“Pie?  For breakfast?”

“Sartin.  Laviny Marthy, my first wife, always had a piece of pie warmed for me, and I’ve missed it since.  I don’t really care two cents for breakfast without pie.”

“Well now, Caleb, if you think I’m goin’ to get up and warm up pie every mornin’, let alone fryin’ potatoes, and—­”

“See here, Hannah!  Seems to me if I’m willin’ to turn out at that ungodly hour and then go scratchin’ around the henhouse to please you, you might be willin’ to have a piece of pie het up for me.”

“Well, maybe you’re right.  But I must say—­well, I’ll try and do it.  It’ll seem kind of hard, though, after the simple breakfasts Kenelm and I have when we’re alone.  But—­what are you stoppin’ for?”

“There seems to be a kind of crossroads here,” said Caleb, bending forward and peering out of the carryall.  “It’s so everlastin’ dark a feller can’t see nothin’.  Yes, there is crossroads, three of ’em.  Now, which one do we take?  I ain’t drove to Bayport direct for years.  When we went to the Cattle Show we went up through the Centre.  Do you know which is the right road, Hannah?”

Hannah peered forth from the blackness of the back seat.  “Now, let me think,” she said.  “Last time I went to Bayport by this road was four year ago come next February.  Sarah Snow’s daughter Becky was married to a feller named Higgins—­Solon Higgins’ son ’twas.  No, ’twa’n’t his son, because—­”

“Aw, crimus!  Who cares if ’twas his aunt’s gran’mother?  What I want to know is which road to take.”

“Well, seems to me, nigh as I can recollect, that we took the left-hand road.  No, I ain’t sure but ’twas the right-hand.  There’s a bare chance that it might have been the middle one, ’cause there was trees along both sides.  I know we was goin’ to Becky Snow’s weddin’—­”

“Trees ‘long it!  There ain’t nothin’ but trees for two square miles around these diggin’s.  Git dap, you!  I’ll take the right-hand road.  I think that’s the way.”

“Well, so do I; but, as I say, I ain’t sure.  You needn’t be so cross and unlikely, whether ’tis or ’tain’t.”

If the main road had been dark, the branch road was darker, and the branches of the trees slapped and scratched the sides of the carryall.  Caleb’s whole attention was given to his driving, and he said nothing.  Miss Parker at length broke the dismal silence.

“Caleb,” she said, “what time had we ought to get to Bayport?”

“About four o’clock, I should think.  We’ll drive ’round till about seven o’clock, and then we’ll go and get married.  I used to know the Methodist minister there, and—­”

“Methodist minister!  You ain’t goin’ to a Methodist minister to be married?”

“I sartin shouldn’t go to no one else.  I’ve been goin’ to the Methodist church for over thirty year.  You know that well’s I do.”

“I snum I never thought of it, or you wouldn’t have got me this far without settlin’ that question.  I was confirmed into the Baptist faith when I was twelve year old.  And you must have known that just as well as I knew you was a Methodist.”