“Then we won’t go to Trumet.  We’ll go to Bayport.  It’s quite a trip, but that’s all the better ’cause we won’t make Bayport till daylight.  Then we’ll hunt up a parson to marry us and come back here and tell folks when we get good and ready.  Thankful’ll miss the horse and team, I cal’late, but I’ll fix that; I’ll leave a note sayin’ I took the critter, bein’ called away on business.”

“Yes, but what will I tell Kenelm?”

“Don’t tell him anything, the foolhead.  Why, yes, you can leave a note sayin’ you’ve gone up to the village, to the store or somethin’, and that he must get his own breakfast ’cause you won’t be back till after he’s gone to work over to Thankful’s.  That’ll fix it.  By crimus!  That’ll fix it fine.  Look here, Hannah Parker; I’ve set out to do this and, by crimus, I’m goin’ to do it.  Come on now; let’s.”

Caleb was, as has been said, “sot” in his ways.  He was “sot” now, and although Hannah continued to protest and declare she could not do such a thing, she yielded at last.  Mr. Hammond left the Parker cottage in a triumphant mood.  He had won his point and that had pleased him for a time; then, as he began to ponder upon that point and its consequences his triumph changed to misgiving and doubt.  He had had no idea, until that forenoon, of marrying again.  His proposal had been made on impulse, on the spur of the moment.  He was not sure that he wished to marry Hannah Parker.  But he had pleaded and persuaded her into accepting him that very night.  Even if he wished to back out, how could he—­now?  He was conscious of an uneasy feeling that, perhaps, he had made a fool of himself.

He went to his room early in the evening and stayed there, looking at his watch and waiting for the rest of the family to retire.  He heard Georgie’s voice in the room at the end of the hall, where Mrs. Barnes was tucking the youngster in for the night.  Later he heard Imogene come up the backstairs and, after her, Thankful herself.  But it was nearly eleven before Heman Daniels’ important and dignified step sounded on the front stairs and by that time the Hammond nerves were as taut as banjo strings.

It was nearly twelve before he dared creep downstairs and out of the back door, the key of which he left in the lock.  Luckily the barn was a good distance from the house and Mrs. Barnes and Imogene were sound sleepers.  But even with those advantages he did not dare attempt getting the buggy out of the barn, and decided to use the old discarded carryall, relic of “Cap’n Abner,” which now stood under the open shed at the rear.

George Washington looked at him in sleepy wonder as he tiptoed into the barn and lit the lantern.  To be led out of his stall at “midnight’s solemn hour” and harnessed was more than George’s equine reasoning could fathom.  The harnessing was a weird and wonderful operation.  Caleb’s trembling fingers were all thumbs.  After a while, however, the harnessing was accomplished somehow and in some way, although whether the breeching was where the bridle should have been or vice versa was more than the harnesser would have dared swear.  After several centuries, as the prospective bridegroom was reckoning time, the horse was between the shafts of the carriage and driven very carefully along the road to the Parker homestead.