第37章 XV(2)

Mrs. Boynton's eyes searched the face of this visitor from a world she had almost forgotten and finding nothing but tenderness there, said with just a trace of bewilderment: "Thank you yes, do sit down; my workbasket is just inside the door. Take that rocking-chair; I don't have another one out here because I have never been in the habit of seeing visitors."

"I hope I am not intruding," stammered Waitstill, seating herself and beginning her knitting, to see if it would lessen the sense of strain between them.

"Not at all. I always loved young and beautiful people, and so did my husband. If he comes while you are here, do not go away, but sit with him while I get his supper. If Elder Cochrane should be with him, you would see two wonderful men. They went away together to do some missionary work in Maine and New Hampshire and perhaps they will come back together. I do not welcome callers because they always ask so many difficult questions, but you are different and have asked me none at all."

"I should not think of asking questions, Mrs. Boynton."

"Not that I should mind answering them," continued Ivory's mother, "except that it tires my head very much to think. You must not imagine I am ill; it is only that I have a very bad memory, and when people ask me to remember something, or to give an answer quickly, it confuses me the more. Even now I have forgotten why you came, and where you live; but I have not forgotten your beautiful name."

"Ivory thought you might be lonely, and I wanted so much to know you that I could not keep away any longer, for I am lonely and unhappy too. I am always watching and hoping for what has never come yet. I have no mother, you have lost your daughter; I t hought--I thought--perhaps we could be a comfort to each other!"

And Waitstill rose from her chair and put out her hand to help Mrs. Boynton down the steps, she looked so frail, so transparent, so prematurely aged. "I could not come very often--but if I could only smooth your hair sometimes when your head aches, or do some cooking for you, or read to you, or any little thing like that, as I would fer my own mother--if I could, I should be so glad!"

Waitstill stood a head higher than Ivory's mother and the glowing health of her, the steadiness of her voice, the warmth of her hand-clasp must have made her seem like a strong refuge to this storm-tossed derelict. The deep furrow between Lois Boynton's eyes relaxed a trifle, the blood in her veins ran a little more swiftly under the touch of the young hand that held hers so closely. Suddenly a light came into her face and her lip quivered.

"Perhaps I have been remembering wrong all these years," she said. "It is my great trouble, remembering wrong. Perhaps my baby did not die as I thought; perhaps she lived and grew up; perhaps" (her pale cheek burned and her eyes shone like stars) "perhaps she has come back!"

Waitstill could not speak; she put her arm round the trembling figure, holding her as she was wont to hold Patty, and with the same protective instinct. The embrace was electric in its effect and set altogether new currents of emotion in circulation.