“Didn’t he go away from here before nine o’clock?” demanded Deborah, addressing Charlotte at last.

“Yes, he did, some time before nine; he had plenty of time to go home if he wanted to.”

“Where was he, then, I’d like to know?”

“I don’t know, and I wouldn’t lift my finger to find out.  I am not afraid he was anywhere he hadn’t ought to be, nor doin’ anything he hadn’t ought to.”

“Didn’t you stand out in the road and call him back, and he wouldn’t come, nor even turn his head to look at you?” asked Deborah.

“Yes, I did,” returned Charlotte, unflinchingly.  “And I don’t blame him for not coming back and not turning his head.  I wouldn’t if I’d been in his place.”

“You’ll have to uphold him a long time, then; I can tell you that,” said Deborah.  “He won’t never come back if he’s said he won’t.  I know him; he’s got some of me in him.”

“I’ll uphold him as long as I live,” said Charlotte.

“I wonder you ain’t ashamed to talk so.”

“I am not.”

Deborah looked at Charlotte as if she would crush her; then she turned away.

“You’re a hard woman, Mrs. Thayer, and I pity Barney because he’s got you for a mother,” Charlotte said, in undaunted response to Deborah’s look.

“Well, you’ll never have to pity yourself on that account,” retorted Deborah, without turning her head.

The door opened softly, and a girl of about Charlotte’s age slipped in.  Nobody except Mrs. Barnard, who said, absently, “How do you do, Rose?” seemed to notice her.  She sat down unobtrusively in a chair near the door and waited.  Her blue eyes upon the others were so intense with excitement that they seemed to blot out the rest of her face.  She had her blue apron tightly rolled about both hands.

Deborah Thayer, on her way to the door, looked at her as if she had been a part of the wall, but suddenly she stopped and cast a glance at Cephas.  “What be you makin’?” she asked, with a kind of scorn at him, and scorn at her own curiosity.

Cephas did not reply, but he looked ugly as he slapped another piece of dough heavily upon a plate.

Deborah, as if against her will, moved closer to the table and bent over the pan of sorrel.  She smelled of it; then she took a leaf and tasted it, cautiously.  She made a wry face.  “It’s sorrel,” said she.  “You’re makin’ pies out of sorrel.  A man makin’ pies out of sorrel!”

She looked at Cephas like a condemning judge.  He shot a fiery glance at her, but said nothing.  He sprinkled the sorrel leaves in the pie.

“Well,” said Deborah, “I’ve got a sense of justice, and if my son, or any other man, has asked a girl to marry him, and she’s got her weddin’ clothes ready, I believe in his doin’ his duty, if he can be made to; but I must say if it wa’n’t for that, I’d rather he’d gone into a family that was more like other folks.  I’m goin’ to do the best I can, whether you go half way or not.  I’m goin’ to try to make my son do his duty.  I don’t expect he will, but I shall do all I can, tempers or no tempers, and sorrel pies or no sorrel pies.”