“Charles Sanford,” she began, “do you mean to say you walked, and do you know what time it is?”

“Yes, Martha,” he answered, meekly, “it is very late, but I could not help it, and I insisted upon walking rather than have the tired, sleeping boy come out in the cold.  I needed the exercise.  I am not cold.”

“But you have taken cold.  You needn’t tell me, and I’ve got the water ready for a foot-bath, and some hot boneset tea.  How did you leave Mr. Jerrold? and did he take the sacrament at last?” she said, and he replied: 

“No, he did not; he—­”

But before he could say more she burst out with growing irritability: 

“Not take it!  Why then did he send for you on such a night, and why did you stay so long?”

She was pouring the boiling water into the foot-tub, in which she had put a preparation of mustard and prickly ash and red pepper, which she kept on hand for extreme cases like this, and the odor of the steam made him sick and faint, as, grasping the mantel, he replied: 

“He wished me to pray with him; he will not live till morning.  Please don’t talk to me any more.  I am more tired than I thought, and something makes me very sick.”

He was as white as ashes, and with all her better, softer nature roused, for Martha was at heart a very good woman, she helped him to a chair, and bathed his head in alcohol, and rubbed his hands, and did not question him again.  But she made him swallow the herb tea, and she kept on talking herself, wondering what Hannah would do after her father was gone.  Would she stay there alone, or live with her brother?  Most likely the former, as Mrs. Jerrold would never have her in her family, and really, one could not blame her, Hannah was so peculiar and queer.  Pity was that she had never married; an old maid was always in the way.

And then Mrs. Martha, as if bent on torturing her husband, to whom every word was a stab, wondered if any man ever had wanted Hannah Jerrold for his wife, and asked her husband if he had ever heard of any such thing.

“I should not be likely to know it,” he replied, “for until you came, I never heard any gossip.”

There was an implied rebuke in this answer, and it silenced Mrs. Martha, who said no more of Hannah, but as soon as possible got her lord to bed, with a soapstone at his feet and a blanket wrapped around him, in order to make him sweat and break up the cold she was certain he had taken.

Meanwhile at the farm-house Burton and his sister were standing together near the kitchen fire, where poor Grey had stood two hours before, and heard what changed the coloring of his whole life.  They were speaking of him, and what they said was this: 

“If it were only myself I might bear it,” Burton said, “though life can never be to me again what it has been, and I shall think like Cain that the sin is branded on me; and I was so proud, and stood so high, and meant to make the name of Jerrold so honorable a name that Grey and his children would rejoice that they bore it.  Of course Grey will never know, but I shall, and that will make a difference.  Hannah,” he added, quickly, struck by something in her face, “what did you mean, or rather what did father mean by your making restitution to the peddler’s friends?  What is there to restore?”