Major Appleby Cartwright stood not upon the order of his going, but went at once, galloping as if a company of those Yankees with whom he had once fought were upon his hindquarters with fixed bayonets.

However, they being next-door neighbors and friends of a lifetime’s standing, peace was finally patched up.  In Appleboro we do not mention this historic meeting when either of the participants can hear us, though it is one of our classics and no home is complete without it.  The Major ever afterward eschewed Artillery Punch.

This morning, over the fence, Miss Sally Ruth addressed our invalid directly and without prelude, after her wont.  She doesn’t believe in beating about the bush: 

“The wages of walking up and down the earth and going to and fro in it, tramping like Satan, is a lost leg.  Not that it wasn’t intended you should lose yours—­and I hope and pray it will be a lesson to you.”

“Well, take it from me,” he said grimly, “there’s nobody but me collecting my wages.”

A quick approval of this plain truth showed in Miss Sally Ruth’s snapping eyes.

“Come!” said she, briskly.  “If you’ve got sense enough to see that, you’re not so far away from the truth as you might be.  Collecting your wages is the good and the bad thing about life, I reckon.  But everything’s intended, so you don’t need to be too sorry for yourself, any way you look at it.  And you could just as well have lost both legs while you were at it, you know.”  She paused reflectively.  “Let’s see:  I’ve got chicken-broth and fresh rolls to-day—­I’ll send you over some, after awhile.”  She nodded, and went back to her housework.

Laurence went on to High School, Madame had her house to oversee, I had many overdue calls; so we left Pitache and John Flint together, out in the birdhaunted, sweet-scented, sun-dappled garden, in the golden morning hours.  No one can be quite heartless in a green garden, quite hopeless in the spring, or quite desolate when there’s a dog’s friendly nose to be thrust into one’s hand.

I am afraid that at first he missed all this; for he could think of nothing but himself and that which had befallen him, coming upon him as a bolt from the blue.  He had had, heretofore, nothing but his body—­and now his body had betrayed him!  It had become, not the splendid engine which obeyed his slightest wish, but a drag upon him.  Realizing this acutely, untrained, undisciplined, he was savagely sullen, impenetrably morose.  He tired of Laurence’s reading—­I think the boy’s free quickness of movement, his well-knit, handsome body, the fact that he could run and jump as pleased him, irked and chafed the man new and unused to his own physical infirmity.

He seemed to want none of us; I have seen him savagely repulse the dog, who, shocked and outraged at this exhibition of depravity, withdrew, casting backward glances of horrified and indignant reproach.