer. A man's offer of his heart is worth a 'No, thank you,' though he made it to a queen."

"Go at once," she besought him. "I shall be unhappy till I know he knows!"

"Well, my dear," said Reuben, "if you say go, I go. But I'd as lief put my hand in a fire. The poor old man will have suffered nothing like this for many a day."

"Stop an' tek a bit o' breakfast, lad," cried Fuller, as Reuben hurried by him, at the door which gave upon the garden. "It'll be ready i' five minutes."

"I have my orders, sir," said Reuben, with a pale smile. "I can't stop this morning, much as I should like to."

Like most healthy men of vivid fancy he was a rapid walker, and in a few minutes he was in sight of his uncle's house. His heart failed him and he stopped short irresolutely. Should he send the letter, explaining where he found it, and how? He could hardly bear to think of looking on the pain the old man might endure. And yet would it not be kinder to be with him? Might he not be in need of some one? and if he were, who was there but his nephew--the one man of his kindred left alive?

"I'll do it at once," said Reuben, and walking straight to the door, he knocked. He would have given all he had to be away when this was done, but he had to stand his ground, and he waited a long time while a hand drew back the shrieking bolts and clattering chain within. Then the key turned in the lock. The door opened and his uncle stood before him.

"Beest early this morning," he said, with a smile. "Theer's something special brings thee here so 'soon?"

"Yes," answered Reuben, clearing his throat, "something special."

"Come in, lad," said Ezra. "No trouble, I hope. Theer's a kind of a troubled look upon you. What is it?"

Reuben entered without an immediate answer, and Ezra closed the door behind him. The gloom and the almost vault-like odors of the chamber struck upon him with a cold sense of solitude and age. They answered to the thoughts that filled him--the thoughts of his uncle's lonely and sunless life.

"Trouble!" said the old man, in an inward voice. "Theer's trouble everywheer! What is it, lad?"

"Sit down, uncle," began Reuben, after a pause in which Ezra peered at him anxiously. "I find I must tell you some business of my own to make myself quite clear. I wrote a note to Ruth last night, and I learned from her that she had put an answer between the leaves of Manzini. I took the book home and found a note addressed to Mr. Gold. I opened it, and it was signed with an 'R,' and so I read it. But I can't help thinking it belongs to you. The paper's very yellow and old, and I think "--his voice grew treacherous, and he could scarcely command it--"I think it must have lain there unnoticed for some years."

He held it out rustling and shaking in his hand. Ezra, breathing hard and short, accepted it, and began to grope in his pockets for his spectacle-case. After a while he found it, and tremblingly setting his gla.s.ses astride his nose, began to unfold the paper, which crackled noisily in the dead silence.

When he had unfolded it he glanced across at Reuben and walked to the window.

"Theer's summat wrong," he said, when he had stood there for a minute or two, with the crisp, thick old paper crackling in his hand. "Summat the matter wi' my eyes. Read it--out." His voice was ghastly strange.

Reuben approached him and took the letter from his fingers. In this exchange their hands met, and Ezra's was like ice. He laid it on Reuben's shoulder, repeating, "Read it out."

"'Dear Mr. Gold,'" read Reuben, "I have not answered your esteemed note until now, though in receipt of it since Thursday.'"

"Thursday?" said Ezra.

"Thursday," repeated Reuben. "'For I dare not seem precipitate in such a matter. But I have consulted my own heart, and have laid it before the Throne, knowing no earthly adviser.'"

There was such a tremor in the hand which held him that Reuben's voice failed for pure pity.

"Yes," said Ezra. "Goon."

"'Dear Mr. Gold,'" read Reuben, in a voice even less steady than before, "'it shall be as you wish.'" There he paused again, his voice betraying him.

"Go on," said Ezra.

"'It shall be as you wish, and I trust G.o.d may help me to be a worthy helpmeet. So no more till I hear again from you. R.'"

"That's all?" asked Ezra.

"That's all."

"Thank you, lad, thank you." He stooped as if in the act of sitting down, and Reuben, pa.s.sing an arm about his waist, led him to an armchair. "Thank you, lad," he said again. An eight-day clock ticked in a neighboring room. "That was how it came to pa.s.s," said the old man, in a voice so strangely commonplace that Reuben started at it. "Ah! That was how it came to pa.s.s." He was silent again for two or three minutes, and the clock ticked on. "That was how it came to pa.s.s," he said again.

With great deliberation he set his hands together, finger by finger, in the shape of a wedge, and then pushing them between his knees, bent his head above them, and seemed to stare at the dim pattern of the carpet.

He was silent for a long time now, and sat as still as if he were carved in stone. "Who's there?" he cried, suddenly looking up.

"I am here, uncle," Reuben answered.

"Yes, yes," said Ezra. "Reuben. Yes, of course. And that was how it came to pa.s.s."

Reuben, with a burning and choking sensation in his throat, stood in his place, not knowing what to say or do.

"Wheer is it?" asked Ezra, looking up again. Reuben handed him the note, and he sat with bent head above it for a long time. "Reuben, lad," he said then, "I'll wish thee a good-mornin'. I'm like to be poor company, and to tell the truth, lad, I want to be by mysen for a while. I've been shook a bit, my lad, I've been shook a bit."

As he spoke thus he arose, and with his hands folded behind him walked to and fro. His face was grayer than common, and the bright color which generally marked his cheeks was flown; but it was plain to see that he had recovered full possession of himself, though he was still much agitated. Reuben went away in silence, and Ezra continued to pace the room for an hour. His house-keeper appeared to tell him that breakfast was on the table, but though he answered in his customary manner he took no further notice. She came again to tell him with a voice of complaint that everything was cold and spoiled.

"Well, well, woman," said Ezra, "leave it theer."

He went on walking up and down, until, without any acceleration of his pace, he changed the direction of his walk and pa.s.sed out at the door, feeling in the darkened little pa.s.sage for his hat.