Rachel marched from the garden and disappeared through the door-way without a backward glance.  The girl, holding the crumpled letter in both hands behind her, beat her foot upon the greensward, and looked downward with flushed cheeks and glittering eyes.  Her life had not hitherto been fruitful of strong emotions, and she had never felt so angry or aggrieved as she felt now.

“How did she dare?  What can Reuben think of me?”

These were the only thoughts which found form in her mind, and each was poignant.

A knock sounded at the street door, and she moved mechanically to answer it, but catching sight of her father’s figure in the hall she turned away, and seated herself at the musicians’ table.

Fuller greeted Reuben-for the early visitor was no other than he-with a broad grin, and stuck a facetious forefinger in his ribs.

“Come in, lad, come in,” he said, chuckling.  “I never seed such a lark i’ my born days as we’ve had here this mornin’.”

“Indeed!” said Reuben.  “Can I-” He began to blush and stammer a little.  “Can I see Miss Ruth, Mr. Fuller?”

“All i’ good time, lad,” replied Fuller.  “Come in.  Sit thee down.”  Reuben complied, scarcely at his ease, and wondered what was coming.  “Was you expectin’ any sort of a letter last night, Reuben?” the old fellow asked him, with a fat enjoying chuckle.

“Yes, sir,” said Reuben, blushing anew, but regarding his questioner frankly.

“Was that what you took away the book o’ duets for, eh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Didst find the letter?” Fuller was determined to make the most of his history, after the manner of men who have stories ready made for them but rarely.

“I don’t know,” replied Reuben, to the old man’s amazement.  “Do you know what the letter was about, Mr. Fuller?”

“Don’t know?” cried Fuller.  “What beest hov-erin’ about?  Knowst whether thee hadst a letter or not, dostn’t?”

“I had a letter,” said Reuben, “but I can’t think it was meant for me.  Perhaps I ought to have spoken first to you, sir, but I wrote to Miss Ruth yesterday-” There he paused, asking himself how to put this altogether sacred thing into words.

“Didst now?” asked Fuller, unctuously enjoying the young man’s discomfort.  “What might it ha’ been about?”

“I wrote to ask her if she would marry me,” said Reuben, with desperate simplicity.

“Ah!” said Fuller.  “And what says her to that?”

“I can’t believe that I have had her answer,” returned Reuben, with much embarrassment.  “I found a letter in the book, but I think-I am sure-it is not meant for me.”

“You’ll find Ruth i’ the gardin,” said Fuller, puzzled in his turn.  “Her’ll tell you, mayhap.  But wait a bit; her’s rare an’ wroth this mornin’, and I ain’t sure as it’s safe to be anigh her.  Miss Blythe’s been here this mornin’-Aunt Rachel, as the wench has allays called her, though her’s no more than her mother’s second cousin-and it seems as th’ old creetur found out about Ruth’s letter, and went and took it from wheer it was and marched it off.  Her was here this mornin’ t’ ask me to open it and read it along with her.  Theer’s no tekin’ note of her, Reuben, poor old ooman.  Her’s got a hive in her head.  ’Do you know this young man’s character’ her says.  ‘Why, yis,’ I says; ’it’d be odd if I didn’t,’ I says.  ‘Well,’ her says, ‘he’s a villin.’  ‘Rubbidge,’ says I; ‘theer’s no moor esteemable feller i’ the parish,’ I says, ’onless it’s his uncle Ezra.’  Then her fires up and her says, ’His uncle Ezra is a villin.’  Then I bust out a-laughin’ in her face.  Her’s flighty, you know, lad, her’s uncommon flighty.  Six-and-twenty year ago-it was afore thee couldst toddle-her left the parish because of Ezra.”

“Because of my uncle?” There were so many things to be amazed at in this speech of Fuller’s that the youngster hardly knew which to be surprised at most.

