Chapter XXXV

The next day, in the afternoon, when Eperson had alighted from the train, he met his sister waiting for him in the buggy. "I got your message," she said, as he hurriedly approached her, brushing the dust of travel from his hat, "and here I am. What can I do to help poor Tilly?"

"Come with me to her," he said, sadly. "It may give me an opportunity to see her alone. I have already heard what was done at court, but I have even worse news for her."

He hurriedly explained as they drove along. He had met Cavanaugh and the astounded contractor had told him of John and Dora's secret departure. The old man had wept as he said that John had taken himself away as an obstacle to his wife's happiness, and that he evidently intended to disappear completely and forever. As Cavanaugh saw it, John had taken Dora with him to rescue the child from a fate similar to his own, which was a grand and noble thing to do, "especially," the contractor had added with a gulp, "when the poor boy was already loaded down with troubles of his own."

"It will break Tilly's heart--it may kill her!" Martha Jane declared, with strong emotion. "Poor thing!"

Just before reaching Whaley's Joel said: "I may not get a good chance to see Tilly alone, and in that case we'd better not keep her in suspense. Perhaps, after all, you could tell her even better than I."

Martha Jane nodded. "Poor Joel!" she murmured. "I see. You haven't the heart to tell her. Well, I will do it for you."

The elder Whaleys sat on the veranda. Tilly was not in sight. "I'll stay here in the buggy. You go in," Joel said. "They will let you talk to her alone. They always do."

Martha Jane got down to the ground between the parted wheels of the buggy and went into the yard.

"Where is Tilly, Mrs. Whaley?" she asked.

"Up in her room," Mrs. Whaley said. "Will you go up, or wait down here?"

"I'll run up, I guess," the visitor answered, with assumed lightness. "Joel, wait for me. I'll be down soon."

"Won't you come in, Joel?" Mrs. Whaley asked.

"No, I thank you, Mrs. Whaley," he said. "I'll watch my horse out here."

He remained seated in the buggy, slightly bending forward. A horse-fly was teasing the shuddering back of his horse, and he deftly flicked at it with his whip till he had knocked it away. A man in a field across the road was gathering yellow pumpkins and loading them into a cart. Joel himself had several acres of pumpkins ready for harvesting, and ordinarily he would have been interested in the quantity and quality of this farmer's product, but there were graver things on his mind now. Surely Martha Jane was staying a long time up-stairs. Had she put it delicately enough? Had she omitted to mention the fact of Trott's taking the child away with him? Joel had intended emphasizing that, for it was a thing any wife would be proud to hear of the man she had married. The time dragged even more slowly now. Old Whaley left his seat, walked around to the well, drew up a bucket of water, and drank from the bucket itself, tilting it forward with both his hands. Then Mrs. Whaley went into the house. Presently Martha Jane came down the stairs and out into the yard.

"Good-by, Mrs. Whaley," she called out. "I must be going now."

"Good-by, Martha Jane!" from within the house. "Come again when you find the time."

"I will, thank you, Mrs. Whaley. You must come out to see mother. She never gets into town, and you mustn't count visits with her."

There was a response to this which Joel did not hear, for he was studying his sister's face as he stood ready to help her into the buggy.

"Well?" he said, as they started to drive on. "What did you do?"

"Oh, don't ask me--don't ask me!" Martha Jane's eyes were filling, her lips twitching. "Oh, Joel, it was awful--simply awful! I'm glad you did not try to tell her. She stood tottering pitifully and looking as white as a dead person. I thought she was going to faint, and would have called her mother if she hadn't stopped me. It seemed to take away all the hope she had left. She sees it exactly as Mr. Cavanaugh does--that her husband intends to disappear for good and all. She thinks it was for her sake, too. She said so. She declared she did not blame him at all, and when I told her about that child she said she understood that, too, and knew he did it for the little girl's good--that the child was facing a terrible future."

"Well, well, is that all?" Joel inquired, huskily.

"I left her seated at a window," Martha Jane continued. "I tried to get her to promise to be calm and hopeful, but all the old strength and energy seemed to have left her. I'm afraid, very much afraid, that she will never get over it. She has borne a lot already and this shock is the last straw."

A strap which held the breeching around the buttocks of the horse and fastened it to the shafts had broken, and Joel got down to fix it. The buckle-hole had torn out of the rotten leather, and he had to punch another with his pocket-knife.

"Poor Joel!" Martha Jane thought, as she sat and watched him. "People needn't tell me that men can't be constant. He'd love Tilly if she were to wipe her feet on him. He'd love her if she refused him a dozen times for other men. He'd go any length right now to give her back her husband. I wonder what there is about her that men care so much for. I'm sure I don't know, unless it is because she is so patient and gentle and plucky."

The harness was fixed. Joel got back into the buggy and drove on to the Square. "I was going to stop and get some things," Martha Jane said, "but I won't. I'm coming in to see Tilly to-morrow. I'm about the only one that goes to see her now. You knew, didn't you, that some of these narrow-minded women and girls are pretending to believe simply awful things about her?"

"What sort of things?" Eperson asked, waxing indignant.

"Why, you know--they say that Mr. Trott took her to his mother's house and introduced her to the worst sort of folks. There isn't a word of truth in it. Tilly has not yet even met the woman. Tilly and he had a cottage all to themselves. She told me that herself."

Joel groaned angrily. "I'm not surprised at anything the people around here would say and believe," he said, his lips drawn tight, his eyes holding fierce fires that were bursting into flames.

"Joel," Martha Jane said, as they were nearing their home, "you must take yourself in hand. This is showing on you. Tilly's marriage was bad enough, but this is hurting you even more."

"Oh, don't bother about me!" he cried, testily. "I'm a man and can stand anything. But you must look after her. Do you understand? You must come in to-morrow early and stay all day. She will need somebody besides that sour-faced, crabbed old pair that is with her. They will kill her or drive her insane."

"I'll do it--you may depend on me, brother," Martha Jane promised, as he helped her from the buggy at the gate.