give her. I mean to see that she has it."

Mrs. Keith looked disgusted. "You're perfectly infatuated with that
girl, John Keith," she said. "It is ridiculous. If I were like some
women I should be jealous."

"If I were like some men you might be. Now, Gertrude, you'll buy in
future from Hamilton and Company, won't you?"

"I suppose so. When your chin sets that way I know you're going to be
stubborn and I may as well give in first as last. I'll patronize your
precious Mary-'Gusta, but I WON'T associate with her. You needn't ask
that."

"Don't you think we might wait until she asks it first?"

"Tut! tut! Really, John, you disgust me. I wonder you don't order Sam to
marry her."

"From what Clara writes he might not have needed any orders if he had
received the least encouragement from her. Sam might do worse; I imagine
he probably will."

So, because John Keith's chin was set, the Keith custom shifted
to Hamilton and Company. And because the Keiths were wealthy and
influential, and because the head of the family saw that that influence
was brought to bear upon his neighbors and acquaintances, their custom
followed. Hamilton and Company put a delivery wagon--a secondhand
one--out on the road, and hired a distinctly secondhand boy to drive it.
And Mary and Shadrach and Zoeth and, in the evenings, the boy as well,
were kept busy waiting on customers. The books showed, since the silent
partner took hold, a real and tangible profit, and the collection and
payment of old debts went steadily on.

The partners, Shadrach and Zoeth, were no longer silent and glum. The
Captain whistled and sang and was in high spirits most of the time. At
home he was his old self, chaffing Isaiah about the housekeeping, taking
a mischievous delight in shocking his friend and partner by irreverent
remarks concerning Jonah or some other Old Testament personage, and
occasionally, although not often, throwing out a sly hint to Mary about
the frequency of letters from the West. Mary had told her uncles
of Crawford's leaving Boston and returning to Nevada because of his
father's ill health. The only item of importance she had omitted to tell
was that of the proposal of marriage. She could not speak of that even
to them. They would ask what her answer was to be, and if she loved
Crawford. How could she answer that--truthfully--without causing them to
feel that they were blocking her way to happiness? They felt that quite
keenly enough, as it was.