birthplace, and bring their children into acquaintance with each other. Eben Griswold, who lived at Greenfield, was nearer home than any of the others, and Lizzy, consequently, oftener at her grandfather's house than her cousins. She and John Boynton were playmates from childhood, and it was not strange that John, who had never known a pleasure unshared by Lizzy, or suffered a pain without her consolation, should grow up in the idea that he could not possibly live without her, an idea also entertained half-consciously by Miss Lizzy, though neither of them ever yet had expressed it; for John was poor, and had no home to offer any woman, much less the petted child of a rich farmer. So Mr. Boynton, Jr., left home to teach school in Roxbury, five years before the date of our story, without making any confidences on the subject of his hopes and fears to Miss Griswold; and she knit him stockings and hemmed pocket-handkerchiefs for him with the most cold-blooded perseverance, and nobody but the yarn and the needles knew whether she dropped any tears on them or not.
Now it had always been John Boynton's custom to give his school Thanksgiving-week as a vacation,—to take the train on Monday for Greenfield, and stay there till Wednesday, when the whole family set off together for Coventry, to spend the next day, according to time-honored precedent.
Whatever John and Lizzy did in those two dull November days, it never has been made known to the present chronicler; it is only understood that no point-blank love-making went on; yet the days always ran away, instead of creeping; and neither of the twain could believe it was Wednesday when Wednesday came. But this year those forty-eight hours were destined to drag past, for John wasn't coming; why, we shall discover,—for Polly Mariner has finished the cider, and the gingerbread is as much subject of inquiry as "The Indians,—where are they?"
"So John Boynton a'n't a-comin'? Well! Hetty Maria Clapp's jest got home from Bunkertown, that's tew mile from Roxbury, 'n' she told Miss Lucas that Miss Perrit, whose sister's son keeps a grocer's store to Roxbury, told that Mr. Boynton, their teacher to the 'Cademy, was waitin' on Miss Roxany Sharp's cousin, a dreadful pretty gal, who'd come down from Boston to see Roxany, an' liked it so well she staid to Roxbury all through October. I do'no's I should ha' remembered it, only 't I hed the dredfullest jumpin' toothache that ever you did, 'n' Miss Lucas, she'd jest come in to our house, an' she run an' got the lodlum an' was a-puttin' some on't onto some cotton so's to plug the hole, while she was tellin'; 'n' I remember I forgot all about the jumpin' while 't she was talkin', so I ses, ses I, 'Miss Lucas, I guess your talkin's as good as lodlum'; 'n' she bu'st out larfin', 'n' ses she, 'Polly Mariner, I declare for't, you do beat all!' 'Well,' ses I, 'I'd die content, ef I could beat John Boynton; fur ef ever I see a feller payin' attention to a gal, he's been payin' on't to Lizzy Gris'ld this four year; and 'ta'n't no wonder 't I think hard on't, for there never was a prettier-behaved gal than her on Greenfield Hill'; an' I ses"–
Lizzy was on the point of "freeing her mind" just at this juncture, when Mrs. Griswold interposed her quiet voice,—
"Don't trouble yourself to defend Lizzy, Miss Mariner; you know John Boynton is her cousin, and he has been here a good deal. Folks will talk, I suppose, always; but if John Boynton marries well, I don't think anybody 'll be more forward to shake hands with him than our Lizzy."
"Of course I shall," said the young lady, with a most indignant toss of her head. "Pray, keep your pity, Miss Polly, for somebody else. I don't need it."
"H'm," sniffed the sagacious Polly. "Well, I didn't suppose you'd allow 't you felt put out about it; and I wouldn't, if I was you. Besides, there's as good fish in the sea as–I declare for 't! there's Mr. Gris'ld! I'll come round early to-morrer. Good-day, all on ye!"
So Polly departed.
"I don't care, if he is!" said Lizzy, flinging herself down on the settle, when the door closed behind Polly's blue cloak.
Mrs. Griswold said nothing, but Sam looked up from his whittling, and coolly remarked,—
"It looks as if you did, though!"
"Sam!" said his mother, with—emphasis.
Sam whistled, and, with his hands in his pockets, having shut his jack-knife with a click, and kicked his shavings into the fire, muttered something about feeding the pigs, and beat an ignominious retreat,—snubbed, as the race of Adam daily are, and daily will be, let us hope, for telling "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."
For Lizzy certainly did look as if she cared. A pretty enough picture she made, too, flung down on the old black settle, one well-shaped hand pinching the arm as if it had been—John Boynton's!—the other as vigorously clenched on a harmless check-apron that showed no disposition to get away; her bright red lips trembling a little, and her gray eyes suspiciously shiny about the lashes, while her soft black hair had fallen from part of its restraints on to the gay calico dress she wore, and her foot beat time to some quick step that she didn't sing!
Mrs. Griswold did not care for the picturesque, just then; she cared much more for Lizzy, and her acute feminine instinct helped her to the right word.
"I don't believe it, dear!" said she; "you'd better finish straining that squash, or Widow Peters won't have her pies for Thursday."
Lizzy went to work,—work is a grand panacea, even for sentimental troubles,—and in doing battle with the obstinate squash,—which was not as well cooked as it might have been,—Lizzy, for the moment, looked quite bright, and forgot John, till her father came in to dinner.
Somebody once said that Mrs. Griswold was "a lesser Providence," and Lizzy thought so now; for scarce were they all seated at dinner, when she remarked, in a very unconcerned and natural way,—
"What keeps John in Roxbury so long, father?"
"He has business in Boston," curtly answered Mr. Griswold.—"Sam, did you go over to the Corners, yesterday, about those sheep?"
Sam answered, and the conversation went on, but John's name did not enter it, nor did Mr. Griswold offer to show his letter either to mother or Lizzy.
Now the latter lady, not being a perfect woman, had sundry small faults; she was proud, after a certain fashion of her own; slightly sentimental, which is rather a failing than a fault; but her worst trait was a brooding, fault-seeing, persevering tact at making herself miserable, scarce ever equalled. The smallest bit of vantage-ground was enough for a start, and on that foundation Lizzy took but a few hours of suspicion and imagination to build up a whole Castle Doubting. The cause she had to-day was even greater than was necessary; it was peculiar that her father should be so reserved; it was more strange that he so perseveringly withheld John's letter; and certainly he watched Lizzy at her work with unusually tender eyes, that sometimes filled with a sort of mist. All these things heaped up evidence for the poor girl; she brooded over each separate item all night, and added to the sum Polly Mariner's gossip, and looked forward to the day when everybody in Greenfield should say, "Lizzy Griswold's had a disapp'intment of John Boynton!" Poor, dear, Lizzy! as if that were an unheard-of pang! as if nine-tenths of her accusers were not "disapp'inted" themselves,—some before, some after marriage,—some in themselves, some in their children, some in their wretched, dreary lives! But there was only one John and only one heart-break present to her vision.
Polly Mariner came to breakfast next day, and pervaded the kitchen like a daily paper. Horrible murders, barn-burnings, failures, deaths, births, marriages, separations, lawsuits, slanders, and petty larcenies outran each other in her glib speech, and her fingers flew as fast on Sam's blue jacket as her tongue clappered above it.
Lizzy's pride kept her up before the old woman; she was in and out and everywhere, a pretty spot of crimson on either fair cheek, her eyes as sparkling and her step as light as any belle's in a ballroom, and her whole manner so gay and charming that Polly inwardly pronounced John Boynton a mighty fool, if he dodged such a pretty girl as that, and one
