“You poor thing!” said Aunt Ollie, “I’ll do anything in the world to help you.  If ever you need me, just call on me.  I’ll go start him back in a hurry.”

He came every night, but Kate steadily refused, until she felt able to sit up in a chair, to see him, or his mother when she came to see the babies.  She had recovered rapidly, was over the painful part of nursing the babies, and had a long talk with Aunt Ollie, before she consented to see George.  At times she thought she never could see him again; at others, she realized her helplessness.  She had her babies to nurse for a year; there was nothing she could think of she knew to do, that she could do, and take proper care of two children.  She was tied “hand and foot,” as Aunt Ollie said.  And yet it was Aunt Ollie who solved her problem for her.  Sitting beside the bed one day she said to Kate:  “My dear, do you know that I’m having a mighty good time?  I guess I was lonesomer than I thought out there all alone so much, and the work was nigh to breaking me during the long, cold winter.  I got a big notion to propose somepin’ to you that might be a comfort to all of us.”

“Propose away,” said Kate.  “I’m at my wit’s end.”

“Well, what would you think of you and George taking the land, working it on the shares, and letting me have this room, an’ live in Walden, awhile?”

Kate sat straight up in bed:  “Oh, Aunt Ollie!  Would you?” she cried.  “Would you?  That would be a mercy to me; it would give George every chance to go straight, if there is a straight impulse in him.”

“Yes, I will,” said Aunt Ollie, “and you needn’t feel that I am getting the little end of the bargain, either.  The only unpleasant thing about it will be my sister, and I’ll undertake to manage her.  I read a lot, an’ I can always come to see you when mortal sperrits will bear her no more.  She’ll be no such trial to me, as she is to you.”

“You’re an angel,” said Kate.  “You’ve given me hope where I had not a glimmer.  If I have George out there alone, away from his mother, I can bring out all the good there is in him, and we can get some results out of life, or I can assure myself that it is impossible, so that I can quit with a clear conscience.  I do thank you.”

“All right, then, I’ll go out and begin packing my things, and see about moving this afternoon.  I’ll leave my stoves, and beds, and tables, and chairs for you; you can use your wedding things, and be downright comfortable.  I’ll like living in town a spell real well.”

So once more Kate saw hope a beckoning star in the distance, and ruffled the wings of the spirit preparatory to another flight:  only a short, humble flight this time, close earth; but still as full of promise as life seemed to hold in any direction for her.  She greeted George casually, and as if nothing had happened, when she was ready to see him.

“You’re at the place where words are not of the slightest use to me,” she said.  “I’m giving you one, and a final chance to act.  This seems all that is open to us.  Go to work like a man, and we will see what we can make of our last chance.”