It was commodious and well-appointed, with a pleasant outlook by daylight. In the dawn that struggled in a low-spirited way through the rifts in the rain and refused to blend with the yellow blink of her candle and Homer’s lantern, no chamber could be less than dismal. Homer was on his knees in front of the flickering fire, at which he stared as if doggedly determined to put it out of countenance. “Now”—his way of beginning nine out of every ten sentences—“this ere’s a new pattern of a range to me, an’ it’s tuk me some time fur ter git holt on it. Most new things comes awk’ard to most folks.” Hetty blew out her candle, and, dropping into a chair in physical and mental languor, sat watching the grotesque figure clearing away ashes and cinders. His wrestle with the new pattern had begrimed his pale face and reddened his weak eyes. His matutinal costume of a dim blue flannel shirt, gray trousers, and a black silk skull cap cast off by Mr. Wayt, pushed well back upon the nape of the neck and revealing a scanty uneven fringe of whitey-brown hair, did not provoke the spectator to a smile. “There is no bringing _him_ up to the tone of that study!” she meditated grimly. “He and I are hopeless drudges, but he is the happier of the two. Homer! I believe you really _love_ to work!” she broke forth finally. Homer snickered—a sudden spurt that left him very sober. His laugh always went out like a damp match. “Yes’m, cert’nly, ma’am! Ef ’twant fur work, there wouldn’t be nuthin’ to live fur!” He shambled off to the cellar with the ashpan, and in a few minutes, she could distinguish in the sounds rumbling and smothering in the depths beneath her feet the melancholy tune of his favorite ditty: “On the banks of the Omaha—maha! ’Twas there we settled many a night. As happy as the little bird that sparkled on our block On the banks of the Omaha!” Hetty raised the window and leaned out, gasping for breath. A garden lay behind the house and on one side of it. It was laid out in walks and borders, and was rather broad than deep. Beyond this were undefined clumps of trees that looked like an orchard. Roofs and chimneys and spires and lines of other trees, marking the course of streets, were emerging from the soaking mists. Five o’clock struck from a tower not far away, and then a church bell began to ring gently—a persuasive call to early prayers. The warm, sweet, wet air that aroused her to look over the sill at a row of hyacinths in full bloom, the slow peal of the bell, the hush of the early morning, did not comfort her—but the soft moisture that filled her eyes drew heat and bitterness out of her heart. When she went up to awaken Hester she carried a spray of hyacinth bells, weighted with fragrant drops. Fine gems of rain sprinkled her hair, her cheeks were cool and damp, the scent of fresh earth and growing things clung to her skirts. She laid the flowers playfully against the heavy lids lifted peevishly at her call.