Now he looked about him with some unusual attention.  There was no carpet.  A set of oddly coloured chairs and settees which would have pleased Ann, a square mahogany table set on elephantine legs, completed the furnishings of a whitewashed room, where the flies, driven indoors by cool weather, buzzed on window glasses dull with dust.  The back room had only a writing-table, a small case of theological books, and two or three much used volumes of American history.  Penhallow looked around him with unusually awakened pity.  The gathered dust, the battered chairs, the spider-webs in the darker corners, would have variously annoyed and disgusted Ann Penhallow.  A well-worn Bible lay on the table, with a ragged volume of “Hiawatha” and “Bunyan’s Holy War.”  There were no other books.  This form of poverty piteously appealed to him.

“By George!” he exclaimed, “that is sad.  The man is book-poor.  Ann must have that library.  I will ask him to use mine.”  As he stood still in thought, he heard steps, and turned to meet Dr. McGregor.

“Come to see Grace, sir?” said the doctor.

“Yes, I came about a little business, but there seems to be no one in.”

“Grace is in bed and pretty sick too.”

“What is the matter?”

“Oh, had a baptism in the river—­stood too long in the water and got chilled.  It has happened before.  Come up and see him—­he’ll like it.”

The Squire hesitated and then followed the doctor.  “Who cares for him?” he asked as they moved up the stairs.

“Oh, his son.  Rather a dull lad, but not a bad fellow.  He has no servant—­cooks for himself.  Ever try it, Squire?”

“I—­often.  But what a life!”

The stout little clergyman lay on a carved four-post bedstead of old mahogany, which seemed to hint of better days.  The ragged patch-work quilt over him told too of busy woman-hands long dead.  The windows were closed, the air was sick (as McGregor said later), and there was the indescribable composite odour which only the sick chamber of poverty knows.  The boy, glad to escape, went out as they entered.

Grace sat up.  “Now,” he said cheerfully, “this is real good of you to come and see me!  Take a seat, sir.”

The chairs were what the doctor once described as non-sitable, and wabbled as they sat down.

“You are better, I see, Grace,” said the doctor.  “I fetched up the Squire for a consultation.”

“Yes, I’m near about right.”  He had none of the common feeling of the poor that he must excuse his surroundings to these richer visitors, nor any least embarrassment.  “It’s good to see some one, Mr. Penhallow.”

“I come on a pleasant errand,” said Penhallow.  “We will talk it over and then leave you to the doctor.  Mrs. Penhallow wants me to roof your church.  I came to say to you that I shall do it with pleasure.  You will lose the use of it for one Sunday at least.”

“Thank you, Squire,” said Grace simply.  “That’s real good medicine.”