Caleb set it before him, but he did not begin to eat.  He looked at Rebecca’s empty place, then at his wife’s face, long and pale and full of stern rancor, behind the sugar-bowl and the cream-pitcher.

“Rebecca got home?” he ventured, with wary eyes upon her.

“Yes, she’s got home.”

Caleb winked, meekly.  “Ain’t she comin’ to supper?”

“I dunno whether she is or not.”

“Does she know it’s ready?” Deborah vouchsafed no reply.  She poured out the tea.

Caleb grated his chair suddenly.  “I’ll jest speak to her,” he proclaimed, courageously.

“She knows it’s ready.  You set still,” said Deborah.  And Caleb drew his chair close again, and loaded his knife with toast, bringing it around to his mouth with a dexterous sidewise motion.

“She ain’t sick, is she?” he said, presently, with a casual air.

“No, I guess she ain’t sick.”

“I s’pose she eat so many cherries she didn’t want any supper,” Caleb said, chuckling anxiously.  His wife made no reply.  Ephraim reached over slyly for the toast-spoon, and she pushed his hand back.

“You can’t have any more,” said she.

“Can’t I have jest a little more, mother?”

“No, you can’t.”

“I feel faint at my stomach, mother.”

“You can keep on feelin’ faint.”

“Can’t I have a piece of pie, mother?”

“You can’t have another mouthful of anything to eat to-night.”

Ephraim clapped his hand to his side again and sighed, but his mother took no notice.

“Have you got a pain, sonny?” asked Caleb.

“Yes, dreadful.  Oh!”

“Hadn’t he ought to have somethin’ on it?” Caleb inquired, looking appealingly at Deborah.

“He can have some of his doctor’s medicine if he don’t feel better,” she replied, in a hard voice.  “Set your chair back now, Ephraim, and get out your catechism.”

“I don’t feel fit to, mother,” groaned Ephraim.

“You do jest as I tell you,” said his mother.

And Ephraim, heaving with sighs, muttering angrily far under his breath lest his mother should hear, pulled his chair back to the window, and got his catechism out of the top drawer of his father’s desk, and began droning out in his weak, sulky voice the first question therein:  “What is the chief end of man?”

“Now shut the book and answer it,” said his mother, and Ephraim obeyed.

Ephraim was quite conversant with the first three questions and their answers, after that his memory began to weaken; either he was a naturally dull scholar, or his native indolence made him appear so.  He had been drilled nightly upon the “Assembly’s Catechism” for the past five years, and had had many a hard bout with it before that in his very infancy, when his general health admitted—­and sometimes, it seemed to Ephraim, when it had not admitted.