“She may not die.  Doctors are very often mistaken.  They do not know much more about the secrets of life and death than the rest of us.”

“I allow that’s true; for a couple of them give me up for death, a good many years ago; and a pretty fright they give me for nothing.”

“Were you afraid to die?”

“You may be sure I was.  Its very unsartin work, is dying.”

“Mrs. Flaxman has lent me the lives of some very good people to read.  They were not afraid to die, but looked forward to it, some of them, with delight.”

“They was the pious sort, that don’t make much reckonin’ in this life, I allow.”

“I have read the lives of both kinds of people—­the good, and those who were not pious.  The former seemed to be the happiest always.”

“They say Mr. Winthrop is a great man—­writes fine works and things—­but he’s not happy.  I take more good out of Oaklands and the horses than he does.  He seems to sense the flower-gardens a good deal.  I often find him there early of a summer’s morning when I go to work, with a bit of paper and a pencil writing away for dear life; and he don’t seem to mind me any more’n if I was one of the vegetables.”

I smiled at Thomas’ comparison; for now that he mentioned it, he did seem something like an animated turnip.

“I dare say he has far higher pleasures than you or I ever experience.  His thoughts are like a rich kingdom to him.”

“He’s had some pretty bitter thoughts, I guess.  He got crossed in love once, and its sort of made him dislike wimmen folks.  Maybe you’ve noticed it yourself?” Thomas gave me a searching look.

“I did not know he ever cared for a woman in his life.  I thought he was above such things,” I murmured, too astonished to think of a proper reply.

“There’s very few men get up that high, I reckon; leastaways, I’ve never sot eyes on them.”

I turned a quizzical look on Thomas, which he understood—­his face reddened.

“I don’t claim to be one of the high kind, but I allow Oaklands is better for me than a wife.  I never sot great store by wimmen folks.  They’re sort of pernicketty cattle to manage; I’d sooner take to horses; and if one happens to die, you don’t feel so cut up like as if it was a wife.  Now there’s Dan Blake.  Marrying’s been enough sight more worryment to him than comfort.  I’ve figgured up the pros and cons close, and them that keeps single don’t age near as fast as the married ones.  There’s the widow Larkum, if she’d kept single, she’d have been young and blooming now.  Human folks is many of them very poor witted,” Thomas concluded, with fine scorn, and then he was silent.

My thoughts went off in eager surprise over that strange episode in Mr. Winthrop’s life, wondering what sort of a woman it was who had power so to mar his happiness, and why she had not responded to his love, and all the fascinating story that my sense of honor prevented me from finding out from Thomas, or Mrs. Blake, or even Mrs. Flaxman.  Now that I had quiet to think it over, it seemed like desecration to have the stolid, phlegmatic Thomas talk about it.