Green River that wants you? Is that the
reason?"
She shook her head. "I can't ever marry anybody," she said, and her
voice was suddenly quite firm. She wiped her eyes.
Francis sat down beside her. "O Lois, you do love me, after all?"
"I can't marry you," said she.
"Why not, dear?"
"I can't. You mustn't ask me why."
Francis looked down at her half laughing. "Some dreadful obstacle in
the way?"
She nodded solemnly.
Francis put his arm around her. "Oh, my dear," he said, "don't you
know obstacles go for nothing if you do like me, after all? Wait a
little and you'll find out. O Lois, are you sure you do like me? You
are so pretty."
"I can't," repeated Lois, trembling.
"Suppose this obstacle were removed, dear, you would then?"
"It never can be."
"But if it were, you would? Yes, of course you would. Then I shall
remove it, you depend upon it, I shall, dear. Lois, I liked you the
minute I saw you, and, it's terribly conceited, but I do believe you
liked me a little. Dear, if it ever can be, I'll take care of you all
my life."
The two sat there together, and the long summer afternoon passed
humming and singing with bees and birds, and breathing sweetly
through the pine branches. They themselves were as a fixed heart of
love in the midst of it, and all around them in their graves lay the
dead who had known and gone beyond it all, but nobody could tell if
they had forgotten.
Chapter X
When Lois left home that afternoon her mother had been in her bedroom
changing her dress. When she came out she had on her best black
dress, her black shawl and gloves, and her best bonnet. The three
women stared at her. She stood before them a second without speaking.
The strange look, for which Lois had watched her face, had appeared.
"Why, what is the matter, Mis' Field?" cried Mrs. Babcock. "Where be
you going?"
"I'm goin' out a little ways," replied Mrs. Field. Then she raised
her voice suddenly. "I've got something to say to all of you before I
go," said she. "I've been deceivin' you, and everybody here in
Elliot. When I came down here, they all took me for my sister, Esther
Maxwell, and I let them think so. They've all called me Esther
Maxwell here. That's how I got the money. Old Mr. Maxwell left it to
Flora Maxwell if my sister didn't outlive him. I shouldn't have had a
cent. I stole it. I thought my daughter would die if we didn't have
it an' get away from Green River; but that wa'n't any
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