“Didst never hear o’ that?” asked Fuller.  “It’s been the talk o’ the parish ever sence her come back to live in it.  Your uncle used to be a good deal at her mother’s house from thirty to six-and-twenty ’ear ago, and used to tek his fiddle theer and gie ’em a taste o’ music now and then.  Her seems to ha’ let it tek root in her poor head as he was squirin’ her and mekin’ up to her for marriage; but after four or five year her got tired and hopeless, I reckon, and went away.  Then I expect her begun to brood a bit, after the mode of a woman as is lonely, and has got no such thing as a man around her, and that’s how it is, lad.”

“My uncle!” Reuben fell to pacing up and down the room, talking aloud, but as if he addressed himself rather than his sweetheart’s father.  “Manzini was the last man whose works he played-the last man he ever handled bow and fiddle for.  His own words.  He left the book open when he went away, and closed it when he came back again.”  He drew the discolored note from his pocket, and stared at it with a look of tragic certainty.

“Be we all mad together?” said Fuller.  “What’s the matter with the lad, i’ the name o’ wonder?”

“I’ll explain everything, sir,” answered Reuben, like a man awakening from sleep.  “And yet I don’t know that I can.  I don’t know that I have a right to explain.  I could ask Ruth’s advice.  It’s hard to know what to do in such a case.”

“Theer’s no such thing as a straight wescut i’ the house, worse luck,” said Fuller.  “Theer is a clothesline, if that ’ud serve as well.”

“May I see Miss Ruth, sir?” asked Reuben.  “I’ll tell you all about it if I can.  But I think I have found out a very strange and mournful thing.”

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 compassion.

“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 glasses 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 God 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, passing 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 pass,” said the old man, in a voice so strangely commonplace that Reuben started at it.  “Ah!  That was how it came to pass.”  He was silent again for two or three minutes, and the clock ticked on.  “That was how it came to pass,” 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 pass.”

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 passed out at the door, feeling in the darkened little passage for his hat.

“You sha’n’t goo out wi’ nothing on your stomach,” said the servant, who had been watching and waiting to see what he would do.  Ezra, to satisfy her, poured out and drank a cup of coffee, and then walked out into the street, bending his steps in the direction of Rachel’s cottage.  Twice on the way he paused and half drew from his waistcoat-pocket the yellow old note which had so long lingered on its way to him, but each time he returned it without looking at it, and walked on again.

He stood for a moment at the wicket-gate, and then opening it passed through, suffering it to fall with a clatter behind him.  His hand trembled strangely as he lifted it to the door, and he knocked with a tremulous loudness.  When he had waited for a time he heard Rachel’s footsteps tapping on the oil-cloth of the passage which divided her toy sitting-room from her bandbox of a parlor.  His gray face went a shade grayer, and he cleared his throat nervously, with the tips of his thin fingers at his month.  He heard the rattling of the door-chain, but it seemed rather as if it were being put up than taken down, and this suspicion was confirmed when it was opened with a little jar and stopped short at the confines of the chain.  Rachel’s face looked round the edge of the door.  He had time to speak but a single word-“Rachel!”

The door was vigorously slammed in his face, and he heard the emphatic tapping of footsteps as she retired.  He stood for a minute irresolute, and then, quitting the porch, walked round the thread of gravelled foot-path which led to the back of the cottage.  He had but rounded the corner of the building when the back door closed with a clang, and he heard the bolts shot.  Next, while he still stood irresolute, he saw Rachel approach a window and vigorously apply herself to the blind cord.  In the mere instant which intervened between this and the descent of the blind she looked at him with a profound and passionate scorn.  The old man sighed, and nodding his head up and down retraced his steps, but lingering in the pathway in the little garden, and surveying the house wistfully, he was again aware of Rachel, who faced him once more with an unchanging countenance.  This time she appeared at the parlor window, and a second time the blind came down between him and her gaze of uncompromising scorn.

“Eh, dear!” he said, tremblingly, as he turned away.  “Her’s got reason to think it, poor thing.  It’s hard to find out the ways o’ Providence.  If it warn’t for good it couldn’t ha’ happened, but it’s a heavy burden all the same.”